Good News Translation has rearranged the lines of verses 20-21 to give a more logical presentation for the English reader (see the comments below). Translators will have to determine if such a rearrangement is useful in their language.

But Judah shall be inhabited for ever, and Jerusalem to all generations: These two parallel lines show that Judah and Jerusalem will always have inhabitants in contrast to the future for Egypt and Edom. Good News Translation combines them into one line, saying “But Judah and Jerusalem will be inhabited forever.”

I will avenge their blood, and I will not clear the guilty: This line in the Hebrew text is somewhat difficult to translate. Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation have followed the Septuagint, which itself may have been a free translation of the Hebrew. The Hebrew is literally “and I will not leave unpunished their blood [which] I have left [yet] unpunished” (so Hebrew Old Testament Text Project, which recommends this reading). The meaning seems to be that God has not yet punished the Egyptians and the Edomites for killing the people of Judah (verse 20), but he threatens to do so. (The literal translation of the Hebrew in the RSV footnote: is not accurate.) So both Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation have adequately expressed the intended meaning of the Hebrew. Revised English Bible has “I shall avenge their blood, the blood I have not yet avenged.” Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch (1982) says “Should I leave that unpunished? I will punish them for it…!”

Avenge their blood is a Hebrew figure of speech, which Good News Translation translates nonfiguratively with “avenge those who were killed.”

Good News Translation moves this first line of verse 21 before verse 20 to preserve the connection with verse 19, so it combines verses 20-21.

For the LORD dwells in Zion: Yahweh’s fellowship with his people was interrupted by the plague of locusts, but now he lives with them again in his Temple. For this line see the comments at verse 17. Since Yahweh himself continues to speak here, Good News Translation translates the LORD as “I, the LORD.” Again, Good News Translation refers to Zion as “Mount Zion,” to remind the readers that this is the place where the Temple stands.

Quoted with permission from de Blois, Kees & Dorn, Louis. A Handbook on Joel. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2020. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .