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![JO AH 2 COMME TARY
EDITED BY GLE PEASE
1 [a]From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the
Lord his God.
BAR ES, "Then - (“And”) Jonah prayed, i. e., when the three days and nights were
passed, he uttered this devotion. The word “prayed” includes thanksgiving, not petition
only. It is said of Hannah that she “prayed” 1Sa_2:1; but her canticle is all one
thanksgiving without a single petition. In this thanksgiving Jonah says how his prayers
had been heard, but prays no more. God had delivered him from the sea, and be thanks
God, in the fish’s belly, as undisturbed as in a Church or an oratory, secure that God,
who had done so much, would fulfill the rest. He called God, “his” God, who had in so
many ways shown Himself to be His, by His revelations, by His inspirations, by His
chastisements, and now by His mercy . “From these words, ‘Jonah prayed unto the Lord
his God out of the fish’s belly,’ we perceive that, after he felt himself safe in the fish’s
belly, he despaired not of God’s mercy.”
CLARKE, "Then Jonah prayed - out of the fish’s belly - This verse makes the
first of the second chapter in the Hebrew text.
It may be asked, “How could Jonah either pray or breathe in the stomach of the fish?”
Very easily, if God so willed it. And let the reader keep this constantly in view; the whole
is a miracle, from Jonah’s being swallowed by the fish till he was cast ashore by the same
animal. It was God that had prepared the great fish. It was the Lord that spake to the
fish, and caused it to vomit Jonah upon the dry land. All is miracle.
GILL, "Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God out of the fish's belly.
Though Jonah had been a praying man, being a good man, and a prophet of the Lord,
yet it seems he had not prayed for some time; being disobedient to the will of God, he
restrained prayer before him; all the while he was going to Joppa he prayed not; and
how indeed could he have the face to pray to him, from whose face he was fleeing? and
as soon as he was in the ship he fell asleep, and there lay till he was waked by the
shipmaster, who called upon him to arise, and pray to his God; but whether he did or no
is not said; and though it is very probable he might, when convicted of his sin, and
before he was cast into the sea, and as he was casting into it; his not recorded; but when
he was in the fish's belly, "then he prayed"; where it is marvellous he should, or could; it
was strange he should be able to breathe, and more strange to breathe spiritually; it was](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-1-2048.jpg)
![that his prayer proceeded from true faith; for he does not simply say that he prayed
to Jehovah, but he adds that he was his God; and he speaks with a serious and
deeply-reflective mind. Though Jonah then was not only like one dead, but also on
the confines of perdition, he yet believed that God would be merciful if he fled to
him. We hence see that Jonah prayed not at random, as hypocrites are wont to take
God’s name in their mouths when they are in distress, but he prayed in earnest; for
he was persuaded that God would be propitious to him.
But we must remember that his prayer was not composed in the words which are
here related; but Jonah, while in the bowels of the fish, dwelt on these thoughts in
his mind. Hence he relates in this song how he thought and felt; and we shall see
that he was then in a state of distraction, as our minds must necessarily be tossed
here and there by temptations. For the servants of God do not gain the victory
without great struggle. We must fight, and indeed strenuously, that we may
conquer. Jonah then in this song shows that he was agitated with great trouble and
hard contests: yet this conviction was firmly fixed in his heart, — that God was to be
sought, and would not be sought in vain, as he is ever ready to bring help to his
people whenever they cry to him.
COFFMA , "All ten verses of this brief chapter relate almost entirely to the prayer
uttered by Jonah from inside the fish. Jonah was a close student of the Holy
Scriptures, especially of the Psalms, as indicated by his use of much terminology
found also in them. Destructive critics have exercised the most valiant and persistent
efforts to make this common terminology between Jonah and the Psalms a basis of
their insistence upon a post-exilic date; but, as we shall more pointedly observe in
the notes, below, such allegations are groundless. Many of the Psalms having words
or clauses in common with Jonah were doubtless dated long before the prophet
appeared; and in a very few cases where this is alleged not to be the case, the
correspondence clearly indicated that the Psalmist was influenced by Jonah, and not
the other way around. In addition to this, there is convincing evidence of the most
positive nature found in the prayer itself which indicates a date long before that
favored by Old Testament enemies.
Jonah 2:1
"Then Jonah prayed unto Jehovah his God out of the fish's belly."
The first threat to Jonah's life was, of course, that of drowning; and, for whatever
period of time he might have been conscious inside the sea-monster, he was
profoundly grateful for his being saved from drowning; and that salvation led him
to believe that God would preserve him alive throughout the entire experience. This
situation explains the double application of some of the expressions in the prayer.
Critics like to complain that the passage (Jonah 2) "is not a prayer but a
thanksgiving for deliverance."[1] However, in the words of Young who refuted such
statements, "Is not thanksgiving of the very essence of prayer?"[2]
"Such critical censure is pointless, displaying ignorance of the fact that thanksgiving](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-4-2048.jpg)
![is the very heart of prayer; but this is not a psalm of deliverance from the great fish.
It is rather a psalm of deliverance from drowning."[3]
THE PROBLEM OF THE PSALM
The fact of a number of words, phrases, and clauses from Jonah's prayer (or psalm)
resembling or corresponding rather closely to similar expressions in the Book of
Psalms is a big point of contention to some. It is true that a number of parallels
exist:[4]
Jonah 2 Psalms
Jonah 2:3b...................Ps. 18:7; 120:1
Jonah 2:4b...................Ps. 18:6; 30:4 Jonah 2:5....................Ps. 42:8
Jonah 2:6....................Ps. 31:23; 5:8
Jonah 2:7....................Ps. 18:8; 69:2f
Jonah 2:8....................Ps. 18:17; 30:4; 103:4
Jonah 2:9....................Ps. 142:4; 143:4; 18:7; 5:8
Jonah 2:10...................Ps. 88:3; 31:7; 26:7; 50:14,23; 42:5; 116:7
All that is actually proved by these similarities is that Jonah was steeped in a
thorough knowledge of the devotional language of God's people. Keil was correct in
his flat denial that Jonah's prayer was in any way "compounded from passages in
the Psalms."[5] Knobel and DeWette, as quoted by Keil, affirm that:
"Jonah's prayer is the simple and natural utterance of a man versed in the holy
Scripture and living in the Word of God, and is in perfect accordance with the
prophet's circumstances and the state of his mind."[6]
There are no quotations from the Psalms in Jonah's words, but only the usage of
certain words, phrases, etc., known to all faithful Hebrews.
"The words (in Jonah's prayer) fit none (of the Psalms) well enough to conclude
that they are specific quotations. More likely, many Psalms were in mind and freely
paraphrased to fit the particular situation and in a manner which expressed Jonah's
appropriate emotions."[7]
Critics will have their way, however, and one of the strategies is to date all of the
Psalms at a point long after Jonah lived, but we shall not play games with dating
Old Testament Scriptures. If the Psalms are later than Jonah, then the Psalmist was
influenced by the Prophet! And, as Deane said, "It is a matter of controversy,
incapable of settlement, whether Jonah or the Psalmist is the original!"[8]
Concerning the date of the Psalms, certainly,
"The most of these had then (in the times of Jonah) been written, and, as the
Church Psalter, would be familiar to a prophet of God ... and so in all times, all over
the world, the saintly praise and pray `in the words of David.'"[9]
The nobility and spiritual import of this matchless psalm-prayer were commented
upon by Blaikie:](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-5-2048.jpg)
!["Only tell us what a man says into the secret ear of God and you have told us all
that is in his heart, have revealed what microscope could not detect, not scalpel lay
bare ... It shows Jonah at bottom, a regenerate and saintly man."[10]
PECULIARITIES OF THE PRAYER
Its brevity. One of the startling things about this remarkable utterance on the part
of Jonah is the brevity of it, being easily read in less than sixty seconds! Hillis
thought this suggested that Jonah "did not live long inside the fish."[11] There is no
certain way by which this question may be dogmatically resolved; and we shall leave
it open. Many, along with Banks, have observed that, "Conservative Bible scholars
believe that he died and point out that this best typifies what happened to
Christ."[12]
The use of the past tense. According to Matthew Henry:
"This indicates that he (Jonah) afterward recollected the substance of it, and left it
upon record. He reflects upon the workings of his heart toward God when he was in
his distress and danger, and the conflict that was then in his breast between faith
and sense, between hope and fear."[13]
U ITY OF JO AH
This psalm-prayer is alleged by some to be an addition to the narrative, thus
compromising the unity of the Book of Jonah, and leading to the allegation that this
chapter is not a part of the original record. This is false. As Young pointed out, "If
Jonah 2:2-9 be removed, the symmetry of the book is most certainly destroyed."[14]
Besides that, there is not the slightest historical or textual evidence that the 2chapter
of this book is any less original than the rest of it. All of the objections to this
prayer-psalm disappear upon a careful examination of the text itself.
COKE, "Jonah 2:1. Then Jonah prayed, &c.— The following prayer was conceived
and formed, as to substance, in the belly of the fish, and probably afterwards
digested and written in its present mode; a thanksgiving for his deliverance being
added at the end of it. Houbigant very properly reads the verbs in the following
verse in the present tense, because, says he, Jonah is said to pray when in the belly
of the fish. By the belly of hell, is meant the lowest parts of the deep, or place which
was to Jonah as the grave.
PETT, "Verse 1
‘Then Jonah prayed to YHWH his God out of the fish’s innards.’
All Jonah probably knew was that he was somewhere safe where he could breathe
and pray. It would only be later that he discovered that he was in the innards of a
large fish. And knowing that he had been saved from certain death he was no doubt
confident that God would sort everything out.
Verses 1-10](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-6-2048.jpg)
![c “Those who regard lying vanities, forsake their own mercy” (Jonah 2:8 a).
b “But I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving, I will pay what I have
vowed. Salvation is of YHWH” (Jonah 2:9-9).
a And YHWH spoke to the fish, and it vomited out Jonah on the dry land (Jonah
2:10).
ote that in ‘a’ Jonah spoke to YHWH from the fish, and in the parallel YHWH
spoke to the fish about Jonah. In ‘b’ he cried to YHWH from the very belly of Sheol,
and in the parallel he gives thanks that God heard him and delivered him. In ‘c’ we
find Jonah seemingly treated without mercy, and in the parallel the consequence of
Jonah’s lying vanities, will be that he has forsaken his own mercy. In ‘d’ he looks
towards YHWH’s holy Temple, and in the parallel he prays towards YHWH’s holy
Temple. In ‘e’ the waters surrounded his soul, and in the parallel his soul fainted
within hi. Centrally in ‘f’ he reached the lowest depths only to find deliverance.
BE SO , "Verse 1-2
Jonah 2:1-2. Then Jonah prayed — Those devout thoughts and feelings which he
had at that time, he afterward digested into the following prayer, and added a
thanksgiving for his deliverance at the end of it. So several of David’s Psalms were
probably composed after his trouble was over; but in a manner suitable to the
thoughts he had at the time of his affliction; and with a grateful sense of God’s
mercies for his deliverance out of it: see Psalm 54. and 120. And he heard me — He
thanks God that, in consequence of his prayer, his life is wonderfully preserved. Out
of the belly of hell cried I — The word שׁאול signifies the state of the dead. So it may
most properly be rendered the grave here, as the margin reads: the belly of the fish
was to Jonah instead of a grave.
TRAPP, " Then Jonah prayed unto the LORD his God out of the fish’s belly,
Ver. 1. Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God] i.e. Praised God with this
Canticum eucharisticum, this gratulatory song, as Tremellius calleth it. That he
prayed in the ship, in the sea, in the whale’s belly, we doubt not; but that he chiefly
intendeth to show his thankfulness for the return of prayers and the sweet support
he felt in the whale’s belly we do as little doubt, see Jonah 2:2; Jonah 2:6-7; yea, that
this was the substance (though now better methodized) of what he prayed and
praised in the bowels of the fish we have cause to believe from this very verse; and
therefore also his deliverance is set down, Jonah 2:10, after his doxology. The word
here rendered prayed signifieth also, sometimes, to give thanks, as 1 Samuel 2:2;
and who knows not that thanksgiving is a special part of prayer? This therefore is
prayer. Jonah having prayed, and perceiving that he was heard, and by the
goodness of God preserved safe in body and sound in mind, he grows "strong in
faith, giving glory to God," Romans 4:20, and being fully persuaded that he should
yet walk before him again in the land of the living.
Out of the fish’s belly] Where, though he might seem buried alive, and free among
the dead, yet he enjoyed God’s gracious presence, and those strong consolations that
made him live in the very mouth of death, and say in effect, as blessed Bradford did,
I thank God more for this prison and for this dark dungeon than for any parlour,](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-8-2048.jpg)
![Hasbeya, on the western skirts of Hermon, an eclipse of the moon.
When the shadow began to creep across her disc there rose from the village a
hideous din of drums, metal pots, and planks of wood beaten together; guns were
fired, and there was much shouting. I was told that this was done to terrify the great
fish which was swallowing the moon, and to make him disgorge her. ow these
purely natural myths were applied by the prophets and poets of the Old Testament
to the illustration, not only of Jehovah’s sovereignty over the storm and the night,
but of His conquest of the heathen powers who had enslaved His people. Isaiah had
heard in the sea the confusion and rage of the peoples against the bulwark which
Jehovah set around Israel, [Isaiah 17:12-14] but it is chiefly from the time of the
Exile onward that the myths themselves, with their cruel monsters and the prey of
these, are applied to the great heathen powers and their captive, Israel. One prophet
explicitly describes the Exile of Israel as the swallowing of the nation by the
monster, the Babylonian tyrant, whom God forces at last to disgorge his prey. Israel
says: [Jeremiah 51:34] " ebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon hath devoured me and
crushed me, he hath swallowed me up like the Dragon, filling his belly, from my
delights he hath cast me out." But Jehovah replies: [Jeremiah 51:44-45] "I will
punish Bel in Babylon, and I will bring out of his mouth that which he hath
swallowed My people, go ye out of the midst of her."
It has been justly remarked by Canon Cheyne that this passage may be considered
as the intervening link between the original form of the myth and the application of
it made in the story of Jonah. To this the objection might be offered that in the story
of Jonah "the great fish" is not actually represented as the means of the prophet’s
temporary destruction, like the monster in Jeremiah 51:1-64, but rather as the
vessel of his deliverance. This is true, yet it only means that our author has still
further adapted the very plastic material offered him by this much-transformed
myth. But we do not depend for our proof upon the comparison of a single passage.
Let the student of the Book of Jonah read carefully the many passages of the Old
Testament, in which the sea or its monsters rage in vain against Jehovah, or are
harnessed and led about by Him; or still more those passages in which His conquest
of these monsters is made to figure His conquest of the heathen powers-and the
conclusion will appear irresistible that the story of the "great fish" and of Jonah the
type of Israel is drawn from the same source. Such a solution of the problem has one
great advantage. It relieves us of the grotesqueness which attaches to the literal
conception of the story, and of the necessity of those painful efforts for accounting
for a miracle which have distorted the common-sense and even the orthodoxy of so
many commentators of the book. We are dealing, let us remember, with poetry-a
poetry inspired by one of the most sublime truths of the Old Testament, but whose
figures are drawn from the legends and myths of the people to whom it is addressed.
To treat this as prose is not only to sin against the commonsense which God has
given us, but against the simple and obvious intention of the author. It is blindness
both to reason and to Scripture.
These views are confirmed by an examination of the Psalm or Prayer which is put
into Jonah’s mouth while he is yet in the fish. We have already seen what grounds](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-10-2048.jpg)
![5. Then I said, I am banished from the sight of thine eyes; —
Yet I will again look towards the temple of thy holiness.
6. Encompass me do the waters to the soul,
The deep surrounds me,
The sedge is wrapped around my head:
tings off of the mountains have I descended;
The earth! Its bars arecontinually around me:
But thou wilt bring from destruction my life,
O Jehovah, my God.
">8. When overwhelmed within me was my soul,
Jehovah did I remember;
And come to thee shall my prayer —
To the temple of thy holiness.
9. They who regard idols of vanity,
Their own mercy forsake:
the voice of praise, will sacrifice to thee,
What I have vowed will I fulfill:
Salvation belongsto Jehovah.
“The cuttings off,” in verse 7, says Parkhurst, were those parts which were cut off
from the mountains at the deluge. The Septuagint has σχισµας — rents-clefts. Roots,
bottoms, foundations, have been adopted by some, but not consistently with the
meaning of the original word, — “The bars or bolts” of the earth convey the idea of
impediments in his way to return to the earth. They were “around” him, or literally
“upon” him, ,בעדי that is, they were, as it were, closed upon him. — Ed.
COFFMA , "Verse 2
"I called by reason of my affliction unto Jehovah,
And he answered me;
Out of the belly of Sheol cried I,
And thou heardest my voice."
This marvelous prayer which God heard and answered was not offered from any
formal position such as kneeling, standing, etc. "The Bible shows by example that
men may pray in any posture."[15] The Scriptures show that men prayed kneeling
(1 Kings 8:54), standing ( ehemiah 9:5; Luke 18:13), bowing down on the earth
with face between the knees (1 Kings 18:42), lying in a sickbed and turning the face
to the wall (2 Kings 20:2), failing prostrate upon the ground (Matthew 26:39), and](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-23-2048.jpg)
![walking along or standing in public (John 11:41,42; 12:28f).
This prayer is totally unsuitable for an allegory, "And, as no one could have known
its substance except Jonah, we have here an argument for his authorship of the
book."[16]
"Out of the belly of Sheol ..." "Sheol means netherworld, or underworld, and is
equivalent to Hades in the ew Testament."[17] "It is the regular word in Semitic
literature for the realm of the dead."[18] De Haan made a strong argument from
this that Jonah actually died, basing it upon the contrast between the belly of the
fish and the belly of Sheol, in which different words were used by the Holy Spirit;
[19] but it may very well be that Jonah meant, "That the Lord had snatched him
from the Jaws of death, delivering him before the gates of Sheol closed upon
him."[20] We remain uncertain whether or not Jonah actually died and was raised
up from death. There was no problem at all for the Lord either way. It appears to
this writer that the argument from the antitype to the effect that since Christ
actually died, the type, Jonah, also, in all likelihood died, is more convincing than
the argument from the use of Sheol in this passage; but as Banks pointed out "A
type should never be unduly pressed; and there is no one else in the Bible who,
having been brought to life again, gives a detailed account of his experience in
death."[21]
PETT, "Verse 2
‘And he said,
“I called by reason of my affliction to YHWH,
And he answered me,
Out of the belly of Sheol I cried,
You heard my voice.”
As he sank into the sea after being hurled from the deck Jonah had felt that he was
sinking into the belly of Sheol (the grave). He had felt that he was about to die. But
he had cried to YHWH in his affliction and he now knew that YHWH had heard his
voice and answered him, for here he was alive and able to pray and offer thanks.
For the thought of someone being in the belly of Sheol see Isaiah 5:14, ‘Sheol has
enlarged herself and opened her mouth without measure, and their glory, and their
plenty, and their pomp, and the one who rejoices among them will descend into it’.
But in Jonah’s case his meaning is brought out in Jonah 2:3. His experience was like
being in the belly of Sheol because he was engulfed in water. Compare Psalms 18:5,
‘the cords of Sheol were round about me, the snares of death came on me.’
TRAPP, "Jonah 2:2 And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the LORD,
and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, [and] thou heardest my voice.
Ver. 2. And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction] His lips did not move in
affliction, like a creaking door or a new cart wheel, with murmuring and mutinying
against God and men; he set not his mouth against heaven (as the howling wolf
when hunger bitten), neither did his tongue walk through the earth, cursing the day](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-24-2048.jpg)
![of his birth, and cutting deep into the sides of such as were means of his misery,
Psalms 73:9. But putting his mouth in the dust, if so be there might be hope, he cried
by reason of his affliction, Lamentations 3:29. The time of affliction is the time of
supplication; no time like that for granting of suits, Zechariah 13:9. God’s afflicted
may have what they will of him then, such are his fatherly compassions to his sick
children; he reserveth his best comforts for the worst times, and then speaketh to
the hearts of his people when he hath brought them into the wilderness, Hosea 2:13.
This Jonah experimented, and therefore said, "I cried out of mine affliction unto the
Lord."
“ Ad Dominum afflicto de pectore suspirando. ”
And he heard me] How else am I alive amidst so many deaths? Here is a visible
answer, a real return: O, "blessed be God, who hath not turned away my prayer,
nor his mercy from me," Psalms 66:20. Surely as the cloud, which riseth out of the
earth many times in thin and insensible vapours, falleth down in great and
abundant showers; so our prayers, which ascend weak and narrow, return with a
full and enlarged answer. This was but a pitiful poor prayer that Jonah here made,
as appears Jonah 2:4; and so was that of David, Psalms 31:22, "For I said in mine
haste, I am cut off from before thine eyes: nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my
supplications when I cried unto thee." It would be wide with us if God should
answer the best of us according to our prayers, yea, though well watered with tears;
since, Ipsae lacrymae sint lacrymabiles, we had need to weep over our tears, sigh
over our sobs, mourn over our griefs. Jonah was so taken with this kindness from
the Lord his God that he repeats it and celebrates it a second time.
Out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice] The whale’s belly he
calleth hell’s belly, because horrid and hideous, deep and dismal. Thence he cried,
as David did, De profundis, from the depths, and was heard and delivered. Yea, had
hell itself closed her mouth upon a praying Jonah, it could not long have held him,
but must have vomited him up. A mandamus commission from God will do it at any
time, Psalms 44:4, and what cannot faithful prayer have of God? there is a certain
omnipotence in it, said Luther.
ELLICOTT, "(2) By reason of mine affliction.—See margin. There is a close
correspondence between this opening and that of Psalms 120 Comp. also Psalms
18:6.
Out of the belly of hell.—This remarkable expression—a forcible figure for
imminent death—has its nearest parallel in Isaiah 5:14, where sheôl (see Psalms 6:5)
is represented as opening a huge mouth to swallow the princes of the world and
their pomp. The under-world represents the Hebrew word sheôl more nearly than
hell or the grave (margin). (Comp. Psalms 18:5; Psalms 30:3.)
And thou heardest . . .—The conjunction is unnecessarily introduced. The sudden](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-25-2048.jpg)
![In short, Jonah shows here what dreadful temptations presented themselves to him
while he was endeavoring to offer up prayers. It came first to his mind that God was
his most inveterate enemy. For Jonah did not then think of the sailors and the rest
who had cast him into the sea; but his mind was fixed on God: this is the reason why
he says, Thou, Lord, hadst cast me into the deep, into the heart of the sea; and then,
Thybillows, Thy waves (38) He does not here regard the nature of the sea; but he
bestows, as I have already said, all his thoughts on God, and acknowledges that he
had to do with him; as though he said, “Thou Lord, in pursuing me, drivest me
away; but to thee do I come: thou showest by dreadful proofs that thou art offended
with me, but yet I seek thee; so far is it that these terrors drive me to a distance from
thee, that now, being subdued as it were by thy goads, I come willingly to thee; for
nowhere else is there for me any hope of deliverance.” We now then see how much
avails the contrast, when Jonah sets the terrible punishment which he endured in
opposition to his prayer. Let us now proceed —
COFFMA , "Verse 3
"For thou didst cast me into the depth, in the heart of the seas,
And the flood was round about me;
All thy waves and thy billows passed over me."
"Thou didst cast me ..." Jonah here attributed to God the action of the mariners
who cast him overboard, because it was upon God's command as given through
Jonah that they did this.
"And the flood was round about me ..." The Hebrew word here for flood means
literally river.
"This may mean "the current" as in Psalms 24:2, which in the Mediterranean sea
flows west to east, and, impinging on the Syrian coast, turns north; or it may have
reference to the notion familiar to us in Homer, which regarded the ocean as a
river."[22]
"Thy waves and thy billows ..." Thus Jonah acknowledged God's hand in the
dreadful punishment he received.
PETT, "Verse 3
“For you cast me into the depth,
In the heart of the seas,
And the flood was round about me,
All your waves and your billows passed over me.”
His remembrance of his experience was vivid. He had been cast into the heart of the
sea, and had felt as though he was being swallowed up by the sea, almost as though
he had been in his grave, with the waters sweeping over him. ote his emphasis on
the fact that it was YHWH Who had done this to him, and that it was His waves and
billows which passed over him. YHWH had been with him in all that had happened.](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-30-2048.jpg)
![TRAPP, "Verse 3
Jonah 2:3 For thou hadst cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas; and the
floods compassed me about: all thy billows and thy waves passed over me.
Ver. 3. For thou hadst cast me into the deep] A graphic description of his woeful
condition, which yet he remembereth now as waters that are past, and is thankful to
his Almighty deliverer: see the like in David, Psalms 116:3, and learn of these and
other saints to acknowledge the uttermost extremity of a calamity after we are
delivered out of it. For hereby thy judgment will be the better instructed and the
more convinced; thine heart also will be the more enlarged to admire, and thy
mouth the wider opened to celebrate the power, wisdom, and mercy of God in thy
deliverance. As if this be not done, God will be provoked either to inflict heavier
judgments, or else to cease to smite thee any more with the stripes of a father, and to
give thee up for a lost child.
For thou hadst cast me into the deep] ot the mariners, but thou didst it, and
therefore there was no averting or avoiding it. Thou hadst cast me with a force, as a
stone out of a sling, or as that mighty angel, Revelation 18:21, that took up a stone
like a great millstone, and cast it into the sea, saying, "Thus with violence," &c.
In the midst of the seas] Heb. in the heart of the seas; so Matthew 12:40, "So shall
the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth." And
Deuteronomy 4:11, we read of the heart of heaven, that is, the middle of it, as the
heart sitteth in the midst of the body as king of that Isle of Man. ow, if it were so
grievous to be cast into the main sea, what shall it be to be hurled into hell by such a
hand, and with such a force into that bottomless gulf, whence nothing was ever yet
buoyed up again?
And the floods compassed me about] Aquarum confluges, the sea, whence all floods
or rivers issue, and whereto they return (Homer calleth the ocean ποταµον, a river,
by the figure meiosis, (a) Pοταµοιο ρεεθρα ωκεανου. Iliad. xiv.). Danaeus here
noteth that out of that gulf of the sea, which of Plato is called Tartarus, that is, hell,
the waters do flow into the veins of the earth (as it is, Ecclesiastes 1:7), losing their
saltness in the passage. Here Jonah cried out, as Psalms 69:1-2, "Save me, O God;
for the waters are come in unto my soul. I sink in deep mire, where there is no
standing: I am come into the deep waters, where the floods overflow me." It was
only his faith that held him up by the chin; and, like blown feathers, bore him aloft
all waters.
All thy billows and thy waves passed over me] All; so it seemed to Jonah, that God
had poured out all his displeasure upon him; but he suffereth not his whole wrath to
arise against his people; neither remembereth iniquity for ever. Thy billows or](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-31-2048.jpg)
![and though he was afraid he would not look down upon him in a way of grace and mercy,
he was resolved to look up to God in the way of prayer and supplication; and
particularly, for the further encouragement of his faith and hope, he looked to the
Messiah, the antitype of the temple, ark, and mercy seat, and for whose sake he might
hope his prayers would be heard and answered.
JAMISO , "cast out from thy sight — that is, from Thy favorable regard. A just
retribution on one who had fled “from the presence of the Lord” (Jon_1:3). Now that he
has got his desire, he feels it to be his bitterest sorrow to be deprived of God’s presence,
which once he regarded as a burden, and from which he desired to escape. He had
turned his back on God; so God turned His back on him, making his sin his punishment.
toward thy holy temple — In the confidence of faith he anticipates yet to see the
temple at Jerusalem, the appointed place of worship (1Ki_8:38), and there to render
thanksgiving [Henderson]. Rather, I think, “Though cast out of Thy sight, I will still with
the eye of faith once more look in prayer towards Thy temple at Jerusalem, whither, as
Thy earthly throne, Thou hast desired Thy worshippers to direct their prayers.”
CALVI , "In the first clause of this verse Jonah confirms again what I have said, —
that when he sought to pray, not only the door was closed against him, but there
were mountains, as it were, intervening, so that he could not breathe a prayer to
God: for he did not so much think of the state in which he was; nay, but he chiefly
considered his own case, how he had provoked the wrath of God. Hence he says, I
have said, I am cast away from the sight of thine eyes. Some give this frigid
exposition, that he had been only expelled from his own country, that he might not
behold the temple. But I have no doubt but that Jonah tells us here that he suffered
extreme agonies, as though every hope of pardon had been cut off from him:
“What! shall I yet hope that God will be propitious? It is not to be hoped.” This then
is the casting away of which he speaks: for it is said that God casts us away, when he
allows us no access to him. Hence Jonah thought that he was wholly alienated from
God. Were any to object and say, that then his faith must have been extinct; the
obvious answer is, — that in the struggle of faith there are internal conflicts; one
thought is suggested, and then another of an opposite character meets it; there
would indeed be no trial of our faith, except there were such internal conflicts; for
when, with appeased minds, we can feel assured that God is propitious to us, what is
the trial of faith? But when the flesh tells us that God is opposed to us, and that
there is no more hope of pardon, faith at length sets up its shield, and repels this
onset of temptation, and entertains hope of pardon: whenever God for a time
appears implacable, then faith indeed is tried. Such then was the condition of
Jonah; for, according to the judgment of the flesh, he thought that he was utterly
cast away by God, so that he came to him in vain. Jonah, then, having not yet put off
flesh and blood, could not immediately lay hold on the grace of God, but difficulties
met him in his course.
