World English Bible · Under Assyria
Jonah 1
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Now word came to the son of , saying, "Arise, go to , that great city, and preach against it, for their wickedness has come up before me." But rose up to flee to from the of . He went down to , and found a ship going to ; so he paid its fare, and went down into it, to go with them to from the of . But sent out a great wind on the sea, and there was a mighty storm on the sea, so that the ship was likely to break up. Then the mariners were afraid, and every man cried to his . They threw the cargo that was in the ship into the sea to lighten the ship. But had gone down into the innermost parts of the ship and he was laying down, and was asleep. So the ship master came to him, and said to him, "What do you mean, sleeper? Arise, call on your ! Maybe your will notice us, so that we won't ." They all said to each other, "Come! Let's cast lots, that we may know who is responsible for this evil that is on us." So they cast lots, and the lot fell on . Then they asked him, "Tell us, please, for whose cause this evil is on us. What is your occupation? Where do you come from? What is your country? Of what people are you?" He said to them, "I am a , and I , the of , who has made the sea and the dry land." Then the men were exceedingly afraid, and said to him, "What have you done?" For the men knew that he was fleeing from the of , 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 grew more and more stormy. He said to them, "Take me up, and throw me into the sea. Then the sea will be calm for you; for I know that because of me this great storm is on you." Nevertheless the men rowed hard to get them back to the land; but they could not, for the sea grew more and more stormy against them. Therefore they cried to , and said, "We beg you, , we beg you, don't let us for this man's life, and don't lay on us innocent ; for you, , have done as it pleased you." So they took up and threw him into the sea; and the sea ceased its raging. Then the men feared exceedingly; and they offered a to and made . prepared a huge fish to swallow up , and was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.
A public domain modern English translation, free to read and share. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Under Assyria, 745 BC to 612 BC ›
Assyria at full stretch, deporting whole populations as policy. The northern kingdom is destroyed in 722 BC and Judah survives as a tribute-paying vassal.
- Assyria
- The first empire to run mass deportation as ordinary administration: move the leadership somewhere else, settle strangers in their place, and the province stops being a nation. It worked. Samaria fell in 722 BC and the northern tribes did not come back. Assyria also advertised its cruelty deliberately, carving flayings and impalements on palace walls where envoys would see them, because terror is cheaper than garrisons.
- Judah
- Survives by paying. Hezekiah rebels, Sennacherib takes forty-six Judean towns and besieges Jerusalem in 701 BC, and the city holds. The Assyrian account boasts of shutting Hezekiah up like a bird in a cage and pointedly does not claim to have taken the city, which is one of the more interesting silences in ancient records.
- Egypt
- The splintered reed of a staff that Assyria's field commander mocks Judah for leaning on. It promises help and cannot deliver, and Isaiah spends decades saying so. Assyria eventually invades and sacks Thebes.
- Further afield
- Greece is in its archaic period, founding colonies from Spain to the Black Sea. Rome is under kings. Assyria's own libraries are collecting the literature of Mesopotamia, which is how Gilgamesh survived to be read again in the nineteenth century.