1 The word of the Lord is this, that was made to Joel, the son of Pethuel.
2 Eld [or old] men, hear ye this, and all dwellers of the land, perceive ye with ears. If this thing was done in your days, either in the days of your fathers.
3 Of this thing tell ye to your sons, and your sons tell to their sons, and the sons of them tell to another generation.
4 A locust ate the residue of a wortworm, and a bruchus ate the residue of a locust, and rust ate the residue of a bruchus.
5 Drunken men, wake ye, and weep; and yell ye, all that drink wine in sweetness; for it perished from your mouth.
6 For why a folk strong and unnumberable ascended [or went up] on my land. The teeth thereof be as the teeth of a lion, and the cheek teeth thereof be as of a whelp of a lion.
7 It setted my vinery [or put my vineyard] into desert, and took away the rind of my fig tree. It made naked and spoiled that vinery, and casted forth; the branches thereof be made white.
8 Wail thou, as a virgin girded with a sackcloth on the husband of her time of marriage.
9 Sacrifice and moist sacrifice perished from the house of the Lord; and priests, the ministers of the Lord, mourned.
10 The country is made bare of people. The earth mourned; for wheat is destroyed. Wine is shamed, and oil was sick, either failed.
11 The earth-tillers be shamed, the vine-tillers yelled on wheat and barley; for the ripe corn of the field is perished.
12 The vinery is shamed [or the vine-yard is confounded]; and the fig tree was sick. The pomegranate tree, and the palm tree, and the fir tree, and all the trees of the field dried up; for joy is shamed from the sons of men.
13 Ye priests, gird you, and wail; ye ministers of the altar, yell. Ministers of my God, enter ye, lie ye in sackcloth; for why sacrifice and moist sacrifice perished from the house of your God.
14 Hallow ye fasting, call ye the company, gather ye together eld [or old] men, and all dwellers of the earth, into the house of your God; and cry ye to the Lord,
15 A! A! A! to the day; for the day of the Lord is nigh, and shall come as a tempest from the Almighty.
16 Whether foods perished not before your eyes; gladness and full out joy perished from the house of your God?
17 Beasts waxed rotten in their drit. Barns be destroyed, cellars be destroy-ed, for wheat is shamed.
18 Why wailed a beast? why lowed the flocks of oxen and kine? for no pasture is to them; but also the flocks of sheep perished.
19 Lord, I shall cry to thee, for fire ate the fair things of desert, and flame burnt all the trees of the country.
20 But also beasts of the field, as a cornfloor thirsting rain, beheld [up] to thee; for the wells of waters be dried up, and fire devoured the fair things of desert.