[1543] Gen. x. 12, according to which the Great City included, besides Niniveh, at least Resen and Kelach.
[1544] And taking the present Kujundschik, Nimrud, Khorsabad and Balawat as the four corners of the district.
[1545] iii. 2, iv. 11.
[1546] Compare the Book of Jonah, for instance, with the Book of Nahum.
[1547] Cf. Herod. IX. 24; Joel i. 18; Virgil, Eclogue V., Æneid XI. 89 ff.; Plutarch, Alex. 72.
[1548] LXX.: and they did clothe themselves in sackcloth, and so on.
[1549] So LXX. Heb. text: may turn and relent, and turn.
[1550] The alleged discrepancies in this account have been already noticed. As the text stands the fast and mourning are proclaimed and actually begun before word reaches the king and his proclamation of fast and mourning goes forth. The discrepancies might be removed by transferring the words in ver. 6, and they cried a fast, and from the greatest of them, to the least they clothed themselves in sackcloth, to the end of ver. 8, with a לאמר or ויאמרו to introduce ver. 9. But, as said above (pp. [499], 510, n. [1499]), it is more probable that the text as it stands was original, and that the inconsistencies in the order of the narrative are due to its being a tale or parable.
[1551] Deut. xviii. 21, 22.
[1552] The Hebrew may be translated either, first, Doest thou well to be angry? or second, Art thou very angry? Our versions both prefer the first, though they put the second in the margin. The LXX. take the second. That the second is the right one is not only proved by its greater suitableness, but by Jonah’s answer to the question, I am very angry, yea, even unto death.