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On the Greek text. The Greek throughout follows the standard critical text — uniform in its main wording across the modern editions (NA28, SBLGNT, THGNT), and itself an ancient, public-domain text; NA28's distinctively copyrighted critical apparatus is not reproduced.

The Book of the Prophet Jonah (LXX) — Interlinear: Themes, Outlines & Translation Notes

A consolidated companion to the Jonah data set: every chapter of LXX Jonah (1–4) rendered as a six-tier Greek reverse-interlinear (Greek · gloss · parsing/case · syntax · semantic force · lexical note), with per-verse discourse analysis and a chapter argument-outline.

This document gathers the theme, the argument outline (the outline movements authored into each data file), and the translation / textual / exegetical notes (the text_note of each file, reproduced verbatim) — followed by a summary of the major translation and interpretive cruxes that were deliberately annotated rather than silently resolved. Jonah, among the Twelve, is the prophet who fled — the storm, the great fish, Nineveh's repentance, and the unanswered question of divine pity; its LXX form supplies the New Testament's 'sign of Jonah' (κοιλία τοῦ κήτους, Matt 12:40) and famously reads 'three days' where the Hebrew has forty (3:4). The Greek follows the standard critical text of the Septuagint (Rahlfs–Hanhart in its main wording, itself an ancient public-domain text); the distinctively copyrighted apparatus is not reproduced, and versification follows the LXX.

Scope

Chapter Verses Words annotated Outline movements
Jonah 1 16 403 4
Jonah 2 11 184 5
Jonah 3 10 236 3
Jonah 4 11 263 3
Total 48 1,086 15

Each annotated word carries Greek, a working gloss, color-coded grammatical case, parsing (Tense·Voice·Mood·Person·Number + lemma), a Wallace-style syntactic-function label, an aspectual semantic-force label (verbal forms), and a condensed lexical note. As translation Greek, the annotation additionally flags Hebraisms and the underlying Hebrew idiom where it illuminates the rendering.

The argument of the book

The macro-structure of the whole book — its major movements — under which the chapter-by-chapter detail below unfolds. LXX Jonah follows the Hebrew closely within the Dodekapropheton; its four chapters run flight, prayer, proclamation, and protest. (Section divisions are interpretive; the more common analysis is generally followed.)

Chapter-by-chapter

Jonah 1 — ΙΩΝΑΣ Α′

Theme. The commissioning and flight of the prophet: the LORD's word goes out to Jonah, who flees to sea; the LORD answers with a storm that exposes his servant's disobedience to the pagan sailors, whose growing fear of Israel's God culminates in sacrifice and vows — while Jonah sinks toward the deep.

Outline.

Translation & textual notes. The Greek text of Jonah 1 follows the standard critical text of the Septuagint as established in the Rahlfs–Hanhart edition (Septuaginta, Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft); the ancient text itself is public domain, and the critical apparatus is not reproduced. Jonah belongs to the Dodekapropheton, the Book of the Twelve Minor Prophets, which circulated as a single scroll in the LXX tradition and is one of the earliest Greek biblical texts attested (the Nahal Hever scroll, 8 BCE–50 CE, offers a near-MT revision). The LXX Jonah is a faithful but idiomatic Greek translation rather than a woodenly literal rendering, and a number of its choices diverge meaningfully from the Masoretic Text. The prophet's name appears as Ἰωνᾶς (a first-declension masculine; nom. Ἰωνᾶς, gen. Ἰωνᾶ), and his father as Ἀμαθί — an indeclinable transliteration of the Hebrew אֲמִתַּי, reflecting the LXX habit of leaving exotic patronymics uninflected. The destination Nineveh appears as Νινευή (also effectively indeclinable in usage). The port of embarkation is Ἰόππη (Joppa, modern Jaffa), and the ship's destination is Θαρσίς — the LXX's rendering of Tarshish, understood in antiquity as the far western Mediterranean. The storm vocabulary is distinctive: κλύδων (1:4, 'surge, swell') for the tempest's force, κοπάζω (1:11,12) for its abating, and ἐκρίπτω (1:5,15) for cargo and person thrown overboard. The most celebrated divergence from the MT is at 1:9: the LXX reads δοῦλος κυρίου ('servant of the LORD') where the MT has עִבְרִי ('Hebrew'); this is a major text-critical crux (discussed further at v.9). LXX versification of chapter 1 runs vv.1–16; the famous 'great fish' verse is LXX 2:1, not 1:17, and belongs to the next chapter. Throughout, Hebraisms in the Greek — pleonastic particles, the construction εἶπεν + infinitive for commands, και-parataxis — are flagged in the word-level notes. The NT sign of Jonah (Matt 12:39–41; Luke 11:29–32) depends on this chapter's LXX form, and echoes are noted at the relevant verses.

