Commentary on the
BOOK OF JOEL
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Joel's prophecy of the Day of the Lord was cited by Peter in his first sermon on the day of Pentecost. It's imagery was adapted by John in Revelation. The book of Joel thus stands as one of the great "end time" prophecies of Israel's prophets.
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| CHAPTER TWO | CHAPTER ONE | CHAPTER THREE |
1 –
The word of the LORD
The Bible everywhere claims to be the “word
of the Lord,” not of man. If scripture merely represents the
subjective thoughts and impressions of man, then it has only the
authority of man; it is fallible, subject to error, and may be
gainsaid and ignored with impunity. But if scripture represents
the word of God, then it speaks with the infallibility and
authority of God and cannot be ignored without mortal peril.
That scripture is the word of God, not man, is affirmed by
Peter: “Knowing this
first, that no prophecy of scripture is of any private
interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the
will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the
Holy Ghost” (2 Pet. 1:20, 21). Peter, speaking as an apostle
of Jesus Christ, thus affirms that scripture does not find its
origin in the “will of man,” but the Spirit of God. That not
merely the thoughts, but the very words themselves (verbissima
ipsi) are selected by God’s Spirit, is implicit in the
statement of Paul that
“all scripture is given by inspiration of God” (2 Tim. 3:16).
The word “inspiration” here is from the Greek “qeopneustoV”
(theo-pneustos), or “God-breathed” and signifies that scripture
is spoken (“breathed
out”) by God, making the prophets merely the instruments through
which he speaks. If we
can think of the prophets and apostles as musical instruments,
each with its unique qualities and characteristics given by God,
which the Spirit “plays,” selecting each note and the very mood
and tone conveyed, we would come close to the conception of
scripture that the Bible communicates about itself (cf. 1 Cor.
14:6-8). However, scripture is inerrant only in the
original autographs;
the text has suffered small errors of spelling and other
oversights at the hands of copyists and scribes. However, none
of these errors or omissions affects the slightest part of the
Bible’s message; God has
providentially preserved his word for the benefit and
salvation of man. “The
word of the Lord endureth forever” (1 Pet. 1:23-25; Ps.
119:89; Isa. 40:8; Matt. 24:35).
that came to
When Aaron and Mariam spoke against Moses
because he had married a woman of Ethiopia, God rebuked them,
saying,
If
there be a prophet among you, I the LORD will make myself known
unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream. My
servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all mine house. With
him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in
dark speeches; and the similitude of the LORD shall he behold.
(Num. 12:7, 8; cf. Ex. 33:11
Whereas God spoke face to face with Moses
and Moses beheld the similitude of the Lord, God revealed
himself to other prophets by
dreams and visions.
These dreams and visions included
oracular revelation
impressed upon the prophet’s mind. In the first book of Samuel,
the Lord thus “appeared” to Samuel “by the word of the LORD” (1
Sam. 3:1, 21). Similarly, Paul states that he learned the gospel
not from man, but by revelation (Gal. 1:11, 12). So here, God’s
revelation came to Joel in oracular form, recorded here in the
book bearing his name.
Joel the son of Pethuel.
The name “Joel” means “JHWH (Jehovah) is
God.” Nothing more is known of this prophet than that he was the
son of Pethuel, whose name signifies “the sincerity” or
“open-heartedness of God” (the suffix “el” is the Hebrew for
“God”). Even the time Joel prophesied is cloaked in mystery. The
only certain indication we possess is reference in Joel 3:2, 12
to the “valley of Jehoshaphat,” so that he must have written
sometime after the event of which that became a symbol (2 Chron.
20). It is supposed by some that Joel wrote before Amos and
Isaiah on the ground that these seem to borrow from him (cf.
Joel 3:16 with Amos 1:2, Joel 3:18 with Amos 9:13; Joel 1:15
with Isa. 13:6). However, the opposite inference is equally
plausible; viz., that Joel borrowed from Isaiah and Amos.
Besides, since God is ultimately the author of all scripture, no
real inference can be drawn about the priority of any given
writer based upon similar usage of speech, since common
authorship makes inevitable the use of common themes and
language. In the end, the time the book of Joel was written
cannot be known.
2 –
Hear this, ye old men, and give ear, all ye inhabitants of the
land.
