TRV
Translation
King James Version
Hear this, ye old men, and give ear, all ye inhabitants of the land. Hath this been in your days, or even in the days of your fathers?
Complete Jewish Bible
"Hear this, you leaders! Listen, all who live in the land! Has anything like this ever happened in your days, or in your ancestors' days?
Berean Standard Bible
Hear this, O elders; and give ear, all who dwell in the land. Has anything like this ever happened in your days or in the days of your fathers?
American Standard Version
Hear this, ye old men, and give ear, all ye inhabitants of the land. Hath this been in your days, or in the days of your fathers?
World English Bible Messianic
Hear this, you elders, And listen, all you inhabitants of the land. Has this ever happened in your days, or in the days of your fathers?
Geneva Bible (1599)
Heare ye this, O Elders, and hearken ye all inhabitantes of the land, whether such a thing hath bene in your dayes, or yet in the dayes of your fathers.
Young's Literal Translation
Hear this, ye aged ones, And give ear, all ye inhabitants of the land, Hath this been in your days? Or in the days of your fathers?
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In the KJVVerse 22,294 of 31,102
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Commentary on Joel 1 verses 1–7
1 ¶ The word of the LORD that came to Joel the son of Pethuel.
2 Hear this, ye old men, and give ear, all ye inhabitants of the land. Hath this been in your days, or even in the days of your fathers?
3 Tell ye your children of it, and let your children tell their children, and their children another generation.
4 That which the palmerworm hath left hath the locust eaten; and that which the locust hath left hath the cankerworm eaten; and that which the cankerworm hath left hath the caterpiller 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 nation is come up upon my land, strong, and without number, whose teeth are the teeth of a lion, and he hath the cheek teeth of a great lion.
7 He hath laid my vine waste, and barked my fig tree: he hath made it clean bare, and cast it away; the branches thereof are made white.
It is a foolish fancy which some of the Jews have, that this Joel the prophet was the same with that Joel who was the son of Samuel (Sa1 8:2); yet one of their rabbin very gravely undertakes to show why Samuel is here called Pethuel. This Joel was long after that. He here speaks of a sad and sore judgment which was now brought, or to be brought, upon Judah, for their sins. Observe,
I. The greatness of the judgment, expressed here in two things: - 1. It was such as could not be paralleled in the ages that were past, in history, or in the memory of any living, Joe 1:2. The old men are appealed to, who could remember what had happened long ago; nay, and all the inhabitants of the land are called on to testify, if they could any of them remember the like. Let them go further than any man's memory, and prepare themselves for the search of their fathers (Job 8:8), and they would not find an account of the like in any record. Note, Those that outdo their predecessors in sin may justly expect to fall under greater and sorer judgments than any of their predecessors knew. 2. It was such as would not be forgotten in the ages to come (Joe 1:3): "Tell you your children of it; let them know what dismal tokens of the wrath of God you have been under, that they make take warning, and may learn obedience by the things which you have suffered, for it is designed for warning to them also. Yea, let your children tell their children, and their children another generation; let them tell it not only as a strange thing, which may serve for matter of talk" (as such uncommon accidents are records in our almanacs - It is so long since the plague, and fire - so long since the great frost, and the great wind), "but let them tell it to teach their children to stand in awe of God and of his judgments, and to tremble before him." Note, We ought to transmit to posterity the memorial of God's judgments as well as of his mercies.