The latter clause is differently explained by interpreters. Some take it negatively, “I
shall no more look towards the temple of thy holiness:” but the words admit not of
this explanation. ,אך ak, means in Hebrew, truly, nevertheless; and it means also,](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-34-2048.jpg)
![rescued from drowning by the great fish, encouraging him to believe that he would
yet be spared alive to worship God in Jerusalem. Thus, in the last clause here, he
envisions a deliverance which had not at that moment come to pass; but which the
inspired prophet already considered as a reality.
"I will look again toward thy holy temple ..." "Thus, Jerusalem was not yet
destroyed, for the temple was still standing."[23] ow the Babylonian army had
completed the destruction of the temple in 586 B.C., after a siege of 18 months,
consequent upon Zedekiah's rebellion."[24] However, the moral and spiritual ruin
of the temple had occurred much earlier under Rehoboam, Abijah, and Asa, in
whose reigns the golden treasures of the temple had been robbed and all kinds of
abominations introduced into its services,[25] leaving us with the certainty that such
an affectionate mention of the temple as that which occurs here could not have been
made by a prophet like Jonah except about the approximate time we have assigned
as the date of this book. This mention of the temple as still standing completely
explodes the efforts to date this in the fifth century or in postexilic times. The critics
know this, of course; so they insist that Jonah was not actually referring to the
temple in Jerusalem, but to God's eternal temple in heaven! However, the dual
mention of God's "holy temple" both here and in Jonah 2:7, below, has its most
simple and obvious meanings a plain reference to the temple of Solomon then
standing in Jerusalem. Denials of this are invariably grounded in a determination to
deny the whole prophecy by late dating it.
COKE, "Jonah 2:4. Then I said, I am cast out, &c.— "My first apprehensions were,
that as I had justly forfeited thy favour for my disobedience, so thou wouldst cast
me out of thy protection. But, upon recollecting myself, I thought it my duty not to
despair of thy mercy, but to direct my prayer toward thy heavenly habitation: for I
have the strongest confidence, since thou hast thus far saved me, that I shall look
again towards thy holy temple." There is a great similarity between this prayer of
Jonah and many expressions in the Psalms.
PETT, "Verse 4
“And I said, ‘I am cast out from before your eyes,
Yet I will look again towards your holy temple.”
And his first thoughts as he viewed approaching death was that he had been cast out
from before YHWH’s eyes. He was a reject. But his automatic impulse had been to
look towards the Temple of YHWH in his mind, even though he had recognised that
he was a castaway. It was an instantaneous admission of guilt and a plea for
acceptance. He who had refused mercy towards others was now seeking it for
himself.
BE SO , "Verses 4-7
Jonah 2:4-7. Then I said, I am cast out, &c. — “My first apprehensions were, that as
I had justly forfeited thy favour by my disobedience, so thou wouldest cast me out of
thy protection; yet, upon recollecting myself, I thought it my duty not to despair of
thy mercy, but direct my prayer toward thy heavenly habitation.” — Lowth. The
waters compassed me even to the soul — Or life; that is, to the extreme hazard of](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-36-2048.jpg)
![my life; and I thought of nothing more than losing my life among the waves. I went,
&c. — I went down to the bottom of the sea, where the foundations of the mountains
lie. Or, the fish carried me down as deep in the sea as are the bottoms of the
mountains. The earth with her bars was about me — I found myself enclosed on
every side, without any way for escape; and should have been enclosed for ever, had
not thy power interposed. Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption — But,
notwithstanding it was involved in all these terrible circumstances, which seemed to
preclude all possibility of its being preserved, yet thou, O my God, by thy power
didst save my life from destruction. When my soul fainted within me — When I
seemed just expiring, and lost all hopes of being preserved; I remembered the Lord
— I thought of thy almighty power and boundless mercy, O Jehovah, who causest to
be whatsoever thou willest; and my prayer came in unto thee — And therefore I
addressed my prayer to thee, as being persuaded that thou couldest still preserve
me, even in the most extreme dangers; and my faith was not disappointed; for I
found, by the event, that thou couldest deliver me, as I believed thou wast able to do.
TRAPP, "Verse 4
Jonah 2:4 Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight; yet I will look again toward thy
holy temple.
Ver. 4. Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight] Thus those straits brought him to
these disputes of despair, as they did likewise David, Psalms 31:22, the Church in
the Lamentations, Lamentations 4:22, and others, apt enough in affliction to have
hard conceits of God and heavy conceits of themselves. While men look at things
present, while they live by sense only, it must need be with them as with a house
without pillars, tottering with every blast; or as a ship without anchor, tossed with
every wave. They must therefore thrust Hagar out of doors, and set up Sarah;
silence their reason, and exalt faith, as did Jonah here; "Then I said, I am cast out
of thy sight." Here you may take him up for a dead man; here he inclineth
somewhat to that of Cain, Genesis 4:13-14, and surely they that go down to this pit
of despair, as Hezekiah speaketh of the grave, Isaiah 38:17, cannot hope for God’s
truth as long as there they stay.
Yet I will look again toward thine holy temple] Here he recollects and recovers
himself; as the same soul may successively doubt and believe, not simultaneously;
and faith, where it is right, will at length out wrestle diffidence, and make a man
more than a conqueror, even a triumpher. When sense saith such a thing will not be,
reason saith, It cannot be, faith gets above and saith, Yea, but it shall be; what talk
you to me of impossibilities, I shall yet (as low as I am, and as forlorn) look again
towards God’s holy temple of heaven; yea, that here on earth, where God is
sincerely served, and whereto the promises are annexed. Faith is by one fitly
compared to the cork upon the net; though the lead on the one sinks it down, yet the
cork on the other keeps it up in the water. The faithful soon check themselves for
their doubtings and despondency, as Jonah here; as David chides David, Psalms
43:5; and as Paul saith of himself and his fellows, that they were staggering, but not
wholly sticking, 2 Corinthians 4:8.](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-37-2048.jpg)
![ELLICOTT, "(4) I am cast out of thy sight.—“Jonah had wilfully withdrawn from
standing in God’s presence. ow God had taken him at his word, and, as it seemed,
cast him out of it. David had said in his haste, “I am cut off” (Psalms 31:22), Jonah
substitutes the stronger word, “I am cast forth,” driven forth, expelled like the mire
and dirt which the waves drive along, or like the waves themselves in their restless
motion, or the heathen (the word is the same) whom God had driven out before
Israel, or as Adam from Paradise” (Pusey).
Yet I will look again.—The Hebrew is very impressive, and reads like one of those
exile hopes so common in the Psalms: “Yet I have one thing left, to turn towards
Thy holy Temple and pray.” (For the attitude see ote on Psalms 28:2.)
PULPIT, "Jonah confesses that he at first fully expected death; but faith and hope
soon triumphed over despondency. I am cast out of thy sight. This was his thought
when what is mentioned in verse 3 happened unto him. The words are a
reminiscence of Psalms 31:22, altered somewhat to suit Jonah's circumstances. The
psalmist says, "I said in my haste." Jonah says simply, "I said," without any
limitation; and for "I am cut off," Jonah uses, "I am cast out." Septuagint,
ἀπῶσµαι—a strong term, implying banishment with violence. Out of thy sight;
literally, frown before thine eyes; i.e. from thy protecting care. He who had fled
from the presence of the Lord in Canaan fears that he has forfeited the favour of
God. Yet I will look again toward thy holy temple. I will turn in prayer to that holy
place where thou dost manifest thy presence. The Jews were wont to turn towards
Jerusalem when they prayed. Some think that Jonah expresses a hope of
worshipping again in the temple; but the turn of expression in the text hardly
warrants this. Others refer the term to the heavenly temple, as they do in verse 7;
Psalms 11:4; Psalms 18:6.
5 The engulfing waters threatened me,[b]
the deep surrounded me;
seaweed was wrapped around my head.
BAR ES, "The waters compassed me about even to the soul - Words which
to others were figures of distress (Psa_69:2. See the introduction to Jonah), “the waters
have come even to the soul,” were to Jonah realities. Sunk in the deep seas, the water](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-38-2048.jpg)
![because they soon putrefy. But what Jonah means is certain and that is, that weed
enveloped his head, or that weed grew around his head: but to refer this to the head
of the fish, as some do, is improper: Jonah speaks metaphorically when he says that
he was entangled in the sedge, inasmuch as there is no hope when any one is rolled
in the sedge at the bottom of the sea. How, indeed, can he escape from drowning
who is thus held, as it were, tied up? It is then to be understood metaphorically; for
Jonah meant that he was so sunk that he could not swim, except through the
ineffable power of God.
COFFMA , ""The waters compassed me about, even to the soul;
The deep was round about me;
The weeds were wrapped about my head."
"Even to the soul ..." "The meaning is that the waters so press in that life itself is
threatened."[26]
"The weeds were wrapped about my head ..." Some of the critics have really hooted
at this, screaming that "weeds do not grow in a great fish's belly!"[27] Indeed,
indeed! either did Jonah "grow in the belly of the big fish," but there he was; and,
of course, both Jonah and the sea weed got there in the same swallow. It is nothing
short of amazing how commentators are intimidated by blatant assertion, risking all
kinds of bizarre guesses as their answer to this phantom objection. Livingston
supposed that, "Jonah had become entangled with other material within the fish";
[28] and thought that maybe Jonah mistook "the whale's viscera!"[29] and merely
thought it was seaweed! Blair stated the truth:
"Doubtless the fish had swallowed not only Jonah but considerable seaweed as well.
There was Jonah floundering in the entangling mass, all adding to the confusion of
his distressing dilemma."[30]
It seems hardly credible that intelligent men could find any kind of objection to this
mention of the seaweed. This writer has seen accumulations of this weed so thick
that one could almost be tempted to try walking on them in the open sea; and,
especially off the coast of ova Scotia, and following a storm, the accumulations of
this material are very extensive. Remember that Jonah and his co-sailors were in a
storm; and the presence of masses of seaweed at the place where Jonah was cast
overboard would have made it absolutely impossible for a big fish to swallow him
without taking on a substantial load of the seaweed at the same time, which, of
course, is evidently what happened. Deane attempted an explanation of it by
suggesting that, "Jonah sank to the bottom before he was swallowed by the
fish."[31] Well, maybe he did; but none of this type of explanation is necessary. If
the fish swallowed Jonah in three seconds after he hit the water, he would still have
swallowed a lot of seaweed also. Dummelow understood the situation perfectly when
he wrote, "Floating seaweed entangles him as he sinks."[32]](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-42-2048.jpg)
![COKE, "Jonah 2:5. The waters compassed me, &c.— Jonah, as we have before
observed, speaks this in the bowels of the fish; therefore they seem to mistake the
matter, who say that Jonah speaks this in the midst of the sea, before he was
swallowed by the fish. The fish swallowed up Jonah, when first he fell to the bottom
of the sea, involved with sea-weed, into which he fell. Houbigant. But why may not
this (as well as the following verse, which must necessarily be so) be understood
figuratively and poetically, describing his situation in the deep, when in the belly of
the fish?
PETT, "Verse 5
“The waters compassed me about,
Even to the soul,
The deep was round about me,
The weeds were wrapped about my head.”
But his awful experience had gone on. (God does not always step in immediately
until we have learned our lesson). He had felt as though the waters had entered into
his very soul. The depths of the sea had been all around him, and he had felt weeds
wrapping round his head. He had known that he was drowning, which was of
course what he had anticipated. Rescue had been far from his mind.
For the whole idea compare Psalms 69:1-2. Save Me, O God, for the waters are
come into my soul, -- I am come into deep waters where the floods overflow me’. But
in the case of Jonah the experience had been a literal one.
TRAPP, "Verse 5
Jonah 2:5 The waters compassed me about, [even] to the soul: the depth closed me
round about, the weeds were wrapped about my head.
Ver. 5. The waters compassed me about, even to the soul] That is, usque ad animae
deliquium, till I laboured for life, and was as good as gone.
The depth closed me round about] {See Trapp on "Jonah 2:3"} and further observe,
that God’s dear children may fall into desperate and deadly dangers, see Psalms
18:3; Psalms 88:3; Psalms 116:3. And this for, 1. Prevention, 2. Purgation, 3.
Probation, 4. Preparations to further both mercies and duties. Let us not therefore
censure ourselves or others as hated of God, because greatly distressed; but
encourage ourselves in them, as did David at Ziklag, 1 Samuel 30:6. The right hand
of the Lord shall change all this.
“ Flebile principium melior fortuna sequetur. ”
The weeds were wrapped about mine head] Alga as Alligando. The weeds which the
fish had devoured, or whereunto the fish, wherein I was, had dived and lain down
among them. Or this might befall Jonah in the bottom of the sea, before the fish had](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-43-2048.jpg)
![for ever — so far as any effort of mine can deliver me.
yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption — rather, “Thou bringest ...
from the pit” [Maurer]. As in the previous clauses he expresses the hopelessness of his
state, so in this, his sure hope of deliverance through Jehovah’s infinite resources.
“Against hope he believes in hope,” and speaks as if the deliverance were actually being
accomplished. Hezekiah seems to have incorporated Jonah’s very words in his prayer
(Isa_38:17), just as Jonah appropriated the language of the Psalms.
CALVI , "According to the same sense he says, I descended to the roots of the
mountains. But he speaks of promontories, which were nigh the sea; as though he
had said, that he was not cast into the midst of the sea, but that he had so sunk as to
be fixed in the deep under the roots of mountains. All these things have the same
designs which was to show that no deliverance could be hoped for, except God
stretched forth his hand from heaven, and indeed in a manner new and incredible.
He says that the earth with its bars was around him. He means by this kind of
speaking, that he was so shut up, as if the whole earth had been like a door. We
know what sort of bars are those of the earth, when we ascribe bars to it: for when
any door is fastened with bolts, we know how small a portion it is. But when we
suppose the earth itself to be like a door, what kind of things must the bolts be? It is
the same thing then as though Jonah had said, that he was so hindered from the
vital light, as if the earth had been set against him to prevent his coming forth to
behold the sun: the earth, then, was set against me, and that for ever
He afterwards comes to thanksgiving, And thou Jehovah, my God, hast made my
life to ascend from the grave. Jonah, after having given a long description, for the
purpose of showing that he was not once put to death, but that he had been
overwhelmed with many and various deaths, now adds his gratitude to the Lord for
having delivered him, Thou, he says,hast made my life to ascend from the grave, O
Jehovah. He again confirms what I have once said, — that he did not pour forth
empty prayers, but that he prayed with an earnest feeling, and in faith: for he would
not have called him his God, except he was persuaded of his paternal love, so as to
be able to expect from him a certain salvation. Thou, then, Jehovah, my God, he
says; he does not say, Thou hast delivered me, but, Thou hast brought forth my life
from the grave. Then Jonah, brought to life again, testifies here that he was not only
delivered by God’s aid from the greatest danger, but that he had, by a certain kind
of resurrection, been raised from the dead. This is the meaning of this mode of
speaking, when he says that his life had been brought forth from the grave, or from
corruption itself. It follows —
COFFMA , "Verse 6
"I went down to the bottoms of the mountains;
The earth with its bars closed upon me forever;
Yet hast thou brought up my life from the Pit,](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-46-2048.jpg)
![O Jehovah my God."
"Bottoms of the mountains ..." The roots or foundations of earth's mountains lie far
beneath the sea, and this expression reveals the apparent hopelessness of Jonah's
situation.
"Earth with its bars closed upon me forever ..."
"The thought is that as he sinks he goes far from the earth, the home of the living,
and its doors are closed and barred against him forever. o return to the light and
sunshine seems possible."[33]
COKE, "Jonah 2:6. The earth with her bars was about me, &c.— Houbigant
connects the word rendered for ever, with bars, and reads, The earth, with her
everlasting bars, was about me, &c. But others give the passage another turn, and
render it thus, The earth with her bars would have been about me for ever; but thou
broughtest up, &c.
PETT, "Verse 6
“I went down to the bottoms of the mountains,
The earth with its bars closed on me for ever,
Yet have you brought up my life from the pit,
O YHWH my God.”
He had felt himself sinking lower and lower, into the very depths. ‘The bottom of
the mountains’ indicates the sea floor, for as men stood on the shore they saw the
slope of the mountains going down into the seas and realised that at the bottom of
the slope was a valley, the sea floor. As the boat was clearly not far from shore, the
bottom of the sea would not have been at any great depth. And he had felt as though
he was excluded from the earth by bars which prevented his returning, and which
would hold him for ever. But then he had found himself remarkably delivered and
he had been lifted out of the pit, and he had thus recognised that it was the action of
YHWH His God.
TRAPP, "Verse 6
Jonah 2:6 I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with her bars
[was] about me for ever: yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O
LORD my God.
Ver. 6. I went down to the bottoms of the mountains] That is, of the promontories or
rocks of the sea, where the waters are deepest. Thus Mercer after Kimchi. "The
channels of waters were seen, and the foundations of the world were discovered,"
Psalms 18:15. The mountains are said to be under water, Proverbs 8:25, because
their foundations are there placed.
The earth with her bars was about me for ever] As if resolved there to keep me close
prisoner; that though the fish had disgorged me, yet I should never have got to land.](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-47-2048.jpg)
![The shores are set by God as bars to keep the sea within his bounds, Job 38:8; Job
38:10-11, Jeremiah 5:22. Here then all the creatures seemed to set against poor
Jonah, and (which was more than all) the Creator too: so that he might sigh and say,
as in the poet (Martial).
“ In me omnis terraeque aviumque marisque rapina est,
Forsitan et coeli ”
Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption] i.e. From the place where I was
likely to have lain and rotted. Cum duplicantur lateres, venit Moses: when things
are at the worst God appeareth, as it were out of an engine, εκ της µηχανης. In the
mount will the Lord be seen, Ezekiel 37:11, 2 Kings 19:3; he stays so long sometimes
that he hardly "finds faith on earth," Luke 18:8, and yet comes at last to the relief of
his poor people; viz. when they are ripe and ready for it. He is a God of judgment,
he knows how and when to deal forth his favours; and even waiteth to be gracious,
Isaiah 30:18; Isaiah 28:21.
O Lord my God] sc. by the mean and merit of thy Son, in whom alone it is that thou,
Lord, art my God, and that I can call thee Abba, Father. It is well observed by an
interpreter, that in this short history of Jonah are all things contained which may
make to the sound and saving knowledge of God and his will, of ourselves also and
our duties.
ELLICOTT, "(6) Bottoms of the mountains.—Literally, ends or cuttings off, as, in
margin. So the Vulg. extrema montium. Mountains were in the Hebrew conception
the pillars of the world (see Job 9:6; Job 26:11), having their foundations firmly
planted in the sea. These “hidden bases of the hills” were therefore the verge of the
earth itself, and one lost among them would be close on the under-world of death.
The earth with her bars . . .—Literally, the earth her bars behind me for ever; i.e.,
the earth’s gates were closed upon me for ever, there was no possibility of return.
The metaphor of a gateway to sheôl is common (Isaiah 38:10, &c.), but the earth is
nowhere else said to be so guarded. Ewald therefore proposes to read sheôl here.
But it is quite as natural to imagine a guarded passage out of the land of the living
as into the land of the dead.
Corruption.—Rather, pit. (See ote, Psalms 16:10.)
ISBET, "OUT OF THE DEEP PIT
‘Yet hast Thou brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God.’
Jonah 2:6 (R.V.)
I. Have you got down into the pit?—It may be by your own fault. So it was with
Jonah. He would never have been in this plight had he not disobeyed the voice of the
Lord. He paid the fare to go to Tarshish, but really to go down into the depths, and](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-48-2048.jpg)
![Jonah’s example in this respect is worthy of imitation. Having received from God a
commission to denounce his judgments against ineveh, and being afraid, that, after
all, God would exercise mercy towards them, and make him appear a false prophet,
he declined the office that had been assigned him, and endeavoured to “flee from the
presence of the Lord.” But a storm overtook him; and he was cast into the sea, and
swallowed by a fish; and then, being preserved alive in that extraordinary situation,
he thought on his ways, and cried unto his God for mercy. After his deliverance, he
called to remembrance the exercises of his mind during his perilous confinement;
and recorded them, for the benefit of the Church to the end of time. He tells us, that
at first he began to despair; conceiving that “the Lord had cast him out of his sight.”
But, knowing that nothing was impossible with God, he directed his eyes towards
heaven, and prayed. His prayer was heard, and the desired mercy was vouchsafed
to him. This he acknowledges in the words before us: in which we have,
I. An instructive history—
Every part of this history is replete with instruction. Other parts of Holy Writ
inform us of the frailties of God’s people, and exhibit oah, Lot, David, Peter, and
others, in very humiliating conditions. But there is a peculiarity in the character of
Jonah that distinguishes him from all others, and gives us a deep insight into the
human heart. We cannot however stop to enter minutely into his character, or into
the diversified lessons which his history would teach us. We shall confine ourselves
to two observations, which are of a general nature and of universal importance:
1. Rebellion against God will surely bring upon us his heavy displeasure—
[Jonah might think lightly perhaps of the sin he had committed, when refusing to
execute the commission he had received: and he certainly was unmindful of the
danger he had brought upon himself, even while all who sailed with him in the ship
were in the utmost terror. But God was visiting him for his iniquity; and, in order to
the discovery of it, suggested to the minds of the mariners to ascertain, by a lot, who
the guilty person was, for whose sake the storm was raised. The lot fell on Jonah:
and he, being impeached thus by God himself, confessed his crime; and prescribed,
as the only means of pacifying the Deity, that he himself should be cast into the sea.
Thus did vengeance overtake him. And shall we sin with impunity? What though we
think light of our sins, and sleep in security when we should be praying to our God;
does God estimate sin by our standard? or is danger at all more remote, because we
do not see it? Of this we may be assured, that “evil will hunt the wicked man, to
overthrow him;” and, however long we may elude its pursuit, it will seize upon us at
last, as its legitimate prey. The declaration of God to every impenitent person is, “Be
sure your sin will find you out.”]
2. Whatever effects of his displeasure we may now feel, the prayer of penitence
and faith will deliver us from them—
[A more desperate condition than that of Jonah cannot well be conceived [ ote: See
his description of it, ver. 2, 3, 5.]. Yet from thence was he brought by the efficacy of](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-50-2048.jpg)
![fervent prayer [ ote: ver. 2, 4, 7.]. Be it so then; we have sinned against the Lord in
a very grievous manner; and we are at this moment under his chastising hand; still
“Has the Lord forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut up his tender
mercies?” o: the Lord is merciful and gracious: and, if only we have a heart to
pray, we need not doubt but that he has an ear to hear. Were we at the bottom of
the sea, yet if we were able to look unto his holy Temple, we should not look in vain.
We might not be delivered with respect to the body; but the soul should find
acceptance at God’s hands, and be made a monument of his sparing mercy.]
We dwell the less on the historical view of Jonah’s deliverance, because we wish you
to notice it more particularly as,
II. A glorious type—
We are always cautious of exceeding the bounds of truth and soberness in the
explanation of types. On this account we altogether omit, what some have laid a
stress upon, the idea of Christ’s offering up himself a sacrifice to God for the
purpose of averting his wrath from us. And we should be inclined to limit the typical
import of this history to the resurrection of Christ, if he himself had not given us a
more extended view of it. But, in the place where he speaks of Jonas as being “a
sign” to the people, he calls him “the Prophet Jonas,” and mentions the remarkable
success of his ministrations [ ote: Matthew 12:38-41.]. We are induced therefore to
consider the whole of this history as designating the ministry of Jesus;
1. In its temporary suspension—
The casting of Jonah into the sea, and his being swallowed by a fish, effectually, as it
should seem, put an end to his mission. Whatever gracious intentions God had
formed respecting the inevites, they were now, to all appearance, frustrated; so
that, unless God should send to them by some other prophet, his judgments would
come upon them without warning, and without a remedy.
Such was also the distressful, and apparently irremediable, state, to which the world
was reduced by the death of Christ. His enemies triumphed when they saw him dead
upon the cross, and committed to the silent tomb. His friends and followers then
concluded, that they had been mistaken in their expectations, and that the
redemption of Israel which they had looked for at his hands was a hopeless phantom
[ ote: Luke 24:21.]. To guard them against this erroneous conclusion, our blessed
Lord expressly told his disciples, that “he should be three days and three nights in
the heart of the earth.”]
2. Its speedy restoration—
[After three days, Jonah was, by God’s overruling providence, disgorged in safety
upon dry land; and his commission to preach unto the inevites was renewed.
Thus by the resurrection of Christ were the hopes of a ruined world revived. ot](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-51-2048.jpg)
![only was the ministry of our Lord himself renewed, but all his Apostles also received
afresh their commission to preach the Gospel to every creature. Could the inevites
have foreseen the effect of Jonah’s deliverance, how would their hearts have leaped
for joy! And well may all the nations of the earth rejoice in the tidings of a risen
Saviour, through whom repentance and remission of sins are preached, and by
whom the most abandoned of sinners may be brought to God.]
3. Its ultimate success—
[Wonderful indeed was the effect of Jonah’s ministrations! and we may well
suppose that the relation of his miraculous preservation and deliverance contributed
in no small degree to the success of his mission. The people of ineveh would
necessarily conclude, that he was sent of God, and that the denunciations delivered
by him would be fulfilled.
And was not this the effect of Christ’s resurrection? The very point which all the
Apostles most insisted on, was this: “they preached Jesus and the Resurrection:”
they preached, “that he died according to the Scriptures, and rose again the third
day according to the Scriptures.” From hence the inference was clear that Jesus was
the promised Messiah, the Saviour of the world: and so rapidly did this truth
prevail, that in one day there were converted to him three thousand souls; and, in a
very short space of time, the whole Roman empire was filled with his acknowledged
followers.]
We may learn from hence,
1. On what a firm basis our religion stands—
[The sign which above all others our blessed Lord laid the greatest stress upon, was
his fulfilling of this type. Though he gave innumerable proofs of his divine mission,
yet it was to this chiefly, yea, to this only, that he referred the confirmed sceptics. He
said, in fact, “I shall die, and rise again the third day without seeing corruption, and
shall live for evermore, to perfect the work assigned me. If I rise on the third day,
then you will know that I am the Messiah: if I do not, I am contented that you shall
account me an impostor.” ow, brethren, you know the means which his enemies
used to prevent any collusion among his disciples; yea, and how incredulous his
disciples themselves were; and consequently, you are sure that he did indeed rise,
and that all which God hath spoken by him, or of him, is true; it is true that the
impenitent and unbelieving shall perish; but that “all who believe in him shall be
justified from all things.”]
2. What has been done for every believer—
[Though Jonah stands alone in his particular line of experience, there is not a
believer whose soul has not been in as perilous a condition as Jonah himself was at
the bottom of the sea; nor one who has not obtained deliverance by the very same
means, humiliation and prayer. The experience of David was not unlike to Jonah’s](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-52-2048.jpg)
![[ ote: Psalms 40:1-3.]; and that of the Church of old is painted in expressions
precisely similar to those in the chapter before us [ ote: Lamentations 3:54-58.];.
Happy, happy they, who have obtained mercy of the Lord, and can thus attest the
efficacy of believing prayer! Let not your feelings, brethren, be forgotten; but get
them written in the tablet of your hearts; and let your acknowledgments be suited to
the mercies vouchsafed unto you.]
3. What the Lord will do for all who call upon him—
[Our blessed Saviour, by dying for our offences and rising again for our
justification, has procured for us whatever we stand in need of. Even in the
denunciations of God’s wrath there is an implied promise of mercy, if we repent and
turn to God. However great therefore our guilt may be, or however imminent our
danger, let us remember, that “with the Lord there is mercy, and with him is
plenteous redemption.” Let us remember, that “Jesus is exalted to give repentance
and remission of sins;” and that, though we were as much “in the belly of hell” as a
living creature can be, our cry should come before him into his holy temple, and “he
would bring up our souls out of the pit of corruption;” “after two days he would
revive us; in the third day he would raise us up, and we should live in his sight
[ ote: Hosea 6:1-2.];.”]
PULPIT, "The bottoms of the mountains; literally, the cuttings off, where the
mountains seem to be cut off by the ocean floor; the roots of the mountains. εἰς
σχισµὰς ὀρέων, "the clefts of the mountains"; Psalms 18:15. The earth with her
bars; as for the earth, her bars were about me; return to it was shut out for me; the
gate by which I might return was locked behind me. He adds, forever, as it was to
all appearance, because he had no power in himself of returning to earth and life.
Yet; in spite of all, I am preserved. From corruption (shachath); as Job 17:14; de
corruptione (Vulgate); so the Chaldee and Syriac; Septuagint, ἀναβήτω ἐκ φθορᾶς ἡ
ζωή µου (Alex), ἀναβήτω φθορὰ ζωῆς µου (Vatican), "Let my life arise from
destruction;" or, "Let the destruction of my life [i.e. my destroyed life] arise."
Jerome refers the word to the digestive process in the fish's stomach; it is probably
merely a synonym for "death." The marginal rendering, "the pit," i.e. Sheol, is also
etymologically correct (comp. Psalms 30:3). My God. He thankfully acknowledges
that Jehovah has proved himself a beneficent God to him.
