Joel 1:1–12

1:1 The Lord spoke to prophets in different ways. Some prophets declare that God spoke to them in visions (Isa. 1:1; Ezek. 1:1; Amos 1:1), others directly (Hos. 1:1; Jonah 1:1; Mic. 1:1; Zeph. 1:1; Zech. 1:1). Joel belongs to the latter camp, but in both cases the prophets are clear that they are not the initiators of a message of their own making. They are mediators of God’s word.

Little is known about Joel. He simply gives his own name (meaning “Yahweh is God”) and that of his father, Pethuel (cf. Introduction). He does not mention where he is from or even the location of his ministry. From the context later in the book, however, it is clear his ministry is to the southern kingdom of Judah, with Jerusalem as his main focus.

1:2–3 The first message of Joel is a call to hear the Lord’s word. The verb translated “hear” means more than just to “listen,” carrying the implication of to “listen and act” (the same word is translated as “obey” in Deut. 4:30; Josh. 1:17; Ps. 103:20). Those addressed are “the elders,” which may denote simply the older men in the Judean community or possibly those who held responsibility as chosen representatives. The second clause in the verse commands, “give ear,” a synonym for “hear,” and the message is for “all the inhabitants of the land.” Clearly the Lord’s word was meant for the entire community of Judah.

The message itself is prefaced by two questions and a command. The questions focus the attention of the people on their present calamity by asking if anything similar to this has ever happened in their time or in any time in the past (“in the days of your fathers”). The command is to tell successive generations about the devastation caused by the locust plague. It is so severe that recollection of it should serve as a warning against turning from the Lord.

1:4 The invasion of locusts, which in this prophetic foretelling has been going on for some considerable time (cf. 2:25, “the years that the swarming locust has eaten”), is described in poetic terms, with a parallelism reinforcing the message. The poetry can be set out like this, using transliteration of the Hebrew terms:

What the gazam left, the ʼarbeh has eaten;

what the ʼarbeh has left, the yeleq has eaten;

what the yeleq has left, the hasil has eaten.

In translation this becomes:

What the cutting locust left, the swarming locust has eaten;

what the swarming locust left, the hopping locust has eaten;

what the hopping locust left, the destroying locust has eaten.

The rarity of these four words in Hebrew makes it impossible to give a precise identification of each.⁴ While many in the past have allegorized this passage, the indications are that it is referring to an actual locust invasion of Palestine (cf. Introduction: Interpretive Challenges). These are well documented from the past history of the region; in particular, invasion by locusts in plague proportions in Palestine in 1865 and 1915 showed how the region could be devastated by them. God the Creator was using his control of nature to bring judgment on Judah in the form of insect plagues. Just as he used invading nations to express his displeasure with his people, so also he used natural phenomenon to do so (cf. the signs and wonders at the time of the exodus recorded in Ex. 7:14–12:30, or God’s threats of using fire as his judgment against the nations in Amos 1:1–2:16).

1:5–7 The people of Judah are first described as “drunkards” (v. 5). They are called upon to weep and wail because their source of drink is gone (“it is cut off from your mouth”). This is because of the “nation” of locusts coming upon what the Lord calls “my land.” While Israel and Judah often thought of the land of Canaan as theirs, in reality it was God’s land; they were merely its caretakers. The Lord is depicted as allowing innumerable attackers to come against it, with teeth like lions devouring everything in their path—the grape vines are devastated, and the fig trees have lost their bark. The message is clear: God will send his messengers of judgment, and the pleasures of life, such as wine and figs, will be taken away.

1:8 The next message begins with a call to lament like a “virgin wearing sackcloth.” Sackcloth was a form of dark clothing worn during times of mourning (cf. Gen. 37:34; Isa. 22:12; Amos 8:10); in this case, the mourning is for the “bridegroom of her youth.” Once a bride was betrothed, she was regarded as legally having a husband. This scene pictures the death of said husband, leaving the betrothed virgin without the protection and support that marriage entailed. The picture displays the intensity of grief that the nation ought to exhibit.

1:9 The result of the locust plague is insufficient produce to offer even the normal grain and drink offerings. The Hebrew word for “grain offering” (minkhah) was the general term for an offering, but it also bore the specialized meaning of “grain offering.” It was normally offered daily alongside a “drink offering” (nesek), and hence the combination found here is common in the OT (cf. Ex. 29:40–41; Lev. 23:13; Num. 15:1–10). During famine, these prescribed offerings (Lev. 23:13) could not be made at the “house of the LORD.” The word “house” was applied not only to domestic dwellings in the Near East but also to temples (cf. “house of Dagon”; 1 Sam. 5:5). It could be used also of the tabernacle (Ex. 23:19) and later was used, as here, to refer to the temple in Jerusalem.

Since grain offerings were normally consumed by the priests (cf. Lev. 6:14–18), it is not surprising that the priests are described as mourning their loss of sustenance, although doubtless they were also distressed because their priestly role was largely inactive (cf. Joel 1:13, 16). The term “minister” is virtually a synonym for “priest” in contexts such as these; those who had the special status of priesthood, the Levites, could be designated also as ministers.

1:10 The state of the countryside is described. So desolate are the fields that they are pictured, in a personified way, as mourning. Indeed, this description uses the same verb used of the priests in the previous verse. This verse simply continues the description of the desolation that has come over the land; grain, wine, and oil are all unavailable because of the devastation.

1:11 Those who labor at tilling the soil or tending the vineyard have nothing to show for their toil. They planted crops of wheat and barley, but they have no harvest of which to boast. Farmers would have suffered dearly at the hands of such a locust pestilence, demonstrating the life-and-death nature of the threat.

1:12 The verb translated “dries up” (hobishah) includes the same consonants as the verb at the beginning of verse 11 (“be ashamed”; hobishu). Both vine and fig tree will fail, depriving the community of food from these sources. The verse concludes by noting that the dryness of the land has as its counterpart the drying up of gladness among the people.