John Gill Commentary Ecclesiastes 4:5

"The fool foldeth his hands together, and eateth his own flesh." — Ecclesiastes 4:5 (ASV)

The fool foldeth his hands together. In order to get more sleep, or as unwilling to work; so the Targum adds, "he folds his hands in summer, and will not labour;" see (Proverbs 6:10) .

Some persons, to escape the envy which diligence and industry bring on men, will not work at all, or do any right work, and think to sleep in a whole skin; this is great folly and madness indeed.

and eateth his own flesh. Such a man is starved and famished for want of food, so that his flesh is wasted away; or he is so hungry bitten, that he is ready to eat his own flesh; or he hereby brings to ruin his family, his wife, and children, which are his own flesh, (Isaiah 58:7) .

The Targum is, "in winter he eats all he has, even the covering of the skin of his flesh."

Some understand this of the envious man, who is a fool, traduces the diligent and industrious, and will not work himself; and not only whose idleness brings want and poverty on him as an armed man, but whose envy eats up his spirit, and is rottenness in his bones, (Proverbs 6:11) (14:30) .

Jarchi, out of a book of theirs called Siphri, interprets this of a wicked man in hell, when he sees the righteous in glory, and he himself judged and condemned.