Joel 2:10

10 The earth shakes as they advance; ¹ the sky trembles. The sun and the moon grow dark, and the stars no longer shine.

Joel 2:10 Meaning and Commentary

Joel 2:10

The earth shall quake before them
The inhabitants of it, because of the desolating judgments they bring with them, and those enemies that are signified by them: the heavens shall tremble;
being obscured by them: the sun and moon shall be dark;
the locusts sometimes come in such large numbers as to intercept the rays of the sun. Pliny ^F20 says they sometimes darken it; and though some thought they did not fly in the night, because of the cold; this he observes is owing to their ignorance, not considering that they pass over wide seas to distant countries; and this will account for it how the moon also may be darkened by them, and the stars, as follows: and the stars shall withdraw their shining;
though all this may be understood in a figurative sense of the great consternation that all sorts of persons should be in at such calamities coming upon the land, either by locusts, or by enemies; as the king, queen, nobles, and the common people of the land, signified by sun, moon, and stars, heaven and earth.

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FOOTNOTES:

F20 Ibid. (Nat. Hist. l. 11. c. 29.)

Joel 2:10 In-Context

8 or get in each other's way. They swarm through defenses, and nothing can stop them.

9 They rush against the city; they run over the walls; they climb up the houses and go in through the windows like thieves.

10 The earth shakes as they advance; the sky trembles. The sun and the moon grow dark, and the stars no longer shine.

11 The Lord thunders commands to his army. The troops that obey him are many and mighty. How terrible is the day of the Lord! Who will survive it?

12 "But even now," says the Lord, "repent sincerely and return to me with fasting and weeping and mourning.

Cross References

• 1. 2.10Revelation 8.12.