Yoel 2:8

2:8 They do not jostle one another; ¹ 

each of them marches straight ahead. ² 

They burst through ³  the city defenses ⁴ 

and do not break ranks.

Yoel 1:18

1:18 Listen to the cattle groan! ⁵ 

The herds of livestock wander around in confusion ⁶ 

because they have no pasture.

Even the flocks of sheep are suffering.

Yoel 2:7

2:7 They ⁷  charge ⁸  like warriors;

they scale walls like soldiers. ⁹ 

Each one proceeds on his course;

they do not alter ¹⁰  their path.

Yoel 3:21

3:21 I will avenge ¹¹  their blood which I had not previously acquitted.

It is the Lord who dwells in Zion!

Yoel 1:16

1:16 Our food has been cut off right before our eyes! ¹² 

There is no longer any joy or gladness in the temple of our God! ¹³ 

Yoel 3:19

3:19 Egypt will be desolate

and Edom will be a desolate wilderness,

because of the violence they did to the people of Judah, ¹⁴ 

in whose land they shed innocent blood.

Yoel 2:27

2:27 You will be convinced that I am in the midst of Israel.

I am the Lord your God; there is no other.

My people will never again be put to shame.

Yoel 2:26

2:26 You will have plenty to eat,

and your hunger will be fully satisfied; ¹⁵ 

you will praise the name of the Lord your God,

who has acted wondrously in your behalf.

My people will never again be put to shame.

Yoel 2:2

2:2 It will be ¹⁶  a day of dreadful darkness, ¹⁷ 

a day of foreboding storm clouds, ¹⁸ 

like blackness ¹⁹  spread over the mountains.

It is a huge and powerful army ²⁰  –

there has never been anything like it ever before,

and there will not be anything like it for many generations to come! ²¹ 

Yoel 1:6

1:6 For a nation ²²  has invaded ²³  our ²⁴  land.

There are so many of them they are too numerous to count. ²⁵ 

Their teeth are like those ²⁶  of a lion;

they tear apart their prey like a lioness. ²⁷ 

Yoel 1:10

1:10 The crops of the fields ²⁸  have been destroyed. ²⁹ 

The ground is in mourning because the grain has perished.

The fresh wine has dried up;

the olive oil languishes.

Yoel 3:10

3:10 Beat your plowshares ³⁰  into swords,

and your pruning hooks ³¹  into spears! ³² 

Let the weak say, ‘I too am a warrior!’ ³³ 

Yoel 2:19

2:19 The Lord responded ³⁴  to his people,

“Look! I am about to restore your grain ³⁵ 

as well as fresh wine and olive oil.

You will be fully satisfied. ³⁶ 

I will never again make you an object of mockery among the nations.

Yoel 3:17

The Lord’s Presence in Zion

3:17 You will be convinced ³⁷  that I the Lord am your God,

dwelling on Zion, my holy mountain.

Jerusalem ³⁸  will be holy –

conquering armies ³⁹  will no longer pass through it.

Yoel 1:20

1:20 Even the wild animals ⁴⁰  cry out to you; ⁴¹ 

for the river beds ⁴²  have dried up;

fire has destroyed ⁴³  the grassy pastures. ⁴⁴ 

Yoel 2:13-14

2:13 Return to the Lord your God,

for he is merciful and compassionate,

slow to anger and boundless in loyal love ⁴⁵  – often relenting from calamitous punishment. ⁴⁶ 

2:14 Who knows?

Perhaps he will be compassionate and grant a reprieve, ⁴⁷ 

and leave blessing in his wake ⁴⁸  –

a meal offering and a drink offering for you to offer to the Lord your God! ⁴⁹ 

Yoel 1:13

1:13 Get dressed ⁵⁰  and lament, you priests!

Wail, you who minister at the altar!

Come, spend the night in sackcloth, you servants of my God,

because no one brings grain offerings or drink offerings

to the temple of your God anymore. ⁵¹ 

Yoel 2:3

2:3 Like fire they devour everything in their path; ⁵² 

a flame blazes behind them.

