A verse by verse commentary on Joel chapter 3 dealing with the judgment of the nations and the blessings of God's people.

1. JOEL 3 COMMENTARY
EDITED BY GLENN PEASE
The Nations Judged
1 [a]“In those days and at that time,
when I restore the fortunes of Judah and
Jerusalem,
BARNES, "For, behold - The prophet by the word, “for,” shows that he
is about to explain in detail, what he had before spoken of, in sum. By the
word, “behold,” he stirs up our minds for something great, which he is to
set before our eyes, and which we should not be prepared to expect or
believe, unless he solemnly told us, “Behold.” As the detail, then, of what
goes before, the prophecy contains all times of future judgment on those
who should oppose God, oppress His Church and people, and sin against
Him in them and all times of His blessing upon His own people, until the
Last Day. And this it gives in imagery, partly describing nearer events of
the same sort, as in the punishments of Tyre and Sidon, such as they
endured from the kings of Assyria, from Nebuchadnezzar, from
Alexander; partly using these, His earlier judgments, as representatives
of the like punishments against the like sins unto the end.
In those days and in that time - The whole period of which the prophet
had been speaking, was the time from which God called His people to
repentance, to the Day of Judgment. The last division of that time was
from the beginning of the Gospel unto that Day. He fixes the occasion of
which he speaks by the words, “when I shall bring again the captivity of
Judah and Jerusalem.” This form was used, before there was any general
dispersion of the nation. For all captivity of single members of the Jewish
people had this sore calamity, that it severed them from the public
worship of God, and exposed them to idolatry. So David complains, “they
have driven me out this day from abiding in the inheritance of the Lord,
saying, go serve other gods” 1Sa_26:19. The restoration then of single
members, or of smaller bodies of captives, was, at that time, an
unspeakable mercy. It was the restoration of those shut out from the
worship of God; and so was an image “of the deliverance from the
bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the sons of God” Rom_
8:21, or of any “return” of those who had gone astray, “to the Shepherd
and Bishop of their souls 1Pe_2:25. The grievous captivity of the Jews,
now, is to Satan, whose servants they made themselves, when they said,
“we have no king but Caesar; His Blood be upon us and upon our
children.” Their blessed deliverance will be “from the power of Satan
unto God” Act_26:18. It is certain from Paul Rom_11:26, that there shall
1

2. be a complete conversion of the Jews, before the end of the world, as
indeed has always been believed. This shall probably be shortly before
the end of the world, and God would here say, “when I shall have brought
to an end the “captivity of Judah and Jerusalem,” i. e., of that people “to
whom were the promises” Rom_9:4, and shall have delivered them from
the bondage of sin and from blindness to light and freedom in Christ,
then will I gather all nations to judgment.”
CLARKE, "For, behold, in those days - According to the preceding
prophecy, these days should refer to Gospel times, or to such as should
immediately precede them. But this is a part of the prophecy which is
difficult to be understood. All interpreters are at variance upon it; some
applying its principal parts to Cambyses; his unfortunate expedition to
Egypt; the destruction of fifty thousand of his troops (by the moving
pillars of sand) whom he had sent across the desert to plunder the rich
temple of Jupiter Ammon; his return to Judea, and dying of a wound
which he received from his own sword, in mounting his horse, which
happened at Ecbatane, at the foot of Mount Carmel. On which his army,
composed of different nations, seeing themselves without a head, fell
out, and fought against each other, till the whole were destroyed. And
this is supposed to be what Ezekiel means by Gog and Magog, and the
destruction of the former. See Ezekiel 38 and 39.
Others apply this to the victories gained by the Maccabees, and to the
destruction brought upon the enemies of their country; while several
consider the whole as a figurative prediction of the success of the Gospel
among the nations of the earth. It may refer to those times in which the
Jews shall be brought in with the fullness of the Gentiles, and be re-
established in their own land. Or there may be portions in this prophecy
that refer to all the events; and to others that have not fallen yet within
the range of human conjecture, and will be only known when the time of
fulfillment shall take place. In this painful uncertainty, rendered still
more so by the discordant opinions of many wise and learned men, it
appears to be my province, as I have nothing in the form of a new
conjecture to offer, to confine myself to an explanation of the
phraseology of the chapter; and then leave the reader to apply it as may
seem best to his own judgment.
I shall bring again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem - This may
refer to the return from the Babylonish captivity; extending also to the
restoration of Israel, or the ten tribes.
GILL, "For, behold, in those days, and at that time,.... Which Kimchi
refers to the times of the Messiah; and is true of the latter times of the
Messiah, of his spiritual reign yet to come:
when I shall bring again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem: not from
the Edomites, Tyrians, and Philistines, that had carried them captive in
the times of Ahaz; nor from Babylon, where they had been carried
captive by Nebuchadnezzar; for nothing of what is after foretold followed
upon the return of these captivities: but this designs the present captivity
of the Jews, and the restoration of them to their own land; of which see
2

3. Isa_52:8.
HENRY, "We have often heard of the year of the redeemed, and the
year of recompences for the controversy of Zion; now here we have a
description of the transactions of that year, and a prophecy of what shall
be done when it comes, whenever it comes, for it comes often, and at the
end of time it will come once for all.
I. It shall be the year of the redeemed, for God will bring again the
captivity of Judah and Jerusalem, Joe_3:1. Though the bondage of God's
people may be grievous and very long, yet it shall not be everlasting. That
in Egypt ended at length in their deliverance into the glorious liberty of
the children of God. Let my son go, the he may serve me. That in Babylon
shall likewise end well. And the Lord Jesus will provide for the effectual
redemption of poor enslaved souls from under the dominion of sin and
Satan, and will proclaim that acceptable year, the year of jubilee, the
release of debts and servants, and the opening of the prison to those that
were bound. There is a day, there is a time, fixed for the bringing again
of the captivity of God's children, for the redeeming of them from the
power of the grave; and it shall be the last day and the end of all time.
II. It shall be the year of recompences for the controversy of Zion.
Though God may suffer the enemies of his people to prevail against them
very far and for a long time, yet he will call them to an account for it, and
will lead captivity captive (Psa_68:18), will lead those captive that led his
people captive, Rev_13:10. Observe,
JAMISON, "Joe_3:1-21. God’s vengeance on Israel’s foes in the Valley
of Jehoshaphat. His blessing on the church.
bring again the captivity — that is, reverse it. The Jews restrict this to
the return from Babylon. Christians refer it to the coming of Christ. But
the prophet comprises the whole redemption, beginning from the return
out of Babylon, then continued from the first advent of Christ down to
the last day (His second advent), when God will restore His Church to
perfect felicity [Calvin].
K&D, “(Heb. Bib. ch. 4.) Judgment upon the World of Nations, and
Glorification of Zion- Joe_3:1, Joe_3:2. “For, behold, in those days, and
in that time, when I shall turn the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem, I
will gather together all nations, and bring them down into the valley of
Jehoshaphat, and will contend with them there concerning my people
and my inheritance Israel, which they have scattered among the
nations, and my land have they divided. Joe_3:3. And for my people
they cast the lot; and gave the boy for a harlot, and the maiden they
have sold for wine, and drunk (it).” The description of the judgment-day
predicted in Joe_2:31 commences with an explanatory ‫י‬ ִⅴ‫י‬ ִⅴ‫י‬ ִⅴ‫י‬ ִⅴ. The train of
thought is the following: When the day of the Lord comes, there will be
deliverance upon Zion only for those who call upon the name of the Lord;
for then will all the heathen nations that have displayed hostility to
Jehovah's inheritance be judged in the valley of Jehoshaphat. By hinnhinnhinnhinnēēēēhhhh,
the fact to be announced is held up as something new and important. The
notice as to the time points back to the “afterward” in Joe_2:28 : “in
those days,” viz., the days of the outpouring of the Spirit of God. This
3

4. time is still further described by the apposition, “at that time, when I
shall turn the captivity of Judah,” as the time of the redemption of the
people of God out of their prostrate condition, and out of every kind of
distress. ‫בוּת‬ ְ‫שׁ‬ ‫ת‬ ֶ‫א‬ ‫שׁוּב‬‫בוּת‬ ְ‫שׁ‬ ‫ת‬ ֶ‫א‬ ‫שׁוּב‬‫בוּת‬ ְ‫שׁ‬ ‫ת‬ ֶ‫א‬ ‫שׁוּב‬‫בוּת‬ ְ‫שׁ‬ ‫ת‬ ֶ‫א‬ ‫שׁוּב‬ is not used here in the sense of “to bring back the
prisoners,” but, as in Hos_6:11, in the more comprehensive sense of
restitutio in integrum, which does indeed include the gathering together
of those who were dispersed, and the return of the captives, as one
element, though it is not exhausted by this one element, but also
embraces their elevation into a new and higher state of glory,
transcending their earlier state of grace. In ‫י‬ ִ ְ‫צ‬ ַ ִ‫ק‬ְ‫ו‬‫י‬ ִ ְ‫צ‬ ַ ִ‫ק‬ְ‫ו‬‫י‬ ִ ְ‫צ‬ ַ ִ‫ק‬ְ‫ו‬‫י‬ ִ ְ‫צ‬ ַ ִ‫ק‬ְ‫ו‬ the prediction of
judgment is appended to the previous definition of the time in the form
of an apodosis. The article in ‫ם‬ִ‫וֹי‬ ַ‫ל־ה‬ ָⅴ‫ם‬ִ‫וֹי‬ ַ‫ל־ה‬ ָⅴ‫ם‬ִ‫וֹי‬ ַ‫ל־ה‬ ָⅴ‫ם‬ִ‫וֹי‬ ַ‫ל־ה‬ ָⅴ (all the nations) does not refer to
“all those nations which were spoken of in Hos_1:1-11 and 2 under the
figure of the locusts” (Hengstenberg), but is used because the prophet
had in his mind all those nations upon which hostility towards Israel, the
people of God, is charged immediately afterwards as a crime: so that the
article is used in much the same manner as in Jer_49:36, because the
notion, though in itself an indefinite one, is more fully defined in what
follows (cf. Ewald, §227, a). The valley of YYYYeeee
hhhhōōōōshshshshââââphphphphââââtttt, i.e., Jehovah judges,
is not the valley in which the judgment upon several heathen nations
took place under Jehoshaphat (2 Chronicles 20), and which received the
name of Valley of blessing, from the feast of thanksgiving which
Jehoshaphat held there (2Ch_20:22-26), as Ab. Ezra, Hofmann, Ewald,
and others suppose; for the “Valley of blessing” was not “the valley of
Kidron, which was selected for that festival in the road back from the
desert of Tekoah to Jerusalem” (see Bertheau on 2 Chronicles l.c.), and
still less “the plain of Jezreel” (Kliefoth), but was situated in the
neighbourhood of the ruins of BereikBereikBereikBereikûûûûtttt, which have been discovered by
Wolcott (see Ritter, Erdkunde, xv. p. 635, and Van de Velde, Mem. p.
292). On the other hand, the valley of Jehoshaphat is unquestionably to
be sought for, according to this chapter (as compared with Zec_14:4), in
or near Jerusalem; and the name, which does not occur anywhere else in
either the Old or New Testament, excepting here and in Joe_3:12, is
formed by Joel, like the name ‛‛‛‛ēēēēmeqmeqmeqmeq hechhechhechhechâââârrrrūūūūtstststs in v. 14, from the judgment
which Jehovah would hold upon the nations there. The tradition of the
church (see Euseb. and Jerome in the Onom. s.v. κοιλκοιλκοιλκοιλάάάάςςςς, Caelas, and
Itiner. Anton. p. 594; cf. Robinson, Pal. i. pp. 396, 397) has correctly
assigned it to the valley of the Kidron, on the eastern side of Jerusalem,
or rather to the northern part of that valley (2Sa_18:18), or valley of
Shaveh (Gen_14:17). There would the Lord contend with the nations,
hold judgment upon them, because they had attacked His people
(nachnachnachnachăăăăllllââââththththıııı, the people of Jehovah, as in Joe_2:17) and His kingdom (''''artsartsartsartsıııı).
The dispersion of Israel among the nations, and the division (‫ק‬ ‫ח‬‫ק‬ ‫ח‬‫ק‬ ‫ח‬‫ק‬ ‫)ח‬ of the
Lord's land, cannot, of course, refer to the invasion of Judah by the
Philistines and Arabians in the time of Joram (2Ch_21:16-17). For
although these foes did actually conquer Jerusalem and plunder it, and
carried off, among other captives, even the sons of the king himself, this
transportation of a number of prisoners cannot be called a dispersion of
the people of Israel among the heathen; still less can the plundering of
4

