The MAJOR & MINOR Prophets - The 16 Writing Prophets Of The Hebrew Canon

The Book of Joel

If you were God, and you determined that you must act decisively to awaken your people out of spiritual/moral apathy and religious backsliding, what would you do? What action, plague or terrifying event would shake up the people, turning them humbly back to their God? What about an army of destruction , one that would show no mercy, one that would reduce Judah to a bare existence? Or, the plan God used to get His people out of Egypt: ten horrific plagues!

Once again it was time to shake up His people. Once again God would need a special, fearless prophet. Although some commentators favor a late date that is postexilic like the time of the Babylonian captivity, our approach follows the evidence suggesting Joel was written in the mid-ninth century B.C., possibly about 835 B.C.

Our proposal is that the Book of Joel does not describe what was actually happening or had happened, but rather it was a timeless, visionary prophecy that laid out the consequences that occur when a people forget *RG 7KH WKHPH RI ´WKH 'D\ RI WKH /25'µ LV QRW XQLTXH WR -RHO 1 but the graphic description (not traceable to a specific KLVWRULFDO RFFDVLRQ VHWV EHIRUH *RG·V SHRSOH (even to this day) the awful results of forsaking God and the glorious results of doing His will. So, with this in mind, whom could God find to deliver such a challenging message? He VHOHFWHG -RHO ZKLFK LQ +HEUHZ PHDQV ´

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