The Hebrew noun yegiah (יְגִיעָה) denotes weariness or the state of exhaustion from labor. It is the abstract noun form of the root yaga (H3021), and appears in Ecclesiastes 12:12: 'Of making many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness (yegiah) of the flesh.' The word captures the felt experience of depletion that comes from sustained effort.
Ecclesiastes 12:12 is part of the book's concluding wisdom: human intellectual striving, like all human effort under the sun, produces weariness. The Teacher's conclusion is not despair but redirection: 'Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man' (Ecclesiastes 12:13). In this framing, yegiah is the felt limit of human capacity — the signal that pushes us back to God as the source of all wisdom and renewal. Jesus' invitation — 'Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest' (Matthew 11:28) — is the New Testament answer to the weariness (yegiah) Ecclesiastes names.