So Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city, and there made himself a booth, and sat under it in the shadow, till he might see what would become of the city.
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Augustine of Hippo
AD 430
But when Jonah made himself a booth and sat down opposite the city of Nineveh, waiting to see what would befall it, the prophet played a part of different significance. He was a type of the carnal people of Israel, for he was sad over the preservation of the Ninevites! He was frustrated over the redemption and salvation of the Gentiles! This is why Christ came to call “not the just but sinners to repentance.” But the shadow of the vine over his head was the promise of the Old Testament. Its law manifested, as the apostle says, “a shadow of things to come.” God was offering shade from the heat of temporal evils in the land of promise. But the worm came in the morning. It gnawed at the vine and withered it. For when the gospel had been published by Christ’s mouth, all those things withered and faded away. The shade of the vine symbolized temporal prosperity for the Israelites. And now those people have lost the kingdom of Jerusalem and their priesthood and sacrifice. All of this was a fo...
The days being now past, after which it was time that the things foretold should be accomplished, and his anger as yet taking no effect, Jonah understood that God had pity on Nineveh. Still he does not give up all hope, and thinks that a respite of the evil has been granted them on their willingness to repent, but that some effect of his displeasure would come, since the pains of their repentance had not equaled their offenses. So thinking in himself apparently, he departs from the city and waits to see what will become of them. He expected, apparently, that it would either fall by an earthquake or be burned with fire, like Sodom.
LXX: similar. Cain who initiated civilisation by fratricide and homicide in killing his brother was the first to build a city, and he gave it the name of his son Enoch. This is why the prophet Hosea declares, "I am God, and not a man, amongst you I am a saint, and I will not come into the city". For the Lord, says the psalmist, is the charge of "the transition of the dead". This is why one of this cities of refuge is called Ramoth, which is translated as 'vision of death'. Therefore quite justly anyone who is a fugitive and on account of his sins does not merit living in Jerusalem lives in the city of death and is across the waves of the Jordan, which signifies 'descent'. The dove, or the suffering, comes out from such a town and lives in the east whence the sun rises. And it is there in his tent, where having contemplated every hour that passes, he hears what is going to happen to this city. Before Nineveh was saved and before the gourd dried up, before the Gospel of Christ becomes fa...