II. The judgment itself; it is an invasion of the country of Judea by a great army. Many interpreters both ancient and modern understand it of armies of men, the forces of the Assyrians, which, under Sennacherib, took all the defenced cities of Judah, and then, no doubt, made havoc of the country and destroyed the products of it: nay, some make the four sorts of animals here names (Joe 1:4) to signify the four monarchies which, in their turns, were oppressive to the people of the Jews, one destroying what had escaped the fury of the other. Many of the Jewish expositors think it is a parabolic expression of the coming of enemies, and their multitude, to lay all waste. So the Chaldee paraphrast mentions these animals (Joe 1:4); but afterwards (Joe 2:25) puts instead of them, Nations, peoples, tongues, languages, potentates, and revenging kingdoms. But it seems much rather to be understood literally of armies of insects coming upon the land and eating up the fruits of it. Locusts were one of the plagues of Egypt. Of them it is said, There never were any like them, nor should be (Exo 10:14), none such as those in Egypt, none such as these in Judah - none like those locusts for bigness, none like these for multitude and the mischief they did. The plague of locusts in Egypt lasted but for a few days; this seems to have continued for four years successively (as some think), because here are four sorts of insects mentioned (Joe 1:4), one destroying what the other left; but others think they came all in one year. We are not told, in the history of the Old Testament, when this happened, but we are sure that no word of God fell to the ground; and, though a devastation by these insects is primarily intended here, yet it is expressed in such a language as is very applicable to the destruction of the country by a foreign enemy invading it, because, if the people were not humbled and reformed by that less judgment which devoured the land, God would send this greater upon them, which would devour the inhabitants; and by the description of that they are bidden to take it for a warning. If this nation of worms do not subdue them, another nation shall come to ruin them. Observe, 1. What these animals are that are sent against them - locusts and caterpillars, palmer-worms and canker-worms, Joe 1:4. We cannot now describe how these differed one from another; they were all little insects, any one of them despicable, and which a man might easily crush with his foot or with his finger; but when they came in vast swarms, or shoals, they were very formidable and ate up all before them. Note, God is Lord of hosts, has all creatures at his command, and, when he pleases, can humble and mortify a proud and rebellious people by the weakest and most contemptible creatures. Man is said to be a worm; and by this it appears that he is less than a worm, for, when God pleases, worms are too hard for him, plunder his country, eat up that for which he laboured, destroy the forage, and cut off the subsistence of a potent nation. The weaker the instrument is that God employs the more is his power magnified. 2. What fury and force they came with. They are here called a nation (Joe 1:6), because they are embodied, and act by consent, and as it were with a common design; for, though the locusts have no king, yet they go forth all of them by bands (Pro 30:27), and it is there mentioned as an instance of their wisdom. It is prudence for those that are weak severally to unite and act jointly. They are strong, for they are without number. The small dust of the balance is light, and easily blown away, but a heap of dust is weighty; so a worm can do little (yet one worm served to destroy Jonah's gourd), but numbers of them can do wonders. They are said to have teeth of a lion, of a great lion, because of the great and terrible execution they do. Note, Locusts become as lions when they come armed with a divine commission. We read of the locusts out of the bottomless pit, that their teeth were as the teeth of lions, Rev 9:8. 3. What mischief they do. They eat up all before them (Joe 1:4); what one leaves the other devours; they destroy not only the grass and corn, but the trees (Joe 1:7): The vine is laid waste. There vermin eat the leaves which should be a shelter to the fruit while it ripens, and so that also perishes and comes to nothing. They eat the very bark of the fig-tree, and so kill it. Thus the fig-tree does not blossom, nor is there fruit in the vine.
III. A call to the drunkards to lament this judgment (Joe 1:5): Awake and weep, all you drinkers of wine. This intimates, 1. That they should suffer very sensibly by this calamity. It should touch them in a tender part; the new wine which they loved so well should be cut off from their mouth. Note, It is just with God to take away those comforts which are abused to luxury and excess, to recover the corn and wine which are prepared for Baal, which are made the food and fuel of a base lust. And to them judgments of that kind are most grievous. The more men place their happiness in the gratification of sense the more pressing temporal afflictions are upon them. The drinkers of water need not to care when the vine was laid waste; they could live as well without it as they had done; it was no trouble to the Nazarites. But the drinkers of wine will weep and howl. The more delights we make necessary to our satisfaction the more we expose ourselves to trouble and disappointment. 2. It intimates that they had been very senseless and stupid under the former tokens of God's displeasure; and therefore they are here called to awake and weep. Those that will not be roused out of their security by the word of God shall be roused by his rod; those that will not be startled by judgments at a distance shall be themselves arrested by them; and when they are going to partake of the forbidden fruit a prohibition of another nature shall come between the cup and the lip, and cut off the wine from their mouth.
Matthew Henry (1662–1714) — Commentary on the Whole Bible. This section covers verses 1–7. Public domain.