5. the land and capital be called a division of the land of Jehovah; to say
nothing of the fact, that the reference here is to the judgment which
would come upon all nations after the outpouring of the Spirit of God
upon all flesh, and that it is not till Joe_3:4-8 that Joel proceeds to speak
of the calamities which neighbouring nations had inflicted upon the
kingdom of Judah. The words presuppose as facts that have already
occurred, both the dispersion of the whole nation of Israel in exile
among the heathen, and the conquest and capture of the whole land by
heathen nations, and that in the extent to which they took place under
the Chaldeans and Romans alone.
BENSON, "Joel 3:1-2. For, &c. — This particle shows the connection of this
chapter with the latter part of the preceding: as if he had said, As an earnest of
the accomplishment of these predictions, my people shall be restored to their own
land, and then their enemies shall be humbled: see note on Joel 2:28. In those
days, when I shall bring again — Namely, out of Babylon, (to which deliverance
this promise seems primarily to refer,) the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem —
As the type of the whole remnant which shall be saved. I will also gather all
nations — In the type the expression means, all those nations that had oppressed
Judah; in the antitype, all the nations that had been enemies to Christ and his
church. And will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat — That is, into
the place of judgment; for the word Jehoshaphat signifies divine judgment, or,
the place where Jehovah will execute judgment. Thus the valley of Jezreel
signifies the place where God’s arm, or strength, would exert itself. The
expression likewise alludes to the valley of Berachah, or of blessing, as it was
afterward called, mentioned 2 Chronicles 20:26, the place in which Jehoshaphat
obtained a remarkable victory; or, where God, by his miraculous interposition,
so infatuated the enemies of his people, that they destroyed one another, and few
or none of them that came against Judah escaped. Archbishop Newcome
considers it as a prediction of an extraordinary battle which was to be won in
that valley, probably, he thinks, by Nebuchadnezzar, which would utterly
discomfit the ancient enemies of the Jews, and resemble that victory of
Jehoshaphat. But it seems more probable that the prediction principally refers to
a general discomfiture of the enemies of God’s church in the latter days,
probably to that foretold Isaiah 66:16, or to the battle of Gog and Magog,
described Ezekiel 39., and that of Armageddon, spoken of Revelation 16:14;
Revelation 16:16. And I will plead with them — I will require of them the reason
why they thus used my people. God pleads with men, and vindicates the cause of
oppressed truth and righteousness by his judgments. Then the consciences of the
guilty fly in their faces, and force them to acknowledge the justice of the
punishments they suffer. For my people and for my heritage Israel, &c. — The
prophets in the Old Testament often denounced judgments against Edom, Moab,
and other hostile neighbours of the Jews, who took advantage of their calamities
to vent their spite against them. But since all nations are summoned to answer
the impeachment here mentioned, we may suppose the word Israel to
comprehend the faithful of all ages; and then we may observe, that the
judgments denounced against the church’s enemies, are chiefly for their hatred
and cruelty toward God’s servants.
5

6. CALVIN, "Verse 1
The Prophet confirms in these words what he had before taught respecting the
restoration of the Church; for it was a thing difficult to be believed: when the
body of the people was so mutilated, when their name was obliterated, when all
power was abolished, when the worship of God also, together with the temple,
was subverted, when there was no more any form of a kingdom, or even of any
civil government, who could have thought that God had any concern for a people
in such a wretched condition? It is then no wonder that the Prophet speaks so
much at large of the restoration of the Church; he did so, that he might more
fully confirm what would have otherwise been incredible.
He therefore says, Behold, in those days, and at that time, in which I shall restore
the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem, I shall then make all Gentiles to come
down into the valley of Jehoshaphat. And the Prophet says this, because the Jews
were then hated by all people, and were the execration and the dregs of the
whole world. As many nations as were under heaven, so many were the enemies
of the Jews. A fall then inter despair was easy, when they saw the whole world
incensed against them: “Though God may wish to redeem us, there are yet so
many obstacles, that we must necessarily perish; not only the Assyrians are
enraged against us, but we have found even greater hatred in our own
neighbors.” We, indeed, know that the Moabites, the Ammonites, the Syrians,
the Sidonians, the Idumeans, the Philistines, and, in short, all in the surrounding
countries, were very hostile to the Jews. Seeing then every access to their land
was closed up to the Jews, it was difficult to entertain any hope of deliverance,
though God encouraged them. For this reason the Prophet now says, that God
would be the judge of the whole world, and that it was in his purpose and power
to call together all the Gentiles, as though he said, “Let not the number and
variety of enemies frighten you: the Assyrians alone, I know, are not your
enemies, but also all your neighbors; but when I undertake the defense of your
cause, I shall be alone sufficient to protect you; and however much all people
may oppose, they shall not prevail. Then believe that I shall be a sufficient
defender, and shall deliver you from the hand of all the nations ” We now
perceive the Prophet’s design when he declares, that God would come tothe
valley of Jehoshaphat, and there call together all nations.
But the Prophet says, In those days, and at that time, when the Lord shall restore
the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem, etc. This time the Jews limit to their
return: they therefore think, that when liberty to return was granted them by
Cyrus and Darius, what the Prophet declares here was then fulfilled; Christian
doctors apply this prediction to the coming of Christ; but both interpret the
words of the Prophet otherwise than the drift of the passage requires. The
Prophet, no doubt, speaks here of the deliverance we have just noticed, and at
the same time includes the kingdom of Christ; and this, as we have seen in other
parts, is very commonly done. While then the prophets testify that God would be
the redeemer of his people, and promise deliverance from Babylonian exile, they
lead the faithful, as it were, by a continuous train or course, to the kingdom of
Christ. For what else was the Jewish restoration, but a prelude of that true and
real redemptions afterwards effected by Christ? The Prophet then does not
speak only of the coming of Christ, or of the return of the Jews, but includes the
6

7. whole of redemption, which was only begun when the Lord restored his people
from the Babylonian exile; it will then go on from the first coming of Christ to
the last day; as though he said, “When God will redeem his people, it will not be
a short or momentary benefit, but he will continue his favor until he shall visit
with punishment all the enemies of his Church.” In a word, the Prophet here
shows, that God will not be a half Redeemer, but will continue to work until he
completes everything necessary for the happy state of his Church, and makes it
in every respect perfect. This is the import of the whole.
COFFMAN, "Verse 1
The prophecy of this chapter is one of the most remarkable in the whole Bible;
and, for centuries, interpreters have found no agreement in what to make of it.
More than 150 years ago, Adam Clarke wrote that, "This is a part of the
prophecy which is difficult to understand; all interpreters are at variance upon
it,'" himself leaning toward the view that it referred to certain victories or
changes in the fortunes of the secular state of Israel. It is our conviction that
most of the failure to understand Joel 3 derives from a misunderstanding of the
secular state and fleshly nation of the Jews as the principal, or even the sole,
subject of God's concern and of his prophetic word, a confusion of the two
Israel's of God, the one of the flesh alone, the other of the spirit and mind of
Abraham. It is of this latter Israel, the true Israel alone, that the great prophecies
of the O.T. are speaking, some notable exceptions occurring at a time when the
two were commingled with a secular state which the fleshly Israel had injected
into God's plans by their rebellion against him and their insistence upon having
a king. As during the subsequent centuries the true Israel was necessarily
mingled with the secular, and indeed confused with it, there were indeed many
prophecies and references to "Israel" which applied to them both.
But in this chapter, one should forget all about the secular Israel, the Jewish
state, the Hebrew nation, the fleshly Israel, the old Israel, etc. All of the
references to Judah, Jerusalem, Zion, "my heritage Israel," etc. are used in a
spiritual sense of the church and kingdom of Jesus Christ our Lord. The very
first verse of this chapter dates everything in it subsequently to the Day of
Pentecost; and that leaves the secular Israel completely out of it.
The first section of the chapter, in highly metaphorical language, speaks of the
"true Israel" receiving the forgiveness of sins, and of the judgments of God upon
the nations which opposed his purpose (Joel 3:1-7). Section two (Joel 3:9-13) has
the same meaning as the gathering of the nations for the battle of Armageddon
(Revelation 16); and it also has the summoning of all nations to the Final
Judgment, presented under the figure of the sickle and the harvest as is also the
case in Revelation 14. The reign of Christ is depicted in section three (Joel
3:14-17), during which time, the Lord "roars from Jerusalem" (in the N.T.
which originated there), and also during which time the "people of Israel" (the
church of Jesus Christ) will find their refuge in Jehovah (not in literal
Jerusalem). All men during this phase of divine history will be caught up in "the
valley of decision," where will be determined their destiny as servants either of
Christ, or of the devil.
7

