Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Joel 1:6
For a nation is come up upon my land, strong, and without number, whose teeth [are] the teeth of a lion, and he hath the cheek teeth of a great lion.
6 7. By what agency this devastation has been wrought: an army of depredators has invaded Judah, countless in numbers and well equipped for their work; and vine and fig-tree have been left by them bare.
a nation ] cf. for the figure Pro 30:24-26: also Homer’s expression , , &c. ( Il. 2:87, 469, &c.).
is come up upon (or against)] the phrase used of an invading army (e.g. 2Ki 18:13).
my land ] the prophet speaks in the name of the people. So Joe 1:7 ; Joe 1:13 ; Joe 1:19 and frequently (cf. the writer’s Introduction, p. 366 f.).
strong ] Cf. Joe 2:2; Joe 2:5; Joe 2:11. The term is used often of a powerful and numerous nation (e.g. Deu 26:5, Isa 60:22, Mic 4:7). The reference is partly to the strength of limb possessed by the locust, enabling it for instance to take long flights and to persevere incessantly in its work of destruction, partly to the irresistible numbers in which swarms of locusts are apt to invade a country.
without number ] a characteristic of locust-swarms, often alluded to in the O.T.: Psa 105:34 (“and the yle without number”); and in comparisons Jdg 6:5; Jdg 7:12, Jer 46:23 (all of the arbeh), Jer 51:14; Jer 51:27 (of the yle). Modern travellers speak often of the literally incalculable numbers in which locusts come. Thus an observer in South Africa writes, “For the space of 10 miles on each side of the Sea-Cow river, and 80 90 miles in breadth, an area of 16 1800 square miles, the whole surface might literally be said to be covered with them: the water of the river was scarcely visible on account of the dead carcases which floated on the surface, drowned in the attempt to come at the weeds which grew in it.” Again, in Cyprus, “the locusts lay swarming above a foot deep in several parts of the high road, and thousands were destroyed by the wheels of the carriage driving over them.” A writer in Nature (1889, p. 153) states “that a flight of locusts that passed over the Red Sea in Nov. 1889, was 2000 square miles in extent,” and upon the assumption that it was 48 miles square, half a mile deep, and contained 144 locusts, each weighing 16 oz., to a cubic foot, he calculated that it contained 24,420 billions of insects, and weighed 42,850 millions of tons. “A second similar, perhaps even larger flight, was seen passing in the same direction the next day. In Cyprus in 1881, up to the end of October, 1,600,000,000 egg-cases bad that season been collected and destroyed, each case containing a considerable number of eggs. By the end of the season over 1300 tons of eggs had been collected; and yet not less than 5,076,000,000 egg-cases were, it is believed, deposited in the island two years afterwards” ( Cambridge Nat. Hist. v. 292).
his teeth, &c.] the locust’s teeth are edged like a saw, and very powerful; hence, though infinitely smaller, they may for destructiveness be compared to those of a lion. Cp. Rev 9:8.
the cheek-teeth ] or jaw teeth (R.V.), i.e. the sharp and prominent eye-teeth of the animal. The word is the same which is found in Job 29:17 and Pro 30:14; and (with two letters transposed) in Psa 58:6 (also of the lion: R.V. “great teeth”): it possibly signifies (from the Arabic) the projectors.