7 “When my life was ebbing away,
I remembered you, Lord,
and my prayer rose to you,](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-53-2048.jpg)
![reference to that temple. Griffiths asserted that, "This is probably not the literal
Jerusalem temple";[34] but that is the only temple that any of the Jews of that era
knew. As Blaikie put it:
"Jonah thinks of the temple (the literal temple), the sacred ark, the mercy seat, the
over-shadowing cherubim, the promise of Moses: "There will I meet with you, and I
will commune with you from above the mercy seat."[35]
At first thought, it appears that Jonah was a bit late remembering God; but
remember him he did and therefore received the blessing.
PETT, "Verse 7
“When my soul fainted within me,
I remembered YHWH,
And my prayer came in to you,
Into your holy temple.
In his desperation he had remembered YHWH, and he had prayed to YHWH
towards His holy Temple. And he knew that in that moment YHWH had answered,
so that here he was, safe, even though he knew not where.
TRAPP, "Jonah 2:7 When my soul fainted within me I remembered the LORD: and
my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple.
Ver. 7. When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the Lord] And could say, as
the Church in Isaiah 63:16, when at lowest, "Doubtless thou art our father, our
redeemer, thy name is from everlasting." As there is in the creatures an instinct of
nature to do after their kind; so there. is of grace in the saints to run to God. "Yea,
in the way of thy judgments, O Lord, have we waited for thee; the desire of our soul
is to thy name, and to the remembrance of thee. With my soul have I desired thee in
the night; yea, with my spirit within me will I seek thee early," Isaiah 26:8-9. "O
Lord," saith Habakkuk, Habakkuk 1:12, "art not thou from everlasting my God,
and mine Holy One?" It was a bold question, but God approves and assents to it in
a gracious answer ere they went farther: "We shall not die" (say they abruptly), "O
Lord, thou hast ordained them" (the Chaldeans) "for judgment"; but us only for
chastisement. Here was the triumph of their faith, and this was that which held up
Jonah’s hope, though with wonderful difficulty, held head above water. He
remembered "the years of the right hand of the Most High," Psalms 77:10; he called
to mind his songs in the night season, Jonah 2:6, his former experience, a just
ground of his present confidence. He remembered the Lord, his power and
goodness, those two pillars, the Jachin and the Boaz, that support faith; and this
fetched him again when ready to faint. "I had even fainted, unless I had believed to
see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living," Psalms 27:13.
And my prayer came in unto thee] q.d. Though I was so faint I could scarcely utter
a prayer, yet thou hearkenedst and heardest, as Malachi 3:16; thou madest hard
shift to hear (as I may say); thine ears were in my prayers, as St Peter hath it, 1
Peter 3:12; thou feltest my breathing, when no voice could be heard, Lamentations](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-57-2048.jpg)
![3:56; thou heldest not "thy peace at my tears," Psalms 39:12, quando fletu agerem
non afflatu; yea, thou heardest the voice of mine affliction, Genesis 16:11.
Into thine holy temple] Whether we take it to be the temple at Jerusalem (a type of
Christ), Jonah’s prayer was accepted for Christ’s sake; and proved to no less
purpose, though made in the whale’s belly, than if he had been pouring it out in
God’s holy temple. Or if we understand it to be heaven, the habitation of God’s
holiness, and of his glory, his prayers were come up thither for a memorial before
the Almighty, Acts 10:4, and like pillars of incense pierced into his presence, Song of
Solomon 3:6, neither would they away without their errand, but lay at God’s feet till
he should command deliverance out of Zion.
SIMEO , "JO AH’S REFLECTIO S I THE WHALE’S BELLY
Jonah 2:7-9. When my soul fainted within me I remembered the Lord: and my
prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple. They that observe lying vanities
forsake their own mercy. But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of
thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the Lord.
TO take a retrospect of our feelings, under circumstances of peculiar trial, is
exceedingly beneficial. There are times when we realize in our minds truths which at
other seasons have had no weight, and produced on us no effect. Thus Jonah, after
his deliverance from the belly of the fish, called to mind, and transmitted for our
good, the reflections which occupied his soul in that peculiarly awful situation, and
in the near prospect of death. He here records,
I. The mercy vouchsafed—
This was such as never was vouchsafed to any other man, either before or since—
[The history you well know. But there are some points which we must particularly
notice on this occasion. He was delivered, you know, from the belly of a fish. But
mark the time when this mercy was vouchsafed to him: it was when he was in the
very act of rebellion against God — — — Mark also the means: it was by a
miraculous influence of God upon the fish, directing it to go to the sea-shore, and to
vomit him forth upon the dry land. The occasion also must especially be noticed: it
was in answer to a prayer offered from the bottom of the sea: “When Jonah’s soul
fainted within him, he remembered the Lord: and his prayer came in unto God,
even into his holy temple.”]
Though we have never been in a situation like his, have not we also wonderful
mercies to recount?
[We have all of us, more or less, been in situations of danger, either by sickness or
by accident, when we were in a state most unprepared to meet our God; and when,
if we had been taken into the eternal world, we must have for ever perished in our](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-58-2048.jpg)
![sins. On some such occasion, perhaps, we have reflected on our state, and felt our
need of mercy, and cried unto our God, and obtained mercy at his hands: and here
we are living witnesses for God, that “he desireth not the death of a sinner, but
rather that he turn from his wickedness and live” — — —]
Let us pass on to consider,
II. The conviction wrought—
Jonah had known, before, the folly of idolatry, and the wisdom of relying wholly
upon God. But now he felt this in a way that he had not done before. ow too he
felt, that to flee from the presence of God, as he had done, and to decline the service
of his God, and to seek happiness in a way of disobedience to God, was folly in the
extreme; and that the only way to be truly happy, was to serve, and honour, and
obey the Lord.
And were not such our convictions, also, in the prospect of death?
[ one of us need be told that the creature is but a broken cistern; and that “to
forsake the fountain of living waters for cisterns of our own formation, is a great
evil [ ote: Jeremiah 2:13.];.” But, whilst we acknowledge this as a speculative truth,
who feels it practically, so as to act upon it, and to have his life regulated in
accordance with it? In a time of health, we see perhaps what is right, but do it not;
nor have in our souls any fixed purpose to carry into effect the dictates of our mind
and judgment. But in the near approach of death these truths assume a reality and
importance which we never discerned before. Once, perhaps, we could laugh at
them, as the dreams of enthusiasm, and the peculiarities of a sect: but in that solemn
hour when we are expecting to be summoned into the immediate presence of our
God, we bitterly regret that we have given so little weight to these considerations;
and we then are convinced, indeed, that “in observing and following lying vanities
we have madly forsaken our own mercies.” The convict that is about to perish by
the hand of the public executioner, however obdurate he has been in times past,
feels this; and the public feel it for him. Would to God that, in our time of health
and prosperity, we all felt it for ourselves!]
The result of that conviction we shall see in,
III. The determination formed—
ow would the prophet henceforth praise his God: and, having made vows to God
in the hour of his extremity, he would now pay them; and be a living witness for
God, that “salvation is of the Lord” for every soul that will seek it, however deep his
guilt, or however desperate his condition.
These are the determinations, Brethren, which I desire you, in dependence upon
God’s help, to form—](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-59-2048.jpg)
![[Look to the mercies vouchsafed to you in the hour of your necessity, when you cried
unto the Lord: look at your deliverance from death and hell: look at a resurrection
vouchsafed to you, from death to life, from misery to peace, from hell to heaven; a
resurrection like unto that of Jonah; or rather like to that which was typified by it,
the resurrection of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ: and then tell me, whether
you should not “sacrifice unto the Lord with the voice of thanksgiving,” and your
every word be praise — — — Call to mind, also, the vows which you made in the
hour of trouble; how you would live henceforth, not unto yourselves, but to your
God; and not for time only, but for eternity. ow, beware that you forget not the
resolutions then formed. Beg of God that they may not, as is too generally the case,
vanish as the early dew that passeth away. They are all recorded in the book of
God’s remembrance; and if violated by you, in return for all the mercies vouchsafed
unto you, they will fearfully aggravate your eternal condemnation — — — ow,
too, be living witnesses for God, for the encouragement of others. Shew to others
what a salvation you have found, and found in your lowest extremity, in answer to
the prayer of faith. Who can tell what a blessing you may he to those around you?
Doubtless the mercy vouchsafed to Jonah was, under God, the salvation of all that
great and populous city to which he preached. His miraculous deliverance gave, so
to speak, an irresistible energy to his word; insomuch that all, from the king on the
throne to the lowest of the populace, instantly turned in penitential sorrow to the
Lord. So you, when you can say to others, “What my eyes have seen, and ears have
heard, and hands have handled, of the word of life, the same declare I unto you,”
may he instrumental to the honouring of God your Saviour, and to the saving of
many souls alive.]
On a review of this subject, see,
1. How wonderful are the ways of God!
[Who would have thought to what even the rebellion of Jonah should lead; and how
the punishing of that should lead to the salvation of his soul, and of the souls of
many others? Truly, “God’s ways are in the great deep, and his footsteps are not
known.” But from all this we may learn never to despond; but rather, however
desperate our condition may be, to say, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him”
— — —]
2. How marvellous is the efficacy of converting grace!
[See what a change is wrought in Jonah; though, indeed, far less than might have
been expected. But to change our rebellious hearts into a frame of obediential love
and gratitude; and to renew us in our inner man, so as to make us as lights in a dark
world; this is, and must be, the effect of true conversion. See then, brethren, that ye
offer unto God the sacrifice of praise continually; and especially for your
redemption from all the penal effects of sin, through the blood and righteousness of
our Lord Jesus Christ. See, too, that you live to God as his redeemed people, in
holiness and righteousness before him all the days of your life; and that you labour,
in every possible way, to commend to others the salvation which you yourselves have](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-60-2048.jpg)
![found — — —]
PULPIT, "His prayer was heard. When my soul fainted within me; literally, was
covered—referring, says Pusey, to that physical exhaustion when a film comes over
the eyes, and the brain is mantled over. The clause is from Psalms 142:3 or Psalms
143:4. I remembered the Lord. That was his salvation (Psalms 119:55). He turned in
thought to thine holy temple (Psalms 143:4), the sanctuary where God's presence
was most assured, like the psalmist in the wilderness (Psalms 63:2). or like the exiles
by the waters of Babylon when they remembered Zion (Psalms 137:1-9).
8 “Those who cling to worthless idols
turn away from God’s love for them.
BAR ES, "They that observe lying vanities - , i. e., (by the force of the Hebrew
form , that diligently watch, pay deference to, court, sue, “vanities of vanities,” vain
things, which prove themselves vain at last, failing the hopes which trust in them. Such
were actual idols, in which men openly professed that they trusted Such are all things in
which men trust, out of God. One is not more vain than another. All have this common
principle of vanity, that people look, out of God, to that which has its only existence or
permanence from God. It is then one general maxim, including all people’s idols, idols of
the flesh, idols of intellect, idols of ambition, idols of pride, idols of self and self-will.
People “observe” them, as gods, watch them, hang upon them, never lose sight of them,
guard them as though they could keep them. But what are they? “lying vanities,” breath
and wind, which none can grasp or detain, vanishing like air into air.
And what do they who so “observe” them? All alike “forsake their own mercy;” i. e.,
God, “Whose property is, always to have mercy,” and who would be mercy to them, if
they would. So David calls God, “my mercy.” Psa_144:2. Abraham’s servant and Naomi
praise God, that He “hath not forsaken His mercy” Gen_24:27; Rth_2:20. Jonah does
not, in this, exclude himself. His own idol had been his false love for his country, that he
would not have his people go into captivity, when God would; would not have Nineveh
preserved, the enemy of his country; and by leaving his office, he left his God, “forsook”
his “own mercy.” See how God speaks of Himself, as wholly belonging to them, who are
His. He calls Himself “their own mercy” . He saith not, “they who” do “vanities,” (for
Ecc_1:2. ‘vanity of vanities, and all things are vanity’) lest he should seem to condemn
all, and to deny mercy to the whole human race; but “they who observe, guard vanities,”
or lies; “they,” into the affections of whose hearts those “vanities” have entered; who not
only “do vanities,” but who “guard” them, as loving them, deeming that they have found](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-61-2048.jpg)
![things; for without God there is no salvation and no help to be found.
“ Qui vana idola colunt,
Felicitatis suae auctorem deserunt —
They who worship vain idols,
Desert the author of their own happiness.”
More literally —
“They who attend on the idols of vanity,
Their own goodness forsake.”
There is a contrast between vain idols and their own goodness, that is, the goodness
received by them from God. Grotius gives this paraphrase, “They who worship idols
are vain; for they forsake their own mercy, that is, God, who is able to help them in
their distress.” Henry suggests another view, “They who follow their own
inventions, as Jonah had done, when he fled from the presence of the lord to go to
Tarshish, forsake their own mercy, that mercy which they may find in God.” — Ed.
COFFMA , "Verse 8
"They that regard lying vanities
Forsake their own mercy."
The prophet's deep-seated hatred of idolatry appears in this. He had just observed
the distressed mariners each appealing to his god; but, as yet, Jonah's attitude
toward them would appear to be colored by that detestation in which all the Jews
held other peoples. That this was the case appears in Jonah's displeasure when the
inevites actually repented and were spared by the Lord.
"Lying vanities ..." Dummelow pointed out that this is in every way the equivalent
of "idol gods"[36] (Deuteronomy 32:21). The word "vanity" means literally
"something evanescent and worthless."[37] It exemplifies a strange trait of human
nature that Jonah who himself was not at that time out of danger should
nevertheless have uttered these derogatory remarks about the pagan sailors (who
seem to be in his thoughts), even addressing such remarks to God himself! Despite
the fair and even magnanimous actions of the sailors toward himself, Jonah appears
in this passage not to have entertained any generous thoughts concerning them.
Banks pointed out the relevance of the teaching against idolatry in this verse by
affirming its relevance to our own times:
"We do not bow and scrape before heathen images, but we are also idolaters. ot in
the crude way of Jonah's time, but in a more subtle, sophisticated, and therefore a
more sinister way. We have merely made some substitutions. In the place of
Ashtaroth, Baal, Chemosh, Dagon, Diana, Isis, Mammon, Molech and ebo we have
put alcohol, ambition, automobiles, greed, Hollywood, jazz, money, nicotine,](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-65-2048.jpg)
![pleasure, science, sports and sex. Moreover, many in "Christian" America classify
themselves as Buddhists, Muslims, etc.; and hundreds of millions in other lands still
worship the heathen gods."[38]
COKE, "Jonah 2:8. Forsake their own mercy, &c.— "They who worship idols
abandon the mercy of God, render it useless, and reject it, even though offered to
them and always ready to save them." Houbigant reads the last clause, Have
forsaken their benefactor: and he supposes that Jonah applies this to the mariners
who prayed to their gods, before they knew that the true God of heaven and earth,
who had raised the storm, was the same who appeased it.
PETT, "Verse 8-9
Those who regard lying vanities,
Forsake their own mercy,
But I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving,
I will pay what I have vowed.
Salvation is of YHWH.”
But he acknowledged that he had been clinging on to deceitful vanities as though he
was an idolater (for the phrase compare Psalms 31:6 where it probably refers to
idolatry). He had actually believed that he could resign his position as the servant of
YHWH and simply walk out on Him, as though YHWH was just an idol. And it had
caused him forsake the mercy that was available to him from YHWH. He could
hardly believe it of himself. But now all that was past. He was restored to his
obedience to YHWH, and once he was in a position to do so he would offer his
thanksgiving offering with gratitude, and would pay what he had vowed while he
was drowning. For now he recognised in a way that he had not before, that
Salvation was of YHWH, totally undeserved and freely given. It had to be for he
had just experienced it in that way himself.
‘Salvation is of YHWH.’ This is the message of the whole prophecy. It is God Who
saves and God alone. And He does it to whomever He will. o one, not even Jonah,
could interfere. Once he had learned that lesson he was free to go.
BE SO , "Verse 8-9
Jonah 2:8-9. They that observe lying vanities, &c. — They that seek to, or trust in,
idols, (often called by the names of vanity and lies,) forsake their own mercy —
Forsake him who alone is able to show mercy to them, and preserve them in time of
danger: who, to all that depend upon him, is an eternal fountain of mercy, even a
fountain of living waters which flow freely to all that seek unto him for them. But I
will sacrifice unto thee, &c. — I will offer to thee those thanks which I solemnly
promised to pay in the time of my trouble, and which will be as acceptable to thee as
the sacrifices of slain beasts.
TRAPP, "Verse 8
Jonah 2:8 They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy.](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-66-2048.jpg)
![Ver. 8. They that observe lying vanities] That listen to sense and reason in matters
of God, and make provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof, as Jonah had
done to his cost, till, having paid for his learning, he descried them all to be but
"lying vanities," or most vain vanities, empty nothings.
Forsake their own mercy] Are miserable by their own election, because sinners, in a
special manner, "against their own souls," as were Korah and his accomplices,
umbers 15:38; as was Pope Silvester, who gave his soul to the devil for seven years’
enjoyment of the popedom; and as are all those wilful wicked persons, that refusing
to be reformed, and hating to be healed, choose to spend the span of this life after
the ways of their own hearts, though they thereby perish for ever. These are those
fools of the people, that prefer an apple before paradise, a mess of pottage before the
inheritance of heaven, their swine before their Saviour, turning their backs upon
those blessed and bleeding embracements of his, and cruelly cutting the throats of
their own poor souls by an impenitent continuance in sin; so losing, for a few bitter
sweet pleasures, or paltry profits in this vale of tears, for an inch of time, that
fulness of felicity at God’s right hand, through all eternity. It is written of them who
tame the tiger, that when they have taken away the young one, knowing that
presently they shall be pursued by the old tigress, they set lookingglasses in the way
by which they flee; whereunto when she cometh and seeth some representation of
herself, she lingereth about them a good space, deceived by the shadow, and
detained in a vain hope to recover the young again; meanwhile the hunter most
speedily posteth away with his prey. Likewise deals Satan with the men of this world
(saith mine author); he casts before them the deceitful lusts of profit, pleasure, and
preferment, the worldling’s trinity, those "lying vanities," being none other than
shadows and semblances of good; yet are men so delighted with these that they dote
about them, having no care to pursue the enemy for recovery of that image of God,
the Divine nature, that Satan hath beguiled them from. He setteth them to the tree
of knowledge, that they may not taste of the tree of life. He putteth out their eyes
with the dust of covetousness, and shutteth their ears against the instructions of life,
lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should
understand with their hearts, and should be converted, and God should heal them,
Matthew 13:15. In all which there is not anything more to be lamented than this,
that people should "love to have it so," Jeremiah 5:31; be active in their own utter
undoing, Hosea 13:9; wittingly and willingly forsake God, the fountain of living
waters, their own mercies, as he is here called, and elsewhere, Psalms 144:2, and
hew themselves out "cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water," Jeremiah
2:13.
ELLICOTT, "(8) They that observe lying vanities.—See ote, Psalms 31:6.
Forsake their own mercy—i.e., forfeit their own share of the covenant grace. In
Psalms 37:28 it is said that Jehovah does not forsake his chasîdim; they, however, by
forsaking Jehovah (Himself called Israel’s mercy, Psalms 144:2, margin) and His
law (Psalms 89:30) can forfeit their chesed or covenant privilege.](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-67-2048.jpg)
![inwardness of mutual possession, the soul which has given itself to God and
possesses Him, has not only communion, but may even venture to claim as its own
the deeper and more mysterious union with God. Those multiform mercies, ‘which
endure for ever,’ and speed on their manifold errands into every remotest region of
His universe, gather themselves together, as the diffused lights of some nebulæ
£oncentrate themselves into a sun. That sun, like the star that led the wise men from
the East, and finally stood over one poor house in an obscure village, will shine
lambent above, and will pass into, the humblest heart that opens for it. They who
can say, as we all can if we will, ‘My God,’ can never want.
And if we turn to the alternative in our text, and consider who they are to whom we
turn when we turn from God, there should be nothing more needed to drive home
the wholesome conviction of the folly of the wisest, who deliberately prefers shadow
to substance, lying vanities to the one true and only reality. I beseech you to take
that which is your own, and which no man can take from you. Weigh in the scales of
conscience, and in the light of the deepest necessities of your nature, the whole pile
of those emptinesses that have been telling you lies ever since you listened to them;
and place in the other scale the mercy of God, and the Christ who brings it to you,
and decide which is the weightier, and which it becomes you to take for your pattern
for ever.
PULPIT, "Jonah contrasts the joy and comfort arising from the thought of God
with the miserable fate of idolaters. They that observe (Psalms 31:6); court, pay
deference to, reverence. Lying vanities; Septuagint, µάταια καὶ ψευδῆ, "vain things
and false." Idom (comp. Jeremiah 18:15; Hosea 12:11; 1 Corinthians 8:4). Their
own mercy; i.e. their state of favour with God—the mercy shown to them, as "the
mercies of [shown to] David" (Isaiah 55:3); or God himself, the Fountain of mercy
and goodness (Psalms 144:2). Henderson translates, "forsake their Benefactor."
9 But I, with shouts of grateful praise,
will sacrifice to you.
What I have vowed I will make good.
I will say, ‘Salvation comes from the Lord.’”
BAR ES, "But (And) with the voice of thanksgiving will I (would I fain)](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-70-2048.jpg)
![And hence he adds, To Jehovah is, or belongs, salvation; that is, to save is the
prerogative of God alone; Jehovah is here in the dative case, for prefixed to it is ,ל
lamed. It is then to Jehovah that salvation belongs; the work of saving appertains to
no other but to the Supreme God. Since it is so, we see how absurd and insane men
are, when they transfer praises to another, as every one does who invents an idol for
himself. As, then, there is but the one true God who saves, it behaves us to ascribe to
him alone all our praises, that we may not deprive him of his right. This is the
import of the whole. It follows —
COFFMA , "Verse 9
"But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving;
I will pay that which I have vowed. Salvation is of Jehovah."
"I will sacrifice ..." These are bold words indeed for one in the precarious situation
of Jonah at the time he uttered this promise; and Deane must surely be correct in
pointing out that "The Hebrew words here denote rather, `I would fain sacrifice,' as
it depended not on him but upon God whether or not he would be able to worship
again in the Holy Land."[39]
Livingston commented that, "The true act of sacrifice is an expression of gratitude
to God, rather than an effort to appease His wrath."[40] However, the experience
through which Jonah had so immediately lived surely indicates that penalties
exacted for sin and disobedience are directly connected with the appeasement of the
wrath of God, as when Jonah's being cast overboard was followed by the great
calm. Thus, there is an element of propitiation, and not merely expiation alone, both
in the experience of Jonah the type, and in the greater wonder of the atoning death
of the Christ upon Calvary.
TRAPP, "Verse 9
Jonah 2:9 But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay
[that] that I have vowed. Salvation [is] of the LORD.
Ver. 9. But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving] q.d. Let others
do as they think good; let them make a match with mischief till they have enough of
it; let them walk till they have wearied themselves in the ways of their hearts and in
the sight of their eyes; but let them know (I speak it by woeful experience) that for
all these things God will bring them to judgment, Ecclesiastes 11:9. The best that
can come of sin is repentance: and that is not in man’s power but in God’s gift, 2
Timothy 2:25. If he had not melted my hard heart, and brought me back to himself
with a strong hand, I had pined away in mine iniquities, and perished for ever. But
now having been so miraculously delivered from so great a death, "I will sacrifice
unto the Lord with the voice of thanksgiving"; I will set up my note and sing aloud
unto God my Saviour, who hath thus beyond all desert delivered such a miserable
wretch, rebel, and regegade as myself.](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-74-2048.jpg)
![I will sacrifice] Heb. I will slay, sc. those birds and beasts in use for feasts and
sacrifices at Jerusalem,
with the voice of thanksgiving] Heb. of confession, that is, I will confess and
acknowledge God to be what he is, to do what he doth, and to give what he giveth.
ow to offer a sacrifice at such a confession or thanksgiving added much to the
solemnity thereof; and made it more honourable in itself, and more acceptable to
God. To these gratulatory sacrifices the word slaying is attributed, as hero, to show
that even in gratulation expiation must be made; and that by the blood and sacrifice
of Christ all our offerings are accepted in heaven.
I will pay that I have vowed] ot my general vow only as a covenanter, to devote
myself to his fear and service all my days; but those particular, personal, voluntary
vows made in my distress; such as was that of Jacob, Genesis 28:20; Hannah, 1
Samuel 1:11; David, Psalms 132:1-2, &c. In affliction men are wondrously apt to
promise great matters, if they may but be delivered. See Psalms 78:36. Pliny, in an
epistle to one of his friends, that desired rules from him how to order his life aright;
I will, saith he, give you one rule, that shall be instead of a thousand: Ut tales esse
perseveremus sani, quales nos futuros esse profitemur infirmi: That you be sure to
be the same when well that you vowed to be when you were sick. But this is few
men’s care. See Jeremiah 34:10-11. Sons of Belial break these bonds as Samson did
the green withes, and cast away those cords from them; if they could, at least; being
worse herein than those mariners, Jonah 1:16, than Saul, that made great
conscience of violating his vow, 1 Samuel 14:21, than Turks and Papists, who are
superstitiously strict this way. Jonah knew it to be as bad, if not worse, than
perjury, to vow and not to perform, umbers 30:3, and that God is the avenger of
all such, Deuteronomy 23:21. He therefore, not merely for fear of punishment, but
chiefly for hatred of that sin, saith,
I will pay that I have vowed] The Hebrew word Ashallemah seemeth to imply two
things. First, that his vow till paid was incomplete, it was an imperfect thing; the
better part of it was yet wanting. ext, that till that chare were done he could not be
at peace within himself, he could not be quiet; for vows are debts; and debts, till
they be paid, are a burden to an honest mind, and do much disease it.
Salvation is of the Lord] Salus omnimoda, as the Hebrew word Jeshugnathah
(having one letter more than ordinary in it) importeth; {Hebrew Text ote} all
manner of salvation, full and plentiful deliverance, "is of the Lord"; who is
therefore called, the "God of salvation," unto whom belong the issues from death,
Psalms 68:20. A quo vera salus non aliunde venit. This Jonah speaketh, as he doth
all else in this holy canticle, not by reading, or by rote, but out of his own feeling and
good experience; his whole discourse was dug out of his own breast, as it is said of
that most excellent 119th Psalm, that it is made up altogether of experiments; and it](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-75-2048.jpg)
![said, to the fish.
But as this deliverance of Jonah is an image of the resurrection, this is an
extraordinary passage, and worthy of being especially noticed; for the Holy Spirit
carries our minds to that power by which the world was formed and is still
wonderfully preserved. That we may then, without hesitation and doubt, be
convinced of the restoration which God promises to us, let us remember that the
world was by him created out of nothing by his word and bidding, and is still thus
sustained. But if this general truth is not sufficient, let this history of Jonah come to
our minds, — that God commanded a fish to cast forth Jonah: for how was it that
Jonah escaped safe and was delivered? Even because it so pleased God, because the
Lord commanded; and this word at this day retains the same efficacy. By that
power then, by which he works all things, we also shall one day be raised up from
the dead. ow follows —
COFFMA , "Verse 10
"And Jehovah spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land."
"Jonah's deliverance is the only pleasant usage of the word vomit in the whole
Bible."[41] We do not know, of course, exactly where Jonah was deposited on dry
land; but Josephus stated that it was upon the shore of the Euxine sea.[42] If that
was true, the great fish passed through the Dardenelles before depositing him, thus
following the strong current which is mentioned in Jonah's prayer. Some have
quibbled about how Jonah got his information about being in the fish "three days
and three nights"; and we cannot give a positive answer to that either; however, as
an inspired prophet of God he accurately foretold the calm that would follow his
being thrown overboard; and it appears that this was a far more wonderful
knowledge than that of the exact time he was inside the fish. We may therefore trust
the holy record implicitly.
An ancient poem attributed to Tertullian describes Jonah's deliverance thus:
"His sails ... the intestines of a fish;
Himself shut in by waters, yet untouched;
In the sea's heart, and yet beyond its reach;
Mid wrecks of fleets
Half eaten, and men's carcasses dissolved
In putrid disintegrity: in life
Learning the process of his death; but still-
To be a sign hereafter of the Lord,](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-81-2048.jpg)
![To witness was he in his very self,
ot of destruction, but of death's repulse!"[43]SIZE
COKE, "Jonah 2:10. And the Lord spake unto the fish— The power of the
Almighty is frequently represented in Scripture, as bringing things to pass by his
bare word and command; he speaks, and it is done. Various are the traditions of the
Orientals, respecting the place where Jonah was disembogued; but, as Calmet well
observes, amidst such doubt and obscurity, the best part is absolute silence, and the
sincere declaration that the matter is entirely unknown. Bishop Huet supposes, that
Jonah's deliverance from the fish's belly gave occasion to the famous Greek fable of
Arion, who, after he was cast into the sea, was conveyed, as the story goes, by a
dolphin into the port of Corinth; and it is certain that a great part of the heathen
mythology was borrowed from the Scripture history.