8. The final section of this chapter (Joel 3:18-21) is a figurative presentation of the
wonderful spiritual blessings available in the kingdom of heaven.
Joel 3:1
"For behold in those days, and at that time, when I shall bring back the captivity
of Judah and Jerusalem.
"In those days, and at that time ..." Cole said that this "points to the distant and
vague future";[2] and, although that might be true as it seemed to the people of
Joel's day, it is not so for us. What is clearly meant is that "in the times of the
pouring out of God's Spirit upon all flesh," as prophesied immediately before
these words, the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem will be "brought back." And
of course, we know exactly when that time began, namely, on the first Pentecost
after the resurrection of Christ. As Keil noted, "All of the views which refer
these words to events before the Christian era are irreconcilable with the
context."[3] Everything in this chapter is to occur after the outpouring of God's
Spirit upon all flesh. Hailey correctly identified the time-frame of this chapter
with "the dispensation following Pentecost."[4] All applications of these words to
some future millennium, or to pre-Christian episodes, are incorrect.
"I shall bring back the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem ..." One is at once
aware of variations from this rendition, "The RSV (and a number of
translations) rendering it in the more general sense of restore the fortunes."[5]
This change was evidently made in order to accommodate the interpretation of
this place as pertaining to secular Israel, an interpretation denied by the literal
meaning of the words, because "even after the returns of the sixth and fifth
centuries, many Jews still remained in exile."[6] However, the ASV and all of the
ancient versions harmonize with the KJV in this place, "bring again the captivity
of Judah"; and "this is the literal translation."[7] It is therefore a very general
and widespread captivity which is the subject of the prophecy. What is it? Jesus
mentioned it in the first public sermon he ever preached:
"He hath sent me to proclaim release to the captives, And recovering of sight to
the blind, To set at liberty them that are bruised, To proclaim the acceptable
year of the Lord" (Luke 4:18).
This is the only release of captives that can properly be identified with the
dispensation of the Spirit of God; and it is clearly a release from bondage and
servitude of sin that is meant. "It is the deliverance from the bondage of
corruption into the glorious liberty of the Son of God."[8] The terrible captivity
of the Jews (in the general sense) is to Satan, whose servants they chose to
become when they cried, "We have no king but Caesar," and "his blood be upon
us and upon our children." Likewise, the vast majority of the whole Gentile
world as well are engaged in the very same servitude of the evil one. It is that
captivity, preeminently, and above all others, with which God has always been
concerned. In speaking of Jews and Gentiles, let it ever be remembered that all
alike, both Jews and Gentiles, are invited by the gospel of Christ to receive the
turn of their captivity. Whosoever will may come! This sublime truth makes it
impossible to suppose that God has in any manner wronged Israel by his refusal
8

9. to accommodate to their carnal view of God's kingdom which identified it with
their state! The fact that Amos "spoke of `an entire captivity' (Amos 1:6,9),"[9]
at a period long before either the Assyrian or Babylonian captivities occurred,
shows the ancient prophets did not restrict this to a physical captivity. Then, as
now, the problem was sin and rebellion against God.
"Turning again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem" thus refers to the times of
regeneration in the kingdom of Christ, that is, to this present dispensation of the
gospel when all men, of every race and nation, if they so desire, may receive the
forgiveness of their sins and the restoration of their broken fellowship with the
Father.
COKE, "Joel 3:1. For, behold, in those days, &c.— As the foregoing promise of
the Spirit was an assurance to the Jews, that, notwithstanding they might be
reduced very low by their enemies, yet they should not be destroyed as a nation
till God had accomplished all the great prophesies relating to the Messiah; so he
in this chapter assures them of a deliverance from the oppression of their
enemies, which they then laboured under; particularly from the Tyrians,
Sidonians, Philistines, Egyptians, and Idumaeans, who were the neighbouring
nations, and had each in their turns invaded them, pillaged their treasures, and
led them into captivity. Upon this account God expostulates with them, Joel 3:2-6
promises the Jews that their captives should return, and that he would cause
them to execute his just vengeance on their enemies, who, with all their power
and forces, should not be able to deliver themselves; Joel 3:7-16. That Jerusalem
should be taken under his protection, and the Jews enjoy such great prosperity,
and see the violence, unrighteousness, and insolence of their enemies so signally
avenged, as should cause them to acknowledge the power of Jehovah their God,
and adore him for his great and unmerited favours towards them; Joel 3:17 to
the end. Houbigant reads this verse, Behold, after those days, and after that time,
&c. And he supposes that these words refer to the 27th verse of the preceding
chapter, as they evidently cannot refer to the times posterior to the destruction of
Jerusalem by the Romans.
GUZIK, "Joel 3 - Judgment in the Valley of Decision
A. A warning to the nations.
1. (1-3) A promise to bring back scattered and mistreated Israel.
For behold, in those days and at that time, when I bring back the captives of
Judah and Jerusalem, I will also gather all nations, and bring them down to the
Valley of Jehoshaphat; and I will enter into judgment with them there on
account of My people, My heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the
nations; they have also divided up My land. They have cast lots for My people,
have given a boy as payment for a harlot, and sold a girl for wine, that they may
drink.
9

10. a. In those days and at that time: Joels prophecy still concerns the time period
connected with it shall come to pass afterward mentioned in Joel 2:28. This is the
broad period of the Last Days, initiated by the Ascension of Jesus and the birth
of the Church on the Day of Pentecost.
i. Many have the wrong idea of the last days, thinking only in terms of the final
years or months immediately before the return of Jesus in glory to this earth, or
the rapture of the Church. Scripturally, we can think of the last days as an era,
one that began with the birth of the Church on the Day of Pentecost. Since that
time, the Church has not been rushing towards a distant edge that represents the
consummation of all things. Instead, at the Day of Pentecost the Church came to
the edge - and has run parallel to the brink for some 2,000 years.
b. When I bring back the captives of Judah and Jerusalem: In a lesser,
immediate sense this was fulfilled in the return from the Babylonian exile. In the
greater, ultimate sense it will be fulfilled in the end-times regathering of Israel, to
the point where an expectant Israel welcomes Jesus saying, Blessed is He who
comes in the name of the Lord (Matthew 23:39) and salvation comes to Israel as
a whole (Romans 11:26-27).
c. I will also gather all nations, and bring them down to the Valley of
Jehoshaphat: Joel here describes the final gather of the nations in rebellion
against God at the Battle of Armageddon (Revelation 16:12-16). There is no
place in Israel known as the Valley of Jehosphaphat but the name Jehoshaphat
means, The Lord Judges. It describes Gods place of judgment.
i. There is no such valley in the land of Judea; and hence the name must be
symbolical. It signifies the judgment of God, or Jehovah judgeth. (Clarke)
ii. This is a judgment of all nations. Joel was written at a time when a terrible
plague of locusts brought the judgment of God upon the people of God. At a time
like that, it is easy to think God, You are dealing harshly with us, but what about
the ungodly nations? We may be bad, but they are worse. Dont you care about
them? God uses Joel 3 to assure Israel that the nations will be dealt with.
d. I will enter into judgment with them there on account of My people: Gods
complaint against the nations is that they have mistreated His people. Primarily,
this has in view the way the nations treat Israel, but also extends to how the
nations treat the Church. When Gods people are mistreated, God takes it
personally and will avenge it.
10

11. i. In the judgment of the nations Jesus described in Matthew 25:31-46, the
criteria is not faith in Jesus Christ but how the nations have treated the people of
Israel - the brethren of Jesus. Held on the earth after His return in glory, this
judgment determines who is allowed to enter into the Millennial Earth, and who
goes straight to judgment.
ii. They have cast lots for My people: It is bad enough for man to regard any
human life as cheap; it is worse to regard the people of God as cheap. God
remembers and will repay.
HAWKER, “Though it may, in a subordinate and secondary sense, be said, that
these blessings to the Church were in a measure given on the occasional
deliverance of Zion from her enemies, when at any time the Lord reckoned with
her foes: yet, it were sadly to enervate scripture, to suppose that the Holy Ghost
pointed to any temporal mercies when speaking of the great day of the Lord.
Evidently the days here spoken of were the gospel days, and that time the time of
salvation, by the incarnation, death, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And this scripture, read in this point of view, opens a subject of the most blessed
nature. What thanks is there due from the Church to God the Holy Ghost, for
thus preparing the Church so many ages before the coming of Christ, to be
waiting and looking for her Lord's approach. The valley of Jehoshaphat was
near to Jerusalem, as if pointing to the very spot of the Lord Jesus' ministry.
And how was the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem brought again, but by the
death of Jesus? Reader! how sweet and blessed this subject becomes, when in the
many gracious things said in it, you and I can discover our own personal interest
in them?
EBC, “THE JUDGMENT OF THE HEATHEN
Joel 3:1-21
HITHERTO Joel has spoken no syllable of the heathen, except to pray that God
by His plagues will not give Israel to be mocked by them. But in the last chapter
of the Book we have Israel’s captivity to the heathen taken for granted, a
promise made that it will be removed and their land set free from the foreigner.
Certain nations are singled out for judgment, which is described in the terms of
Apocalypse; and the Book closes with the vision, already familiar in prophecy, of
a supernatural fertility for the land.
It is quite another horizon and far different interests from those of the preceding
chapter. Here for the first time we may suspect the unity of the Book, and listen
to suggestions of another authorship than Joel’s. But these can scarcely be
regarded as conclusive. Every prophet, however national his interests, feels it his
duty to express himself upon the subject of foreign peoples, and Joel may well
have done so. Only, in that case, his last chapter was delivered by him at another
time and in different circumstances from the rest of his prophecies. Chapters 1-2
are complete in themselves. Chapter 3 opens without any connection of time or
11

