章 |
1:1 |
The word of the LORD that came to Joel son of Pethuel.
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1:2 |
Hear this, you elders; listen, all who live in the land. Has anything like this ever happened in your days or in the days of your forefathers?
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1:3 |
Tell it to your children, and let your children tell it to their children, and their children to the next generation.
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1:4 |
What the locust swarm has left the great locusts have eaten; what the great locusts have left the young locusts have eaten; what the young locusts have left other locusts have eaten.
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1:5 |
Wake up, you drunkards, and weep! Wail, all you drinkers of wine; wail because of the new wine, for it has been snatched from your lips.
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1:6 |
A nation has invaded my land, powerful and without number; it has the teeth of a lion, the fangs of a lioness.
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1:7 |
It has laid waste my vines and ruined my fig trees. It has stripped off their bark and thrown it away, leaving their branches white.
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1:8 |
Mourn like a virgin in sackcloth grieving for the husband of her youth.
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1:9 |
Grain offerings and drink offerings are cut off from the house of the LORD. The priests are in mourning, those who minister before the LORD.
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1:10 |
The fields are ruined, the ground is dried up; the grain is destroyed, the new wine is dried up, the oil fails.
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1:11 |
Despair, you farmers, wail, you vine growers; grieve for the wheat and the barley, because the harvest of the field is destroyed.
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1:12 |
The vine is dried up and the fig tree is withered; the pomegranate, the palm and the apple tree-- all the trees of the field--are dried up. Surely the joy of mankind is withered away.
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1:13 |
Put on sackcloth, O priests, and mourn; wail, you who minister before the altar. Come, spend the night in sackcloth, you who minister before my God; for the grain offerings and drink offerings are withheld from the house of your God.
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1:14 |
Declare a holy fast; call a sacred assembly. Summon the elders and all who live in the land to the house of the LORD your God, and cry out to the LORD.
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1:15 |
Alas for that day! For the day of the LORD is near; it will come like destruction from the Almighty.
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1:16 |
Has not the food been cut off before our very eyes-- joy and gladness from the house of our God?
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1:17 |
The seeds are shriveled beneath the clods. The storehouses are in ruins, the granaries have been broken down, for the grain has dried up.
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1:18 |
How the cattle moan! The herds mill about because they have no pasture; even the flocks of sheep are suffering.
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1:19 |
To you, O LORD, I call, for fire has devoured the open pastures and flames have burned up all the trees of the field.
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1:20 |
Even the wild animals pant for you; the streams of water have dried up and fire has devoured the open pastures.
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