Charles Ellicott Commentary 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 12:2 (ASV)

Here the style rises, and we have a figurative description of the evil days; but, as sometimes happens in the case of highly wrought poetry, it is much easier to perceive the general effect intended than to account for all the words that produce it. English readers generally have been deeply impressed by Ecclesiastes 12:6-7, understanding them in a general way as speaking of the dissolution of the noble structure of the bodily frame; and they scarcely gain anything by the efforts of commentators to explain to them what exactly is meant by the silver cord and the golden bowl. After using all the help my predecessors have given me, I frankly admit I am unable to give more than a vague account of the figures employed in this whole passage.

Darkened. —See Ecclesiastes 11:8. On darkness of the heavens as a symbol of calamity, compare Isaiah 13:10-11; Jeremiah 4:28–29; Ezekiel 32:7–9; Joel 2:1–10; Amos 8:9–10; and contrast Isaiah 30:26; Isaiah 60:10.