Jonah 4
1 And it is grievous to Jonah—a great evil—and he is displeased at it;
And Jonas was exceedingly troubled, and was angry:
2 and he prays to YHWH, and he says, “Ah, now, O YHWH, is this not my word while I was in my own land—therefore I was beforehand [going] to flee to Tarshish—that I have known that You [are] a God, gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in kindness, and relenting of evil?
And he prayed to the Lord, and said: I beseech thee, O Lord, is not this what I said, when I was yet in my own country? therefore I went before to flee into Tharsis: for I know that thou art a gracious and merciful God, patient, and of much compassion, and easy to forgive evil.
3 And now, O YHWH, please take my soul from me, for better [is] my death than my life.”
And now, O Lord, I beseech thee take my life from me: for it is better for me to die than to live.
4 And YHWH says, “Is doing good displeasing to you?”
And the Lord said: Dost thou think thou hast reason to be angry?
5 And Jonah goes forth from the city, and sits on the east of the city, and makes a shelter for himself there, and sits under it in the shade, until he sees what is in the city.
Then Jonas went out of the city, and sat toward the east side of the city: and he made himself a booth there, and he sat under it in the shadow, till he might see what would befall the city.
6 And YHWH God appoints a gourd, and causes it to come up over Jonah, to be a shade over his head, to give deliverance to him from his affliction, and Jonah rejoices because of the gourd [with] great joy.
And the Lord God prepared an ivy, and it came up over the head of Jonas, to be a shadow over his head, and to cover him (for he was fatigued), and Jonas was exceeding glad of the ivy.
7 And God appoints a worm at the going up of the dawn on the next day, and it strikes the gourd, and it dries up.
But God prepared a worm, when the morning arose on the following day: and it struck the ivy and it withered.
8 And it comes to pass, about the rising of the sun, that God appoints a cutting east wind, and the sun strikes on the head of Jonah, and he wraps himself up, and asks for his soul to die, and says, “Better [is] my death than my life.”
And when the sun was risen, the Lord commanded a hot and burning wind: and the sun beat upon the head of Jonas, and he broiled with the heat: and he desired for his soul that he might die, and said: It is better for me to die than to live.
9 And God says to Jonah: “Is doing good displeasing to you, because of the gourd?” And he says, “To do good is displeasing to me—to death.”
And the Lord said to Jonas: Dost thou think thou hast reason to be angry, for the ivy? And he said: I am angry with reason even unto death.
10 And YHWH says, “You have had pity on the gourd, for which you did not labor, neither did you nourish it, which came up [as] a son of night, and perished [as] a son of night,
And the Lord said: Thou art grieved for the ivy, for which thou hast not laboured, nor made it to grow, which in one night came up, and in one night perished.
11 and I—do I not have pity on Nineveh, the great city, in which there are more than one hundred twenty thousand of mankind, who have not known between their right hand and their left—and much livestock?”
And shall not I spare Ninive, that great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons that know not how to distinguish between their right hand and their left, and many beasts?
