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This resource relating to Jonah 3:10-4:11 provides a poem by Robert Graves (1895-1985) highlighting Jonah's resentment towards the Ninevites and a poem by Clare Pollard highlighting the denouncing of evil.
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Lectionary:
Revised Common Lectionary
Source:
Englewood Review
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Audio/Video:
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Full Text:
** Revised Common Lectionary ***
Lectionary Reading: Jonah 3:10-4:11
CLASSIC POEM:
Jonah
Robert Graves
A purple whale
Proudly sweeps his tail
Towards Nineveh;
Glassy green
Surges between
A mile of roaring sea.
“O town of gold,
Of splendour multifold,
Lucre and lust,
Leviathan’s eye
Can surely spy
Thy doom of death and dust.”
On curving sands
Vengeful Jonah stands.
“Yet forty days,
Then down, down,
Tumbles the town
In flaming ruin ablaze.”
With swift lament
Those Ninevites repent.
They cry in tears,
“Our hearts fail!”
The whale, the whale!
Our sins prick us like spears.”
Jonah is vexed;
He cries, “What next? what next?”
And shakes his fist.
“Stupid city,
The shame, the pity,
The glorious crash I’ve missed.”
Away goes Jonah grumbling,
Murmuring and mumbling;
Off ploughs the purple whale,
With disappointed tail.
*** This poem is in the public domain,
and may be read in a live-streamed worship service.
CONTEMPORARY POEM:
Leviathan
Clare Pollard
SNIPPET:
Sometimes I feel like Jonah
fleeing Nineveh.
Who wants to hear what is evil?
Every day we make this earth less
alive, various or legal.
…
[ READ THE FULL POEM ]
Content Type:
Key Scriptures:
Jonah 3:10; 4
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RCL Lectionary Week:
Year A Proper 20 (Ordinary Time 25)
Date:
Monday, September 18, 2023