Jonah's Anger at the Lord's Compassion

1But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry. 2And he prayed to the LORD, and said, I pray thee, O LORD was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before to Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest of the evil. 3Therefore now, O LORD, take, I beseech thee, my life from me; for it is better for me to die than to live. 4Then said the LORD, Doest thou well to be angry?

5So Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city, and there made him a booth, and sat under it in the shade, till he might see what would become of the city. 6And the LORD God prepared a gourd, and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shade over his head, to deliver him from his grief. So Jonah was exceeding glad of the gourd. 7But God prepared a worm when the morning rose the next day, and it smote the gourd that it withered. 8And it came to pass, when the sun rose that God prepared a vehement east wind; and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah, that he fainted, and wished in himself to die, and said, It is better for me to die than to live.

9And God said to Jonah, Doest thou well to be angry for the gourd? And he said, I do well to be angry, even to death. 10Then said the LORD, Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for which thou hast not labored, neither made it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night: 11And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand, and also many cattle?