Jonah 1:4

1:4 But the Lord hurled a powerful wind on the sea. Such a violent tempest arose on the sea that the ship threatened to break up!

Jonah 4:8

4:8 When the sun began to shine, God sent a hot east wind. So the sun beat down on Jonah’s head, and he grew faint. So he despaired of life, 10  and said, “I would rather die than live!” 11 

tn The disjunctive construction of vav + nonverb followed by a nonpreterite marks a strong contrast in the narrative action (וַיהוָה הֵטִיל, vayhvah hetil; “But the Lord hurled…”).

tn The Hiphil of טוּל (tul, “to hurl”) is used here and several times in this episode for rhetorical emphasis (see vv. 5 and 15).

tn Heb “great.” Typically English versions vary the adjective here and before “tempest” to avoid redundancy: e.g., KJV, ASV, NRSV “great...mighty”; NAB “violent…furious”; NIV “great…violent”; NLT “powerful…violent.”

tn Heb “great.”

tn The nonconsecutive construction of vav + nonverb followed by nonpreterite is used to emphasize this result clause (וְהָאֳנִיָּה חִשְּׁבָה לְהִשָׁבֵר, vÿhaoniyyah khishvah lÿhishaver; “that the ship threatened to break up”).

tn Heb “the ship seriously considered breaking apart.” The use of חָשַׁב (khashav, “think”) in the Piel (“to think about; to seriously consider”) personifies the ship to emphasize the ferocity of the storm. The lexicons render the clause idiomatically: “the ship was about to be broken up” (BDB 363 s.v. חָשַׁב 2; HALOT 360 s.v. חשׁב).

tn Or “appointed.” See preceding note on v. 7.

tc The MT adjective חֲרִישִׁית (kharishit, “autumnal”) is a hapax legomenon with an unclear meaning (BDB 362 s.v. חֲרִישִׁי); therefore, the BHS editors propose a conjectural emendation to the adjective חֲרִיפִית (kharifit, “autumnal”) from the noun חֹרֶף (khoref, “autumn”; see BDB 358 s.v. חרֶף). However, this emendation would also create a hapax legomenon and it would be no more clear than relating the MT’s חֲרִישִׁית to I חָרַשׁ (kharash, “to plough” [in autumn harvest]).

tn Heb “attacked” or “smote.”

10 tn Heb “he asked his soul to die.”

11 tn Heb “better my death than my life.”