[1227] I. 278, quoted by Pusey.
[1228] i. 17–20: see above, p. [403].
[1229] Prophetic past: Driver.
[1230] Opinion is divided as to the meaning of this phrase: לצדקה = for righteousness. A. There are those who take it as having a moral reference; and (1) this is so emphatic to some that they render the word for early rain, מורה, which also means teacher or revealer, in the latter significance. So (some of them applying it to the Messiah) Targum, Symmachus, the Vulgate, doctorem justitiæ, some Jews, e.g. Rashi and Abarbanel, and some moderns, e.g. (at opposite extremes) Pusey and Merx. But, as Calvin points out (this is another instance of his sanity as an exegete, and refusal to be led by theological presuppositions: he says, “I do not love strained expositions”), this does not agree with the context, which speaks not of spiritual but wholly of physical blessings. (2) Some, who take מורה as early rain, give לצדקה the meaning for righteousness, ad justitiam, either in the sense that God will give the rain as a token of His own righteousness, or in order to restore or vindicate the people’s righteousness (so Davidson, Expositor, 1888, I., p. 203, n.), in the frequent sense in which צדקה is employed in Isa. xl. ff. (see Isaiah xl.—lxvi., Expositor’s Bible, pp. [219] ff.). Cf. Hosea x. 13, צדק; above, Vol. I., p. 289, n. [611]. This of course is possible, especially in view of Israel having been made by their plagues a reproach among the heathen. Still, if Joel had intended this meaning, he would have applied the phrase, not to the early rain only, but to the whole series of blessings by which the people were restored to their standing before God. B. It seems, therefore, right to take לצדקה in a purely physical sense, of the measure or quality of the early rain. So even Calvin, rain according to what is just or fit; A.V. moderately (inexact); R.V. in just measure; Siegfried-Stade sufficient. The root-meaning of צדק is probably according to norm (cf. Isaiah xl.—lxvi., p. 215), and in that case the meaning would be rain of normal quantity. This too suits the parallel in the next clause: as formerly. In Himyaritic the word is applied to good harvests. A man prays to God for אפקל ואתֹמר צדקם, full or good harvests and fruits: Corp. Inscr. Sem., Pars Quarta, Tomus I., No. 2, lin. 1–5; cf. the note.
[1231] Driver, in loco.
[1232] Heb. also repeats here early rain, but redundantly.
[1233] בראשון, in the first. A.V. adds month. But LXX. and Syr. read כראשננה, which is probably the correct reading, as before or formerly.
[1234] i. 18.
[1236] Cf. Hist. Geog., Chap. XXI., especially p. 463.