What Does Joel 1:4 Mean in the King James?
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.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The verse measures devastation by its chain of handoffs: every remainder becomes the next thing consumed.
THE MEANING
One force leaves a remainder; the next consumes that remainder. What survives one loss is still exposed to the next, with no untouched reserve named in the sequence.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
What survives the first loss is safe from further loss.
THE ROOT
יֶתֶר
yeter
GROWS FROM
י־ת־ר
Y-T-R
To remain over; to be left as a remainder.
“what is left” in this verse is yeter. The passage repeats this word at each handoff: what one eater leaves becomes the object of the next clause. “Left” is only a temporary state here, not a safe remainder.
ALSO GROWS
yitron: Surplus; advantage or profit.
יִתְרוֹן
It shares the sense of what remains over, while Joel shows a remainder stripped of any advantage or security.
notar: What remains; what is left over.
נוֹתָר
This related form makes the verse’s repeated handoff visible: each remainder is exposed to another eater.
אָכַל
akal
GROWS FROM
א־כ־ל
A-K-L
To eat or consume.
“eaten” in this verse is akal. The same verb recurs in all three clauses, making consumption the mechanism that links each wave to the next. What remains from one act becomes food in the next.
ALSO GROWS
ma'akhal: Food; something eaten.
מַאֲכָל
The word for food grows from the same root as “eaten,” fitting the verse’s shift of each remainder into the next eater’s meal.
okhel: One who eats; an eater.
אֹכֵל
This branch names the agent of each repeated act, while the verse passes the role of eater from one insect to another.
THE PATTERN
Destruction can proceed in successive waves, each consuming what survived the previous one.
And they shall cover the face of the earth, that one cannot be able to see the earth: and they shall eat the residue of that which is escaped, which remaineth unto you from the hail, and shall eat every tree which groweth for you out of the field:Seemeth it a small thing unto you to have eaten up the good pasture, but ye must tread down with your feet the residue of your pastures? and to have drunk of the deep waters, but ye must foul the residue with your feet?THE THREAD
And I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten, the cankerworm, and the caterpiller, and the palmerworm, my great army which I sent among you.Joel 1:4 gives the insects as a chain of consumption; Joel 2:25 names those same insects in a promise to restore the years they ate. The book holds the devastation and the return of what was lost together.
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