Jonah 2 — ΙΩΝΑΣ Β′

Theme. From the belly of the sea-monster to the dry land, Jonah's psalm enacts the full arc of the individual lament-thanksgiving: a descent to Sheol itself (κοιλία ᾅδου, ἄβυσσος, the bars of the underworld) answered by a divine rescue recalled in past tenses, a vow of sacrifice and fulfilled praise, and the confessional summit — σωτηρία τῷ κυρίῳ, 'salvation belongs to the LORD' — before the fish's violent expulsion restores Jonah to dry land and a renewed commission.

Outline.

Translation & textual notes. The Greek text follows Rahlfs–Hanhart (Septuaginta, Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2006 revised edition) in its main wording, an ancient public-domain text; the distinctively copyrighted critical apparatus is not reproduced. Verse punctuation, paragraphing, and capitalization are editorial and conventional.

Versification divergence. LXX Jonah 2 has 11 verses. The verse that English Bibles number 1:17 ('Now the LORD had prepared a great fish') is 2:1 in the LXX (καὶ προσέταξεν κύριος κήτει μεγάλῳ), and the chapter continues through what English Bibles call 2:1–10. The MT and LXX agree in treating 2:1 as the appointment of the fish and 2:11 as its vomiting Jonah onto land. All verse references in this data file follow LXX/MT numbering 1–11.

The fish. The LXX renders the Hebrew דָּג גָּדוֹל ('great fish') with κῆτος μέγα (2:1) — κῆτος being the standard Greek term for a sea-monster or whale. Matthew 12:40 cites this explicitly: ὥσπερ γὰρ ἦν Ἰωνᾶς ἐν τῇ κοιλίᾳ τοῦ κήτους ('just as Jonah was in the belly of the sea-monster'), making the LXX wording a direct source for the NT typology.

The psalm (2:3–10). The prayer of 2:3–10 is a psalm of thanksgiving in the mold of the individual lament-psalms, composed in elevated Hebrew and rendered into LXX Greek with characteristic Psalter vocabulary. Several words align directly with the Greek Psalter: κοιλία ᾅδου (2:3) renders שְׁאוֹל as 'belly of Hades,' the same equivalence found in Ps 17:6 LXX and elsewhere; ἄβυσσος (2:6) echoes Ps 35:7 and 106:26 LXX (deep, the cosmic abyss); ἔδυ ἡ κεφαλή μου εἰς σχισμὰς ὀρέων (2:6), the head sunk to the mountain-clefts; ἀναβήτω φθορὰ ζωῆς μου (2:7) petitions ascent from the pit (φθορά = שַׁחַת). The psalm moves through a classical lament-to-praise arc: recall of distress (2:3–5), deepening crisis to the nadir and the turning petition (2:6–7), remembrance, the exclusion of idolaters, and the vow (2:8–10), climaxing in the confession 'salvation belongs to the LORD' (2:10).