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JeromeAD 420
Commentary on Joel
(Version 2, 3.) Listen to this, elders, and perceive with your ears, all inhabitants of the earth, whether this happened in your days or in the days of your fathers: tell this to your children, and let your children tell their children, and let their children tell the next generation. LXX: Listen to these things, elders, and perceive with your ears, all inhabitants of the earth, whether such things happened in your days or in the days of your fathers: tell this to your children, and let your children tell their children, and let their children tell the next generation. The elderly are ordered to listen, the inhabitants of the earth to perceive with their ears. It is not said to the elderly, 'Listen, everyone'; to the inhabitants of the earth it is added, 'Perceive with your ears, everyone.' For in the holy scriptures, hearing is not that which resonates in the ear, but that which is perceived in the heart, according to what the Lord speaks in the Gospel: 'He who has ears to hear, let him hear' (Matt. 13:9). And what we have translated as 'perceive with your ears' is the same word in Greek and Hebrew, in Greek it is ἐνωτίσασθε, in Hebrew it is Eezinu, which is properly perceived not in the heart, but in the ear. And in order that we may know that hearing is more sacred than that which resonates in the ears, let us learn from the words of Isaiah: 'Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth' (Isa. I, 2). The elderly, who are heavenly, hear spiritually; those who dwell on the earth, and are called earthly, hear with their ears. And this should be noted in all the Scriptures where these two words are joined together. We also read this in the case of Lamech, a sinner, who spoke to his wives Ada and Sella: 'Hear my words, O wives of Lamech, give ear to my words, for I have slain a man to my wounding, and a young man to my hurt' (Gen. IV, 23); he knew that what he spoke was obscure, and therefore he called his wives not only to the simple sound of his words, but also to the understanding of his hidden sayings. So if someone is an old man, and an old man chosen in the Lord of mature age, as we read in the following passages according to the Septuagint Interpreters, and he has left behind the infancy of little ones, let him hear what is being said. But whoever still dwells on the earth, and cannot say, “I am a stranger and a pilgrim like all my fathers” (Ps. 39:12), let him perceive with his ears. If it has happened, he says, in your days, or in the days of your fathers. The art of rhetoric, focused on the magnitude of things, captivates the listener: no age, he says, remembers these things, which have not happened in your time, nor in the time of your fathers and ancestors. But recognize the fathers, grandfathers, and great-grandfathers, and the sons of sons, and all the subsequent offspring, according to that Virgilian saying (Aeneid, Book III):
And the children of the children, and those who will be born from them:
And therefore, old men and inhabitants of the earth, tell your sons and posterity; let the old man teach his children the mysteries: let the inhabitant of the earth tell a simple story. Until this day, we who believe in Christ, from whom the veil has been taken away from our eyes together with Moses, and of whom it is said: The wisdom of an aged man is in his gray hairs (Wis. IV, 8), we narrate secret and wonderful things to our children. But the Jews who inhabit the land speak earthly things, and cling to the earth, of whom it is written: He who is of the earth speaks of the earth: He who comes from heaven is above all (John III, 31).
Theodoret of CyrusAD 458
Ecclesiastical History 4:19
But these same villains, vessels of wrath fitted for destruction,2 screwed up their noses and poured out, if I may say so, as from a well-head, foul noises through their nostrils and rent the raiment from Christ’s holy virgins, whose conversation gave an exact likeness of saints. They dragged them in triumph, naked as when they were born, through all the town. They made indecent sport of them at their pleasure. Their deeds were barbarous and cruel. Anyone who interfered in pity and was urged to mercy was dismissed with wounds. Ah! Woe is me. Many a virgin underwent brutal violation. Many a maid beaten on the head with clubs lay dumb. Even their bodies were not allowed to be given up for burial. Their grief-stricken parents cannot find their corpses to this day. But why recount woes that seem small when compared with greater? Why linger over these and not hurry on to events more urgent? When you hear them, I know that you will wonder and will stand with us long dumb, amazed at the kindness of the Lord in not bringing all things utterly to an end. At the very altar the impious perpetrated the very things that, as Joel had prophesied, were never heard of and had never happened before in the days of our fathers.
Source: Quotations drawn from early Church Fathers and historical Christian theologians (AD 100–1500). Some quotes address the surrounding passage context rather than this verse alone.
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SUMMARY
Joel 1:2 opens the prophetic book with an urgent and solemn summons to the entire nation of Judah, particularly its elders, to heed an unprecedented and catastrophic event. The prophet's rhetorical question underscores the unparalleled nature of the impending or unfolding disaster, indicating that its magnitude surpasses anything experienced in living memory or passed down through generations. This immediate establishment of an extraordinary crisis sets a tone of divine judgment and a pressing call for national attention and spiritual discernment.
CONTEXT
EXPOSITION AND ANALYSIS
Key Word Analysis
Verse Breakdown
Literary Devices
Joel 1:2 masterfully employs several literary devices to convey its urgent message. The use of Imperative Commands ("Hear this," "give ear") immediately establishes a tone of authority and urgency, demanding immediate and serious attention from the audience. This is reinforced by Parallelism, where "Hear this" and "give ear" function as synonymous expressions, intensifying the call to listen. Similarly, the audience is broadened from "ye old men" to "all ye inhabitants of the land," demonstrating a progression from specific authority figures to the entire populace. The most prominent device is the Rhetorical Question: "Hath this been in your days, or even in the days of your fathers?" This question is not posed to elicit information but to make a forceful assertion about the unprecedented nature of the impending disaster. It leverages the collective historical memory of the people to underscore the uniqueness and gravity of the divine judgment, creating a sense of awe and dread. This rhetorical strategy also employs a form of Hyperbole, suggesting that the coming event is so catastrophic that it transcends all prior historical experience, thereby magnifying its impact.
