GOD provided a huge fish to swallow Jonah; and Jonah remained in the fish’s belly three days and three nights.

Jonah prayed to the ETERNAL his God from the belly of the fish.

He said:In my trouble I called to GOD,Who answered me;From the belly of Sheol I cried out,And You heard my voice.

You cast me into the depths,Into the heart of the sea,The floods engulfed me;All Your breakers and billowsSwept over me.

I thought I was driven awayOut of Your sight:Would I ever gaze againUpon Your holy temple?

The waters closed in over me,The deep engulfed me.Weeds twined around my head.

I sank to the base of the mountains;The bars of the earth closed upon me forever.Yet You brought my life up from the pit,My ETERNAL God!

When my life was ebbing away,I called GOD to mind;And my prayer came before You,Into Your holy temple.

They who cling to empty follyForsake their own welfare,awelfare Meaning of Heb. uncertain.

But I, with loud thanksgiving,Will sacrifice to You;What I have vowed I will perform.Deliverance is GOD’s!

GOD commanded the fish, and it spewed Jonah out upon dry land.

The word of GOD came to Jonah a second time:

“Go at once to Nineveh, that great city, and proclaim to it what I tell you.”

Jonah went at once to Nineveh in accordance with GOD’s command.Nineveh was an enormously large cityaan enormously large city Lit. “a large city of God.” a three days’ walk across.

Jonah started out and made his way into the city the distance of one day’s walk, and proclaimed: “Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!”

The people of Nineveh believed God. They proclaimed a fast, and great and small alike put on sackcloth.

When the news reached the king of Nineveh, he rose from his throne, took off his robe, put on sackcloth, and sat in ashes.

And he had the word cried through Nineveh: “By decree of the king and his nobles: No human or animal—of flock or herd—shall taste anything! They shall not graze, and they shall not drink water!

They shall be covered with sackcloth—human and animal—and shall cry mightily to God. Let everyone turn back from their own evil ways and from the injustice of which they are guilty.

Who knows but that God may turn and relent? [God] may turn back from wrathfulness, so that we do not perish.”

God saw what they did, how they were turning back from their evil ways. And God renounced the punishment that had been planned for them, and did not carry it out.

This displeased Jonah greatly, and he was grieved.

He prayed to GOD, saying, “O ETERNAL One! Isn’t this just what I said when I was still in my own country? That is why I fled beforehand to Tarshish. For I know that You are a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in kindness, renouncing punishment.

Please, ETERNAL One, take my life, for I would rather die than live.”

GOD replied, “Are you that deeply grieved?”

Now Jonah had left the city and found a place east of the city. He made a booth there and sat under it in the shade, until he should see what happened to the city.

The ETERNAL God provided a ricinus plant,aricinus plant Meaning of Heb. uncertain; in contrast to others “gourd.” which grew up over Jonah, to provide shade for his head and save him from discomfort. Jonah was very happy about the plant.

But the next day at dawn God provided a worm, which attacked the plant so that it withered.

And when the sun rose, God provided a sultrybsultry Meaning of Heb. uncertain. east wind; the sun beat down on Jonah’s head, and he became faint. He begged for death, saying, “I would rather die than live.”

Then God said to Jonah, “Are you so deeply grieved about the plant?” “Yes,” he replied, “so deeply that I want to die.”

Then GOD said: “You cared about the plant, which you did not work for and which you did not grow, which appeared overnight and perished overnight.

And should not I care about Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not yet know their right hand from their left, and many animals as well!”cI.e., infants and animals are not held responsible for their actions.