The Pulpit Commentary — Joel — Section 22

EXPOSITION. CHAPTER Il. thongh subsequently Moriah wns chose~ as the temple-hill Let all the inha.bitant'a of Vera. 1-11.-These veraes contain a t.he land tremble : for the day of the Lord further deseription of the calamity oooa,.: oometh, for it is nigh at hand. The' effect sioned by the locusts and the •ppeara.nce here precedes the cause, as if what is upper- presented by them ; the calling of a con- most in the heart comes first to the lips ; gregational meeting for penitence and while the abruptness may, perhaps, express the excitement and intensity of feeling. : prayer; the reason assigned in the coming Bnt li,ow oould the Lord's cle.y be said to of the day of the Lord. have come (ba is perfect), and yet to he near Ver. 1.-Blow ye the trampet (margin. at band? Hengstenberg replies. that, in carnet) in Zion, a.nd I01llld an alarm (or, the intuition of the prophet, it had already cauae it to sound) in my holy maanta.in. come,'though in reality it was only dra.wing The a'hophar, or far-sounding horn. and near. Keil's solution of the difficulty is probably the ehattiots<ra.h, the hazar or silver more satisfactory: every particular judg- trumpet, were called into requisition. The ment that takes place in the history of God's priests are urged with great vehemence, as kingdom is the clay of the Lord, and yet tiqu slwphM and hariu imply, to apprise the only approaching e.s far as the complete pt,ople that tbe <lay of Jehovab's terrible fulfilment wo.s concerned. judgment wa~ near at hand, and to prepare Ver. 2.-A day of darlme11 and of gloomi- for it. This alarm wo.s to be sounded from ne11, a day of oloudl and of thiek d&rkne11. Zion, the dry or llllllDY hill, the holy moun- It wo.s, indeed, a day of Divina ju<lgment, tain. The noun qadoah, like uadlq, is ap- a day of aore distress. Besides the common plied to per8Cltls, therefore the noun qodahe is terms for "darkness" and "cloud," •there 1liled. It rose to e.n elevation of 2539 feet aro two other terms, r.7.p_a,, thick and denso e.bove the level of the Mediterranean See.. It WB.1! tile pla.ce of the ark in David's day, darkness, such as 01111ucs after sunect ; the 1111d so of the ruible symbol of the Divine root ~@tt, though not use4 in the Hebrew, pr-ce, and therefor1, the holy mountu.in, is cognate with the Arabic afal,a, properly, OH, If, 1-,82,] TltE BOOK <1'I' ,JOEL 19