Jonah 3 — ΙΩΝΑΣ Γ′

Theme. The reluctant prophet's second chance becomes the ancient world's most spectacular mass repentance — pagan Nineveh, from king to cattle, strips off royal pomp, dons sackcloth, and turns from violence, and God, seeing their works, relents of the destruction he had decreed: the chapter is the theological axis of the book, setting up the bitter irony of chapter 4 where the one man who should rejoice is the one who protests.

Outline.

Translation & textual notes. The Greek follows the Rahlfs–Hanhart Septuaginta (2nd ed., 2006) in its main wording — an ancient, public-domain text; the distinctively copyrighted Göttingen critical apparatus is not reproduced. Verse numbering and punctuation are those of Rahlfs. The chapter presents Jonah's second commissioning, his proclamation inside Nineveh, and the city's repentance that moves God to relent. The dominant textual-theological crux of the chapter is at 3:4, where the LXX reads ἔτι τρεῖς ἡμέραι καὶ Νινευη καταστραφήσεται — 'yet three days and Nineveh shall be overthrown' — against the Masoretic Text's 'yet forty days' (עוֹד אַרְבָּעִים יוֹם). The number three (τρεῖς) is not a slip: it is found consistently in the principal LXX manuscripts and in Origen's Hexapla. Whether it represents a variant Hebrew Vorlage, an inner-Greek corruption of an original τεσσαράκοντα, or a deliberate theological recasting is debated; the shorter deadline raises the urgency sharply and may have led readers to hear an echo of the 'three days' motif that pervades biblical death-and-restoration typology (cf. Hos 6:2; Jon 2:1 LXX). The verb καταστραφήσεται (Fut Pass Indic of καταστρέφω) is charged: it is the very word used at Gen 19:21, 25, 29 LXX for the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, making Nineveh's threatened fate an explicit echo of the cities of the plain. At 3:5 the LXX reports that the Ninevites believed God (ἐνεπίστευσαν τῷ θεῷ), a phrase whose verbal construction — πιστεύω + dative — matches the Abrahamic faith of Gen 15:6 LXX; the NT resonance is direct (Matt 12:41 cites the Ninevites as rising in judgment against 'this generation,' and Luke 11:32 does the same). The king's decree at 3:7–9 is a masterpiece of conditional repentance, piling up imperatives and subjunctives. At 3:10 God's response is expressed with the verb μετενόησεν (Aor Act Indic 3 Sg · μετανοέω) — 'he repented' or 'relented.' The LXX here uses the full theological vocabulary of repentance rather than the niphal of נחם normally rendered by παρακαλέω or ἀθετέω; the choice raises the classic question of divine μετάνοια: does God change his mind? The note at 3:10 follows the ancient Jewish and Christian reading that this is an anthropopathism — a phenomenological description of God's response to changed human conditions — rather than a revision of the divine will. The Septuagint's framing of the pericope thus sets up a powerful theological contrast: the prophet who runs from repentance (ch. 1–2) is surpassed by a pagan city that runs toward it.

Jonah 4 — ΙΩΝΑΣ Δ′

Theme. God's mercy toward Nineveh meets Jonah's furious resistance: a series of divine appointments — plant, worm, scorching east wind — stages an enacted parable in which Jonah's irrational grief over a transient gourd becomes the premise of the book's unanswered closing question, asking whether the One who created both prophet and city may not pity a hundred and twenty thousand persons, and many cattle besides.

Outline.

