Be confounded, you farmers! Wail, you vineyard keepers; for the wheat and for the barley; for the harvest of the field has perished.
Parallel Translations
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Be confounded, you farmers! Wail, you vineyard keepers; for the wheat and for the barley; for the harvest of the field has perished.
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Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen; howl, O ye vinedressers, for the wheat and for the barley; because the harvest of the field is perished.
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Be ashamed, O ye husbandmen, wail, O ye vinedressers, for the wheat and for the barley; because the harvest of the field is perished.
Cross-references (5)
Passages linked to Joel 1:11 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Jeremiah 14:3-4 Their nobles send their little ones to the waters. They come to the cisterns, and find no water. They return with their vessels empty. They are disappointed and confounded, and cover their heads. Because of the ground which is cracked, because no rain has been in the land, the plowmen are disappointed. They cover their heads.
- Isaiah 17:11 In the day of your planting, you hedge it in. In the morning, you make your seed blossom, but the harvest flees away in the day of grief and of desperate sorrow.
- Jeremiah 9:12 Who is wise enough to understand this? Who is he to whom the mouth of Yahweh has spoken, that he may declare it? Why has the land perished and burned up like a wilderness, so that no one passes through?
- Amos 5:16 Therefore Yahweh, the God of Armies, the Lord, says: “Wailing will be in all the wide ways; and they will say in all the streets, ‘Alas! Alas!’ and they will call the farmer to mourning, and those who are skillful in lamentation to wailing.
- Romans 5:5 and hope doesn’t disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain The Prophet says nothing new here, but only strengthens…
The Prophet says nothing new here, but only strengthens what he had said before, and is not wordy without reason; for he intends here not merely to teach, but also to produce an effect: And this is the design of heavenly teaching; for God not only wishes that what he says may be understood, but intends also to penetrate into our hearts: and the word of God, we know, consists not of doctrine only, but also of exhortations, and threatenings, and reproofs. This plan then the Prophet now pursues: Ye husband men, he says, be ashamed, and ye vinedressers, howl; for perished has the harvest of the field. The sum of the whole is, that the Jews, as we have already said, could by no excuse cover their indifference; for their clamor was everywhere heard, their complaints everywhere resounded, that the land had become a waste, that they were themselves famished that they were afflicted with many calamities; and yet no one acknowledged that God, who visited them for their sins, was the author. But what remains I shall put off until to-morrow.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Joe 1:11 Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen; howl,…
Joe 1:11 Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen; howl, O ye vinedressers, for the wheat and for the barley; because the harvest of the field is perished.
Ver. 11. Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen] This repetition of his former exhortation is not needless; for man is a stout and stubborn creature; neither goeth anything more against the hair and the heart with him than to come downward, and to be so soundly sensible of God’s judgments as seriously to repent. Hence St James’s extraordinary importunity in pressing this most needful but much neglected duty, Jas 4:9-10. He knew, and so did our prophet, that this work must be done, or else men are undone. Hence that heap of words. Nunquam satis dicitur quod nunquam satis discitur (Seneca). That can never be too much taught that is never enough learned.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen: some read it…
Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen: some read it assertively, the husbandmen are ashamed, and as to matter of fact it is true they were ashamed; but the imperative mood, or by way of exhortation, will better suit the context. They are now called upon to blush, repent, and search into the cause of this barrenness, and loss of their labour in ploughing, sowing, and manuring their tillage; the prophet aims at this principally, to bring them, as well as the priests, to repentance.
Vine-dressers; a sort of men as well known with that people as gardeners are with us; men whose work was to plant, water, prune, and manage vineyards, and whose labour (unless for sin blasted) did usually succeed to a great increase.
