Joel Joel
Joel
Introduction
At a Glance
Author: Joel the prophet
Audience: The survivors of a locust plague
Date: Unknown; estimates span centuries of possible dates
Type of Literature: Prophecy
Major Themes: The day of Yahweh; repentance; Spirit-filling; chesed; hope; seeing Jesus in the book
Outline: The focal point of the book of Joel is the dual manifestation of the day of Yahweh. The structure of the book may be described as a chiasmus, comprised of two reinforcing, contrasting, and parallel emphases on that day—one negative and one positive. These two cycles hinge on the central call to repentance in 2:12–17. This pivotal central section serves as a transitional movement from presenting the day of Yahweh as a dreadful judgment on his people for their disobedience to displaying that day as a manifestation of God’s supreme grace.
A: 1:1–2:11 The day of Yahweh in judgment
i. Locust invasion (a): literal economic devastation of the land (1:1–12)
ii. Initial call to repentance (1:13–14)
iii. Locust invasion (b): economic devastation continued (1:15–20)
iv. Locust invasion (c): likened to a military destruction of the land (2:1–11)
B: 2:12–17 Central call to repentance
i. Exhortation to return to the Lord God (2:12–14)
ii. Instructions to declare a fast and summon a sacred assembly before Yahweh (2:15–17)
A1: 2:18–3:21 The day of Yahweh in blessing
i. Yahweh promises blessing: compassion, renewal, economic prosperity, detailed future prosperity, and a restored covenant relationship with his people (2:18–27)
ii. The spiritual consummation of the day of Yahweh: God’s Spirit poured out, celestial signs, and salvation for all who call on Yahweh (2:28–32)
iii. The day of Yahweh: judgment on the enemies of God’s people and deliverance, restoration, spiritual renewal, and pardon for God’s people (3:1–21)
About the Book of Joel
This book is one of the most difficult in the Bible for determining the Sitz im Leben (who was writing to whom at what specific time for what specific reason). Serious attempts to answer this question have Joel writing anytime from just after Samuel’s work until deep into the Hellenistic occupation some one thousand years later. The book provides some vague clues but nothing conclusive. This gives Joel a universal appeal, even to us today. It fits anytime and anywhere when people of faith, either as individuals, groups, or nations, go through a devastating season and seek to find meaning and redemption in the wake of it.
That being said, there are several traditional Jewish dating theories for the book of Joel:
1. The days of Samuel (according to Rashi, one of the great rabbis). This seems to make little sense as there was no temple in the time of Samuel.
2. The days of King Jehoram, the son of King Ahab and Queen Jezebel. Another J(eh)oram of Judah was king in the south at about the same time (850–841 BC).
3. The days of King Manasseh (687–643 BC) of Judah (Seder Olam Rabbah, second century AD), son of King Hezekiah and Hephzibah. According to this chronology, Joel received Torah instruction from the prophet Micah.
There are many more theories, including the times of King J(eh)oash (836–797 BC) or King Josiah of Judah (640–609 BC).
While we cannot unequivocally rule out an early date such as those mentioned, there does appear to be a consensus that a later date may be a better fit for several reasons.
First, there seems to be a Jerusalem and a temple but no king, thus indicating Second Temple Judaism and not the exilic time between the temples. Kings are virtually always mentioned by name in the prophetic books.
Second, the fact that Joel quoted from so many other prophets shows that he was, like Luke, summarizing and curating from previous works. (See Luke’s explanations of his work in Luke 1:1–4 and Acts 1:1.) Many see Joel’s work as an anthology of Bible wisdom. His message draws on brilliant insights of many other biblical prophets, as the following examples (there are many more) show:
Joel 1:15—Isa. 13:6; Ezek. 30:2–3; Zeph. 1:7
Joel 2:2—Zeph. 1:14–15
Joel 2:3—Isa. 51:3; Ezek. 36:35
Joel 2:6—Nah. 2:10
Joel 2:17—Ps. 79:10
Joel 2:27—Isa. 45:5–6, 18; Ezek. 36:11
Joel 2:28—Ezek. 39:29
Joel 2:31—Mal. 4:5
Joel 2:32—Obad. 17
Joel 3:4—Obad. 15
Joel 3:10—Isa. 2:4; Mic. 4:3
Joel 3:16—Isa. 13:13; Amos 1:2
Joel 3:17—Ezek. 36:11
Joel 3:18—Amos 9:13
Joel thus reads a bit like an anthology and perhaps was intended to be a capstone to the prophetic tradition. It is more likely that he was quoting from many Old Testament sources than that all of them were quoting from him. But again, this cannot be dogmatically asserted.
Third, the prophet mentioned Israel’s sin (a major theme) but didn’t tell readers what the sins were. Perhaps Joel assumed that readers were familiar with the sins mentioned by the other prophets and/or wanted the book to apply to any of them or to anything any reader is going through in his or her current time.
