Neville Goddard on Jonah 3:3-10 - Mystical Bible Interpretation

Read Jonah 3 in context

Scripture Focus

3So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the LORD. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days' journey.

4And Jonah began to enter into the city a day's journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.

5So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.

6For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes.

7And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water:

8But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands.

9Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger, that we perish not?

10And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.

Jonah 3:3-10

Biblical Context

Jonah goes to Nineveh and delivers a warning. The people respond with fasting, sackcloth, and turning from their evil ways, and God relents.

Neville's Inner Vision

Nineveh in this tale is your mind under the spell of old habits. When Jonah enters, the I AM of you steps with a direct order to reconsider what you have believed must endure. The forty days is time given to explore a new possibility, not a sentence of doom. Belief in the word of God moves the city to act—fasting, sackcloth—the outward signs of a genuine inward decision. The king’s decree mirrors the authority of your inner ruler declaring that nothing of fear or violence will govern you any longer. When you cry out to God, you are turning away from the violence of self-attack toward a gentler pattern of being. God’s repentance is not a correction from without; it is awareness re-seeing a new state you have chosen. Seeing their works, God withdraws the threatened outcome because your mind has chosen mercy over accusation. The mercy you seek is the mercy you embody; forgiveness and reconciliation arise as your consciousness aligns with compassion. This is the functional miracle: a change in your inner state produces a changed outer scene.

Practice This Now

Imaginative act: Sit in quiet and assume the inner decree that a new pattern is already established. Feel the mercy you seek as present reality and revise fear into faith until it feels real.