The Grace Commentary

Jonah 1:5. The storm was so great the sailors became afraid. In all likelihood, these were seasoned, veteran sailors who had experienced many great storms in their lives. For them to become afraid in this storm indicates how severe it was. As a result of their fear, they do two things. First, each man cried unto his god. They were so afraid for their lives that they cried out to their gods for deliverance. They likely prayed to their own personal deities, but paid special attention to the storm god, Baal Hadad, and the god of the sea and chaos, Yamm.[ref]Walton, 106.[/ref]

But not content to just pray to their gods, they also did whatever they could to survive this terrible storm. They hurled the cargo which was in the ship into the sea. Just as Yahweh hurled the wind upon the sea, the sailors hurled their cargo overboard. A ship bound for Tarshish probably carried cargo of gold, silver, iron, ivory, jewels, spices and exotic animals, but would have certainly included food and water for the journey.[ref]Ibid., 107.[/ref] Hurling their cargo into the sea indicates how desperate their situation had become. They knew that all was lost, and it was better to possibly survive with their lives than to go down with a ship full of cargo. Riches and food are no good to a dead man. The goal, of course, was to lighten the load. A ship that was not weighed down by cargo could ride higher upon the sea, thereby taking on less water and less damage from the waves.

In all of this chaos, with the description of the wind, the waves, the groaning boat, the sailors crying out to their gods for deliverance, and even throwing their cargo overboard, the reader of the story is left to wonder how Jonah is faring in this storm. In verse 3, Jonah went down into the deepest parts of the ship, which is often where some of the cargo is stored. As the storm surges, the ship recognized it was about to break up, the sailors realized they were about to drown, and what is Jonah doing? Is he also praying? Is he helping hurl cargo into the sea? Is he also fearful for his life?

No. Jonah had gone down into the deepest part of the ship, had lain down, and had fallen down into a deep sleep. Once again, just as with verse 3, there is an emphasis on the word down to show that Jonah is in a downward spiral. He went down to Joppa, down into a boat, down into the deepest part of the ship, laid down, and fell down into a deep sleep. His descent downward is nearly complete.

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Jonah 1:4. Since Jonah has refused to defend Yahweh’s honor when called upon, and in fleeing westward to Tarshish has done the opposite and inflicted more shame upon God, God responds as expected: he apparently sets out to kill Jonah, and the unlucky sailor who happen to be with him at the time. The text says that Yahweh hurled a great wind upon the sea. While most people at the time believed that some deities ruled over certain sections of land, and other deities ruled over the sea, and yet others ruled the weather patterns, God is shown here to be in control of the sea and the storm.[ref]Ellison, 370.[/ref] He is the God of all creation, and it appears that He is out to destroy Jonah for his blatant rebellion and shameful behavior.

The great wind caused a great storm. This was no minor storm, but a tempest, a violent burst of wind and waves and pelting rain, the like of which these seasoned sailors had probably never seen. In antiquity, storms were seen to be one of the primary ways that the gods exacted discipline upon people who sinned. Sometimes, if a person’s sin was so great, the gods would wait until that person boarded a ship, and then sink the ship in a storm, along with all the other innocent people who were unlucky enough to be on board.[ref]Sasson, 90-92.[/ref] This is not necessarily how Yahweh disciplines people for sin, but God is using this belief of the sailors to help them discover the sin of Jonah.

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Jonah 1:3. Now that Jonah has been instructed by God to go to rise up and go to Nineveh and cry out against it because of its great wickedness, the careful reader is set up to believe that Jonah will be on the next caravan to Nineveh. This is the chance of a lifetime for Jonah, to be the prophet who announces judgment upon the enemy nation of Assyria so that Israel may continue her prosperous expansion without fear of war.

The initial words of verse 3 echo the instructions of God in 1:2. God told Jonah to rise up, and so Jonah rose up. This echo leads the reader to initially think that Jonah is going to do what is expected—to rise up and go to Nineveh and cry out against it. Other men of God, when they were given nearly identical commands by God, rose up immediately and did what God asked. When God told Abraham to get and take his son to Moriah (Gen 22:2), the very next morning, Abraham rose early and went (Gen 22:3). When God instructed Elijah to get up and go eastward to the Brook Cherith (1 Kings 17:3), Elijah immediately got up and went (1 Kings 17:5). Such immediate and complete obedience is the prophetic precedent and Jonah is expected to follow their example.