The prophet calls the eldest
representatives of the community and all the inhabitants of the
land to heed the events he is about to predict. “Old men” are
specifically named because Israel was a
patriarchal society
in which men were charged with the weight and responsibility of
leadership, and women were to be in subjection to their husbands
or fathers, such that the prophet’s calling old men to listen is
most natural, whereas had he said “hear this, ye old women” we
should be very surprised.
Hath this been in your days, or even in the days of your
fathers?
The coming calamity is without precedent in
the mind and memory those living; nothing like it has occurred
in their lives, or in the lives of their fathers.
“Fathers” are mentioned, again laying emphasis to the
patriarchal order of Israelite society. When a nation wanders
into spiritual apostasy, the natural role of the members and
sexes are often reversed, further aggravating the people’s
ability to find their way and order their lives and society. The
prophet Isaiah, in the midst of Israel’s great spiritual
apostasy leading to the Assyrio-Babylonian captivity, thus
indicts the nation, saying,
“As for my people,
children are their oppressors, and women rule over them” (Isa.
3:12). The apostle Paul was similarly at pains to establish
the divine order for the human race, of which the woman’s
headship veiling is a symbol (1 Cor. 11:2-16), saying,
“I would have you to
know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the
woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God” (1 Cor. 11:3).
Thus, although it is not Joel’s purpose here to give instruction
regarding the role of the sexes; it is nevertheless implicit in
addressing men as the natural, appointed leaders and
representatives of the community.
3 –
Tell ye your children of it, and let your children tell their
children, and their children another generation.
Like the plague of locusts upon the
Egyptians, which “neither thy fathers, nor thy fathers’ fathers
have seen” and which would be retold “in the ears of thy son,
and of thy son’s son” (Ex. 10:2, 6), the coming catastrophe
would be so great that it would be recounted for generations
among the Jews, and thus serve to warn future generations to
fear and obey the Lord lest they suffer similar calamity. God is
reluctant to visit man’s sins upon him; only when there is no
other remedy is God’s hand forced to bring his mighty judgments
upon mankind to turn them from their sinful ways. When calamity
strikes, generations profit and thus keep themselves from evil.
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 caterpillar eaten.
The plagues of insects here are sometimes
taken metaphorically for the Assyrio-Babylonian invasions of
Tiglath-Pileser, Shalmaneser, Sennacherib, and Nebuchadnezzar,
or the succession of four world empires depicted by Daniel;
viz., Babylon,
Mede-Persia, Greece, and Rome. In support of this view we may
note that the prophet Nahum wrote against Nineveh, likening the
invading armies of foreigners to swarms of locusts and
cankerworms:
There shall the fire devour thee; the sword shall cut thee off,
it shall eat thee up like the cankerworm: make thyself many as
the cankerworm, make thyself many as the locusts. Thou hast
multiplied thy merchants above the stars of the heaven: the
cankerworm spoileth, and flieth away. Thy crowned are as the
locusts, and thy captains as the great grasshoppers, which camp
in the hedges in the cold day. Nahum 3:15-17
Jeremiah used similar imagery against
Babylon, saying, “cause the horses to come up as caterpillars”
(Jer. 51:27). Finally, Revelation borrows directly from Joel’s
imagery to depict the legions of Vespasian and Titus sent
against the Jewish nation (Rev. 9:1-11). Since invading armies
are likened by the prophets to a plague of locusts, and
Revelation in particular uses Joel’s imagery in a figurative and
symbolic sense, some commentators interpret Joel metaphorically
here. However, merely
because a passage will bear an interpretation does not mean it
is correct. The only valid interpretation is the one the author
intended. In the
passages we have looked at, the author’s intention and use of
figurative expressions is apparent; we recognize instantly that
the writer is employing a simile to liken one thing to another,
and does not intend we understand him literally. However, no
such intention is apparent in Joel. Although use of Joel’s
prophecy by Peter at Pentecost (Acts 2:16-21) and John in
Revelation indicates Joel’s imagery possessed a
plenior sensus
(fuller sense) that looked ahead to Messianic times and the
destruction of Jerusalem by Rome (A.D. 66-70), the better view
is that the verses before us are intended in the
first instance to be
understood literally of various species of locusts and
crop-destroying pests.
5 –
Awake, ye drunkards, and weep; and howl, all ye drinkers of
wine; for it is cut off from your mouth.
