Chronological

1 ¶ The word of the LORD that went to Joel the son of Pethuel.

² Hear this, ye old men, and give ear, all ye inhabitants of the earth. Has this been in your days, or even in the days of your fathers?

³ Tell your sons of it, and let your sons tell their sons, and their sons another generation.

⁴ That which the palmerworm has left the locust has eaten; and that which the locust has left the cankerworm has eaten; and that which the cankerworm has left the caterpillar has eaten.

⁵ Awake, ye drunkards, and weep; and howl, all ye drinkers of wine, because of the new wine; for it is cut off from your mouth.

⁶ For a people has come up upon my land, strong, and without number, whose teeth are the teeth of a lion, and he has the molars of a great lion.

⁷ He has laid my vine waste and barked my fig tree: he has made it clean bare and cast it away; its branches are made white.

⁸ ¶ Lament like a young woman girded with sackcloth for the husband of her youth.

⁹ The grain offering and the drink offering of the house of the LORD has perished; the priests, the LORD’s ministers, mourn.

¹⁰ The field was destroyed, the land mourns; for the wheat was destroyed; the new wine was dried up, the oil perished.

¹¹ Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen; howl, O ye vinedressers, for the wheat and for the barley; because the harvest of the field is lost.

¹² The vine has dried up, and the fig tree has perished; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all the trees of the field, have withered: therefore joy has withered away from the sons of men.

¹³ Gird yourselves, and lament, ye priests: howl, ye ministers of the altar: come, lie all night in sackcloth, ye ministers of my God: for the present and the drink offering is taken away from the house of your God.

¹⁴ ¶ Sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly, gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the earth into the house of the LORD your God and cry unto the LORD.

¹⁵ Alas for the day! for the day of the LORD is at hand, and it shall come as a destruction from the Almighty.

¹⁶ Is not the food cut off before our eyes, the joy and the gladness from the house of our God?

¹⁷ The seed has rotted under their clods, the storehouses were laid desolate, the barns were destroyed for the wheat is withered.

¹⁸ How the beasts groan! The herds of cattle are perplexed because they have no pasture; the flocks of sheep are condemned.

¹⁹ O LORD, to thee will I cry for the fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness, and the flame has burned all the trees of the field.

²⁰ The beasts of the field also cry unto thee for the rivers of waters are dried up, and the fire has devoured the meadows of the wilderness.

2 ¶ Blow the shofar in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain; let all the inhabitants of the earth tremble for the day of the LORD comes, for it is near at hand;

² a day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of clouds and of shadow that spreads itself upon the mountains as the dawn: a people great and strong; there has not ever been the like, neither shall there be any more after him, even to the years of many generations.

³ A fire devours before him and behind him a flame burns: the earth is as the garden of Eden before him, and behind him a desolate wilderness; neither shall anyone escape him.

⁴ His appearance is as the appearance of horses; and as horsemen, so shall they run.

⁵ Like the thunder of chariots they shall leap over the tops of mountains, like the noise of a flame of fire that devours the stubble, as a strong people set in battle array.

⁶ Before him the peoples shall fear: all faces shall go pale.

⁷ They shall run like mighty men; they shall climb the wall like men of war, and they shall march each one in his ways, and they shall not break his ranks.

⁸ No one shall crowd his companion; they shall walk each one in his path: and even falling upon the sword, they shall not be wounded.

⁹ They shall go through the city; they shall run upon the wall; they shall climb up upon the houses; they shall enter in at the windows like a thief.

¹⁰ The earth shall quake before him; the heavens shall tremble: the sun and the moon shall go dark; and the stars shall withdraw their shining:

¹¹ and the LORD shall utter his voice before his army: for many are his camps and strong, that execute his word; for the day of the LORD is great, and very terrible; and who can abide it?

¹² ¶ Therefore also now, saith the LORD, turn unto me with all your heart and with fasting and with weeping, and with mourning:

¹³ and rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the LORD your God for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and great in mercy, and he does repent of chastisement.

¹⁴ Who knows if he will return and repent and leave a blessing behind him even a present and a drink offering unto the LORD your God?

¹⁵ Blow the shofar in Zion, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly:

¹⁶ gather the people, sanctify the meeting, assemble the elders, gather the children and those that suck the breasts; let the bridegroom go forth of his chamber and the bride out of her closet.

¹⁷ Let the priests, the ministers of the LORD, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, Forgive thy people, O LORD, and do not give thine heritage to reproach that the Gentiles should rule over her: why should they say among the peoples, Where is their God?