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Because the harvest of the field is perished; your sins have brought upon you this woeful scarcity, your harvest in which you expected your labour, and cares should be recompensed is perished, quite destroyed, as the word imports. This is just cause why you, O husbandmen, should lament, and further inquire why God is so displeased with you.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen,.... Tillers of the…
Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen,.... Tillers of the land, who have took a great deal of pains in cultivating the earth, dunging, ploughing, and sowing it; confusion may cover you, because of your disappointment, the increase not answering to your expectations and labours:
howl, O ye vinedressers; that worked in the vineyards, set the vines, watered and pruned them, and, when they had done all they could to them, were dried up with the drought, or devoured by the locusts, as they were destroyed by the Assyrians or Chaldeans; and therefore had reason to howl and lament, all their labour being lost:
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for the wheat and for the barley: because the harvest of the field is perished; this belongs to the husbandmen, is a reason for their shame and blushing, because the wheat and barley were destroyed before they were ripe; and so they had neither wheat nor barley harvest. The words, by a transposition, would read better, and the sense be clearer, "thus, be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen, for the wheat and for the barley: because the harvest", &c. "howl, O ye vine dressers"; for what follows:
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain Be ye ashamed - This is a just cause…
Be ye ashamed - This is a just cause why you should lament and inquire why God is so displeased with you.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain Joe 1:11-12. Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen —…
Joe 1:11-12. Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen — Be struck with confusion to see all your hopes disappointed, and no fruit arising from your labour; to find nothing of that which you had made yourselves sure of. Howl, O ye vine-dressers — This is to be referred to what is said in the next verse, and not to the words immediately following, which belong to the husbandmen, as the subject for their lamentation; as the vine, being dried up, was the cause of the sorrow of the vine-dressers. Because joy is withered away from the sons of men — Through want of food and wine. Or, he refers to the joy they used to show at the gathering in of the fruits of the earth.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain Be ye ashamed, O ye farmers - The prophet…
Be ye ashamed, O ye farmers - The prophet dwells on and expands the description of the troubles which he had foretold, setting before their eyes the picture of one universal dessolation. For the details of sorrow most touch the heart, and he wished to move them to repentance. He pictures them to themselves; some standing aghast and ashamed of the fruitlessness of their toil others giving way to bursts of sorrow, and all things around waste and dried. Nothing was exempt. Wheat and barley, widespread as they were (and the barley in those countries, “more fertile” than the wheat,) perished utterly. The rich juice of the vine, the luscious sweetness of the fig the succulence of the ever-green pomegranate, the majesty of the palm tree, the fragrance of the eastern apple, exempted them not. All, fruitbearing or barren, were dried up, for joy itself, and every source of joy was dried up from the sons of men.
All these suggest a spiritual meaning. For we know of a spiritual harvest, souls born to God, and a spiritual vineyard, the Church of God; and spiritual farmers and vinedressers, those whom God sends. The trees, with their various fruits were emblems of the faithful, adorned with the various gifts and graces of the Spirit. All well-nigh were dried up. Wasted without, in act and deed, the sap of the Spirit ceased within; the true laborers, those who were jealous for the vineyard of the Lord of hosts were ashamed and grieved. : “Husbandmen” and “vinedressers,” are priests and preachers; “farmers” as instructors in morals, “vinedressers” for that joy in things eternal, which they infuse into the minds of the bearers. “Husbandmen,” as instructing the soul to deeds of righteousness; vinedressers, as exciting the minds of hearers to the love of wisdom. Or, “farmers,” in that by their doctrine they uproot earthly deeds and desires; “vinedressers,” as holding forth spiritual gifts.” “The vine is the richness of divine knowledge; the fig the sweetness of contemplation and the joyousness in things eternal.” The pomegranate, with its manifold grains contained under its one bark, may designate the variety and harmony of graces, disposed in their beautiful order. “The palm, rising above the world.” : “Well is the life of the righteous likened to a palm, in that the palm below is rough to the touch, and in a manner enveloped in dry bark, but above it is adorned with fruit, fair even to the eye; below it is compressed by the enfoldings of its bark; above, it is spread nut in amplitude of beautiful greenness. For so is the life of the elect, despised below, beautiful above. Down below, it is, as it were, enfolded in many barks, in that it is straitened by innumerable afflictions. But on high it is expanded into a foliage, as it were, of beautiful greenness by the amplitude of the rewarding.”
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain Be . . . ashamed--that is, Ye shall have…
Be . . . ashamed--that is, Ye shall have the shame of disappointment on account of the failure of "the wheat" and "barley . . . harvest."
howl . . . vine dressers--The semicolon should follow, as it is the "husbandmen" who are to be "ashamed . . . for the wheat." The reason for the "vine dressers" being called to "howl" does not come till Joe 1:12, "The vine is dried up."