12. subject with those that precede it.
The time of the prophecy is a time when Israel’s fortunes are at low her sons
scattered among the heathen, her land, in part at least, held by foreigners. But it
would appear (though this is not expressly said, and must rather be inferred
from the general proofs of a post-exilic date) that Jerusalem is inhabited.
Nothing is said to imply that the city needs to be restored.
All the heathen nations are to be brought together for judgment into a certain
valley, which the prophet calls first the Vale of Jehoshaphat and then the Vale of
Decision. The second name leads us to infer that the first, which means
"Jehovah-judges," is also symbolic. That is to say, the prophet does not single
out a definite valley already called Jehoshaphat. In all probability, however, he
has in his mind’s eye some vale in the neighborhood of Jerusalem, for since
Ezekiel (Ezekiel 38:1-23) the judgment of the heathen in face of Jerusalem has
been a standing feature in Israel’s vision of the last things; and as no valley
about that city lends itself to the picture of judgment so well as the valley of the
Kedron with the slopes of Olivet, the name Jehoshaphat has naturally been
applied to it. Certain nations are singled out by name. These are not Assyria and
Babylon, which had long ago perished, nor the Samaritans, Moab and Ammon,
which harassed the Jews in the early days of the Return from Babylon, but Tyre,
Sidon, Philistia, Edom, and Egypt. The crime of the first three is the robbery of
Jewish treasures, not necessarily those of the Temple, and the selling into slavery
of many Jews. The crime of Edom and Egypt is that they have shed the innocent
blood of Jews. To what precise events these charges refer we have no means of
knowing in our present ignorance of Syrian history after Nehemiah. That the
chapter has no explicit reference to the cruelties of Artaxerxes Ochus in 360
would seem to imply for it a date earlier than that year. But it is possible that
Joel 3:17 refers to that, the prophet refraining from accusing the Persians for the
very good reason that Israel was still under their rule.
Another feature worthy of notice is that the Phoenicians are accused of selling
Jews to the sons of the Jevanim, Ionians or Greeks. The latter lie on the far
horizon of the prophet, and we know from classical writers that from the fifth
century onward numbers of Syrian slaves were brought to Greece. The other
features of the chapter are borrowed from earlier prophets.
"For, behold, in those days and in that time, When I bring again the captivity of
Judah and Jerusalem, I will also gather all the nations, And bring them down to
the Vale of Jehoshaphat; And I will enter into judgment with them there, For My
people and for My heritage Israel, Whom they have scattered among the
heathen, And My land have they divided. And they have cast lots for My people:
They have given a boy for a harlot, And a girl have they sold for wine and drunk
it. And again, what are ye to Me, Tyre and Sidon and all circuits of Philistia? Is
it any deed of Mine ye are repaying? Or are ye doing anything to Me? Swiftly,
speedily will I return your deed on your head, Who have taken My silver and My
gold, And My goodly jewels ye have brought into your palaces.
The sons of Judah and the sons of Jerusalem have ye sold to the sons of the
12

13. Greeks, In order that ye might set them as far as possible from their own border.
Lo! I will stir them up from the place to which ye have sold them, And I will
return your deed upon your head. I will sell your sons and your daughters into
the hands of the sons of Judah, And they shall sell them to the Shebans, To a
nation far off; for Jehovah hath spoken. Proclaim this among the heathen,
hallow a war, Wake up the warriors, let all the fighting-men muster and go up
Beat your ploughshares into swords, And your pruning-hooks into lances. Let
the weakling say, I am strong and come, all ye nations round about, And gather
yourselves together. Thither bring down Thy warriors, Jehovah, Let the heathen
be roused, And come up to the Vale of Jehoshaphat, For there will I sit to judge
all the nations round about. Put in the sickle, for ripe is the harvest. Come, get
you down; for the press is full, The vats overflow, great is their wickedness.
Multitudes, multitudes in the Vale of Decision! For near is Jehovah’s day in the
Vale of Decision. Sun and moon have turned black, And the stars withdrawn
their shining. Jehovah thunders from Zion, And from Jerusalem gives forth His
voice Heaven and earth do quake But Jehovah is a refuge to His people, And for
a fortress to the sons of Israel. And ye shall know that I am Jehovah your God,
Who dwell in Zion, the mount of My holiness; And Jerusalem shall be holy,
Strangers shall not pass through her again. And it shall be on that day The
mountains shall drop sweet wine, And the hills be liquid with milk.
And all the channels of Judah flow with water; A fountain shall spring from the
house of Jehovah, And shall water the Wady of Shittim. Egypt shall be
desolation, And Edom desert-land, For the outrage done to the children of
Judah, Because they shed innocent blood in their land. Judah shall abide
peopled forever, And Jerusalem for generation upon generation. And I will
declare innocent their blood, which I have not declared innocent, Jehovah who
dwelleth in Zion."
BI, “For, behold, in those days, and in that time, when I shall bring
again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem.
The year of recompense
I. It shall be the year of the redeemed. Though the bondage of God’s
people may be grievous and long, it shall not be everlasting. That in Egypt
ended at length in their deliverance into the glorious liberty of the
children of God. That in Babylon shall likewise end well.
II. It shall be the year of recompences for the controversy of Zion.
Though God may suffer the enemies of His people to prevail against them
very far, and for a long time, yet He will call them to an account for it,
and will lead those captive that led His people captive.
1. Who those are that shall be reckoned with. “All nations.” This
intimates—
(1) That all the nations had made themselves liable to the
judgment of God for wrong done to His people. But the
neighbouring nations should be particularly dealt with.
(2) That whatsoever nation injured God’s nation, they should not
go unpunished. Little persecutors shall be taken account of as well
as great ones.
13

14. 2. The sitting of this court for judgment.
3. The plaintiff called, on whose behalf this prosecution is set on foot.
4. The charge exhibited against them, which is very particular.
(1) They had been very abusive to the children of Israel.
(2) They had unjustly seized God’s silver and gold.
5. The sentence passed upon them. “Return your recompence upon
your own head.”
(1) They shall not gain their end in the mischief they designed.
(2) They shall be paid in their own coin. (Matthew Henry.)
The persecution of good men
I. There have ever been good men on earth.
1. “My people.” They are His—
(1) They have surrendered themselves to His will.
(2) He has pledged them His loving guardianship.
2. “My heritage” (Exo_19:5). He who owns the universe, esteems holy
souls as the most valuable of His possessions.
II. These good men on earth have generally been subject to persecution.
“Whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted My land.”
There is a persecution that, whilst it does not involve bonds,
imprisonments, and physical violences, involves the malice of hell, and
inflicts grievous injury. There is social calumny, scorn, degradation, and
various disabilities.
III. Their persecution will be avenged by heaven. “I will also gather all
nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and
will plead with them there, for My people and for My heritage Israel.”
Ah! the time hastens when persecutors of all types and ages will have full
retribution dealt out to them in some great valley of Jehoshaphat.
(Homilist.)
LANGE, “Joel 3:1-3. For behold in those days, etc. The ‫י‬ ִ‫כּ‬ in Joel 3:1 gives the
reason for the thought that deliverance can be found only in Zion, in the day of the
Lord, for then shall all heathen nations be judged. In those days, i. e., the days that shall
come, the “afterward” of the previous chapter. The signs of the event belong essentially
to the event itself; but the time is more exactly determined by the statement “when I
shall bring again,” etc. This distinctly shows that the object of the day of the Lord
Isaiah, the deliverance of the people of God. The judgment of the heathen world is
simply a means to that end. Bring back the captivity, or to return the captivity, means
to make an end of it. This phrase, from the use here made of it to designate the epoch of
judgment as a terminus technicus for a restitutio in integrum promised to God’s people,
may have been borrowed from some more ancient prophecy. The condition out of
which the captivity is brought appears from the close of Joel 3:2. But the conclusion of
the chapter shows, that the captivity is not simply to end, but that its termination
involves a positively new and higher order of things. Judah and Jerusalem,i. e., Judah
14

15. generally, Jerusalem specially.
2 I will gather all nations
and bring them down to the Valley of
Jehoshaphat.[b]
There I will put them on trial
for what they did to my inheritance, my
people Israel,
because they scattered my people among the
nations
and divided up my land.
BARNES, "I will gather all nations and bring them down to the valley of
Jehoshaphat - It may be that the imagery is furnished by that great
deliverance which God gave to Jehoshaphat, when “Ammon and Moab
and Edom come against” him, “to cast God’s people out of” His
“possession,” which “He gave” them “to inherit” 2Ch_20:11, and
Jehoshaphat appealed to God, “O our God, wilt Thou not judge them?”
and God said, “the battle is not yours but God’s,” and God turned their
swords everyone against the other, “and none escaped. And on the fourth
day they assembled themselves in the valley of Berachah” (blessing); “for
there they blesed the Lord” 2 Chr. 24, 26. So, in the end, He shall destroy
antichrist, not by human aid, but “by the breath of His mouth,” and then
the end shall come and lie shall sit on the throne of His glory to judge all
nations. Then shall none escape of those gathered against Judah and
Jerusalem, but shall be judged of their own consciences, as those former
enemies of His people fell by their own swords.
That valley, however, is nowhere called “the valley of Jehoshaphat.” It
continued to be “called the valley of Berachah,” the writer adds, “to this
day.” And it is so called still. Caphar Barucha, “the village of blessing,”
was still known in that neighborhood in the time of Jerome ; it had been
known in that of Josephus . Southwest of Bethlehem and east of Tekoa
are still 3 or 4 acres of ruins , bearing the name Bereikut , and a valley
below them, still bearing silent witness to God’s ancient mercies, in its
but slightly disguised name, “the valley of Bereikut” (Berachah). The
only valley called the “valley of Jehoshaphat” , is the valley of Kedron,
lying between Jerusalem and the Mount of Olives, incircling the city on
the east.
There Asa, Hezekiah, and Josiah cast the idols, which they had burned
15

16. 1Ki_15:13; 2Ch_30:14; 2Ki_23:6, 2Ki_23:12. The valley was the common
burying-place for the inhabitants of Jerusalem . “There” was the garden
where Jesus oftentimes resorted with His disciples; “there” was His
Agony and Bloody Sweat; there Judas betrayed Him; thence He was
dragged by the rude officers of the high priest. The temple, the token of
God’s presence among them, the pledge of His accepting their sacrifices
which could only be offered there, overhung it on the one side. There,
under the rock on which that temple stood, they dragged Jesus, “as a
lamb to the slaughter” Isa_53:7. On the other side, it was overhung by the
Mount of “Olives,” from where, “He beheld the city and wept over it,”
because it “knew” not “in” that its “day, the things which belong to its
peace;” whence, after His precious Death and Resurrection, Jesus
ascended into, heaven.
There the Angels foretold His return, “This heaven shall so come in like
manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven” Act_1:11. It has been a
current opinion, that our Lord should descend to judgment, not only in
like manner, and in the like Form of Man, but in the same place, over this
valley of Jehoshaphat. Certainly, if so it be, it were appropriate, that He
should appear in His Majesty, where, for us, He bore the extremest
shame; that He should judge “there,” where for us, He submitted to be
judged. “He sheweth,” says Hilary (in Matt. 25), “that the Angels bringing
them together, the assemblage shall be in the place of His Passion; and
meetly will His Coming in glory be looked for there, where He won for us
the glory of eternity by the sufferings of His humility in the Body.” But
since the Apostle says, “we shall meet the Lord in the air,” then, not “in”
the valley of Jehoshaphat, but “over” it, in the clouds, would His throne
be. : “Uniting, as it were, Mount Calvary and Olivet, the spot would be
well suited to that judgment wherein the saints shall partake of the glory
of the Ascension of Christ and the fruit of His Blood and Passion, and
Christ shall take deserved vengeance of His persecutors and of all who
would not be cleansed by His Blood.”
God saith, “I will gather all nations,” of the gathering together of the
nations against Him under antichrist, because He overrules all things,
and while they, in “their” purpose, are gathering themselves against His
people and elect, He, in His purpose secret to them, is gathering them to
sudden destruction and judgment, “and will bring them down;” for their
pride shall be brought down, and themselves laid low. Even Jewish
writers have seen a mystery in the word, and said, that it hinteth “the
depth of God’s judgments,” that God “would descend with them into the
depth of judgment” , “a most exact judgment even the most hidden
things.”
His very presence there would say to the wicked , “In this place did I
endure grief for you; here, at Gethsemane, I poured out for you that
sweat of water and Blood; here was I betrayed and taken, bound as a
robber, dragged over Cedron into the city; hard by this valley, in the
house of Caiaphas and then of Pilate, I was for you judged and
condemned to death, crowned with thorns, buffeted, mocked and spat
upon; here, led through the whole city, bearing the Cross, I was at length
crucified for you on Mount Calvary; here, stripped, suspended between
heaven and earth, with hands, feet, and My whole frame distended, I
offered Myself for you as a Sacrifice to God the Father. Behold the Hands
which ye pierced; the Feet which ye perforated; the Sacred prints which
ye anew imprinted on My Body. Ye have despised My toils, griefs,
16

