A prophecy of forthcoming judgements in Israel, including the final conflict in which God will dramatically intervene. The Locust Plague (chapter 1) From the start God had warned Israel that if they turned from His word, great disasters would follow (Deuteronomy 28). Literal plagues of locusts were sent to remind God’s people of what He had said. When He appealed to the Jews through the prophet Joel, around 800bc, God likened the forthcoming invasions of human armies to the cutting, swarming, hopping, destroying locusts, which they may already have experienced (1:4). Invading Armies (chapter 2) Assyrian and Babylonian invasions of the land of Israel, foretold in this chapter, were followed centuries later by Greek, Roman and Arab incursions. These left the Holy Land desolate until 1917ad, when the Jews were allowed to return. Promise of Blessing (2:18–32) The troubles which were to come on God’s people had as their object
Joel