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 11, 12. Call to the plowmen and to the…
11, 12. Call to the plowmen and to the vinedressers. They too have ground for lamentation, since their prospects are completely ruined. It is better to regard Joe_1:11 as an appeal and not as a declaratory sentence. The special appeal in Joe_1:5 advances to the general in Joe_1:8, then returns to the special in Joe_1:11.
Be ye ashamed — The Hebrew verb is used also in the sense of “to be disappointed” (Isa_1:29; Isa_20:5); it expresses intense disappointment, which manifests itself in the terrified look, the change of color; we might render, with Keil, “turn pale.” The cause for terror is stated in the latter part of the verse, “for the wheat and for the barley, because the harvest of the field is perished.” The locusts have devastated everything.
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Howl, O ye vinedressers — Since the destruction of various trees (Joe_1:12) seems to be the cause for the lamentation of the “vinedressers,” it is necessary to seek a more comprehensive term; kerem means “vineyard,” but also “garden” or “orchard” (Jdg_15:5); the korem is therefore the keeper of the orchard, the gardener as well as the vinedresser.
The fig tree — Native in Western Asia; very plentiful in Palestine. It was highly prized, and is often mentioned along with the vine (Deu_8:8; Jer_5:17). To “sit under one’s vine and fig tree” is a symbol of prosperity and security (1Ki_4:25; Mic_4:4). Figs were dried and pressed into cakes, and they formed a staple article of food (1Sa_25:18); they were used also as a poultice (2Ki_20:7; Isa_38:21). Grapes and figs are called by Josephus (Wars, iii, 10:8) “the principal fruits of the land”; and it is said by travelers that “many houses are entirely covered with vines and are hidden almost entirely behind fig trees.”
Pomegranate tree — The Scripture references to the pomegranate are very numerous (Num_13:23; Num_20:5; Deu_8:8; 1Sa_14:2; Son_4:3; Son_4:13). It is a shrub or low tree, from ten to fifteen feet high, with small dark green foliage; the fruit is about the size of an orange, with a hard rind, yellowish or brownish, with a blush of red; it is filled with numerous seeds, each enveloped in bright red pulp, whence the Latin and English names grained apple. The fruit is of two varieties, the sweet and the acid. The pulp is most refreshing to the taste; the juice of the acid kind is sweetened as a beverage (Son_8:2), and is also used in salads. The name “Gath-rimmon” (Jos_21:25) signifies winepress of the pomegranate, and implies that the wine-presses of the city were used for the making of pomegranate wine. The rind and bark and outer part of the root are valued for the tannin which they contain. The pomegranate is highly prized and extensively cultivated even now. (See Van Lennep, Bible Lands, 140f.; Thomson, The Land and the Book, 2:392).
Palm tree — The palm tree has existed “since prehistoric times over a vast area in the dry warm zone which extends from Senegal to the basin of the Indus, chiefly between the fifteenth to thirtieth degrees of latitude.” It is uncertain where it was cultivated first, but there is sufficient evidence to show that it was cultivated very early in Babylonia, Egypt, and Arabia. In Syria, including Palestine, the tree seems to have been common; the name Phoenicia is thought by some to be connected with its Greek name. The coin struck at Rome to commemorate the capture of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. represented a weeping woman, the symbol of the country, sitting under a palm tree, with the inscription Judaea capta. At present palm trees are not found in great numbers in Syria except in the plain of Philistia, in the neighborhood of Beirut, and near Jericho. Tamar, the word used here, is the name of the date palm, a tree consisting of a single stem or trunk fifty to sixty feet high, without a branch, and “crowned at the summit by a cluster or tuft of leaves that droop and shape themselves somewhat in the form of an umbrella.” The uses of the palm are numerous. The leaves are useful for covering the roofs and sides of houses, for fences, mats, and baskets. The palm yields “an excellent kind of honey, not much inferior in sweetness to other honey” (Josephus, Wars, iv, 8:3). The fruit grows in large clusters which hang from the trunk, and it constitutes an important article of food. Even the stony seeds are ground and yield nourishment for the camels. Old Testament references to the palm trees are frequent. (See Van Lennep, Bible Lands, 146ff.; Tristram, Natural History of the Bible, 378ff.)
