Jonah 2:3

You threw me ¹  into the deep waters, ²  into the middle ³  of the sea; ⁴  the ocean current ⁵  engulfed ⁶  me; all the mighty waves ⁷  you sent ⁸  swept ⁹  over me.

You hurled me into the deep, into the very heart of the seas, and the currents swirled about me; all your waves and breakers swept over me.

"For You had cast me into the deep, Into the heart of the seas, And the current engulfed me. All Your breakers and billows passed over me.

You threw me into the ocean depths, and I sank down to the heart of the sea. I was buried beneath your wild and stormy waves.

You threw me into ocean's depths, into a watery grave, With ocean waves, ocean breakers crashing over me.

For you have put me down into the deep, into the heart of the sea; and the river was round about me; all your waves and your rolling waters went over me.

You cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the flood surrounded me; all your waves and your billows passed over me.

For You cast me into the deep, Into the heart of the seas, And the floods surrounded me; All Your billows and Your waves passed over me.

You threw me ¹  into the deep waters, ²  into the middle ³  of the sea; ⁴  the ocean current ⁵  engulfed ⁶  me; all the mighty waves ⁷  you sent ⁸  swept ⁹  over me.

¹ tn Or “You had thrown me.” Verse 3 begins the detailed description of Jonah’s plight, which resulted from being thrown into the sea.

² tn Heb “the deep” (so KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV); NLT “into the ocean depths.”

³ tn Heb “heart” (so many English versions); CEV “to the (+ very TEV) bottom of the sea.”

⁴ tc The BHS editors suggest deleting either מְצוּלָה (mÿtsulah, “into the deep”) or בִּלְבַב יַמִּים (bilvav yammim, “into the heart of the sea”). They propose that one or the other is a scribal gloss on the remaining term. However, the use of an appositional phrase within a poetic colon is not unprecedented in Hebrew poetry. The MT is therefore best retained.

⁵ tn Or “the stream”; KJV, ASV, NRSV “the flood.” The Hebrew word נָהָר (nahar) is used in parallel with יַם (yam, “sea”) in Ps 24:2 (both are plural) to describe the oceans of the world and in Ps 66:6 to speak of the sea crossed by Israel in the exodus from Egypt.

⁶ tn Heb “surrounded” (so NRSV); NAB “enveloped.”

⁷ tn Heb “your breakers and your waves.” This phrase is a nominal hendiadys; the first noun functions as an attributive adjective modifying the second noun: “your breaking waves.”

⁸ tn Heb “your… your…” The 2nd person masculine singular suffixes on מִשְׁבָּרֶיךָ וְגַלֶּיךָ (mishbarekha vÿgallekha, “your breakers and your waves”) function as genitives of source. Just as God had hurled a violent wind upon the sea (1:4) and had sovereignly sent the large fish to swallow him (1:17 [2:1 HT]), Jonah viewed God as sovereignly responsible for afflicting him with sea waves that were crashing upon his head, threatening to drown him. Tg. Jonah 2:3 alters the 2nd person masculine singular suffixes to 3rd person masculine singular suffixes to make them refer to the sea and not to God, for the sake of smoothness: “all the gales of the sea and its billows.”

⁹ tn Heb “crossed”; KJV, NAB, NASB, NRSV “passed.”

¹⁰ sn Verses 3 and 5 multiply terms describing Jonah’s watery plight. The images used in v. 3 appear also in 2 Sam 22:5-6; Pss 42:7; 51:11; 69:1-2, 14-15; 88:6-7; 102:10.