Jonah 3

Then God spoke to Jonah again. This is what God said:

“Get moving! Go to Nineveh, the large capital city {of Assyria}, and preach to the people who live there the message that I tell you to preach to them.”

This time, Jonah got moving and went to Nineveh, just as God had told him to do. \* Now Nineveh was an extremely large city. It was so large that a person had to walk for three days {to go completely through it}.

When Jonah arrived, he began walking through the city for about one day. Then he proclaimed to the people in the city, “Forty days from now, God will destroy Nineveh!” \*

The people of Nineveh believed the message from God {that Jonah proclaimed}. They decided that everyone should fast and wear coarse cloth on their bodies {in order to show that they were sorry for the evil things that they had been doing}. So everyone in the city did that, from the most important people to the least important people.

When the king of Nineveh heard about the message {that Jonah was preaching}, he got up from his throne. He took off his royal robes, put on coarse cloth instead, and sat down on a heap of cold ashes. {He did all this to show that he also was sorry for the evil actions that he had been doing.} \*

Then he sent messengers to proclaim to the people in Nineveh: “The king and his officials have decreed that no person or animal may taste any food nor drink any water. Even the cows and the sheep may not graze.

Every person and every {domestic} animal must wear coarse cloth on their bodies. Everyone must pray fervently to God. Also, everyone must stop doing the evil things that they have been doing and the violent things that they have been doing {to other people}.

If everyone does those things, it is possible that this god will change his mind and be merciful to us. He may relent from being so angry with us, with the result that we will live.” \*

So the people did those things and stopped doing the evil actions that they had been doing. God saw all of this. So God had mercy on them and did not destroy them as he had said he would do. {Even though he had said that,} he did not do it. \*