Translation & textual notes. The Greek follows Rahlfs–Hanhart (Septuaginta, 2nd ed. 2006), the standard critical text for the LXX of the Minor Prophets, itself an ancient public-domain text; the copyrighted Göttingen critical apparatus is not reproduced. Verse numbering follows the LXX (= MT for this chapter); Jonah 4 runs 4:1–11, identical in both traditions. Verse punctuation, paragraphing, and capitalization are editorial and conventional. At the centre of the chapter stands the credal citation in 4:2: Jonah quotes — against himself — the divine self-predication of Exod 34:6 LXX (ὅτι σὺ θεὸς οἰκτίρμων καὶ ἐλεήμων, μακρόθυμος καὶ πολυέλεος καὶ μετανοῶν ἐπὶ ταῖς κακίαις), here with slight LXX variation (ἐλεήμων and οἰκτίρμων transposed relative to MT). This 'Sinai formula' threads through Psalms, Joel 2:13, and Neh 9:17; Jonah's complaint makes it the reason for his flight (1:3) — he knew this mercy would be turned on Nineveh. The force of the verb μετανοέω ('change one's mind/repent') applied to God is a profound theological crux: the LXX uses the same word for human and divine 'repentance,' while MT uses נִחַם (niham), 'relent, be sorry.' The plant of 4:6 is called κολόκυνθα in Rahlfs–Hanhart — the Greek word for a gourd (possibly the bottle-gourd, Lagenaria siceraria) or wild cucumber. The MT has קִיקָיוֹן (qiqayon), a hapax of uncertain botany. Jerome's Vulgate famously chose hedera ('ivy') rather than cucurbita ('gourd'), triggering his well-known exchange with Augustine, who insisted on retaining cucurbita since congregations rioted when lectors read hedera (Augustine, Ep. 71 and 75). The LXX κολόκυνθα sides with the gourd tradition. The plant grows up (ἀνέβη) in a night, shelters Jonah's head (σκιάζειν), and is withered by a worm (σκώληξ) at dawn — a parabolic economy that mirrors the rise and fall of Nineveh's divine favour. The east wind (πνεῦμα καύσωνος ἀπηλιώτης) that burns Jonah in 4:8 is a sirocco-like blast, the same figure of divine judgment in Hos 13:15 and Ezek 19:12. The book closes with the open rhetorical question of 4:11: God asks whether he should not φείσομαι ('spare, have pity on') Nineveh, a city of more than 120,000 persons 'who do not know their right hand from their left, and many cattle.' The verb φείδομαι (fut. φείσομαι) is deliberate: the same verb frames Jonah's own pity over the plant (4:10 οὐ σύ ἐφείσω), so the divine question is not rhetorical decoration but a syllogism — if you pitied a plant you did not plant or tend, how much more should I pity this city and its creatures? The answer Jonah does not give invites the reader to supply it. The LXX ends, like the MT, without resolution — a narrative openness that has made Jonah's closing question one of the most haunting in biblical literature.

Major translation & exegetical cruxes

Where the Greek legitimately admits more than one rendering or reading — or where the LXX diverges from the Hebrew — the point was flagged in the lexical notes and chapter text_notes rather than decided silently; the more common analysis was generally taken and the alternative noted. The principal cruxes in LXX Jonah:

