Judah and Israel 191
fourth the sufferers resorted to the unclean animals ; in the fifth, to reptiles and insects ; and in the sixth the monstrous thing happened that women crazed by hunger consumed their own children as food. But the acme of distress was reached in the seventh year, when men sought to gnaw the flesh from their own bones." To these occurrences the prophecies of Joel apply, for he lived in the awful days of the famine in Joram's reign.
Luckily, God revealed to Joel at the same time how Israel would be rescued from the famine. The winter following the seven years of dearth brought no relief, for the rain held back until the first day of the month of Nisan. When it began to fall, the prophet said to the people, " Go forth and sow seed ! " But they remonstrated with him, " Shall one who hath saved a measure of wheat or two measures of barley not use his store for food and live, rather than for seed and die ? " But the prophet urged them, " Nay, go forth and sow seed." And a miracle happened. In the ant hills and mouse holes, they found enough grain for seed, and they cast it upon the ground on the second, the third, and the fourth day of Nisan. On the fifth day of the month rain fell again. Eleven days later the grain was ripe, and the offering of the 'Omer could be brought at the appointed time, on the sixteenth of the month. Of this the Psalmist was thinking when he said, " They that sow in tears shall reap in joy." "
