Joel 1:4

That which the palmer worm hath left hath the locust eaten,.... These, with the two following, are four kinds of, locusts as Jarchi observes; though it is difficult to fix the particular species

That which the palmerworm hath left hath the locust eaten; and that which the locust hath left hath the cankerworm eaten; and that which the cankerworm hath left hath the caterpiller eaten.

Four sorts of insects pernicious to all sorts of trees, corn, and herbs are here mentioned, which did succeed each other, and devoured all that might be a future support to the Jews; whence ensued a grievous famine for four years together, say the Jewish interpreters, though there is no cogent reason in what they mention for proof hereof. These insects might in the same year succeed each other, the one, as is usual, might come sooner, the rest successively, each in its season, and so spoil the springing of all things, which they did (I do believe) really; and though these might be emblems of some future devastation, yet it seems most agreeable to reason, and the context, that there should really have been such caterpillars and other vermin, and that they did devour all that was green; and though this is no where else mentioned, as I remember, in the sacred history, yet it is likely it was done, as here told, and as so done was a figure of some greater devastation made by foreign powers, as by Tiglath-pileser, Shalmaneser, Sennacherib, and Nebuchadnezzar.

Joe 1:4 That which the palmerworm hath left hath the locust eaten; and that which the locust hath left hath the cankerworm eaten; and that which the cankerworm hath left hath the caterpiller eaten.Ver. 4. That which the palmerworm hath left hath the locust eaten] The palmerworm hath its name in Hebrew from shaving, βζν (because it shaveth off the fruits of the earth). In Chaldee from creeping; in Greek from crookening; in Latin from gnawing. (Zachala. καμπη. Eruca ab erodendo.) The locust hath its name in Hebrew from multitude, wherewith the very sun is darkened; in Latin from burning places, where it spoileth, Locusts, quasi loca ustulans; in Greek from cropping the tops of grain and plants, which, as they fled, they fed upon. The cankerworm hath its name in Hebrew from licking; in Chaldee from fleeing; in Greek and Latin from feeding upon the flowers of apples and other fruits, Aκρις Mηλοχονθη. Comester some render it. Flemings call it, The preacher, a bombo quem palando edit, from the noise it maketh as it flies. The caterpillar hath its name, Chasil, from wasting, because it utterly consumeth all, not only fruits and leaves, but tender boughs and branches: Ut ita creseat oratio sicut ipsum malum, to show that as their sin increased so did their punishment. The Lord of hosts cannot possibly want a weapon wherewith to beat a rebel; neither may wicked men expect that he should lay down the bucklers first. To that bold question of Pharaoh, Exodus 5:2, "Who is the Lord, that I should obey him?" God made a large reply, by his armies of locusts, lice, flies, &c., till Pharaoh was forced to answer himself, "The Lord is righteous." What spoil hath been made by these despicable creatures here mentioned in other countries, Pliny recordeth. Pierius testifieth that the Egyptians made the locust a hieroglyphic of famine. And although we find not expressly set down in the holy history when this particular plague was executed, yet we need not doubt but it was done according to Deuteronomy 28:38-39. See 1 Kings 8:37.

(4) That which the palmerworm hath left.—The picture is introduced suddenly and graphically. “Behold the desolation!” “Note the cause.” The earth is bared by locusts beyond all previous experience. There were different sorts of locusts; as many as ninety have been reckoned. The four names, palmerworm, locust, cankerworm, caterpiller, indicate different swarms of the insect. The first—Gazam—points to its voracity; the second—Arbeh—its multitude; the third—Yelek—its manner of “licking up” the grass like cattle; the fourth—Chasil—its destructive effect. The number enumerated, four, draws attention to the “four sore judgments” with which Ezekiel was instructed to threaten Jerusalem, and to the four foreign invasions by the Assyrians, Chaldæans, Macedonians, and Romans.

