1 Verbum Domini, quod factum est ad Joël, filium Phatuel.
Jerome · AD 420 (Chapter 1, Verse 1) The word of the Lord that came to Joel the son of Pethuel. The Seventy Interpreters translated Pethuel as Bathuel, which has no meaning in Hebrew. However, Pethuel is translated into our language as the breadth of God, or God opening, as we read in Mark with the Savior saying to the deaf-mute: Ephphatha, which means, be opened (Mark 7).
2 Audite hoc, senes, et auribus percipite, omnes habitatores terræ: si factum est istud in diebus vestris, aut in diebus patrum vestrorum?
Jerome · AD 420 (Version 2, 3.) Listen to this, elders, and perceive with your ears, all inhabitants of the earth, whether this happened in your days or in the days of your fathers: tell this to your children, and let your children tell their children, and let their children tell the next generation.
Theodoret of Cyrus · AD 458 But these same villains, vessels of wrath fitted for destruction,2 screwed up their noses and poured out, if I may say so, as from a well-head, foul noises through their nostrils and rent the raiment from Christ's holy virgins, whose conversation gave an exact likeness of saints. They dragged them in triumph, naked as when they were born, through all the town.
3 Super hoc filiis vestris narrate, et filii vestri filiis suis, et filii eorum generationi alteræ.
4 Residuum erucæ comedit locusta, et residuum locustæ comedit bruchus, et residuum bruchi comedit rubigo.
Jerome · AD 420 (Verse 4) The residue of a caterpillar is eaten by a locust, and the residue of a locust is eaten by a beetle, and the residue of the beetle is eaten by rust. In the same way seventy times.
John Cassian · AD 435 For although the Lord has granted strong cattle, bodily health, a successful outcome to every activity and prosperous deeds, prayer must still be offered lest, as it is written, there be "a heaven of brass and an earth of iron" and lest "the swarming locust eat what the cutting locust has left, and the caterpillar devour what the swarming locust has left, and the blight consume…
Ishodad of Merv · AD 850 The mashota ("cutting locust") is similar to a larva. It is black and longer than a larva; when it falls to the ground, it does not destroy completely the plant but devours just the leaves and does not touch the rest. Through it the prophet signifies Tiglath-pileser, because the troubles that he caused to the people of Israel were mild.
5 Expergiscimini, ebrii, et flete et ululate, omnes qui bibitis vinum in dulcedine, quoniam periit ab ore vestro.
Jerome · AD 420 (Verse 5.) Wake up, you drunkards, and weep and howl, all you who drink wine in sweetness, because it has perished from your mouth. LXX: Wake up, you who are drunk with your wine, and mourn and lament, all you who drink wine in intoxication, because it has been taken away from your mouth.
Cyril of Alexandria · AD 444 What a servile mentality from a crazed brain that knows how to do nothing else but gabble. We must reply to our opponents, "You are drunken men; rouse yourselves from your cups." Why do you do such violence to the truth? Why have you twisted the sense of the divine teachings so as to have been carried off the royal road?
6 Gens enim ascendit super terram meam, fortis et innumerabilis: dentes ejus ut dentes leonis, et molares ejus ut catuli leonis.
John Chrysostom · AD 407 How then are we to be freed from this pest? If we can drink a potion that is able to kill the worms within us and the serpents. And of what nature, it will be asked, may this potion be, that hath such power?
Jerome · AD 420 (Verse 6,7.) For a strong and innumerable nation will ascend over my land: its teeth, like lion's teeth, and its molars, like lion cubs. It has turned my vineyard into a desert, and has stripped my fig tree bare: it has made it naked and thrown it away; its branches have turned white.
7 Posuit vineam meam in desertum, et ficum meam decorticavit; nudans spoliavit eam, et projecit: albi facti sunt rami ejus.
Gregory the Dialogist · AD 604 O wretched beings, who by going after the praises of men waste to themselves all the fruits of their labors, and while they aim to show themselves to the eyes of others, blast all that they do. When the evil spirits prompt them to boastfulness, taking them for a prey they strip bare their works, as we have said.
8 Plange quasi virgo accincta sacco super virum pubertatis suæ.
Jerome · AD 420 (Verse 8.) Lament like a young woman dressed in sackcloth, over the man of your youth. (Vulgate: Lament like a young woman dressed in sackcloth, over her young husband). LXX: Lament to me over the bride dressed in sackcloth, over her young husband.