But Jonah does the unexpected. Jonah rose up to flee to Tarshish. Jonah’s actions are a shocking surprise for the reader.[ref]Allen, 176, 204.[/ref] “It is strange that a prophet of God would not follow God’s command to preach condemnation.”[ref]Hannah, 1465.[/ref]

Though a journey to Nineveh would have taken Jonah eastward, a journey to Tarshish is as far westward as Jonah can possibly go. It certainly existed, but in the minds of most Israelites, “going to Tarshish” was like saying you were traveling to the end of the world.[ref]Sasson, 79.[/ref] Tarshish was on the far western side of the Mediterranean Sea, in modern-day Spain, about 2500 miles from Joppa.[ref]Victor H. Matthews, Social World of the Hebrew Prophets (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2001), 164; Radmacher et al., eds., 1065.[/ref] Archeologists are not certain of the location of Tarshish, but this does not mean it is an invented place. In King Solomon’s day, ships going to Tarshish would not return for three years (1 Kings 10:22).[ref]Walton, 105.[/ref] It might also be significant that the author mentions Tarshish rather than just saying that Jonah fled westward. “Tarshish was famous for its ships (Ps 48:7; Isa 2:16) which carried gold, silver, iron, tin, lead, ivory, apes, and monkeys (1 Kings 10:22; Jer 10:9; Ezek 27:25). Because the ships of Tarshish carried such great riches, they became symbols of wealth, power, and pride.”[ref]J. D. Douglas, ed. The Illustrated Bible Dictionary, 3 vols. vols. (Wheaton: Tyndale, 1980), III:1518.[/ref] As such, is likely that there is some symbolism involved in Jonah’s choice in boarding a ship to Tarshish.

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Jonah 1:2. God’s commission to Jonah was to rise up and go to Nineveh. Nineveh was about 500 miles from Gath-Hepher, and was situated along the Tigris River. It eventually became the capital of Assyria, the powerful and wicked nation to the east which was threatening the peace, prosperity, and continued expansion of Israel. Though the Assyrians became the bitterest enemy of Israel in pre-exilic times,[ref]Bewer, 29.[/ref] in the days of Jonah, Nineveh was just another city in a nation struggling to survive the shifting power struggles of the Ancient Near East.[ref]John H. Walton, “Jonah,” in Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary, ed. John H. Walton (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2009), 102.[/ref]

Though until now, Jonah had only ministered in and around Israel, God was now calling Jonah to go to Nineveh. Such a command was extremely rare for prophets of God. Usually, when God commanded prophets to speak against other nations, it was a message from God for the encouragement and instruction of His own people. Rarely does God send a prophet to another nation to speak a message to them.[ref]Allen, 176; J. Vernon McGee, Thru the Bible with J. Vernon McGee, 5 vols. (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1982), 743.[/ref]

Nineveh is described as a great city. But how was the city great? Some believe the city was great in power, but this is unlikely, since at the time of Jonah, Nineveh was not the most influential city of Assyria, and was not the Assyrian capital. A second option is that Nineveh was great in size. This is possible, especially since Jonah 3:3 refers to the breadth of the city and Jonah 4:11 talks about its large population. However, there is a third option about how Nineveh was great, which is hinted at in Jonah 3:3 and developed in more detail in chapter 4. We will develop this point in more detail in those places. At this point in the story, however, the author of Jonah wishes only to point out that Nineveh was a great city, and leaves unanswered the question as to how it was great. Following his lead, we will do the same until the proper time in the story.

After Jonah travels to Nineveh, God wants Jonah to cry out against it. The terminology implies that God wants Jonah to proclaim a message of doom upon Nineveh.[ref]John D. Hannah, “Jonah,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures – Old Testament, ed. John F. Walvoord et al. (Wheaton: Victor, 1985), 1464.[/ref] God sought to judge the city and overthrow it. This is right in line with what the average Israelite expected God to do to a wicked and evil city like Nineveh.

Furthermore, God explains why He wants Jonah to cry out against the city. It is because of its evil. As discussed in the section on the historical background to Jonah, Nineveh was a wicked and evil city. It was widely known for its pride, greed, brutality, adultery, and idolatry.[ref]Ibid., 1465; Radmacher et al., eds., 1065.[/ref]

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Jonah 1 introduces the main characters in the story of Jonah, as well as the main themes of the character of God, the nature of evil, and the conditions and consequences of repentance. This chapter also raises the pressing question about why Jonah did not obey God when asked to go to Nineveh and cry out against it.