of a great lion ] of a lioness. Hebrew has several distinct terms, all denoting generally the lion, but, unfortunately, seldom distinguishable in English except by the use of separate epithets. The ordinary word for lion is that used in the former clause of the present verse ( aryh, also r ), that used here ( lbh’) is the lioness, Num 23:24, Deu 33:20 al., but only in poetry; another ( kphr) is the young lion (Isa 31:4, and frequently); other poetical words are layish, only Isa 30:6, Job 4:11, Pro 30:30; and shaal, properly the roarer, Hos 5:14; Hos 13:7, Job 4:10; Job 10:16; Job 28:8, Pro 26:13, Psa 91:13. Gr (or gr) is a lion’s whelp, Gen 49:9 al. In poetry, the synonyms for lion appear often, as they do here, in the parallel clauses of a verse: see esp. Job 4:10-11.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
For a nation is come up upon my land – He calls this scourge of God a nation, giving them the title most used in Holy Scripture, of pagan nations. The like term, people, folk, is used of the ants and the conies Pro 30:25-26, for the wisdom with which God teaches them to act. Here it is used, in order to include at once, the irrational invader, guided by a Reason above its own, and the pagan conqueror. This enemy, he says, is come up (for the land as being Gods land, was exalted in dignity, above other lands,) upon My land, i. e. the Lords land Hos 9:3, hitherto owned protected as Gods land, a land which, Moses said to them, the Lord thy God careth for; the eyes of the Lord thy God are always upon it, from the beginning of the year even unto the end of the year Deu 11:12. Now it was to be bared of Gods protection, and to be trampled upon by a pagan foe.
Strong and without number – The figure is still from the locust, whose numbers are wholly countless by man. Travelers sometimes use likenesses to express their number, as clouds darkening the sun (see the note at Joe 2:10) or discharging flakes of snow ; some grave writers give it up, as hopeless. : Their multitude is incredible, whereby they cover the earth and fill the air; they take away the brightness of the sun. I say again, the thing is incredible to one who has not seen them. It would not be a thing to be believed, if one had not seen it. On another day, it was beyond belief: they occupied a space of eight leagues (about 24 English miles). I do not mention the multitude of those without wings, because it is incredible. : When we were in the Seignory of Abrigima, in a place called Aquate, there came such a multitude of locusts, as cannot be said. They began to arrive one day about terce (nine) and until night they cease not to arrive; and when they arrived, they bestowed themselves. On the next day at the hour of prime they began to depart, and at mid-day there was not one, and there remained not a leaf on the trees. At this instant others began to come, and staved like the others to the next day at the same hour; and these left not a stick with its bark, nor a green herb, and thus did they five days one after another; and the people said that they were the sons, who went to seek their fathers, and they took the road toward the others which had no wings. After they were gone, we knew the breadth which they had occupied, and saw the destruction which they had made, it exceeded three leagues (nine miles) wherein there remained no bark on the trees.
Another writes of South Africa ; Of the innumerable multitudes of the incomplete insect or larva of the locusts, which at this time infested this part of Africa, no adequate idea could be conceived without having witnessed them. For the space of ten miles on each side of the Sea-Cow river, and eighty or ninety miles in length, an area of 16, or 1800 square miles, the whole surface might literally be said to be covered with them. The water of the river was scarcely visible on account of the dead carcasses which floated on the surface, drowned in the attempt to come at the weeds which grew in it. : The present year is the third of their continuance, and their increase has far exceeded that of a geometrical progression whose whole ratio is a million. A writer of reputation says of a column of locusts in India ; It extended, we were informed, 500 miles, and so compact was it when on the wing, that, like an eclipse, it completely hid the sun; so that no shadow was cast by any object, and some lofty tombs, not more than 200 yards distant, were rendered quite invisible.
In one single neighborhood, even in Germany, it was once calculated that near 17,000,000 of their eggs were collected and destroyed . Even Volney writes of those in Syria , the quantity of these insects is a thing incredible to anyone who has not seen it himself; the ground is covered with them for several leagues. The steppes, says Clarke , an incredulous traveler, were entirely covered by their bodies, and their numbers falling resembled flakes of snow, carried obliquely by the wind, and spreading thick mists over the sun. Myriads fell over the carriage, the horses, the drivers. The Tartars told us, that persons had been suffocated by a fall of locusts on the steppes. It was now the season, they added, in which they began to diminish. : It was incredible, that their breadth was eight leagues.
Strong – The locust is remarkable for its long flights. Its strength of limbs is amazing; when pressed down by the hand on the table, it has almost power to move the fingers .