The apple tree — Heb, tappuah. Opinions vary as to the tree designated by this name. It has been identified with the quince, the citron, the orange, the apricot, and the apple. To decide the question we must examine the references to the tree in the Old Testament, that we may see which one meets all the conditions. According to Son_2:3, it must be a majestic tree suitable to sit under; according to Son_8:5, its branches must expand sufficiently to overshadow a tent or a house; according to Son_2:3, its fruit must be pleasant to the taste; according to Son_7:8, its smell must be desirable; according to Son_2:5, it must refresh the weary. Tristram (pp. 334ff.) declares that it cannot be the apple, “for though that fruit is cultivated with success in the higher parts of Lebanon, out of the boundaries of the Holy Land, yet it barely exists in the country itself.…
The climate is far too hot for the apple tree. There is one fruit, however, that meets all the requirements of the context, and the only one which does so — the apricot.” Nevertheless, it is doubtful if the apricot would be mentioned as a fruit of special fragrance; nor is it used above others to refresh the weary. The quince cannot be meant, for its fruit is sour, never sweet. The citron was introduced into Palestine probably later than Old Testament times; so also the orange. Notwithstanding Tristram’s statement, there seems no serious objection to identifying the tappuah with the apple, for, as G.E. Post says, “The apple fulfills all the conditions perfectly; it is a fruit tree which often attains a large size, is planted in orchards and near houses, and is a special favorite of the people in Palestine and Syria. It is true that the fruit of the Syrian apple is far inferior to that of Europe, and especially to that of America; nevertheless it is a favorite with all the people, and in a few places fine varieties have been introduced and thriven well.… They have the aroma of the better kinds, and it is for this quality that they are most prized. It is very common, when visiting a friend, to have an apple handed to you just to smell” (article “Apple,” Hastings’s Dictionary of the Bible; Thomson, The Land and the Book, 2:328, 329). The trees mentioned by name are the most precious, but they are not the only ones that have suffered; all the trees of the field are withered — The verb might be used of the devastation by the locusts; so Jerome, “All trees, whether fruit-bearing or not, are consumed by the destructive locusts”; but, as Credner first suggested, it may have reference to the effects of a drought accompanying the plague of locusts (Joe_1:17-20).
The last clause of Joe_1:12 is rendered better, “yea, joy is vanished from the sons of men.” It emphasizes at once the effect of the general destruction and the cause of the universal lamentation. The joy is the rejoicing in anticipation of the harvest and of the vintage, and at those seasons of the year (Hos_9:1). There will be neither harvest nor vintage.
Is withered — Or, is vanished. The same verb is translated in Joe_1:10, “dried up”; in Joe_1:11, “be ashamed”; in Joe_1:12, “dried up”: a play upon words throughout. Literally, showeth shame. As a person whose nature it is to be running over with gladness is ashamed of his hilarity in the presence of grief and withdraws, so rejoicing, out of place in the midst of this calamity, vanishes.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 11. Be ashamed] more exactly shew shame, i.e. manifest,…
11. Be ashamed] more exactly shew shame, i.e. manifest, by overt signs, your disappointment. To shew shame (or to be ashamed) is said in Hebrew idiomatically where we should say be disappointed: it expresses, however, a little more than our English phrase, for it signifies rather to be disconcerted, or to shew, in countenance or demeanour, overt signs of disappointment. People are thus often said to be “ashamed,” when the help, or support, on which they rely fails them: see e.g. Isa_1:29 (the Israelites to be ‘ashamed’ of the oaks which they have desired, i.e. disappointed of the rewards which they hoped that the rites observed under them would bring them), Isa_20:5 (those who rely upon Egypt to be “ashamed,” i.e. disappointed; similarly Isa_30:5); Job_6:20 (caravans in the wilderness, travelling to a wady in which they expect to find water, are “ashamed” when they arrive there and find none). With the usage here, cf. Jer_14:3 b, 4b.