The land looks like the Garden of Eden ⁵³  before them,

but behind them there is only a desolate wilderness –

for nothing escapes them! ⁵⁴ 

Yoel 2:17

2:17 Let the priests, those who serve the Lord, weep

from the vestibule all the way back to the altar. ⁵⁵ 

Let them say, “Have pity, O Lord, on your people;

please do not turn over your inheritance to be mocked,

to become a proverb ⁵⁶  among the nations.

Why should it be said ⁵⁷  among the peoples,

“Where is their God?”

[2:8]  ¹ tn “each one does not crowd his brother.”

[2:8]  ² tn Heb “each warrior walks in his own course.”

[2:8]  ³ tn Heb “they fall upon.” This line has been interpreted in two different ways: (1) although they fall upon the sword, they shall not be wounded (KJV), or (2) when they “burst through” the city’s defenses, they will not break ranks (RSV, NASB, NIV, NIrV).

[2:8]  ⁴ tn Heb “missile” or “javelin.” This term appears to function as a synecdoche for the city’s defenses as a whole (cf. NASB, NIV, TEV). Some scholars instead understand the reference to be an aqueduct by which the locusts (or armies) entered the city.

[1:18]  ⁵ tn Heb “how the cattle groan!”

[1:18]  ⁶ tn Heb “the herds of cattle are confused.” The verb בּוּךְ (bukh, “be confused”) sometimes refers to wandering aimlessly in confusion (cf. Exod 14:3).

[2:7]  ⁷ sn Since the invaders are compared to warriors, this suggests that they are not actually human, but instead an army of locusts.

[2:7]  ⁸ tn Heb “run.”

[2:7]  ⁹ tn Heb “men of battle.”

[2:7]  ¹⁰ tc The translation reads יְעַבְּתוּן (yÿ’abbÿtun) for MT יְעַבְּטוּן (yÿ’abbÿtun). The verb found in MT (עָבַט, ’avat) means “take or give a pledge” (cf. Deut 15:6, 8; 24:10) and does not fit the context. Some scholars have proposed various emendations: (1) יְעָוְּתוּן (yÿ’avvÿtun, “they make crooked”); (2) יָטּוּן (yattun, “they turn aside”); (3) יָעַוּוּן (ya’avvun, “they err”); and (4) יְעָבְּתוּן (adopted in the present translation) from the root I עָבַת (’avat, “to twist, pervert”) or II עָבַת (’avat, “to change, abandon”). KBL adopt the latter option, but the only biblical evidence for this is the problematic reference in Joel 2:7. Another option is to view it as a variant of the root חבט (khavat, “turn aside from”), a meaning attested for the Arabic cognate. The difference in spelling would be due to the interchange of the guttural letters khet (ח) and ayin (ע). This may lay behind LXX rendering ἐκκλίνωσιν (ekklinwsin; cf. Syriac Peshitta nstwn and Vg declinabunt). See S. F. Whitley, “‘bt in Joel 2, 7,” Bib 65 (1984): 101-2.

[3:21]  ¹¹ tc The present translation follows the reading וְנִקַּמְתִּי (vÿniqqamti, “I will avenge”) rather than וְנִקֵּתִי (vÿniqqeti, “I will acquit”) of the MT.

[1:16]  ¹² tn Heb “Has not the food been cut off right before our eyes?” This rhetorical question expects an affirmative answer; the question has been translated as an affirmation for the sake of clarity and emphasis.

[1:16]  ¹³ tn Heb “joy and gladness from the house of our God?” Verse 16b is a continuation of the rhetorical question begun in v. 16a, but has been translated as an affirmative statement to make the meaning clear. The words “There is no longer any” are not in the Hebrew text, but have been supplied in the translation for clarity.

[3:19]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “violence of the sons of Judah.” The phrase “of the sons of Judah” is an objective genitive (cf. KJV “the violence against the children of Judah”; NAB, NIV, NRSV “violence done to the people of Judah”). It refers to injustices committed against the Judeans, not violence that the Judeans themselves had committed against others.

