Joel 2:6 - Exposition

Before their face the people shall be much pained: all faces shall gather blackness . Peoples or nations writhe in pain or tremble at the sight of them, lest they should settle on their fields and gardens, destroying the "golden glories" of the one, and the "leafy honours" of the other. In the second member the word פָארוּר is

"Being all descended to the labouring heart;

Who, in the conflict that it holds with death,

Attracts the same for aidance 'gainst the enemy:

Which with the heart there cools and ne'er returneth

To blush and beautify the cheek again."

The parallel usually cited in favour of asaph being employed in the sense of withdrawing is, "And the stars shall withdraw their shining" ( Joel 2:10 ; Joel 3:15 ). This proceeds on the supposition that asaph and qabhats have the same meaning of "gathering "—gathering up, gathering in, withdrawing. But D. Kimchi quotes his father (Joseph Kimchi) as objecting to this rendering, on the ground of the distinction which he asserts to prevail between them. Asaph , he says, "is used of gathering together, or in, that which is dispersed, or net present; but qabhats is not so used."