Joel 3:1-21
We have reached the finale of Joel's prophecy. The vision enlarges and embraces those broader experiences connected with “the day of the Lord.” In cc. 1 and 2 we see the prophetic history of Israel; in the final chapter the judgment of the Lord upon all the earth is revealed, followed by the millennial triumph for Jerusalem and the redeemed.
A. JUDGMENT UPON UNBELIEVERS, 3:1-17
For, behold in those days, and in that time (1) seems to refer directly to the period of Judah's restoration from the captivity in Babylon. However, the RSV translates it more generally: “I will restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem.” Along with most commentators this translation seems to include the broader promise of final restoration for Israel. This interpretation is verified in the gathering of all nations (2) to the valley of Jehoshaphat (Jehovah judges).1
The description of judgment, I … will plead with them, is not a picture of the Lord pleading in the modern sense of the term. Rather, God is contending for my people and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations. God will bring judgment in behalf of Israel upon the nations which have divided His land. (Joel uses Israel and Judah interchangeably.)
Verse 3 points out that the enemies of Israel have shown no consideration for their captives, including the children, whom they have sold for a harlot and for wine. Casting lots refers to the dividing of the spoil in Jerusalem by the Chaldeans (Obad. 11).
Verses 4-16 constitute a direct address to the pagan nations. All the coasts of Palestine (4; the Philistines and Phoenicians) are added to Tyre, and Zidon as no less culpable. The question: Will ye render me a recompence? probably reflects a false claim by the enemies of Israel that they were only seeking justice. Jehovah very quickly “warns that their so-called ‘recompense’ will be repaid to them”: I return your recompence upon your own head.2
The reasons for divine justice quickly follow: Ye have taken my silver and my gold (5). They had deposited God's treasures in pagan temples. Joel continues with the accusation of trade in slavery by selling the children (people) of Judah (6) to the Grecians (Ionian Greeks). Verses 7-8 follow with the punishment from the Lord returned upon your own head (7), i.e., by repaying in kind. The very people who were deprived (Israel) now sell the sons and daughters (8) of their enemies to the Sabeans.3 The pronouncement is given divine verification: for the Lord hath spoken it.
In 9, Joel continues with the judgment to be visited on the Gentiles, first broached in v. 2 (cf. Zech. 14:2). The call is to all nations to prepare themselves for battle and to appear in the valley of Jehoshaphat (12). Their adversary, however, is not Israel, but the God of Israel: for there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about. It is to this end that He challenges the nations: Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruning-hooks into spears (10). Note that this is just the reverse of the later Messianic promise (cf. Isa. 2:4; Mic. 4:3). Even the weak are to be called into battle.
Assemble yourselves, and come (11) repeats the summons to doom. The RSV translates it, “Hasten and come” to the valley of judgment. In 13 the timeliness of judgment is represented in the figures of reaping ripened grain and treading out the grapes in the filled winepress. The same figures are used in 2:24 to describe conversely the fullness of God's blessings. Here the ripe harvest and the overflowing vats both indicate the degree of wickedness for which the nations shall be judged.
Multitudes (hamonim) means noisy or tumultuous crowds. Its repetition, multitudes, multitudes (14), here probably is intended to suggest the great numbers in the valley of decision waiting for the imminent judgment of the day of the Lord.
In 15 the natural phenomena listed in 2:31 are repeated as signs accompanying the judgment; there shall be a darkening of the sun, the moon, and the stars. Then shall the Lord … roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth shall shake (16; similar imagery is used in 2:11; Jer. 25:30; Amos 1:2).
But it is only toward His enemies that the Lord roars out of Zion. To His own people He is a hope and a strength. From this, His people will learn that Jehovah is their God (17), sanctifying Jerusalem through His presence. It is apparent that Joel is here speaking of Armageddon as the valley of judgment and of Jerusalem as the heavenly Zion which shall appear in the “latter day.”
B. TRIUMPH FOR JERUSALEM AND THE REDEEMED, 3:18-21
In this section, with the exception of v. 19, judgment is broken off and the millennial vision forms the conclusion of the prophecy. In lovely symbolic language, Joel paints the glorious future of God's people. The mountains shall drop down new wine (18; cf. Amos 9:13). The streams which usually run dry shall water the valley of Shittim4—all from the house of the Lord.
Parenthetically, judgment is again threatened to Egypt and Edom (19; symbols of all the hostile nations). Their desolation shall come because of violence against the children of Judah and in the shedding of innocent blood (cf. I Kings 14:25-26; II Kings 23:29; Obad. 1-21).
On the other hand, Judah shall dwell for ever, and Jerusalem from generation to generation (20). Again and again Egypt or Assyria had crossed Judah to fight out their grievances in the quest for world power. Israel had been the battleground of all the great nations. Now, Jehovah was promising a perpetual peace in Jerusalem, the “glorified city of God.”
The final verse combines both blessing and judgment—the themes of the entire prophecy. The rendering of the KJV may be misleading. The RSV translation is more accurate: “I will avenge their blood, and I will not clear the guilty.”5 This verse does not announce a further punishment upon Egypt and Edom, “but simply the thought with which the proclamation closes, namely that the eternal desolation of the world-kingdoms … will wipe out all the wrong which they have done to the people of God, and which hitherto remained unpunished.”6
The millennial blessings of the Lord in 3:18-21 suggest: (1) The overabundant blessing of God in nature, 18; (2) The balancing of the scales of justice, 21; (3) The final promise of security from generation to generation, 20.