Jonah is Called to Preach (1:1-3)

1:1. The word Now (Heb., vayehi) is frequently used in Hebrew to show progression of action. It usually indicates the continuation of a story already in progress, rather than the beginning of a new story. So by beginning the story of Jonah with this word, the author is showing us that this short story is part of a longer narrative.[ref]Leslie C. Allen, The Books of Joel, Obadiah, Jonah and Micah, ed. R. K. Harrison, The New International Commentary on the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1976), 175; Jack M. Sasson, Jonah: A New Translation with Introduction, Commentary, and Interpretations, ed. William Foxwell Albright and David Noel Freedman, The Anchor Bible, vol. 24b (New York: Doubleday, 1990), 66-67.[/ref] But Jonah is not missing any inspired text at the beginning. To the contrary, the author is showing that the story of Jonah is a continuation of the plan of God already in progress upon the world. A few other Old Testament books begin similarly (1 Samuel, Ruth, Judges, Esther, Nehemiah, Ezekiel).[ref]Julius A. Bewer, “A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Jonah,” in The International Critical Commentary: A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi and Jonah, ed. Samuel Rolles Driver, Alfred Plummer, and Charles Augustus Briggs (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1912), 28; Douglas K. Stuart, Hosea-Jonah, ed. David A. Hubbard et al., Word Biblical Commentary, vol. 31 (Waco: Word, 1987), 444.[/ref] In modern English idiom, this opening word could be translated “And it so happened” or “It came to pass.” At the beginning of a story such as this, it could even be translated “Once upon a time,” yet without any fairy tale connotations. Since the word appears so often in Hebrew narrative, it is frequently left untranslated, and is “virtually the equivalent of capitalization at the beginning of English sentences.”[ref]Stuart, 445.[/ref] It has been translated in the GEB to indicate the beginning of the story.

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Most people have heard the story of Jonah. It is arguably one of the more familiar stories in all of Scripture. As such, people—especially Christians—believe they know what the story of Jonah is all about. Most believe it is about a man who is asked by God to go preach to a city so they can be saved. This man doesn’t want to go, but after the near-death experience of getting swallowed by a fish, he ends up doing what God asks, and the entire city repents and is saved. The message then is that when God calls us to preach the Gospel to other people, we had better go.

The following Commentary on Jonah will challenge this way of reading Jonah. There are some elements of truth to this traditional way of reading Jonah, but this approach is not the main message in Jonah, nor is it the main point of the story. But to see the point and to grasp the message, we must forget everything we think we know about Jonah, and read the story with fresh eyes, letting the story speak for itself. We must place ourselves in the sandals of Jonah, reminding ourselves of his popularity and success as a prophet of God in Israel, and also remembering the situation that Israel faced with the growing threat of Assyria to the east.  When we read Jonah with this perspective, we immerse ourselves within the story and gain new insight and understanding into what the book of Jonah is all about.

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As indicated previously, the story of Jonah is not about how he survived the ordeal of getting swallowed by a fish. The title “Jonah and the Whale,” which is often put on children’s books and even to some sermon titles, is one of the biggest misnomers of Scripture. Not only was the fish not a whale at all, but the fish is only mentioned in three verses out of the entire book (1:17; 2:1, 10)! The book of Jonah is not a fish story.[ref][contentblock id=16 img=html.png]III:740.[/ref]

But what is the book about? In his commentary on Jonah, Jack Sasson includes numerous quotes from various scholars and Bible teachers about the theme and purpose of Jonah, showing that there is very little consensus on the question.[ref][contentblock id=18 img=html.png]323-325.[/ref] The theories include such ideas as: Jonah being a prophetical allegory of the resurrection of Jesus; God’s plan of salvation for the whole world: the post-conversion experience of a man who had a nervous breakdown; the emptiness of a life lived apart from God; and “the revalorization of some archaic and universally distributed symbols of mythico-ritual scenarios.”[ref]This is the view of Mircea Eliade. See [contentblock id=18 img=html.png]325[/ref] (Yes, feel free to roll your eyes at that last one.)

Thankfully, we do not have to pick one purpose for Jonah, but can focus instead on prominent themes that run throughout the book. Here are a few:

God’s Mission.

