¹ The word of the LORD that came to Joel, the son of Pethuel: ² Hear this, O elders,
And listen, all inhabitants of the land.
Has anything like this happened in your days
Or in your fathers’ days? ³ Tell your sons about it,
And let your sons tell their sons,
And their sons the next generation. ⁴ What the gnawing locust has left, the swarming locust has eaten;
And what the swarming locust has left, the creeping locust has eaten;
And what the creeping locust has left, the stripping locust has eaten. ⁵ Awake, drunkards, and weep;
And wail, all you wine drinkers,
On account of the sweet wine
That is cut off from your mouth. ⁶ For a nation has invaded my land,
Mighty and without number;
Its teeth are the teeth of a lion,
And it has the fangs of a lioness. ⁷ It has made my vine a waste
And my fig tree splinters.
It has stripped them bare and cast them away;
Their branches have become white. ⁸ Wail like a virgin girded with sackcloth
For the bridegroom of her youth. ⁹ The grain offering and the drink offering are cut off
From the house of the LORD.
The priests mourn,
The ministers of the LORD. ¹⁰ The field is ruined,
The land mourns;
For the grain is ruined,
The new wine dries up,
Fresh oil fails. ¹¹ Be ashamed, O farmers,
Wail, O vinedressers,
For the wheat and the barley;
Because the harvest of the field is destroyed. ¹² The vine dries up
And the fig tree fails;
The pomegranate, the palm also, and the apple tree,
All the trees of the field dry up.
Indeed, rejoicing dries up
From the sons of men. ¹³ Gird yourselves with sackcloth
And lament, O priests;
Wail, O ministers of the altar!
Come, spend the night in sackcloth
O ministers of my God,
For the grain offering and the drink offering
Are withheld from the house of your God. Starvation and Drought ¹⁴ Consecrate a fast,
Proclaim a solemn assembly;
Gather the elders
And all the inhabitants of the land
To the house of the LORD your God,
And cry out to the LORD. ¹⁵ Alas for the day!
For the day of the LORD is near,
And it will come as destruction from the Almighty. ¹⁶ Has not food been cut off before our eyes,
Gladness and joy from the house of our God? ¹⁷ The seeds shrivel under their clods;
The storehouses are desolate,
The barns are torn down,
For the grain is dried up. ¹⁸ How the beasts groan!
The herds of cattle wander aimlessly
Because there is no pasture for them;
Even the flocks of sheep suffer. ¹⁹ To You, O LORD, I cry;
For fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness
And the flame has burned up all the trees of the field. ²⁰ Even the beasts of the field pant for You;
For the water brooks are dried up
And fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness.