Psalms 39:6

Surely people go through life as mere ghosts. ¹  Surely they accumulate worthless wealth without knowing who will eventually haul it away.” ² 

Man is a mere phantom as he goes to and fro: He bustles about, but only in vain; he heaps up wealth, not knowing who will get it.

"Surely every man walks about as a phantom; Surely they make an uproar for nothing; He amasses riches and does not know who will gather them.

We are merely moving shadows, and all our busy rushing ends in nothing. We heap up wealth for someone else to spend.

Oh! we're all puffs of air. Oh! we're all shadows in a campfire. Oh! we're just spit in the wind. We make our pile, and then we leave it.

Truly, every man goes on his way like an image; he is troubled for no purpose: he makes a great store of wealth, and has no knowledge of who will get it.

Surely everyone goes about like a shadow. Surely for nothing they are in turmoil; they heap up, and do not know who will gather.

Surely every man walks about like a shadow; Surely they busy themselves in vain; He heaps up riches , And does not know who will gather them.

Surely people go through life as mere ghosts. ¹  Surely they accumulate worthless wealth without knowing who will eventually haul it away.” ² 

¹ tn Heb “surely, as an image man walks about.” The preposition prefixed to “image” indicates identity here.

sn People go through life (Heb “man walks about”). “Walking” is here used as a metaphor for living. The point is that human beings are here today, gone tomorrow. They have no lasting substance and are comparable to mere images or ghosts.

² tc Heb “Surely [in] vain they strive, he accumulates and does not know who gathers them.” The MT as it stands is syntactically awkward. The verb forms switch from singular (“walks about”) to plural (“they strive”) and then back to singular (“accumulates and does not know”), even though the subject (generic “man”) remains the same. Furthermore there is no object for the verb “accumulates” and no plural antecedent for the plural pronoun (“them”) attached to “gathers.” These problems can be removed if one emends the text from הֶבֶל יֶהֱמָיוּן (hevel yehemaun, “[in] vain they strive”) to הֶבְלֵי הָמוֹן (hevley hamon, “vain things of wealth”). This assumes a misdivision in the MT and a virtual dittography of vav (ו) between the mem and nun of המון. The present translation follows this emendation.