This adjective, used substantively with the article, designates 'the northern one'—an invader or threat coming from the north. Joel 2:20 applies this term to what most interpreters understand as a locust swarm, though the imagery blends with that of a military invasion. The north was the traditional direction from which Mesopotamian armies approached Israel, making 'northerner' a loaded term suggesting foreign threat and judgment. The locust plague thus functions as both literal agricultural disaster and prophetic symbol.