[1] The word of the LORD came to Jonah a second time: [2] "Get up! Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach the message that I tell you." [3] Jonah got up and went to Nineveh according to the LORD's command. Now Nineveh was an extremely great city, a three-day walk. [4] Jonah set out on the first day of his walk in the city and proclaimed, "In forty days Nineveh will be demolished!" [5] Then the people of Nineveh believed God. They proclaimed a fast and dressed in sackcloth-from the greatest of them to the least. [6] When word reached the king of Nineveh, he got up from his throne, took off his royal robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. [7] Then he issued a decree in Nineveh: By order of the king and his nobles: No person or animal, herd or flock, is to taste anything at all. They must not eat or drink water. [8] Furthermore, both people and animals must be covered with sackcloth, and everyone must call out earnestly to God. Each must turn from his evil ways and from his wrongdoing. [9] Who knows? God may turn and relent; he may turn from his burning anger so that we will not perish. [10] God saw their actions-that they had turned from their evil ways-so God relented from the disaster he had threatened them with. And he did not do it.