Whose teeth are the teeth of a lion – The teeth of the locust are said to be harder than stone. : They appear to be created for a scourge; since to strength incredible for so small a creature, they add saw-like teeth admirably calculated to eat up all the herbs in the land. Some near the Senegal, are described as quite brown, of the thickness and length of a finger, and armed with two jaws, toothed like a saw, and very powerful. The prophet ascribes to them the sharp or prominent eye-teeth of the lion and lioness, combining strength with number. The ideal of this scourge of God is completed by blending numbers, in which creatures so small only could exist together, with the strength of the fiercest. : Weak and short-lived is man, yet when God is angered against a sinful people, what mighty power does He allow to man against it! And what more cruel than those who endeavor to slay souls, turning them from the Infinite and Eternal Good, and so dragging them to the everlasting torments of Hell?
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 6. A nation is come up upon my land] That real locusts are intended there can be little doubt; but it is thought that this may be a double prophecy, and that the destruction by the Chaldeans may also be intended, and that the four kinds of locusts mentioned above may mean the four several attacks made on Judea by them. The first in the last year of Nabonassar, (father of Nebuchadnezzar,) which was the third of Jehoiakim; the second when Jehoiakim was taken prisoner in the eleventh year of his reign; the third in the ninth year of Zedekiah; and the fourth, three years after, when Jerusalem was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar. Others say that they mean four powers which have been enemies of the Jews:
1. The palmerworm, the Assyrians and Chaldeans.
2. The locust, the Persians and Medes.
3. The cankerworm, the Greeks, and particularly Antiochus Epiphanes.
4. The caterpillar, the Romans.
Others make them four kings; Tiglath-pileser, Shalmaneser, Sennacherib, and Nebuchadnezzar. But of such similitudes there is no end; and the best of them is arbitrary and precarious.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
This verse countenanceth their conjecture who take the locusts and vermin to be emblematical in part as well as literal; for it seems not very suitable to call their teeth teeth of a lion.
For a nation; an innumerable multitude of locusts and caterpillars, called a nation here, as Solomon calls the conies and the ants, Pro 30:25,26. A prognostic of a very numerous and mighty nation, that ere long will invade Judah.
Is come up, or suddenly will come, upon my land; upon Canaan, which God calls his land; or more particularly the two tribes, Judea strictly taken.
Strong; mighty in power and undaunted in courage, if you refer it to the Assyrians or Babylonians; if to those vermin, they are, though each weak by itself, yet in those multitudes which come, strong enough, and irresistible, and shall do Gods work, that is, waste the land, and devour all before them.
Without number; not simply numberless, but in such multitudes none of you shall be able to recount them.
Whose teeth are the teeth of a lion; a strong lion of the middle age, that hath whelps, and hunts the prey for them.
And he hath the cheek teeth of a great lion; which is old, and the more fierce and terrible in his looks, no way lessened in his strength, and that preys for his young ones: now what waste such lions make, such these locusts will make, such the Assyrians will make.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
6. nationapplied to thelocusts, rather than “people” (Pro 30:25;Pro 30:26), to mark not onlytheir numbers, but also their savage hostility; andalso to prepare the mind of the hearer for the transition to thefigurative locusts in the second chapter, namely, the “nation”or Gentile foe coming against Judea (compare Joe2:2).
my landthat is,Jehovah’s; which never would have been so devastated were Inot pleased to inflict punishment (Joe 2:18;Isa 14:25; Jer 16:18;Eze 36:5; Eze 38:16).
strongas irresistiblysweeping away before its compact body the fruits of man’s industry.
without numbersoJdg 6:5; Jdg 7:12,”like grasshoppers (or “locusts”) for multitude”(Jer 46:23; Nah 3:15).
teeth . . . lionthatis, the locusts are as destructive as a lion; there is no vegetationthat can resist their bite (compare Re9:8). PLINY says “theygnaw even the doors of houses.”
