In my tribulation I cried out to the Lord my God, and when I heard me, I cried out of the belly of hell, and you heard my voice. Thou hast cast me into the depths of the heart of the sea, and the rivers have passed over me: all the heights are Thine, and Thy waves have passed over me. And I said: I have denied Thy sight, shall I bring food to look upon Thy holy church? The water poured out upon me to the depths of my soul, the last abyss passed over me, I plunged my head into the clefts of the mountains. He went down into the earth, and sealed its faith for eternity. And may my life ascend from decay to You, O Lord my God. Whenever my soul passes away from me, I will remember the Lord, and may my prayer come to You to Your holy church. Those who keep vain and false things have abandoned their mercy. But with a voice of praise and confession I will devour You, having promised, I will repay You for my salvation, O Lord. And the Lord commanded the whale and the monster Jonah to dry land.
And the word of the Lord came to Jonah with the second verb: Arise and go to the great city of Nineveh, and preach in it according to the first sermon, which I told you. And Jonah arose and went to Nineveh, as the Lord said: Now Nineveh is a great city to God, like a journey of three days. And Jonah began to enter the city, as the journey of one day, and preaching and saying: Three more days, and Nineveh will be transformed. And the men of Nineveh believed in God, and commanded fasting, and put on sackcloth, from their greatness even to their smallest. And the word came to the king of Nineveh, and he rose from his throne, and stripped off his robe, and put on sackcloth, and sat on ashes. And it was preached, and a word was spoken in Nineveh from the king and his nobles, saying: Men, and cattle, and oxen, and sheep, let them not eat anything, neither let them graze, nor let them drink below the water.
And men and beasts put on sackcloth, and cried out diligently to God: and they turned every one from the way of his evil one, and from the wickedness that was in their hands, saying: Who knows, if God will repent and pray, and He will turn from the wrath of His wrath, and we will not perish; and God saw their deeds, as if they had turned from their wicked ways: and God repented of the evil which he said he would do to them, and he would not do it. And Jonah was saddened with great sorrow, and was troubled. And I prayed to the Lord, and said: O Lord, are not these my words, even verbs, still existing on my land? For this reason, before fleeing to Tarshish, we knew that You are merciful and generous, long-suffering and abundantly merciful, and repent of (human) wickedness. And now, Master Lord, take my soul from me, for I must die rather than live. And the Lord said to Jonah: Are you very sad? And Jonah went out from the city, and sat straight before the city, and made himself a tabernacle, and sat under it in the canopy until he saw that there would be hail.
And the Lord God commanded the pumpkin and the growth over the head of Jonah, that there should be a shade over his head, to shade him from his evil ones, and Jonah rejoiced over the pumpkin with great joy. And the Lord God commanded the worm early in the morning, and to eat the pumpkin, and so on. And suddenly the sun came to rise, and God commanded the scorching hot wind, and struck the sun on the head of Jonah: and you were faint-hearted, and you denied your soul, and said: we must not die, than to live. And the Lord God spoke to Jonah: Are you so sad about the pumpkin? And he said (Jonah): I was greatly saddened even to the point of death. And the Lord said: you were offended because of the pumpkin; you did not labor for it, nor did you feed it, even though it was born and the world perished. Shall I not spare the great city of Nineveh, in which live multitudes, even more than twelve men, even though they have not known their right hand, below their Shui people and their many cattle?
Reading the prophecy of Jonah [1:1 – 4:11]
The word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amatha, and said: Arise and go to Nineveh, the great city, and preach in it, for the cry of its wickedness has come to Me. And Jonah arose to flee from the presence of the Lord to Tarshish; and he went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish, and gave his wages for the passage, and entered into it to sail to Tarshish with them from the presence of the Lord. And the Lord raised up a strong wind on the sea, and a great storm arose on the sea, and the ship was in danger of being broken. And the shipmen were afraid, and each cried out to his god, and began to throw the things that were on the ship into the sea in order to relieve it of them. And Jonah went down to the bottom of the ship and slept and snored there. And the helmsman came up to him and said to him: “Why are you snoring? Get up and pray to your God that God will save us and we will not perish.” And they said to each other: “Let’s go, cast lots and find out for whom this disaster has come upon us”? And they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah.
And they said to him: “Tell us for whom this disaster has come upon us; What is your business, where are you coming from and where are you going, and what country and what people are you from?” And he said to them: “I am the servant of the Lord and I honor the Lord God of heaven, who created the sea and the dry land.” And the people were afraid with great fear and said to him: “What have you done?” For these people knew that he had fled from the presence of the Lord, as he had declared to them. And they said to him: “What should we do with you so that the sea will calm down for us?” For the sea rose and increased the excitement more and more. And Jonah said to them: “Take me and throw me into the sea, and the sea will calm down for you, for I have learned that this great disturbance has arisen against you because of me.” And the people tried to land on the ground, but they could not, because the sea kept rising and rising on them. And they cried out to the Lord and said: “No, Lord! May we not perish for the soul of this man, and may you not lay righteous blood on us, for You, Lord, have done as you willed.” And they took Jonah and threw him into the sea, and the sea became calm from its disturbance.
And the men were afraid of the great fear of the Lord, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and prayed fervently. And the Lord commanded the large whale to swallow Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the whale for three days and three nights. And Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the belly of the whale, and said:
I cried out in my sorrow to the Lord my God, and He heard me: from the belly of hell is my cry, You have heard my voice. Thou hast cast me into the depths of the heart of the sea, and the rivers have surrounded me, all Thy banks and Thy waves have passed over me. And I said: “I have been rejected from Your eyes; will I ever see Your holy church again? The water enveloped me to my soul, the deepest abyss surrounded me, my head plunged into the crevices of the mountains. I descended into the land whose locks hold forever. But my life will rise from decay to You, O Lord my God! When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the Lord, and may my prayer come to You, to Your holy church. Those who protect vain and false things have abandoned their mercy. And with a voice of praise and confession I will bring to You what I promised, I will bring for my salvation to You, the Lord.”