Ecclesiastes 12:4 (ASV)

Passage

and the doors shall be shut in the street; when the sound of the grinding is low, and one shall rise up at the voice of a bird, and all the daughters of music shall be brought low;

Nearby Context

Ecclesiastes 12:2 before the sun, and the light, and the moon, and the stars, are darkened, and the clouds return after the rain;

Ecclesiastes 12:3 in the day when the keepers of the house shall tremble, and the strong men shall bow themselves, and the grinders cease because they are few, and those that look out of the windows shall be darkened,

Ecclesiastes 12:4 and the doors shall be shut in the street; when the sound of the grinding is low, and one shall rise up at the voice of a bird, and all the daughters of music shall be brought low;

Ecclesiastes 12:5 yea, they shall be afraid of [that which is] high, and terrors [shall be] in the way; and the almond-tree shall blossom, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail; because man goeth to his everlasting home, and the mourners go about the streets:

Ecclesiastes 12:6 before the silver cord is loosed, or the golden bowl is broken, or the pitcher is broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern,

Study Lenses

The verse centers on "doors", "shall", "shut", "street", "sound", "grinding", and "rise". It is saying that the verse draws attention to "doors" and "shall", so its meaning should be read from those terms before moving to application.

The nearby context moves from verse 3's "in the day when the keepers of..." into verse 5's "yea they shall be afraid of that...", so "doors" and "shall" belong inside that flow. In Ecclesiastes context, the local focus is covenant, worship, and faithfulness.

A plain takeaway is to answer the verse's own emphasis on "doors" and "shall" with trust shaped by these words, not by a vague optimism outside the passage.