Jonah 4:10 (DRB)

Passage

And the Lord said: Thou art grieved for the ivy, for which thou hast not laboured, nor made it to grow, which in one night came up, and in one night perished.

Nearby Context

Jonah 4:8 And when the sun was risen, the Lord commanded a hot and burning wind: and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah, and he broiled with the heat: and he desired for his soul that he might die, and said: It is better for me to die than to live.

Jonah 4:9 And the Lord said to Jonah: Dost thou think thou hast reason to be angry, for the ivy? And he said: I am angry with reason even unto death.

Jonah 4:10 And the Lord said: Thou art grieved for the ivy, for which thou hast not laboured, nor made it to grow, which in one night came up, and in one night perished.

Jonah 4:11 And shall I not spare Ninive, that great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons, that know how to distinguish between their right hand and their left, and many beasts?

Study Lenses

The verse centers on "lord", "said", "thou", "grieved", "hast", "laboured", and "grow". It is saying that the verse draws attention to "lord" and "said", so its meaning should be read from those terms before moving to application.

The nearby context moves from verse 9's "And the Lord said to Jonah Dost..." into verse 11's "And shall I not spare Ninive that...", so "lord" and "said" belong inside that flow. In Jonah context, the local focus is covenant, worship, and faithfulness.

A plain takeaway is to answer the verse's own emphasis on "lord" and "said" with trust shaped by these words, not by a vague optimism outside the passage.