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Joe_2:31 The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the LORD come.
Ver. 31. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood] By strange and stupendous eclipses: such as was that of the moon for 12 nights together, a little before the last destruction of Jerusalem; and that of the sun this present 29th day of March, 1652, wherein I write these things, but could scarce see to write, or forbear to behold: for though busy enough to bring this work to an end, if God please, yet I cannot say, as the Duke of Alva did to the King of France, who asked him whether he had observed the late great eclipse? "No," said he, "I have so much to do upon earth, that I have no leisure to look toward heaven." Of this day’s eclipse I may well say, as Lucan doth of another,
“ Ipse caput medio Titan cum ferret Olympo,
Condidit ardentes atra caligine currus;
Involvitque orbem tenebris, gentesque coegit
Desperate diem. ”
I heartily pray it do not presage a dreadful eclipse of the sun of Christ’s glorious Gospel among us; that this bright sun should go down at noon over our heads, and our earth be darkened in the clear day, Amo_8:9. And let every good soul pray that that dismal day may never arise unto us, wherein it shall be said that this glory is departed from our English Israel.
‘ - nobiscum, Christe, maneto;
Extingui lucem nec patiare tuam. ”
And the moon into blood] That is, into redness, as it was likewise on the 15th day of this instant March, in the morning. Two such eclipses so near together having seldom been seen, I fear we may have cause, ere the year come about, to sing sadly with the poet (Ovid. Metam. lib. 15)
“ Signa dabant luctus superi haud incerta futuri
Saepe faces visae, solis quoque tristis imago;
Caerulus et vulture ferrugine Lucifer atra
Sparsus erat, sparsi lunares sanguine currus. ”
Before the great and terrible day of the Lord come] i.e. The great day of general judgment, called here the great day, because the great God will on that day do great things and determine great matters; and the terrible day, because it is a day of anger and of wrath, Rev_6:17; yea, the day of the declaration of the just judgment of God, according to the gospel, Rom_2:5; Rom_2:16. It is elsewhere called "that day" by an appellative proper, Mar_13:32 Luk_21:34 Mat_7:22. That day of note, wherein God will break silence, "execute judgment upon all, and convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him," Jdg_1:15. Enoch foretold this great day before Noah did the Deluge. This day is longer before it comes, but shall be more terrible when it is come. Whether it shall come in the year of our Lord, 1657, as some have gathered out of the numeral letters of these two words, Mundi Conflagratio, and because the year of the world 1657 was the year of the flood, let time determine: I have nothing to say to it.