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
For a nation is come up upon my land,…. A nation of locusts, so called from their great numbers, and coming from foreign parts; just as the ants are called a “people”, and the conies a “folk”,
Pr 30:25; and which were an emblem of the nation of the Chaldeans, which came up from Babylon, and invaded the land of Judea; called by the Lord “my land”, because he had chosen it for the habitation of his people; here he himself had long dwelt, and had been served and worshipped in it: though Kimchi thinks these are the words of the inhabitants of the land, or of the prophet; but if it can be thought they are any other than the words of God, they rather seem to be expressed by the drunkards in particular, howling for want of wine, and observing the reason of it:
strong, and without number; this description seems better to agree with the Assyrians or Chaldeans, who were a mighty and powerful people, as well as numerous; though locusts, notwithstanding they are weak, singly taken, yet, coming in large bodies, carry all before them, and there is no stopping them:
whose teeth [are] the teeth of a lion, and he hath the cheek teeth of a great lion; or “the grinders” m of such an one; being hard, strong, and sharp, to bite off the tops, boughs, and branches of trees: Pliny n says, locusts will gnaw with their teeth the doors of houses; so the teeth of locusts are described in Re 9:8; this may denote the strength, cruelty, and voraciousness of the Chaldean army.
m “molares”, Pagninus, Mercerus, Burkius. n Nat. Hist. l. 11. c. 29.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Of what some think, that punishment, not yet inflicted, is denounced here on the people, I again repeat, I do not approve; but, on the contrary, the Prophet, according to my view, records another judgment of God, in order to show that God had not only in one way warned the Jews of their sins, that he might restore them to a right mind; but that he had tried all means to bring them to the right way, though they proved to have been irreclaimable. After having then spoke of the sterility of the fields and of other calamities, he now adds that the Jews had been visited with war. (3) Surely famine ought to have touched them, especially when they saw that evils, succeeding evils, had happened for several years contrary to the usual course of things, so that they could not be imputed to chance. But when God brought war upon them, when they were already worn out with famine, must they not have been more than insane in mind, to have continued astonied at God’s judgments and not to repent? Then the meaning of the Prophet is, that God had tried, by every means possible, to find out whether the Jews were healable, and had given them every opportunity to repent, but that they were wholly perverse and untamable.
Then he says, Verily a nation came up. The particle כי ki is not to be taken as a causative, but only as explanatory, Verily, or surely, he says, a nation came up; though an inference also is not amiss, if it be drawn from the beginning of the verse: ‘Hear, ye old men, and tell your children;’ what shall we tell? even this, that a nation, etc. But in this form also כי ki would be exegetical, and the sense would be the same. This much as to the meaning of the passage.
A nation, then, came up over my land. God here justly claims the land of Canaan as his own heritage, and does so designedly, that the Jews might more clearly know that he was angry with them; for their condition would not have been worse than that of other nations, had not God resolved to punish them for their sins. There is here then an implied comparison between Judea and other countries, as though the Prophet said, “How comes it, that your land is wasted by wars and many other calamities, while other countries are at rest? This land is no doubt sacred to God, for he has chosen it for himself, that he might rule in it; he has here his own habitation: it then must be that there is some cause for God’s wrath, as your land is so miserably wasted, when other lands enjoy tranquillity.” We now perceive what the Prophet means. A nation, he says, came up upon my land, and what then? God could surely have prevented this; he could have defended his own land, of which he was the keeper, and which was under his protection: how then had it happened that enemies with impunity inundated this land, having marched into it and utterly laid it waste, except that it had been forsaken by the Lord himself?
A nation, he says, came up upon my land, strong and without number; and further, who had the teeth of a lion, the jaw-bones of a young lion. The nations had no strength which God could not in an instant have broken down, nor had he need of mighty auxiliaries, for he could by a nod only have reduced to nothing whatever men might have attempted: when, therefore, the Assyrians so impetuously assailed the Jews they were necessarily exposed to the wantonness of their enemies, for they were unworthy of being protected, as hitherto, by the hand of God.
