Jonah 2 - Micah 2

New King James Version

Jonah’s Prayer and God’s Answer

2 Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the fish’s belly. ²And he said:

“I ^(A)cried out to the Lord because of my affliction,
^(B)And He answered me.

“Out of the belly of Sheol I cried,
And You heard my voice.
³^(C)For You cast me into the deep,
Into the heart of the seas,
And the floods surrounded me;
^(D)All Your billows and Your waves passed over me.
⁴^(E)Then I said, ‘I have been cast out of Your sight;
Yet I will look again ^(F)toward Your holy temple.’
⁵The ^(G)waters surrounded me, even to my soul;
The deep closed around me;
Weeds were wrapped around my head.
⁶I went down to the ^[a]moorings of the mountains;
The earth with its bars closed behind me forever;
Yet You have brought up my ^(H)life from the pit,
O Lord, my God.

⁷“When my soul fainted within me,
I remembered the Lord;
^(I)And my prayer went up to You,
Into Your holy temple.

⁸“Those who regard ^(J)worthless idols
Forsake their own ^[b]Mercy.
⁹But I will ^(K)sacrifice to You
With the voice of thanksgiving;
I will pay what I have ^(L)vowed.
^(M)Salvation is of the ^(N)Lord.”

¹⁰So the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.

Jonah Preaches at Nineveh

3 Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, ²“Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach to it the message that I tell you.” ³So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, ^[c]a three-day journey in extent. ⁴And Jonah began to enter the city on the first day’s walk. Then ^(O)he cried out and said, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!”

The People of Nineveh Believe

⁵So the ^(P)people of Nineveh believed God, proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest to the least of them. ⁶Then word came to the king of Nineveh; and he arose from his throne and laid aside his robe, covered himself with sackcloth ^(Q)and sat in ashes. ⁷^(R)And he caused it to be proclaimed and published throughout Nineveh by the decree of the king and his ^[d]nobles, saying,

Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything; do not let them eat, or drink water. ⁸But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily to God; yes, ^(S)let every one turn from his evil way and from ^(T)the violence that is in his hands. ⁹^(U)Who can tell if God will turn and relent, and turn away from His fierce anger, so that we may not perish?

¹⁰^(V)Then God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God relented from the disaster that He had said He would bring upon them, and He did not do it.

Jonah’s Anger and God’s Kindness

4 But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he became angry. ²So he prayed to the Lord, and said, “Ah, Lord, was not this what I said when I was still in my country? Therefore I ^(W)fled previously to Tarshish; for I know that You are a ^(X)gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, One who relents from doing harm. ³^(Y)Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for ^(Z)it is better for me to die than to live!”

⁴Then the Lord said, “Is it right for you to be angry?”

⁵So Jonah went out of the city and sat on the east side of the city. There he made himself a shelter and sat under it in the shade, till he might see what would become of the city. ⁶And the Lord God prepared a ^[e]plant and made it come up over Jonah, that it might be shade for his head to deliver him from his misery. So Jonah ^[f]was very grateful for the plant. ⁷But as morning dawned the next day God prepared a worm, and it so damaged the plant that it withered. ⁸And it happened, when the sun arose, that God prepared a vehement east wind; and the sun beat on Jonah’s head, so that he grew faint. Then he wished death for himself, and said, ^(AA)“It is better for me to die than to live.”

⁹Then God said to Jonah, “Is it right for you to be angry about the plant?”

And he said, “It is right for me to be angry, even to death!”

¹⁰But the Lord said, “You have had pity on the plant for which you have not labored, nor made it grow, which ^[g]came up in a night and perished in a night. ¹¹And should I not pity Nineveh, ^(AB)that great city, in which are more than one hundred and twenty thousand persons ^(AC)who cannot discern between their right hand and their left—and much livestock?”

Judgment on Israel and Judah

1 The word of the Lord that came to ^(AD)Micah of Moresheth in the days of ^(AE)Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem.

The Coming Judgment on Israel

²Hear, all you peoples!
Listen, O earth, and all that is in it!
Let the Lord God be a witness against you,
The Lord from ^(AF)His holy temple.

³For behold, the Lord is coming out of His place;
He will come down
And tread on the high places of the earth.
⁴^(AG)The mountains will melt under Him,
And the valleys will split
Like wax before the fire,
Like waters poured down a steep place.
⁵All this is for the transgression of Jacob
And for the sins of the house of Israel.
What is the transgression of Jacob?
Is it not Samaria?
And what are the ^(AH)high places of Judah?
Are they not Jerusalem?

