Jonah 3

Complete Jewish Bible

3 The word of Adonai came to Yonah a second time: ²“Set out for the great city of Ninveh, and proclaim to it the message I will give you.” ³So Yonah set out and went to Ninveh, as Adonai had said. Now Ninveh was such a large city that it took three days just to cross it. ⁴Yonah began his entry into the city and had finished only his first day of proclaiming, ‘In forty days Ninveh will be overthrown,’ ⁵when the people of Ninveh believed God. They proclaimed a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least. ⁶When the news reached the king of Ninveh, he got up from his throne, took off his robe, put on sackcloth and sat in ashes. ⁷He then had this proclamation made throughout Ninveh: “By decree of the king and his nobles, no person or animal, herd or flock, is to put anything in his mouth; they are neither to eat nor drink water. ⁸They must be covered with sackcloth, both people and animals; and they are to cry out to God with all their might — let each of them turn from his evil way and from the violence they practice. ⁹Who knows? Maybe God will change his mind, relent and turn from his fierce anger; and then we won’t perish.”