[2:26]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “you will surely eat and be satisfied.”

[2:2]  ¹⁶ tn The phrase “It will be” does not appear in the Hebrew, but is supplied in the translation for the sake of smoothness and style.

[2:2]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “darkness and gloom.” These two terms probably form a hendiadys here. This picture recalls the imagery of the supernatural darkness in Egypt during the judgments of the exodus (Exod 10:22). These terms are also frequently used as figures (metonymy of association) for calamity and divine judgment (Isa 8:22; 59:9; Jer 23:12; Zeph 1:15). Darkness is often a figure (metonymy of association) for death, dread, distress and judgment (BDB 365 s.v. חשֶׁךְ 3).

[2:2]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “a day of cloud and darkness.”

[2:2]  ¹⁹ tc The present translation here follows the proposed reading שְׁחֹר (shÿkhor, “blackness”) rather than the MT שַׁחַר (shakhar, “morning”). The change affects only the vocalization; the Hebrew consonants remain unchanged. Here the context calls for a word describing darkness. The idea of morning or dawn speaks instead of approaching light, which does not seem to fit here. The other words in the verse (e.g., “darkness,” “gloominess,” “cloud,” “heavy overcast”) all emphasize the negative aspects of the matter at hand and lead the reader to expect a word like “blackness” rather than “dawn.” However, NIrV paraphrases the MT nicely: “A huge army of locusts is coming. They will spread across the mountains like the sun when it rises.”

[2:2]  ²⁰ tn Heb “A huge and powerful people”; KJV, ASV “a great people and a strong.” Many interpreters understand Joel 2 to describe an invasion of human armies, either in past history (e.g., the Babylonian invasion of Palestine in the sixth century b.c.) or in an eschatological setting. More probably, however, the language of this chapter referring to “people” and “armies” is a hypocatastic description of the locusts of chapter one. Cf. TEV “The great army of locusts advances like darkness.”

[2:2]  ²¹ tn Heb “it will not be repeated for years of generation and generation.”

[1:6]  ²² sn As becomes increasingly clear in what follows, this nation is to be understood figuratively. It refers to the locust invasion as viewed from the standpoint of its methodical, destructive advance across the land (BDB 156 s.v. גּוֹי 2). This term is used figuratively to refer to animals one other time (Zeph 2:14).

[1:6]  ²³ tn Heb “has come up against.”

[1:6]  ²⁴ tn Heb “my.”

[1:6]  ²⁵ tn Heb “[It] is huge and there is not number.”

[1:6]  ²⁶ tn Heb “its teeth are the teeth of a lion.”

[1:6]  ²⁷ tn Heb “its incisors are those of a lioness.” The sharp, cutting teeth are metonymical for the action of tearing apart and eating prey. The language is clearly hyperbolic. Neither locusts nor human invaders literally have teeth of this size. The prophet is using exaggerated and picturesque language to portray in vivid terms the enormity of the calamity. English versions vary greatly on the specifics: KJV “cheek teeth”; ASV “jaw-teeth”; NAB “molars”; NASB, NIV, NRSV “fangs.”

[1:10]  ²⁸ tn Heb “the field has been utterly destroyed.” The term “field,” a collective singular for “fields,” is a metonymy for crops produced by the fields.

[1:10]  ²⁹ tn Joel uses intentionally alliterative language in the phrases שֻׁדַּד שָׂדֶה (shuddad sadeh, “the field is destroyed”) and אֲבְלָה אֲדָמָה (’avlah ’adamah, “the ground is in mourning”).

[3:10]  ³⁰ sn Instead of referring to the large plow as a whole, the plowshare is simply the metal tip which actually breaks the earth and cuts the furrow.

[3:10]  ³¹ sn This implement was used to prune the vines, i.e., to cut off extra leaves and young shoots (M. Klingbeil, NIDOTTE 1:1117-18). It was a short knife with a curved hook at the end sharpened on the inside like a sickle.