(3) But most commentators consider these two verses as containing a more particular description of the devastations produced by the locusts mentioned before. That they are called “a nation” is according to prophetic style, and what has been done by heathen poets: the wasting of the vine and the barking of the fig-tree seem more suitable to this view. It is true that נוי, nation, and not וזם people, as in Pro 30:25, is here used; but, as Dr. Henderson observes, it seems to have been selected on purpose “to prepare the minds of the Jews for the allegorical use made of these insects in chapter 2.” — Ed.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(6) A nation.It was not uncommon with Hebrew writers to apply the name people or folk to animals, as, The ants are a people not strong; The conies are but a feeble folk (Pro. 30:25-26); but the word used by Joel is different from that in the Proverbs. He selected a word indicative of foreign nations, suggestive of attack, including both the irrational invader and the foreign conqueror. The surpassing strength of the nation is indicated by the extraordinary power of the locusts teeth, compared to that of the lions jaws. The same comparison is made by St. John (Rev. 9:8): Their teeth (the locusts) were as the teeth of lions.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
A Description of the Plague And Its Consequences ( Joe 1:6-18 ).
The effects of the huge plagues of locusts which had arrived to devastate the land are graphically described, and the consequences in the devastation of all vegetation in the land, with the result that both the people and the priests and servants of the Temple mourn and weep over what has happened, especially because it means that the meal and drink offerings are no longer available in the house of YHWH, and there are great shortages of food among the people. Joel sees what has happened as a reminder of the imminence of the coming Day of YHWH when God’s final purposes will be accomplished in both judgment and blessing.
Analysis of Joe 1:6-18 ).
a
b He has laid my vine waste, and de-barked my fig-tree, he has made it clean bare, and cast it away, its branches are made white (Joe 1:7).
c Lament like a virgin (young woman) girded with sackcloth, for the husband of her youth (Joe 1:8).
d The meal-offering and the drink-offering are cut off from the house of YHWH (Joe 1:9 a).
e The priests, the ministers of YHWH, mourn (Joe 1:9 b).
f The field is laid waste, the land mourns, because the grain is destroyed. The new wine is dried up, the oil languishes (Joe 1:10).
g Be confounded, O you husbandmen, wail, O you vinedressers, for the wheat and for the barley, because the harvest of the field is perished (Joe 1:11).
f The vine is withered, and the fig-tree languishes, the pomegranate-tree, the palm-tree also, and the apple-tree, even all the trees in the countryside are withered, for joy is withered away from the sons of men (Joe 1:12).
e Gird yourselves with sackcloth, and lament, you priests, wail, you ministers of the altar, come, lie all night in sackcloth, you ministers of my God (Joe 1:13 a).
d For the meal-offering and the drink-offering are withheld from the house of your God (Joe 1:13 b).
c Sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly, gather the old men and all the inhabitants of the land to the house of YHWH your God, and cry to YHWH, “Alas for the day!” for the day of YHWH is at hand, and as destruction from the Almighty will it come (Joe 1:14-15).
b Is not the food cut off before our eyes, joy and gladness from the house of our God? The seeds rot under their clods, the garners are laid desolate, the barns are broken down, for the grain is withered (Joe 1:16-17).
a How do the beasts groan, the herds of cattle are perplexed, because they have no pasture, yes, the flocks of sheep are made desolate (Joe 1:18).
Note how in ‘a’ reference is made to the arrival of the locusts as being like lions, although ‘without number’, and in the parallel the cattle and sheep are desolated. In ‘b’ vines and fig trees are devastated, and in the parallel joy and gladness is cut off from the house of God, and the grain is useless. In ‘c’ they are to lament like a young newly married woman mourning for a dead husband, and in the parallel they are to lament because of the imminence of the day of YHWH. In ‘d’ the meal-offering and the drink-offering are cut off from the house of YHWH, and in the parallel the meal-offering and the drink-offering are withheld from the house of your God. In ‘e’ the priests, the ministers of YHWH, mourn, and in the parallel the priests and ministers are to cover themselves with sackcloth. In ‘f’ the grain, wine and oil are greatly affected, and in the parallel the fruit-bearing trees are withered. Centrally in ‘g’ the husbandmen and vinedressers are confounded because the harvest of the countryside is perished
Joe 1:6
‘For a nation is come up upon my land,
Strong, and without number,
His teeth are the teeth of a lion,
And he has the jaw-teeth of a lioness.’
