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.” ³ So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, ^[a]a three-day journey in extent. ⁴ And Jonah began to enter the city on the first day’s walk. Then ^(A)he cried out and said, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!”

The People of Nineveh Believe

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

^10 (H)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.

¹¹ And should I not pity Nineveh, ^(A)that great city, in which are more than one hundred and twenty thousand persons ^(B)who cannot discern between their right hand and their left—and much livestock?”