[3:10]  ³² sn This conversion of farming instruments to instruments of war is the reverse of Isa 2:4 (cf. Mic 4:3), where military weapons are transformed into tools for farming. Isaiah describes a time of kingdom blessing and prosperity, whereas Joel describes a time of eschatological conflict and judgment.

[3:10]  ³³ sn The “weak” individual mentioned here is apparently the farmer who has little or no military prowess or prior fighting experience. Under ordinary circumstances such a person would be ill-prepared for assuming the role of a soldier. However, in the scene that Joel is describing here even the most unlikely candidate will become a participant to be reckoned with in this final conflict.

[2:19]  ³⁴ tn Heb “answered and said.”

[2:19]  ³⁵ tn Heb “Look! I am sending grain to you.” The participle used in the Hebrew text seems to suggest imminent action.

[2:19]  ³⁶ tc One of the Qumran manuscripts (4QXXII^c) inserts “and you will eat” before “and you will be fully satisfied” (the reading of the MT, LXX).

[3:17]  ³⁷ tn Heb “know.”

[3:17]  ³⁸ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[3:17]  ³⁹ tn Heb “strangers” or “foreigners.” In context, this refers to invasions by conquering armies.

[1:20]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “beasts of the field.”

[1:20]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “long for you.” Animals of course do not have religious sensibilities as such; they do not in any literal sense long for Yahweh. Rather, the language here is figurative (metonymy of cause for effect). The animals long for food and water (so BDB 788 s.v. עָרַג), the ultimate source of which is Yahweh.

[1:20]  ⁴² tn Heb “sources of water.”

[1:20]  ⁴³ tn Heb “consumed.”

[1:20]  ⁴⁴ tn Heb “the pastures of the wilderness.”

[2:13]  ⁴⁵ tn Heb “and great of loyal love.”

[2:13]  ⁴⁶ tn Heb “and he relents from calamity.”

[2:14]  ⁴⁷ tn Heb “turn” or “turn back.”

[2:14]  ⁴⁸ tn Heb “leave a blessing behind him.”

[2:14]  ⁴⁹ tn The phrase “for you to offer” does not appear in the Hebrew, but is supplied in the translation for the sake of clarity.

[1:13]  ⁵⁰ tn Heb “put on.” There is no object present in the Hebrew text, but many translations assume “sackcloth” to be the understood object of the verb “put on.” Its absence in the Hebrew text of v. 13 is probably due to metrical considerations. The meter here is 3 + 3, and that has probably influenced the prophet’s choice of words.

[1:13]  ⁵¹ tn Heb “for grain offering and drink offering are withheld from the house of your God.”

[2:3]  ⁵² tn Heb “a fire devours before it.”

[2:3]  ⁵³ tn Heb “like the garden of Eden, the land is before them.”

[2:3]  ⁵⁴ tn Heb “and surely a survivor there is not for it.” The antecedent of the pronoun “it” is apparently עַם (’am, “people”) of v. 2, which seems to be a figurative way of referring to the locusts. K&D 26:191-92 thought that the antecedent of this pronoun was “land,” but the masculine gender of the pronoun does not support this.

[2:17]  ⁵⁵ tn Heb “between the vestibule and the altar.” The vestibule was located at the entrance of the temple and the altar was located at the other end of the building. So “between the vestibule and the altar” is a merism referring to the entire structure. The priestly lament permeates the entire house of worship.

[2:17]  ⁵⁶ tn For the MT reading לִמְשָׁל (limshol, an infinitive, “to rule”), one should instead read לְמָשָׁל (lÿmashal, a noun, “to a byword”). While the consonantal Hebrew text permits either, the context suggests that the concern here is more one of not wanting to appear abandoned by God to ongoing economic depression rather than one of concern over potential political subjection of Israel (cf. v. 19). The possibility that the form in the MT is an infinitive construct of the denominative verb II מָשַׁל (mashal, “to utter a proverb”) does not seem likely because of the following preposition (Hebrew בְּ [bÿ], rather than עַל [’al]).

[2:17]  ⁵⁷ tn Heb “Why will they say?”