Joel 2:18

The Lord’s Response

2:18 Then the Lord became ¹  zealous for his land;

he had compassion on his people.

Joel 2:10

2:10 The earth quakes ²  before them; ³ 

the sky reverberates. ⁴ 

The sun and the moon grow dark;

the stars refuse to shine. ⁵ 

Joel 2:30

2:30 I will produce portents both in the sky ⁶  and on the earth –

blood, fire, and columns of smoke.

Joel 1:2

A Locust Plague Foreshadows the Day of the Lord

1:2 Listen to this, you elders; ⁷ 

pay attention, ⁸  all inhabitants of the land.

Has anything like this ever happened in your whole life ⁹ 

or in the lifetime ¹⁰  of your ancestors? ¹¹ 

Joel 1:6

1:6 For a nation ¹²  has invaded ¹³  our ¹⁴  land.

There are so many of them they are too numerous to count. ¹⁵ 

Their teeth are like those ¹⁶  of a lion;

they tear apart their prey like a lioness. ¹⁷ 

Joel 1:14

1:14 Announce a holy fast; ¹⁸ 

proclaim a sacred assembly.

Gather the elders and ¹⁹  all the inhabitants of the land

to the temple of the Lord your God,

and cry out to the Lord.

Joel 2:1

The Locusts’ Devastation

2:1 Blow the trumpet ²⁰  in Zion;

sound the alarm signal on my holy mountain!

Let all the inhabitants of the land shake with fear,

for the day of the Lord is about to come.

Indeed, ²¹  it is near! ²² 

Joel 2:3

2:3 Like fire they devour everything in their path; ²³ 

a flame blazes behind them.

The land looks like the Garden of Eden ²⁴  before them,

but behind them there is only a desolate wilderness –

for nothing escapes them! ²⁵ 

Joel 3:16

3:16 The Lord roars from Zion;

from Jerusalem ²⁶  his voice bellows out. ²⁷ 

The heavens ²⁸  and the earth shake.

But the Lord is a refuge for his people;

he is a stronghold for the citizens ²⁹  of Israel.

Joel 3:19

3:19 Egypt will be desolate

and Edom will be a desolate wilderness,

because of the violence they did to the people of Judah, ³⁰ 

in whose land they shed innocent blood.

Joel 2:20

2:20 I will remove the one from the north ³¹  far from you.

I will drive him out to a dry and desolate place.

Those in front will be driven eastward into the Dead Sea, ³² 

and those in back westward into the Mediterranean Sea. ³³ 

His stench will rise up as a foul smell.” ³⁴ 

Indeed, the Lord ³⁵  has accomplished great things.

Joel 3:2

3:2 Then I will gather all the nations,

and bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat. ³⁶ 

I will enter into judgment ³⁷  against them there

concerning my people Israel who are my inheritance, ³⁸ 

whom they scattered among the nations.

They partitioned my land,

[2:18]  ¹ tn The time-frame entertained by the verbs of v.18 constitutes a crux interpretum in this chapter. The Hebrew verb forms used here are preterites with vav consecutive and are most naturally understood as describing a past situation. However, some modern English versions render these verbs as futures (e.g., NIV, NASV), apparently concluding that the context requires a future reference. According to Joüon 2:363 §112.h, n.1 Ibn Ezra explained the verbs of Joel 2:18 as an extension of the so-called prophetic perfect; as such, a future fulfillment was described with a past tense as a rhetorical device lending certainty to the fulfillment. But this lacks adequate precedent and is very unlikely from a syntactical standpoint. It seems better to take the verbs in the normal past sense of the preterite. This would require a vantage point for the prophet at some time after the people had responded favorably to the Lord’s call for repentance and after the Lord had shown compassion and forgiveness toward his people, but before the full realization of God’s promises to restore productivity to the land. In other words, it appears from the verbs of vv. 18-19 that at the time of Joel’s writing this book the events of successive waves of locust invasion and conditions of drought had almost run their course and the people had now begun to turn to the Lord.

[2:10]  ² sn Witnesses of locust invasions have described the visual effect of large numbers of these creatures crawling over one another on the ground. At such times the ground is said to appear to be in motion, creating a dizzying effect on some observers. The reference in v. 10 to the darkening of the sun and moon probably has to do with the obscuring of visibility due to large numbers of locusts swarming in the sky.

[2:10]  ³ tn Heb “before it.”

[2:10]  ⁴ tn Heb “trembles.”

[2:10]  ⁵ tn Heb “gather their brightness.”

[2:30]  ³ tn Or “in the heavens.” The Hebrew term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) may be translated “heavens” or “sky” depending on the context.

[1:2]  ⁴ sn Elders here refers not necessarily to men advanced in years, but to leaders within the community.

[1:2]  ⁵ tn Heb “give ear.”

[1:2]  ⁶ tn Heb “days.” The term “days” functions here as a synecdoche for one’s lifespan.

[1:2]  ⁷ tn Heb “days.”

[1:2]  ⁸ tn Heb “fathers.”

[1:6]  ⁵ sn As becomes increasingly clear in what follows, this nation is to be understood figuratively. It refers to the locust invasion as viewed from the standpoint of its methodical, destructive advance across the land (BDB 156 s.v. גּוֹי 2). This term is used figuratively to refer to animals one other time (Zeph 2:14).

[1:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “has come up against.”

[1:6]  ⁷ tn Heb “my.”

