Joel

Joel 2

32 verses · Minor Prophets · Old Testament

1Blow the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain! Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of Yahweh comes, for it is close at hand: 2A day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness. As the dawn spreading on the mountains, a great and strong people; there has never been the like, neither will there be any more after them, even to the years of many generations. 3A fire devours before them, and behind them, a flame burns. The land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them, a desolate wilderness. Yes, and no one has escaped them. 4Their appearance is as the appearance of horses, and they run as horsemen. 5Like the noise of chariots on the tops of the mountains, they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire that devours the stubble, like a strong people set in battle array. 6At their presence the peoples are in anguish. All faces have grown pale. 7They run like mighty men. They climb the wall like warriors. They each march in his line, and they don’t swerve off course. 8Neither does one jostle another; they march everyone in his path, and they burst through the defenses, and don’t break ranks. 9They rush on the city. They run on the wall. They climb up into the houses. They enter in at the windows like thieves. 10The earth quakes before them. The heavens tremble. The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining. 11Yahweh thunders his voice before his army; for his forces are very great; for he is strong who obeys his command; for the day of Yahweh is great and very awesome, and who can endure it? 12“Yet even now,” says Yahweh, “turn to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning.” 13Tear your heart, and not your garments, and turn to Yahweh, your God; for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, and relents from sending calamity. 14Who knows? He may turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him, even a meal offering and a drink offering to Yahweh, your God. 15Blow the trumpet in Zion! Sanctify a fast. Call a solemn assembly. 16Gather the people. Sanctify the assembly. Assemble the elders. Gather the children, and those who nurse from breasts. Let the bridegroom go out of his room, and the bride out of her room. 17Let the priests, the ministers of Yahweh, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, “Spare your people, Yahweh, and don’t give your heritage to reproach, that the nations should rule over them. Why should they say among the peoples, ‘Where is their God?’ ” 18Then Yahweh was jealous for his land, And had pity on his people. 19Yahweh answered his people, “Behold, I will send you grain, new wine, and oil, and you will be satisfied with them; and I will no more make you a reproach among the nations. 20But I will remove the northern army far away from you, and will drive it into a barren and desolate land, its front into the eastern sea, and its back into the western sea; and its stench will come up, and its bad smell will rise.” Surely he has done great things. 21Land, don’t be afraid. Be glad and rejoice, for Yahweh has done great things. 22Don’t be afraid, you animals of the field; for the pastures of the wilderness spring up, for the tree bears its fruit. The fig tree and the vine yield their strength.
23“Be glad then, you children of Zion, and rejoice in Yahweh, your God; for he gives you the early rain in just measure, and he causes the rain to come down for you, the early rain and the latter rain, as before. 24The threshing floors will be full of wheat, and the vats will overflow with new wine and oil. 25I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the great locust, the grasshopper, and the caterpillar, my great army, which I sent among you. 26You will have plenty to eat, and be satisfied, and will praise the name of Yahweh, your God, who has dealt wondrously with you; and my people will never again be disappointed. 27You will know that I am among Israel, and that I am Yahweh, your God, and there is no one else; and my people will never again be disappointed.
28“It will happen afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh; and your sons and your daughters will prophesy. Your old men will dream dreams. Your young men will see visions. 29And also on the servants and on the handmaids in those days, I will pour out my Spirit. 30I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth: blood, fire, and pillars of smoke. 31The sun will be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of Yahweh comes. 32It will happen that whoever will call on Yahweh’s name shall be saved; for in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be those who escape, as Yahweh has said, and among the remnant, those whom Yahweh calls.

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What others are saying

4 commentators · 81 notes on this chapter

Matthew HenryEnglish Puritan / Nonconformist · 1708–17144

Writes as a pastor rather than a critic. Expect devotional and practical application over historical or linguistic analysis, read through a Reformed covenantal frame — and expect the Old Testament to be read forward toward Christ throughout.