Finally, in 3:6 Joel mentioned Greeks, who would most likely have come in contact with Israel at a later date. However, evidence also indicates that Sidon (one of the most important ancient Phoenician city-states, along with Tyre) was actively trading with the ancient Greeks (i.e., Ionians) by the late 800s BC. And this could well have included trading in slaves—as mentioned here in 3:6.
Part of the message of Joel is that cascading malfunctions occur around us from time to time. Our actions cannot ever be entirely separated from the causes of these disasters. Thus, these difficult times are an opportunity for us to change our path and learn from what has happened. The concept of repentance (shuwb, in Hebrew, “to change direction”) is a major key to the book of Joel. In fact, if we don’t alter course, an even bigger tidal wave of troubles awaits us. It is a hard truth, but the fact is that we learn more from hard times than from easy times, if and only if we take advantage of the opportunity to change direction.
A burst of light shines through in 2:12–17: if we make this course correction, Yahweh is patient, full of unconditional love for us, and will restore us.
In the end, Joel is a prophet of hope. Repentance leads to restoration, abundance, and human flourishing. It is not just a nostalgic return to the better times of the past but rather an upgrade to a Spirit-filled future (2:28–32) in direct communication with the living God, with a renewed creation coming alive all around us.
May your reading of Joel plant just such a seed of hope in your soul as it has for so many people of every generation.
Purpose
The book of Joel seems to gather the best of the prophetic tradition into three power-packed chapters. Despite the mysteries surrounding the time and place of the book’s writing, Joel’s reasons for writing seem clear:
1. Find meaning in a recent locust plague.
2. Show listeners that human behavior and large disasters cannot be totally separated.
3. Challenge and invite people to take responsibility for their part when things go wrong around them and express sorrow for those actions.
4. Challenge and invite people to change their behavior, for true repentance involves much more than mere verbal expression of regret.
5. Give them a reason to engage in that repentance: to receive a full pardon for sin and an eternally renewed relationship with the living God (2:12–17).
6. Give them a hope for which to live: God’s Spirit filling them and his presence among them bringing abundance.
So, what is God’s purpose through Joel’s book for us today? What it meant is important. What it means is perhaps always more important.
Our souls are sealed off from one another, in terms of direct experience. But we are not sealed off from the living God. This “opening” is that through which prophets like Joel experience a dabar (“word”; Joel 1:1) from God, and they share it with us through language . . . words.
Words are all we have to tell others the story about what is going on in our souls. We cannot show anyone our inner life. Human consciousness is one of the most mysterious phenomena in the universe since it, by its very nature, is impervious to outside observation and thus unreachable through any scientific probing.
Therefore, it is so important to freshen and present again the words of Joel, from his soul to ours. Joel has long passed from this life, but his words echo on, especially in the Jewish liturgy of confession and repentance on the Sabbath before Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. The word catechesis contains the root word echo; the communal recitation of God’s Word, back and forth, received and passed on by Joel, has long sustained the Jewish people through countless calamities, not unlike the ones described so vividly in Joel’s book. Faith is not about the denial of the catastrophic, which falls upon us from time to time, but rather about overcoming the plagues of life, whether they be swarms of locusts, the scourge of war, persecution, injustice, or pandemics.
Even though we are indeed cut off from direct experience of each other’s lives other than through testimony and storytelling, Joel promised us a wide-open portal to personal connection with the Creator, through the Holy Spirit, through whom we have the only true path to unity and fellowship with one another. Joel gave a foreshadowing of Pentecost to come (Acts 2:1–41). Why? Because he experienced this opening to heaven in a personal way. It’s hard to know if the writers of the Bible realized they were writing Scripture in the sense that we understand it. But with Joel, we get a sense that he knew that his words would be used, in all times and places, to give expression to pain and voice to faith and hope, for young and old, male and female, wealthy and poor. All flesh.
Author and Audience
We know only one thing about the author, Joel: that the name of his father was Pethuel. It’s as though Joel wanted his book to be about God’s kingdom and not about himself.
Jo-el is perhaps an inversion of the name Eli-jah, both meaning, roughly, “Yahweh (Jah-) is (my) God (El).” Some Jewish scholars have surmised that Joel was a Levite priest and was once connected to temple worship since he included many references to temple practices and procedures.
Joel’s audience is universal: people of faith everywhere and in every season. If he had wanted it to reach a specific group, he would have added clear historical frames of reference, but he did not. It’s as if he wanted to share the best of the entire prophetic tradition with everyone.
In times of calamity, God has an answer. In the age of the canonical prophets, it fell to their divinely appointed lot to herald a new day and awaken the people to return to Yahweh. They became, in that sense, “awakeners,” of whom Joel was a prime example. This does not refer primarily to a better methodology but to a better messenger. In the era of the new covenant, in the absence of divinely inspired fresh revelation (that age has passed), “awakeners” may be those who, via the gifting of the Spirit of God, apply and teach the meaning of God’s Word to God’s people today.