REFLECTIO S.—1st, ever, to appearance, was situation more desperate than
when Jonah was cast into the stormy ocean, unless it were when he descended into
the fish's belly: yet even in the lowest state of misery God can save; and Jonah now
is as safe in the monster's stomach, as if he were on dry land; and finds both power
to pray, and fervent desires after the Lord his God, who thus plainly shewed him
that he had not abandoned him to destruction, and thereby engaged him to exercise
faith in his pardoning grace and preserving providence. ote; (1.) o place can shut
out the soul from communion with God; wherever we are, the way to a throne of
grace is open. (2.) Our encouragement to draw near to God is, the humble
persuasion that he is our God, reconciled to us, and willing to hear and help us in
every time of need.
1. He cried and was heard: I cried by reason of mine affliction. This was the blessed
means of driving him to God. Out of the belly of hell cried I, out of the belly of the
fish, where he seemed buried as in his grave; and thou heardest my voice, for no
prayer of faith returns without an answer of peace.
2. He describes his distressed situation, sunk in the deep, buried in the midst of the
seas, compassed with the floods, and all the waves and billows running over him.
And this was God's doing. His life appeared in the most imminent danger: he was
inclosed with waters, and his head wrapped with sea-weeds; he went down to the
bottoms of the mountains, when the fish descended; and the bars of the earth, so
deep he sunk, appeared to be about him for ever: his state helpless and hopeless. To
such distress are God's dearest children sometimes reduced, to shew them more
eminently the power and grace of God engaged for their deliverance.
3. His heart began to fail him. God's displeasure, seen in his wretched case,
discouraged him, and he feared that he was abandoned, and cast out of God's sight,
as he knew that he had justly deserved to be. Thus when outward trials oppress us,
we too often give way to unbelief, and are sore beset with inward fears, as if God
had utterly forsaken us, and hid his face in displeasure: but it is our privilege to be](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-82-2048.jpg)
![recollect that it was intended as a very peculiar type of Christ's resurrection, the
ground of all our hopes. The greater exertion of Omnipotence may be expected,
where the mission of the Saviour of the world, who is the great Creator and
Supporter of the universe, was to be in any measure established thereby.
PETT, "Verse 10
‘And YHWH spoke to the fish, and it vomited out Jonah on the dry land.’
Then the large fish approached land, no doubt under God’s direction, and YHWH
then spoke to it and it vomited Jonah out on the dry land. ow at last Jonah knew
where he had been, in the innards of a large fish.
The message was clear to all. Whether it was a matter of the sea, or of the denizens
of the deep, YHWH was in full control of His creation, which did what He bid.
BE SO , "Verse 10
Jonah 2:10. And the Lord — This should rather have been rendered, For the Lord;
because what follows was not done after the preceding thanksgiving, but before it;
and it is mentioned here only to show the cause or subject of the thanksgiving. The
Lord spake unto the fish, &c. — God’s almighty power is represented in Scripture
as bringing things to pass by his bare will and command: see Genesis 1:3. He willed
that the fish should cast Jonah up on the dry land, and the fish did so. Various are
the traditions of the Orientals respecting the place where Jonah was disembogued;
but, as Calmet well observes, amidst such doubt and obscurity, the best part is
absolute silence, and the sincere declaration that the matter is entirely unknown.
“The fame of Jonah’s deliverance appears to have spread among the heathen
nations; and the Greeks, who were accustomed to adore the memory of their heroes
by every remarkable event and embellishment which they could appropriate, added
to the fictitious adventures of Hercules, that of his having continued three days,
without injury, in the belly of a dog, sent against him by eptune.” — Gray’s Key.
Huetius (Demonst. Evang., Prop. 4) supposes that Jonah’s deliverance from the
whale’s belly gave occasion to the Greek story of Arion, who, after he was cast into
the sea, was conveyed by a dolphin to the port of Corinth.
TRAPP, "Verse 10
Jonah 2:10 And the LORD spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the
dry [land].
Ver. 10. And the Lord spake unto the fish] He spake the word and it was done: he is
the great centurion of the world, that saith to his creature, Do this, and he doth it.
Dei dicere est facere (Aug.). Yea, he is the great, great Induperator, {Imperator} to
whom everything saith, Iussa sequi tam velle mihi quam posse necesse esse (Lucan.):
I am wholly at thy beck and check. Jonah spake to God, and God to the fish. It may
be said of faithful prayer, that it can do whatsoever God himself can do; since he is
pleased to yield himself, overcome by the prayers of his people, and to say unto them
cordially, as Zedekiah did to his courtiers colloquingly, The king is not he that can
deny you anything. Prayer is of that power that it can open the doors of leviathan,](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-84-2048.jpg)
![as we see here (which yet is reckoned as a thing not feasible, Job 41:14), yea of the
all devouring grave, Hebrews 11:35. If the Lord, pricked on by the prayer of his
people, set in hand to save them, and shall "say to the north, Give up; and to the
south, Keep not back: bring my sons from far, and my daughters from the ends of
the earth," Isaiah 43:6, they shall come amain, and none shall be able to hinder
them; "Come, therefore" (with those good souls in Hosea, who had smarted for
their folly, as well as Jonah), "and let us return unto the Lord: for he hath torn, and
he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up. After two days will he revive
us: in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight," Hosea 6:1-2. A
time we must have to be in the fire, in the fish’s belly, as in God’s nurturing house;
but he will take care that we be not there overly long; what is two or three days to
eternity? Hold out, faith and patience: "Yet a very little, little while, and he that
shall come will come, and will not tarry," Hebrews 10:37.
And it vomited up Jonah upon the dry land] And here death was defeated and
wiped; it was much more so when it had swallowed up Christ; and little dreamt that
itself should have been thereby "swallowed up in victory." Quantum in devoratione
mors laetata est, tantum luxit in vomitu (Jerome). But then was fulfilled that of the
prophet, O death, I will be thy death. And as there, so here, in a proportion, and as
a type, omnia iam inversa, saith Mercer, all things are turned the other way. Before
the fish was an instrument of death; now of life, and serves Jonah for a ship to bring
him to dry land. This fish useth not to come near the shore, but to sport in the great
waters; howbeit now he must, by special command, "vomit up Jonah upon the dry
land." "Why then should it be thought a thing incredible with any that God should
raise the dead?" Acts 26:8. The sea shall surely give up the dead that were in it; and
death and hell deliver up the dead that were in them; and they shall be judged every
man according to his works, Revelation 20:13. This some of the heathens believed;
as Zoroaster, Theopompus, and Plato. And the Stoics’ opinion was, that the world
should one day be dissolved by fire or water; and all things brought to a better state,
or to the first golden age again (Sen. at. Quaest. 1. 3, c. 26-30). But we have a more
sure word of prophecy; and this that is here recorded may serve as an image and
type of our preservation in the grave, and our resurrection from the dead, by one
and the same almighty power of God.
PULPIT, "Spake unto the fish. The punishment having done its work, the fish is
impelled by some secret influence to eject Jonah on the dry land, on the third day
after he was swallowed (Jonah 1:17). Some, who regard the Book of Jonah as an
historical allegory, see in these three days an adumbration of the period of the
Babylonish captivity, during which Israel was buried in darkness, and from which
she rose to a new and happier life. They compare, as referring to the same
transaction, Jeremiah 51:34, Jeremiah 51:44 and Hosea 6:1, Hosea 6:2. Upon the
dry land. Probably on the coast of Palestine, whence he had started.](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/jonah2commentary-161014025737/75/Jonah-2-commentary-85-2048.jpg)
Uploaded byGLENN PEASE
Jonah 2 commentary
Jonah prayed to God from inside the belly of the great fish that had swallowed him. In his prayer, Jonah thanked God for delivering him from drowning in the sea and expressed his faith that God would fully rescue him. Jonah referred to God as "his God", indicating he still maintained his covenant relationship with God despite disobeying him. The prayer shows Jonah was in great mental anguish as his faith struggled against his fears, but he remained convinced that God would show mercy if he cried out for help. Scholars debate whether similarities between Jonah's prayer and passages in Psalms indicate the prayer incorporated parts of the psalms or simply reflected Jonah's knowledge of scripture, but in either case it
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Jonah 2 commentary
- 1. JO AH 2COMME TARY EDITED BY GLE PEASE 1 [a]From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the Lord his God. BAR ES, "Then - (“And”) Jonah prayed, i. e., when the three days and nights were passed, he uttered this devotion. The word “prayed” includes thanksgiving, not petition only. It is said of Hannah that she “prayed” 1Sa_2:1; but her canticle is all one thanksgiving without a single petition. In this thanksgiving Jonah says how his prayers had been heard, but prays no more. God had delivered him from the sea, and be thanks God, in the fish’s belly, as undisturbed as in a Church or an oratory, secure that God, who had done so much, would fulfill the rest. He called God, “his” God, who had in so many ways shown Himself to be His, by His revelations, by His inspirations, by His chastisements, and now by His mercy . “From these words, ‘Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God out of the fish’s belly,’ we perceive that, after he felt himself safe in the fish’s belly, he despaired not of God’s mercy.” CLARKE, "Then Jonah prayed - out of the fish’s belly - This verse makes the first of the second chapter in the Hebrew text. It may be asked, “How could Jonah either pray or breathe in the stomach of the fish?” Very easily, if God so willed it. And let the reader keep this constantly in view; the whole is a miracle, from Jonah’s being swallowed by the fish till he was cast ashore by the same animal. It was God that had prepared the great fish. It was the Lord that spake to the fish, and caused it to vomit Jonah upon the dry land. All is miracle. GILL, "Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God out of the fish's belly. Though Jonah had been a praying man, being a good man, and a prophet of the Lord, yet it seems he had not prayed for some time; being disobedient to the will of God, he restrained prayer before him; all the while he was going to Joppa he prayed not; and how indeed could he have the face to pray to him, from whose face he was fleeing? and as soon as he was in the ship he fell asleep, and there lay till he was waked by the shipmaster, who called upon him to arise, and pray to his God; but whether he did or no is not said; and though it is very probable he might, when convicted of his sin, and before he was cast into the sea, and as he was casting into it; his not recorded; but when he was in the fish's belly, "then he prayed"; where it is marvellous he should, or could; it was strange he should be able to breathe, and more strange to breathe spiritually; it was
- 2. very wonderful heshould have the exercise of his reason, and more that he should have the exercise of grace, as faith and hope, as it appears by the following prayer he had. Prayer may be performed any where, on a mountain, in a desert, in the caves and dens of the earth, and in a prison, as it has been; but this is the only time it ever was performed in such a place. Jonah is the only man that ever prayed in a fish's belly: and he prayed unto the Lord as "his God", not merely by creation, and as the God of nature and providence, the God of his life, and of his mercies; but as his covenant God and Father; for though he had sinned against the Lord, and had been sorely chastised by him, yet he did not take his lovingkindness from him, nor suffer his faithfulness to fail, or break his covenant with him; covenant interest and relation still continued; and Jonah had knowledge of it, and faith in it; and as this is an argument the Lord makes use of to engage backsliders to return unto him, it is a great encouragement to them so to do, Jer_ 3:14. In this Jonah was a type of Christ, who, amidst his agonies, sorrows, and sufferings, prayed to his Father, and claimed his interest in him as his God, Heb_5:7. What follows contains the sam and substance of the prophet's thoughts, and the ejaculations of his mind, when in the fish's belly; but were not put up in this form, but were reduced by him into it after he was delivered; as many of David's psalms were put into the form and order they are after his deliverance from troubles, suitable to his thoughts of things when he was in them; and indeed the following account is an historical narration of facts, which were before and after his prayer, as well as of that itself. HE RY, "God and his servant Jonah had parted in anger, and the quarrel began on Jonah's side; he fled from his country that he might outrun his work; but we hope to see them both together again, and the reconciliation begins on God's side. In the close of the foregoing chapter we found God returning to Jonah in a way of mercy, delivering him from going down to the pit, having found a ransom; in this chapter we find Jonah returning to God in a way of duty; he was called up in the former chapter to pray to his God, but we are not told that he did so; however, now at length he is brought to it. Now observe here, I. When he prayed (Jon_2:1): Then Jonah prayed; then when he was in trouble, under the sense of sin and the tokens of God's displeasure against him for sin, then he prayed. Note, When we are in affliction we must pray; then we have occasion to pray, then we have errands at the throne of grace and business there; then, if ever, we shall have a disposition to pray, when the heart is humbled, and softened, and made serious; then God expects it (in their affliction they will seek me early, seek me earnestly); and, though we bring our afflictions upon ourselves by our sins, yet, if we pray in humility and godly sincerity, we shall be welcome to the throne of grace, as Jonah was. Then when he was in a hopeful way of deliverance, being preserved alive by miracle, a plain indication that he was reserved for further mercy, then he prayed. An apprehension of God's good-will to us, notwithstanding our offences, gives us boldness of access to him, and opens the lips in prayer which were closed with the sense of guilt and dread of wrath. II. Where he prayed - in the fish's belly. No place is amiss for prayer. I will that men pray every where. Wherever God casts us we may find a way open to heaven-ward, if it be not our own fault. Undique ad coelos tantundem est viae - The heavens are equally accessible from every part of the earth. He that has Christ dwelling in his heart by faith, wherever he goes carries the altar along with him, that sanctifies the gift, and is himself a living temple. Jonah was here in confinement; the belly of the fish was his prison, was a close and dark dungeon to him; yet there he had freedom of access to God, and walked
- 3. at liberty incommunion with him. Men may shut us out from communion with one another, but not from communion with God. Jonah was now in the bottom of the sea, yet out of the depths he cries to God; as Paul and Silas prayed in the prison, in the stocks. III. To whom he prayed - to the Lord his God. He had been fleeing from God, but now he sees the folly of it, and returns to him; by prayer he draws near to that God whom he had gone aside from, and engages his heart to approach him. In prayer he has an eye to him, not only as the Lord, but as his God, a God in covenant with him; for, thanks be to God, every transgression in the covenant does not throw us out of covenant. This encourages even backsliding children to return. Jer_3:22, Behold, we come unto thee, for thou art the Lord our God. IV. What his prayer was. He afterwards recollected the substance of it, and left it upon record. He reflects upon the workings of his heart towards God when he was in his distress and danger, and the conflict that was then in his breast between faith and sense, between hope and fear. JAMISO , "Jon_2:1-10. Jonah’s prayer of faith and deliverance. his God — “his” still, though Jonah had fled from Him. Faith enables Jonah now to feel this; just as the returning prodigal says of the Father, from whom he had wandered, “I will arise and go to my Father” (Luk_15:18). out of the fish’s belly — Every place may serve as an oratory. No place is amiss for prayer. Others translate, “when (delivered) out of the fish’s belly.” English Version is better. CALVI , "When Jonah says that he prayed from the bowels of the fish, he shows first with what courage of mind he was endued. He had then put on a new heart; for when he was at liberty he thought that he could in a manner escape from God, he became a fugitive from the Lord: but now while inclosed within narrow bounds, he begins to pray, and of his own accord sets himself in God’s presence. This is a change worthy of being noticed: and hence we may learn how much it profits us to be drawn back often as it were by cords, or to be held tied up with fetters because when we are free we go astray here and there beyond all limits. Jonah, when he was at liberty, became, as we have seen, wanton; but now finding himself restrained by the mighty hand of God, he receives a new mind, and prays from the bowels of the fish (36). But how was it that he directed his petitions then to God, by whose hand he saw that he was so heavily pressed? For God most rigidly handled him; Jonah was in a manner doomed to eternal ruin; the bowels of the fish, as we shall hereafter see, were indeed to him as it were hell or the grave. But in this state of despair Jonah even gathered courage, and was able to retake himself directly to God. It was a wonderful and almost incredible example of faith. Let us then learn to weigh well what is here said; for when the Lord heavily afflicts us, it is then a legitimate and seasonable time for prayer. But we know that the greater part despond, and do not usually offer their prayers freely to God, except their minds be in a calm state; and yet God then especially invites us to himself when we are reduced to extremities. Let this, then, which Jonah declares of himself, come to our minds, — that he cried to God from hell itself: and, at the same time, he assures us
- 4. that his prayerproceeded from true faith; for he does not simply say that he prayed to Jehovah, but he adds that he was his God; and he speaks with a serious and deeply-reflective mind. Though Jonah then was not only like one dead, but also on the confines of perdition, he yet believed that God would be merciful if he fled to him. We hence see that Jonah prayed not at random, as hypocrites are wont to take God’s name in their mouths when they are in distress, but he prayed in earnest; for he was persuaded that God would be propitious to him. But we must remember that his prayer was not composed in the words which are here related; but Jonah, while in the bowels of the fish, dwelt on these thoughts in his mind. Hence he relates in this song how he thought and felt; and we shall see that he was then in a state of distraction, as our minds must necessarily be tossed here and there by temptations. For the servants of God do not gain the victory without great struggle. We must fight, and indeed strenuously, that we may conquer. Jonah then in this song shows that he was agitated with great trouble and hard contests: yet this conviction was firmly fixed in his heart, — that God was to be sought, and would not be sought in vain, as he is ever ready to bring help to his people whenever they cry to him. COFFMA , "All ten verses of this brief chapter relate almost entirely to the prayer uttered by Jonah from inside the fish. Jonah was a close student of the Holy Scriptures, especially of the Psalms, as indicated by his use of much terminology found also in them. Destructive critics have exercised the most valiant and persistent efforts to make this common terminology between Jonah and the Psalms a basis of their insistence upon a post-exilic date; but, as we shall more pointedly observe in the notes, below, such allegations are groundless. Many of the Psalms having words or clauses in common with Jonah were doubtless dated long before the prophet appeared; and in a very few cases where this is alleged not to be the case, the correspondence clearly indicated that the Psalmist was influenced by Jonah, and not the other way around. In addition to this, there is convincing evidence of the most positive nature found in the prayer itself which indicates a date long before that favored by Old Testament enemies. Jonah 2:1 "Then Jonah prayed unto Jehovah his God out of the fish's belly." The first threat to Jonah's life was, of course, that of drowning; and, for whatever period of time he might have been conscious inside the sea-monster, he was profoundly grateful for his being saved from drowning; and that salvation led him to believe that God would preserve him alive throughout the entire experience. This situation explains the double application of some of the expressions in the prayer. Critics like to complain that the passage (Jonah 2) "is not a prayer but a thanksgiving for deliverance."[1] However, in the words of Young who refuted such statements, "Is not thanksgiving of the very essence of prayer?"[2] "Such critical censure is pointless, displaying ignorance of the fact that thanksgiving
- 5. is the veryheart of prayer; but this is not a psalm of deliverance from the great fish. It is rather a psalm of deliverance from drowning."[3] THE PROBLEM OF THE PSALM The fact of a number of words, phrases, and clauses from Jonah's prayer (or psalm) resembling or corresponding rather closely to similar expressions in the Book of Psalms is a big point of contention to some. It is true that a number of parallels exist:[4] Jonah 2 Psalms Jonah 2:3b...................Ps. 18:7; 120:1 Jonah 2:4b...................Ps. 18:6; 30:4 Jonah 2:5....................Ps. 42:8 Jonah 2:6....................Ps. 31:23; 5:8 Jonah 2:7....................Ps. 18:8; 69:2f Jonah 2:8....................Ps. 18:17; 30:4; 103:4 Jonah 2:9....................Ps. 142:4; 143:4; 18:7; 5:8 Jonah 2:10...................Ps. 88:3; 31:7; 26:7; 50:14,23; 42:5; 116:7 All that is actually proved by these similarities is that Jonah was steeped in a thorough knowledge of the devotional language of God's people. Keil was correct in his flat denial that Jonah's prayer was in any way "compounded from passages in the Psalms."[5] Knobel and DeWette, as quoted by Keil, affirm that: "Jonah's prayer is the simple and natural utterance of a man versed in the holy Scripture and living in the Word of God, and is in perfect accordance with the prophet's circumstances and the state of his mind."[6] There are no quotations from the Psalms in Jonah's words, but only the usage of certain words, phrases, etc., known to all faithful Hebrews. "The words (in Jonah's prayer) fit none (of the Psalms) well enough to conclude that they are specific quotations. More likely, many Psalms were in mind and freely paraphrased to fit the particular situation and in a manner which expressed Jonah's appropriate emotions."[7] Critics will have their way, however, and one of the strategies is to date all of the Psalms at a point long after Jonah lived, but we shall not play games with dating Old Testament Scriptures. If the Psalms are later than Jonah, then the Psalmist was influenced by the Prophet! And, as Deane said, "It is a matter of controversy, incapable of settlement, whether Jonah or the Psalmist is the original!"[8] Concerning the date of the Psalms, certainly, "The most of these had then (in the times of Jonah) been written, and, as the Church Psalter, would be familiar to a prophet of God ... and so in all times, all over the world, the saintly praise and pray `in the words of David.'"[9] The nobility and spiritual import of this matchless psalm-prayer were commented upon by Blaikie:
- 6. "Only tell uswhat a man says into the secret ear of God and you have told us all that is in his heart, have revealed what microscope could not detect, not scalpel lay bare ... It shows Jonah at bottom, a regenerate and saintly man."[10] PECULIARITIES OF THE PRAYER Its brevity. One of the startling things about this remarkable utterance on the part of Jonah is the brevity of it, being easily read in less than sixty seconds! Hillis thought this suggested that Jonah "did not live long inside the fish."[11] There is no certain way by which this question may be dogmatically resolved; and we shall leave it open. Many, along with Banks, have observed that, "Conservative Bible scholars believe that he died and point out that this best typifies what happened to Christ."[12] The use of the past tense. According to Matthew Henry: "This indicates that he (Jonah) afterward recollected the substance of it, and left it upon record. He reflects upon the workings of his heart toward God when he was in his distress and danger, and the conflict that was then in his breast between faith and sense, between hope and fear."[13] U ITY OF JO AH This psalm-prayer is alleged by some to be an addition to the narrative, thus compromising the unity of the Book of Jonah, and leading to the allegation that this chapter is not a part of the original record. This is false. As Young pointed out, "If Jonah 2:2-9 be removed, the symmetry of the book is most certainly destroyed."[14] Besides that, there is not the slightest historical or textual evidence that the 2chapter of this book is any less original than the rest of it. All of the objections to this prayer-psalm disappear upon a careful examination of the text itself. COKE, "Jonah 2:1. Then Jonah prayed, &c.— The following prayer was conceived and formed, as to substance, in the belly of the fish, and probably afterwards digested and written in its present mode; a thanksgiving for his deliverance being added at the end of it. Houbigant very properly reads the verbs in the following verse in the present tense, because, says he, Jonah is said to pray when in the belly of the fish. By the belly of hell, is meant the lowest parts of the deep, or place which was to Jonah as the grave. PETT, "Verse 1 ‘Then Jonah prayed to YHWH his God out of the fish’s innards.’ All Jonah probably knew was that he was somewhere safe where he could breathe and pray. It would only be later that he discovered that he was in the innards of a large fish. And knowing that he had been saved from certain death he was no doubt confident that God would sort everything out. Verses 1-10
- 7. Jonah’s Prayer OfRepentance And Gratitude (Jonah 2:1-10). Finding himself rescued from drowning, Jonah expressed his gratitude to God, and, probably puzzled as to where he was, called on God for restitution to His favour, ‘I am cast out from your sight, yet will I look again towards your holy Temple’, and again, ‘Those who regard lying vanities (Jonah in his flight), forsake their own mercy, but I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving, I will pay what I have vowed.’ It is apparent that while in the sea he had made certain vows to YHWH. The prayer is necessary in order to demonstrate that God’s mercy was revealed towards Jonah, as it had been towards the sailors, and would be towards ineveh. It draws attention to his repentance, and prepares for what follows. There is nothing in it which requires a late date, and its ideas are similar to what we view as mainly early Psalms. It suggests that Jonah was very familiar with Temple worship, or with similar worship in Israel. The parallels are not such, however, as to suggest direct borrowing. For examples of such parallels see the introduction. To those who ask whether Jonah was likely to compose a Psalm while in the innards of the great fish our reply is, what else was he likely to do. He had to have something to occupy his time. For a prophet composing a prophetic psalm would be ideal. His description of nearly drowning is vivid, even though his experience must only have lasted two or three minutes. At such times the thoughts are very much concentrated. It did, however, give him the opportunity to review what he had done and to repent in his heart. And then quite by a miracle he had found himself seized, and he had found himself enveloped by something he knew not what, and that he was able to breathe. And now here he was, able to thank God for deliverance from drowning and to confirm his repentance, and wait on God for further deliverance. His mind would naturally turn to composing a psalm of thanksgiving. Analysis of Jonah 2:1-10. a Then Jonah prayed to YHWH his God out of the fish’s innards (Jonah 2:1). b “I called by reason of my affliction to YHWH, and he answered me, out of the belly of Sheol I cried, you heard my voice” (Jonah 2:2). c “For you cast me into the depth, in the heart of the seas, and the flood was round about me, all your waves and your billows passed over me” (Jonah 2:3). d “And I said, ‘I am cast out from before your eyes, yet I will look again towards your holy temple” (Jonah 2:4). e “The waters compassed me about, even to the soul, the deep was round about me, the weeds were wrapped about my head” (Jonah 2:5). f “I went down to the bottoms of the mountains, the earth with its bars closed on me for ever, yet have you brought up my life from the pit, O YHWH my God” (Jonah 2:6). e “When my soul fainted within me, I remembered YHWH” (Jonah 2:7 a). d “And my prayer came in to you, into your holy temple” (Jonah 2:7 b).