vine-dressers] more exactly, vineyard-keepers. These are in this verse subordinate: the reason why they are to lament appearing only in Joe_1:12.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain Vers. 11, 12. Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen.…
Vers. 11, 12. Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen. The verb from vwB (formed from vbey), to be or feel ashamed, or turn pale with shame; rpej is "to blush or turn red with shame." It is written defectively, to distinguish it from vybiwOh, which occurs in the tenth verse and again in the twelfth, and which is the Hiph. of vbey, to be parched or dried up. Their hope was disappointed through the destruction of their wheat and barley their most serviceable and valuable cereals; while disappointment of hope causes shame; hence we read of a "hope that maketh not ashamed, because it never disappoints as empty hopes do. Howl, O ye vinedressers, for the wheat and for the harley; because the harvest of the field is perished. The vine is dried up, and the fig tree languisheth. There is a transposition here which is a species of the figure ehiasmus, so called from the form of the Greek letter chi (c). The husbandmen are put to shame on account of the destruction of the wheat and barley the entire failure of their field crops and ruin of their harvest; while the vinedressers have reason to howl because of the loss of their vines and the languishing of their fig trees. The prophet, after particularizing the vine and fig tree, proceeds with the enumeration of other important fruit trees that had perished by the teeth of the locusts. The pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all the trees of the field, are withered.
The pomegranate, though abundant in that region, had shared the fate of the fig and vine; even the palm tree, the date palm, though a vigorous tree and little subject to injury, having no juice in the leaves or fresh greenness in the rind, ceased to flourish; and the apple tree the medicinal apple, as Virgil terms it suffered in like manner. Nor was it the fruit trees only that were injured; the hardier forest or timber trees all the trees of the field shared in the calamity. Thus Jerome represents the prophet as asking, "Why should I speak of the corn, wine, oil, and barley? when even the fruits of the trees have been dried up, the fig trees have languished, with the pomegranate and palm and apple; and all trees, whether fruit-bearing or not, are consumed by the devastating locusts." Because joy is withered away from the sons of men. This clause is connected by" because" with "howl," the intermediate words being treated parenthetically or passed over. Joy here is either
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(1) literal; while "withered" is figurative, and signifies "has ceased or been taken away;" or
(2) "joy" is figurative, denoting the means of joy, and" withered" may then be understood literally. The rain, from, is a pregnant construction, that is, "is withered from" being equivalent to "is withered and taken away from" the sons of men. Thus Kimchi: Because joy is withered is withered, as if he said, "it has ceased because the products and the fruits are the joy of the sons of men," and so Jonathan explains it, "because joy has ceased;" or the meaning of "withered" may be by way of figure."
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain The harvest of the field is perished.
Joe_1:11-12
The harvest of the field is perished.
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The destructive nature of sin
The prophet still lingers on the theme of his solemn and faithful discourses and urges all classes to attend to him that their sin and sorrow may be removed. He did not seek new or pleasing themes on which to address the nation. He was anxious to produce a deep and lasting conviction, and hence dwelt long on the subject which he felt to be of the greatest importance.
I. It is destructive of human labour. Because the harvest of the field is perished. The tillers of Judah had taken a great deal of pains in cultivating their soil; they had ploughed and sowed it, and certainly expected as the result a rich and golden harvest. Also the vine dressers had worked hard in the vineyards in watering and pruning the vines, and anticipated their reward. But the wheat and barley were destroyed before they were ripe; and the vines were withered. Thus we see how sin destroys the products of human labour and industry; how it utterly wastes those things which are designed by God to supply the wants of man, and to be remunerative of his energy.
1. Sin is destructive by incapacitating man for industrious labour. There are many men so enfeebled by sin that they are really unable to go into the fields and attend to advancing harvests, they are unable to look after the growth of the vines and the pomegranate tree. They are divested of their vital energy and of their muscular power by a continued habit of transgression against the laws of purity and temperance.
2. Sin is destructive by rendering men prodigal of the time which should be occupied by industrious labour. There are men who will only work three or four days in a week; the rest they spend in idleness. Thus fields are untilled, the vines are neglected, while indolent pleasures are pursued.
3. Sin is destructive by diminishing the ultimate utility of industrious labour. The fields and the vines may be productive of crops and fruits, but if man were a saint instead of a sinner he would enhance their value by putting them to the best and highest use. Sin makes the labour of men tess useful than otherwise it would be.
II. It is destructive of the good and beauteous things of the material universe.
1. Sin destroys the beautiful things of the material universe. We can well imagine the desolated condition of the land of Judah robbed of all its harvests and fruits. The corn stricken. The vines withered. The trees peeled of their bark. Nature, divested of her beautiful vesture of green and gay life, a complete wreck. The difference between Eden and the world as we now see it is entirely occasioned by sin. How lovely would this universe appear were all sin removed from amidst its fields and vines!
