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Ask anyone who has any knowledge of the Bible if they know the story of Jonah and I suspect they will tell you about Jonah being swallowed by a whale

Jonah: A Whale of a Story                August 15, 2010            Warren Covell

Ask anyone who has any knowledge of the Bible if they know the story of Jonah and I suspect they will tell you about Jonah being swallowed by a whale (large fish). 

A teacher was talking to her first grade class about whales when a little girl made the observation that whales are big enough to swallow people.  The teacher explained that even though they were a very large mammal their throats have pleats that make it physically impossible to swallow a human.  The little girl countered that Jonah was swallowed by a whale.  The teacher reiterated that a whale could not swallow a human; it was impossible.  The little girl said, "Well, when I get to heaven I'll just ask Jonah if he was really swallowed by a whale."  The teacher asked, "What if Jonah went to hell?" to which the girl replied, "Well, then you can ask him."

I make four general observations about the book of Jonah.

First, it is a short story about the prophet.  All the other prophetic books in the Bible contain the message of the prophets themselves through whom God is speaking.  Jonah, on the other hand, is a short story about the prophet himself.  The message is inherent [found] in the story itself.  This is true of many of the stories Jesus tells.

Second, there is fleeting reference to "the prophet, Jonah, son of Amittai" [ah mit' eye] in II Kings 14:25.  Nothing more is known of him except in the book that bares his name.

Third, it is important to remember that the literature of the Bible was first written to speak to the people of the writer's day.  It is helpful, then, in order to more clearly hear a Biblical book's message for our day, to understand as best we can the meaning the writing may have had for its original audience.  Frequently that can only be a guess (but it is still a helpful attempt). 

Fourth Nineveh was the capital of Assyria.  For a brief period of about 100 years, Assyria was the great power in the world between 730 - 625 BCE, greater than all the other powers of the area.   The ruins of Nineveh are across the Tigris River from Mosul, the second largest city in Iraq (1,800,000 population). 

Assyria was a hated enemy of the Jewish people.  They were particularly ruthless to any people who resisted them.  Ten of the 12 tribes of Israel, making up the divided kingdom of Israel (& Judah in the south) were destroyed by the Assyrian forces in 722.  A large percentage of the people were deported and replaced by people from other lands.  Only Judah in the south survived, though at a heavy price of tribute to Assyria.  The ten tribes disappeared, being completely assimilated with other people both in Israel and beyond.  Intermarrying, they became a people in Jesus' day known as Samaritans, despised because of their mix heritage.

Back to our story.  Jonah was called of God to go to Nineveh to announce its destruction.  Jonah refuses to go, heading instead in the opposite direction on a boat going to Tarshish (modern Spain!).  Wouldn't you think Jonah would relish the task of announcing the destruction of the city?!  It becomes clear later why he did not want to go.  He finally goes to Nineveh, announces it's destruction and, guess what!; everybody, I mean everybody repents, poor, rich, the king, even the animals! So the LORD changes his mind and decides not to destroy Nineveh. 

And is Jonah angry!  Jonah complains bitterly to the LORD:

O LORD!  Is not this what I said while I was still in my own country?  That is why I fled to Tarshish at the beginning; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing.  And now, O LORD, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live.  (4:2-3) 

Jonah wanted Nineveh's utter destruction!  But he knew the nature of his God and suspected that, should Nineveh repent, God might well spare them.  He didn't want that.  He wanted his enemies and the enemies of his people annihilated!  Jonah could accept God's forgiveness for himself, but not for Nineveh.  God ‘s final reply to Jonah is;

"You are concerned about a bush...  And should I not be concerned about Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know [right from wrong], and also many animals?" (4:11)

"That is the nature of our God" our writer is saying!  God is concerned not only for the Jewish people but for all people.  God is concerned not only for Jews and Christians but Muslims and Hindus and Buddhists and animists and atheists -the whole family of humanity-and what's more, for animals and the whole of creation!  God is concerned for us, but God is concerned for those whom we consider our enemies as well.  That is the God we worship-or that is the nature of God, whether that is the God we worship or not.

Other prophets condemned Assyria and the other enemies of the Jewish people and they prophesied their destruction.  Some of the Psalms condemn Israel's-and God's-enemies.  God is utterly/ultimately opposed to the evil that humans do, whoever they are.  God is opposed to the evil our enemies perpetrate: God is opposed to the evil we perpetrate, by our actions or our inactions.  The evil we do disrupts our family, our friends and relationship with the world at large.  But God is "a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing."  That is the truth proclaimed by the writer of this short story.  Ought not that be the mind of God's people also?

Jesus said it some 400 years later when he said,  "You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.'  But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven."[1]  If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you?  For even sinners love those who love them.  If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you?  For even sinners do the same. ...  But love your enemies, do good, and lend expecting nothing in return.  Your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for he is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.  Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful."[2] 

Mahatma Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., demonstrated for us how we can love our enemies.  He taught that one was to love the person-acknowledge they are human beings worthy of respect, care, justice and dignity-while resisting the evil the person does.  The person is treated as a human being, a child of God; the wrong or evil the person perpetrates is resisted and challenged.

I have lived long enough to see those who were our enemies at one time have become our friends.  During WWII Germany, Italy and Japan were our enemies.  They are now our friends and allies.  Who are those we consider our enemies today?  North Korea?  Iran?  Al Qaeda?  Will today's enemies become tomorrow's friends?  I suspect and hope so.

A program on PBS last May 31 told a moving story of former US service personnel returning to Vietnam to meet those who had once been their enemies-North Vietnamese service men.  The group included a young girl who never knew her father who died there during that conflict.  Former enemies were sharing time together, experiencing the bond of a common experience.  One American could be heard saying to his North Vietnamese hosts, "To think, you were once our enemies and now you are our friends."  There was a scene where they shared a moment at an expansive cemetery where thousands of North Vietnamese killed during the war were buried.  There was a time of reflective silence.  Tears were shed.  A subdued voice from one of the American soldiers was heard; "We did that."

Closer to home, what does that say about our conflicts with other people; those with whom we work, the neighbor we have issues with, in family break-ups?  Can we see those persons as children of God whom God cares for as God cares for us?  Can we demonstrate respect, care, justice and dignity for the person even while resisting what they may be seeking to do to us? 

Three years ago Time Magazine had a series of articles on John Fitzgerald Kennedy called "The Lessons of J.F.K."  In an article by David Talbot, "Warrior For Peace," in referring to what he called Kennedy's "Peace Speech" June 10, 1963, Mr. Talbot writes;

In his stirring address, J.F.K. would do something that no other President during the cold war-and no American leader today would dare.  He attempted to humanize our enemy.  No matter how ‘profoundly repugnant' we might find our foes' ideology or system of government, he told the American public, they are still-like us-human beings.  ...  "We all inhabit this small planet.  We all breathe the same air.  We all cherish our children's future.  And we are all mortal."[3]

"...should I not be concerned about Nineveh, that great city in which there are more than a hundred twenty thousand persons who do not know [right from wrong], and also many animals?"

[1] Matthew 6:43-45a NRSV

[2] Luke 6:32-33, 35-36

[3] David Talbot, "Warrior For Peace," in Time Magazine, July 2, 2007