- 8. c “Those whoregard lying vanities, forsake their own mercy” (Jonah 2:8 a). b “But I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving, I will pay what I have vowed. Salvation is of YHWH” (Jonah 2:9-9). a And YHWH spoke to the fish, and it vomited out Jonah on the dry land (Jonah 2:10). ote that in ‘a’ Jonah spoke to YHWH from the fish, and in the parallel YHWH spoke to the fish about Jonah. In ‘b’ he cried to YHWH from the very belly of Sheol, and in the parallel he gives thanks that God heard him and delivered him. In ‘c’ we find Jonah seemingly treated without mercy, and in the parallel the consequence of Jonah’s lying vanities, will be that he has forsaken his own mercy. In ‘d’ he looks towards YHWH’s holy Temple, and in the parallel he prays towards YHWH’s holy Temple. In ‘e’ the waters surrounded his soul, and in the parallel his soul fainted within hi. Centrally in ‘f’ he reached the lowest depths only to find deliverance. BE SO , "Verse 1-2 Jonah 2:1-2. Then Jonah prayed — Those devout thoughts and feelings which he had at that time, he afterward digested into the following prayer, and added a thanksgiving for his deliverance at the end of it. So several of David’s Psalms were probably composed after his trouble was over; but in a manner suitable to the thoughts he had at the time of his affliction; and with a grateful sense of God’s mercies for his deliverance out of it: see Psalm 54. and 120. And he heard me — He thanks God that, in consequence of his prayer, his life is wonderfully preserved. Out of the belly of hell cried I — The word שׁאול signifies the state of the dead. So it may most properly be rendered the grave here, as the margin reads: the belly of the fish was to Jonah instead of a grave. TRAPP, " Then Jonah prayed unto the LORD his God out of the fish’s belly, Ver. 1. Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God] i.e. Praised God with this Canticum eucharisticum, this gratulatory song, as Tremellius calleth it. That he prayed in the ship, in the sea, in the whale’s belly, we doubt not; but that he chiefly intendeth to show his thankfulness for the return of prayers and the sweet support he felt in the whale’s belly we do as little doubt, see Jonah 2:2; Jonah 2:6-7; yea, that this was the substance (though now better methodized) of what he prayed and praised in the bowels of the fish we have cause to believe from this very verse; and therefore also his deliverance is set down, Jonah 2:10, after his doxology. The word here rendered prayed signifieth also, sometimes, to give thanks, as 1 Samuel 2:2; and who knows not that thanksgiving is a special part of prayer? This therefore is prayer. Jonah having prayed, and perceiving that he was heard, and by the goodness of God preserved safe in body and sound in mind, he grows "strong in faith, giving glory to God," Romans 4:20, and being fully persuaded that he should yet walk before him again in the land of the living. Out of the fish’s belly] Where, though he might seem buried alive, and free among the dead, yet he enjoyed God’s gracious presence, and those strong consolations that made him live in the very mouth of death, and say in effect, as blessed Bradford did, I thank God more for this prison and for this dark dungeon than for any parlour,
- 9. yea, than ofany pleasure that ever I had; for in it I find God my most sweet God always. ELLICOTT, "Verse 1 II. JO AH’S PRAYER A D DELIVERA CE. (1) Then Jonah prayed.—This introduction, to what is in reality a psalm of thanksgiving, has its parallel in Hannah’s song (1 Samuel 2:1-10), which is introduced in the same way. Comp. also the ote appended by the psalm collector at the end of Psalms 72, “The prayers of David the son of Jesse are ended.” EXPOSITOR'S BIBLE COMME TARY, "THE GREAT FISH A D WHAT IT MEA S-THE PSALM Jonah 2:1-10 AT this point in the tale appears the Great Fish. "And Jehovah prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights." After the very natural story which we have followed, this verse obtrudes itself with a shock of unreality and grotesqueness. What an anticlimax! say some; what a clumsy intrusion! So it is if Jonah be taken as an individual. But if we keep in mind that he stands here, not for himself, but for his nation, the difficulty and the grotesqueness disappear. It is Israel’s ill-will to the heathen, Israel’s refusal of her mission, Israel’s embarkation on the stormy sea of the world’s politics, which we have had described as Jonah’s. Upon her flight from God’s will there followed her Exile, and from her Exile, which was for a set period, she came back to her own land, a people still, and still God’s servant to the heathen. How was the author to express this national death and resurrection? In conformity with the popular language of his time, he had described Israel’s turning from God’s will by her embarkation on a stormy sea, always the symbol of the prophets for the tossing heathen world that was ready to engulf her; and now to express her exile and return he sought metaphors in the same rich poetry of the popular imagination. To the Israelite who watched from his hills that stormy coast on which the waves hardly ever cease to break in their impotent restlessness, the sea was a symbol of arrogance and futile defiance to the will of God. The popular mythology of the Semites had filled it with turbulent monsters, snakes, and dragons who wallowed like its own waves, helpless against the bounds set to them, or rose to wage war against the gods in heaven and the great lights which they had created; but a god slays them and casts their carcasses for meat and drink to the thirsty people of the desert. It is a symbol of the perpetual war between light and darkness; the dragons are the clouds, the slayer the sun. A variant form, which approaches closely to that of Jonah’s great fish, is still found in Palestine. In May, 1891, I witnessed at
- 10. Hasbeya, on thewestern skirts of Hermon, an eclipse of the moon. When the shadow began to creep across her disc there rose from the village a hideous din of drums, metal pots, and planks of wood beaten together; guns were fired, and there was much shouting. I was told that this was done to terrify the great fish which was swallowing the moon, and to make him disgorge her. ow these purely natural myths were applied by the prophets and poets of the Old Testament to the illustration, not only of Jehovah’s sovereignty over the storm and the night, but of His conquest of the heathen powers who had enslaved His people. Isaiah had heard in the sea the confusion and rage of the peoples against the bulwark which Jehovah set around Israel, [Isaiah 17:12-14] but it is chiefly from the time of the Exile onward that the myths themselves, with their cruel monsters and the prey of these, are applied to the great heathen powers and their captive, Israel. One prophet explicitly describes the Exile of Israel as the swallowing of the nation by the monster, the Babylonian tyrant, whom God forces at last to disgorge his prey. Israel says: [Jeremiah 51:34] " ebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon hath devoured me and crushed me, he hath swallowed me up like the Dragon, filling his belly, from my delights he hath cast me out." But Jehovah replies: [Jeremiah 51:44-45] "I will punish Bel in Babylon, and I will bring out of his mouth that which he hath swallowed My people, go ye out of the midst of her." It has been justly remarked by Canon Cheyne that this passage may be considered as the intervening link between the original form of the myth and the application of it made in the story of Jonah. To this the objection might be offered that in the story of Jonah "the great fish" is not actually represented as the means of the prophet’s temporary destruction, like the monster in Jeremiah 51:1-64, but rather as the vessel of his deliverance. This is true, yet it only means that our author has still further adapted the very plastic material offered him by this much-transformed myth. But we do not depend for our proof upon the comparison of a single passage. Let the student of the Book of Jonah read carefully the many passages of the Old Testament, in which the sea or its monsters rage in vain against Jehovah, or are harnessed and led about by Him; or still more those passages in which His conquest of these monsters is made to figure His conquest of the heathen powers-and the conclusion will appear irresistible that the story of the "great fish" and of Jonah the type of Israel is drawn from the same source. Such a solution of the problem has one great advantage. It relieves us of the grotesqueness which attaches to the literal conception of the story, and of the necessity of those painful efforts for accounting for a miracle which have distorted the common-sense and even the orthodoxy of so many commentators of the book. We are dealing, let us remember, with poetry-a poetry inspired by one of the most sublime truths of the Old Testament, but whose figures are drawn from the legends and myths of the people to whom it is addressed. To treat this as prose is not only to sin against the commonsense which God has given us, but against the simple and obvious intention of the author. It is blindness both to reason and to Scripture. These views are confirmed by an examination of the Psalm or Prayer which is put into Jonah’s mouth while he is yet in the fish. We have already seen what grounds
- 11. there are forbelieving that the Psalm belongs to the author’s own plan, and from the beginning appeared just where it does now. But we may also point out how, in consistence with its context, this is a Psalm, not of an individual Israelite, but of the nation as a whole. It is largely drawn from the national liturgy. It is full of cries which we know, though they are expressed in the singular number, to have been used of the whole people, or at least of that pious portion of them, who were Israel indeed. True that in the original portion of the Psalm, and by far its most beautiful verses, we seem to have the description of a drowning man swept to the bottom of the sea. But even here, the colossal scenery and the magnificent hyperbole of the language suit not the experience of an individual, but the extremities of that vast gulf of exile into which a whole nation was plunged. It is a nation’s carcass which rolls upon those infernal tides that swirl among the roots of mountains and behind the barred gates of earth. Finally, Jonah 2:9-10 are obviously a contrast, not between the individual prophet and the heathen, but between the true Israel, who in exile preserve their loyalty to Jehovah, and those Jews who, forsaking their "covenant-love," lapse to idolatry. We find many parallels to this in exilic and post- exilic literature. "And Jonah prayed to Jehovah his God from the belly of the fish, and said:"- "I cried out of my anguish to Jehovah, and He answered me; From the belly of Inferno I sought help-Thou heardest my voice. For Thou hadst cast me into the depth, to the heart of the seas, and the flood rolled around me; All Thy breakers and billows went over me. Then I said I am hurled from Thy sight: shall I ever again look towards Thy holy temple? Waters enwrapped me to the soul; the Deep rolled around me"; "The tangle was bound about my head. I was gone down to the roots of the hills; Earth and her bars were behind me forever. But Thou broughtest my life up from destruction, Jehovah my God! When my soul fainted upon me, I remembered Jehovah, And my prayer came in unto Thee, to Thy holy temple. They that observe the idols of vanity, They forsake their covenant-love. But to the sound of praise I will sacrifice to Thee; What I have vowed I will perform. Salvation is Jehovah’s." "And Jehovah spake to the fish, and it threw up Jonah on the dry land." PULPIT, "Then Jonah prayed. These were his feelings when he sank in the waters and while he lay in his mysterious prison; he may have put them into their metrical form after his deliverance. The grammatical arrangement, and especially the language of verse 7, seem to speak of a deliverance already experienced rather than of one expected. As this "prayer" does not suit an allegory, and as no cue but Jonah could have known its substance, we have here an argument for his authorship. It is rather a thanksgiving than a prayer—like that of Hennas (1 Samuel 2:1). When he realizes that he was saved from drowning, he uttered his gratitude, and saw that he might hope for further rescue. How he passed the three days we cannot tell; some have thought he was unconscious; but thin is, perhaps, hardly consistent with the notice of his praying, and with the action of his great Antitype, who, during his
- 12. sojourn in theunseen world, "preached to the spirits in prison" (1 Peter 3:19). His God. He acknowledges Jehovah as his God. He had proved himself his by inspiration, by chastisement, and now by mercy (Pusey). The following prayer contains ample reminiscences of the Psalms, which would be familiar to a devout Israelite. Those quoted are mostly what have been considered to belong to David's time. if their date is really ascertained. But it is a matter of controversy, incapable of settlement, whether Jonah or the psalmist is the original. BI 1-9, "And Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God, out of the fish’s belly. The return to God The object in setting forth the history of Jonah is to show the nature of his sin, the truth of his penitence, and the way in which he was restored to God’s favour. Turn thought to the change which was worked in Jonah’s soul. Bear in mind what was the nature of his sin It was not that he was separated from God, but that he had abandoned his duty, had shrunk from his mission, had thought more of his own relief from trial than of God’s will. When some wrong has been done which we have not the courage to confess, and the truth is discovered, fixing the charge on one’s self-personality, we know what a terrible shock and deep inward sense of self-reproach is felt. Illustrate by the cases of Achan and David. When the sailors asked Jonah what was to be done, he replied, “Cast me forth into the sea . . . for I know that for my sake this great tempest is upon you.” What do his words prove? Not only Jonah’s personal sense of guilt, but his complete surrender of himself to God, whether to live or to die. “If I die,” he seems to say, “it is my just doom; if I live, it is the pure undeserved mercy of God.” It was the most perfect reparation we can conceive. As before he would not surrender his own will and his own judgment, notwithstanding the command of God, so now he would give himself up wholly for whatever God might will as his deserved punishment. The sailors east him into the sea, but then a yet deeper sense of penitence awoke within him, and a yet stronger expression of profound sorrow and unquestioning childlike faith broke forth from him. Jonah saw, by faith, life restored; he saw Divine mercy working itself out in the midst of the deep darkness, and he acknowledged God as his Father, his Protector, his eternal Hope even then in the midst of his awful doom. Two lessons— 1. We see here an act of purest faith. There is a faith of a soft and easy kind, when everything goes smooth, and we have no anxiety, no fear or distress darkening the path of life. How glibly then do men speak of having their hope in God. There is another kind of faith, which produces resignation, patience, willingness to endure and be brave, and even willing to suffer. But yet it may not be faith that cheers the soul,—not a “rejoicing in the Lord,” not the triumph of a trustful soul. The real saving faith is seen when the soul finds God working in the storm and tempest, and reads the handwriting on the wall, speaking even in the midst of death and terror, and yet can calmly look on the Redeemer on the Cross, and see in the future the immortality beyond the grave, see the brightness of the glory that will one day be” to the faithful the heritage of boundless joy, and so be comforted and gladdened even in sorrow and pain,—it is such faith we see realised in the repentant Jonah. 2. We may learn the reason of trials and troubles which so often disturb the currents of our life. What would it be if we were always in the sunshine, always prosperous? Would there not be, even to the most faithful, a risk of too great confidence of a false assurance? (T. T. Carter.)
- 13. Jonah in thesea 1. Objectively, the prophet’s experience was that of one in the belly of hell, in the midst of the seas, entangled in the weeds, and among the caverns worn by the waves beneath the mountains on the coast. Jonah was in the belly of hell—Sheol, the region of the dead. He was in the heart of the seas. He sank at once when cast into the sea. He was entangled with the sea-weeds. Entangled with the weeds which gathered about his head, the prophet drifted towards the coast, and was presently carried into some of its submarine caverns by the current, and there he must have perished but for the Divine mercy. 2. The subjective experience of Jonah beneath the waves was that of a living, conscious, suffering, and suppliant person. It was a miraculous circumstance that the prophet remained alive in such a position. Jonah was not only alive, but conscious while under the sea. The distress he experienced beneath the water appears to have been spiritual rather than physical. His soul was overwhelmed with the consciousness that he was cast out of God’s sight. Jonah was saved from despair by the suppliant mood which possessed him. We need despair of no man while he prays. His prayer was accompanied by a look toward the temple of Jehovah. It was prompted by his remembrance of the Lord. “I remembered Jehovah.” It was accompanied by a vow. It was answered in a remarkable manner. Observe his reflections when in the fish. 1. “Thou hast brought up my life from destruction, O Lord my God!” 2. “My prayer came in unto Thee, into Thine holy temple.” 3. “They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy.” 4. “Salvation is of the Lord.” (S. C. Burn.) Jonah’s prayer Here we have a very clear and intense history of Jonah’s inward life. Notice some points of it. 1. There was a great and sudden quickening of consciousness. 2. Rapidly this new consciousness became distressful. The reserved sorrow of long sinning comes all at once. 3. Then he began to “look”—upwards to earth, eastwards to the temple where he knew that the lost presence was richly manifested. 4. The look soon became a cry. It may have been an audible cry. But evidently the soul of the cry was this, that it was tim cry of the soul. 5. He began to be grateful. 6. The final state of his mind is a state of entire dependence. (A. Raleigh, D. D.) The imprisonment of Jonah
- 14. It is evidentfrom the chapter that, whether a longer or a shorter period elapsed, what befell him, and how he was exercised during his confinement, were things which he distinctly recollected. In verse 1 Jonah gives a summary statement of what was his situation and exercise. The belly of a fish. Clearly his preservation and escape were things altogether miraculous. That was his situation; his exercise was prayer. Let none then neglect secret prayer to God, or think themselves excused because they have not a proper or convenient place to which they may retire. The description given of the object of his prayer is worthy of notice. “The Lord his God.” The God of Israel, the only living and true God, God in covenant. It was plainly the prayer of an appropriating faith. Verse 2 requires but little explanation. Here we have the success with which this exercise of prayer was crowned. His situation had been one of deep distress. He cried unto the Lord out of his affliction. He was in great straits, and very closely besieged. His body and mind were both shut up. The word “cried,” as used in relation with the exercise of prayer, is very significant. It is not here merely a loud voice; it implies close engagements of heart, great fervour, earnestness, and importunity. This is the more strongly indicated as the word is repeated. Our prophet did not direct his cry to one whose ear was shut or averted. Our God is the hearer of prayer. Verse 3 contains an amplified account of the dismal situation of the prophet, and of the utter hopelessness of life being preserved, or deliverance obtained, except by miraculous influence. Without attempting to describe the peculiarly distressing feelings of the prophet when in the fish’s belly, a case which baffles all description, let us direct attention to the piety of the man. He traces the storm to God Himself. In verse 4 we have a short but lively description of that conflict which often takes place, in the case of God’s people, between grace and remaining corruption, particularly between faith and unbelief. This conflict, though incident to the people of God at all times, is specially felt in seasons of distress. The language is not to be understood as referring to God’s natural presence, or as intimating that the prophet was beyond the sphere of God’s omniscience; for he was better taught than to give any countenance to such an idea. But he then felt strongly tempted to say that he was cast out of the Lord’s gracious presence. But he had in him the principle of a true saving faith. He says, “I will look again toward Thy holy temple.” This language intimates that the faith of the prophet embraced God in His gracious and new-covenant character. The following truths may be inferred. That God is jealous of His glory, and frequently manifests this most signally in His dealings with His own people. That it is God who adjusts the kind, measure, and duration of the afflictions with which His righteous people are afflicted. That while God displays much of His sovereignty in the afflictions He sends upon His people, yet some sin is often the immediate precursor. That right exercise under affliction consists in a clear and impressive discernment of this connection. That when afflictions are sanctified to persons they seek unto God by prayer for pardon and restoration. That although the genuine people of God, under this or the other affliction, may be reduced to a very low state as respects their soul-exercise, yet they are always upheld, and in the mercy of God are prevented from plunging into the fatal abyss of despair! (James Clyde.) The conflict between despair and faith Doctrine— 1. It is the usual lot of the Lord’s children to have not only outward afflictions to wrestle with, but spiritual temptations and sad conclusions, gathered from their troubles, which are sorer to endure than many simple afflictions. For so was it with
- 15. Jonah when hewas in the sea. 2. The children of the Lord in their troubles may be so tossed and divided betwixt hope and despair that faith and unbelief will be talking word about, for so doth Jonah’s experience teach. “I said, I am cast out; yet will I look again.” 3. In a time of temptation, unbelief’s word is generally first out, till faith come and correct it; ordinarily what is said in haste is unbelief’s language, and to be unsaid again, for this comes first out, I am cast out of Thy sight. 4. A child of God may not only be assaulted with fits of despair, but for a time be overcome with it, and yield to it; and yet, for all that, recover his feet again. 5. As it is ordinary under temptation to judge of all God’s respect, care, and love by our sense of His present dealing, so to be cast off by God, as one that He will not favour nor care for nor take notice of, is the sorest of trials, especially to the child of God, who lives by God’s favour, and is made up in all his afflictions when he finds that God thinks on him, and that his troubles endear him to God’s care. 6. It is no new thing to see a child of God, and vessel of mercy, apprehending reprobation and rejection from God, in his sad and dark hour, for this also is Jonah’s temptation. 7. Nor is it strange to see the children of God exercised and sadly afflicted with that which hath never been, nor will be, save in their own fearful apprehensions; for so is Jonah with “casting off.” When we reckon by our own deservings, and by probabilities in a strait, and not by God’s love and all-sufficiency, we cannot but draw sad conclusions, and our own spirits will make us work enough. 8. Temptations, even when they have overcome for a season, are not to be lien with, and given way to, by the children of God, but ought to be resisted and set against, though they should (if it were possible) perish in the attempt, this being the way to honour God and get deliverance,—for vanquished Jonah will not quit it so; “Yet will I look again.” 9. That whereby the children of the Lord must oppose all troubles inward and outward, and resist temptations, is naked faith closely adhering to the covenant of grace made in Christ, and gathering hope of better dealing This is imported in his “looking again toward the holy Temple,” or eyeing God in His covenant, whereof that was a sign. To cast away confidence as useless in a strait, or not to essay faith until we are hired by sense, or to lie by in wilful unbelief, think that is the way to get sense to loose our doubts; or to seek any footing for faith but in God’s covenant and free grace in Christ, is the height of folly. 10. The weakest act of faith may do much good in a day of greatest need; for in all this extremity Jonah had no more but a “looking again” as a poor banished man. 11. Faith in a time of need will find a way through many a dark impediment to find God. 12. It speaks much to God’s praise that when His people are laid by with their temptations yet He will not lose them, but recover them out of their deepest swoons, and make vanquished faith yet again to triumph over difficulties which they had judged insuperable. For this is also recorded to His praise: that not only Jonah persevered crying when his trouble was great, but that he was strengthened, after he had once yielded to the temptation, to believe and “look again.” (George Hutcheson.)
- 16. The prayer ofJonah This prayer, as it now stands, was obviously composed after his restoration. It may be regarded as a compendium of what he uttered in his distress. Notice— 1. The depth of the prophet’s misery. The prophet was in the utmost jeopardy. He knew not but that death might speedily be his portion. His misery arose chiefly from the agony of his soul—the conviction that he had been arrested in an act of wilful disobedience,—in the attempt, vain as that of the first fallen pair, to escape from the presence of the Lord. Many of his expressions are similar to those of the psalmist. David felt the bitterness which is the invariable result of a departure from the living God,—the intolerable anguish which arises from a consciousness of guilt when the conscience, by habitual transgression, has not been seared, and reverential fear of God not rooted out from the heart. When we contemplate the prophet in his dark hours of terror and agony, and behold the inevitable wretchedness which is the natural consequence of disobedience, we cannot but admire the wisdom, while we should seek to follow the example, of that apostle who declared, in the presence of Felix, that he exercised himself to have always a conscience void of offence toward God and toward men. Though depressed and desponding, Jonah did not give way to despair. He called to mind former mercies. His prayer ascended with the incense to heaven. And to whom should we betake ourselves in the hour of affliction, but to that God who dwelleth not in temples made with hands? We should not look to other sources for that comfort which Jehovah alone can bestow. As Jonah looked to the temple, and thought upon the legal sacrifices there offered, so must we, in all our addresses to the throne of grace, have respect to the meritorious efficacy of that great sacrifice by which the Lord Jesus hath averted the Father’s displeasure, and opened a way of access through His blood. The prayer of Jonah was not in vain. He was speedily delivered from his prison-house. No doubt can be entertained of the sincerity of the prophet’s repentance—of the deep humiliation of his soul, of his heartfelt contrition for having disobeyed the Divine command. No sooner was the prophet restored than, like the mariners, he offered praise and thanksgiving, and paid his vows unto the Lord. How overwhelming must have been his feelings on this miraculous deliverance from his strange and fearful prison-house. His soul must have been transported with gratitude and amazement, and his vows were doubtless poured forth with a fervour proportioned to a sense of deliverance. But how often are pious resolutions forgotten when the time of danger is past. “Salvation is of the Lord.” What truth more important to be habitually realised than this,—that all our temporal, spiritual, and eternal blessings proceed from God. What have we that we have not received? Our worldly success we are tempted to ascribe to our prudence and skilful management. We refer to second causes that which should be referred to the great First Cause of all. And we are apt to forget that it is “by grace we are saved.” The great practical lesson for us to learn is—the value and importance of prayer. (Thomas Bissland, M. A.) The prophet’s prayer The bottom of the sea was Jonah’s holy ground, and the belly of the fish his consecrated oratory. His gloomy prison was turned into a house of prayer. Jonah evidently retained his consciousness during the term of his imprisonment. We have only the substance of
- 17. the captive’s prayerpreserved for us. 1. The spiritual exercises with which the prophet’s prayer is identified. It is impossible to conceive of a more critical or distressing condition than that to which the servant of God was reduced. 2. The conclusion of unbelief. “Then I said, I am cast out of Thy sight.” An outcast from Divine favour. 3. The victory of faith. “Yet will I look again towards Thy holy temple.” See faith’s realised triumph, “Yet hast Thou brought up my life from corruption, O Lord my God.” 4. The ardour of Jonah’s gratitude. 5. His emphatic ascription. “Salvation is of the Lord.” Notice also the evidence of spiritual reclamation which the prophet’s prayer supplies. This is seen in his altered feeling towards God. In the rekindling of the spirit of devotion. In the vigorous action of faith. In the expression of this faith Jonah embodied the sentiments of former saints. The prophet’s mind was evidently richly stored with the Word of God. (John Broad.) The conflict of faith and sense The prayer of Jonah is an illustrious instance of the conflict between sense and faith. Sense prompting to despair,—faith pleading for hope and procuring victory. This prayer of faith, though in unparalleled circumstances, and spiritually noble in a marvellous degree, contains in it nothing but the ordinary principles of all believing prayer. It is the very trial of faith to have circumstances to contend with which appear to extinguish hope, which even seem to shut out hope altogether. This is the true place and action of faith. Surrounded by incidents, events, circumstances, influence, powers, all adverse to your deliverance and salvation; and with your hope, as far as this region of the things seen and temporal is concerned, utterly cut off; your faith discovers another region, a realm and kingdom unseen. Your faith draws upon them. I. View Jonah’s position from the side of sense. Was ever a case so fitted to call forth utter despair? Mark— 1. The case in which Jonah finds himself. 2. The hand to which he traces it. 3. The immediate effects produced on his mind by it. He felt to be cast out of God’s sight. His soul fainted in him. Outwardly he was begirt with terrors unspeakable. These to him were tokens of an angry God. His soul was brought to the very verge of despair. II. Jonah’s faith rose in its strength and triumph. What can stand us in any stead in such an hour but the prayer of faith? 1. We see the truth and power of Jonah’s faith in that he betook himself to prayer at all. 2. He set before himself the certainty of Jehovah’s reconcilableness, His promised forgiveness, His sure accessibility.