[1:6]  ⁸ tn Heb “[It] is huge and there is not number.”

[1:6]  ⁹ tn Heb “its teeth are the teeth of a lion.”

[1:6]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “its incisors are those of a lioness.” The sharp, cutting teeth are metonymical for the action of tearing apart and eating prey. The language is clearly hyperbolic. Neither locusts nor human invaders literally have teeth of this size. The prophet is using exaggerated and picturesque language to portray in vivid terms the enormity of the calamity. English versions vary greatly on the specifics: KJV “cheek teeth”; ASV “jaw-teeth”; NAB “molars”; NASB, NIV, NRSV “fangs.”

[1:14]  ⁶ tn Heb “consecrate a fast” (so NASB).

[1:14]  ⁷ tc The conjunction “and” does not appear in MT or LXX, but does appear in some Qumran texts (4QXII^c and 4QXII^g).

[2:1]  ⁷ tn The word translated “trumpet” here (so most English versions) is the Hebrew שׁוֹפָר (shofar). The shophar was a wind instrument made from a cow or ram’s horn and used as a military instrument for calling people to attention in the face of danger or as a religious instrument for calling people to occasions of communal celebration.

[2:1]  ⁸ tn Or “for.”

[2:1]  ⁹ sn The interpretation of 2:1-11 is very difficult. Four views may be mentioned here. (1) Some commentators understand this section to be describing a human invasion of Judah on the part of an ancient army. The exact identity of this army (e.g., Assyrian or Babylonian) varies among interpreters depending upon issues of dating for the book of Joel. (2) Some commentators take the section to describe an eschatological scene in which the army according to some is human, or according to others is nonhuman (i.e., angelic). (3) Some interpreters argue for taking the section to refer to the potential advent in the fall season of a severe east wind (i.e., Sirocco) that would further exacerbate the conditions of the land described in chapter one. (4) Finally, some interpreters understand the section to continue the discussion of locust invasion and drought described in chapter one, partly on the basis that there is no clear exegetical evidence in 2:1-11 to suggest a shift of referent from that of chapter one.

[2:3]  ⁸ tn Heb “a fire devours before it.”

[2:3]  ⁹ tn Heb “like the garden of Eden, the land is before them.”

[2:3]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “and surely a survivor there is not for it.” The antecedent of the pronoun “it” is apparently עַם (’am, “people”) of v. 2, which seems to be a figurative way of referring to the locusts. K&D 26:191-92 thought that the antecedent of this pronoun was “land,” but the masculine gender of the pronoun does not support this.

[3:16]  ⁹ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[3:16]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “he sounds forth his voice.”

[3:16]  ¹¹ tn Or “the sky.” See the note on “sky” in 2:30.

[3:16]  ¹² tn Heb “sons.”

[3:19]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “violence of the sons of Judah.” The phrase “of the sons of Judah” is an objective genitive (cf. KJV “the violence against the children of Judah”; NAB, NIV, NRSV “violence done to the people of Judah”). It refers to injustices committed against the Judeans, not violence that the Judeans themselves had committed against others.

[2:20]  ¹¹ sn The allusion to the one from the north is best understood as having locusts in view. It is not correct to say that this reference to the enemy who came form the north excludes the possibility of a reference to locusts and must be understood as human armies. Although locust plagues usually approached Palestine from the east or southeast, the severe plague of 1915, for example, came from the northeast.

[2:20]  ¹² tn Heb “his face to the eastern sea.” In this context the eastern sea is probably the Dead Sea.

[2:20]  ¹³ tn Heb “and his rear to the western sea.” The western sea refers to the Mediterranean Sea.

[2:20]  ¹⁴ sn Heb “and his foul smell will ascend.” The foul smell probably refers to the unpleasant odor of decayed masses of dead locusts. The Hebrew word for “foul smell” is found only here in the Old Testament. The Hebrew word for “stench” appears only here and in Isa 34:3 and Amos 4:10. In the latter references it refers to the stench of dead corpses on a field of battle.

[2:20]  ¹⁵ tn The Hebrew text does not have “the Lord.” Two interpretations are possible. This clause may refer to the enemy described in the immediately preceding verses, in which case it would have a negative sense: “he has acted in a high-handed manner.” Or it may refer to the Lord, in which case it would have a positive sense: “the Lord has acted in a marvelous manner.” This is clearly the sense of the same expression in v. 21, where in fact “the Lord” appears as the subject of the verb. It seems best to understand the clause the same way in both verses.

[3:2]  ¹² sn There is a play on words here. Jehoshaphat in Hebrew means “the Lord has judged,” and the next line in v. 2 further explicates this thought. The location of this valley is uncertain (cf. v. 12). Many interpreters have understood the Valley of Jehoshaphat to be the Kidron Valley, located on the east side of old Jerusalem. Since this is described as a scene of future messianic activity and judgment, many Jews and Muslims have desired to be buried in the vicinity, a fact attested to in modern times by the presence of many graves in the area. A variation of this view is mentioned by Eusebius, Onomasticon 1:10. According to this view, the Valley of Jehoshaphat is located in the Hinnom Valley, on the south side of the old city. Yet another view is held by many modern scholars, who understand the reference to this valley to be one of an idealized and nonliteral scene of judgment.

[3:2]  ¹³ tn Heb “I will execute judgment.”

[3:2]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “concerning my people and my inheritance Israel.”