John Trapp on Joel 2:1

CHAP. II.

Verſe 1. BLow ye the trumpet in Zion,] Idem aliis verbis repetit, ſaith Mercer here. The Prophet repeateth the ſame as in the former Chapter; onely in other words, more at large, and after another manner: preſſing the people further to the practiſe of repentance by many ſweet promiſes of the bleſſings of this, and a better life. Our Prophet may ſeem to bee of the ſame mind with Tertullian, who ſaid that he was nulli rei natus niſi poenitentiae, born for no other end, but to repent, and to call upon others ſo to do. Tot autem verbis & figuris ntitur, ſaith Luther, he uſeth ſo many words, & figures, becauſe he had to do with a people that were harder then rocks, Jer. 5.3. as alſo, becauſe there is an abſolute neceſſity of repentance. Aut poenitendum, aut pereundum, as our Saviour tells his Diſciples twice in a breath, Luke 13.2, 5. The Prophet had urged them hereunto from the evils they felt, or feared, chap. 1. Pain and penitency are words of one derivation: God plagueth men that he may make them cry Peccavi: not Perij onely, I am undone, as Cain; but peccavi, I have done very fooliſhly, as David. The ſeventeen firſt verſes of this Chapter, are Hortatory; the reſt Conſolatory. The day of the Lord cometh; therefore Repent. This is the ſumme of the exhortation. It cometh, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. Herod. and that inſtantly; Give warning therefore: God loveth to foreſignifie, (ſaith the Heathen Hiſtorian) and to premoniſh, before he puniſh. He dealt ſo with Cain, to whom he read the firſt lecture of Repentance, Gen. 4. as he had done of Faith, to his father Adam, in the Chapter before. He dealt ſo with the old world, with the Sodomites, Ninevites, &c.

Sound an alarm in my holy Mountain,] Ring the bels backwards, (as amongſt us they do) the houſe is on fire; the enemy is at hand.

Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble,] and take courſe to prevent, or mitigate the enſuing miſchief; to cut the cart-ropes of ſin, that pull down wrath upon the land.

for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand.] An end is come, is come, is come, as Ezekiel hath it, chap. 7.6, 7. I will overturn, overturn, overturn, as the ſame Prophet hath it elſewhere.Ezek. 21.27. and 10. Should we then make mirth? as it is in the ſame Chapter: ſhould we ſleep upon a maſt-pole, dance upon a weather-cock? go hallowing and hooping to the place of execution?