Peter Pett's Commentary on the Bible
Joel 1:6-18
A Description of the Plague And Its Consequences (Joel 1:6).
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 Joel 1:6).
a 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 (Joel 1:6).
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 (Joel 1:7).
c Lament like a virgin (young woman) girded with sackcloth, for the husband of her youth (Joel 1:8).
d The meal-offering and the drink-offering are cut off from the house of YHWH (Joel 1:9 a).
e The priests, the ministers of YHWH, mourn (Joel 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 (Joel 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 (Joel 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 (Joel 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 (Joel 1:13 a).
d For the meal-offering and the drink-offering are withheld from the house of your God (Joel 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 (Joel 1:14).
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 (Joel 1:16).
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 (Joel 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
‘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 Proverbs 30:25 where a similar idea is expressed; and the use of goyim in Zephaniah 2:14 of animals in their differing species) which was strong and without number (compare Psalms 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.
‘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 (Joel 1:4).
‘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 Isaiah 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 Isaiah 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 Genesis 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.
‘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.
‘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.
‘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'.
‘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.
‘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.
‘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.
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.'
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.
‘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'.