Joel 1:5-7

Joel 1:5-7

[5] Awake,  ye drunkards,  and weep;  and howl,  all ye drinkers  of wine,  because of the new wine;  for it is cut off  from your mouth.  [6] For a nation  is come up  upon my land,  strong,  and without number,  whose teeth  of a lion,  and he hath the cheek teeth  of a great lion.  [7] He hath laid  my vine  waste,  and barked  my fig tree:  he hath made it clean  and cast it away;  the branches  thereof are made white. 

What does Joel 1:5-7 Mean?

Contextual Meaning

Joel urged the drunkards of the land to weep because the locusts had destroyed all the grapevines. There would be no grapes to produce sweet (the most favored) wine for them to drink (cf. Isaiah 5:11-12; Isaiah 5:22; Isaiah 22:13; Isaiah 28:1; Isaiah 28:7; Isaiah 56:12; Hosea 4:11-19; Hosea 7:5; Hosea 7:13-14; Amos 2:6-8; Amos 6:6; Amos 9:13; Micah 2:11; Acts 2:13; Acts 2:15).
"Sweet wine ("asis) was made by drying the grapes in the sun for a short time and then allowing the juice to ferment for five to seven days instead of the more usual nine." [1]
Normally drunkards laugh, with no concern for what goes on around them, but now they should wail. The locusts had invaded the land like a hostile army. The teeth of these invaders were like lions" teeth in that they destroyed their prey. They had stripped the vines and fig trees so thoroughly that their branches stood bare. The vine and the fig tree were symbols of God"s blessings on Israel and symbols of Israel itself, so Joel probably also meant that the locusts had left the whole nation bare.
"All that remained of shady, fruit-laden bowers were skeletonized wrecks of trees with their barkless branches gleaming white." [2]