1 But it displeased Jonah exceedingly. He was angry!
2 He prayed to Jehovah: »I pray to you, O Jehovah, was this what I said, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I hurried to flee to Tarshish. Because I knew that you are a gracious God. You are merciful, slow to anger, abundant in loving kindness, and one who takes pity over calamity tragedycatastrophedisaster.
3 »Now, O Jehovah, please take my life from me for it is better for me to die than to live.«
4 Jehovah asked him: »Do you have good reason to be angry?«
5 Then Jonah went out of the city. He sat on the east side of the city. He made a booth, and sat under it in the shade. He wanted to see what would become of the city.
6 And Jehovah God prepared a gourd plant. He made it grow up over Jonah. That way it would be a shade over his head. It would deliver him from his disastrous fateful attitude. So Jonah was very glad to have the gourd plant.
7 The next morning God prepared a worm and it attacked the plant and it withered.
8 When the sun rose God prepared a sultry burning hot east wind. So the sun beat upon the head of Jonah and he grew faint. He requested for himself that he might die. He said: »It is better for me to die than to live!«
9 However God replied to Jonah: »Do you have good reason to be angry at the plant?« He said to God: »I have good reason to be angry even unto death.«
10 Jehovah said: »You have compassion for the plant for which you did not work and which you did not cause to grow. It came up overnight and perished in a night.
11 »Should I not then have regard for Nineveh, that great city, where there are more than one hundred and twenty thousand people that do not know the difference between their right and their left hand, and also many animals?«