Jonah 1:1

Jonah Tries to Run from the Lord

1:1 The Lord said ¹  to Jonah son of Amittai, ² 

Jonah 3:1-2

The People of Nineveh Respond to Jonah’s Warning

3:1 The Lord said to Jonah ³  a second time, 3:2 “Go immediately ⁴  to Nineveh, that large city, ⁵  and proclaim to ⁶  it the message that I tell you.”

Jonah 3:10

3:10 When God saw their actions – they turned ⁷  from their evil way of living! ⁸  – God relented concerning the judgment ⁹  he had threatened them with ¹⁰  and he did not destroy them. ¹¹ 

[1:1]  ¹ tn Heb “The word of the Lord.” The genitive noun in the construction דְּבַר־יְהוָה (dÿvar-yÿhvah, “word of the Lord”) could function as a possessive genitive (“the Lord’s word”; see IBHS 145 §9.5.1g), but more likely it functions as a subjective genitive (“the Lord said”; see IBHS 143 §9.5.1a). The Aramaic translation of Jonah 1:1 (Aramaic translations of the Hebrew Bible are known as Targums) interprets the Hebrew as “There was a word of prophecy from the Lord” (cf. Tg. Hos 1:1).

[1:1]  ² tn Heb “The word of the Lord was to Jonah…saying….” The infinitive לֵאמֹר (le’mor, “saying”) introduces direct discourse and is untranslated in English.

[3:1]  ³ tn Heb “The word of the Lord [was] to Jonah.” See the note on 1:1.

[3:2]  ⁵ sn The commands of 1:2 are repeated here. See the note there on the combination of “arise” and “go.”

[3:2]  ⁶ tn Heb “Nineveh, the great city.”

[3:2]  ⁷ tn The verb קָרָא (qara’, “proclaim”) is repeated from 1:2 but with a significant variation. The phrase in 1:2 was the adversative קְרָא עָל (qÿra’ ’al, “proclaim against”), which often designates an announcement of threatened judgment (1 Kgs 13:4, 32; Jer 49:29; Lam 1:15). However, here the phrase is the more positive קְרָא אֶל (qÿra’ ’el, “proclaim to”) which often designates an oracle of deliverance or a call to repentance, with an accompanying offer of deliverance that is either explicit or implied (Deut 20:10; Isa 40:2; Zech 1:4; HALOT 1129 s.v. קרא 8; BDB 895 s.v. קָרָא 3.a). This shift from the adversative preposition עַל (“against”) to the more positive preposition אֶל (“to”) might signal a shift in God’s intentions or perhaps it simply makes his original intention more clear. While God threatened to judge Nineveh, he was very willing to relent and forgive when the people repented from their sins (3:8-10). Jonah later complains that he knew that God was likely to relent from the threatened judgment all along (4:2).

[3:10]  ⁷ tn This clause is introduced by כִּי (ki, “that”) and functions as an epexegetical, explanatory clause.

[3:10]  ⁸ tn Heb “from their evil way” (so KJV, ASV, NAB); NASB “wicked way.”

[3:10]  ⁹ tn Heb “calamity” or “disaster.” The noun רָעָה (ra’ah, “calamity, disaster”) functions as a metonymy of result – the cause being the threatened judgment (e.g., Exod 32:12, 14; 2 Sam 24:16; Jer 18:8; 26:13, 19; 42:10; Joel 2:13; Jonah 4:2; HALOT 1263 s.v. רָעָה 6). The root רָעָה is repeated three times in vv. 8 and 10. Twice it refers to the Ninevites’ moral “evil” (vv. 8 and 10a) and here it refers to the “calamity” or “disaster” that the Lord had threatened (v. 10b). This repetition of the root forms a polysemantic wordplay that exploits this broad range of meanings of the noun. The wordplay emphasizes that God’s response was appropriate: because the Ninevites repented from their moral “evil” God relented from the “calamity” he had threatened.

[3:10]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “the disaster that he had spoken to do to them.”

[3:10]  ¹¹ tn Heb “and he did not do it.” See notes on 3:8-9.