[[Joel-03]] Prev: [[Prophecies in Joel-02]] | Next: [[Prophecies in Am-01]] --- ### "Behold, I will stir them up out of the place where you have sold them, and will return your repayment on your own head; and I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hands of the children of Judah, and they will sell them to the men of Sheba, to a faraway nation, for Yahweh has spoken it." *Type*: prophecy *Summary*: God predicts that the people of Tyre, Sidon, and Philistia, who sold Judeans into slavery to the Greeks, will themselves have their children sold into slavery by the people of Judah to the Sabeans. *Historical context*: Theologians and historians often point to the conquests of Alexander the Great in 332 BC as a fulfillment. After the siege of Tyre, Alexander sold approximately 30,000 of its inhabitants into slavery. Similarly, Artaxerxes III Ochus had previously enslaved many from Sidon. While secular records of a specific sale to the Sabeans via Judah are rare, the historical reversal of the Phoenician slave-trading power and the mass enslavement of their own populations is widely regarded as the realization of this 'measure for measure' judgment. *Related to*: ### Egypt will be a desolation, and Edom will be a desolate wilderness, for the violence done to the children of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land. *Type*: prophecy *Summary*: Joel prophesies the total desolation of Egypt and Edom as punishment for their historical violence against the people of Judah. *Historical context*: The prophecy regarding Edom has seen significant historical fulfillment. Following the Babylonian conquest, Edom was gradually pushed out of its territory by the Nabataeans. By the first century AD, the remaining Idumeans (Edomites) were absorbed into the Jewish population or destroyed during the Roman-Jewish wars, and their original homeland became a desolate wilderness as described, with cities like Petra remaining abandoned for centuries. Egypt's 'desolation' is often interpreted as the end of its status as an independent world power following successive conquests by Persians, Greeks, and Romans. *Related to*: ### It will happen in that day, that the mountains will drop down sweet wine, the hills will flow with milk, all the brooks of Judah will flow with waters, and a fountain will flow out from Yahweh's house, and will water the valley of Shittim. *Type*: prophecy *Summary*: A prediction of future supernatural abundance and a literal or spiritual fountain emerging from the Temple in Jerusalem to water a dry valley. *Historical context*: This prophecy is often cross-referenced with [[Ezek|Ezekiel 47]] and [[Zech-14#v8|Zechariah 14:8]], which also describe a river flowing from the Temple. Many biblical scholars view this as an eschatological prophecy (yet to be fully realized in a physical sense). However, Christian theologians often interpret the 'fountain' as the spiritual life of the Gospel beginning in Jerusalem and spreading to the 'Gentile world' (the valley of Shittim/Acacias representing a dry, distant place). Geographically, there is no permanent natural river currently flowing from the Temple Mount to the Dead Sea area. *Related to*: --- #ai_prophecy