- 18. 3. He didnot do this in vain. He was answered in the progressive strengthening of his faith, even while his trial lasts. 4. Jonah offers the sacrifice of thanksgiving. He cometh unto God—unto God his exceeding joy. (Hugh Martin, M. A.) Jonah the penitent suppliant This has been called a “Song of deliverance.” It suggests— 1. The moral significance of adverse circumstances. Circumstances make or unmake, mould or mar us for future usefulness and distinction, according to the spirit in which they are received and utilised. Adverse circumstances are morally advantageous when rightly understood, patiently borne, and rightly used. Adversity ever has a spiritual significance. Whether it be guidance judicial or disciplinary, we cannot do better than acknowledge with reverence the hand that strikes, and supplicate His mercy. 2. The important part prayer plays in the adversities of life. It is indispensable in the trying and troublous experiences of our moral and physical being. Jonah’s prayer was a necessity. He was borne on the wings of strong moral impulses. 3. That the hearer or receiver of prayer is always within reach and approachable. Time, circumstances, con dition, place are no hindrances in themselves to drawing near to God. From every point in the compass of life He is accessible. (1) Jonah’s prayer was a personal recognition of God. (2) He was earnest in supplication. Importunity is never unsuccessful. 4. That our prayers to a great extent are moulded by our experience. As the countenance indexes the mind, the eye, the health, so prayer is a pretty sure indicator of the soul’s attitude Godward, its condition in grace, its experience in the faith-life. This chapter teaches the prevalency of prayer. It was answered in complete salvation. Note here, amazing Divine condescension. Great deviation from the Divine habitude. Prompt and perfect deliverance. Prayer is omnipotent, for it prevails with, it conquers God. There is no dilemma in Christian experience that prayer cannot deliver from. (J. O. Keen, D. D.) In the deep and mighty waters Some few years ago a terrible calamity occurred in a colliery at Tynewydd, South Wales. The mine was flooded with water, and for several days the miners were entombed, despite heroic efforts to save them. As one of the rescuing parties was exploring the mine they thought they heard singing, and creeping in the direction of the sound, heard the entombed men singing the words of a Welsh hymn, “In the deep and mighty waters there is One to rescue me.” (S. S. Chronicle.) More of thanksgiving beneath the waters There is an old legend concerning a golden organ which, when a monastery was being sacked, the monks threw into the rushing stream that hurried past their home; and the
- 19. story has itthat for long, long years thereafter the music of the organ was still heard beneath the waters; for, though they drowned the instrument, they could not drown its song. There is a lesson for us even in an apparently worthless legend. When God’s waves and billows roll over us, let us remember that we are God’s, and that will set the seal. Though the organ beneath the surface may run the risk of being drowned, if the Spirit of God is with us, then the sweet new song will be going on all the same. (Christian Herald.) 2 He said: “In my distress I called to the Lord, and he answered me. From deep in the realm of the dead I called for help, and you listened to my cry. BAR ES, "I cried by reason of mine affliction - , or, “out of affliction” which came “to me.” So the Psalmist thanked God in the same words, though in a different order ; “To the Lord in trouble to me I called, and He heard me.” He “called,” and God heard and answered , “He does not say, I “call,” but I “called”; he does not pray for the future, but gives thanks for the past.” Strange cause of thankfulness this would seem to most faith, to be alive in such a grave; to abide there hour after hour, and day after day, in one unchanging darkness, carried to and fro helplessly, with no known escape from his fetid prison, except to death! Yet spiritual light shone on that depth of darkness. The voracious creature, which never opened his mouth save to destroy life, had swallowed him, to save it . “What looked like death, became safe-keeping,” and so the prophet who had fled to avoid doing the will of God and to do his own, now willed to be carried about, he knew not where, at the will; as it seemed, of the huge animal in which he lay, but in truth, where God directed it, and he gave thanks. God had heard him. The first token of God’s mercy was the earnest of the whole. God was dealing with him, was looking on him. It was enough. Out of the belly of hell cried I. - The deep waters were as a grave, and he was counted “among the dead” Psa_88:4. Death seemed so certain that it was all one as if he were in the womb of hell, not to be reborn to life until the last Day. So David said Psa_ 18:5, “The bands of death compassed me round about;” and Psa_30:3, “Thou hast drawn my life out of hell.” The waters choked his speech; but he cried with a loud cry to
- 20. God Who knewthe heart. “I cried; Thou heardest.” The words vary only by a kindred letter . The real heart’s cry to God according to the mind of God and His hearing are one, whether, for man’s good, He seem at the time to hear or no. “Not of the voice but of the heart is God the Hearer, as He is the Seer. Do the ears of God wait for sound? How then could the prayer of Jonah from the inmost belly of the whale, through the bowels of so great a creature, out of the very bottomless depths, through so great a mass of waters, make its way to heaven?” “Loud crying to God is not with the voice but with the heart. Many, silent with their lips, have cried aloud with their heart; many, noisy with their lips, could, with heart turned away, obtain nothing. If then thou criest, cry within, where God heareth.” “Jonah cried aloud to God out of the fish’s belly, out of the deep of the sea, out of the depths of disobedience; and his prayer reached to God, Who rescued him from the waves, brought him forth out of the vast creature, absolved him from the guilt. Let the sinner too cry aloud, whom, departing from God, the storm of desires overwhelmed, the malignant Enemy devoured, the waves of this present world sucked under! Let him own that he is in the depth, that so his prayer may reach to God.” CLARKE, "Out of the belly of hell - Among the Hebrews שאול sheol means the grave, any deep pit, the place of separate spirits, etc. Here the prophet represents himself as in the bottom of the sea; for so sheol must be understood in this place. GILL, "And said,.... Not unto the Lord in prayer, but to others, to whom he communicated what passed between God and him in this time of distress; how he prayed to him, and was heard by him; what a condition he had been in, and how he was delivered out of it; what was his frame of mind while in it, sometimes despairing, and sometimes hoping; and how thankful he was for this salvation, and was determined to praise the Lord for it: I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the Lord, and he heard me; or, "out of my strait" (a); being straitened in his body, and as it were in a prison in the fish's belly; and straitened in his soul, being between hope and despair, and under the apprehensions of the divine displeasure. A time of affliction is a time for prayer; it brings those to it that have disused it; it made Jonah cry to his God, if not with a loud voice, yet inwardly; and his cry was powerful and piercing, it reached the heavens, and entered into the ears of the Lord of hosts, though out of the depths, and out of the belly of a fish, in the midst of the sea: out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice; or, "out of the belly of the grave" (b); out of the midst of it; that is, out of the belly of the fish, which was as a grave to him, as Jarchi observes; where he lay as out of the land of the living, as one dead, and being given up for dead: and it may also respect the frame of his mind, the horror and terror lie was in, arising from a sense of his sins, and the apprehensions he had of the wrath of God, which were as a hell in his conscience; and amidst all this he cried to God, and he heard him; and not only delivered him from he fish's belly, but from those dreadful apprehensions he had of his state and condition; and spoke peace and pardon to him. This is a proof that this prayer or thanksgiving be it called which it will, was composed, as to the form and order of it, after his deliverance; and these words are
- 21. an appeal toGod for the truth of what he had said in the preceding clause, and not a repetition of it in prayer; or expressing the same thing in different words. HE RY, " What his prayer was. He afterwards recollected the substance of it, and left it upon record. He reflects upon the workings of his heart towards God when he was in his distress and danger, and the conflict that was then in his breast between faith and sense, between hope and fear. 1. He reflects upon the earnestness of his prayer, and God's readiness to hear and answer (Jon_2:2): He said, I cried, by reason of my affliction, unto the Lord. Note, Many that prayed not at all, or did but whisper prayer, when they were in prosperity, are brought to pray, nay, are brought to cry, by reason of their affliction; and it is for this end that afflictions are sent, and they are in vain if this end be not answered. Those heap up wrath who cry not when God binds them, Job_36:13. “Out of the belly of hell and the grave cried I.” The fish might well be called a grave, and, as it was a prison to which Jonah was condemned for his disobedience and in which he lay under the wrath of God, it might well be called the belly of hell. Thither this good man was cast, and yet thence he cried to God, and it was not in vain; God heard him, heard the voice of his affliction, the voice of his supplication. There is a hell in the other world, out of which there is no crying to God with any hope of being heard; but, whatever hell we may be in the belly of in this world, we may thence cry to God. When Christ lay, as Jonah, three days and three nights in the grave, though he prayed not, as Jonah did, yet his very lying there cried to God for poor sinners, and the cry was heard. JAMISO , "His prayer is partly descriptive and precatory, partly eucharistical. Jonah incorporates with his own language inspired utterances familiar to the Church long before in Jon_2:2, Psa_120:1; in Jon_2:3, Psa_42:7; in Jon_2:4, Psa_31:22; in Jon_2:5, Psa_69:1; in Jon_2:7, Psa_142:3; Psa_18:6; in Jon_2:8, Psa_31:6; in Jon_2:9, Psa_116:17, Psa_116:18, and Psa_3:8. Jonah, an inspired man, thus attests both the antiquity and inspiration of the Psalms. It marks the spirit of faith, that Jonah identifies himself with the saints of old, appropriating their experiences as recorded in the Word of God (Psa_119:50). Affliction opens up the mine of Scripture, before seen only on the surface. out of the belly of hell — Sheol, the unseen world, which the belly of the fish resembled. K&D, "2 I cried to Jehovah out of my distress, and He heard me; Out of the womb of hell I cried: Thou heardest my voice! The first clause recals to mind Psa_18:7 and Psa_120:1; but it also shows itself to be an original reproduction of the expression י ִל ה ָר ָ ִ,מ which expresses the prophet's situation in a more pointed manner than י ִר־ל ַ ַ in Psa_17:1-15 and י ִ ה ָת ָר ָ ַ in Psa_120:1- 7. The distress is still more minutely defined in the second hemistich by the expression אוֹל ְשׁ ן ֶט ֶ ִ,מ “out of the womb of the nether world.” As a throat or swallow is ascribed to she 'ōl in Isa_5:14, so here it is spoken of as having a ,בטן or belly. This is not to be taken as referring to the belly of the shark, as Jerome supposes. The expression is a poetical
- 22. figure used todenote the danger of death, from which there is apparently no escape; like the encompassing with snares of death in Psa_18:5, and the bringing up of the soul out of sheol in Psa_30:3. In the last clause the words pass over very appropriately into an address to Jehovah, which is brought out into still greater prominence by the omission of the copula Vav. CALVI , "Then he says,I cried, when I had trouble, to Jehovah, and he answered me. Jonah no doubt relates now, after having come forth from the bowels of the fish, what had happened to him, and he gives thanks to the Lord. (37) This verse then contains two parts, — that Jonah in his trouble fled to God, — and the latter part contains thanksgiving for having been miraculously delivered beyond what flesh could have thought. I cried, he says, in my distress, to Jehovah; I cried out from the bowels of hell, thou hast heard my voice. Jonah, as we shall hereafter see, directed his prayers to God not without great struggle; he contended with many difficulties; but however great the impediments in his way, he still persevered and ceased not from praying. He now tells us that he had not prayed in vain; and, that he might amplify the grace of God, he says, from the bowels of the grave He mentioned distress (angustiam — straitness) in the first clause; but here he more clearly expresses how remarkable and extraordinary had been the kindness of God, that he came forth safe from the bowels of the fish, which were like the bowels of the grave. ,שאול shaul, derived from corruption, is called the grave by the Hebrews, and the Latin translator has almost everywhere rendered it hell, (infernum;) and ,שאול shaul, is also sometimes taken for hell, that is, the state of the reprobate, because they know that they are condemned by God: it is, however, taken more frequently for the grave; and I am disposed to retain this sense, — that the fish was like the grave. But he means that he was so shut up in the grave, that there was no escape open to him. What are the bowels of the grave? Even the inside or the recess of the grave itself. When Jonah was in this state, he says, that he was heard by the Lord. It may be proper to repeat again what I have already slightly touched, — that Jonah was not so oppressed, though under the heaviest trial, but that his petitions came forth to God. He prayed as it were from hell, and not simply prayed, for he, at the same time, sets forth his vehemence and ardor by saying, that he cried and cried aloud. Distress, no doubt, extorted from Jonah these urgent entreaties. However this might have been, he did not howl, as the unbelieving are wont to do, who feel their own evils and bitterly complain; and yet they pour forth vain howlings. Jonah here shows himself to be different from them by saying, that he cried and cried aloud to God. It now follows — distress on Jehovah, and he will answer me; From the belly of the grave I cry, —thou hearest my voice. e to the deep, into the midst of the waters, And the flood surrounded me, — Thy billows and waves over me passed;
- 23. 5. Then Isaid, I am banished from the sight of thine eyes; — Yet I will again look towards the temple of thy holiness. 6. Encompass me do the waters to the soul, The deep surrounds me, The sedge is wrapped around my head: tings off of the mountains have I descended; The earth! Its bars arecontinually around me: But thou wilt bring from destruction my life, O Jehovah, my God. ">8. When overwhelmed within me was my soul, Jehovah did I remember; And come to thee shall my prayer — To the temple of thy holiness. 9. They who regard idols of vanity, Their own mercy forsake: the voice of praise, will sacrifice to thee, What I have vowed will I fulfill: Salvation belongsto Jehovah. “The cuttings off,” in verse 7, says Parkhurst, were those parts which were cut off from the mountains at the deluge. The Septuagint has σχισµας — rents-clefts. Roots, bottoms, foundations, have been adopted by some, but not consistently with the meaning of the original word, — “The bars or bolts” of the earth convey the idea of impediments in his way to return to the earth. They were “around” him, or literally “upon” him, ,בעדי that is, they were, as it were, closed upon him. — Ed. COFFMA , "Verse 2 "I called by reason of my affliction unto Jehovah, And he answered me; Out of the belly of Sheol cried I, And thou heardest my voice." This marvelous prayer which God heard and answered was not offered from any formal position such as kneeling, standing, etc. "The Bible shows by example that men may pray in any posture."[15] The Scriptures show that men prayed kneeling (1 Kings 8:54), standing ( ehemiah 9:5; Luke 18:13), bowing down on the earth with face between the knees (1 Kings 18:42), lying in a sickbed and turning the face to the wall (2 Kings 20:2), failing prostrate upon the ground (Matthew 26:39), and
- 24. walking along orstanding in public (John 11:41,42; 12:28f). This prayer is totally unsuitable for an allegory, "And, as no one could have known its substance except Jonah, we have here an argument for his authorship of the book."[16] "Out of the belly of Sheol ..." "Sheol means netherworld, or underworld, and is equivalent to Hades in the ew Testament."[17] "It is the regular word in Semitic literature for the realm of the dead."[18] De Haan made a strong argument from this that Jonah actually died, basing it upon the contrast between the belly of the fish and the belly of Sheol, in which different words were used by the Holy Spirit; [19] but it may very well be that Jonah meant, "That the Lord had snatched him from the Jaws of death, delivering him before the gates of Sheol closed upon him."[20] We remain uncertain whether or not Jonah actually died and was raised up from death. There was no problem at all for the Lord either way. It appears to this writer that the argument from the antitype to the effect that since Christ actually died, the type, Jonah, also, in all likelihood died, is more convincing than the argument from the use of Sheol in this passage; but as Banks pointed out "A type should never be unduly pressed; and there is no one else in the Bible who, having been brought to life again, gives a detailed account of his experience in death."[21] PETT, "Verse 2 ‘And he said, “I called by reason of my affliction to YHWH, And he answered me, Out of the belly of Sheol I cried, You heard my voice.” As he sank into the sea after being hurled from the deck Jonah had felt that he was sinking into the belly of Sheol (the grave). He had felt that he was about to die. But he had cried to YHWH in his affliction and he now knew that YHWH had heard his voice and answered him, for here he was alive and able to pray and offer thanks. For the thought of someone being in the belly of Sheol see Isaiah 5:14, ‘Sheol has enlarged herself and opened her mouth without measure, and their glory, and their plenty, and their pomp, and the one who rejoices among them will descend into it’. But in Jonah’s case his meaning is brought out in Jonah 2:3. His experience was like being in the belly of Sheol because he was engulfed in water. Compare Psalms 18:5, ‘the cords of Sheol were round about me, the snares of death came on me.’ TRAPP, "Jonah 2:2 And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the LORD, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, [and] thou heardest my voice. Ver. 2. And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction] His lips did not move in affliction, like a creaking door or a new cart wheel, with murmuring and mutinying against God and men; he set not his mouth against heaven (as the howling wolf when hunger bitten), neither did his tongue walk through the earth, cursing the day
- 25. of his birth,and cutting deep into the sides of such as were means of his misery, Psalms 73:9. But putting his mouth in the dust, if so be there might be hope, he cried by reason of his affliction, Lamentations 3:29. The time of affliction is the time of supplication; no time like that for granting of suits, Zechariah 13:9. God’s afflicted may have what they will of him then, such are his fatherly compassions to his sick children; he reserveth his best comforts for the worst times, and then speaketh to the hearts of his people when he hath brought them into the wilderness, Hosea 2:13. This Jonah experimented, and therefore said, "I cried out of mine affliction unto the Lord." “ Ad Dominum afflicto de pectore suspirando. ” And he heard me] How else am I alive amidst so many deaths? Here is a visible answer, a real return: O, "blessed be God, who hath not turned away my prayer, nor his mercy from me," Psalms 66:20. Surely as the cloud, which riseth out of the earth many times in thin and insensible vapours, falleth down in great and abundant showers; so our prayers, which ascend weak and narrow, return with a full and enlarged answer. This was but a pitiful poor prayer that Jonah here made, as appears Jonah 2:4; and so was that of David, Psalms 31:22, "For I said in mine haste, I am cut off from before thine eyes: nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my supplications when I cried unto thee." It would be wide with us if God should answer the best of us according to our prayers, yea, though well watered with tears; since, Ipsae lacrymae sint lacrymabiles, we had need to weep over our tears, sigh over our sobs, mourn over our griefs. Jonah was so taken with this kindness from the Lord his God that he repeats it and celebrates it a second time. Out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice] The whale’s belly he calleth hell’s belly, because horrid and hideous, deep and dismal. Thence he cried, as David did, De profundis, from the depths, and was heard and delivered. Yea, had hell itself closed her mouth upon a praying Jonah, it could not long have held him, but must have vomited him up. A mandamus commission from God will do it at any time, Psalms 44:4, and what cannot faithful prayer have of God? there is a certain omnipotence in it, said Luther. ELLICOTT, "(2) By reason of mine affliction.—See margin. There is a close correspondence between this opening and that of Psalms 120 Comp. also Psalms 18:6. Out of the belly of hell.—This remarkable expression—a forcible figure for imminent death—has its nearest parallel in Isaiah 5:14, where sheôl (see Psalms 6:5) is represented as opening a huge mouth to swallow the princes of the world and their pomp. The under-world represents the Hebrew word sheôl more nearly than hell or the grave (margin). (Comp. Psalms 18:5; Psalms 30:3.) And thou heardest . . .—The conjunction is unnecessarily introduced. The sudden
- 26. change of person,a frequent figure in Hebrew poetry, is more striking without the connecting word. PULPIT, "He introduces the prayer with the tact that he cried to God in distress and was heard. By reason of mine affliction; better, out of my affliction. This may be a reminiscence of Psalms 120:1 or Psalms 18:6; but from such coincidences nothing can be established concerning the date of the book. Like circumstances call forth like expressions; and the writers may have composed them quite independently of one another. Hell (Sheol). The unseen world (Ezekiel 32:21). He was as though dead when thus engulfed (comp. Psalms 18:5). Cried I (Psalms 28:1, Psalms 28:2). Thou heardest my voice (Psalms 130:1, Psalms 130:2). 3 You hurled me into the depths, into the very heart of the seas, and the currents swirled about me; all your waves and breakers swept over me. BAR ES, "For Thou hadst (“didst”) cast me into the deep - Jonah continues to describe the extremity of peril, from which God had already delivered him. Sweet is the memory of perils past. For they speak of God’s Fatherly care. Sweet is it, to the prophet to tell God of His mercies; but this is sweet only to the holy, for God’s mercy convicts the careless of ingratitude. Jonah then tells God, how He had cast him vehemently forth into the “eddying depth,” where, when Pharaoh’s army “sank like a stone” (Exo_15:5, add Exo_15:10), they never rose, and that, “in the heart” or center “of the seas,” from where no strong swimmer could escape to shore. “The floods” or “flood,” (literally “river,”) the sea with its currents, “surrounded” him, encompassing him on all sides; and, above, tossed its multitudinous waves, passing over him, like an army trampling one prostrate underfoot. Jonah remembered well the temple psalms, and, using their words, united himself with those other worshipers who sang them, and taught us how to speak them to God. The sons of Korah Psa_42:7. had poured out to God in these self-same words the sorrows which oppressed them. The rolling billows and the breakers , which, as they burst upon the rocks, shiver the vessel and crush man, are, he says to God, “Thine,” fulfilling Thy will on me.
- 27. CLARKE, "All thybillows and thy waves passed over me - This may be understood literally; while the fish, in whose belly he was, sought its pleasure or sustenance in the paths of the deep, the waves and billows of the sea were rolling above. This line seems borrowed from Psa_42:7. GILL, "For thou hadst cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas,.... Though the mariners did this, yet Jonah ascribes it to the Lord; he knew it was he, whom he had sinned against and offended; that he was he that sent the storm after him into the sea; that determined the lot to fall upon him; that it was not only by his permission, but according to his will, that he should be east into it, and overcame the reluctance of the men to it, and so worked upon them that they did it; and therefore Jonah imputes it to him, and not to them; nor does he complain of it, or murmur at it; or censure it as an unrighteous action, or as hard, cruel, and severe; but rather mentions it to set off the greatness of his deliverance: and by this it appears, that it was far from shore when Jonah was cast into the sea, it was the great deep; and which also is confirmed by the large fish which swallowed him, which could, not swim but in deep waters; and because of the multitude of the waters, called "seas", and "in the heart" (c) of them, as it may be rendered; and agreeably Christ the antitype of Jonah lay in the heart of the earth, Mat_ 12:40; and the floods compassed me about; all thy billows and thy waves passed over me; which was his case as soon as cast into the sea, before the fish had swallowed him, as well as after: this was literally true of Jonah, what David says figuratively concerning his afflictions, and from whom the prophet seems to borrow the expressions, Psa_42:7; and indeed he might use them also in a metaphorical sense, with a view to the afflictions of body, and sorrows of death, that compassed him; and to the billows and waves of divine wrath, which in his apprehension lay upon him, and rolled over him. HE RY 3-6, "He reflects upon the very deplorable condition that he was in when he was in the belly of hell, which, when he lay there, he was very sensible of and made particular remarks upon. Note, If we would get good by our troubles, we must take notice of our troubles, and of the hand of God in them. Jonah observes here, (1.) How low he was thrown (Jon_2:3): Thou hadst cast me into the deep. The mariners cast him there; but he looked above them, and saw the hand of God casting him there. Whatever deeps we are cast into, it is God that casts us into them, and he it is who, after he has killed, has power to cast into hell. He was cast into the midst of the seas - the heart of the seas (so the word is), and thence Christ borrows that Hebrew phrase, when he applies it to his own lying so long in the heart of the earth. For he that is laid dead in the grave, though it be ever so shallow, is cut off as effectually from the land of the living as if he were laid in the heart of the earth. (2.) How terribly he was beset: The floods compassed me about. The channels and springs of the waters of the sea surrounded him on every side; it was always high-water with him. God's dear saints and servants are sometimes encompassed with the floods of affliction, with troubles that are very forcible and violent, that bear down on all before them, and that run constantly upon them, as the waters of a river in a continual succession, one trouble upon the neck of another, as Job's messengers of evil tidings; they are enclosed by them on all sides, as the church complains, Lam_3:7. He has hedged me about, that I cannot get out, nor see which way I may flee for safety. All thy billows and they waves passed over me. Observe, He calls
- 28. them God's billowsand his waves, not only because he made them (the sea is his, and he made it), and because he rules them (for even the winds and the seas obey him), but because he had now commissioned them against Jonah, and limited them, and ordered them to afflict and terrify him, but not to destroy him. These words are plainly quoted by Jonah from Psa_42:7, where, though the translations differ a little, in the original David's complaint is the same verbatim - word for word, with this of Jonah's: All thy billows and thy waves passed over me. What David spoke figuratively and metaphorically Jonah applied to himself as literally fulfilled. For the reconciling of ourselves to our afflictions, it is good to search precedents, that we may find there has no temptation taken us but such as is common to men. If ever any man's case was singular, and not to be paralleled, surely Jonah's was, and yet, to his great satisfaction, he finds even the man after God's own heart making the same complaint of God's waves and billows going over him that he has now occasion to make. When God performs the thing that is appointed for us we shall find that many such things are with him, that even our path of trouble is no untrodden path, and that God deals with us no otherwise than as he uses to deal with those that love his name. And therefore for our assistance in our addresses to God, when we are in trouble, it is good to make use of the complaints and prayers which the saints that have been before us made use of in the like case. See how good it is to be ready in the scriptures; Jonah, when he could make no use of his Bible, by the help of his memory furnished himself from the scripture with a very proper representation of his case: All thy billows and thy waves passed over me. To the same purport, Jon_2:5, The waters compassed me about even to the soul; they threatened his life, which was hereby brought into imminent danger; or they made an impression upon his spirit; he saw them to be tokens of God's displeasure, and in them the terrors of the Almighty set themselves in array against him; this reached to his soul, and put that into confusion. And this also is borrowed from David's complaint, Psa_69:1. The waters have come in unto my soul. When without are fightings it is no marvel that within are fears. Jonah, in the fish's belly, finds the depths enclosing him round about, so that if he would get out of his prison, yet he must unavoidably perish in the waters. He feels the sea-weed (which the fish sucked in with the water) wrapped about his head, so that he has no way left him to help himself, nor hope that any one else can help him. Thus are the people of God sometimes perplexed and entangled, that they may learn not to trust in themselves, but in God that raises the dead, 2Co_1:8, 2Co_1:9. (3.) How fast he was held (Jon_2:6): He went down to the bottom of the mountains, to the rocks in the sea, upon which the hills and promontories by the seaside seem to be bottomed; he lay among them, nay, he lay under them; the earth with her bars was about him, so close about him that it was likely to be about him for ever. The earth was so shut and locked, so barred and bolted, against him, that he was quite cut off from any hope of ever returning to it. Thus helpless, thus hopeless, did Jonah's case seem to be. Those whom God contends with the whole creation is at war with. JAMISO , "thou hadst cast ... thy billows ... thy waves — Jonah recognizes the source whence his sufferings came. It was no mere chance, but the hand of God which sent them. Compare Job’s similar recognition of God’s hand in calamities, Job_1:21; Job_2:10; and David’s, 2Sa_16:5-11. K&D, "3 Thou castedst me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, And the stream surrounded me; All Thy billows and Thy waves went over me.
- 29. 4 Then Isaid, I am thrust away from Thine eyes, Yet I will look again to Thy holy temple. The more minute description of the peril of death is attached by Vav consec., to express not sequence in time, but sequence of thought. Jehovah cast him into the depth of the sea, because the seamen were merely the executors of the punishment inflicted upon him by Jehovah. Me tsūlâh, the deep, is defined by “the heart of the seas” as the deepest abyss of the ocean. The plural yammım (seas) is used here with distinct significance, instead of the singular, “into the heart of the sea” (yâm) in Exo_15:8, to express the idea of the boundless ocean (see Dietrich, Abhandlung zur hebr. Grammatik, pp. 16, 17). The next clauses are circumstantial clauses, and mean, so that the current of the sea surrounded me, and all the billows and waves of the sea, which Jehovah had raised into a storm, went over me. Nâhâr, a river or stream, is the streaming or current of the sea, as in Psa_24:2. The words of the second hemistich are a reminiscence of Psa_42:8. What the Korahite singer of that psalm had experienced spiritually, viz., that one wave of trouble after another swept over him, that had the prophet literally experienced. Jonah “does not say, The waves and the billows of the sea went over me; but Thy waves and Thy billows, because he felt in his conscience that the sea with its waves and billows was the servant of God and of His wrath, to punish sin” (Luther). Jon_2:4 contains the apodosis to Jon_2:3: “When Thou castedst me into the deep, then I said (sc., in my heart, i.e., then I thought) that I was banished from the sphere of Thine eyes, i.e., of Thy protection and care.” These words are formed from a reminiscence of Psa_31:23, י ִ ְשׁ ַרְגִנ being substituted for the י ִ ְז ַרְגִנ of the psalm. The second hemistich is attached adversatively. ְךፍ, which there is no necessity to alter into ְך ֵא = ְיך ֵ,א as Hitzig supposes, introduces the antithesis in an energetic manner, like ם ֵכፎ elsewhere, in the sense of nevertheless, as in Isa_14:15; Psa_49:16; Job_13:15 (cf. Ewald, §354, a). The thought that it is all over with him is met by the confidence of faith that he will still look to the holy temple of the Lord, that is to say, will once more approach the presence of the Lord, to worship before Him in His temple, - an assurance which recals Psa_5:8. The thought that by the grace of the Lord he has been once more miraculously delivered out of the gates of death, and brought to the light of the world, is carried out still further in the following strophe, in entirely new turns of thought. CALVI , "In this verse are set forth his difficulties: for Jonah, for the sake of amplifying, refers to his condition. It was a great thing that he cried to God from the bowels of the fish; but it was far more difficult for him to raise up his mind in prayer, when he knew or thought God to be angry with him: for had he been thrown into extreme evils, he might yet call upon God; but as it came to his mind that all the evil he suffered was inflicted by God, because he tried to shun his call, how was it possible for him to penetrate into heaven when such an obstacle stood in his way? We hence see the design of these words, But thou hadst cast me into the gulf, into the heart of the sea; the flood surrounded me, all thy billows and waves passed over me.
- 30. In short, Jonahshows here what dreadful temptations presented themselves to him while he was endeavoring to offer up prayers. It came first to his mind that God was his most inveterate enemy. For Jonah did not then think of the sailors and the rest who had cast him into the sea; but his mind was fixed on God: this is the reason why he says, Thou, Lord, hadst cast me into the deep, into the heart of the sea; and then, Thybillows, Thy waves (38) He does not here regard the nature of the sea; but he bestows, as I have already said, all his thoughts on God, and acknowledges that he had to do with him; as though he said, “Thou Lord, in pursuing me, drivest me away; but to thee do I come: thou showest by dreadful proofs that thou art offended with me, but yet I seek thee; so far is it that these terrors drive me to a distance from thee, that now, being subdued as it were by thy goads, I come willingly to thee; for nowhere else is there for me any hope of deliverance.” We now then see how much avails the contrast, when Jonah sets the terrible punishment which he endured in opposition to his prayer. Let us now proceed — COFFMA , "Verse 3 "For thou didst cast me into the depth, in the heart of the seas, And the flood was round about me; All thy waves and thy billows passed over me." "Thou didst cast me ..." Jonah here attributed to God the action of the mariners who cast him overboard, because it was upon God's command as given through Jonah that they did this. "And the flood was round about me ..." The Hebrew word here for flood means literally river. "This may mean "the current" as in Psalms 24:2, which in the Mediterranean sea flows west to east, and, impinging on the Syrian coast, turns north; or it may have reference to the notion familiar to us in Homer, which regarded the ocean as a river."[22] "Thy waves and thy billows ..." Thus Jonah acknowledged God's hand in the dreadful punishment he received. PETT, "Verse 3 “For you cast me into the depth, In the heart of the seas, And the flood was round about me, All your waves and your billows passed over me.” His remembrance of his experience was vivid. He had been cast into the heart of the sea, and had felt as though he was being swallowed up by the sea, almost as though he had been in his grave, with the waters sweeping over him. ote his emphasis on the fact that it was YHWH Who had done this to him, and that it was His waves and billows which passed over him. YHWH had been with him in all that had happened.
