Jonah and Ninevah: Part 2 – The fate of Ninevah

Minstrel: [singing]
He is packing it in and packing it up
And sneaking away and buggering off
And chickening out and pissing off home,
Yes, bravely he is throwing in the sponge.

After Jonah washed off the fish’s digestive fluids he walked to Nineveh which was such a big city that it took three days to walk across it. Jonah decided that after one full day of walking toward the city center he was far enough in to start warning of Jehovah induced destruction. It didn’t take the people of Nineveh long to get really freaked out about their impending end. They all believed the message and started to pray and fast. Even the king took off his fancy clothes, dressed in sackcloth, and covered himself with ashes. He commanded that everyone throughout the city pray, fast, and dress in sackcloth and ashes.

Jehovah saw that everyone decided to dance to his little tune, and there’s nothing Jehovah likes better that to see people scared and miserable on His behalf. So, Jehovah decided to not destroy Nineveh after all. This made Jonah mad. He was all sorts of upset that God forgave the people of Nineveh, but didn’t let him flee to Tarshish. Usually when someone gets mad at Jehovah, He just kills them; but for some reason with Jonah He departed from His modus operandi. Instead He explained that even if He doesn’t forgive the sins of a single person, it’s important to forgive naughtiness when a lot of people (and cattle) are involved. You should find odd if you’re familiar with the Old Testament because it represents a complete 180 in Jehovah’s thinking.

Of course Nineveh’s newfound righteousness didn’t last that long and Jehovah eventually ended up destroying it anyway.

Easy come, easy go.

Ref: Jonah 3-4