Study Desk

"Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach against it, for their wickedness has come up before me."

They all said to each other, "Come, let us cast lots, that we may know for whose cause this evil is on us." So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah.

Then they asked him, "Tell us, please, for whose cause this evil is on us. What is your occupation? Where do you come from? What is your country? Of what people are you?"

Then were the men exceedingly afraid, and said to him, "What is this that you have done?" For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of Yahweh, because he had told them.

Then said they to him, "What shall we do to you, that the sea may be calm to us?" For the sea grew more and more tempestuous.

He said to them, "Take me up, and throw me into the sea. Then the sea will be calm for you; for I know that because of me this great tempest is on you."

Nevertheless the men rowed hard to get them back to the land; but they could not, for the sea grew more and more tempestuous against them.

Therefore they cried to Yahweh, and said, "We beg you, Yahweh, we beg you, let us not perish for this man's life, and don't lay on us innocent blood; for you, Yahweh, have done as it pleased you."

For you threw me into the depths, In the heart of the seas. The flood was all around me. All your waves and your billows passed over me.

He prayed to Yahweh, and said, "Please, Yahweh, wasn't this what I said when I was still in my own country? Therefore I hurried to flee to Tarshish, for I knew that you are a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in lovingkindness, and you repent of the evil.

Therefore now, Yahweh, take, I beg you, my life from me; for it is better for me to die than to live."

Yahweh said, "Is it right for you to be angry?"

It happened, when the sun arose, that God prepared a sultry east wind; and the sun beat on Jonah's head, so that he fainted, and requested for himself that he might die, and said, "It is better for me to die than to live."

God said to Jonah, "Is it right for you to be angry about the vine?" He said, "I am right to be angry, even to death."

Yahweh said, "You have been concerned for the vine, for which you have not labored, neither made it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night.

Shouldn't I be concerned for Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred twenty thousand persons who can't discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?"

For, behold, Yahweh comes forth out of his place, And will come down and tread on the high places of the earth.

"All this is for the disobedience of Jacob, And for the sins of the house of Israel. What is the disobedience of Jacob? Isn't it Samaria? And what are the high places of Judah? Aren't they Jerusalem?

Therefore I will make Samaria like a rubble heap of the field, Like places for planting vineyards; And I will pour down its stones into the valley, And I will uncover its foundations.

All her idols will be beaten to pieces, And all her temple gifts will be burned with fire, And all her images I will destroy; For of the hire of a prostitute has she gathered them, And to the hire of a prostitute shall they return."