What does Jonah 4:11 mean by people who cannot tell their right hand from their left?

The capital of the ancient kingdom of Assyria. It was founded very early by Nimrod. Gen. 10:11-12; cf. Micah 5:6. It was doubtless comparatively small at first, but nothing is related of its progress until Jonah was sent, about 1,300 years after its founding, to threaten its destruction. It was then an exceeding great city (lit. 'a great city unto God') of three days' journey, probably signifying, its circumference. A three days 'journey' is estimated by Niebuhr to be about ninety English miles. This area would include gardens, pastures (which the 'much cattle' would necessitate), and pleasure grounds. The population was large, but not densely located together as in modern cities. There were 120,000 that could not discern their right hand from their left, probably children, which would give a population of about 600,000.

The last verse of the Book of Jonah should be carefully considered, for it gives us a delightful insight into the heart of God as Creator. His love and compassion for perishing sinners is happily familiar to us. It has reached us in the Gospel message. The cross of Christ tells out, as nothing else could, God's earnest desire for the salvation of men, and His unwillingness that any should perish eternally; But Jonah 4:11 is not quite as John 3:16. In the latter passage we hear the voice of the Son of God speaking on earth; but in the former it is the Creator who is speaking, and that in terms of remonstrance with His ungracious servant. "Should not I spare Nineveh that great city, wherein there are more than six-score thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?" Thus God in His government of the earth took account of 120,000 helpless children in Nineveh, "and also much cattle"; and it rejoiced Him that the repentance of the King and his people enabled Him to sheathe the sword of judgement, at least for the time being.

Whatever might have been the infirmities of the prophet Jonah, cowardice was none of them, as observed already. He possessed great courage of faith, which we saw him manifesting during that terrible storm. The same courage of faith which he had shown at sea he now shows on the land. "Nineveh," we read, "was an exceeding great city of three days' journey," i.e., of three days in diameter. And when reading at the close of the book, that it contained no less than one hundred and twenty thousand infants, "that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand," it will not be difficult to arrive at an estimate of the whole of the population of that "exceeding great city," immense for those days.

"Then said the Lord, Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for the which thou hast not laboured, neither madest it grow, which came up in a night and perished in a night; and should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than six score thousand persons which cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand, and also much cattle?" In other words, "You, Jonah, pity this gourd, which came up in one night and perished in one night, and which thou hast neither planted nor hast made it grow. You mourn over its shortened existence, because it gave you shade and coolness. You regret its sudden decay, because it deprived you of the relief and refreshment which that tree had provided for you. And should not God have pity on a city like Nineveh, where there are one hundred and twenty thousand babes [God knew their number] that cannot discern their left hand from their right, besides those millions of penitent inhabitants, creatures of Mine, and your fellow-sinners, Jonah, and so much cattle?" God, Who hears the voice of the raven, and without Whom not a sparrow falls from the roof, had heard even the moaning and lowing of the cattle — His creatures-ascending to heaven together with the cries of lamentation of numberless penitent sinners. The prophet had witnessed that grand deeply-affecting scene of general penitence, which had not failed to reach the ear and heart of the gracious God and Creator, Who with His numberless hosts of mighty angels rejoices "over one sinner that repenteth." But those sounds of mourning had only fallen on Jonah's ears. They had not reached his heart. He was only thinking of the divine pardon which would be called forth by their penitence, and impair his reputation and character as a prophet.

Jonah 4. God's clemency greatly displeased Jonah, and he was very angry; what would become of his reputation? In his prayer he repeated what he had at first said to himself about the grace of God. He asked God to take away his life: how could he be a prophet to such a God? Alas, he was filled with his own importance. As he watched to see what would become of the city, God prepared a gourd to give him shade from the heat of the sun, and he rejoiced over the gourd; but the next day it withered, and under the power of the sun and the east wind he fainted, and again asked to die. He said to God that he did well to be angry about the gourd, but God condescended to reason with him, saying that as Jonah had had pity on the gourd which cost him nothing; so God had had pity on Nineveh, a city with more than 120,000 inhabitants who knew not their right hand from their left, besides very much cattle.

