How do the mariners respond to Jonas during the storm?

God sends Jonas son of Amathi to preach in great Ninive because of its wickedness; the edition identifies it as Assyria’s capital. Jonas instead flees from God’s face toward Tharsis, finds a ship at Joppe, pays its fare and boards. The edition preserves proposed identifications of Tharsis as Tharsus of Cilicia, Tartessus of Spain or Carthage.

God sends wind and tempest threatening the ship. Frightened mariners cry to their god and throw wares overboard to lighten it. Jonas sleeps deeply inside. The edition compares this sleep with sinners’ insensibility amid threatened judgment. The shipmaster asks him to rise and call on his God in the hope of survival. Lots fall on Jonas, and the men question cause, business, country, destination and people. Jonas identifies himself as a Hebrew fearing heaven’s God, maker of sea and land. They are greatly afraid and ask why he has done this, knowing of his flight because he told them.

They ask what to do with him as the sea swells. Jonas tells them to cast him into the sea, saying the tempest is for his sake and that the sea will calm. They first row hard for land but cannot return because the sea tosses and swells. They pray not to perish for his life or incur innocent blood, then cast him into the sea, which ceases raging. The men fear God exceedingly, sacrifice victims and make vows. The chapter does not report Jonas’s later deliverance or guarantee outcomes for other storms.