17. sufferings; ye have counted the Blood of My covenant an unholy thing; ye
have chosen to follow your own concupiscences rather than Me, My
doctrine and law; ye have preferred momentary pleasures, riches,
honors, to the eternal salvation which I promised; ye have despised Me,
threatening the fires of hell.
Now ye see whom ye have despised; now ye see that My threats and
promises were not vain, but true; now ye see that vain and fallacious
were your loves, riches, and dignities; now ye see that ye were fools and
senseless in the love of them; but too late. “Depart, ye cursed, into
everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.” But ye who
believed, hoped, loved, worshiped Me, your Redeemer, who obeyed My
whole law; who lived a Christian life worthy of Me; who lived soberly,
godly and righteously in this world, looking for the blessed hope and this
My glorious Coming, “Come ye blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom
of heaven prepared for you from the foundation of the World - And these
shall go into everlasting fire; but the righteous into life eternal.” Blessed
he whoso continually thinketh or foreseeth, provideth for these things.”
And will plead with them there - Woe to him, against whom God
pleadeth! He saith not, “judgeth” but “pleadeth,” making Himself a
party, the Accuser as well as the Judge , “Solemn is it indeed when
Almighty God saith, “I will plead. He that hath ears to hear let him hear.”
For terrible is it. Wherefore also that “Day of the Lord” is called “great
and terrible.” For what more terrible than, at such a time, the pleading of
God with man? For He says, “I will plead,” as though He had never yet
pleaded with man, great and terrible as have been His judgments since
that first destruction of the world by water. Past are those judgments on
Sodom and Gomorrah, on Pharaoh and his hosts, on the whole people in
the wilderness from twenty years old and upward, the mighty
oppressions of the enemies into whose hands He gave them in the land of
promise; past were the four Empires; but now, in the time of antichrist,
“there shall be tribulation, such as there had not been from the
beginning of the world.” But all these are little, compared with that great
and terrible Day; and so He says, “I will plead,” as though all before had
not been, to “plead.””
God maketh Himself in such wise a party, as not to condemn those
unconvicted; yet the “pleading” has a separate awfulness of its own. God
impleads, so as to allow Himself to be impleaded and answered; but
there is no answer. He will set forth what He had done, and how we have
requited Him. And we are without excuse. Our memories witness against
us; our knowledge acknowledges His justice; our conscience convicts us;
our reason condemns us; all unite in pronouncing ourselves ungrateful,
and God holy and just. For a sinner to see himself is to condemn himself;
and in the Day of Judgment, God will bring before each sinner his whole
self.
For My people - o: “God’s people are the one true Israel, “princes with
God,” the whole multitude of the elect, foreordained to eternal life.” Of
these, the former people of Israel, once chosen of God, was a type. As
Paul says, “They are not all Israel which are of Israel” Rom_9:6; and
again, “As many as walk according to this rule” of the Apostle’s teaching,
“peace be on them and mercy, and upon the Israel of God” Gal_6:16, i. e.,
not among the Galatians only, but in the whole Church throughout the
world. Since the whole people and Church of God is one, He lays down
17

18. one law, which shall be fulfilled to the end; that those who, for their own
ends, even although therein the instruments of God, shall in any way
injure the people of God, shall be themselves punished by God. God
makes Himself one with His people. “He that toucheth you, toucheth the
apple of My eye” Zec_2:8. So our Lord said, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest
thou Me?” Act_9:4 and in the Day of Judgment He will say, “I was an
hungered and ye gave me no meat. Forasmuch as ye did it not unto one of
the least of these My brethern, ye did it not to Me” Mat_25:34-35. : “By
calling them “My heritage,” He shows that He will not on any terms part
with them or suffer them to be lost, but will vindicate them to Himself
forever.”
Whom they have scattered among the nations - Such was the offence of
the Assyrians and Babylonians, the first ““army,” which God sent against
His people. And for it, Nineveh and Babylon perished. : “Yet he does not
speak of that ancient people, or of its enemies only, but of all the elect
both in that people and in the Church of the Gentiles, and of all
persecutors of the elect. For that people were a figure of the Church, and
its enemies were a type of those who persecute the saints.” The
dispersion of God’s former people by the pagan was renewed in those
who persecuted Christ’s disciples from “city to city,” banished them, and
confiscated their goods. Banishment to mines or islands were the
slightest punishments of the early Christians .
CLARKE, "The valley of Jehoshaphat - There is no such valley in the
land of Judea; and hence the word must be symbolical. It signifies the
judgment of God, or Jehovah judgeth; and may mean some place (as Bp.
Newcome imagines) where Nebuchadnezzar should gain a great battle,
which would utterly discomfit the ancient enemies of the Jews, and
resemble the victory which Jehoshaphat gained over the Ammonites,
Moabites, and Edomites, 2Ch_20:22-26.
And parted my land - The above nations had frequently entered into
the territories of Israel; and divided among themselves the lands they
had thus overrun.
While the Jews were in captivity, much of the land of Israel was seized
on, and occupied by the Philistines, and other nations that bordered on
Judea.
GILL, "I will also gather all nations,.... Or cause or suffer them to be
gathered together against his people; not the Moabites, Ammonites, and
Edomites, in the times of Jehoshaphat, as Aben Ezra; but either the
Turks, prophesied of under the name of Gog and Magog in Ezekiel, Eze_
38:1; and a multitude of other nations with them, who shall be gathered
together against the Jews, to regain the land of Judea from them, they
will upon their conversion inhabit; or else all the antichristian kings and
nations, which shall be gathered to the battle of the great day of God
Almighty, Rev_16:14;
and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat: Kimchi thinks
this was some valley near to Jerusalem, in which Jehoshaphat built or
18

19. wrought some works, and so was called by his name: Joseph Ben Gorion
(x) speaks of a valley, called the valley of Jehoshaphat, which was near
Jerusalem, to the further end of which one Zachariah, a good man, in the
times of the Jewish wars, was rolled and died, being cast down from the
top of a tower upon the wall east of Jerusalem; and which is confirmed
by R. Abraham, as quoted by Lively; and the true Josephus says (y), that
the valley into which this man was cast lay directly under Jerusalem; and
Benjamin of Tudela (z) makes mention of a valley of this name, which he
says lies between Jerusalem and the mount of Olives; where Jerom (a)
places it by the name of Caelas; with whom Mr. Maundrell (b) agrees,
who says that this valley lies between Mount Moriah and Mount Olivet,
and has its name from the sepulchre of Jehoshaphat: and, according to
Lyra on the place, who is followed by Adrichomius (c), it is the same with
the valley of Kidron, which was so situated; but, why that should be
called the valley of Jehoshaphat, no reason is given. Aben Ezra and
others are of opinion that this is the same with the valley of Berachah,
where Jehoshaphat obtained a very great victory over many nations,
2Ch_20:1; but it does not appear to have been called by his name, and,
besides, seems to be at a great distance from Jerusalem; though there
may be an allusion to it, that as many nations were there collected
together and destroyed, so shall it be in the latter day; and I am of
opinion that no proper name of a place is here meant, as going by it in
common, but is so called from the judgment of God here executed upon
his and his people's enemies. So Jarchi calls it "the valley of judgments";
Jehoshaphat signifying "the judgment" of the Lord: Kimchi says it may
be so called because of judgment, the Lord there pleading with the
nations, and judging them: and in the Targum it is rendered,
"the valley of the division of judgment:''
and to me it designs no other than Armageddon, the seat of the battle of
Almighty God, Rev_16:16; and which may signify the destruction of their
troops; See Gill on Rev_16:16;
and will plead with them there for my people, and for my heritage Israel;
the people of the Jews, who will now be converted, who will have the
"loammi", Hos_1:9, taken off of them, and will be called the people of the
living God again, and be reckoned by him as his portion and inheritance;
though not them only, but all the saints; all that have separated from
antichrist, his doctrine and worship, and have suffered by him:
whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land;
Kimchi refers this to the scattering of the Jews by Titus and his army,
and the partition of Judea among them, which is not amiss; in
consequence of which they are still a scattered people, and their land has
been parted between Turks and Papists (d); sometimes inhabited by the
one, and sometimes by the other, and now by both, on whom God will
take vengeance; he will plead the cause of his people, by the severe
judgments he will inflict on his and their enemies. This may respect the
persecuting of the Christians from place to place, and seizing on their
lands and estates, and parting them, as well as the dispersion of the
Jews, and the partition of the land of Canaan.
19

