Joel
Joel begins with a catastrophe everyone could see: waves of locusts stripping the land bare, an event so total that he asks whether anything like it had ever happened. The prophet reads the plague as a herald of something greater, the day of the Lord, and calls the whole community, elders to infants, to return to God with fasting and torn hearts, for he is gracious and merciful. Then the promises pour out: restored years the locusts ate, and beyond that, God's Spirit poured on all flesh, sons and daughters prophesying, and salvation for everyone who calls on his name.
Joel son of Pethuel; otherwise unknown.
Unknown; proposals range from the ninth to the fifth century BC.
Judah and Jerusalem, reeling from a devastating locust plague.
To call Judah to wholehearted repentance before the day of the Lord, and to promise restoration and the outpoured Spirit.