Komentarz do Koheleta 10:15

The labor of the fools exhausts them. Their foolishness causes them labor,²⁸Fools busy themselves to understand profound and mysterious matters, when they lack comprehension of even simple matters. They are compared to those who wish to enter a city but do not know the way. They stumble and grow weary without achieving their goal. (Ibn Ezra) which wearies them, because they did not learn the ways of the approaches to the city, and he becomes weary by entering by way of pits and marshes, and he is wearied by his feet sinking into the mire; i.e., the laziness of those who abandon the Torah causes them wearying labor in Gehinnom.

“The toil of the fools will exhaust him, as he will not know to go to a city” (Ecclesiastes 10:15).
“The toil of the fools will exhaust him” – this is a student who stagnates in his study; “as he will not know to go to a city” – should he not have gone to his teacher to restore his learning to him?
Another matter: “The toil of the fools will exhaust him” – this is Yiftaḥ; “as he will not know to go to a city” – should he not have gone to Pinḥas so he would annul his vow for him?⁶⁹Yiftaḥ had vowed that the first item that would exit his house to meet him upon his return home would be a sacrifice to God. When he returned home, his daughter was first to exit his house, and because of the vow, she lived out her life in solitude (see Judges 11:30–40). However, Yiftaḥ said: ‘I am the chief and commander of Israel; shall I go to Pinḥas?’ Pinḥas said: ‘I am a High Priest, son of a High Priest; shall I go to an ignoramus?’ Between the two of them that unfortunate one was lost, and the two of them are liable for her blood. Yiftaḥ’s limbs were severed one after another and buried, as it is written: “He was buried in the cities of Gilad” (Judges 12:7). In how many places was he buried that you say: “He was buried in the cities of Gilad”? Rather, it teaches that his limbs were severed one after another, and each one was buried in its place. What did Pinḥas lose? The Divine Spirit left him for two hundred years, as it is not written, “he was chief over them,” but it is written: “Pinḥas ben Elazar had been chief over them; in the past the Lord was with him” (I Chronicles 9:20).⁷⁰The Lord had been with him in the past, but was not with him in the present.

For he does not know the way. To the path of truth, to part from transgression,²⁹Alternatively, this phrase refers to an ignorant person who does not go to the city and learn from its wise people. (Targum) because he did not study Torah, as it is stated, “Your word is a lamp for my feet.”³⁰Tehillim 119:105.