20. HENRY, "Who those are that shall be reckoned with - all nations, Joe_
3:2. This intimates, (1.) That all the nations had made themselves liable
to the judgment of God for wrong done to his people. Persecution is the
reigning crying sin of the world; that lying in wickedness itself is set
against godliness. The enmity that is in the old serpent, the god of this
world, against the seed of the woman, appears more or less in the
children of this world. Marvel not if the world hate you. (2.) That,
whatsoever nation injured God's nation, they should not go unpunished;
for he that touches the Israel of God shall be made to know that he
touches the apple of his eye. Jerusalem will be a burdensome stone to all
people, Zec_12:3. But the neighboring nations shall be particularly
reckoned with - Tyre, and Sidon, and all the coasts of Palestine, or the
Philistines, who have been troublesome neighbours to the Israel of God,
Joe_3:4. When the more remote and potent nations that laid Israel
wastes are reckoned with the impotent malice of those that lay near
them, and helped forward the affliction, (Zec_1:15), and made a hand of
it (Eze_26:2), shall not be passed by. Note, Little persecutors shall be
called to an account as well as great ones; and, though they could not do
much mischief, shall be reckoned with according to the wickedness of
their endeavors and the mischief they would have done.
2. The sitting of this court for judgment. They shall all be gathered
(Joe_3:2), that those who have combined together against God's people,
with one consent (Psa_83:5), may together receive their doom. They
shall be brought down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, which lay near
Jerusalem, and there God will plead with them, (1.) Because it is fit that
criminals should be tried in the same country where they did the fact.
(2.) For their greater confusion, when they shall see that Jerusalem
which they have so long endeavored and hoped for the ruin of, in spite of
all their rage, made a praise in the earth. (3.) For the greater comfort
and honor of God's Jerusalem, which shall see God pleading their cause.
(4.) Then shall be re-acted what God did for Jehoshaphat when he gave
him victory over those that invaded him, and furnished him and his
people with matter of joy and praise, in the valley of Berachah. See 2Ch_
20:26. (5.) It was in this valley of Jehoshaphat (as Dr. Lightfoot suggests)
that Sennacherib's army, or part of it, lay, when it was destroyed by an
angel. They came together to ruin Jerusalem, but God brought them
together for their own ruin, as sheaves into the floor, Mic_4:12.
3. The plaintiff called, on whose behalf this prosecution is set on foot; it
is for my people, and for my heritage Israel. It is their cause that God
will now plead with jealousy. Note, God's people are his heritage, his
peculiar, his portion, his treasure, above all people, Exo_19:5; Deu_
32:9. They are his demesne, and therefore he has a good action against
those that trespass upon them.
4. The charge exhibited against them, which is very particular. Many
affronts they had put upon God by their idolatries, but that for which
God has a quarrel with them is the affront they have put upon his people
and upon the vessels of his sanctuary.
JAMISON, "Parallel to Zec_14:2, Zec_14:3, Zec_14:4, where the
“Mount of Olives” answers to the “Valley of Jehoshaphat” here. The
latter is called “the valley of blessing” (Berachah) (2Ch_20:26). It lies
20

21. between Jerusalem and the Mount of Olives and has the Kedron flowing
through it. As Jehoshaphat overthrew the confederate foes of Judah,
namely, Ammon, Moab, etc. (Psa_83:6-8), in this valley, so God was to
overthrow the Tyrians, Zidonians, Philistines, Edom, and Egypt, with a
similar utter overthrow (Joe_3:4, Joe_3:19). This has been long ago
fulfilled; but the ultimate event shadowed forth herein is still future,
when God shall specially interpose to destroy Jerusalem’s last foes, of
whom Tyre, Zidon, Edom, Egypt, and Philistia are the types. As
“Jehoshaphat” means “the judgment of Jehovah,” the valley of
Jehoshaphat may be used as a general term for the theater of God’s final
judgments on Israel’s foes, with an allusion to the judgment inflicted on
them by Jehoshaphat. The definite mention of the Mount of Olives in
Zec_14:4, and the fact that this was the scene of the ascension, makes it
likely the same shall be the scene of Christ’s coming again: compare “this
same Jesus ... shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into
heaven” (Act_1:11).
all nations — namely, which have maltreated Judah.
plead with them — (Isa_66:16; Eze_38:22).
my heritage Israel — (Deu_32:9; Jer_10:16). Implying that the source
of Judah’s redemption is God’s free love, wherewith He chose Israel as
His peculiar heritage, and at the same time assuring them, when
desponding because of trials, that He would plead their cause as His
own, and as if He were injured in their person.
K&D 2-8, “In Joe_3:2 and Joe_3:3 Joel is speaking not of events
belonging to his own time, or to the most recent past, but of that
dispersion of the whole of the ancient covenant nation among the
heathen, which was only completely effected on the conquest of Palestine
and destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, and which continues to this
day; though we cannot agree with Hengstenberg, that this furnishes an
argument in favour of the allegorical interpretation of the army of
locusts in ch. 1 and 2. For since Moses had already foretold that Israel
would one day be driven out among the heathen (Lev_26:33.; Deu_
28:36.), Joel might assume that this judgment was a truth well known in
Israel, even though he had not expressed it in his threatening of
punishment in ch. 1 and 2. Joe_3:3 depicts the ignominious treatment of
Israel in connection with this catastrophe. The prisoners of war are
distributed by lot among the conquerors, and disposed of by them to
slave-dealers at most ridiculous prices, - a boy for a harlot, a girl for a
drink of wine. Even in Joel's time, many Israelites may no doubt have
been scattered about in distant heathen lands (cf. v. 5); but the heathen
nations had not yet cast lots upon the nation as a whole, to dispose of the
inhabitants as slaves, and divide the land among themselves. This was
not done till the time of the Romans.
(Note: After the conquest and destruction of Jerusalem, Titus
disposed of the prisoners, whose number reached 97,000 in the
course of the war, in the following manner: Those under seventeen
years of age were publicly sold; of the remainder, some were executed
immediately, some sent away to work in the Egyptian mines, some
kept for the public shows to fight with wild beasts in all the chief cities
of Rome; and only the tallest and most handsome for the triumphal
procession in Rome (compare Josephus, de bell. Jud. vi. 9, 2, 3). And
21

22. the Jews who were taken prisoners in the Jewish war in the time of
Hadrian, are said to have been sold in the slave-market at Hebron at
so low a price, that four Jews were disposed of for a measure of
barley. Even in the contests of the Ptolemaeans and Seleucidae for the
possession of Palestine, thousands of Jews were sold as prisoners of
war. Thus, for example, the Syrian commander Nicanor, in his
expedition against the Jews in the Maccabaean war, sold by
anticipation, in the commercial towns along the Mediterranean, such
Jews as should be made prisoners, at the rate of ninety prisoners for
one talent; whereupon 1000 slave-dealers accompanied the Syrian
army, and carried fetters with them for the prisoners (1 Maccabees
3:41; 2 Maccabees 8:11, 25; Jos. Ant. xii. 7, 3).)
But, as many of the earlier commentators have clearly seen, we must not
stop even at this. The people and inheritance of Jehovah are not merely
the Old Testament Israel as such, but the church of the Lord of both the
old and new covenants, upon which the Spirit of God is poured out; and
the judgment which Jehovah will hold upon the nations, on account of
the injuries inflicted upon His people, is the last general judgment upon
the nations, which will embrace not merely the heathen Romans and
other heathen nations by whom the Jews have been oppressed, but all
the enemies of the people of God, both within and without the earthly
limits of the church of the Lord, including even carnally-minded Jews,
Mohammedans, and nominal Christians, who are heathens in heart.
(Note: As J. Marck correctly observes, after mentioning the
neighbouring nations that were hostile to Judah, and then the Syrians
and Romans: “We might proceed in the same way to all the enemies of
the Christian church, from its very cradle to the end of time, such as
carnal Jews, Gentile Romans, cruel Mohammedans, impious Papists,
and any others who either have borne or yet will bear the punishment
of their iniquity, according to the rule and measure of the restitution
of the church, down to those enemies who shall yet remain at the
coming of Christ, and be overthrown at the complete and final
redemption of His church.”)
Before depicting the final judgment upon the hostile nations of the
world, Joel notices in Joe_3:4-8 the hostility which the nations round
about Judah had manifested towards it in his own day, and foretels to
these a righteous retribution for the crimes they had committed against
the covenant nation. Joe_3:4. “And ye also, what would ye with me, O
Tyre and Sidon, and all ye coasts of Philistia? will ye repay a doing to
me, or do anything to me? Quickly, hastily will I turn back your doing
upon your head. Joe_3:5. That ye have taken my silver and my gold,
and have brought my best jewels into your temples. Joe_3:6. And the
sons of Judah and the sons of Jerusalem ye have sold to the sons of
Javan, to remove them far from their border. Joe_3:7. Behold, I waken
them from the place whither ye have sold them, and turn back your
doing upon your head. Joe_3:8. And sell your sons and your daughters
into the hand of Javan, and they sell them to the Sabaeans, to a people
far off; for Jehovah has spoken it.” By vvvveeee
gamgamgamgam the Philistines and
Phoenicians are added to the ggggōōōōyimyimyimyim already mentioned, as being no less
culpable than they; not, however, in the sense of, “and also if one would
inquire more thoroughly into the fact” (Ewald), or, “and even so far as ye
are concerned, who, in the place of the friendship and help which ye
22

23. were bound to render as neighbours, have oppressed my people”
(Rosenmüller), for such additions as these are foreign to the context; but
rather in this sense, “and yea also ... do not imagine that ye can do wrong
with impunity, as though he had a right so to do.” ‫י‬ ִ‫ל‬ ‫ם‬ ֶ ፍ‫ה־‬ ָ‫מ‬‫י‬ ִ‫ל‬ ‫ם‬ ֶ ፍ‫ה־‬ ָ‫מ‬‫י‬ ִ‫ל‬ ‫ם‬ ֶ ፍ‫ה־‬ ָ‫מ‬‫י‬ ִ‫ל‬ ‫ם‬ ֶ ፍ‫ה־‬ ָ‫מ‬ does not mean,
“What have I to do with you?” for this would be expressed differently
(compare Jos_22:24; Jdg_11:12); but, “What would ye with me?” The
question is unfinished, because of its emotional character, and is
resumed and completed immediately afterwards in a disjunctive form
(Hitzig). Tyre and Sidon, the two chief cities of the Phoenicians (see at
Jos_19:29 and Jos_11:8), represent all the Phoenicians. ‫פל‬ ‫ילוֹת‬ ִ‫ל‬ְ ‫ּל‬‫כ‬‫פל‬ ‫ילוֹת‬ ִ‫ל‬ְ ‫ּל‬‫כ‬‫פל‬ ‫ילוֹת‬ ִ‫ל‬ְ ‫ּל‬‫כ‬‫פל‬ ‫ילוֹת‬ ִ‫ל‬ְ ‫ּל‬‫כ‬, “all
the circles or districts of the Philistines,” are the five small princedoms
of Philistia (see at Jos_13:2). ‫מוּל‬ְ‫מוּל‬ְ‫מוּל‬ְ‫מוּל‬ְ , the doing, or inflicting (sc., of evil),
from ggggââââmalmalmalmal, to accomplish, to do (see at Isa_3:9). The disjunctive
question, “Will ye perhaps repay to me a deed, i.e., a wrong, that I have
done to you, or of your own accord attempt anything against me?” has a
negative meaning: “Ye have neither cause to avenge yourselves upon me,
i.e., upon my people Israel, nor any occasion to do it harm. But if
repayment is the thing in hand, I will, and that very speedily (qalqalqalqal mmmmeeee
hhhhēēēērrrrââââhhhh,
see Isa_5:26), bring back your doing upon your own head” (cf. Psa_7:17).
To explain what is here said, an account is given in Joe_3:5, Joe_3:6 of
what they have done to the Lord and His people, - namely, taken away
their gold and silver, and brought their costly treasures into their palaces
or temples. These words are not to be restricted to the plundering of the
temple and its treasury, but embrace the plundering of palaces and of the
houses of the rich, which always followed the conquest of towns (cf. 1Ki_
14:26; 2Ki_14:14). ‫ם‬ ֶ‫יכ‬ ֵ‫ל‬ ְ‫יכ‬ ֵ‫ה‬‫ם‬ ֶ‫יכ‬ ֵ‫ל‬ ְ‫יכ‬ ֵ‫ה‬‫ם‬ ֶ‫יכ‬ ֵ‫ל‬ ְ‫יכ‬ ֵ‫ה‬‫ם‬ ֶ‫יכ‬ ֵ‫ל‬ ְ‫יכ‬ ֵ‫ה‬ also are not temples only, but palaces as well
(cf. Isa_13:22; Amo_8:3; Pro_30:28). Joel had no doubt the plundering
of Judah and Jerusalem by the Philistines and Arabians in the time of
Jehoram in his mind (see 2Ch_21:17). The share of the Phoenicians in
this crime was confined to the fact, that they had purchased from the
Philistines the Judaeans who had been taken prisoners, by them, and
sold them again as salves to the sons of Javan, i.e., to the Ionians or
Greeks of Asia Minor.
(Note: On the widespread slave-trade of the Phoenicians, see
Movers, Phönizier, ii. 3, p. 70ff.)
The clause, “that ye might remove them far from their border,” whence
there would be no possibility of their returning to their native land,
serves to bring out the magnitude of the crime. This would be repaid to
them according to the true lex talionis (Joe_3:7, Joe_3:8). The Lord
would raise up the members of His own nation from the place to which
they had been sold, i.e., would bring them back again into their own land,
and deliver up the Philistines and Phoenicians into the power of the
Judaeans (mmmmââââkharkharkharkhar bbbbeeee
yyyyââââdddd as in Jdg_2:14; Jdg_3:8, etc.), who would then sell
their prisoners as slaves to the remote people of the Sabaeans, a
celebrated trading people in Arabia Felix (see at 1Ki_10:1). This threat
would certainly be fulfilled, for Jehovah had spoken it (cf. Isa_1:20). This
occurred partly on the defeat of the Philistines by Uzziah (2Ch_26:6-7)
and Hezekiah (2Ki_18:8), where Philistian prisoners of war were
certainly sold as slaves; but principally after the captivity, when
23