9 Periit sacrificium et libatio de domo Domini; luxerunt sacerdotes, ministri Domini.
Jerome · AD 420 (V. 9 seqq.) The sacrifice and libation from the house of the Lord have perished; the priests, ministers of the Lord, mourn. The land is laid waste, the earth mourns; for the wheat is destroyed. The wine is spoiled, the oil languishes, the farmers are confused. The vintners wail over the wheat and barley, for the harvest of the field is perished.
10 Depopulata est regio, luxit humus, quoniam devastatum est triticum, confusum est vinum, elanguit oleum.
11 Confusi sunt agricolæ, ululaverunt vinitores super frumento et hordeo, quia periit messis agri.
Theodoret of Cyrus · AD 458 Describing the calamity at greater length to bring to repentance those suffering from indifference, he bids even the produce to lament the failure of the barley and the wheat and the defoliation of the vine, and in general the lack of fruit on olives and figs and the other fruit trees due to their being deprived of moisture.
12 Vinea confusa est, et ficus elanguit; malogranatum, et palma, et malum, et omnia ligna agri aruerunt, quia confusum est gaudium a filiis hominum.
13 Accingite vos, et plangite, sacerdotes: ululate, ministri altaris; ingredimini, cubate in sacco, ministri Dei mei, quoniam interiit de domo Dei vestri sacrificium et libatio.
Gregory of Nazianzus · AD 390 Joel again summons us wailing and will have the ministers of the altar lament under the conditions of famine. He does not allow us to revel in the misfortunes of others.
Jerome · AD 420 (Verse 13, 14.) Clothe yourselves and lament, priests; howl, ministers of the altar; enter, lie down in sackcloth, ministers of my God, because the sacrifice and libation have perished from the house of your God; sanctify a fast, call an assembly, gather the elders, all the inhabitants of the land into the house of your God, and cry out to the Lord.
14 Sanctificate jejunium, vocate cœtum, congregate senes, omnes habitatores terræ in domum Dei vestri, et clamate ad Dominum:
Jerome · AD 420 If God does not desire fasting, how is it that in Leviticus he commands the whole people in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, to fast until the evening, and threatens that he who does not constrain his soul shall die and be cut off from his people?
15 A, a, a, diei! quia prope est dies Domini, et quasi vastitas a potente veniet.
Jerome · AD 420 (Verse 15.) Ah, ah, ah, woe to the day, for the day of the Lord is near, and it will come like a devastation (or storm) from the Almighty. LXX: Woe is me, woe is me, woe is me on that day! For the day of the Lord is near, and it will come like misery upon misery.
16 Numquid non coram oculis vestris alimenta perierunt de domo Dei nostri, lætitia et exsultatio?
Jerome · AD 420 (Verse 16) Have not the provisions perished before our eyes from the house of our God, joy and exultation? LXX: The provisions have perished before your eyes: from the house of our God, joy and delight.
17 Computruerunt jumenta in stercore suo, demolita sunt horrea, dissipatæ sunt apothecæ, quoniam confusum est triticum.
Jerome · AD 420 (Verse 17, 18.) The animals have trampled in their own dung; the barns have been destroyed, the storehouses have been scattered, because the grain has been mixed up; why does the animal groan, why do the herds of cattle moo? Because there is no pasture for them; and the flocks of sheep have also perished.
Gregory the Dialogist · AD 604 What is a basket of dung, except the memory of sins? For the sins of the flesh are called dung. Hence it is also said through the prophet: "The beasts have rotted in their dung." For the beasts to rot in their dung is for carnal people to end their lives in the stench of luxury.
18 Quid ingemuit animal, mugierunt greges armenti? quia non est pascua eis; sed et greges pecorum disperierunt.
Gregory the Dialogist · AD 604 The prophet says, "The beasts of burden have become putrid in their own dung." For beasts of burden to become putrid in their own dung means for all those who are materialistic to end their lives in the stench of dissipation.
19 Ad te, Domine, clamabo, quia ignis comedit speciosa deserti, et flamma succendit omnia ligna regionis.
Jerome · AD 420 (Verse 19, 20.) I will cry out to you, Lord, for the fire has consumed the beautiful things of the desert, and the flame has set all the wood of the region ablaze; even the beasts of the field, like a parched land thirsting for rain, have looked up to you; for the springs of water have dried up, and the fire has devoured the beautiful things of the desert.
20 Sed et bestiæ agri, quasi area sitiens imbrem, suspexerunt ad te, quoniam exsiccati sunt fontes aquarum, et ignis devoravit speciosa deserti.