Reference Crux Discussion
1:9 δοῦλος κυρίου ἐγώ εἰμι ('I am a servant of the LORD') The MT reads עִבְרִי אָנֹכִי ('I am a Hebrew'), the standard ethnic self-identification. The LXX's δοῦλος κυρίου ('servant of the LORD') is a striking departure: either the LXX translator read a different Vorlage, interpreted the Hebrew title theologically, or made a deliberate substitution to present Jonah in prophetic terms (δοῦλος κυρίου being the standard honorific for prophets in the LXX: Amos 3:7; Jer 7:25). The Nahal Hever scroll (8 BCE–50 CE), which represents a proto-MT revision of the Greek, does not preserve this verse. Most text critics regard the MT as original and the LXX as an interpretive paraphrase.
1:5 ἔρρεγχεν ('was snoring') The MT simply has יִשְׁכַּב וַיֵּרָדַם ('he lay down and fell fast asleep'). The LXX adds ἔρρεγχεν from ῥέγχω ('to snore'), a vivid and unusual detail not in the Hebrew. This may be a free LXX expansion for dramatic effect, or a rare instance of the LXX preserving a detail from a different Vorlage; the word ῥέγχω is rare in surviving Greek literature outside this passage.
1:4 κλύδων ('surge, swell') The MT has סַעַר גָּדוֹל ('great tempest/storm'); the LXX chooses κλύδων rather than the more common χειμών or σεισμός. κλύδων emphasizes the rolling surge of open-sea waves rather than a violent squall; the word recurs in Jas 1:6 (wave-tossing of doubt) and κλυδωνίζομαι in Eph 4:14. The choice may reflect nautical accuracy or literary preference for a less common term.
1:14 αἷμα δίκαιον ('innocent blood') The MT has דָּם נָקִי ('clean/innocent blood'). The LXX renders נָקִי with δίκαιον ('righteous, innocent') rather than the expected καθαρόν ('clean'). δίκαιος for נָקִי is unusual; most LXX passages use ἀθῷος or ἀναίτιος. The choice may reflect the LXX translator's tendency to render moral-purity concepts in ethical rather than ritual terms. The Deuteronomic blood-guilt complex (Deut 21:8–9; 27:25) lies behind both Hebrew and Greek.
1:3 τοῦ φυγεῖν / τοῦ πλεῦσαι (articular infinitives of purpose) The genitive articular infinitive (τοῦ + infinitive) as a purpose construction is a Hebraism, reflecting Hebrew לִ + infinitive construct. The LXX uses this construction twice in v.3 (τοῦ φυγεῖν and τοῦ πλεῦσαι) where classical Greek would more typically use an infinitive alone or a ὥστε / ἵνα clause. This Hebraism is characteristic of LXX translation style and recurs at vv.5 and 13.
2:3 κοιλίας ᾅδου — 'belly of Hades' The LXX renders the Hebrew שְׁאוֹל not with a transliteration but with the Greek underworld term ᾅδης, and frames it as κοιλία ('belly/womb') — a double translation choice that equates the fish's interior with the realm of the dead. The same equivalence appears in Ps 17:6 LXX (ὠδῖνες ᾅδου). Jonah thus interprets his time in the fish as literally a death-and-resurrection experience, which is precisely how Jesus cites it at Matt 12:40 (ὥσπερ ... Ἰωνᾶς ἐν τῇ κοιλίᾳ τοῦ κήτους).
2:4 πάντες οἱ μετεωρισμοί σου καὶ τὰ κύματά σου ἐπ᾽ ἐμὲ διῆλθαν — 'all your surging waves and your billows passed over me' The phrase is a near-verbatim citation of Ps 41:8 LXX (πάντες οἱ μετεωρισμοί σου καὶ τὰ κύματά σου ἐπ᾽ ἐμέ), confirming that Jonah's psalm is composed with conscious Psalter allusion. The rare word μετεωρισμός ('billow, swell') appears in the LXX almost exclusively in this Psalter context, making the quotation unmistakable.
2:5 ἆρά γε προσθήσω τοῦ ἐπιβλέψαι — 'shall I yet look again toward' The construction is a Hebraism: ἆρά γε (interrogative-affirmative particle) + future of προστίθημι + articular infinitive = the Hebrew idiom יָסַף + infinitive ('do [something] again'). The question form expects a positive answer: 'will I not look again?' = 'I will surely look again.' It introduces the psalm's note of hope at the nadir.
