Jonah 2

World English Bible 86 include this book

1 Then Jonah prayed to the LORD, his God, out of the fish’s belly.

2 He said, “I called because of my affliction to the LORD. He answered me. Out of the belly of Sheol I cried. You heard my voice.

3 For you threw me into the depths, in the heart of the seas. The flood was all around me. All your waves and your billows passed over me.

4 I said, ‘I have been banished from your sight; yet I will look again toward your holy temple.’

5 The waters surrounded me, even to the soul. The deep was around me. The weeds were wrapped around my head.

6 I went down to the bottoms of the mountains. The earth barred me in forever; yet you have brought my life up from the pit, LORD my God.

7 “When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the LORD. My prayer came in to you, into your holy temple.

8 Those who regard vain idols forsake their own mercy.

9 But I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving. I will pay that which I have vowed. Salvation belongs to the LORD.”

10 Then the LORD spoke to the fish, and it vomited out Jonah on the dry land.

Go deeper in Jonah

3 places named in this book — no place is named in this chapter, so the whole book is shown.

Nineveh traditional The narrative turns on Nineveh, though the place of composition is not stated.

Traditions differ. Each position is shown rather than one asserted as settled.

Traditional: 780 BC–750 BC Jonah
Jonah is named as a prophet under Jeroboam II.
Critical: 400 BC–350 BC Anonymous
Language and the book's parabolic shape suggest a much later author writing about an earlier figure.

Events overlapping the period this book is dated to (780 BC–350 BC).

1200 BC–600 BC Zoroaster teaches in Persia Persia
Founder of Zoroastrianism, whose dating is disputed by as much as six centuries. His teaching on a cosmic struggle between good and evil later touched Jewish and Christian thought.
1200 BC–400 BC Olmec civilisation Mesoamerica
The earliest major Mesoamerican civilisation, known for colossal stone heads and an early calendar.
1070 BC–350 AD The kingdom of Kush Africa
A Nubian power on the upper Nile that ruled Egypt itself as its twenty-fifth dynasty.
776 BC First recorded Olympiad Greece
The traditional starting point of Greek historical chronology.
753 BC Traditional founding of Rome Rome
The legendary date of Rome's founding, later used as the anchor of the Roman calendar.
745 BC–609 BC Neo-Assyrian empire at its height Mesopotamia
Assyria dominated the Near East, deporting conquered populations as policy, including the northern kingdom of Israel.
722 BC Fall of Samaria Levant
The Assyrian conquest of the northern kingdom of Israel and the deportation of much of its population.
620 BC–560 BC Coinage invented in Lydia Anatolia
Stamped electrum coins of guaranteed weight, an idea that spread across the ancient world within a century.

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