- 31. TRAPP, "Verse 3 Jonah2:3 For thou hadst cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas; and the floods compassed me about: all thy billows and thy waves passed over me. Ver. 3. For thou hadst cast me into the deep] A graphic description of his woeful condition, which yet he remembereth now as waters that are past, and is thankful to his Almighty deliverer: see the like in David, Psalms 116:3, and learn of these and other saints to acknowledge the uttermost extremity of a calamity after we are delivered out of it. For hereby thy judgment will be the better instructed and the more convinced; thine heart also will be the more enlarged to admire, and thy mouth the wider opened to celebrate the power, wisdom, and mercy of God in thy deliverance. As if this be not done, God will be provoked either to inflict heavier judgments, or else to cease to smite thee any more with the stripes of a father, and to give thee up for a lost child. For thou hadst cast me into the deep] ot the mariners, but thou didst it, and therefore there was no averting or avoiding it. Thou hadst cast me with a force, as a stone out of a sling, or as that mighty angel, Revelation 18:21, that took up a stone like a great millstone, and cast it into the sea, saying, "Thus with violence," &c. In the midst of the seas] Heb. in the heart of the seas; so Matthew 12:40, "So shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth." And Deuteronomy 4:11, we read of the heart of heaven, that is, the middle of it, as the heart sitteth in the midst of the body as king of that Isle of Man. ow, if it were so grievous to be cast into the main sea, what shall it be to be hurled into hell by such a hand, and with such a force into that bottomless gulf, whence nothing was ever yet buoyed up again? And the floods compassed me about] Aquarum confluges, the sea, whence all floods or rivers issue, and whereto they return (Homer calleth the ocean ποταµον, a river, by the figure meiosis, (a) Pοταµοιο ρεεθρα ωκεανου. Iliad. xiv.). Danaeus here noteth that out of that gulf of the sea, which of Plato is called Tartarus, that is, hell, the waters do flow into the veins of the earth (as it is, Ecclesiastes 1:7), losing their saltness in the passage. Here Jonah cried out, as Psalms 69:1-2, "Save me, O God; for the waters are come in unto my soul. I sink in deep mire, where there is no standing: I am come into the deep waters, where the floods overflow me." It was only his faith that held him up by the chin; and, like blown feathers, bore him aloft all waters. All thy billows and thy waves passed over me] All; so it seemed to Jonah, that God had poured out all his displeasure upon him; but he suffereth not his whole wrath to arise against his people; neither remembereth iniquity for ever. Thy billows or
- 32. surges; not thesea’s, but thine. God seemed to fight against Jonah with his own hand. David likewise in a desertion complains that all God’s waves and floods were gone over him, Psalms 42:7. In this case (for it may be any one’s case) let us do as Paul and his company did (in that dismal tempest, Acts 27:20, when they saw neither sun nor star for many days and nights together), cast anchor of hope, even beyond hope; and then wait and wish for day. God will appear at length, and all shall clear up; he will deliver our souls from the nethermost hell. PULPIT, "He describes his danger and distress. Thou hadst cast; rather, thou didst cast, the sailors being the agents of the Divine will. Septuagint, ἀπέῤῥi ψας. The deep; βάθη, "depths"; Exodus 15:8. In the midst; literally, in the heart; Septuagint, καρδίας θαλάσσης: galore, in corde maris. This defines more closely the previous expression. The floods; literally, the river. This may mean the current (as in Psalms 24:2), which in the Mediterranean Sea sets from west to east, and, impinging on the Syrian coast, turns north; or it may have reference to the notion, familiar to us in Homer. which regarded the ocean as a river. All thy billows and thy waves; πάντες οἱ µετεωρισµοί σου καὶ τὰ κύµατά σου "all thy swellings and waves"; omnes gurgites tui, et fluctus tui (Vulgate). The former are "breakers," the latter "rolling billows." The clause is from Psalms 42:7, Jonah transferring what is there said metaphorically to his own literal experience, at the same time acknowledging God's hand in the punishment by speaking of "thy billows" (comp. Psalms 88:6, Psalms 88:7). 4 I said, ‘I have been banished from your sight; yet I will look again toward your holy temple.’ BAR ES, "I am cast out of Thy sight - , literally, “from before Thine eyes.” Jonah had willfully withdrawn from standing in God’s presence. Now God had taken him at his word, and, as it seemed, cast him out of it. David had said in his haste, “I am cut off.” Jonah substitutes the stronger word, “I am cast forth,” driven forth, expelled, like the
- 33. “mire and dirt”Isa_57:20 which the waves drive along, or like the waves themselves in their restless motion Isa_57:20, or the pagan (the word is the same) whom God had driven out before Israel (Exo_34:11, and the Piel often), or as Adam from Paradise Gen_ 3:24. Yet (Only) I will look again - He was, as it were, a castaway, cast out of God’s sight, unheeded by Him, his prayers unheard; the storm unabated, until he was cast forth. He could no longer look with the physical eye even toward the land where God showed the marvels of His mercy, and the temple where God was worshiped continually. Yet what he could not do in the body, he would do in his soul. This was his only resource. “If I am cast away, this one thing will I do, I will still look to God.” Magnificent faith! Humanly speaking, all hope was gone, for, when that huge vessel could scarcely live in the sea, how should a man? When God had given it no rest, while it contained Jonah, how should tie will that Jonah should escape? Nay, God had hidden His Face from him; yet he did this one, this only thing only this, “once more, still I will add to look to God.” Thitherward would he look, so long as his mind yet remained in him. If his soul parted from him, it should go forth from him in that gaze. God gave him no hope, save that He preserved him alive. For he seemed to himself forsaken of God. Wonderful pattern of faith which gains strength even from God’s seeming desertion! “I am cast vehemently forth from before Thine eyes; yet this one thing will I do; mine eyes shrill be unto Thee, O Lord.” The Israelites, as we see from Solomon’s dedication prayer, “prayed toward the temple,” (1Ki_8:29-30, 1Ki_8:35 ff) where God had set His Name and shown His glory, where were the sacrifices which foreshadowed the great atonement. Thitherward they looked in prayer, as Christians, of old, prayed toward the East, the seat of our ancient Paradise. where our Lord “shall appear unto them that look for Him, a second time unto salvation.” Heb_9:28. Toward that temple then he would yet look with fixed eye for help, where God, Who fills heaven and earth, showed Himself to sinners reconciled. CLARKE, "I am cast out of thy sight - See Psa_31:22. Thy holy temple - Then Jerusalem was not yet destroyed, for the temple was standing. GILL, "Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight,.... Or, "from before thine eyes" (d); the Targum, from before thy Word; as David also said in his distress, Psa_31:22; not but that he knew he was in the reach and under the eye of his omniscience, which saw him in the fish's belly, in the depths of the sea, for nothing can hide from that; but he thought he was no longer under the eye of his providence; and that he would no more care for him, but leave him in this forlorn condition, and not deliver him; and especially he concluded that he would no more look upon him with an eye of love, grace, and mercy, pity and compassion: these are the words of one in despair, or near unto it; and yet a beam of light, a ray of hope, breaks in, and a holy resolution is formed, as follows: yet I will look again toward thy holy temple; not the temple at Jerusalem, towards which men used to look when they prayed, being at a distance from it, 1Ki_8:29; though there may be an allusion to such a practice; for it can hardly be thought that Jonah, in the fish's belly, could tell which way the temple stood; and look towards that; but he looked upwards and heavenwards; he looked up to God in his holy temple in heaven;
- 34. and though hewas afraid he would not look down upon him in a way of grace and mercy, he was resolved to look up to God in the way of prayer and supplication; and particularly, for the further encouragement of his faith and hope, he looked to the Messiah, the antitype of the temple, ark, and mercy seat, and for whose sake he might hope his prayers would be heard and answered. JAMISO , "cast out from thy sight — that is, from Thy favorable regard. A just retribution on one who had fled “from the presence of the Lord” (Jon_1:3). Now that he has got his desire, he feels it to be his bitterest sorrow to be deprived of God’s presence, which once he regarded as a burden, and from which he desired to escape. He had turned his back on God; so God turned His back on him, making his sin his punishment. toward thy holy temple — In the confidence of faith he anticipates yet to see the temple at Jerusalem, the appointed place of worship (1Ki_8:38), and there to render thanksgiving [Henderson]. Rather, I think, “Though cast out of Thy sight, I will still with the eye of faith once more look in prayer towards Thy temple at Jerusalem, whither, as Thy earthly throne, Thou hast desired Thy worshippers to direct their prayers.” CALVI , "In the first clause of this verse Jonah confirms again what I have said, — that when he sought to pray, not only the door was closed against him, but there were mountains, as it were, intervening, so that he could not breathe a prayer to God: for he did not so much think of the state in which he was; nay, but he chiefly considered his own case, how he had provoked the wrath of God. Hence he says, I have said, I am cast away from the sight of thine eyes. Some give this frigid exposition, that he had been only expelled from his own country, that he might not behold the temple. But I have no doubt but that Jonah tells us here that he suffered extreme agonies, as though every hope of pardon had been cut off from him: “What! shall I yet hope that God will be propitious? It is not to be hoped.” This then is the casting away of which he speaks: for it is said that God casts us away, when he allows us no access to him. Hence Jonah thought that he was wholly alienated from God. Were any to object and say, that then his faith must have been extinct; the obvious answer is, — that in the struggle of faith there are internal conflicts; one thought is suggested, and then another of an opposite character meets it; there would indeed be no trial of our faith, except there were such internal conflicts; for when, with appeased minds, we can feel assured that God is propitious to us, what is the trial of faith? But when the flesh tells us that God is opposed to us, and that there is no more hope of pardon, faith at length sets up its shield, and repels this onset of temptation, and entertains hope of pardon: whenever God for a time appears implacable, then faith indeed is tried. Such then was the condition of Jonah; for, according to the judgment of the flesh, he thought that he was utterly cast away by God, so that he came to him in vain. Jonah, then, having not yet put off flesh and blood, could not immediately lay hold on the grace of God, but difficulties met him in his course. The latter clause is differently explained by interpreters. Some take it negatively, “I shall no more look towards the temple of thy holiness:” but the words admit not of this explanation. ,אך ak, means in Hebrew, truly, nevertheless; and it means also,
- 35. certainly; and sometimesit is taken dubitatively, perhaps. The greater part of expounders render the clause thus, “But I shall see the temple of thy holiness;” as though Jonah here reproved his own distrust, which he had just expressed, as the case is with the faithful, who immediately check themselves, when they are tempted to entertain any doubt: “What! dost thou then cast away hope, when yet God will be reconciled to thee if thou wilt come to him?” Hence interpreters think that it is a sort of correction, as though Jonah here changed his mind, and retracted what he had previously taken up, as a false principle derived from the judgment of the flesh. He had said then that he had been cast away from the presence of the Lord; but now, according to these expositors, he repels that temptation, But I shall see thy holy temple; though I seem now to be rejected by thee, thou wilt at last receive me into favor. We may, however, explain this clause, consistently with the former, in this way, At least, or, but, I would again see, etc., as an expression of a wish. The future then may be taken for the optative mood, as we know that the Hebrews are wont thus to use the future tense, either when they pray or express a wish. This meaning then best agrees with the passage, that Jonah as yet doubtingly prays, At least, or, but, I would again, O Lord, see the temple of thy holiness. But since the former explanation which I have mentioned is probable, I do not contend for this. However this may be, we find that Jonah did not wholly despair, though the judgment of the flesh would drive him to despair; for he immediately turned his address to God. For they who murmur against God, on the contrary, speak in the third person, turning themselves, as it were, away from him: but Jonah here sets God before his eyes,I have been cast away, he says, from the sight of thine eyes He does not remonstrate here with God, but shows that he was seeking God still, though he thought that he was cast far away. Then he adds, I would at least see again the temple of thy holiness. And by speaking of the temple, he no doubt set the temple before him as an encouragement to his faith. As then he had been cast away, he gathers everything that might avail to raise up and confirm his hope. He had indeed been circumcised, he had been a worshipper of God from his childhood, he had been educated in the Law, he had exercised himself in offering sacrifices: under the name of temple he now includes briefly all these things. We hence see that he thus encouraged himself to entertain good hope in his extreme necessity. And this is a useful admonition; for when every access to God seems closed up against us, nothing is more useful than to recall to mind, that he has adopted us from our very infancy, that he has also testified his favor by many tokens, especially that he has called us by his Gospel into a fellowship with his only-begotten Son, who is life and salvation; and then, that he has confirmed his favor both by Baptism and the Supper. When, therefore, these things come to our minds, we may be able by faith to break through all impediments. Let us go on — COFFMA , "Verse 4 "And I said, I am cast out from before thine eyes; Yet I will look again toward thy holy temple." Apparently, Jonah, at the instant indicated by these words, had already been
- 36. rescued from drowningby the great fish, encouraging him to believe that he would yet be spared alive to worship God in Jerusalem. Thus, in the last clause here, he envisions a deliverance which had not at that moment come to pass; but which the inspired prophet already considered as a reality. "I will look again toward thy holy temple ..." "Thus, Jerusalem was not yet destroyed, for the temple was still standing."[23] ow the Babylonian army had completed the destruction of the temple in 586 B.C., after a siege of 18 months, consequent upon Zedekiah's rebellion."[24] However, the moral and spiritual ruin of the temple had occurred much earlier under Rehoboam, Abijah, and Asa, in whose reigns the golden treasures of the temple had been robbed and all kinds of abominations introduced into its services,[25] leaving us with the certainty that such an affectionate mention of the temple as that which occurs here could not have been made by a prophet like Jonah except about the approximate time we have assigned as the date of this book. This mention of the temple as still standing completely explodes the efforts to date this in the fifth century or in postexilic times. The critics know this, of course; so they insist that Jonah was not actually referring to the temple in Jerusalem, but to God's eternal temple in heaven! However, the dual mention of God's "holy temple" both here and in Jonah 2:7, below, has its most simple and obvious meanings a plain reference to the temple of Solomon then standing in Jerusalem. Denials of this are invariably grounded in a determination to deny the whole prophecy by late dating it. COKE, "Jonah 2:4. Then I said, I am cast out, &c.— "My first apprehensions were, that as I had justly forfeited thy favour for my disobedience, so thou wouldst cast me out of thy protection. But, upon recollecting myself, I thought it my duty not to despair of thy mercy, but to direct my prayer toward thy heavenly habitation: for I have the strongest confidence, since thou hast thus far saved me, that I shall look again towards thy holy temple." There is a great similarity between this prayer of Jonah and many expressions in the Psalms. PETT, "Verse 4 “And I said, ‘I am cast out from before your eyes, Yet I will look again towards your holy temple.” And his first thoughts as he viewed approaching death was that he had been cast out from before YHWH’s eyes. He was a reject. But his automatic impulse had been to look towards the Temple of YHWH in his mind, even though he had recognised that he was a castaway. It was an instantaneous admission of guilt and a plea for acceptance. He who had refused mercy towards others was now seeking it for himself. BE SO , "Verses 4-7 Jonah 2:4-7. Then I said, I am cast out, &c. — “My first apprehensions were, that as I had justly forfeited thy favour by my disobedience, so thou wouldest cast me out of thy protection; yet, upon recollecting myself, I thought it my duty not to despair of thy mercy, but direct my prayer toward thy heavenly habitation.” — Lowth. The waters compassed me even to the soul — Or life; that is, to the extreme hazard of
- 37. my life; andI thought of nothing more than losing my life among the waves. I went, &c. — I went down to the bottom of the sea, where the foundations of the mountains lie. Or, the fish carried me down as deep in the sea as are the bottoms of the mountains. The earth with her bars was about me — I found myself enclosed on every side, without any way for escape; and should have been enclosed for ever, had not thy power interposed. Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption — But, notwithstanding it was involved in all these terrible circumstances, which seemed to preclude all possibility of its being preserved, yet thou, O my God, by thy power didst save my life from destruction. When my soul fainted within me — When I seemed just expiring, and lost all hopes of being preserved; I remembered the Lord — I thought of thy almighty power and boundless mercy, O Jehovah, who causest to be whatsoever thou willest; and my prayer came in unto thee — And therefore I addressed my prayer to thee, as being persuaded that thou couldest still preserve me, even in the most extreme dangers; and my faith was not disappointed; for I found, by the event, that thou couldest deliver me, as I believed thou wast able to do. TRAPP, "Verse 4 Jonah 2:4 Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight; yet I will look again toward thy holy temple. Ver. 4. Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight] Thus those straits brought him to these disputes of despair, as they did likewise David, Psalms 31:22, the Church in the Lamentations, Lamentations 4:22, and others, apt enough in affliction to have hard conceits of God and heavy conceits of themselves. While men look at things present, while they live by sense only, it must need be with them as with a house without pillars, tottering with every blast; or as a ship without anchor, tossed with every wave. They must therefore thrust Hagar out of doors, and set up Sarah; silence their reason, and exalt faith, as did Jonah here; "Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight." Here you may take him up for a dead man; here he inclineth somewhat to that of Cain, Genesis 4:13-14, and surely they that go down to this pit of despair, as Hezekiah speaketh of the grave, Isaiah 38:17, cannot hope for God’s truth as long as there they stay. Yet I will look again toward thine holy temple] Here he recollects and recovers himself; as the same soul may successively doubt and believe, not simultaneously; and faith, where it is right, will at length out wrestle diffidence, and make a man more than a conqueror, even a triumpher. When sense saith such a thing will not be, reason saith, It cannot be, faith gets above and saith, Yea, but it shall be; what talk you to me of impossibilities, I shall yet (as low as I am, and as forlorn) look again towards God’s holy temple of heaven; yea, that here on earth, where God is sincerely served, and whereto the promises are annexed. Faith is by one fitly compared to the cork upon the net; though the lead on the one sinks it down, yet the cork on the other keeps it up in the water. The faithful soon check themselves for their doubtings and despondency, as Jonah here; as David chides David, Psalms 43:5; and as Paul saith of himself and his fellows, that they were staggering, but not wholly sticking, 2 Corinthians 4:8.
- 38. ELLICOTT, "(4) Iam cast out of thy sight.—“Jonah had wilfully withdrawn from standing in God’s presence. ow God had taken him at his word, and, as it seemed, cast him out of it. David had said in his haste, “I am cut off” (Psalms 31:22), Jonah substitutes the stronger word, “I am cast forth,” driven forth, expelled like the mire and dirt which the waves drive along, or like the waves themselves in their restless motion, or the heathen (the word is the same) whom God had driven out before Israel, or as Adam from Paradise” (Pusey). Yet I will look again.—The Hebrew is very impressive, and reads like one of those exile hopes so common in the Psalms: “Yet I have one thing left, to turn towards Thy holy Temple and pray.” (For the attitude see ote on Psalms 28:2.) PULPIT, "Jonah confesses that he at first fully expected death; but faith and hope soon triumphed over despondency. I am cast out of thy sight. This was his thought when what is mentioned in verse 3 happened unto him. The words are a reminiscence of Psalms 31:22, altered somewhat to suit Jonah's circumstances. The psalmist says, "I said in my haste." Jonah says simply, "I said," without any limitation; and for "I am cut off," Jonah uses, "I am cast out." Septuagint, ἀπῶσµαι—a strong term, implying banishment with violence. Out of thy sight; literally, frown before thine eyes; i.e. from thy protecting care. He who had fled from the presence of the Lord in Canaan fears that he has forfeited the favour of God. Yet I will look again toward thy holy temple. I will turn in prayer to that holy place where thou dost manifest thy presence. The Jews were wont to turn towards Jerusalem when they prayed. Some think that Jonah expresses a hope of worshipping again in the temple; but the turn of expression in the text hardly warrants this. Others refer the term to the heavenly temple, as they do in verse 7; Psalms 11:4; Psalms 18:6. 5 The engulfing waters threatened me,[b] the deep surrounded me; seaweed was wrapped around my head. BAR ES, "The waters compassed me about even to the soul - Words which to others were figures of distress (Psa_69:2. See the introduction to Jonah), “the waters have come even to the soul,” were to Jonah realities. Sunk in the deep seas, the water
- 39. strove to penetrateat every opening. To draw breath, which sustains life, to him would have been death. There was but a breath between him and death. “The deep encompassed me,” encircling, meeting him wherever he turned, holding him imprisoned on every side, so that there was no escape, and, if there otherwise had been, he was bound motionless, “the weed was wrapped around my head, like a grave-band.” “The weed” was the well known seaweed, which, even near the surface of the sea where man can struggle, twines round him, a peril even to the strong swimmer, entangling him often the more, the more he struggles to extricate himself from it. But to one below, powerless to struggle, it was as his winding sheet. CLARKE, "The waters compassed me about even to the soul - So as to seem to deprive me of life. I had no hope left. The weeds were wrapped about my head - This may be understood literally also. He found himself in the fish’s stomach, together with sea weeds, and such like marine substances, which the fish had taken for its aliment. GILL, "The waters compassed me about, even to the soul,.... Either when he was first cast into the sea, which almost suffocated him, and just ready to take away his life, could not breathe for them, as is the case of a man drowning; or these were the waters the fish drew into its belly, in such large quantities, that they compassed him about, even to the endangering of his life there. So the Targum, "the waters surrounded me unto death.'' In this Jonah was a type of Christ in his afflictions and sorrows, which were so many and heavy, that he is said to be "exceeding sorrowful", or surrounded with sorrow, "even unto death", Mat_26:38; see also Psa_69:1; the depth closed me round about; the great deep, the waters of the sea, both when he fell into it, and while in the belly of the fish: thus also Christ his antitype came into deep waters, where there was no standing, and where floods of sin, and of ungodly men, and of divine wrath, overflowed him; see Psa_18:4; the weeds were wrapped about my head; the sea weeds, of which there are great quantities in it, which grow at the bottom of it, to which Jonah came, and from whence he rose up again, before swallowed by the fish; or these weeds were drawn into the belly of the fish, along with the water which it took in, and were wrapped about the head of the prophet as he lay there; or the fish went down with him into the bottom of the sea, and lay among those weeds; and so they may be said to be wrapped about him, he being there, as follows. The Targum is, "the sea of Suph being over my head;'' the same with the Red sea, which is so called, Psa_106:9; and elsewhere, and that from the weeds that were in it; and R. Japhet, as Aben Ezra observes, says the sea of Suph is mixed with the sea of Joppa; that is, as a learned man (e) observes, by means of the river Rhinocorura, through which the lake of Sirbon mingles with the great sea; and which
- 40. lake itself isso called from the weeds in it; yea, was anciently called Suph, and the sea of Suph, or "mare Scirpeum", hence Sirbon: and the same writer thinks that the father of Andromede, said to be devoured by a whale about Joppa, had his name of Cepheus from hence. JAMISO , "even to the soul — that is, threatening to extinguish the animal life. weeds — He felt as if the seaweeds through which he was dragged were wrapped about his head. K&D, "5 Waters surrounded me even to the soul: the flood encompassed me, Sea-grass was wound round my head. 6 I went down to the foundations of the mountains; The earth, its bolts were behind me for ever: Then raisedst Thou my life out of the pit, O Jehovah my God. 7 When my soul fainted within me, I thought of Jehovah; And my prayer came to Thee into Thy holy temple. This strophe opens, like the last, with a description of the peril of death, to set forth still more perfectly the thought of miraculous deliverance which filled the prophet's mind. The first clause of the fifth verse recals to mind Psa_18:5 and Psa_69:2; the words “the waters pressed (אוּ ָ ) even to the soul” (Psa_69:2) being simply strengthened by יִפוּנ ָפ ֲא after Psa_18:5. The waters of the sea girt him round about, reaching even to the soul, so that it appeared to be all over with his life. Te hōm, the unfathomable flood of the ocean, surrounded him. Sūph, sedge, i.e., sea-grass, which grows at the bottom of the sea, was bound about his head; so that he had sunk to the very bottom. This thought is expressed still more distinctly in Psa_18:6. ים ִר ָה י ֵב ְצ ִ,ק “the ends of the mountains” (from qâtsabh, to cut off, that which is cut off, then the place where anything is cut off), are their foundations and roots, which lie in the depths of the earth, reaching even to the foundation of the sea (cf. Psa_18:16). When he sank into the deep, the earth shut its bolts behind him (ץ ֶרፎ ָה is placed at the head absolutely). The figure of bolts of the earth that were shut behind Jonah, which we only meet with here (ד ַע ְ from the phrase רַג ָס ד ַע ְ ת ֶל ֶ ַ,ה to shut the door behind a person: Gen_7:16; 2Ki_4:4-5, 2Ki_4:33; Isa_26:20), has an analogy in the idea which occurs in Job_38:10, of bolts and doors of the ocean. The bolts of the sea are the walls of the sea-basin, which set bounds to the sea, that it cannot pass over. Consequently the bolts of the earth can only be such barriers as restrain the land from spreading over the sea. These barriers are the weight and force of the waves, which prevent the land from encroaching on the sea. This weight of the waves, or of the great masses of water, which pressed upon Jonah when he had sunk to the bottom of the sea, shut or bolted against him the way back to the earth (the land), just as the bolts that are drawn before the door of a house fasten up the entrance into it; so that the reference is neither to “the rocks jutting out above the water, which prevented any one from ascending from the sea to the land,” nor “densissima terrae
- 41. compages, qua abyssustecta Jonam in hac constitutum occludebat” (Marck). Out of this grave the Lord “brought up his life.” Shachath is rendered φθορά, corruptio, by the early translators (lxx, Chald., Syr., Vulg.); and this rendering, which many of the more modern translators entirely reject, is unquestionably the correct one in Job_17:14, where the meaning “pit” is quite unsuitable. But it is by no means warranted in the present instance. The similarity of thought to Psa_30:4 points rather to the meaning pit = cavern or grave, as in Psa_30:10, where shachath is used interchangeably with וֹר and אוֹל ְשׁ in Jon_2:4 as being perfectly synonymous. Jon_2:7 is formed after Psa_142:4 or Psa_143:4, except that י ִשׁ ְפַנ is used instead of י ִ,רוּח because Jonah is not speaking of the covering of the spirit with faintness, but of the plunging of the life into night and the darkness of death by drowning in the water. ף ֵ ַע ְת ִ,ה lit., to veil or cover one's self, hence to sink into night and faintness, to pine away. י ַל ָ,ע upon or in me, inasmuch as the I, as a person, embraces the soul or life (cf. Psa_42:5). When his soul was about to sink into the night of death, he thought of Jehovah in prayer, and his prayer reached to God in His holy temple, where Jehovah is enthroned as God and King of His people (Psa_18:7; Psa_ 88:3). But when prayer reaches to God, then He helps and also saves. This awakens confidence in the Lord, and impels to praise and thanksgiving. These thoughts form the last strophe, with which the Psalm of thanksgiving is appropriately closed. CALVI , "Here in many words Jonah relates how many things had happened to him, which were calculated to overwhelm his mind with terror and to drive him far from God, and to take away every desire for prayer. But we must ever bear in mind what we have already stated, — that he had to do with God: and this ought to be well considered by us. The case was the same with David, when he says in Psalms 39:9, ‘Thou hast yet done it;’ for, after having complained of his enemies, he turned his mind to God: “What then do I? what do I gain by these complaints? for men alone do not vex me; thou, God, he says, hast done this.” So it was with Jonah; he ever set before him the wrath of God, for he knew that such a calamity had not happened to him but on account of his sins. He therefore says that he was by waters beset, and then, that he was surrounded by the deep; but at length he adds, that God made his life to ascend, etc. All these circumstances tend to show that Jonah could not have raised up his mind to God except through an extraordinary miracle, as his life was in so many ways oppressed. When he says that he was beset with waters even to the soul, I understand it to have been to the peril of his life; for other explanations seem frigid and strained. And the Hebrews says that to be pressed to the soul, is to be in danger of one’s life; as the Latins, meaning the same thing, say that the heart, or the inside, or the bowels, are wounded. So also in this place the same thing is meant, ‘The waters beset me even to the soul,’ and then, ‘the abyss surrounds me.’ Some render ,סוף suph, sedge; others sea-weed; others bulrush: but the sense amounts to the same thing. o doubt ,סוף suph, is a species of sedge; and some think that the Red Sea was thus called, because it is full of sedges or bulrushes. They think also that bulrushes are thus called,
- 42. because they soonputrefy. But what Jonah means is certain and that is, that weed enveloped his head, or that weed grew around his head: but to refer this to the head of the fish, as some do, is improper: Jonah speaks metaphorically when he says that he was entangled in the sedge, inasmuch as there is no hope when any one is rolled in the sedge at the bottom of the sea. How, indeed, can he escape from drowning who is thus held, as it were, tied up? It is then to be understood metaphorically; for Jonah meant that he was so sunk that he could not swim, except through the ineffable power of God. COFFMA , ""The waters compassed me about, even to the soul; The deep was round about me; The weeds were wrapped about my head." "Even to the soul ..." "The meaning is that the waters so press in that life itself is threatened."[26] "The weeds were wrapped about my head ..." Some of the critics have really hooted at this, screaming that "weeds do not grow in a great fish's belly!"[27] Indeed, indeed! either did Jonah "grow in the belly of the big fish," but there he was; and, of course, both Jonah and the sea weed got there in the same swallow. It is nothing short of amazing how commentators are intimidated by blatant assertion, risking all kinds of bizarre guesses as their answer to this phantom objection. Livingston supposed that, "Jonah had become entangled with other material within the fish"; [28] and thought that maybe Jonah mistook "the whale's viscera!"[29] and merely thought it was seaweed! Blair stated the truth: "Doubtless the fish had swallowed not only Jonah but considerable seaweed as well. There was Jonah floundering in the entangling mass, all adding to the confusion of his distressing dilemma."[30] It seems hardly credible that intelligent men could find any kind of objection to this mention of the seaweed. This writer has seen accumulations of this weed so thick that one could almost be tempted to try walking on them in the open sea; and, especially off the coast of ova Scotia, and following a storm, the accumulations of this material are very extensive. Remember that Jonah and his co-sailors were in a storm; and the presence of masses of seaweed at the place where Jonah was cast overboard would have made it absolutely impossible for a big fish to swallow him without taking on a substantial load of the seaweed at the same time, which, of course, is evidently what happened. Deane attempted an explanation of it by suggesting that, "Jonah sank to the bottom before he was swallowed by the fish."[31] Well, maybe he did; but none of this type of explanation is necessary. If the fish swallowed Jonah in three seconds after he hit the water, he would still have swallowed a lot of seaweed also. Dummelow understood the situation perfectly when he wrote, "Floating seaweed entangles him as he sinks."[32]
- 43. COKE, "Jonah 2:5.The waters compassed me, &c.— Jonah, as we have before observed, speaks this in the bowels of the fish; therefore they seem to mistake the matter, who say that Jonah speaks this in the midst of the sea, before he was swallowed by the fish. The fish swallowed up Jonah, when first he fell to the bottom of the sea, involved with sea-weed, into which he fell. Houbigant. But why may not this (as well as the following verse, which must necessarily be so) be understood figuratively and poetically, describing his situation in the deep, when in the belly of the fish? PETT, "Verse 5 “The waters compassed me about, Even to the soul, The deep was round about me, The weeds were wrapped about my head.” But his awful experience had gone on. (God does not always step in immediately until we have learned our lesson). He had felt as though the waters had entered into his very soul. The depths of the sea had been all around him, and he had felt weeds wrapping round his head. He had known that he was drowning, which was of course what he had anticipated. Rescue had been far from his mind. For the whole idea compare Psalms 69:1-2. Save Me, O God, for the waters are come into my soul, -- I am come into deep waters where the floods overflow me’. But in the case of Jonah the experience had been a literal one. TRAPP, "Verse 5 Jonah 2:5 The waters compassed me about, [even] to the soul: the depth closed me round about, the weeds were wrapped about my head. Ver. 5. The waters compassed me about, even to the soul] That is, usque ad animae deliquium, till I laboured for life, and was as good as gone. The depth closed me round about] {See Trapp on "Jonah 2:3"} and further observe, that God’s dear children may fall into desperate and deadly dangers, see Psalms 18:3; Psalms 88:3; Psalms 116:3. And this for, 1. Prevention, 2. Purgation, 3. Probation, 4. Preparations to further both mercies and duties. Let us not therefore censure ourselves or others as hated of God, because greatly distressed; but encourage ourselves in them, as did David at Ziklag, 1 Samuel 30:6. The right hand of the Lord shall change all this. “ Flebile principium melior fortuna sequetur. ” The weeds were wrapped about mine head] Alga as Alligando. The weeds which the fish had devoured, or whereunto the fish, wherein I was, had dived and lain down among them. Or this might befall Jonah in the bottom of the sea, before the fish had
- 44. swallowed him; forweeds easily wrap about those that swim, or are drowned. ELLICOTT, "(5) The waters.—See reference in margin. The weeds were wrapped about my head.—This graphic touch is quite original. The figure of overwhelming waters is a common one in Hebrew song to represent some crushing sorrow, but nowhere is the picture so vivid as here. At the same time the entire absence of any reference to the fish, which would, indeed, be altogether out of place in this picture of a drowning man entangled in seaweed, should be noticed. That on which the prophet lays stress is not on the mode of his escape, but his escape itself. PULPIT, "Compassed me about. ot the same word as in Jonah 2:3. Septuagint, περιεχίθη µοι "was poured around me." Even to the soul; so as to reach his life (comp. Psalms 18:5; Psalms 69:1, Psalms 69:2; Lamentations 3:54). The depth closed me round about. The verb is the lame as in Jonah 2:3, translated there, "compassed me about" Vulgate, abyssus vallavit me. The weeds (suph); seaweed. Jonah sank to the bottom before he was swallowed by the fish. The LXX. omits the word. The Vulgate gives pelagus, which is probably derived from the fact of the Red Sea being called "the Sea of Suph," the term being thence applied to any sea. 6 To the roots of the mountains I sank down; the earth beneath barred me in forever. But you, Lord my God, brought my life up from the pit. BAR ES, "I went down to the bottoms, (literally “the cuttings off”) of the mountains - , the “roots” as the Chaldee and we call them, the hidden rocks, which the mountains push out, as it were, into the sea, and in which they end. Such hidden rocks extend along the whole length of that coast. These were his dungeon walls; “the earth, her bars,” those long submarine reefs of rock, his prison bars, “were around” him “forever:” the seaweeds were his chains: and, even thus, when things were at their uttermost, “Thou hast brought up my life from corruption,” to which his body would have fallen a prey, had not God sent the fish to deliver him. The deliverance for which be
- 45. thanks God isaltogether past: “Thou broughtest me up.” He calls “the” Lord, “my” God, because, being the God of all, He was especially his God, for whom He had done things of such marvelous love. God loves each soul which He has made with the same infinite love with which He loves all. Whence Paul says of Jesus Gal_2:20, “Who loved me and gave Himself for me.” He loves each, with the same undivided love, as if he had created none besides; and He allows each to say, “My God,” as if the Infinite God belonged wholly to each. So would He teach us the oneness of Union between the soul which God loves and which admits His love, and Himself. CLARKE, "I went down to the bottoms of the mountains - This also may be literally understood. The fish followed the slanting base of the mountains, till they terminated in a plain at the bottom of the great deep. The earth with her bars - He represents himself as a prisoner in a dungeon, closed in with bars which he could not remove, and which at first appeared to be for ever, i.e., the place where his life must terminate. Yet hast thou brought up my life - The substance of this poetic prayer was composed while in the fish’s belly; but afterwards the prophet appears to have thrown it into its present poetic form, and to have added some circumstances, such as that before us; for he now speaks of his deliverance from this imminent danger of death. “Thou hast brought up my life from corruption.” GILL, "I went down to the bottom of the mountains,.... Which are in the midst of the sea, whither the fish carried him, and where the waters are deep; or the bottom of rocks and promontories on the shore of the sea; and such vast rocks hanging over the sea, whose bottoms were in it, it seems are on the shore of Joppa, near to which Jonah was cast into the sea, as Egesippus (f) relates: the earth with her bars was about me for ever; that is, the earth with its cliffs and rocks on the seashore, which are as bars to the sea, that it cannot overflow it; these were such bars to Jonah, that could he have got clear of the fish's belly, and attempted to swim to shore, he could never get to it, or over these bars, the rocks and cliffs, which were so steep and high: yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O Lord my God; notwithstanding these difficulties, which were insuperable by human power, and these seeming impossibilities of, deliverance; yet the Lord brought him out of the fish's belly, as out of a grave, the pit of corruption, and where he must otherwise have lain and rotted, and freed his soul from those terrors which would have destroyed him; and by this also we learn, that this form of words was composed after he came to dry land: herein likewise he was a type of Christ, who, though laid in the grave, was not left there so long as to see corruption, Psa_16:10. JAMISO , "bottoms of ... mountains — their extremities where they terminate in the hidden depths of the sea. Compare Psa_18:7, “the foundations of the hills” (Psa_ 18:15). earth with her bars was about me — Earth, the land of the living, is (not “was”) shut against me.