And when God asked him, "Doest thou well to be angry for the gourd?" the poor finite creature of the dust answered the Creator, "I do well to be angry, even unto death." Then comes the lesson. Not God, Elohim, the name of Him as Creator, speaks, but it is Jehovah, the Lord: "Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for the which thou hast not laboured, neither madest it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night: and should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than six score thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left; and also much cattle?" If Jonah felt pity and was angry because of a small vine he had not planted nor made to grow, should not God with greater right have mercy upon His creatures, whom He created and sustained? Jonah is silenced; he could not reply. The last word belongs to Jehovah, who thus demonstrated that in His infinite compassion He embraces not Israel alone, but all His creation, the Gentile world and even animal creation.

Note further: "Thou hast had pity upon the gourd, for the which thou hast not laboured, neither madest it grow." What does that tell us? It tells us of God's tender care, not for the gourd alone, but for the many thousands of Nineveh. Each individual life in that great city was precious in God's sight. Each one was the work of God's hand, for each one He had labored, and it was God alone who had "made each one to grow." This was true not alone of the grown men and women, but of the little children, and the cattle, whom God especially mentions in these verses. What a lesson this is to us as we see the vast numbers of the heathen, those utterly without God in the world. For each of these individually, God has a tender care, on the ground that He has labored for them, He has made them to grow. It is truly His hand that provides them day by day with their daily bread, though they have never learned to acknowledge Him as "Father." May the Lord help us to look on them with His own thoughts, and love them with a little of that wondrous love told out with such ringing eloquence in those words so familiar to us all: "God so loved the world"!

Jehovah had the last word, as indeed He always must have; but listen to that "last word:" "Thou hast pity on the gourd, for which thou hast not laboured, neither madest it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night: and I, should not I have pity on Nineveh, the great city, wherein are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left; and also much cattle?"

What a picture it is! Jonah, "exceeding glad" of the gourd, because it added to his own comfort, but utterly unconscious of the joy in heaven over a whole city that had repented; and even exceedingly displeased, and very angry, because it had done so, and thus been saved from destruction! Jonah was far more deeply concerned with the fate of the gourd, than he was with perhaps a million or more never-dying souls, who had just turned to the living and true God. What a lesson for us today! How many of us are far more deeply concerned over our gourds and our flowers, our houses and our business, our motors and our radios, than we are with the millions of perishing, yet never-dying, souls all about us. How many of us are "exceeding glad" of something that adds a little more to our own comfort and ease and luxury, but we are utterly unconscious and without a care or a thought as to whether there is joy, exceeding joy, in heaven over one sinner that repenteth. And we are "exceedingly displeased" and "very angry" if anything happens to disturb our comfort, and upset the even tenor of our way. The heathen in their blindness may bow down to wood and stone, for all we care, provided the worms do not get into our gourds, and the sultry east wind does not smite us, or destroy our crops. Such is the heart of man, such is your heart and mine! Self ever takes the first place, unless the Lord has taught us to lift up our eyes and look off unto JESUS.

The Lord, then, in marvellous gentleness, turns all these simple circumstances into a page of the profoundest and most affecting instruction. "And God said to Jonah, Doest thou well to be angry for the gourd? And he said, I do well to be angry, even unto death. Then said the Lord, Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for the which thou hast not laboured, neither madst it grow, which came up in a night and perished in a night; and should not I spare Nineveh, that great city wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand, and also much cattle."

The prophet's delight in the gourd is but the faint reflection of the Lord's delight in the mercy that visits the creatures of His hand — be they where they may, at Nineveh, or Jerusalem, or elsewhere, it matters not. And if Jonah would fain have the gourd spared, he must allow repentant Nineveh to be spared. Out of his own mouth he shall be judged: Jonah shall witness for the Lord against himself.

Then the Lord catches him in the toils which He had now woven around him in consummate and divine skill. He convicts him out of his own mouth, and makes his own words correct him. He shows him that he cannot retain both his proud and his angry sorrows. He must cease either to grieve for mercy to Nineveh, or for judgment on the gourd. If he will give up his anger because of the withered gourd, let him do so. But if he still judge it well to be angry on that account, as he says he does, even unto death, then he must cease to be angry, because of preserved Nineveh; for Nineveh was to the Lord just what the gourd had been to the prophet, and if the prophet would fain spare the gourd, he must allow the Lord to spare Nineveh. "Thou hast had pity on the gourd," says the Lord to him, "for the which thou hast not laboured, neither makest it grow, which came up in a night and perished in a night. And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city wherein are more than six-score thousand persons, that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand, and also much cattle?"

With these words the Lord ends, leaving that claim of His to Nineveh, its little ones and its cattle, upon the heart and conscience of Jonah. The echo, as it were, of those sweet words is left in our ears, as we close this beautiful little book.