The initial arrival of the swarms of locusts is described in terms of a ‘nation’ (compare Pro 30:25-27 where a similar idea is expressed; and the use of goyim in Zep 2:14 of animals in their differing species) which was strong and without number (compare Psa 105:34 which speaks of ‘locusts — without number’), and had teeth like a lion or lioness. In other words teeth that could gnaw and eat through anything.
Joe 1:7
‘He has laid my vine waste,
And de-barked (or ‘broken’) my fig-tree,
He has made it clean bare, and cast it away,
Its branches are made white.’
And with those teeth they had laid the vine waste, removed the bark from fig trees, and stripped the trunks and branches bare, leaving the white branches bare and visible, a very vivid picture of the activities of locusts well recognised by those who have experienced such a visitation. This would be a very good description of the activities of the ‘cutting or gnawing’ locusts (Joe 1:4).
Joe 1:8
‘Lament like a virgin girded with sackcloth,
For the husband of her youth.’
Judah were therefore to lament like a newly married woman (bethulah) who had been recently bereaved while still young, a most dreadful situation in those days, not only because her provider was dead, but also because it would affect her position in Judah. (Compare Isa 54:6 where in context such a woman had not borne children). The thought is that the lamentation should go very deep and be almost despairing.
The word translated ‘virgin’ (bethulah) clearly cannot mean literally a woman who has never known a man, for here she was a married woman and would therefore have had relations with her husband on the night of the marriage. But in fact in early Hebrew ‘bethulah’ did not refer to a pure virgin. This is evident from its use at Ugarit of the fertility goddess who was anything other than a genuine virgin, and its use of ‘the virgin daughter of Babylon’, who in Isa 47:9 was seen as a widow with children. Compare how the word had to be qualified by ‘and had not known a man’ in Gen 24:16. It clearly meant a young woman whether married or unmarried, in contrast with ‘alma which indicated a young unmarried woman, and therefore truly a virgin.
Joe 1:9
‘The meal-offering and the drink-offering are cut off from the house of YHWH,
The priests, the ministers of YHWH, mourn.’
Because of the ravages of the locusts no grain and wine would be produced, and this apparently in the whole of Judah, and therefore there would be no firstfruits, and no grain or wine offerings. No wonder then that the priests and Temple servants mourned. There are no good grounds for denying that these types of offerings were offered in pre-exilic times, and they are in fact called for in the Law of Moses.
The lack of grain would affect the daily offerings which were seen as an essential part of the maintenance of the covenant, and the blow thus went very deep, although presumably there was grain in storage that could be used until it ran out or unless the locusts had got to it.
Joe 1:10
‘The field is laid waste, the land mourns,
For the grain is destroyed,
The new wine is dried up,
The oil languishes.’
We now have the explanation for the lack of meal and wine offerings. It was because the fields had been laid waste, the grain was destroyed, the wine was dried up and the olive oil was no longer being produced. The locusts had apparently devastated the total harvest. The result was that even the land was seen as in mourning because it could produce no fruit. Or alternatively the idea of ‘the land’ is the people of the land, for the people were also left bereft.
Joe 1:11
‘Be confounded, O you husbandmen,
Wail, O you vinedressers,
For the wheat and for the barley,
For the harvest of the field is perished.’
The farmers and vinedressers could only look on helplessly at the devastation of their crops, and wail at what was happening. Nothing could be done about locusts which arrived in such vast numbers and would soon chew their way through the vegetation. Under their very eyes they saw their grain being consumed, and their harvest disappearing. Dr Thomson states from his own experience, ‘I saw under my own eyes not only a large vineyard loaded with young grapes, but whole fields of corn disappear as if by magic, and the hope of the husbandman vanish like smoke’.
Joe 1:12
‘The vine is withered, and the fig-tree languishes,
The pomegranate-tree, the palm-tree also, and the apple-tree,
Even all the trees of the field are withered,
For joy is withered away from the sons of men.’