Those addicted to wine and given to
drunkenness are roused from their stupors; the careless abandon
with which they have neglected God and righteousness, giving
themselves instead to pleasure and banqueting, is rebuked by
destruction of the vine; they bewail the loss of wine.[1]
6 –
For a nation is come up upon my land, strong, and without
number,
The source of the vintage’s destruction is
now revealed: The land will undergo an invasion as if by a
foreign army. In the
book of Judges, the Israelites’ sins caused the Lord to deliver
them into the hand of the Midianites and Amalekites who invaded
the land in such numbers that they were likened to swarming
grasshoppers: “For they
came up with the cattle and their tents, and they came as
grasshoppers for multitude; for both they and their camels were
without number: and they entered into the land to destroy it”
(Jud. 6:5).In Judges, the armies of men were likened to
locusts; in Joel, the plague of locusts is likened to an army of
men. Collectively, the locust army is called “a nation” just as
the ants collectively are called “a people” and the conies a
“feeble folk” (Prov. 30:25, 26). “My land” refers to the Lord:
“For the land is mine; for ye are strangers and sojourners with
me” (Lev. 25:23; cf.
Deut. 32:43; 2 Chrn. 7:20; Ps. 85:1). The prophet uses the
prophetic perfect “is
come” to show the certainty of what is foretold. Although spoken
of in absolute terms, such pronouncements nevertheless are
generally conditional: If the people turn from evil and seek the
Lord, God may relent, as the prophet states in the following
chapter: “For he is
gracious, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness,
and repenteth him of the evil” (Joel 2:14). If the predicted
judgment was absolute, why should God tell them beforehand
unless it were to move the people to repentance that the
destruction warned might be avoided?
At
what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a
kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy it; If a
nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I
will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them. Jer.
18:7, 8
whose teeth are the teeth of a lion, and he hath the cheek teeth
of a great lion
The prophet compares the teeth of the
locusts and caterpillars to the teeth of a lion; as lions
strangle their prey and devour it with their teeth, the locusts
will devour crops and foliage.
7 –
He hath laid my vine waste, and barked my fig tree:
The vine and fig tree were proverbial in
Israel as symbols of plenty and security:
“And
Judah and Israel dwelt safely, every man under his vine and
under his fig tree” (1 Kng. 4:25). “But they shall sit every man
under his vine and under his fig tree; and none shall make them
afraid” (Mic. 4:4). “In that day, saith the Lord of hosts, shall
ye call every man his neighbor under the vine and under the fig
tree” (Zech. 3:10). The vine and fig are also used
collectively as symbols of God’s people: “Thou
hast brought a vine out of Egypt: thou hast cast out the
heathen, and planted it” (Ps. 80:8; cf. Jer. 2:21; Lk. 13:6, 7).
It is unclear here which sense the prophet intends, whether
literal vines and fig trees or as a symbol of Judah itself. The
fact that the singular is used—“my vine” and “my fig tree”—
suggests the prophet has in mind the kingdom of Judah
collectively: “For the
vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel, and the
men of Judah his pleasant plant” (Isa. 5:7). Conversely, if
the general destruction of the vintage and fig harvest were
intended, we would expect the plural “my vines” and “my fig
trees.” In the end, however, both are true: In the general
destruction of the vintage and fig harvest Judah itself is laid
waste and bare.
he
hath made it clean bare, and cast it away; the branches thereof
are made white.
The inner cambium layer beneath the outer
bark carries nourishment to the tree’s branches and limbs; this
is the life of the tree and the part that adds “rings” to its
annual growth. When this layer is eaten away, the tree cannot
send sap to its extremities and will die. As trees are stripped
of their outer bark to reveal the soft inner layer which the
locusts devour, so Judah will be stripped clean in the ensuing
plague; it will be as a tree whose limbs have been barked, her
branches white, unable to send nourishment to its limbs.
8 –
Lament like a virgin girded with sackcloth for the husband of
her youth.
The verb “lament” is feminine imperative
and requires a feminine subject, here assumed but not expressed.
The subject almost certainly is the collective people and
congregation of Judah to whom the prophecy is directed.
The image is that of a young maiden betrothed to marry
but as yet unwed, whose husband-to-be is suddenly and tragically
cut off, such that she puts off her bridal gown, donning
sackcloth instead. Passions
are strongest in our youth; the unfulfilled anticipation of
marriage is replaced by premature widowhood, evoking the
bitterest weeping and sorrow.
9 –
The meat offering and the drink offering is cut off from the
house of the LORD; the priests, and LORD’S ministers, mourn.