Now Joel’s original writing may indeed have been a spiritually motivated response in the aftermath of a specific locust plague since the original audience would be those who were left to ponder the meaning of the devastation. Joel provided for them an interpretation and a call to action based on his insights, but it seems that he, also, consciously and intentionally used a broad funnel to collect, curate, and present the best wisdom of the ancient prophetic tradition and a trumpet on the other end with which to call out and reach as many people as possible with that treasure that he synthesized. The locust plague was perhaps just an opportunity for him to do so, the grain of sand around which he produced a pearl for all time.
Major Themes
The Day of Yahweh. This motif is the dominant theme of the book of Joel. It incorporates both positive and negative elements. First of all, considering the negative fulfillment of this phenomenon, it denotes how all of creation, led by the Creator, turns on people when they are out of sync with the Source of all things. We “sow the wind [and] reap the whirlwind” (Hos. 8:7). If we live unhealthy lives, devastating medical diagnoses can be the result. If we cultivate deceptive relationships and dishonor others, an entire culture starts to come unglued. Corruption by leaders keeps many nations poor for generations. We need to “come back to Yahweh [our] God” (Joel 2:13), for it is only in harmony with him that true, lasting shalom can spread among us. The day of Yahweh is a poetic and spiritual term for the very tangible catastrophic results of behavior that is disconnected from God and the high ideals he requires us to live by.
Second, regarding the positive fulfillment of this day, it not only signifies the ultimate destruction of all the enemies of God—both corporate and individual—but also, and wonderfully, the Spirit-filled renewal of the people of God, past, present, and future. This is an accomplishment grounded in the finished redemptive work of Jesus Christ on the cross. Such a renewal will last for eternity—a never-ending day of salvation, renewal, and joy.
Repentance. We English speakers tend to see repentance as a state of mind rather than a positive action to take. We see it primarily as being sorry or apologetic. To the Hebrews, however, repentance (shuwb) had a lot more to do with action, with changing direction, literally, “turning” to take a new and better path. Repentance is not just feeling bad about what we’ve done but actually doing something about it. In both passages in Joel where repentance is front and center (1:13–14; 2:12–17), the mandatory actions of God’s people repenting dominate these sections more than just words and cries of mourning and regret—although these are also required.
Spirit-filling. Joel took other Old Testament promises of the Spirit coming in a special way (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel) and brought them into full blossom with a prophecy of the Spirit of God coming in a universal and powerful way, a hope not unlike the hope for a coming Messiah that was developing during the time of the prophets. Jesus was aware of this hope for the Spirit’s fullness and called it the promise of the Father (Luke 24:49). Peter saw the fulfillment of Joel’s hope in the day of Pentecost, when many were filled with the Holy Spirit, giving birth to the church (see Acts 2:14–41, especially vv. 17–21).
Chesed. Chesed (pronounced with a guttural “h”) is arguably one of the most important words in the Old Testament and a key thematic component of the book of Joel—although the word itself is found only in Joel 2:13 and is translated “extravagant love” (often “kindness” or “love” in other translations). It is the divine love that flows from God’s very nature. It is unearned and available always. The key is our receptivity to this chesed, not our trying to produce it on our own. David’s psalms can be called a pursuit of chesed in the midst of troubles. The word is loosely translated as something like agape (“love”) and charis (“grace”) in the New Testament. The heart of biblical spirituality is the ability to be receptive to chesed and to live out of the transforming power it brings us.
Hope. The Israelis call their national anthem Hatikvah (“The Hope”). It echoes the bold aspirations of the final segment of Joel, where Zion is restored and God’s power and healing emanate from his dwelling among his people in new and powerful ways. Joel starts with a plague and ends with a promise.
Seeing Jesus in the Book. The crucial passage in Joel that reveals an undeniable allusion to the person of Jesus and the gospel is 2:28–32: the spiritual consummation of the day of Yahweh, with God’s promise to “pour out my Spirit on everyone.” The reason we can be so sure of this claim lies in the recorded words of the apostle Peter’s sermon on the day of Pentecost in Acts 2:14–41, in which he explicitly quoted this passage (Acts 2:17–21) and some three thousand people were converted and baptized (Acts 2:41)—a phenomenon that signaled the birth of the new covenant church community and the beginning of the new covenant age of the Spirit of God. Immediately prior to this sermon, the Holy Spirit was visibly poured out on Peter and the other apostles in the form of “tongues of fire.”
The focus of Peter’s message was on the reality and centrality of Jesus’ physical resurrection from the dead after his atoning sacrificial death on the cross that led to his body lying in the grave for three days. Following his resurrection, Jesus ascended to heaven and took his seat at the right hand of his Father. He then actioned the pouring out of the Spirit of God, initially on his apostolic followers and then on all of his followers from that point on. After Peter concluded his sermon, he immediately exhorted his listeners to repent in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of their sins (Acts 2:38). And if they did so, they would receive the same gift of the Spirit of God as the apostles had a short time before. None of this could have happened if Jesus Christ had not been crucified, had not perished and lain in the grave for three days, and had not risen from the dead and ascended to heaven to reign with his heavenly Father. The prophet Joel foresaw all of this in the climactic prophetic passage of Joel 2:28–32.
Joel
The Outpouring
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