2:7 φθορὰ ζωής μου — 'the destruction of my life' / 'my life from the pit' φθορά translates שַׁחַת, which in the Psalter means both 'pit' (physical) and 'corruption/destruction' (moral-metaphorical). The cognate διαφθορά appears in the key Ps 15:10 LXX (οὐδὲ δώσεις τὸν ὅσιόν σου ἰδεῖν διαφθοράν), cited in Acts 2:27 and 13:35 for the resurrection of Jesus. Jonah's rescue 'from the pit' thus provides the foundational typology for both Jesus' burial and his resurrection.
2:9 ἔλεος αὐτῶν ἐγκατέλιπον — 'they forsook the mercy that is theirs' The idol-worshipers 'forsake their own ἔλεος.' The theological claim is that ἔλεος (= חֶסֶד, covenant steadfast love) belongs to covenant members as their inheritance; by pursuing idols (μάταια καὶ ψευδῆ, a Psalter polemic: cf. Ps 30:7 LXX) they throw away their own covenant mercy. This is a striking theological formulation with no exact Psalter parallel, though Ps 30:7 LXX comes close.
2:10 σωτηρία τῷ κυρίῳ — 'salvation belongs to the LORD' An exact echo of Ps 3:9 LXX (τοῦ κυρίου ἡ σωτηρία), a deliberate psalm-citation as the theological summit. The dative τῷ κυρίῳ is a dative of possession: 'salvation is the LORD's.' The verse caps the entire psalm as a confessional formula, and its placement here — after the vow and just before the fish expels Jonah — makes it the interpretive center of the entire Jonah narrative.
2:11 προσετάγη τῷ κήτει — 'it was commanded to the fish' An impersonal passive of the same προστάσσω that opened the chapter (2:1 προσέταξεν), framing the psalm between two divine commands: the fish swallows on command and disgorges on command. The obedience of the sea-monster brackets — and quietly indicts — the disobedience of the prophet. The versification is a known crux: LXX 2:1 is English 1:17, so the whole chapter sits one verse ahead of English Bibles (LXX 2:11 = English 2:10).
3:4 ἔτι τρεῖς ἡμέραι — 'yet three days' (MT: forty) The LXX's τρεῖς against MT's אַרְבָּעִים is one of the most discussed LXX/MT divergences in the Minor Prophets. The three-day figure appears consistently in principal LXX witnesses and in Origen's Hexapla column; it is not a copyist error in the tradition we have. Proposed explanations: (1) a different Hebrew Vorlage read שְׁלֹשָׁה instead of אַרְבָּעִים; (2) inner-Greek corruption (τρεῖς for τεσσαράκοντα is phonologically implausible but scribal confusion of numerals is common); (3) deliberate theological shaping — the three-day deadline heightens urgency, echoes the three-day journey of 3:3, and may have invited typological reading (Hos 6:2; Jon 2:1; cf. Matt 12:40). The NT's silence on the number in citing Jonah (Matt 12:41 // Luke 11:32) is notable. Translation follows the Greek: 'yet three days.'
3:4 καταστραφήσεται — 'shall be overthrown' (Sodom-echo) The Fut Pass of καταστρέφω is the term used for Sodom's destruction in Gen 19:21, 25, 29 LXX (καταστροφή / καταστρέφω). By reusing this loaded verb, the LXX makes Nineveh's threatened fate an explicit Sodom-typology: this city faces the same catastrophe as the original type of divine judgment. The irony is that Nineveh avoids what Sodom did not.
3:5 ἐνεπίστευσαν τῷ θεῷ — Abrahamic faith formula The construction πιστεύω + dative matches Gen 15:6 LXX (ἐπίστευσεν Αβραμ τῷ θεῷ), the definitive statement of Abraham's saving faith. The LXX narrator casts the Ninevites' response in the exact idiom used for the father of Israel's faith. Matt 12:41 exploits precisely this: if pagans who heard only a single oracle believed, how much more is required of those who hear the Son of Man.
3:9 τίς οἶδεν — 'who knows?' (theology of contingent hope) The formula echoes Joel 2:14 nearly verbatim (τίς οἶδεν εἰ ἐπιστρέψει καὶ μετανοήσει) and 2 Sam 12:22. It is not agnosticism but a form of penitential prayer that refuses to presume on divine mercy while nonetheless hoping for it. The king voices a theology of grace: God is not obligated, yet perhaps he will relent. The prayer uses the very word (μετανοήσει) that will describe God's response in v.10 — the text's own answer to the prayer.