The famine resulting from the locust plague
will impact the whole of Judea; even the temple and priesthood
feel the effects. Meat offerings consisted of fine flour,
sprinkled with oil and frankincense. The priest would take a
handful of flour, pour oil and frankincense upon it and burn it
before the Lord. The rest and remainder of the flour belonged to
the priests as a thing most holy; it was to be baked in a pan
without leaven and eaten in the holy place, in the court of the
tabernacle. Lev. 2:1-3, 6:14-18). The priests were prohibited to
drink wine or alcohol while serving in the tabernacle (Lev.
10:8-10); therefore, unlike meat offerings which belonged to the
priests, drink offerings consisted of wine poured out unto the
Lord, usually accompanying a burnt offering, sin offering, or
other sacrifice (Num. 15:5, 7, 10).
10
– The field is wasted, the land mourneth; for the corn is
wasted: the new wine is dried up, the oil languisheth.
The three great staples of ancient life are
mentioned: grain, wine, and oil. These three appear together
under the horseman of the Apocalypse that brought famine, a
probable reference to the famine that occurred in the days of
Claudius Caesar (Acts 11:28):
And
when he had opened the third seal, I heard the third beast say,
Come and see. And I beheld, and lo a black horse; and he that
sat on him had a pair of balances in his hand. And I heard a
voice in the midst of the four beasts say, A measure of wheat
for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny; and see
thou hurt not the oil and the wine. Rev. 6:5, 6
The plagues in Revelation progressively
worsen and grow more pervasive in effect as God attempted to
lead the Jewish people to repentance and acceptance of the
gospel. Hence, a limit is set upon the famine: Oil and wine are
there ordered not to be hurt. But the famine in Joel admits of
no such limitation: grain, wine, and oil will all suffer
scarcity.
11
– Be ashamed, O ye husbandmen; howl, O ye vinedressers, for the
wheat and for the barley; because the harvest of the field is
perished.
Those occupied as husbandmen and
vinedressers are called to join the priestly caste in mourning
the devastation of crops; their means of gainful employment
vanishes before their eyes by the ever-advancing army of
locusts. Wheat and barley are spring crops. Barley winters over
and is ready for harvest at Passover, at the first full moon
following the vernal equinox; the offering of the sheaf of
firstfruits of the barley harvest on the “morrow after the
Sabbath” following Passover prefigured the resurrection
of Christ (Lev. 23:4-14). The wheat harvest follows fifty
days later marked by Pentecost (Ex. 34:22; Lev. 23:15-21). The
grape harvest came at the end of summer and was followed by the
feast of Tabernacles or Ingathering the fifteenth day of the
seventh month (Ex. 34:22; Lev. 23:33-44; Deut. 16:13). The
plague would apparently be so timed as to destroy the barley
when it was ripe, the wheat when it was as yet unripe, and the
new growth of the vine, destroying the entire harvest of grain
and summer fruit.
12
– The vine is dried up, and the fig tree languisheth; the
pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even
all the trees of the field, are withered: because joy is
withered away from the sons of men.
When Moses described the blessed state of
the Promised Land that the Jews were about to enter, he mentions
the products here:
For
the LORD thy God bringeth thee into a good land, a land of
brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of
valleys and hills; a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and
fig trees, and pomegranates; a land of oil olive, and honey; a
land wherein thou shalt eat bread without scarceness, thou shalt
not lack any thing in it; a land whose stones are iron, and out
of whose hills thou mayest dig brass. When thou hast eaten and
art full, then thou shalt bless the LORD thy God for the good
land which he hath given thee. Deut. 8:7-10
But the happy condition of the land is now
reversed, and famine and scarcity overtake the people because of
their sin and apostasy from God. The principle crops of grain,
grapes, and figs are not alone affected; all the trees of the
field are ravished by the locust plague. The pomegranate, the
date-palm, and apple trees are all denuded of foliage and wither
away. The greatness of the calamity is inexpressible; therefore
joy also withers and departs from the sons of men.
13
– Gird yourselves, and lament, ye priests: howl, ye ministers of
the altar: come, lie all night in sackcloth, ye ministers of my
God: for the meat offering and the drink offering is withholden
from the house of your God.
Priests were mediators between God and man.
Under the Old Testament, the worshiper was prohibited to
approach God except through the sprinkling of blood and an
appointed intermediary; the stranger that drew nigh was to be
put to death (Num. 1:51). As the appointed mediators of the
people, the priestly caste is called upon to intercede for the
nation with God by humbling themselves in sackcloth and
prostrating themselves before God in night-long vigil. Sackcloth
was made from goat’s hair; was coarse and black (cf.