Although the book of Jonah is not about world missions, the theme of God’s mission to the world is definitely present in the book. Certainly, God desired Jonah to proclaim a message to Nineveh in the hopes that they would turn from their wicked ways. God does not desire that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance (1 Tim 2:4). God’s mission to the Gentiles is definitely a theme within the book.[ref][contentblock id=4 img=html.png]85; [contentblock id=11 img=html.png]1462.[/ref]

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When studying Scripture, it is critical to gain understanding of the historical background and cultural setting of the book or passage being studied. The most difficult and troubling passages often open their meaning and significance in the most beautiful way when the historical and cultural background of the text is grasped.

This is certainly true with the story of Jonah.

Jonah lived and ministered in Israel during the 8th century BC, during the reign of King Jeroboam II (2 Kings 14:23-29). Second Kings 14:25 says that King Jeroboam II “restored the territory of Israel from the entrance of Hamath to the Sea of the Arabah, according to the word of the Lord God of Israel, which He had spoken through His servant Jonah the son of Amittai, the prophet who was from Gath Hepher” (NKJV). According to this passage, Jonah had prophesied that Israel would expand her boundaries, and under the leadership of the king, the prophecy had been fulfilled.

Prior to this prophecy, it had been a difficult time for Israel, full of affliction and bitterness (2 Kings 14:26), but God rescued and saved the people of Israel from destruction. Though Jeroboam II was not a good king, God used him to help rescue Israel by giving him victory in war (2 Kings 14:27-28). Through these wars, God fulfilled the prophecy of Jonah, and the borders of Israel expanded.

As a result of these events, it seems that Jonah became a well-liked and popular prophet. People viewed his prophecy about the expansion of Israel’s territory as evidence that God was on their side, that God was blessing them as a nation, and that maybe this was just the first step in Israel finally receiving the full allotment of land promised to them by God (Exod 23:27-31; Num 34:1-15; Deut 1:5-8).

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Since the date and author of Jonah are hard to pin down, attempts at “identifying the book’s audience is fraught with complications…[and] any attempt to identify  the audience of the book is likely to be too subjective to be of lasting value.”[ref][contentblock id=4 img=html.png]62[/ref] Yet while a specific audience might be impossible to pin down, the themes and message of the book of Jonah give several clues to the attitude and mind frame of this audience—whoever they were.

Jonah is portrayed as a prophet in exile who finds himself in a foreign land proclaiming a message of divine judgment upon a wicked people whom God seems intent on blessing. Whether the book of Jonah was written for Hebrews who were still in exile or who had returned from exile, there was widespread confusion among the people about God’s behavior toward His own people in contrast with God’s treatment of foreign nations.

The destruction of Samaria in 721 BC by the Assyrians and the subsequent deportation of the ten northern tribes must have raised many questions and doubts in the minds of God’s people. How could God allow the Assyrians to do this? Was this actually part of his sovereign will? Did Israel really deserve such harsh treatment? The book of Jonah offers a very relevant response to these issues.[ref][contentblock id=4 img=html.png]90[/ref]

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Though some scholars claim that Jonah is the author,[ref]Cf. [contentblock id=8 img=html.png]771; [contentblock id=10 img=html.png]11; [contentblock id=11 img=html.png]1461; [contentblock id=14 img=html.png]388; [contentblock id=16 img=html.png]III:737.[/ref] this is unlikely for three reasons. First, there is no mention anywhere in Jonah or elsewhere in Scripture about who wrote this short prophetic book. Second, identifying Jonah as the author is impossible if the book was written between 400 BC and 200 BC as suggested above. Third, it is highly unlikely that Jonah is the author since it is “an exposé of his hypocrisy and inconsistency, and ends with a portrayal of his almost childish stubbornness against the point God make via the object lesson of the plant.”[ref][contentblock id=24 img=html.png]432[/ref] Though many people write satires, few have the clarity and humility to write a self-deprecating satire, which is what Jonah would have done if he is the author. Certainly, “a contrite Jonah, later—perhaps years later than the events described in the book—might have chosen magnanimously to characterize himself this vividly and even embarrassingly as dead wrong in his former attitudes,”[ref][contentblock id=24 img=html.png]432[/ref] but such a scenario is highly unlikely.

Nevertheless, it is possible that a version of the story originated with Jonah, and was passed down orally until it was recorded at a later date by a later author. After all, to maintain historical accuracy, some of the details in the story, such as his prayer in the belly of the fish (chapter 2), and the conversation he had with God on the hill overlooking Nineveh (chapter 4), could have come from no one else but Jonah. But if he did not write the book as it currently reads, then the book was likely recorded by a later author. The wording adjustments and allusions to prophetic books would then be later additions to the oral tradition which began with Jonah.

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