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The Hebrew version of Jonah describes him being shaded by a qiqayon, a plant named only here and never identified with certainty. The Greek Septuagint makes it familiar by changing the plant to a gourd.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Jonah 4:6
Hebrew Bible
5 Jonah left the city and sat down east of it. He made a shelter for himself there and sat down under it in the shade to see what would happen to the city. 6 The Lord God appointed a little plant and caused it to grow up over Jonah to be a shade over his head to rescue him from his misery. Now Jonah was very delighted about the little plant. 7 So God sent a worm at dawn the next day, and it attacked the little plant so that it dried up.
LXX Jonah 4:6
Septuagint
5 And Jonah went out of the city and sat down opposite of the city and made there a tent for himself. And he sat under it in the shade until which point he might look up to see what will happen in the city. 6 And the Lord God commanded a gourd, and it rose up over the head of Jonah to provide shade over his head to shade him from his bad things. And Jonah rejoiced at the gourd with great delight. 7 And God commanded a worm early on the next day, and it struck the gourd, and the gourd withered away.
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Notes and References
... It does not help that the qiqayon occurs only this once in Scripture and that, like the fish, this plant is displayed with minimal realism: In less than a full day, the qiqayon grows to remarkable stature and then withers. Altogether, this description cannot apply to the average shrub or tree—be it a gourd, an ivy, or a castor bean. I may be permitted, therefore, not to attach a specific label to qiqayon; instead, I shall follow Aquila and Theodotion who, with their kikeona, found it prudent just to approximate a transcription of the Hebrew ...
Sasson, Jack M.
Jonah: A New Translation with Introduction, Commentary, and Interpretation
(pp. 291-292) Doubleday, 1990
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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