⁶“Therefore I will make Samaria ^(AI)a heap of ruins in the field,
Places for planting a vineyard;
I will pour down her stones into the valley,
And I will ^(AJ)uncover her foundations.
⁷All her carved images shall be beaten to pieces,
And all her ^(AK)pay as a harlot shall be burned with the fire;
All her idols I will lay desolate,
For she gathered it from the pay of a harlot,
And they shall return to the ^(AL)pay of a harlot.”

Mourning for Israel and Judah

⁸Therefore I will wail and howl,
I will go stripped and naked;
^(AM)I will make a wailing like the jackals
And a mourning like the ostriches,
⁹For her wounds are incurable.
For ^(AN)it has come to Judah;
It has come to the gate of My people—
To Jerusalem.

¹⁰^(AO)Tell it not in Gath,
Weep not at all;
In ^[h]Beth Aphrah
Roll yourself in the dust.
¹¹Pass by in naked shame, you inhabitant of ^[i]Shaphir;
The inhabitant of ^[j]Zaanan does not go out.
Beth Ezel mourns;
Its place to stand is taken away from you.

¹²For the inhabitant of ^[k]Maroth ^[l]pined for good,
But ^(AP)disaster came down from the Lord
To the gate of Jerusalem.
¹³O inhabitant of ^(AQ)Lachish,
Harness the chariot to the swift steeds
(She was the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion),
For the transgressions of Israel were ^(AR)found in you.

¹⁴Therefore you shall ^(AS)give presents to ^[m]Moresheth Gath;
The houses of ^(AT)Achzib^[n] shall be a lie to the kings of Israel.
¹⁵I will yet bring an heir to you, O inhabitant of ^(AU)Mareshah;^[o]
The glory of Israel shall come to ^(AV)Adullam.^[p]
¹⁶Make yourself ^(AW)bald and cut off your hair,
Because of your ^(AX)precious children;
Enlarge your baldness like an eagle,
For they shall go from you into ^(AY)captivity.

Woe to Evildoers

2 Woe to those who devise iniquity,
And ^[q]work out evil on their beds!
At ^(AZ)morning light they practice it,
Because it is in the power of their hand.
²They ^(BA)covet fields and take them by violence,
Also houses, and seize them.
So they oppress a man and his house,
A man and his inheritance.

³Therefore thus says the Lord:

“Behold, against this ^(BB)family I am devising ^(BC)disaster,
From which you cannot remove your necks;
Nor shall you walk haughtily,
For this is an evil time.
⁴In that day one shall take up a proverb against you,
And ^(BD)lament with a bitter lamentation, saying:
‘We are utterly destroyed!
He has changed the ^[r]heritage of my people;
How He has removed it from me!
To ^[s]a turncoat He has divided our fields.’ ”

⁵Therefore you will have no ^[t]one to determine boundaries by lot
In the assembly of the Lord.

Lying Prophets

⁶“Do not prattle,” you say to those who ^[u]prophesy.
So they shall not prophesy ^[v]to you;
^[w]They shall not return insult for insult.
⁷You who are named the house of Jacob:
“Is the Spirit of the Lord restricted?
Are these His doings?
Do not My words do good
To him who walks uprightly?

⁸“Lately My people have risen up as an enemy—
You pull off the robe with the garment
From those who trust you, as they pass by,
Like men returned from war.
⁹The women of My people you cast out
From their pleasant houses;
From their children
You have taken away My glory forever.

¹⁰“Arise and depart,
For this is not your ^(BE)rest;
Because it is ^(BF)defiled, it shall destroy,
Yes, with utter destruction.
¹¹If a man should walk in a false spirit
And speak a lie, saying,
‘I will ^[x]prophesy to you ^[y]of wine and drink,’
Even he would be the ^(BG)prattler of this people.

Israel Restored

¹²“I^(BH) will surely assemble all of you, O Jacob,
I will surely gather the remnant of Israel;
I will put them together ^(BI)like sheep of ^[z]the fold,
Like a flock in the midst of their pasture;
^(BJ)They shall make a loud noise because of so many people.
¹³The one who breaks open will come up before them;
They will break out,
Pass through the gate,
And go out by it;
^(BK)Their king will pass before them,
^(BL)With the Lord at their head.”