3:10 μετενόησεν ὁ θεός — divine μετάνοια The LXX employs μετανοέω — the full-strength NT repentance word — for God's relenting. This raises the classical question: does God literally repent? The Septuagint and the MT (וַיִּנָּחֶם, niphal of נחם) both assert a real divine response to human repentance. The ancient resolution, from Philo through Aquinas, is anthropopathism: the text describes God's acts from the human perspective, not a change in the divine will or nature. God's consistent character — mercy toward the penitent — produces what looks, from a human vantage, like a change of plan. The verse sets up ch. 4:2 (Jonah's complaint that he knew God would relent) as the bitter theological denouement of the book.
4:2 ἐλεήμων καὶ οἰκτίρμων — the Sinai formula (Exod 34:6 LXX) LXX transposes the two adjectives relative to MT (רַחוּם וְחַנּוּן); the full five-attribute formula (merciful, compassionate, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love, relenting over calamities) is one of the most-cited OT texts in the OT itself; Jonah's citation of it as a complaint is the book's central theological irony — Israel's highest praise of God becomes the prophet's accusation.
4:2 μετανοῶν ἐπὶ ταῖς κακίαις — 'relenting over calamities' The LXX uses μετανοέω for both human repentance and divine 'relenting' (MT נִחַם niham); applying the same word to God as to Nineveh creates a theological symmetry — both 'repent' in response to the other. The ambiguity of κακίαις ('wickedness' or 'calamities') is deliberate: God relents from sending disaster in response to human moral change.
4:5 Jonah sits to watch 'what would happen to the city' This verse appears misplaced if Jonah has already received God's word (4:2–4); many commentators detect a seam or flashback here. The LXX preserves the MT's order without harmonising the tension, leaving Jonah's motive (continued hope for judgment despite his prayer) as a characterisation detail.
4:6 κολόκυνθα — 'gourd' The MT's qiqayon is a botanical hapax; the LXX renders it κολόκυνθα (gourd/cucurbit), the Vulgate hedera (ivy), prompting Jerome and Augustine's famous exchange (Ep. 71, 75). Jerome insisted hedera was more accurate and philologically defensible; Augustine argued that congregations rioted over the innovation. The LXX's κολόκυνθα sides with the cucurbit tradition and avoids the controversy entirely.
4:8 πνεῦμα καύσωνος ἀπηλιώτῃ — 'scorching east wind' The sirocco (ḥamsin, khamsin) is the scorching hot desert wind from the east/southeast that brings extreme heat and desiccation. Its appointment by God alongside the worm makes it a third instrument of providential pedagogy; the same wind is an image of divine judgment in Hos 13:15 and Ezek 19:12.
4:9 ἕως θανάτου — 'to the point of death' Unique to Jonah's second death-wish (absent from the first, 4:3); the phrase is later echoed in Ps 41:6, 12 LXX and in Jesus's Gethsemane anguish (Matt 26:38; Mark 14:34 περίλυπός ἐστιν ἡ ψυχή μου ἕως θανάτου). Jonah's escalating despair intensifies the contrast with God's compassion.
4:11 οὐ φείσομαι — the unanswered question The future φείσομαι hanging as a rhetorical question is the book's final move. Its symmetry with ἐφείσω (v.10) makes the logic undeniable: Jonah's pity for a plant he never tended vs. God's pity for a city of 120,000 ignorant souls and many cattle. The book ends without recording Jonah's answer — the most haunting silence in prophetic literature, inviting every reader to answer in Jonah's place.

How the data set is organized

The interpretive tiers (syntactic function, semantic force, discourse structure, and the proposed argument outlines) are interpretive by nature; where readings legitimately differ, the more common analysis was generally chosen, and the lexical notes are condensed orientation rather than a substitute for a lexicon (e.g. LEH / Muraoka) or a full commentary.