Joel 1:17

17 The grains have become small and dry under the spade; the store-houses are made waste, the grain-stores are broken down; for the grain is dry and dead.

Joel 1:17 Meaning and Commentary

Joel 1:17

The seed is rotten under their clods
Or "grains" F26 of wheat or barley, which had been sown, and, for want of rain, putrefied and wasted away under the clods of earth, through the great drought; so that what with locusts, which cropped that that did bud forth, and with the drought, by reason of which much of the seed sown came to nothing, an extreme famine ensued: the Targum is,

``casks of wine rotted under their coverings:''
the garners are desolate;
the "treasuries" F1, or storehouses, having nothing in them, and there being nothing to put into them; Jarchi makes these to be peculiar for wine and oil, both which failed, ( Joel 1:10 ) ; the barns are broken down;
in which the wheat and barley had used to be laid up; but this judgment of the locusts and drought continuing year after year, the walls fell down, and, no care was taken to repair them, there being no, use for them; these were the granaries, and, as Jarchi, for wheat particularly: for the corn is withered;
that which sprung up withered and dried away, through the heat and drought: or was "ashamed" F2; not answering the expectation of the sower.
FOOTNOTES:

F26 (twdrp) "grana", Pagninus, Montanus, Mercerus, Tarnovius, Cocceius, Bochartus. So Ben Melech, who observes they are so called, because they are separated and scattered under the earth.
F1 (twrua) "thesauri", Pagninus, Montanus, Mercerus, Vatablus, Piscator.
F2 (vybwh) "confusum est", V. L. "puduit", Drusius; "pudore afficit", Cocceius.

Joel 1:17 In-Context

15 Sorrow for the day! for the day of the Lord is near, and as destruction from the Ruler of all it will come.
16 Is not food cut off before our eyes? joy and delight from the house of our God?
17 The grains have become small and dry under the spade; the store-houses are made waste, the grain-stores are broken down; for the grain is dry and dead.
18 What sounds of pain come from the beasts! the herds of cattle are at a loss because there is no grass for them; even the flocks of sheep are no longer to be seen.
19 O Lord, my cry goes up to you: for fire has put an end to the grass-lands of the waste, and all the trees of the field are burned with its flame.
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