1“The word of the LORD that came to Joel, son of Pethuel.”

2“Hear this, you elders; and listen, all you inhabitants of the land. Has anything like this ever happened in your days, or even in the days of your ancestors? 3Tell your children of it, and let your children tell their children, and their children the next generation. 4What the palmer worm has left, the locust has eaten; and what the locust has left, the cankerworm has eaten; and what the cankerworm has left, the caterpillar has eaten. 5Wake up, you drunkards; weep and wail, all you drinkers of wine, because the new wine has been snatched from your lips. 6For a nation, strong, and beyond number, has invaded My land, with teeth like the teeth of a lion, and cheek teeth like those of a great lion. 7He has laid My vines waste, and barked My fig tree; and stripped and thrown away its bark; its branches are white and bare. 8Mourn like a virgin in sackcloth mourning for the husband of her youth. 9The meal offerings and the drink offerings are cut off from the Temple of the LORD; the priests, the LORD's ministers, mourn. 10The fields are wasted, the land mourns; for the grain is destroyed; the new wine is dried up, the olive oil languishes. 11Be ashamed, and despair, O you farmers; wail, O you vinedressers, for the wheat and for the barley; because the harvest of the field is ruined. 12The vine is dried up, and the fig tree withers; the pomegranate, palm, and the apple tree - all the trees of the field - are withered. Surely all the peoples’ joy has departed.”

13“Put on sackcloth, and lament, you priests; wail, you ministers of the altar; come, lie all night in sackcloth, you ministers of my God; for the meal offering and the drink offering are withheld from the house of your God. 14Declare a solemn fast; call a sacred assembly; assemble the elders and all the inhabitants of the land into the Temple of the LORD, your God, and cry unto the LORD. 15Alas for the day! For the day of the LORD is at hand, as a day of destruction from the Almighty shall it come. 16Has not the food supply been cut off before our eyes, yea, and joy and gladness gone from the house of our God? 17The seed rots under the clods, the storehouses are laid desolate, the barns are broken down; for the grain is dried up. 18How the cattle groan from hunger! The herds of cattle are perplexed, searching for pasture; yea, the flocks of sheep and goats are made desolate. 19O LORD, to You will I cry; for fire has devoured the wilderness pastures, and flames have burned all the trees of the field. 20Even the wild animals of the field cry to You; for the streams have dried up, and fire has devoured the pastures in the wilderness.”