1:3 Tell your children 1 about it,
have your children tell their children,
and their children the following generation. 2
1:7 They 3 have destroyed our 4 vines; 5
they have turned our 6 fig trees into mere splinters.
They have completely stripped off the bark 7 and thrown them aside;
the 8 twigs are stripped bare. 9
1:8 Wail 10 like a young virgin 11 clothed in sackcloth,
lamenting the death of 12 her husband-to-be. 13
1 tn Heb “sons.” This word occurs several times in this verse.
2 sn The circumstances that precipitated the book of Joel surrounded a locust invasion in Palestine that was of unprecedented proportions. The locusts had devastated the country’s agrarian economy, with the unwelcome consequences extending to every important aspect of commercial, religious, and national life. To further complicate matters, a severe drought had exhausted water supplies, causing life-threatening shortages for animal and human life (cf. v. 20). Locust invasions occasionally present significant problems in Palestine in modern times. The year 1865 was commonly known among Arabic-speaking peoples of the Near East as sent el jarad, “year of the locust.” The years 1892, 1899, and 1904 witnessed significant locust invasions in Palestine. But in modern times there has been nothing equal in magnitude to the great locust invasion that began in Palestine in February of 1915. This modern parallel provides valuable insight into the locust plague the prophet Joel points to as a foreshadowing of the day of the Lord. For an eyewitness account of the 1915 locust invasion of Palestine see J. D. Whiting, “Jerusalem’s Locust Plague,” National Geographic 28 (December 1915): 511-50.
3 tn Heb “it.” Throughout vv. 6-7 the Hebrew uses singular forms to describe the locust swarm, but the translation uses plural forms because several details of the text make more sense in English as if they are describing the appearance and effects of individual locusts.
4 tn Heb “my.”
5 tn Both “vines” and “fig trees” are singular in the Hebrew text, but are regarded as collective singulars.
6 tn Heb “my.”
7 tn Heb “it has completely stripped her.”
8 tn Heb “her.”
9 tn Heb “grow white.”
sn Once choice leafy vegetation is no longer available to them, locusts have been known to consume the bark of small tree limbs, leaving them in an exposed and vulnerable condition. It is apparently this whitened condition of limbs that Joel is referring to here.
10 sn The verb is feminine singular, raising a question concerning its intended antecedent. A plural verb would be expected here, the idea being that all the inhabitants of the land should grieve. Perhaps Joel is thinking specifically of the city of Jerusalem, albeit in a representative sense. The choice of the feminine singular verb form has probably been influenced to some extent by the allusion to the young widow in the simile of v. 8.
11 tn Or “a young woman” (TEV, CEV). See the note on the phrase “husband-to-be” in the next line.
12 tn Heb “over the death of.” The term “lamenting” does not appear in the Hebrew, but is supplied in the translation for smoothness.
13 sn Heb “the husband of her youth.” The woman described here may already be married, so the reference is to the death of a husband rather than a fiancé (a husband-to-be). Either way, the simile describes a painful and unexpected loss to which the national tragedy Joel is describing may be compared.