A Fish Swallowing a Man Whole? | Jonah - "The Lord, his God" | How many days exactly did the people of Nineveh fast? Is this fast the same as Jonah’s fast? | Readings Recommended during Jonah's Fast | Subtly, God Spoke to Jonah | The Sign of the Prophet Jonah | Jonah the Prophet and the Lord Christ | The Prophet Jonah, the Whale, and the Great City of Nineveh | Jonah and Jesus | The Mystery of Jonah | The Flight of Jonah
Jonah was fleeing from the face of God, or rather, thought that he was
fleeing: but he was overtaken by the sea, and the storm, and the lot, and
the whale’s belly, and the three days’ entombment, the type of a greater
mystery. He fled from having to announce the dread and awful message to the
Ninevites, and from being subsequently, if the city was saved by
repentance, convicted of falsehood: not that he was displeased at the
salvation of the wicked, but he was ashamed of being made an instrument of
falsehood, and exceedingly zealous for the credit of prophecy, which was in
danger of being destroyed in his person, since most men are unable to
penetrate the depth of the Divine dispensation in such cases.
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But, as I have learned from a man skilled in these subjects, and able to
grasp the depth of the prophet, by means of a reasonable explanation of
what seems unreasonable in the history, it was not this which caused Jonah
to flee, and carried him to Joppa and again from Joppa to Tarshish, when he
entrusted his stolen self to the sea: for it was not likely that such a
prophet should be ignorant of the design of God, viz., to bring about, by
means of the threat, the escape of the Ninevites from the threatened doom,
according to His great wisdom, and unsearchable judgments, and according to
His ways which are beyond our tracing and finding out; nor that, if he knew
this he would refuse to co-operate with God in the use of the means which
He designed for their salvation. Besides, to imagine that Jonah hoped to
hide himself at sea, and escape by his flight the great eye of God, is
surely utterly absurd and stupid, and unworthy of credit, not only in the
case of a prophet, but even in the case of any sensible man, who has only a
slight perception of God, Whose power is over all.
On the contrary, as my instructor said, and as I am myself convinced, Jonah
knew better than anyone the purpose of his message to the Ninevites, and
that, in planning his flight, although he changed his place, he did not
escape from God. Nor is this possible for any one else, either by
concealing himself in the bosom of the earth, or in the depths of the sea,
or by soaring on wings, if there be any means of doing so, and rising into
the air, or by abiding in the lowest depths of hell, or by enveloping
himself in a thick cloud, or by any other of the many devices for ensuring
escape. For God alone of all things cannot be escaped from or contended
with; if He wills to seize and bring them under His hand, He outstrips the
swift, He outwits the wise, He overthrows the strong, He abases the lofty,
He subdues rashness, He represses power
Jonah then was not ignorant of the mighty hand of God, with which he
threatened other men, nor did he imagine that he could utterly escape the
Divine power; this we are not to believe: but when he saw the falling away
of Israel, and perceived the passing over of the grace of prophecy to the
Gentiles — this was the cause of his retirement from preaching and of his
delay in fulfilling the command; accordingly he left the watchtower of joy,
for this is the meaning of Joppa in Hebrew, I mean his former dignity and
reputation, and flung himself into the deep of sorrow: and hence he is
tempest-tossed, and falls asleep, and is wrecked, and aroused from sleep,
and taken by lot, and confesses his flight, and is cast into sea, and
swallowed, but not destroyed, by the whale; but there he calls upon God,
and, marvelous as it is, on the third day he, like Christ, is delivered: but
my treatment of this topic must stand over, and shall shortly, if God
permit, be more deliberately worked out..
Saint Gregory of Nanzianzen
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