2. Sin destroys the valuable things of the material universe. It destroys the things which are appointed to sustain the very life of man, and failing which the grave is immediately sure. It does not merely destroy the little superfluities of the universe, but its most essential and strongest things.
III. It is destructive of that joy which is the destined heritage of man. Because joy is withered away from the sons of men.
1. It is certain that God designed that man should experience enjoyment in a wise use of the things around him. God does not wish man to be miserable in the universe which He has made for his welfare. But the use of His creatures must be wise. They must not he abused by excess or ingratitude, or they will be withdrawn, and the joy they should give will be turned into mourning. Let us not rest in the creature, but in the Creator, and seek all our joy in Him, then it shall never fail.
2. Sin is destructive of those things which should inspire joy in the soul of man. It destroys the harvests to which he had looked forward as the reward of earnest toil. It brings him into great need and destitution. It hushes the joy of a nation. Lessons--
1. That sin is destructive of human toil.
2. That sin divests the world of its beauty.
3. That sin is incompatible with true joy. (J. S. Exell, M. A.)
The advantages of a bad harvest
A harvest may be called bad as compared with expectation or as compared with crops of former years; or as compared with the harvests of other lands. Under Gods benign providence a bad harvest is an instrument for good to men. Like all chastisement, it becomes a blessing to such as are exercised thereby.
I. It recalls us to a sense of our dependence upon God. In these days law is everything. There is a tendency to exclude God from nature. What is law but His will? Adversity helps to cure this sore evil. Do what men will, they cannot make sure of results. There are causes beyond their ken. There are influences at work which they cannot control.
II. It awakens us to a deeper peeling of the evil of sin. Calamity witnesses for God against sin. Things are out of course. Every pain, every sorrow, every disaster is a call to repentance. Calamity that affects a whole people is as the ringing of the great bell of providence, summoning a whole nation to repent;
III. It serves as a time of discipline for the improvement of character and the promotion of the general good. Calamity is fitted to humble us. It teaches patience. It stimulates thrift and economy. It quickens the inventive faculties. It moves the heart to a truer sympathy with the struggling and the poor. It develops trade and commerce and civilisation. And commerce becomes a pioneer of the Gospel.
IV. It impresses the soul with a sense of its higher needs and duties. This great lesson is always needful, and never more than in this grossly material age.
V. It invites us to draw nearer to God, and to regard him as the only true and supreme God. If we believe on Christ we should be brave and hopeful. Let the worst come to the worst, our highest interests are safe. In the most desperate straits we may rejoice in God. (William Forsyth, M.A.)
The shame of the husbandman
The husbandmen and vine-dressers should be ashamed, and disappointed of their expectations, through the barrenness of land and trees.
1. Albeit men are bound to labour for their daily bread, yet except God bless, their labour will be in vain, and their expectations by it end in sad disappointments.
2. Sin doth procure great desolation, and doth provoke God to destroy whatsoever is pleasant or profitable to the sinner, and leave him under confusion and sorrow. So much is imported in the first reason of their shame and howling.
3. Albeit men ordinarily count little of the mercy of their daily bread, and of the increase of their labours, yet the want of it would soon be felt as a sad stroke, and will overturn much of their joy and cheerfulness.
4. The matter of mens joy is Gods gift, to give or take it away as He pleaseth; and whatever joy, warranted or unlawful, men have about anything beneath God, it is but uncertain and fading, and ought to be looked on as such; for here, when God pleaseth, He maketh joy to wither away. (George Hutcheson.)
All the trees of the field are withered.
The voice in withered leaves
I. We have a reminder of mans mortality. We all do fade as a leaf. On festive occasions the ancients had a curious custom to remind them of their mortality. Just before the feast a skeleton was carried about in the presence of the assembled guests. The value of human life does not depend upon its length so much as upon its fulness.
II. We have a reminder of the perishing nature of all earthly things. The picture of withered nature in our text is of blight in summer--death just when life is most expected. It is used by Joel as an illustration of the material decay of Israel, living in sin, and exposed to the inroads of enemies without the favour and protection of God. Material blessings are provided for us by the Giver of all good, but we must remember that transitory and uncertain are the things that appear most stable. Men forget this, and reap bitter disappointments in life.