¹⁸ ¶ Then the LORD will be jealous for his earth and forgive his people.

¹⁹ Yea, the LORD will answer and say unto his people, Behold, I will send you bread and new wine and oil, and ye shall be satisfied therewith: and I will no longer make you a reproach among the Gentiles:

²⁰ But I will remove far off from you he of the north wind and will drive him into a land barren and desolate; his face shall be toward the east sea, and his end unto the western sea, and he shall exhale his foul odour, and he shall decompose, because he has lifted himself up.

²¹ Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice: for the LORD has done great things.

²² Be not afraid, ye animals of the field; for the pastures of the wilderness shall become green again, for the trees shall bear their fruit, the fig tree and the vine shall give their fruits.

²³ Ye also, sons of Zion, be glad and rejoice in the LORD your God for he has given you the former rain according to righteousness, and he will cause to come down for you the rain, the former rain, and the latter rain as in the beginning.

²⁴ And the floors shall be full of wheat, and the vats shall overflow with wine and oil.

²⁵ And I will restore to you the years that the caterpillar has eaten, the locust, and the cankerworm, and the palmerworm, my great army which I sent among you.

²⁶ And ye shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the LORD your God that has dealt wondrously with you; and my people shall never again be ashamed.

²⁷ And ye shall know that I am in the midst of Israel and that I am the LORD your God, and there is none other; and my people shall never be ashamed.

²⁸ ¶ And it shall come to pass after this that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions:

²⁹ and even upon the slaves and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit.

³⁰ And I will show wonders in the heaven and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke.

³¹ The sun shall be turned into darkness and the moon into blood before the great and the terrible day of the LORD comes.

³² And it shall come to pass that whoever shall call on the name of the LORD shall escape: for in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be salvation, as the LORD has said, and in those who are left, to whom the LORD shall have called.

3 ¶ For, behold, in those days and in that time when I shall cause the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem to end,

² I will gather together all the Gentiles, and will cause them to descend into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and there I will enter into judgment with them because of my people and of my heritage Israel, whom they scattered among the nations, and parted my land.

³ And they have cast lots for my people and have given a boy for a harlot and sold a girl for wine that they might drink.

⁴ Yea, and what have ye to do with me, O Tyre, and Zidon, and all the coasts of Philistia? will ye render me a recompense? and if ye recompense me, swiftly and speedily I will return your recompense upon your own head;

⁵ because ye have taken my silver and my gold and have carried into your temples my precious and beautiful things

⁶ and ye have sold the sons of Judah and the sons of Jerusalem unto the Grecians that ye might remove them far from their border.

⁷ Behold, I will raise them out of the place where ye have sold them and will return your recompense upon your own head:

⁸ and I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hand of the sons of Judah, and they shall sell them to the Sabeans, to a people far off: for the LORD has spoken it.

⁹ ¶ Proclaim this among the Gentiles: Prepare war; wake up the mighty men, let all the men of war draw near; let them come up:

¹⁰ beat your plowshares into swords and your pruninghooks into spears; let the weak say, I am strong.

¹¹ Assemble yourselves and come, all ye Gentiles, and gather yourselves together round about; there cause thy mighty ones to come down, O LORD.

¹² Let the Gentiles be wakened and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat for there I will sit to judge all the Gentiles round about.

¹³ Put in the sickle for the harvest is ripe; come, go down for the press is full, the vats overflow; for their wickedness is great.

¹⁴ Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision for the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision.

¹⁵ The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining.

¹⁶ The LORD also shall roar out of Zion and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth shall shake; but the LORD will be the hope of his people and the strength of the sons of Israel.

¹⁷ So shall ye know that I am the LORD your God, that I inhabit Zion, the mountain of my holiness: then shall Jerusalem be holy, and no strangers shall pass through her any more.

¹⁸ ¶ And it shall come to pass in that day that the mountains shall drop down new wine, and the hills shall flow with milk, and all the rivers of Judah shall flow with waters, and a fountain shall come forth of the house of the LORD and shall water the valley of Shittim.

¹⁹ Egypt shall be a desolation, and Edom shall be a desolate wilderness, for the violence against the sons of Judah because they have shed innocent blood in their land.

²⁰ But Judah shall dwell for ever; and Jerusalem from generation to generation.

²¹ For I will cleanse the blood of those whom I have not cleansed; for the LORD dwells in Zion.