Joel 1

1The word of the Lord that came to ^aJoel the son of Pethuel.

The Land Laid Waste

²Hear this, you elders,

And give ear, all you inhabitants of the land!

^bHas anything like this happened in your days,

Or even in the days of your fathers?

^3cTell your children about it,

Let your children tell their children,

And their children another generation.

^4dWhat the chewing ¹locust left, the ^eswarming locust has eaten;

What the swarming locust left, the crawling locust has eaten;

And what the crawling locust left, the consuming locust has eaten.

⁵Awake, you ^fdrunkards, and weep;

And wail, all you drinkers of wine,

Because of the new wine,

^gFor it has been cut off from your mouth.

⁶For ^ha nation has come up against My land,

Strong, and without number;

ⁱHis teeth are the teeth of a lion,

And he has the fangs of a ²fierce lion.

⁷He has ^jlaid waste My vine,

And ³ruined My fig tree;

He has stripped it bare and thrown it away;

Its branches are made white.

^8kLament like a virgin girded with sackcloth

For ^lthe husband of her youth.

^9mThe grain offering and the drink offering

Have been cut off from the house of the Lord;

The priests ⁿmourn, who minister to the Lord.

¹⁰The field is wasted,

^oThe land mourns;

For the grain is ruined,

^pThe new wine is dried up,

The oil fails.

^11qBe ashamed, you farmers,

Wail, you vinedressers,

For the wheat and the barley;

Because the harvest of the field has perished.

^12rThe vine has dried up,

And the fig tree has withered;

The pomegranate tree,

The palm tree also,

And the apple tree—

All the trees of the field are withered;

Surely ^sjoy has withered away from the sons of men.

Mourning for the Land

^13tGird yourselves and lament, you priests;

Wail, you who minister before the altar;

Come, lie all night in sackcloth,

You who minister to my God;

For the grain offering and the drink offering

Are withheld from the house of your God.

^14uConsecrate a fast,

Call ^va sacred assembly;

Gather the elders

And ^wall the inhabitants of the land

Into the house of the Lord your God,

And cry out to the Lord.

^15xAlas for the day!

For ^ythe day of the Lord is at hand;

It shall come as destruction from the Almighty.

¹⁶Is not the food ^zcut off before our eyes,

^aJoy and gladness from the house of our God?

¹⁷The seed shrivels under the clods,

Storehouses are in shambles;

Barns are broken down,

For the grain has withered.

¹⁸How ^bthe animals groan!

The herds of cattle are restless,

Because they have no pasture;

Even the flocks of sheep ⁴suffer punishment.

¹⁹O Lord, ^cto You I cry out;

For ^dfire has devoured the ⁵open pastures,

And a flame has burned all the trees of the field.

²⁰The beasts of the field also ^ecry out to You,

For ^fthe water brooks are dried up,

And fire has devoured the ⁶open pastures.