Grasshoppers & Locusts

(13) So Moses held out his rod over the land of Egypt, and the LORD drove an east wind over the land all that day and all night; and when morning came, the east wind had brought the locusts. (14) Locusts invaded all the land of Egypt and settled within all the territory of Egypt in a thick mass; never before had there been so many, nor will there ever be so many again. (15) They hid all the land from view, and the land was darkened; and they ate up all the grasses of the field and all the fruit of the trees which the hail had left, so that nothing green was left, of tree or grass of the field, in all the land of Egypt. (16) Pharaoh hurriedly summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “I stand guilty before the LORD your God and before you.

(25) At the end of forty days they returned from scouting the land. (26) They went straight to Moses and Aaron and the whole Israelite community at Kadesh in the wilderness of Paran, and they made their report to them and to the whole community, as they showed them the fruit of the land. (27) This is what they told him: “We came to the land you sent us to; it does indeed flow with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. (28) However, the people who inhabit the country are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large; moreover, we saw the Anakites there. (29) Amalekites dwell in the Negeb region; Hittites, Jebusites, and Amorites inhabit the hill country; and Canaanites dwell by the Sea and along the Jordan.” (30) Caleb hushed the people before Moses and said, “Let us by all means go up, and we shall gain possession of it, for we shall surely overcome it.” (31) But the men who had gone up with him said, “We cannot attack that people, for it is stronger than we.” (32) Thus they spread calumnies among the Israelites about the land they had scouted, saying, “The country that we traversed and scouted is one that devours its settlers. All the people that we saw in it are men of great size; (33) we saw the Nephilim there—the Anakites are part of the Nephilim—and we looked like grasshoppers to ourselves, and so we must have looked to them.”

(21) Do you not know? Have you not heard? Have you not been told From the very first? Have you not discerned How the earth was founded? (22) It is He who is enthroned above the vault of the earth, So that its inhabitants seem as grasshoppers; Who spread out the skies like gauze, Stretched them out like a tent to dwell in. (23) He brings potentates to naught, Makes rulers of the earth as nothing. (24) Hardly are they planted, Hardly are they sown, Hardly has their stem Taken root in earth, When He blows upon them and they dry up, And the storm bears them off like straw. (25) To whom, then, can you liken Me, To whom can I be compared? —says the Holy One. (26) Lift high your eyes and see: Who created these? He who sends out their host by count, Who calls them each by name: Because of His great might and vast power, Not one fails to appear.

(1) The word of the LORD that came to Joel son of Pethuel. (2) Listen to this, O elders, Give ear, all inhabitants of the land. Has the like of this happened in your days Or in the days of your fathers? (3) Tell your children about it, And let your children tell theirs, And their children the next generation! (4) What the cutter has left, the locust has devoured; What the locust has left, the grub has devoured; And what the grub has left, the hopper has devoured. (5) Wake up, you drunkards, and weep, Wail, all you swillers of wine— For the new wine that is denied you! (6) For a nation has invaded my land, Vast beyond counting, With teeth like the teeth of a lion, With the fangs of a lion’s breed. (7) They have laid my vines waste And splintered my fig trees: They have stripped off their bark and thrown [it] away; Their runners have turned white. (8) Lament—like a maiden girt with sackcloth For the husband of her youth!

(24) Four are among the tiniest on earth, Yet they are the wisest of the wise: (25) Ants are a folk without power, Yet they prepare food for themselves in summer; (26) The badger is a folk without strength, Yet it makes its home in the rock; (27) The locusts have no king, Yet they all march forth in formation; (28) You can catch the lizard in your hand, Yet it is found in royal palaces.