Why this voice is here: The most widely read English commentary for three centuries. Included as a baseline: where Henry and a modern voice diverge, the divergence itself is usually the interesting part.

v. 1–11

Here we have God contending with his own professing people for their sins and executing upon them the judgment written in the law (Deu 28:42), The fruit of thy land shall the locust consume, which was one of those diseases of Egypt that God would bring upon…

v. 12–17

We have here an earnest exhortation to repentance, inferred from that desolating judgment described and threatened in the foregoing verses: Therefore now turn you to the Lord. 1. "Thus you must answer the end and intention of the judgment; for it was sent for…

v. 18–27

See how ready God is to succour and relieve his people, how he waits to be gracious; as soon as ever they humble themselves under this hand, and pray, and seek his face, he immediately meets them with his favours. They prayed that God would spare them, and…

John GillParticular Baptist / High Calvinist · 1746–176332

The most exhaustive and the most doctrinally committed here. Expect high — even supralapsarian — Calvinism applied consistently, and unusually heavy use of rabbinic and Talmudic sources for Jewish context. Where a passage bears on election or the will, Gill will read it in one direction, and knowing that in advance is the point.

Why this voice is here: The strongest Calvinist reading available in the public domain, and the best on Jewish background. Read alongside Clarke, not instead of him — between them you get both sides of the argument.

v. 1

Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain,.... This is spoken to the priests, whose business it was to blow the trumpets for calling solemn assemblies to meet in Zion, the temple built there, called from thence the holy mountain of…

v. 2

A day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of clouds and of thick darkness,.... Alluding to the gloomy and thick darkness caused by the locusts, which sometimes come in prodigious numbers, like thick clouds, and darken the air; so the land of Egypt was…

v. 3

A fire devoureth before them, and behind them aflame burneth,.... This is not to be understood of the heat of the sun, or of the great drought that went before and continued after the locusts; but of them themselves, which were like a consuming fire; wherever…

Keil & DelitzschGerman Lutheran, conservative-critical · 1861–187515

The technical one, and Old Testament only. Expect Hebrew grammar, textual argument, and direct engagement with nineteenth-century critical scholarship — closer to a scholarly apparatus than a devotional read. Where a modern critic claims a text is late or composite, this is where the conservative counter-argument was made.

Why this voice is here: Old Testament only, and heavy going — but the place to look when someone asserts a passage cannot mean what it appears to.

v. 1

By blowing the far-sounding horn, the priests are to make known to the people the coming of the judgment, and to gather them together in the temple to pray. Joe 2:1. "Blow ye the trumpet upon Zion, and cause it to sound upon my holy mountain! All the…

v. 2–3

"A day of darkness and obscurity, a day of clouds and cloudy night: like morning dawn spread over the mountains, a people great and strong: there has not been the like from all eternity, nor will there be after it even to the years of generation and…

v. 4–6

In Joe 2:4-6 we have a description of this mighty army of God, and of the alarm caused by its appearance among all nations. Joe 2:4. "Like the appearance of horses is its appearance; and like riding-horses, so do they run. Joe 2:5. Like rumbling of chariots…

Jamieson, Fausset & BrownScottish Presbyterian / Reformed · 187130

The concise option. Three authors split the canon, so the voice shifts between sections. Expect brief, sober, conservative notes that resolve difficulties rather than dwelling on them — useful for orientation, thinner than Gill or Clarke where a passage is genuinely contested.

Why this voice is here: The quickest way to see what the mainstream Reformed reading of a passage is. Start here, then go to Gill or Clarke when it matters.

v. 2

darkness . . . gloominess . . . clouds . . . thick darkness--accumulation of synonyms, to intensify the picture of calamity (Isa 8:22). Appropriate here, as the swarms of locusts intercepting the sunlight suggested darkness as a fit image of the coming…

v. 3

before . . . behind--that is, on every side (Ch1 19:10). fire . . . flame--destruction . . . desolation (Isa 10:17). as . . . Eden . . . wilderness--conversely (Isa 51:3; Eze 36:35).

v. 4

appearance . . . of horses-- (Rev 9:7). Not literal, but figurative locusts. The fifth trumpet, or first woe, in the parallel passage (Rev 9:1-11), cannot be literal: for in Rev 9:11 it is said, "they had a king over them, the angel of the bottomless pit"--in…

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