NOTES for Jon 1:1-17; Jon 2:10

In modern biblical scholarship, the story of Jonah is generally classed among parables whose meaning matters more than the factual accuracy of the events and circumstances they mention. Yet the details of the narrative are not accidental: they matter no less for understanding the parable's meaning than the details of an actual event would.

It is difficult to understand why a prophet called by God evades His command unless we remember that, in Jonah's eyes, the Ninevites were not ordinary pagans and sinners. They inhabited the capital of a hostile state that its neighbours regarded as a concentrated embodiment of the world's evil, like the Third Reich at the height of the Second World War. Jonah both fears and hates the Ninevites, and therefore wants to evade this unexpected commission.

We are not told why the Lord chose Jonah for such a mission; presumably this is not the most important point. What matters more is that the Lord can address a person at a moment when they not only do not expect it, but consider themselves unfit to fulfil the calling revealed to them. Usually a person can choose whether to follow God or turn aside. Sometimes, however, as in Jonah's story, the Lord insists that the commission be fulfilled by the very person He has chosen, for He sees that person's abilities and possibilities better than they do themselves.

During the storm, Jonah sleeps. It is difficult to say which plays the greater part in his calm: confidence that events will turn out well, or sheer carelessness. Only the captain's request for prayer makes us wonder: has Jonah withdrawn from God in his heart, if it takes an outsider, perhaps a pagan, to remind him of the need to pray?…

We begin reading the Book of the Prophet Jonah. In form, it differs greatly from all the other prophetic books. It is not a work by the prophet himself, but rather a ‘midrash,’ that is, an instructive story similar to the stories about Elijah and Elisha. Jesus would later use the events of the Book of Job repeatedly in His preaching.

One of the book’s main themes is the relationship between God and His messenger, the one He chooses to convey His will to people. The very name Jonah, meaning ‘dove,’ immediately recalls both the bird Noah released from the ark to find land and the fact that the dove has always been a symbol of the Holy Spirit, the Comforter given to us.

The book begins with God telling Jonah where he must go and why. The prophet does not merely refuse; he flees from God, trying to avoid carrying out such an assignment. He refuses to become a messenger of disaster and, at the same time, refuses to become a comforter who can point the way to repentance and a complete change of life. The fact that those on the ship specifically approached Jonah to ask him to pray means that he was aware his actions were wrong and had even stopped turning to God. But the whole world resists the prophet’s sin: the storm prevents the ship from sailing, and even the lot cast by the ship’s officers points to the one who caused the misfortunes that had befallen them.

Today one can often hear from believers: this is for your sins, God has punished you. But a loving God hardly punishes. Jesus Himself says to the disciples about the man born blind: "Neither he sinned, nor his parents, but..."

What then about Jonah? It turns out that God punished him for disobedience? Hardly.

How many people on earth live "not their own" life. We do something because "it is necessary," because a sense of duty or circumstances require it, and in the end we carry out the will of our parents. Sometimes we follow our whims, paying no attention to our deep desire, the one God planted in our heart like a little seed. God has a will for each of us. God created us for happiness, and fulfilling His will can make us happy. Even if, as with Jonah, this fulfillment is accompanied by great difficulties, both inward and outward.

The misfortunes that happen to Jonah are not punishment for disobedience, but help in fulfilling the will of a loving God. On paths far from the path the Lord has prepared for each of us, danger awaits us; on the path of fulfilling God's will, stones are removed so that we do not stumble.

When Jonah declared that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord, the people aboard the ship were greatly afraid. They do not know what has happened or what reasons prompted Jonah to act this way, but the very fact that a person could be capable of such a thing fills them with horror. Even those who do not yet know God perceive the very desire to escape from Him as something monstrous.

But now we see that Jonah is ready to sacrifice himself, and in his readiness we can discern more than a desire to stop the storm and atone for his guilt by accepting punishment for the sin of resisting God. We can now see hope in God in Jonah's calmness; it is no longer the calmness of carelessness. Jonah has overcome fear and is ready to go wherever the Lord may send him.

As a result of these events, Jonah's companions, confronted with the reality of the consequences of opposing God, turned to the Lord and made vows to Him. The Lord is able not only to correct even the consequences of our sinfulness, but also to turn them to good.

The Book of Jonah is unique in its own way. It is unique not because, as some biblical scholars suppose, it was written when Nineveh already lay in ruins: anachronisms occur in other biblical books as well. The mention of Nineveh as the center of world evil testifies, if not directly then indirectly, to the pre-exilic origin of the book. In those times Nineveh was the symbol of man's opposition to God. Later Babylon would become such a symbol.

The uniqueness of the book lies elsewhere: it is not a collection of prophetic sermons, as the other prophetic books are, but a book about a prophet, about how difficult it is to follow God's will even for someone who, it would seem, has already made his choice. Jonah knows perfectly well what God wants from him: he heard His voice quite clearly. The problem is not spiritual deafness, but unwillingness to go where Jonah is sure nothing good awaits him.