24. Alexander the Great and his successors set many of the Jewish prisoners
of war in their lands at liberty (compare the promise of King Demetrius
to Jonathan, “I will send away in freedom such of the Judaeans as have
been made prisoners, and reduced to slavery in our land,” Josephus, Ant.
xiii. 2, 3), and portions of the Philistian and Phoenician lands were for a
time under Jewish sway; when Jonathan besieged Ashkelon and Gaza (1
Maccabees 10:86; 11:60); when King Alexander (Balas) ceded Ekron and
the district of Judah (1 Maccabees 10:89); when the Jewish king
Alexander Jannaeaus conquered Gaza, and destroyed it (Josephus, Ant.
xiii. 13, 3; bell. Jud. i. 4, 2); and when, subsequent to the cession of Tyre,
which had been conquered by Alexander the Great, to the Seleucidae,
Antiochus the younger appointed Simon commander-in-chief from the
Ladder of Tyre to the border of Egypt (1 Maccabees 1:59).
CALVIN, "We also see that the Prophet Haggai speaks in the same manner of
the second temple, — that the glory of the second temple shall be greater than
that of the first, (Haggai 2:3) He, however referred, no doubt, to the prophecy of
Ezekiel; and Ezekiel speaks of the second temple, which was to be built after the
return of the people from exile. Be it so, yet Ezekiel did not confine to four or five
ages what he said of the second temple: on the contrary he meant that the favor
of God would be continued to the coming of Christ: so also Joel means here,
when he says, When God shall restore the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem, he
will then call together all the nations; as though he said, “God will pour out not a
small portion of grace, but will become the complete Redeemer of his people; and
when the whole world shall rise against him, he will yet prevail; he will
undertake the cause of his Church, and will secure the salvation of his people.
Whosoever then will attempt to delay or hinder the restoration of the Church,
shall by no means succeed; for the Lord, the defender of his people, will judge all
nations.”
Let us now see why the Prophet particularly mentions the valley of Jehoshaphat.
Many think that valley to be intended, which was called the Valley of Blessing,
where Jehoshaphat obtained a signal and a memorable victory, when yet he was
not provided with large forces, and when many nations conspired against him.
Though Jehoshaphat fought against a large army with a few people, he yet
wonderfully succeeded; and the people there presented thanks to God, and gave
a name to the place. Hence, many think that this valley is mentioned, that the
Prophet might remind the Jews how wonderfully they were saved; for their
enemies had come for the very purpose of destroying the whole of God’s people,
and thought that this was wholly in their power. The memory then of this history
must have animated the minds of the godly with a good hope; for God then
undertook the cause of a small number against a vast multitude; yea, against
many and powerful nations. And this view seems to me probable. Some place this
valley of Jehoshaphat half way between the Mount of Olives and the city; but
how probable their conjecture is I know not.
Unquestionably, with regard to this passage, their opinion, in my judgment, is
the most correct, who think that there is here a recalling to mind of God’s favor,
which may in all ages encourage the faithful to entertain hope of their salvation.
24

25. Some, however, prefer to take the word as an appellative; and no doubt ‫יהושפט‬
ieushaphath means the judgment of God; and so they render it, “The valley of
the judgment of God.” If this is approved I do not oppose. And, doubtless,
though it be a proper name, and the Prophet speak here of that holy King, to
encourage the Jews to follow his example, he yet alludes, no doubt, to the
judgment of God, or to the contest which he would undertake for the sake of his
people: for it immediately follows ‫שם‬ ‫עמם‬ ‫שפטתי‬ ‫וכ‬ uneshaphathti omem shim,
“And I will contend with them there:” and this verb is derived from ‫שפט‬
shephath. Hence also, if it be the proper name of a place, and taken from that of
the King, the Prophet here meant, that its etymology should be considered; as
though he said, “God will call all nations to judgment, and for this end, that he
may dwell in the midst of his people, and really testify and prove this.”
Some apply this passage to the last judgment, but in too strained a manner.
Hence also has arisen the figment, that the whole world shall be assembled in the
valley of Jehoshaphat: but the world, we know, became infected with such
delirious things, when the light of sound doctrine was extinguished; and no
wonder, that the world should be fascinated with such gross comments, after it
had so profaned the worship of God. (13)
But with respect to the intention of the Prophets he, no doubt, mentions here the
valley of Jehoshaphat, that the Jews might entertain the hope that God would be
the guardian of their safety; for he says everywhere that he would dwell among
them, as we have also seen in the last chapter, “And God will dwell in the midst
of you.” So also now he means the same, I will assemble all nations, and make
them to come down to the valley of Jehoshaphat; that is, though the land shall
for a time be uncultivated and waste, yet the Lord will gather his people, and
show that he is the judge of the whole world; he will raise a trophy in the land of
Judah, which will be nobler than if the people had ever been safe and entire: for
how much soever all nations may strive to destroy the remnant, as we know they
did, though few remained; yet God will sit in the valley of Jehoshaphat, he will
have there his own tribunal, that he may keep his people, and defend them from
all injuries. At the same time, what I have before noticed must be borne in mind;
for he names here the valley of Jehoshaphat rather than Jerusalem, because of
the memorable deliverance they had there, when God discomfited so many
people, when great armies were in an instant destroyed and without the aid of
men. Since God then delivered his people at that time in an especial manner
through his incredible power, it is no wonder that he records here the name of
the valley of Jehoshaphat.
I will contend, he says, with them there for my people, and for my heritage,
Israel. By these words the Prophet shows how precious to God is the salvation of
his chosen people; for it is no ordinary thing for God to condescend to undertake
their cause, as though he himself were offended and wronged; and God contends,
because he would have all things in common with us. We now then, see the
reason of this contention, — even because God so regards the salvation of his
people, that he deems himself wronged in their person; as it is said in another
place, “He who toucheth you toucheth the apple of mine eye”. And to confirm his
doctrine still more, the Prophet adds, For mine heritage, Israel. God calls Israel
25

26. here his heritage, to strengthen distressed minds, and also to comfort them; for if
the Jews had only fixed their minds on their own state, they could not but think
themselves unworthy of being regarded by God; for they were deemed
abominable by all nations; and we also know that they were severely chastised
for having departed from all godliness and for having, as it were, wholly
alienated themselves from God. Since, then, they were like a corrupted body,
they could not but despond in their adversity: but the Prophet here comes to
their assistance, and brings forward the word heritage, as though he said, “God
will execute judgment for you, not that ye are worthy, but because he has chosen
you: for he will never forget the covenant which he made with your father
Abraham ” We see, then, the reason he mentions heritage: it was, that the Jews
might not despair on account of their sins; and at the same time he commends, as
before, the gratuitous mercy of God, as though he had said, “The reason for your
redemption is no other, but that God has allotted to himself the posterity of
Abraham and designed them to be his peculiar people ” What remains we must
defer until to-morrow.
COFFMAN, "Verse 2
"I will gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of
Jehoshaphat; and I will execute judgment upon them there for my people Israel,
whom they have scattered among the nations; and they have parted my land.
"The valley of Jehoshaphat ..." "This is not to be thought of as a literal place in
Palestine, but as an ideal place where judgment is to be executed."[10] This is the
same as the place called Armageddon (Revelation 16); and in both cases, it is the
place where God will execute his wrath upon evil men; and absolutely no
"battle" of any kind is prophesied as occurring at either site. This judgment of
God upon "all nations" who have persecuted God's people has already taken
place repeatedly in history, as witnessed by Tyre, Sidon, Sodom, Gomorrah,
Assyria, Nineveh, Babylon, Persia, Greece, Rome, and Jerusalem; and it is still
going on! (See my Commentary on Revelation, pp. 374-378.)
"My people Israel whom they have scattered among the nations ..." Many
expositors think only of the dispersion of the Jews; but more than that is meant.
The people and inheritance of God are not merely the O.T. Israel as such, but the
church of the Lord, (the true Israel) of both covenants, upon which the Spirit of
God is poured out.[11]
The "scattering" here must then be applied to all of the many "scatterings" that
were inflicted upon the old Israel, as well as to the "scatterings" of Christians all
over the world, a very considerable number of which have resulted directly from
vicious persecution by evil nations, as that which arose around the martyrdom of
Stephen, the dispersion of the faithful that came about from the persecutions of
the apostolic missionaries, as Paul, who fled from place to place, with a result of
congregations being planted all over the Roman empire; and this pattern
continues indefinitely and even into modern times; it was persecutions which
drove the early colonies to the New World in the 17th century. Thus the
scattering of God's people among the nations is not a one-shot episode that
26

