Prophet Joel

Joel, son of Pethuel, is the second of the twelve Minor Prophets. His book gives no king or date, and scholars place him anywhere from the 9th to the 4th century BC. It opens with a devastating plague of locusts and a drought in Judah, which he took as a call to fasting and repentance.

The book goes on to speak of the coming “day of the Lord” and of the promise “I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh”, which the Apostle Peter quoted in his sermon on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2). Tradition, recorded by Ephrem the Syrian and others, says he came from the land beyond the Jordan.