III. We have a reminder of the resurrection. The leaves are falling, but the trees are not dying. In the very decay of autumn we have the promise and hope of spring. And this is the hope of the Christian in view of decay and death. At every stage of life we suffer loss and decay, but every stage brings also fresh gain and new experience. And when we come to the last stage it will be so in richer measure. Our flesh shall rest in hope. (James Menzies.)
Because Joy is withered away from the sons of men.--
Sin destroys joy
A brittle thing is our earthly happiness--brittle as some thin vase of Venetian glass; and yet neither anxiety, nor sorrow, nor the dart of death, which is mightier than the oak-cleaving thunderbolt, can shatter a thing even so brittle as the earthly happiness of our poor little homes if we place that happiness under the care of God. But though neither anguish nor death can break it with all their violence, sin can break it at a touch; and selfishness can shatter it, just as there are acids which will shiver the Venetian glass. Sin and selfishness--Gods balm does not heal in this world the ravages which they cause! (Dean Farrar.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain Joe_1:11.] The third appeal to husbandmen and vinedressers. Wheat…
CRITICAL NOTES.]
Joe_1:11.] The third appeal to husbandmen and vinedressers. Wheat and barley destroyed before their eyes; vines languish and choice fruit-trees perish.
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Joe_1:12. Joy] The joy of harvest withered away (Psa_4:7; Isa_9:3).
HOMILETICS
DISAPPOINTED HUSBANDMEN.—Joe_1:11-12
The next picture is a group of husbandmen and vine-dressers, pale and sick in disappointed toils. Wheat and barley the most important field crops; the vine, fig, and pomegranate, the choice fruit-trees of the land, were destroyed. The datepalm, “which has neither a fresh green rind, nor tender juicy leaves, and therefore not easily injured by the locusts,” and all other trees wither away. Joy is turned into shame, labour is lost, and mourning results.
I. Wasted labour. “The harvest of the field is perished.” The husbandman ploughs, sows, and labours in hope. He waits “for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain.” Between seed-time and harvest there is a time of trial, an opportunity for faith. In all true labour we must expect fruit, and receive it as the precious gift of God. But unsuccessful labour will shame our skill and faith, and confound our hopes. Sin will prevent results, and God will blight our harvests.
1. Husbandmen will be disappointed in anticipation.
2. Vine-dressers will be robbed of choice fruits. “The ground was chapt, for there was no rain in the earth, the plowmen were ashamed, they covered their heads” (Jer_14:3-4).
II. Withered joy. “Because joy is withered away.” The loss of harvest is the withering of joy and enjoyments.
1. The joy of men is withered. “Withered away from the sons of men.” The joy that depends upon the creature is uncertain and unsatisfactory. Those that place happiness in the delights of sense may be deprived of them. Wine and oil may delight, but not satisfy; they have their vacuity and indigence. All outward comforts sooner cloy than cheer, and weary than fill. Christ in the heart is better than harvests in the barn and wine in the vat. “It is better,” says one, “to feel God’s favour one hour in our repenting souls, than to sit whole ages under the warmest sunshine that this world affordeth.” “Nature’s common joys are common cheats.”
2. The joy of nature is withered. Joel again declares the sympathy of nature with man. “The trees of the field are withered, because (for) joy,” &c., as if it were impossible for the natural world to rejoice when the hearts of men were sad and sinful. Poets in all ages have taught “that one life beats throughout the universe, revealing itself in subtle and manifold interchanges of sympathy; that therefore Nature feels with her foster-child man, rejoicing when he rejoices, weeping when he weeps.” Scripture shows that sin may turn a paradise into a wilderness, and “a fruitful land into barrenness, for the wickedness of them that dwell therein” (Psa_107:34). What a picture of demoralization, sensuality, and judgment in the language of Isaiah! “All the merry-hearted do sigh. There is a crying for wine in the streets, all joy is darkened, the mirth of the land is gone.”
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 General Information:
General Information:
God continues speaking to the people of Israel.
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barley
a type of grass, like wheat, whose seeds can be used to make bread (See: Translate Unknowns)
withered
dried up and died
fig ... pomegranate ... apple
different types of fruit (See: Translate Unknowns)
translationWords
shame
wheat
harvest
perish
vine
fig
palm
joy
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.