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Joel 1

Joel turns the devastation of the land into a summons for shared mourning before YHWH and his approaching day.

Locusts have stripped the land, crops have failed, and dried streams leave animals without water. Joel, son of Pethuel, brings YHWH’s word to the inhabitants, calling elders to listen and priests to lead public mourning. With grain and wine gone, offerings at YHWH’s house have stopped. Joel calls for a fast and a gathered cry to God, warns that the day of YHWH is near, and closes by crying out amid the ruin.

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Read
1The LORD’s word that came to Joel, the son of Pethuel.
2Hear 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?
3Tell your children about it, and have your children tell their children, and their children, another generation.
4What the swarming locust has left, the great locust has eaten. What the great locust has left, the grasshopper has eaten. What the grasshopper has left, the caterpillar has eaten.
5Wake up, you drunkards, and weep! Wail, all you drinkers of wine, because of the sweet wine, for it is cut off from your mouth.
6For a nation has come up on my land, strong, and without number. His teeth are the teeth of a lion, and he has the fangs of a lioness.
7He has laid my vine waste, and stripped my fig tree. He has stripped its bark, and thrown it away. Its branches are made white.
8Mourn like a virgin dressed in sackcloth for the husband of her youth!
9The meal offering and the drink offering are cut off from the LORD’s house. The priests, the LORD’s ministers, mourn.
10The field is laid waste. The land mourns, for the grain is destroyed, The new wine has dried up, and the oil languishes.
11Be confounded, you farmers! Wail, you vineyard keepers, for the wheat and for the barley; for the harvest of the field has perished.
12The vine has dried up, and the fig tree withered— the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all of the trees of the field are withered; for joy has withered away from the sons of men.
13Put on sackcloth and mourn, you priests! Wail, you ministers of the altar. Come, lie all night in sackcloth, you ministers of my God, for the meal offering and the drink offering are withheld from your God’s house.
14Sanctify a fast. Call a solemn assembly. Gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land to the house of the LORD, your God, and cry to the LORD.
15Alas for the day! For the day of the LORD is at hand, and it will come as destruction from the Almighty.
16Isn’t the food cut off before our eyes, joy and gladness from the house of our God?
17The seeds rot under their clods. The granaries are laid desolate. The barns are broken down, for the grain has withered.
18How the animals groan! The herds of livestock are perplexed, because they have no pasture. Yes, the flocks of sheep are made desolate.
19LORD, I cry to you, for the fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness, and the flame has burned all the trees of the field.
20Yes, the animals of the field pant to you, for the water brooks have dried up, and the fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness.
World English BibleRead in NIV in Psalmlog →Highlighted verses are the most connected.
Key verses
Joel 1:15The warning about YHWH’s approaching day places the ruined harvest under the weight of divine judgment.
Joel 1:4Each wave of insects consumes what remains, establishing the scale of loss behind the chapter’s calls to mourn.
Joel 1:14Joel directs the priests to gather the whole community in fasting and a shared cry to YHWH.
Where this chapter reaches

Exodus shares the event of locust devastation, while Deuteronomy names locusts and failed crops among covenant judgments. Amos and Isaiah share Joel’s language of the day of YHWH as a time of judgment, placing this warning alongside other prophetic announcements of destruction.

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Notice

After reading the whole chapter

What do you notice about the connection between lost harvests and interrupted worship?

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Which part of Joel’s call to shared mourning would be hardest for you to join, and why?

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Questions people ask about Joel 1

Are the locusts in Joel 1 insects or an invading army?

Joel describes insects consuming crops in successive waves, then portrays the destroyer as a strong nation with lion’s teeth. The agricultural damage supports reading this as a locust plague described through military imagery. Some readers see a human invasion behind the imagery, but the chapter names no foreign army.

What is the day of YHWH in Joel 1?

In verse 15, the day of YHWH is approaching as destruction from the Almighty. Joel places that warning amid crop failure, interrupted offerings, and suffering animals. The chapter connects the present disaster with divine judgment, but gives no date or full account of how that day will unfold.

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Joel · 3 chapters
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What the Bible says about grief →What the Bible says about fear →

Cross-reference data from OpenBible.info (CC BY). Scripture from the World English Bible (public domain). Arc diagram after Chris Harrison and Christoph Römhild (2007).