And the locusts ate everything. The trees withered because their leaves had been consumed and they had even had their bark removed. And the consequence of all this withering was that men’s joy also withered. They no longer had anything to be joyful about. All their labours had been spent in vain.
Joe 1:13
‘Gird yourselves with sackcloth, and lament, you priests,
Wail, you ministers of the altar,
Come, lie all night in sackcloth, you ministers of my God,
For the meal-offering and the drink-offering are withheld from the house of your God.’
And so the call goes up from Joel for the priests and Temple servants who served at the altar to clothe themselves with sackcloth and mourn in repentance for their failures. Indeed they were to lie in sackcloth all night, because the meal and drink offerings were being withheld from the house of their God because of Judah’s sins.
Joe 1:14-15
‘Sanctify a fast,
Call a solemn assembly,
Gather the old men and all the inhabitants of the land to the house of YHWH your God,
And cry to YHWH, “Alas for the day!”
For the day of YHWH is at hand,
And as destruction from the Almighty will it come.’
And they were to go further. They were to summon together all the men of Judah to a solemn assembly in the house of YHWH, including all the old men and all those who lived in the land, and they were to cry to YHWH, ‘Alas for the day’. And this was because the sad devastation that they had gone through was to be seen as a portent of the coming of YHWH’s final day, the Day of YHWH, the Day which would come imminently (at any time) as destruction from the Almighty, and for which they had to prepare themselves. That Day is described in some detail in Isaiah 24. It was a day to be dreaded by all who were not faithfully waiting on God.
Joe 1:16
Is not the food cut off before our eyes,
Joy and gladness from the house of our God?’
Joe 1:17
The seeds rot under their clods,
The garners are laid desolate,
The barns are broken down,
For the grain is withered.’
And this expectancy of coming judgment had been brought on by their food disappearing before their very eyes (typical of what would happen when locusts were on the march), the consequence being that there was no rejoicing and gladness in the house of God (either the Temple or the people as a whole). For what was left of the seeds was rotting, the garners had been desolated, and the makeshift barns had been broken down because the grain was withered.
Joe 1:18
‘How do the beasts groan!
The herds of cattle are perplexed,
Because they have no pasture,
Yes, the flocks of sheep are made desolate.’
And not only the vegetation was affected. The animal world too suffered. The herds of cattle could not understand why they had no pasture, the flocks of sheep were bewildered and desolated. All that remained was the bare denuded earth, and all that they could do was ‘groan’.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Joe 1:6. For a nation is come up A word of consideration concerning the locusts may not be altogether improper, says Dr. Sharpe in his Second Argument, &c. And as the commentators are divided in their opinions, it will be but fair to give a brief view of what has been said on both sides. To begin then with Grotius, Houbigant, Rabbi Tanchum, Abarbanel, &c. they are of opinion, that the prophet has used this image to set forth the multitude of the Chaldean army; but then Bochart and others, on the contrary, assert, that it is an army of real locusts, and not of men. Some, as Cyril and Theodoret, have interpreted it of both. Jerome informs us, that some of the Jews before his time understood this description of the locusts to be figurative, and to mean the most powerful enemies of the Jews: and he himself is forced to confess, that while you read of locusts, you think of the Babylonians. The force of the Chaldeans (says he) is described under the metaphor of locusts. This interpretation is favoured also by the Chaldee. Pocock has, with great learning and diligence, endeavoured to prove, that locusts, not men, are here described by the prophet; and then, after such his literal interpretation, he allows it will be lawful for any to apply them to such things as he pleases. Throughout the prophesies of Daniel, kings, kingdoms, and forces, are represented under the names and parts of animals; the lion, bear, ram, goat, horns, wings. The king of Egypt is represented, Isa 27:1 by leviathan, the crooked serpent; the literal meaning is, “The crocodile of the Nile:” the real import is Psammeticus, king of Egypt, taken prisoner by Cambyses. The army of Nebuchadnezzar is compared to locusts (grasshoppers in our