But Jonah ran away to Tarshish to escape from the presence of the Lord [and his duty as His prophet]. He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish [the most remote of the Phoenician trading cities]. So he paid the fare and went down into the ship to go with them to Tarshish away from the presence of the Lord.

But the LORD sent out a great wind into the sea, and there was a mighty tempest in the sea, so that the ship was in danger of being broken.

Then the men became extremely frightened and said to him, “How could you do this?” For the men knew that he was running from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them.

Then they said to him, What shall we do to you, that the sea may be calm to us? For the sea was going on and being stormy.

But the men rowed hard to bring it to the land; but they could not, for the sea was going on and being stormy against them.

So Jonah arose, and went his way unto Nineveh, according to the word of Yahweh, - Nineveh, being a city great before God, of three days' journey.

And Jonah will begin to go in to the city the going of one day, and he will call, and say, Yet forty days and Nineveh being overthrown.

And he had a proclamation made, and said, "In Nineveh, by a decree of the king and his nobles: "No human being or animal, no herd or flock, shall taste anything! They must not eat, and they must not drink water!

And [the] human beings and [the] animals must be covered [with] sackcloth! And they must call forcefully to God, and each must turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands.

The LORD replied, "Does being angry make you right?"

and I -- have not I pity on Nineveh, the great city, in which there are more than twelve myriads of human beings, who have not known between their right hand and their left -- and much cattle!'