Rev. 6:12 – “black as sackcloth of hair”); and was worn against
the skin, often upon the loins in private self-affliction (Gen.
37:34; 2 Kng. 6:30), but upon the whole body as an outward
display of repentance and humiliation (Isa. 37:1, 2; Jonah
3:5-8); its coarseness made it uncomfortable and suitable for
afflicting oneself before God; black made it appropriate for
mourning. As it would seem impious and inappropriate to dress in
festal garb when one is overtaken by great calamity or the death
of a loved one, sackcloth was deemed an appropriate expression
of personal grief and mourning, or, as in the present case,
repentance and contrition for sin.
14
– Sanctify ye a fast, call a solemn assembly, gather the elders
and all the inhabitants of the land into the house of the LORD
your God, and cry unto the LORD,
Fasting was another form of
self-affliction, appropriate to times of mourning and grief, or
when seeking heaven’s mercy or assistance. The priests were to
take the lead in bringing the nation to repentance before God;
they were charged to
believe the words of the prophet and to take all necessary
action to avoid the predicted calamity by prayer and fasting.
The priests were to be followed by the elders and rulers of the
people. In calling a solemn assembly, all the inhabitants of the
land were marshalled to the house of God where they might seek
God’s mercy and implore his pardon that the plague might be
averted and his favor restored to his people.
15
– Alas for the day! For the day of the LORD
A “day of the Lord” bespeaks a time of
judgment and divine visitation, and is either
special, limited to a
particular nation and people, or
general, bringing
numerous nations and peoples within its sweep. The book of
Zephaniah provides an example of a day of the Lord that
represented a general visitation upon various nations. The
prophecy was given in the time of Josiah, king of Judah, and
described the Babylonian invasion and conquest that brought most
of the known world under the power of the Chaldeans. The nations
mentioned include Judea, Gaza, Ashkelon, Ashdod, Ekron, Moab,
Ammon, Ethiopia, and Nineveh (Zeph. 1:14; 2:1-15).
Another example exists in the third chapter of Joel,
which depicts a time of judgment and wrath upon the nations of
those that persecuted and oppressed God’s people (Joel 3:1-17).
This day of the Lord was eschatological and is the topic of New
Testament teaching, and describes the series of judgments that
ensued shortly after Christ received the kingdom of the world
when he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.
However, the locust plague now under discussion was a special
day of the Lord, limited in scope to God’s visitation upon
Judah.
is
at hand,
The phrase “at hand” signifies that divine
visitation would overtake the generation of those living when
the prophecy was spoken. This also follows from the fact that
the priests, elders, and people were called to don sackcloth,
and to fast and pray, for it is
their sins that
brought on the threatened plague, not a people yet to be born.
It is sometimes objected that “at hand” can bespeak
certainty, rather
than nearness— an argument made by those who assume that
Revelation was not fulfilled in the generation of those to whom
it was written and addressed. It is true that there are one or
two instances where the phrase seems to describe events many
centuries in the future. However, in these cases “at hand” is
used proleptically,
and contemplates the nearness of judgment upon future peoples
whose sins would provoke divine wrath, but who were not alive
when the prophecy was given. Thus, Moses says that destruction
would be “at hand” upon the generation of the Jews whom God
would move to jealousy with a “foolish nation” and those which
are ”not a people”—that is, the first generation of Jews who
rejected the gospel even while the Gentiles received it (Deut.
32:21-35; cf. Rom. 10:19). “At hand” in this case must be viewed
from the perspective of the generation and people to suffer
judgment, not those alive when Moses uttered the prophetic
announcement. This is clear from the entire context of the
passage, which describes the latter end of the Jewish nation
accomplished in A.D. 70. But in the case before us, as in the
overwhelming majority of all others, the judgment was near upon
those called to repentance, and is therefore characterized as
already “at hand.”[2]
and
as a destruction from the Almighty shall it come.
The plagues evoked by Moses upon Egypt were
clearly understood by Pharaoh’s counsellors as divine
visitation, and nothing less than the “finger of God” (Ex.
8:19). So here, the plague of locusts would be such that its
origin and source could not be mistaken as the result of chance
or misadventure, but would be clearly understood as destruction
from the Almighty.
16
– Is not the meat cut off before our eyes, yea, joy and gladness
from the house of our God?
