1And the word of the Lord came to Jonah, the son of Amittai, saying, 2 “Rise, and go to Nineveh, the great city, and announce in it that the outcry of its evil has come up to me.” 3 And Jonah rose to flee from the face of the Lord to Tarshish. And he went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish, and he gave his fare and boarded it to sail with them from the face of the Lord to Tarshish. 4 But the Lord raised up a wind upon the sea, and a great wave came upon the sea, and the ship was in danger of being shattered. 5 And the seamen were afraid and cried out, each to his god. And they threw out the things that were in the ship into the sea in order to lighten it for them. But Jonah went down into the hold of the ship and slept and snored. 6 And the captain came to him and said to him, “How are you snoring? Rise up, and call upon your God so that God might deliver us and we might not be destroyed.” 7 So each said to his neighbor, “Come, let us cast lots and we might know on whose account this evil is among us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell upon Jonah. 8 And they said to him, “Tell us, what is your occupation? And from where did you come? And out of which territory? And from which people are you?” 9 And he said to them, “I am a servant of the Lord, and I revere the Lord, God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.” 10 So the men feared with a great fear and said to him, “What is this you have done?” For the men knew that he was fleeing from the face of the Lord, because he had told them. 11 And they said to him, “What shall we do for you so that the sea might calm down for us?” Because the sea was going about and raising up with greater waves. 12 And Jonah said to them, “Take me, and throw me into the sea, and the sea will cease from you, because I know that this great wave is upon you on account of me.” 13 So the men tried very hard to return toward the land, but they were not able, because the sea came and raised up even more upon them. 14 And they cried out to the Lord and said, “By no means, O Lord, let us perish on account of the life of this person, and do not place upon us righteous blood. For you, O Lord, have done in whatever manner you wished.” 15 And they took Jonah and threw him into the sea, and the sea stopped from its raging.
2And the men feared the Lord with great fear, and they sacrificed a sacrifice to the Lord and prayed. 2 And the Lord commanded a great sea monster to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of the sea monster for three days and three nights.[1] 2 And Jonah prayed to the Lord, his God, from the belly of the sea monster, 3 and said, “I cried out in my distress to the Lord, my God, and he heard me; from the belly of Hades came my outcry, and you heard my voice. 4 You threw me into the depth of the heart of the sea, and rivers surrounded me; all of your swells and your billows have passed over me. 5 And I said, ‘I have been thrust away from your eyes; how shall I proceed to look toward your holy temple?’ 6 Water is poured over me up to my soul; the abyss surrounds me to the last; my head withdraws into the cleft of the hill. 7 I went down into the earth where its bars are eternal barriers, so let the corruption of my life depart, O Lord, my God. 8 When my life was coming to an end from me I remembered the Lord, and my prayer came to you into your holy temple. 9 Observing pointless and false things, they have forsaken their mercy. 10 But I, with a voice of praise, will offer confession to you; as much as I have vowed, I will repay you, the Lord of my deliverance.” 11 And he commanded the sea monster, and it cast Jonah out onto the dry land.
3And the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time, saying, 2 “Rise up, go to Nineveh, the great city, and announce in it according to the previous message that I spoke to you.” 3 And Jonah rose up and went to Nineveh, just as the Lord had spoken. Now Nineveh was a large city before God, a journey of about three days. 4 And Jonah began to enter into the city about one day’s journey, and he announced and said, “Yet three days and Nineveh will be overturned.”[2] 5 And the men of Nineveh gave credence to God and announced a fast and put on sackcloth from their great to their small. 6 And the report came to the king of Nineveh, and he stood up from his throne and removed his garment from himself and put on sackcloth and sat on ashes. 7 And it was proclaimed and said in Nineveh from the king and from his nobles, saying, “Let the humans and the livestock and cattle and sheep not taste anything nor graze nor drink water.” 8 And the humans and livestock clothed themselves with sackcloth, and they cried out to God fervently, and each turned away from his evil way and away from the injustice of their hands, saying,[3] 9 “Who knows whether God will reconsider and turn back from his angry wrath so that we will not perish?” 10 And God saw their efforts, that they turned away from their evil ways. So God reconsidered the evil that he said he would do to them, and he did not do it.[4]
4And Jonah was grieved with great grief, and he was confused. 2 And he prayed to the Lord and said, “O Lord, were these not my words while I was still in my land? On account of this I anticipated to flee to Tarshish because I knew that you are compassionate and merciful, patient and very merciful and willing to reconsider evils. 3 So now, O master, Lord, take my life from me, because it is better for me to die than for me to live.” 4 And the Lord said to Jonah, “Have you been very grieved?” 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. 8 And it came to pass, at once with the rising up of the sun, God commanded a scorching east wind, and the sun struck the head of Jonah, and he became discouraged and renounced his life and said, “It is better for me to die than to live.” 9 And God said to Jonah, “Have you been very grieved over the gourd?” And he said, “I have grieved very much, even until death.” 10 And the Lord said, “You have had pity over the gourd, over which you did not suffer for it, and you did not nourish it, that which came about by night and by night it perished. 11 But should I not have pity over Nineveh, the great city, in which reside more than one hundred and twenty thousand people who did not know their right hand or their left hand, and many livestock?”