Verse 4. That which the palmerworm hath left] Here he begins to open his message, and the words he chooses show that he is going to announce a devastation of the land by locusts, and a famine consequent on their depredations. What the different insects may be which he specifies is not easy to determine. I shall give the words of the original, with their etymology. The palmerworm, גזם gazam, from the same root, to cut short; probably the caterpillar, or some such blight, from its cutting the leaves of the trees into pieces for its nourishment. The locust, ארבה arbeh, from רבה rabah, to multiply, from the immense increase and multitude of this insect. Cankerworm, ילק yelek, from לק lak, to lick or lap with the tongue; the reference is uncertain. Caterpillar, חסיל chasil, from חסל chasal, to consume, to eat up; the consumer. Bishop Newcome translates the first, grasshopper; the second, locust; the third, devouring locust; and the fourth, consuming locust. After all that has been said by interpreters concerning these four animals, I am fully of opinion that the arbeh, or locust himself, is the gazam, the yelek, and the chasil; and that these different names are used here by the prophet to point out the locust in its different states, or progress from embryo to full growth. See Clarke on Joe 2:2.

4. The calamity to which the prophet has thus emphatically directed his hearers’ attention: a visitation of locusts, repeated for more years than one (Joe 2:25), and of unexampled severity; what had escaped the ravages of one swarm, had been speedily devoured by a succeeding one, till the crops were completely ruined, and every chance both of harvest and vintage had been utterly destroyed. That which the shearer (gβzβm) hath left, the swarmer (arbeh) hath eaten;And that which the swarmer (arbeh) hath left, the lapper (yιleḳ ?) hath eaten;And that which the lapper (yιleḳ ?) hath left, the finisher (ḥ ?βsξl) hath eaten. The general intention of the verse is manifestly to describe a total destruction of the herbage of the land; but as we cannot identify with certainty the kinds of locust meant,—nor, if we could, should have suitable English names by which to distinguish them,—it is best to translate the terms used by words expressing the ideas which they probably suggested to the Hebrew ear. Successive swarms of locusts, appearing partly, it is probable, in the same year, partly in following years, are indicated rhetorically by four distinct names, which may partly be synonymous designations of the same species (though not of the same individual insects), partly denote different species, and partly denote the ordinary locust in different stages of its development (see p. 84 f.). The gβzβm is mentioned besides only Joe 2:25, Amos 4:9. Arbeh is the usual name of the locust in Hebrew, and may be presumed therefore to have been the name of the species which most commonly invades Palestine, the Acridium peregrinum. The yιleḳ ? may have denoted the ordinary locust in its wingless larva- or pupa-stage (in which state it is not less destructive than in its mature form): in this case the second line of the verse will describe how what the fully-grown parent insects left in April or May, when they laid their eggs, was destroyed by the young larvae hatched in June. The ḥ ?βsξl is named beside the arbeh, as a plague to which Palestine was liable, in 1 Kings 8:37; this, therefore, was probably a distinct species, perhaps the Oedipoda migratoria or Pachytylus, also common in Palestine[30]. See further particulars in the Excursus at the end of the Book (p. 85 ff.). [30] The four names cannot, as Credner and (somewhat differently) Gesenius thought, denote, as they stand, locusts in four successive stages of their development, for various reasons: (1) because not more than three stages are distinguishable by an ordinary observer [yet cf. p. 90]; (2) because, upon this view, arbeh, the most usual name of the locust, would denote only the immature insect; (3) because in Joe 2:25 the four names occur in a different order; (4) because, as swarms of locusts always move onwards, a swarm in one stage of its development could not be said to have devoured what it had left in a previous stage, since it would be upon entirely new ground.

That which the palmerworm hath left, hath the locust eaten - The creatures here spoken of are different kinds of locusts, so named from their number or voracity.

4. Description of the calamity to which Joe 1:2-3 point. “The land is bare, swarm after swarm of destructive locusts have devoured the crops and the foliage.” What are we to understand by the four