version), Jer 46:23 which is a common metaphor for numerous and destructive armies, as the reader may see by comparing Isa 33:4. Jdg 6:5; Jdg 7:12. It may therefore be presumed, that, under the metaphor of locusts, Joel describes the army of the Chaldeans; and this presumption is moreover favoured by several circumstances in the description. The locusts were of four kinds; and the enemies appointed over the Jews were of four kinds, Jer 15:2-3. Jerome, with other interpreters, suppose the succession of these insects to mean the four several attacks of the Chaldeans: that is to say, first, in the last year of Nabopolassar, and third of Jehoiachim; secondly, when that king was taken prisoner, in the eleventh year of his reign; thirdly, in the ninth of Zedekiah; fourthly, about three years after, when Jerusalem was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar. To conclude, we may with Bishop Warburton regard this as a double prophesy, and consider that Joel in his prediction of an approaching ravage by locusts, foretels likewise, in the same word, a succeeding desolation by the Assyrian army; for we are to observe, that this was God’s method both in warning and punishing a sinful people. Thus when the seven nations, for their exceeding wickedness, were to be exterminated, God promises his chosen nation to send hornets before them,&c. See Exo 23:28 and Wis 12:8, &c. Now Joel, under one and the same prediction, contained in this and the following chapter, foretels both these plagues; the locusts in the primary sense, and the Assyrian army in the secondary. See Div. Leg. book 6: sect. 6 and the note on chap. Joe 2:20.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Under the figure of a swarm of insects destroying the fruits of the earth, is represented the judgment of the Lord upon a guilty land. It is blessed to observe, how the Lord pleads with his people by those striking visitations in the various periods of his Church; and with what gentleness in the midst of correction, the Lord manifests the cause for which he thus deals with them.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Joe 1:6 For a nation is come up upon my land, strong, and without number, whose teeth [are] the teeth of a lion, and he hath the cheek teeth of a great lion.
Ver. 6. For a nation is come up upon my land ] A nation, sc. of vermin, by swarms, as Joe 2:9 , called afterwards an army, Joe 2:11 , and a people, Joe 2:2 . See the like Pro 30:25-26 . “Is come,” that is, shortly shall come, “upon my land,” this glorious and goodly land, as it is called, Dan 11:16 . Tarnovius makes this by a mimesis a to be the drunkard’s lamentation. “A nation is come up,” &c.
Strong and without number
Whose teeth are the teeth of a lion
a Rhet. A figure of speech, whereby the supposed words or actions of another are imitated. D
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
a nation. See Joe 2:20; and compare Dan 11. Put for the great destroying powers which are symbolized in Joe 1:4
by the locusts. Compare Joe 2:2, Joe 2:11, Joe 2:25. Rev 9.
My land. So called because Jehovah is about to put in His claim. The end-time is here referred to, when He will do this:
“the day of the Lord”. See Joe 1:15, and Joe 2:1, &c.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
nation: Joe 2:2-11, Joe 2:25, Pro 30:25-27
my: Psa 107:34, Isa 8:8, Isa 32:13, Hos 9:3
whose: Pro 30:14, Rev 9:7-10
Reciprocal: Exo 10:15 – For they Pro 30:27 – The locusts Rev 9:8 – and their
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Joe 1:6, The language of this verse is a strong indication that the Lord means an army from a heathen country, for the descriptive terms certainly apply to such.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Joe 1:6. For a nation is come up upon my land Insects are described as a nation or people marching in order under their leaders, both by sacred and profane writers, because of their power to do mischief, and their being irresistible by human strength or art. Whose teeth are the teeth of a lion They devour every thing that comes in their way, and there is no possibility of rescuing it from them. Pliny and other writers tell us, that they will not only destroy the leaves and fruits of the trees on which they fasten, but will even devour the very bark and stock thereof.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
1:6 For {d} a nation is come up upon my land, strong, and without number, whose teeth [are] the teeth of a lion, and he hath the cheek teeth of a great lion.
(d) This was another plague with which God had punished them when he stirred up the Assyrians against them.