Joel 2:3

A fire devoureth before them; and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them. A FIRE DEVOURETH BEFORE THEM, AND BEHIND THEM - i:e., on every side (). FIRE ... FLAME - destruction ... desolation (). THE LAND IS AS THE GARDEN OF EDEN BEFORE THEM, AND BEHIND THEM A DESOLATE WILDERNESS - conversely, , "The Lord shall comfort Zion: He will comfort all her waste places; and He will make her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of the Lord" ()....

_Before them, _he says,_the fire will devour, and after them the flame will burn. _He means that the vengeance of God would be such as would consume the whole people: for God has in various ways begun to chastise the people, but, as we have seen, without any advantage. The Prophet then says here that the last stroke remained, and that the Lord would wholly destroy men so refractory, and whom he could not hitherto restore to a sound mind by moderate punishments. For he had in a measure spared them, though he had treated them sharply and severely, and given them time to repent. Hence, when the Prophet saw that they were wholly irreclaimable, he says, that it now only remained that the Lord should at once utterly consume them. He adds, _As the garden of Eden the land is before them, and after them it is the land of solitude; and so _(_and also_) _there will be no escape from them_. Here the...

1-14 The priests were to alarm the people with the near approach of the Divine judgments. It is the work of ministers to warn of the fatal consequences of sin, and to reveal the wrath from heaven against the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. The striking description which follows, shows what would attend the devastations of locusts, but may also describe the effects from the ravaging of the land by the Chaldeans. If the alarm of temporal judgments is given to offending nations, how much more should sinners be warned to seek deliverance from the wrath to come! Our business therefore on earth must especially be, to secure an interest in our Lord Jesus Christ; and we should seek to be weaned from objects which will soon be torn from all who now make idols of them. There must be outward expressions of sorrow and shame, fasting, weeping, and mourning; tears for trouble must be turned i...

Verse Joel 2:3. _A FIRE DEVOURETH BEFORE THEM_] They consume like a general conflagration. "They destroy the ground, not only for the time, but burn trees for two years after." Sir _Hans Sloane_, Nat. Hist. of Jamaica, vol. i., p. 29. _BEHIND THEM A FLAME BURNETH_] "Wherever they feed," says _Ludolf_, in his History of Ethiopia, "their leavings seem as if _parched_ _with fire_." _NOTHING SHALL ESCAPE THEM._] "After devouring the herbage," says _Adanson_, "with the fruits and leaves of trees, they attacked even the _buds_ and the very _bark_; they did not so much as spare the _reeds with which the huts were thatched_....

A FIRE DEVOURETH BEFORE THEM ... - Travelers, of different nations and characters, and in different lands, some unacquainted with the Bible words, have agreed to describe under this image the ravages of locusts. : “They scorch many things with their touch.” : “Whatever of herb or leaf they gnaw, is, as it were, scorched by fire.” : “Wherever they come, the ground seems burned, as it were with fire.” : “Wherever they pass, they burn and spoil everything, and that irremediably.” : “I have myself observed that the places where they had browsed were as scorched, as if the fire had passed there.” : “They covered a square mile so completely, that it appeared, at a little distance, to have been burned and strewn over with brown ashes. Not a shrub, nor a blade of grass was visible.” : “A few months afterward, a much larger army alighted and gave the whole country the appearance of having been bu...

EXPOSITION JOEL 2:1 These verses contain a further description of the calamity occasioned by the locusts and the appearance presented by them; the calling of a congregational meeting for penitence and prayer; the reason assigned in the coming of the day of the Lord. JOEL 2:1 BLOW YE THE TRUMPET (margin, cornet) in Zion, AND SOUND AN ALARM (or, cause it to sound) IN MY HOLY MOUNTAIN. The _shophar_, or far-sounding horn, and probably the _chatsoterah_,_ _the _hazar_ or silver trumpet, were called into requisition. The priests are urged with great vehemence, as _tiqu shophar _and _hariu _imply, to apprise the people that the day of Jehovah's terrible judgment was near

A FIRE DEVOURETH BEFORE THEM, AND BEHIND THEM AFLAME BURNETH,.... This is not to be understood of the heat of the sun, or of the great drought that went before and continued after the locusts; but of them themselves, which were like a consuming fire; wherever they came, they devoured all green grass, herbs, and leaves of trees, as fire does stubble; they sucked out the juice and moisture of everything they came at, and what they left behind shrivelled up and withered away, as if it had been scorched with a flame of fire: and so the Assyrians and Chaldeans, they were an emblem of, destroyed all they met with, by fire and sword; cut up the corn and herbage for forage; and what they could not dispense with they set fire to, and left it burning. Sanctius thinks this refers to fire, which the Chaldeans worshipped as God, and carried before their armies as a sacred and military sign; but this...

II. THE COMING DAY OF THE LORD: THE REPENTANCE AND RESTORATION OF ISRAEL CHAPTER 2 _ 1. The alarm sounded and the day at hand (Joel 2:1) _ 2. The invading army from the north (Joel 2:3) 3. The repentance of the people and cry for help (Joel 2:12) 4. “Then.” The great change (Joel 2:18) 5. Promises of restoration, and the early and latter rain (Joel 2:19) 6. The outpouring of the Spirit upon all flesh (Joel 2:28) 7. Deliverance in Mount Zion

LET THE ALARM BE SOUNDED, FOR THE LOCUSTS ARE PRECURSORS OF THE DAY OF YAHWEH. Speaking in Yahweh's name the prophet bids the priests sound the alarm from Mt. Zion, that all the community may realise that the dreaded Day of Yahweh is approaching. All the mountains, which dawn covers with light, are covered with blackness by the unprecedented hordes of locusts (Exodus 10:1 *). The land they have traversed is left bare as though fire had scorched it, a dreary waste; and so fast do they eat into the fertile country before them that it seems as though they were a flame licking up what comes in its way. Like horses in appearance (Revelation 9:7) the resemblance about the head and mouth has often been remarked they are like them too in the speed of their onrush. The rustling of their wings as they fly over the m

A FIRE, &c. Compare Joel 1:19; Joel 1:20. THEM. The northern army (Joel 2:11) symbolized by the locusts of Joel 1:4. THE GARDEN OF EDEN. Reference to Pentateuch (Genesis 2:8; Genesis 2:13; Genesis 2:10). App-92. Compare Isaiah 51:3.