Jonah 3
Christian Standard Bible
Jonah’s Preaching
3 The word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time:(A) 2 “Get up! Go to the great city of Nineveh(B) and preach(C) the message that I tell you.” 3 Jonah got up and went to Nineveh according to the Lord’s command.
Now Nineveh was an extremely great city,[a](D) a three-day walk. 4 Jonah set out on the first day of his walk in the city and proclaimed,(E) “In forty days Nineveh will be demolished!” 5 Then the people of Nineveh believed God. They proclaimed a fast(F) and dressed in sackcloth—from the greatest of them to the least.
6 When word reached the king of Nineveh, he got up from his throne, took off his royal robe, covered himself with sackcloth,(G) and sat in ashes. 7 Then he issued a decree(H) in Nineveh:
By order of the king and his nobles: No person or animal, herd or flock, is to taste anything at all. They must not eat or drink water. 8 Furthermore, both people and animals must be covered with sackcloth, and everyone must call out earnestly to God.(I) Each must turn from his evil ways(J) and from his wrongdoing.[b] 9 Who knows?(K) God may turn and relent; he may turn from his burning anger so that we will not perish.(L)
10 God saw their actions—that they had turned from their evil ways(M)—so God relented from the disaster(N) he had threatened them with. And he did not do it.
Jonah 3
Easy-to-Read Version
God Calls and Jonah Obeys
3 Then the Lord spoke to Jonah again and said, 2 “Go to that big city Nineveh, and say what I tell you.”
3 So Jonah obeyed the Lord and went to Nineveh. It was a very large city. A person had to walk for three days to travel through it.
4 Jonah went to the center of the city and began speaking to the people. He said, “After 40 days, Nineveh will be destroyed!”
5 The people of Nineveh believed God. They decided to stop eating for a time to think about their sins. They put on special clothes to show they were sorry. All the people in the city did this, from the most important to the least important.
6 When the king of Nineveh heard about this, he left his throne, removed his robe, put on special clothes to show that he was sorry, and sat in ashes.[a] 7 The king wrote a special message and sent it throughout the city:
A command from the king and his great rulers:
For a short time no person or animal should eat anything. No herd or flock will be allowed in the fields. Nothing living in Nineveh will eat or drink water. 8 But every person and every animal must be covered with a special cloth to show they are sad. People must cry loudly to God. Everyone must change their life and stop doing bad things. 9 Who knows? Maybe God will stop being angry and change his mind, and we will not be punished.
10 God saw what the people did. He saw that they stopped doing evil. So God changed his mind and did not do what he planned. He did not punish the people.
Footnotes
- Jonah 3:6 sat in ashes People did this to show that they were sad.
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