In considering the prophecies of Joel, the son of Pethuel, we must do so entirely from an internal examination of their contents, as we have no historical data to aid us in their study. That he was one of the earliest of the Judah prophets is generally allowed, although it would be difficult to fix the precise time when he uttered "the word of the Lord." The silence of Scripture should teach us as distinctly as its utterances.
Judah and Jerusalem and the state of things then existing; famine and a terrible incursion of locusts and other insects who devastated the whole country, forms the text on which the prophet enlarges and announces the coming day of Jehovah, not upon Judah only, but upon all the earth. Joel for "vividness and power of description is not surpassed by any of the prophets." What an elegant account is furnished of the triumphant Assyrian army through the land of Immanuel (Joel. 2.), and which, undoubtedly, in its fullness extends to the future crisis when the land will be invaded and Jerusalem besieged more than once by the then representative of Assyria, the first, as she will be the last of Israel's enemies. This book is one of judgment—of Jehovah's judgment upon all nations. In and around Jerusalem, wrath to the uttermost will fall upon the Gentiles (Joel. 3).
The signs and wonders referred to by Joel precede the day of the Lord (Joel. 2:30, 31); but the blessings—especially the distinguished one of the Holy Ghost poured out on Israel—will be after the day has set in. Peter, in his great Pentecostal discourse (Acts 2:16-2116But this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel; 17And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams: 18And on my servants and on my handmaidens I will pour out in those days of my Spirit; and they shall prophesy: 19And I will show wonders in heaven above, and signs in the earth beneath; blood, and fire, and vapor of smoke: 20The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before that great and notable day of the Lord come: 21And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved. (Acts 2:16‑21)), quotes part of the prophecy of Joel, not in proof of fulfillment, but as showing chat the extraordinary effusion of the Spirit and striking results were in perfect accord or agreement with what the prophet testified. Joel's prophecy yet awaits fulfillment.
"More than half the short prophecy of Joel contains a wonderfully fine and vigorous description of a flight of locusts, and the devastation they occasion. There is not in all literature a description of any like subject comparable to this; and if, in our happy exemption from such visitations, we have been incapable of appreciating the serious nature of a calamity occasioned by mere insects, we have only to listen to the solemn tones in which the prophet speaks of it as a national judgment, calling for acts of public mourning and humiliation, to be satisfied that the visitation from locusts is among the most awful dispensations which a land can sustain. The present is indeed the standard Scripture passage on the subject."
One who has personally witnessed the march of these terrible insects thus writes:-"Riding up a hill, I found the whole surface, as it were, animated and rolling down the declivity. There were millions of young locusts, not yet able to jump, looking like a mass of semi-fluid mortar. On another occasion a flight of locusts did considerable injury, and disappeared. But they laid their eggs; and after a while the news arrived that these were hatched and the young ones on their march. They were without wings, and about the size of full-grown grasshoppers. The whole face of the mountain was black with them. On they came like a living deluge. We dug trenches and kindled fires, and beat and burned to death heaps upon heaps; but the effect was utterly useless. Wave after wave rolled up the mountainside, and poured over rocks, walls, ditches, and hedges—those behind covering up and bridging over the masses already killed."
GENERAL DIVISIONS.
1.-An appeal to the nation, grounded on present calamity, but in view of the period of public and governmental judgment, known as "the day of the Lord." Joel. 1
2.-The day of Jehovah upon Judah, also with intimation of future spiritual blessing upon all flesh, of which Pentecost was a distinct and blessed pledge. Joel. 2
3.-The mighty gathering of the nations; the Gentiles summoned; they gather in the Holy Land to feel the strength of Jehovah's arm in awful judgment; then Judah abides in Jerusalem from generation to generation. Joel. 3