Jonah himself offers to be thrown overboard at the critical moment, and this only proves that he understands perfectly well that what is happening is not accidental: it is God's hand, from which one cannot run away. He is so unwilling to go to Nineveh that to the very end he tests the firmness of His hand. He says: throw me into the sea.

To end up in a stormy sea, even on a board or raft, means certain death. One can be saved in such a situation only if God directly intervenes. Jonah as it were provokes God to such intervention. He shows Him: if You do not want to free me from the task entrusted to me, then here, I throw myself into the sea, and if You need me, You will not let me drown and will deliver me wherever You Yourself want.

It is not immediately clear which there is more of here: challenge, trust, or both at the same time. Only one thing is clear: such an act presupposes strong and sufficiently trusting relations with God, which, for all their trust, can at times be quite ambiguous. As between close people, all kinds of things happen: quarrels, stubbornness, misunderstanding. But, as between people, all this does not cancel the fact of closeness and trust.

In the end God nevertheless delivers His servant to the place. True, in a very unusual and even fabulous way: in the belly of a giant sea animal. In translation it is sometimes called a whale, sometimes a fish, while in the original the matter is a sea monster. The prophet still has to do what God assigns him.

It is not often in our lives that we know exactly what God’s will is for us, the path on which He Himself has set us and on which He will help us. But sometimes this does happen. Such understanding comes at least once in every person’s life. Sometimes we do not dare to follow this path. The reasons may differ, and in one person’s life all these different reasons may be intertwined. We may not love ourselves, and out of this lack of love sink into false humility and conclude, ‘I am too sinful,’ ‘not good enough to fulfill this will of God for me.’ It may be fear of other people, fear that they will not accept this path. But beneath all these reasons for indecision there is, in fact, one problem: unbelief.

It turns out that we do not believe God created us good enough to do His will, or that He created other people good enough to accept our path, even a very unusual one. Nor do we believe that even if we encounter serious difficulties and trials, including those arising from clashes with other people, this too is part of the path. Ultimately, we do not believe that God will sustain us in a difficult moment, that He will be with us in these trials. He is always near, but if we follow the path He has prepared especially for us, it is easier to sense His presence and help. Sometimes, however, unbelief, fears, and doubts become so deafening that, like Jonah, we choose to flee. Then God has no option but to send us into the belly of a whale. This is not punishment. It is the only way to get through to us. Inside the ‘whale’ there are no external influences: it is dark and quiet, there is no one but oneself, and even God seems very far away. Yet one cannot perish inside the ‘whale’ either: one will not drown, the whale swims well, and it is warm and secure… Such a ‘whale’ may be a serious and prolonged, but not fatal, illness, or depression. In short, a situation in which we feel very little, are extremely lonely, and have to look honestly at ourselves and our lives.

Then we can see that we have lost our way, understand that the loving Lord was waiting on the path we abandoned, call on Him for help as Jonah did, find the resolve to follow Him—and become free.

The translation familiar to us says that Jonah was swallowed by a whale, although in the original language the text mentions dag gadol, a great fish. Taking the translation literally provoked unfounded but persistent ridicule from opponents of religion, who liked to point to the size of a whale's gullet, unable to swallow a human being. Yet cases of people being swallowed by certain large predatory fish are known. Even so, the species of the creature mentioned in the Book of Jonah is less important than the meaning of the account.

We see Jonah calm, trusting in God. Looking back now, we can see even in Jonah's calm deep inside the ship during the storm a pledge of his calm inside the fish. But inside the ship, Jonah himself was trying to withdraw from God; inside the fish, he received what he had been seeking, for the Lord gave him that opportunity. Each of us, by turning away from Him, may find ourselves swallowed by a similar fish. It can take any form and appear amid any outward circumstances. It then depends on us whether we cry out to God through the barriers separating us from Him, barriers that have arisen from our own actions and desires.

Jonah's prayer from the depths is an inspired psalm expressing the hope not only of an ancient prophet, but of any of us who fall, often sinking into a state of rejection and abandonment, yet not abandoned by God even then. He is with us everywhere and is ready to lead us out of despair and black darkness, just as He brought Jonah out onto dry land.

…Centuries would pass, and Christ, comparing His time in the tomb with Jonah's time in the whale's belly, would reveal to His listeners that no other sign would be given them ‘except the sign of the prophet Jonah’ (Matt. 12:39–40). Would it be stretching the point to note that Jonah's willingness to sacrifice himself for his fellow voyagers also resembled the coming self-sacrifice of the Son of Man?

Each chapter of the book of the prophet Jonah is a concise and accurate outline of how a person behaves after encountering the will of God. Knowing what he ought to do, Jonah flees, tries to hide, refuses even to pray, and as a result finds himself in a hopeless situation. It is easy to replace the belly of the whale with something more understandable and familiar: illness, failure, depression, loneliness, or a lack of understanding. Everything that deprives us of the will to live and plunges us into despair. Everything that is for us an obvious consequence of our disobedience to God, of our sin. All this is the belly of the whale, where we suddenly realize that escape is possible only by turning to the One who makes even the laws of nature act as His will pleases.