2 Hear this, ye aged ones, And give ear, all ye inhabitants of the land, Hath this been in your days? Or in the days of your fathers?
`Hear this, O priests, and attend, O house of Israel, And, O house of the king, give ear, For the judgment `is' for you, For, a snare ye have been on Mizpah, And a net spread out on Tabor.
A day of darkness and thick darkness, A day of cloud and thick darkness, As darkness spread on the mountains, A people numerous and mighty, Like it there hath not been from of old, And after it there is not again -- till the years of generation and generation.
Wo! for great `is' that day, without any like it, Yea, a time of adversity it `is' to Jacob, Yet out of it he is saved.
He who is having an ear -- let him hear what the Spirit saith to the assemblies: To him who is overcoming -- I will give to him to eat of the tree of life that is in the midst of the paradise of God.
for there shall be then great tribulation, such as was not from the beginning of the world till now, no, nor may be.
And I say, `Hear, I pray you, heads of Jacob, And ye judges of the house of Israel, Is it not for you to know the judgment?
Hear, O peoples, all of them! Attend, O earth, and its fulness, And the Lord Jehovah is against you for a witness, The Lord from His holy temple.
`For, ask, I pray thee, at the former days which have been before thee, from the day that God prepared man on the earth, and from the `one' end of the heavens even unto the `other' end of the heavens, whether there hath been as this great thing -- or hath been heard like it? Hath a people heard the voice of God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as thou hast heard, thou -- and doth live? Or hath God tried to go in to take to Himself, a nation from the midst of a nation, by trials, by signs, and by wonders, and by war, and by a strong hand, and by a stretched-out arm, and by great terrors -- according to all that Jehovah your God hath done to you, in Egypt, before your eyes? Thou, thou hast been shewn `it', to know that Jehovah He `is' God; there is none else besides Him.
Hear ye this word that Jehovah hath spoken concerning you, O sons of Israel, concerning all the family that I brought up from the land of Egypt, saying:
`Hear a word of Jehovah, sons of Israel, For a strife `is' to Jehovah with inhabitants of the land, For there is no truth, nor kindness, Nor knowledge of God, in the land,
`And at that time stand up doth Michael, the great head, who is standing up for the sons of thy people, and there hath been a time of distress, such as hath not been since there hath been a nation till that time, and at that time do thy people escape, every one who is found written in the book.
Come near, ye nations, to hear, And ye peoples, give attention, Hear doth the earth and its fulness, The world, and all its productions.
Jehovah bringeth on thee, and on thy people, And on the house of thy father, Days that have not come, Even from the day of the turning aside of Ephraim from Judah, By the king of Asshur.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Joel 1
Commentary on Joel 1 Matthew Henry Commentary
An Exposition, With Practical Observations, of
The Book of the Prophet Joel
Chapter 1
This chapter is the description of a lamentable devastation made of the country of Judah by locusts and caterpillars. Some think that the prophet speaks of it as a thing to come and gives warning of it beforehand, as usually the prophets did of judgments coming. Others think that it was now present, and that his business was to affect the people with it and awaken them by it to repentance.
Joe 1:1-7
It is a foolish fancy which some of the Jews have, that this Joel the prophet was the same with that Joel who was the son of Samuel (1 Sa. 8:2); yet one of their rabbin very gravely undertakes to show why Samuel is here called Pethuel. This Joel was long after that. He here speaks of a sad and sore judgment which was now brought, or to be brought, upon Judah, for their sins. Observe,
Joe 1:8-13
The judgment is here described as very lamentable, and such as all sorts of people should share in; it shall not only rob the drunkards of their pleasure (if that were the worst of it, it might be the better borne), but it shall deprive others of their necessary subsistence, who are therefore called to lament (v. 8), as a virgin laments the death of her lover to whom she was espoused, but not completely married, yet so that he was in effect her husband, or as a young woman lately married, from whom the husband of her youth, her young husband, or the husband to whom she was married when she was young, is suddenly taken away by death. Between a new-married couple that are young, that married for love, and that are every way amiable and agreeable to each other, there is great fondness, and consequently great grief if either be taken away. Such lamentation shall there be for the loss of their corn and wine. Note, The more we are wedded to our creature-comforts that harder it is to part with them. See that parallel place, Isa. 32:10-12. Two sorts of people are here brought in, as concerned to lament this devastation, countrymen and clergymen.
Joe 1:14-20
We have observed abundance of tears shed for the destruction of the fruits of the earth by the locusts; now here we have those tears turned into the right channel, that of repentance and humiliation before God. The judgment was very heavy, and here they are directed to own the hand of God in it, his mighty hand, and to humble themselves under it. Here is,