THEOLOGICAL AND THEMATIC CONNECTIONS
Joel 1:2 immediately establishes a profound theological foundation for the entire book, emphasizing God's sovereign involvement in human history and His direct communication with His people through prophetic warnings. The call to "hear" and "give ear" underscores the biblical principle that God speaks, and humanity is obligated to listen and respond. The unprecedented nature of the impending calamity points to God's use of extraordinary means to capture the attention of a complacent or disobedient people, signaling a moment of divine reckoning. This sets the stage for the "Day of the Lord," a concept central to prophetic literature, where God intervenes decisively in human affairs, often bringing judgment but also offering a pathway to repentance and restoration. The verse highlights the importance of intergenerational spiritual awareness, where the wisdom of the past informs the present's understanding of God's dealings.
REFLECTION AND APPLICATION
Joel 1:2 serves as a timeless summons to spiritual vigilance and responsiveness. In a world often characterized by distraction and spiritual apathy, the prophet's urgent call to "hear this" and "give ear" resonates powerfully. It reminds us that God consistently communicates with humanity, whether through His written Word, the circumstances of life, or the voices of faithful messengers. We are challenged to cultivate a posture of attentive listening, recognizing that divine warnings are not meant to condemn but to call us to repentance and a deeper relationship with Him. When we encounter events of unusual magnitude or difficulty in our personal lives or in the broader world, this verse prompts us to pause and consider if God is speaking, drawing our attention to His purposes or a need for spiritual introspection. Furthermore, Joel's appeal to the "old men" and the "days of your fathers" highlights the invaluable wisdom found in historical memory and the experience of previous generations. We are encouraged to learn from the past, to value the insights of spiritual elders, and to understand that God's dealings with humanity are consistent, even as their manifestations may be unprecedented. This verse ultimately calls us to an intergenerational responsibility: to pass on spiritual truths and to collectively discern God's hand in our present moment, ensuring that the lessons of history are not forgotten and that each generation remains prepared to respond to His voice.
Questions for Reflection
FAQ
What is the "this" that Joel is referring to in verse 2?
Answer: While not explicitly defined in Joel 1:2, the "this" refers to the unprecedented and catastrophic events that Joel is about to describe in detail throughout the rest of chapter 1. Primarily, it points to a devastating locust plague of unparalleled severity, followed by a severe drought, which together would bring the land of Judah to the brink of ruin. This disaster is presented not merely as a natural phenomenon but as a divine judgment, a foretaste of the greater "Day of the Lord" that the prophet will elaborate upon later in the book Joel 2:1-11.
Why does Joel specifically address the "old men" first, before all the inhabitants?
Answer: In ancient Israelite society, "old men" (elders) held positions of respect, authority, and wisdom. They were the custodians of communal memory, history, and tradition. By addressing them first, Joel appeals to their unique ability to confirm the unprecedented nature of the impending disaster. Their historical knowledge would validate the prophet's assertion that "Hath this been in your days, or even in the days of your fathers?" The elders' inability to recall a similar event would underscore the extraordinary gravity of the situation, thereby lending credibility and urgency to Joel's prophetic message for the entire nation.
CHRIST-CENTERED FULFILLMENT
Joel 1:2, with its urgent call to "hear" an unprecedented event, finds profound Christ-centered fulfillment in the person and work of Jesus Christ. Just as Joel summoned the people to heed an unparalleled divine visitation, so too does the New Testament present Jesus as the ultimate, unparalleled divine visitation, whose coming marked a turning point in human history, far surpassing anything that had come before. Jesus Himself frequently began His teachings with "He who has ears to hear, let him hear" Matthew 11:15, echoing Joel's imperative and calling for a spiritual hearing that leads to understanding and obedience. The "unprecedented" nature of the locust plague in Joel foreshadows the truly unprecedented event of God becoming man, living a sinless life, dying on a cross for the sins of the world, and rising again. This ultimate act of divine intervention, the "Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world" John 1:29, is the most significant event in all of history, far exceeding any natural disaster. Furthermore, the "Day of the Lord" that Joel warns about finds its ultimate and final fulfillment in Christ's return, when He will judge the living and the dead Acts 17:31 and establish His eternal kingdom. Thus, Joel's call to attention becomes a perpetual call for all humanity to "hear" and respond to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the one who brings both judgment and salvation, and whose coming is truly without historical precedent.