When the people enjoyed plenty, their joy
and gladness overflowed into the house of God, which assumed a
festive atmosphere. But when there was drought and famine, the
temple became a place of mourning and lamentation, as the people
bewailed their unhappy condition and besought the mercies of
God. So, now in ensuing plague, joy and gladness are banished
from the temple precincts by the suffering of the people.
17
– The seed is rotten under their clods, the garners are laid
desolate, the barns are broken down; for the corn is withered.
Not only are the new growth and early crops
like barley and wheat devoured, but later maturing crops like
corn and vegetables rot beneath the soil for lack of rain to
germinate their seeds. Consequently, the grain garners and barns
have fallen into disuse and disrepair.
18
– How do the beasts groan! The herds of cattle are perplexed,
because they have no pasture; yea, the flocks of sheep are made
desolate.
The hapless beasts suffer because of the
sins of men; field and pasture are afflicted by the drought;
there is no tender herb for the cattle to lick up or the sheep
to graze upon. The want of necessary pasturage renders the
flocks desolate; they do not conceive, or if they conceive,
their offspring are born still; those that are born alive, are
abandoned by their mothers; sheep become like the barren field
whose seeds rot beneath the clods, their offspring abortive,
still-born, and abandoned. So Jeremiah:
Judah mourneth, and the gates thereof languish; they are black
unto the ground; and the cry of Jerusalem is gone up. And their
nobles have sent their little ones to the waters: they came to
the pits, and found no water; they returned with their vessels
empty; they were ashamed and confounded and covered their heads.
Because the ground is chapt, for there was no rain in the earth,
the plowmen were ashamed and covered their heads. Yea, the hind
also calved in the field, and forsook it, because there was no
grass. Jer. 14:2-5
19
– O LORD, to thee will I cry: for the fire hath devoured the
pastures of the wilderness, and the flame hath burned all the
trees of the field.
The curse pronounced upon the Jews if they
forsook God and his law threatened drought and famine:
And
thy heaven that is over thy head shall be brass, and the earth
that is under thee shall be iron. The LORD shall make the rain
of thy land powder and dust: from heaven shall it come down upon
thee, until thou be destroyed. Deut. 28:23, 24
So here Judea suffers drought and famine
for the iniquity of the inhabitants of the land. Joel
commiserates the plight of man and beast and intercedes with
God. The prophet Amos also made supplication to God when shown a
plague of grasshoppers and drought, saying, “O
Lord God, forgive, I beseech thee: by whom shall Jacob arise,
for he is small?” The Lord relented, saying,
“It shall not be” (Amos
7:1-6). “Fire” here, as in Amos (Amos 7:4), is best
understood figuratively of a great drought that consumes
vegetation like fire, leaving the land scorched and the soil
baked and cracked.
20
– The beasts of the field cry also unto thee: for the rivers of
waters are dried up, and the fire hath devoured the pastures of
the wilderness.
Man and beast alike suffer perplexity for
want of necessary sustenance; cattle which have their dwelling
in the field groan and cry for want of food and provender; their
accustomed places of watering have slowly dried up and shrunk
away; the grasslands have been consumed by drought; famine
approaches and the grim reaper begins his awful harvest of
mortal man and beast.
[1]
This should not be mistaken to
teach that use of wine is unlawful
per se. To
the contrary, a “blessing” is in the vine (Isa. 65:8);
it “cheereth God and man” (Jud. 9:13); and wine “maketh
glad the heart of man” (Ps. 104:15). Christ’s first
miracle was to furnish wine for the wedding couple at
Cana, which is commemorated by the feast of “Epiphany,”
because in it he manifested his divine glory to his
disciples (Jn. 2:1-11). Moreover, it was almost
certainly wine Christ used when he instituted the Lord’s
Supper, for Passover is in the spring; but the vintage
is not brought in until late summer/early fall (Micah
7:1), leaving only fermented, not fresh, “fruit of the
vine” available for use (Luke 22:15-20).
[2]
The other case is the destruction of Babylon in Isaiah
13-14, which is often assumed to refer to the city’s
capture by Cyrus in 539 B.C., making “at hand” (Isa.
13:6) difficult to reconcile seeing the book of Isaiah
was written as much as two hundred years before Cyrus
about 740-680 B.C. However, the destruction here
prophesied is probably that by Sennacherib in 689 B.C.,
so that the prophecy was fulfilled within the generation
it was written.
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