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1. An Invasion of Locusts

¹ The word of the LORD that came to Joel son of Pethuel.

An Invasion of Locusts

    ² Hear this, you elders;
   listen, all who live in the land.
Has anything like this ever happened in your days
   or in the days of your ancestors?
³ Tell it to your children,
   and let your children tell it to their children,
   and their children to the next generation.
⁴ What the locust swarm has left
   the great locusts have eaten;
what the great locusts have left
   the young locusts have eaten;
what the young locusts have left
   other locusts The precise meaning of the four Hebrew words used here for locusts is uncertain. have eaten.

    ⁵ Wake up, you drunkards, and weep!
   Wail, all you drinkers of wine;
wail because of the new wine,
   for it has been snatched from your lips.
⁶ A nation has invaded my land,
   a mighty army without number;
it has the teeth of a lion,
   the fangs of a lioness.
⁷ It has laid waste my vines
   and ruined my fig trees.
It has stripped off their bark
   and thrown it away,
   leaving their branches white.

    ⁸ Mourn like a virgin in sackcloth
   grieving for the betrothed of her youth.
⁹ Grain offerings and drink offerings
   are cut off from the house of the LORD.
The priests are in mourning,
   those who minister before the LORD.
¹⁰ The fields are ruined,
   the ground is dried up;
the grain is destroyed,
   the new wine is dried up,
   the olive oil fails.

    ¹¹ Despair, you farmers,
   wail, you vine growers;
grieve for the wheat and the barley,
   because the harvest of the field is destroyed.
¹² The vine is dried up
   and the fig tree is withered;
the pomegranate, the palm and the apple Or possibly apricot tree—
   all the trees of the field—are dried up.
Surely the people’s joy
   is withered away.

A Call to Lamentation

    ¹³ Put on sackcloth, you priests, and mourn;
   wail, you who minister before the altar.
Come, spend the night in sackcloth,
   you who minister before my God;
for the grain offerings and drink offerings
   are withheld from the house of your God.
¹⁴ Declare a holy fast;
   call a sacred assembly.
Summon the elders
   and all who live in the land
to the house of the LORD your God,
   and cry out to the LORD.

    ¹⁵ Alas for that day!
   For the day of the LORD is near;
   it will come like destruction from the Almighty. Hebrew Shaddai

    ¹⁶ Has not the food been cut off
   before our very eyes—
joy and gladness
   from the house of our God?
¹⁷ The seeds are shriveled
   beneath the clods. The meaning of the Hebrew for this word is uncertain.
The storehouses are in ruins,
   the granaries have been broken down,
   for the grain has dried up.
¹⁸ How the cattle moan!
   The herds mill about
because they have no pasture;
   even the flocks of sheep are suffering.

    ¹⁹ To you, LORD, I call,
   for fire has devoured the pastures in the wilderness
   and flames have burned up all the trees of the field.
²⁰ Even the wild animals pant for you;
   the streams of water have dried up
   and fire has devoured the pastures in the wilderness.

The Prophet says nothing new here, but only strengthens what he had said before, and is not wordy without reason; for he intends here not merely to teach, but also to produce an effect: And this is the design of heavenly teaching; for God not only wishes that what he says may be understood, but intends also to penetrate into our hearts: and the word of God, we know, consists not of doctrine only, but also of exhortations, and threatenings, and reproofs. This plan then the Prophet now pursues: Ye husband men, he says, be ashamed, and ye vinedressers, howl; for perished has the harvest of the field. The sum of the whole is, that the Jews, as we have already said, could by no excuse cover their indifference; for their clamor was everywhere heard, their complaints everywhere resounded, that the land had become a waste, that they were themselves famished that they were afflicted with many calamities; and yet no one acknowledged that God, who visited them for their sins, was the author. But what remains I shall put off until to-morrow.