What Does Joel 2:31 Mean in the King James?
The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the LORD come.
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 lights that order ordinary time become the signs that its order is being overturned.
THE MEANING
The familiar lights of day and night become signs of upheaval: the sun turns to darkness, and the moon to blood. The day of the LORD stands before you as great and fearsome, with the world’s usual measures no longer secure.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that the world’s familiar rhythms guarantee that the order of life cannot be overturned.
THE ROOT
יֵהָפֵךְ
yēhāphēkh
GROWS FROM
הפך
to turn, overturn, or reverse
“turned” in this verse is yēhāphēkh. The word names more than a change in brightness: the sun’s familiar order is overturned. The same root describes an overthrow, so the sky itself becomes the site of upheaval.
ALSO GROWS
mahpekhah: overthrow
מַהְפֵּכָה
This branch makes the force of the sun’s turning vivid: it is an upheaval, not a slight dimming.
wayyahaphokh: and he overthrew
וַיַּהֲפֹךְ
This form describes Sodom’s overthrow in Genesis 19:25, giving the sun’s transformation the same root-language of overturning.
חֹשֶׁךְ
ḥoshekh
GROWS FROM
חשך
to grow dark; the same consonants also carry the sense of withholding or keeping back
Darkness here is the sun’s light withheld from the world. The shared consonants let darkness and withholding echo each other, giving the image a sense of light held back.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāshakh: to grow dark or darken
חָשַׁךְ
This verb supplies the root behind the darkness into which the sun is turned.
ḥāsakh: to withhold or keep back
חָשַׂךְ
In Genesis 22:12 it describes not withholding Isaac; here the same consonants evoke light held back.
הַנּוֹרָא
hannora
GROWS FROM
ירא
to fear, dread, or stand in awe
The word translated “terrible” comes from the root of fear and awe. The day is named as overwhelming, not simply as a date on a calendar.
ALSO GROWS
yare: to fear or stand in awe
יָרֵא
This root gives the day its fearsome force in relation to the LORD.
mora: fear or awe
מוֹרָא
This related noun shows how the root can hold dread and awe together.
THE PATTERN
The LORD’s day is marked by familiar lights becoming signs that the world’s order is being overturned.
For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine.And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord GOD, that I will cause the sun to go down at noon, and I will darken the earth in the clear day:And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring;THE THREAD
Behold, the LORD maketh the earth empty, and maketh it waste, and turneth it upside down, and scattereth abroad the inhabitants thereof.Joel’s “turned” is הָפַךְ (haphakh, to turn or overturn), the same root Isaiah uses for the LORD turning the earth upside down. Joel shows the sky’s lights overturned; Isaiah widens that same image to the whole earth.
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