27. happened to ancient Israel. No wonder the commentators cannot decide what
"scattering" is meant here! "And have parted my land ..." Here again, "my
land" is wrongly read as "Palestine"; but the notion that any such place is any
more "God's land" than North America or any other place on earth should have
been laid to rest twenty centuries ago. "The earth is the Lord's, and the fullness
thereof" (Psalms 24:1). The parting, or dividing of God's land therefore refers to
the horrible divisions that have come upon the earth through the devices of
wicked men. The whole world today is divided, because the only basis of unity
through "one new man in Christ Jesus" has been denied and rejected by evil
men. This passage teaches that the ultimate judgment of God will fall upon
humanity for their sins. Deane was near the common consensus of opinions in
this comment:
"This must be referred to the long subsequent time (from Joel) when Palestine
became a Roman province, its capital leveled with the ground; then the great
dispersion of the covenant people among the nations commenced, and continues
to the present day."[12]
Apparently, however, Deane failed to include here the similar "scattering" of the
true Israel and the "divisions" of mankind resulting from wickedness. They also,
of course, are included.
COKE, "Joel 3:2. I will—gather all nations, &c.— It is very evident from the
phrase at the close of the verse, Who have parted my land, that all is not to be
taken in a very extensive sense. It is to be understood of the neighbouring
nations;—All the heathen round about, as in Joel 3:12. In this third and last part
of his prophesy, Joel relates what will come to pass in those days, and in that
time, when the Lord shall bring again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem. He
apparently describes the great actions of the Maccabees; and that this is the
period of time, to which this part of the prophesy relates, is evident from the
raising up the children of Judah and of Jerusalem, whom their enemies had sold
to the Greeks; Joel 3:7. This return happened under Demetrius. The nations
gathered in the valley of Jehoshaphat, which was near to Jerusalem, are the
Seleucidae, who were afterwards destroyed in the same valley, which is therefore
called The valley decision, or of the threshing.—Tyre and Sidon, and the coasts
of Palestine, Joel 3:4 mean the descendants of the ancient enemies of the Jews;
who assisted in the destruction and plundering of Jerusalem, and whose
posterity were destroyed by the Maccabees. The word ‫יהושׁפט‬ Jehoshaphat
signifies, The Lord judges, or the judgment of the Lord. See Joel 3:14. And
possibly, says Dr. Chandler, thus translated, the valley of Jehoshaphat may
denote no particular place in the country of Judaea, but only some place where
God would execute his vengeance on the enemies of the Jews. Houbigant renders
the last clause, Because they have scattered them among the nations, and have
parted my land. See Chandler, and Sharpe.
ELLICOTT, "(2) The valley of Jehoshaphat.—Some fifty years before Joel
prophesied the kingdom of Judah had been menaced by an imposing
confederacy of hostile tribes. It was an occasion of great anxiety. A national fast
was proclaimed, and after it Jehoshaphat engaged and completely routed the
enemy in a valley in the wilderness of Tekoa. (See 2 Chronicles 20) The victory
27

28. was an occasion of immense exultation, and seems to supply the imagery with
which Joel describes the day of the Lord. The name of Jehoshaphat was at some
period given to the Kedron Valley, but it is here used rather in its grammatical
meaning as the scene of the Divine judgment, the words signifying “the valley
where Jehovah judgeth.”
LANGE, “Joel 3:2. All nations. In the first instance, of course, all those that have
offended against Israel; yet these are representatives of the heathen world in
general, whose position towards God’s people is essentially the same. The valley
of Jehoshaphat. According to 2 Chronicles20, Jehoshaphat by the miraculous
help of the Lord gained a great victory over a Gentile army, in a valley, which
subsequently for this reason took the name of that king. Does the prophet here
mean that valley? Keil and many others say, no. They insist that the valley of the
prophet is an imaginary one, in or near Jerusalem, and is called the valley of
Jehoshaphat = “Jehovah Judges,” because of its being the place of judgment.
The valley certainly stands in close relation to Jerusalem, for in Joel 3:16 it is
said that Jehovah, who there Judges, shall utter his voice from Zion and
Jerusalem. But in this case there is no need of applying a merely geographical
measure. Jehovah may judge in a valley far distant from Jerusalem, and yet have
his dwelling in Israel, in Zion, and Jerusalem. (See 2 Chronicles 20:15-17, where
the Lord, while contending for Israel Isaiah, at the same time, regarded as being
in his sanctuary in Jerusalem.) If the phrase is to be taken in a symbolic sense, it
might be asked, why Joel should have fixed upon a “valley” as the place of
judgment, and should have given it the name of a well-known king? He was
undoubtedly thinking of the great event under Jehoshaphat. The name of this
monarch was significant, and he calls the place “valley of Jehoshaphat,” because
he was reminded of that fortunate king who was victorious over Israel’s enemies,
and because of the peculiar significance of the name Jehoshaphat = Jehovah
judges. By way of anticipation he tells what they have to expect, who are
gathered there. To the question, does he mean that well-known valley then, we
answer, yes, and no. Yes, because he evidently had in view the spot on which
Jeshoshaphat won his victory. No, because he as evidently goes on to describe a
more than common battle fought on a spot which could be identified on no map.
The multitudes gathered there are too vast to be assembled in any ordinary
valley. In painting this prophetic vision there can be no doubt that Joel had in his
mind the historical narrative in 2 Chronicles20. Deal with. E. V. Plead with, i. e.
to charge with crime, with the design of punishing it. Taking the word in its full
sense of arguing a cause, it implies that the nations argue their own cause, and
attempt to vindicate themselves, though, of course they could have no ground to
stand upon, since Jehovah is alone and always in the right. My people, my
heritage. Therefore what the nations did to Israel must be criminal. They have
scattered. The prophet here has in mind what he afterwards more fully
describes.
28

29. 3 They cast lots for my people
and traded boys for prostitutes;
they sold girls for wine to drink.
BARNES, "And they have cast lots - They treated God’s people as of no
account, and delighted in showing their contempt toward them. They
chose no one above another, as though all alike were worthless. “They
cast lots,” it is said elsewhere, “upon their honorable men” Nah_3:10, as
a special indignity, above captivity or slavery. A “girl” they sold for an
evening’s revelry, and a “boy” they exchanged for a night’s debauch.
CLARKE, "Have given a boy for a harlot - To such wretched
circumstances were the poor Jews reduced in their captivity, that their
children were sold by their oppressors; and both males and females used
for the basest purposes. And they were often bartered for the necessaries
or luxuries of life. Or this may refer to the issue of the Chaldean war in
Judea, where the captives were divided among the victors. And being set
in companies, they cast lots for them: and those to whom they fell sold
them for various purposes; the boys to be slaves and catamites, the girls
to be prostitutes; and in return for them they got wine and such things. I
think this is the meaning of the text.
GILL, "And they have cast lots for my people,.... Not only parted their
land, but cast lots for their persons, Or played at dice for them, how
many captives each soldier should have, and which should be their share
and property: ninety seven thousand Jews, Josephus (d) says, were
carried captive by the Romans, who, very probably, cast lots for them, as
was usual in such cases; see Nah_3:10;
and have given a boy for a harlot, and sold a girl for wine, that they might
drink; either they gave a boy to be prostituted to natural lusts, in lieu of a
whore; and a girl to be debauched for a bottle of wine: or they gave a boy
for the price of a whore, as the Targum and Kimchi interpret it; that is,
they gave a boy, instead of money, to a whore, to lie with her, as the
eunuch was given to Thais; and they gave a girl to the wine merchant for
as much wine as they could drink at one sitting. These phrases both
express their uncleanness and intemperance, and also the low price and
value they set upon their captives; and is applicable enough to the
Papists, notorious for the same abominable lusts.
JAMISON, "cast lots for my people — that is, divided among themselves
My people as their captives by lot. Compare as to the distribution of
captives by lot (Oba_1:11; Nah_3:10).
29

30. given a boy for ... harlot — Instead of paying a harlot for her
prostitution in money, they gave her a Jewish captive boy as a slave.
girl for wine — So valueless did they regard a Jewish girl that they
would sell her for a draught of wine.
BENSON, "Joel 3:3. They have cast lots for my people — It was customary with
conquerors, in those days, to divide the captives, taken in war, among themselves
by lot, and so did these enemies of the Jews. And have given a boy for a harlot —
By this is meant, that they exchanged, or gave away, Jewish boys, instead of
money, for harlots. And sold a girl for wine, that they might drink — For a
draught of wine, as it were; that is, at a very vile and low rate. These instances
are mentioned, to signify the contempt in which these enemies of the Jews held
the worshippers of the true God; they parted with them, when they had taken
them captives, upon the vilest terms, as setting little or no value upon them. In
Mingrelia, according to Sir John Chardin, they sell captive children for
provisions and for wine: see Harmer vol. 2. p. 374.
CALVIN, "There follows now another indignity still greater; for they cast lot on
God’s people, — On my people they have cast lot, and prostituted a boy for a
harlot, and a girl have they sold for wine, that they might drink. By these words
the Prophet enhances the injury done them; for the Jews had been reproachfully
treated. Some measure of humanity is mostly shown when men are sold; but the
Prophet here complains in the person of God, that the Jews had been exposed to
sale, as though they were the off scourings of mankind, and of no account. They
have cast lots he says; and this was to show contempt; and the Prophet expresses
more clearly what he meant, and says, that a boy had been given for a harlot,
and a girl for wine. Some consider the Prophet as saying, that boys were
prostituted to base and scandalous purposes; but I prefer another view, — that
the enemies sold them for a mean price to gratify their gluttony, or their lust; as
though the Prophet had said, that the Jews had to endure a grievous reproach by
being set to sale, as they say, and that at the lowest price. He farther adds
another kind of contempt; for whatever price the enemies procured by selling,
they spent it either on harlot or on feasting. We hence see that a twofold injury is
here mentioned, — the Jews had been so despised as not to be regarded as men,
and had been sold not for the usual prices, but had been disposed of in contempt
by their enemies almost for nothing; — and the other reproach was, that the
price obtained for them was afterwards spent on gluttony and whoredom: yet
this people was sacred to God. Now this contumelious treatment, the Prophet
says, God would not endure, but would avenge such a wrong as if done to
himself. This is then the meaning.
But the reason which induces me thus to interpret the Prophet is because he says
that a girl was sold for wine, as the boy for a harlot; and the construction of the
Prophet’s words is the same. It is indeed certain that in the latter clause the
Prophet meant nothing else but that the price was wickedly spent for vile and
shameful purposes; then the former clause must be understood in the same way.
Let us proceed
30