- 46. for ever —so far as any effort of mine can deliver me. yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption — rather, “Thou bringest ... from the pit” [Maurer]. As in the previous clauses he expresses the hopelessness of his state, so in this, his sure hope of deliverance through Jehovah’s infinite resources. “Against hope he believes in hope,” and speaks as if the deliverance were actually being accomplished. Hezekiah seems to have incorporated Jonah’s very words in his prayer (Isa_38:17), just as Jonah appropriated the language of the Psalms. CALVI , "According to the same sense he says, I descended to the roots of the mountains. But he speaks of promontories, which were nigh the sea; as though he had said, that he was not cast into the midst of the sea, but that he had so sunk as to be fixed in the deep under the roots of mountains. All these things have the same designs which was to show that no deliverance could be hoped for, except God stretched forth his hand from heaven, and indeed in a manner new and incredible. He says that the earth with its bars was around him. He means by this kind of speaking, that he was so shut up, as if the whole earth had been like a door. We know what sort of bars are those of the earth, when we ascribe bars to it: for when any door is fastened with bolts, we know how small a portion it is. But when we suppose the earth itself to be like a door, what kind of things must the bolts be? It is the same thing then as though Jonah had said, that he was so hindered from the vital light, as if the earth had been set against him to prevent his coming forth to behold the sun: the earth, then, was set against me, and that for ever He afterwards comes to thanksgiving, And thou Jehovah, my God, hast made my life to ascend from the grave. Jonah, after having given a long description, for the purpose of showing that he was not once put to death, but that he had been overwhelmed with many and various deaths, now adds his gratitude to the Lord for having delivered him, Thou, he says,hast made my life to ascend from the grave, O Jehovah. He again confirms what I have once said, — that he did not pour forth empty prayers, but that he prayed with an earnest feeling, and in faith: for he would not have called him his God, except he was persuaded of his paternal love, so as to be able to expect from him a certain salvation. Thou, then, Jehovah, my God, he says; he does not say, Thou hast delivered me, but, Thou hast brought forth my life from the grave. Then Jonah, brought to life again, testifies here that he was not only delivered by God’s aid from the greatest danger, but that he had, by a certain kind of resurrection, been raised from the dead. This is the meaning of this mode of speaking, when he says that his life had been brought forth from the grave, or from corruption itself. It follows — COFFMA , "Verse 6 "I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; The earth with its bars closed upon me forever; Yet hast thou brought up my life from the Pit,
- 47. O Jehovah myGod." "Bottoms of the mountains ..." The roots or foundations of earth's mountains lie far beneath the sea, and this expression reveals the apparent hopelessness of Jonah's situation. "Earth with its bars closed upon me forever ..." "The thought is that as he sinks he goes far from the earth, the home of the living, and its doors are closed and barred against him forever. o return to the light and sunshine seems possible."[33] COKE, "Jonah 2:6. The earth with her bars was about me, &c.— Houbigant connects the word rendered for ever, with bars, and reads, The earth, with her everlasting bars, was about me, &c. But others give the passage another turn, and render it thus, The earth with her bars would have been about me for ever; but thou broughtest up, &c. PETT, "Verse 6 “I went down to the bottoms of the mountains, The earth with its bars closed on me for ever, Yet have you brought up my life from the pit, O YHWH my God.” He had felt himself sinking lower and lower, into the very depths. ‘The bottom of the mountains’ indicates the sea floor, for as men stood on the shore they saw the slope of the mountains going down into the seas and realised that at the bottom of the slope was a valley, the sea floor. As the boat was clearly not far from shore, the bottom of the sea would not have been at any great depth. And he had felt as though he was excluded from the earth by bars which prevented his returning, and which would hold him for ever. But then he had found himself remarkably delivered and he had been lifted out of the pit, and he had thus recognised that it was the action of YHWH His God. TRAPP, "Verse 6 Jonah 2:6 I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with her bars [was] about me for ever: yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O LORD my God. Ver. 6. I went down to the bottoms of the mountains] That is, of the promontories or rocks of the sea, where the waters are deepest. Thus Mercer after Kimchi. "The channels of waters were seen, and the foundations of the world were discovered," Psalms 18:15. The mountains are said to be under water, Proverbs 8:25, because their foundations are there placed. The earth with her bars was about me for ever] As if resolved there to keep me close prisoner; that though the fish had disgorged me, yet I should never have got to land.
- 48. The shores areset by God as bars to keep the sea within his bounds, Job 38:8; Job 38:10-11, Jeremiah 5:22. Here then all the creatures seemed to set against poor Jonah, and (which was more than all) the Creator too: so that he might sigh and say, as in the poet (Martial). “ In me omnis terraeque aviumque marisque rapina est, Forsitan et coeli ” Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption] i.e. From the place where I was likely to have lain and rotted. Cum duplicantur lateres, venit Moses: when things are at the worst God appeareth, as it were out of an engine, εκ της µηχανης. In the mount will the Lord be seen, Ezekiel 37:11, 2 Kings 19:3; he stays so long sometimes that he hardly "finds faith on earth," Luke 18:8, and yet comes at last to the relief of his poor people; viz. when they are ripe and ready for it. He is a God of judgment, he knows how and when to deal forth his favours; and even waiteth to be gracious, Isaiah 30:18; Isaiah 28:21. O Lord my God] sc. by the mean and merit of thy Son, in whom alone it is that thou, Lord, art my God, and that I can call thee Abba, Father. It is well observed by an interpreter, that in this short history of Jonah are all things contained which may make to the sound and saving knowledge of God and his will, of ourselves also and our duties. ELLICOTT, "(6) Bottoms of the mountains.—Literally, ends or cuttings off, as, in margin. So the Vulg. extrema montium. Mountains were in the Hebrew conception the pillars of the world (see Job 9:6; Job 26:11), having their foundations firmly planted in the sea. These “hidden bases of the hills” were therefore the verge of the earth itself, and one lost among them would be close on the under-world of death. The earth with her bars . . .—Literally, the earth her bars behind me for ever; i.e., the earth’s gates were closed upon me for ever, there was no possibility of return. The metaphor of a gateway to sheôl is common (Isaiah 38:10, &c.), but the earth is nowhere else said to be so guarded. Ewald therefore proposes to read sheôl here. But it is quite as natural to imagine a guarded passage out of the land of the living as into the land of the dead. Corruption.—Rather, pit. (See ote, Psalms 16:10.) ISBET, "OUT OF THE DEEP PIT ‘Yet hast Thou brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God.’ Jonah 2:6 (R.V.) I. Have you got down into the pit?—It may be by your own fault. So it was with Jonah. He would never have been in this plight had he not disobeyed the voice of the Lord. He paid the fare to go to Tarshish, but really to go down into the depths, and
- 49. to have hisreturn fare given him gratis. Disobedience may be forgiven when we confess it with true repentance, as Jonah did, but it costs us dearly. II. Can you dare to appeal to God?—Some, when they get down into the pit, are too ashamed and fearful to cry to Him. They think that they have gone too far and sinned too deeply, not knowing the infinitude of His saving grace, which abounds as much more than our sins as the Flood overtopped the highest mountains. But if only thou wilt say: ‘O Lord my God!’ Even if thou art not worthy to be called a child, even if thou supposest thyself to have committed the unpardonable sin, even if all God’s waves and billows have gone over thee—still thou mayest speak to Him as thy God. Did He not create and redeem thee? Has He not encouraged thee by thousands of promises to come? Does not thine own heart instruct thee that weakness and need are always supreme arguments where goodness and strength blend in a noble character? Cry to Him, ‘O Lord my God, be merciful to me the sinner.’ III. Is it not true that with God the pit is the way to the throne?—It was so with Joseph. Was it not so with our Lord? He will not leave thy soul in Hades, nor suffer thee to see corruption. Dare to look again out of the belly of hell towards His Holy Temple. He who brought thee down will again bring up thy life to see the light. Illustration ‘The fish, through a mistranslation of St. Matthew 12:40, was formerly supposed to be a whale, but the whale’s neck is too narrow to receive a man. The original means simply a great fish. One commentator thinks it was the dogfish, the stomach of which is so large that the body of a man in armour was found in it. Others think it was a shark. Our Lord expressly quotes the incident as a miracle, and as a type of His own resurrection. During his imprisonment in the belly of this great fish the prophet was, so to speak, dead to all the world, and his resurrection was a conspicuous proof of Divine power, such as could not fail to arrest the attention of the inevites, when they became aware of it. Jonah’s prayer is very pathetic. He cried. Yes, often enough we do not cry till the oppression of our affliction lies heavily upon us. But God can hear a cry though it comes from the depths of the sea. What a blessed resolution is that of the fourth verse! O soul of man, thou seemest to be cast out of God’s sight by thy own act and deed. evertheless, look again towards His Holy Temple. Look again! Look again to the wounds of thy Saviour. Look again for pardon and acceptance! Look in true repentance and faith, and thou canst not look in vain!’ SIMEO , "JO AH RESTORED FROM THE BELLY OF A FISH Jonah 2:6, Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O Lord my God. IT is of the highest importance to have seasons of recollection for the more solemn investigation of the state of our souls. ot a day should be closed without serious reflections on our conduct through the day. On particular occasions it would be well to commit them to writing, with a view to our future humiliation or encouragement.
- 50. Jonah’s example inthis respect is worthy of imitation. Having received from God a commission to denounce his judgments against ineveh, and being afraid, that, after all, God would exercise mercy towards them, and make him appear a false prophet, he declined the office that had been assigned him, and endeavoured to “flee from the presence of the Lord.” But a storm overtook him; and he was cast into the sea, and swallowed by a fish; and then, being preserved alive in that extraordinary situation, he thought on his ways, and cried unto his God for mercy. After his deliverance, he called to remembrance the exercises of his mind during his perilous confinement; and recorded them, for the benefit of the Church to the end of time. He tells us, that at first he began to despair; conceiving that “the Lord had cast him out of his sight.” But, knowing that nothing was impossible with God, he directed his eyes towards heaven, and prayed. His prayer was heard, and the desired mercy was vouchsafed to him. This he acknowledges in the words before us: in which we have, I. An instructive history— Every part of this history is replete with instruction. Other parts of Holy Writ inform us of the frailties of God’s people, and exhibit oah, Lot, David, Peter, and others, in very humiliating conditions. But there is a peculiarity in the character of Jonah that distinguishes him from all others, and gives us a deep insight into the human heart. We cannot however stop to enter minutely into his character, or into the diversified lessons which his history would teach us. We shall confine ourselves to two observations, which are of a general nature and of universal importance: 1. Rebellion against God will surely bring upon us his heavy displeasure— [Jonah might think lightly perhaps of the sin he had committed, when refusing to execute the commission he had received: and he certainly was unmindful of the danger he had brought upon himself, even while all who sailed with him in the ship were in the utmost terror. But God was visiting him for his iniquity; and, in order to the discovery of it, suggested to the minds of the mariners to ascertain, by a lot, who the guilty person was, for whose sake the storm was raised. The lot fell on Jonah: and he, being impeached thus by God himself, confessed his crime; and prescribed, as the only means of pacifying the Deity, that he himself should be cast into the sea. Thus did vengeance overtake him. And shall we sin with impunity? What though we think light of our sins, and sleep in security when we should be praying to our God; does God estimate sin by our standard? or is danger at all more remote, because we do not see it? Of this we may be assured, that “evil will hunt the wicked man, to overthrow him;” and, however long we may elude its pursuit, it will seize upon us at last, as its legitimate prey. The declaration of God to every impenitent person is, “Be sure your sin will find you out.”] 2. Whatever effects of his displeasure we may now feel, the prayer of penitence and faith will deliver us from them— [A more desperate condition than that of Jonah cannot well be conceived [ ote: See his description of it, ver. 2, 3, 5.]. Yet from thence was he brought by the efficacy of
- 51. fervent prayer [ote: ver. 2, 4, 7.]. Be it so then; we have sinned against the Lord in a very grievous manner; and we are at this moment under his chastising hand; still “Has the Lord forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies?” o: the Lord is merciful and gracious: and, if only we have a heart to pray, we need not doubt but that he has an ear to hear. Were we at the bottom of the sea, yet if we were able to look unto his holy Temple, we should not look in vain. We might not be delivered with respect to the body; but the soul should find acceptance at God’s hands, and be made a monument of his sparing mercy.] We dwell the less on the historical view of Jonah’s deliverance, because we wish you to notice it more particularly as, II. A glorious type— We are always cautious of exceeding the bounds of truth and soberness in the explanation of types. On this account we altogether omit, what some have laid a stress upon, the idea of Christ’s offering up himself a sacrifice to God for the purpose of averting his wrath from us. And we should be inclined to limit the typical import of this history to the resurrection of Christ, if he himself had not given us a more extended view of it. But, in the place where he speaks of Jonas as being “a sign” to the people, he calls him “the Prophet Jonas,” and mentions the remarkable success of his ministrations [ ote: Matthew 12:38-41.]. We are induced therefore to consider the whole of this history as designating the ministry of Jesus; 1. In its temporary suspension— The casting of Jonah into the sea, and his being swallowed by a fish, effectually, as it should seem, put an end to his mission. Whatever gracious intentions God had formed respecting the inevites, they were now, to all appearance, frustrated; so that, unless God should send to them by some other prophet, his judgments would come upon them without warning, and without a remedy. Such was also the distressful, and apparently irremediable, state, to which the world was reduced by the death of Christ. His enemies triumphed when they saw him dead upon the cross, and committed to the silent tomb. His friends and followers then concluded, that they had been mistaken in their expectations, and that the redemption of Israel which they had looked for at his hands was a hopeless phantom [ ote: Luke 24:21.]. To guard them against this erroneous conclusion, our blessed Lord expressly told his disciples, that “he should be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”] 2. Its speedy restoration— [After three days, Jonah was, by God’s overruling providence, disgorged in safety upon dry land; and his commission to preach unto the inevites was renewed. Thus by the resurrection of Christ were the hopes of a ruined world revived. ot
- 52. only was theministry of our Lord himself renewed, but all his Apostles also received afresh their commission to preach the Gospel to every creature. Could the inevites have foreseen the effect of Jonah’s deliverance, how would their hearts have leaped for joy! And well may all the nations of the earth rejoice in the tidings of a risen Saviour, through whom repentance and remission of sins are preached, and by whom the most abandoned of sinners may be brought to God.] 3. Its ultimate success— [Wonderful indeed was the effect of Jonah’s ministrations! and we may well suppose that the relation of his miraculous preservation and deliverance contributed in no small degree to the success of his mission. The people of ineveh would necessarily conclude, that he was sent of God, and that the denunciations delivered by him would be fulfilled. And was not this the effect of Christ’s resurrection? The very point which all the Apostles most insisted on, was this: “they preached Jesus and the Resurrection:” they preached, “that he died according to the Scriptures, and rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.” From hence the inference was clear that Jesus was the promised Messiah, the Saviour of the world: and so rapidly did this truth prevail, that in one day there were converted to him three thousand souls; and, in a very short space of time, the whole Roman empire was filled with his acknowledged followers.] We may learn from hence, 1. On what a firm basis our religion stands— [The sign which above all others our blessed Lord laid the greatest stress upon, was his fulfilling of this type. Though he gave innumerable proofs of his divine mission, yet it was to this chiefly, yea, to this only, that he referred the confirmed sceptics. He said, in fact, “I shall die, and rise again the third day without seeing corruption, and shall live for evermore, to perfect the work assigned me. If I rise on the third day, then you will know that I am the Messiah: if I do not, I am contented that you shall account me an impostor.” ow, brethren, you know the means which his enemies used to prevent any collusion among his disciples; yea, and how incredulous his disciples themselves were; and consequently, you are sure that he did indeed rise, and that all which God hath spoken by him, or of him, is true; it is true that the impenitent and unbelieving shall perish; but that “all who believe in him shall be justified from all things.”] 2. What has been done for every believer— [Though Jonah stands alone in his particular line of experience, there is not a believer whose soul has not been in as perilous a condition as Jonah himself was at the bottom of the sea; nor one who has not obtained deliverance by the very same means, humiliation and prayer. The experience of David was not unlike to Jonah’s
- 53. [ ote: Psalms40:1-3.]; and that of the Church of old is painted in expressions precisely similar to those in the chapter before us [ ote: Lamentations 3:54-58.];. Happy, happy they, who have obtained mercy of the Lord, and can thus attest the efficacy of believing prayer! Let not your feelings, brethren, be forgotten; but get them written in the tablet of your hearts; and let your acknowledgments be suited to the mercies vouchsafed unto you.] 3. What the Lord will do for all who call upon him— [Our blessed Saviour, by dying for our offences and rising again for our justification, has procured for us whatever we stand in need of. Even in the denunciations of God’s wrath there is an implied promise of mercy, if we repent and turn to God. However great therefore our guilt may be, or however imminent our danger, let us remember, that “with the Lord there is mercy, and with him is plenteous redemption.” Let us remember, that “Jesus is exalted to give repentance and remission of sins;” and that, though we were as much “in the belly of hell” as a living creature can be, our cry should come before him into his holy temple, and “he would bring up our souls out of the pit of corruption;” “after two days he would revive us; in the third day he would raise us up, and we should live in his sight [ ote: Hosea 6:1-2.];.”] PULPIT, "The bottoms of the mountains; literally, the cuttings off, where the mountains seem to be cut off by the ocean floor; the roots of the mountains. εἰς σχισµὰς ὀρέων, "the clefts of the mountains"; Psalms 18:15. The earth with her bars; as for the earth, her bars were about me; return to it was shut out for me; the gate by which I might return was locked behind me. He adds, forever, as it was to all appearance, because he had no power in himself of returning to earth and life. Yet; in spite of all, I am preserved. From corruption (shachath); as Job 17:14; de corruptione (Vulgate); so the Chaldee and Syriac; Septuagint, ἀναβήτω ἐκ φθορᾶς ἡ ζωή µου (Alex), ἀναβήτω φθορὰ ζωῆς µου (Vatican), "Let my life arise from destruction;" or, "Let the destruction of my life [i.e. my destroyed life] arise." Jerome refers the word to the digestive process in the fish's stomach; it is probably merely a synonym for "death." The marginal rendering, "the pit," i.e. Sheol, is also etymologically correct (comp. Psalms 30:3). My God. He thankfully acknowledges that Jehovah has proved himself a beneficent God to him. 7 “When my life was ebbing away, I remembered you, Lord, and my prayer rose to you,
- 54. to your holytemple. BAR ES, "When my sold fainted - , literally “was covered, within me,” was dizzied, overwhelmed. The word is used of actual faintness from heat, Jon_4:8. thirst, Amo_8:13. exhaustion, Isa_51:20. when a film comes over the eyes, and the brain is, as it were, mantled over. The soul of the pious never is so full of God, as when all things else fade from him. Jonah could not but have remembered God in the tempest; when the lots were east; when he adjudged himself to be east forth. But when it came to the utmost, then he says, “I remembered the Lord,” as though, in the intense thought of God then, all his former thought of God had been forgetfulness. So it is in every strong act of faith, of love, of prayer; its former state seems unworthy of the name of faith, love, prayer. It believes, loves, prays, as though all before had been forgetfulness. And my prayer came in unto Thee - No sooner had he so prayed, than God heard. Jonah had thought himself cast out of His sight; but his prayer entered in there. “His holy temple” is doubtless His actual temple, toward which he prayed. God, Who is wholly everywhere but the whole of Him nowhere, was as much in the temple as in heaven; and He had manifested Himself to Israel in their degree in the temple, as to the blessed saints and angels in heaven. CLARKE, "When my soul fainted - When I had given up all hope of life. My prayer came in unto thee - Here prayer is personified, and is represented as a messenger going from the distressed, and entering into the temple of God, and standing before him. This is a very fine and delicate image. This clause is one of those which I suppose the prophet to have added when he penned this prayer. GILL, "When my soul fainted within me,.... Covered with grief; overwhelmed with sorrow; ready to faint and sink at the sight of his sins; and under a sense of the wrath and displeasure of God, and being forsaken by him: I remembered the Lord; his covenant and promises, his former mercies and lovingkindness, the gracious experiences he had had of these in times past; he remembered he was a God gracious and merciful, and ready to forgive, healed the backslidings of his people, and still loved them freely, and tenderly received and embraced them, when they returned to him: and my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple; into heaven itself, the habitation of God's holiness, the temple where he dwells, and is worshipped by holy angels and glorified saints; the prayer the prophet put up in the fish's belly, encouraged to it by remembering the mercy and goodness of God, ascended from thence, and reached the ears of the Lord of hosts in the highest heavens, and met with a kind
- 55. reception, and hada gracious answer; see Psa_3:4. HE RY, "He reflects upon the favour of God to him when thus in his distress he sought to God and trusted him. (1.) He graciously accepted his prayer, and gave admission and audience to it (Psa_9:7): My prayer, being sent to him, came in unto him, even into his holy temple; it was heard in the highest heavens, though it was prayed in the lowest deeps. (2.) He wonderfully wrought deliverance for him, and, when he was in the depth of his misery, gave him the earnest and assurance of it (Psa_9:6): Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O Lord my God! Some think he said this when he was vomited up on dry ground; and then it is the language of thankfulness, and he sets it over-against the great difficulty of his case, that the power of God might be the more magnified in his deliverance: The earth with her bars was about me for ever, and yet thou hast brought up my life from the pit, from the bars of the pit. Or, rather, we may suppose it spoken while he was yet in the fish's belly, and then it is the language of his faith: “Thou hast kept me alive here, in the pit, and therefore thou canst, thou wilt, bring up my life from the pit;” and he speaks of it with as much assurance as if it were done already: Thou has brought up my life. Though he has not an express promise of deliverance, he has an earnest of it, and on that he depends: he has life, and therefore believes his life shall be brought up from corruption; and this assurance he addresses to God: Thou has done it, O Lord my God! Thou art the Lord, and therefore canst do it for me, my God, and therefore wilt do it. Note, If the Lord be our God, he will be to us the resurrection and the life, will redeem our lives from destruction, from the power of the grave. JAMISO , "soul fainted ... I remembered the Lord — beautifully exemplifying the triumph of spirit over flesh, of faith over sense (Psa_73:26; Psa_42:6). For a time troubles shut out hope; but faith revived when Jonah “remembered the Lord,” what a gracious God He is, and how now He still preserves his life and consciousness in his dark prison-house. into thine holy temple — the temple at Jerusalem (Jon_2:4). As there he looks in believing prayer towards it, so here he regards his prayer as already heard. CALVI , "Here Jonah comprehends in one verse what he had previously said, — that he had been distressed with the heaviest troubles, but that he had not yet been so cast down in his mind, as that he had no prospect of God’s favor to encourage him to pray. He indeed first confesses that he had suffered some kind of fainting, and that he had been harassed by anxious and perplexing thoughts, so as not to be able by his own efforts to disengage himself. As to the word ,עטף otheph, it means in Hebrew to hide, to cover; but in iphal and Hithpael (in which conjugation it is found here) it signifies to fail: but its former meaning might still be suitably retained here; then it would be, ‘My soul hid or rolled up itself,’ as it is in Psalms 102:1, ‘The prayer of the afflicted, when he rolled up himself in his distress.’ They who render it, he multiplied prayers, have no reason to support them. I therefore doubt not but that Jonah here means, either that he had been overcome by a swoon, or that he had been so perplexed as not to be able without a violent struggle to raise up his mind to God. However it may have been, he intended by this word to express the anxiety of his mind. While then we are tossed
- 56. about by diversthoughts, and remain, as it were, bound up in a hopeless condition, then our soul may be said to roll or to fold up itself within us. When therefore the soul rolls up itself, all the thoughts of man in perplexity recoil on himself. We may indeed seek to disburden ourselves while we toss about various purposes, but whatever we strive to turn away from us, soon comes back on our own head; thus our soul recoils upon us. We now perceive what Jonah meant by this clause, When my soul infolded itself, or failed within me, I remembered, he says, Jehovah. We hence learn that Jonah became not a conqueror without the greatest difficulties, not until his soul, as we have said, had fainted: this is one thing. Then we learn, also, that he was not so oppressed with distresses but that he at length sought God by prayer. Jonah therefore retained this truth, that God was to be sought, however severely and sharply he treated him for a time; for the remembering, of which he speaks, proceeded from faith. The ungodly also remember Jehovah, but they dread him, for they look on him as a judge; and whenever a mention is made of God, they expect nothing but destruction: but Jonah applied the remembrance of God to another purpose, even as a solace to ease his cares and his anxieties. For it immediately follows, that his prayer had penetrated unto God, or entered before him. (39) We then see that Jonah so remembered his God, that by faith he knew that he would be propitious to him; and hence was his disposition to pray. But by saying that his prayer entered into his temple, he no doubt alludes to a custom under the law; for the Jews were wont to turn themselves towards the temple whenever they prayed: nor was this a superstitious ceremony; for we know that they were instructed in the doctrine which invited them to the sanctuary and the ark of the covenant. Since then this was the custom under the law, Jonah says that his prayer entered into the temple of God; for that was a visible symbol, through which the Jews might understand that God was near to them; not that they by a false imagination bound God to external signs, but because they knew that these helps Had not in vain been given to them. So then Jonah not only remembered his God, but called also to mind the signs and symbols in which he had exercised his faith, as we have just said through the whole course of his life; for they who view him as referring to heaven, depart wholly from what the Prophet meant. We indeed know that the temple sometimes means heaven; but this sense suits not this place. Then Jonah meant that though he was far away from the temple, God was yet near to him; for he had not ceased to pray to that God who had revealed himself by the law which he gave, and who had expressed his will to be worshipped at Jerusalem, and also had been pleased to appoint the ark as the symbol of his presence, that the Jews might, with an assured faith, call upon him, and that they might not doubt but that he dwelt in the midst of them, inasmuch as he had there his visible habitation. COFFMA , "Verse 7 "When my soul fainted within me, I remembered Jehovah; and my prayer came in unto thee, into thy holy temple." See under Jonah 2:4 for the significance of this reference to the temple in Jerusalem as still standing. There is no dependability whatever in denials that this is a
- 57. reference to thattemple. Griffiths asserted that, "This is probably not the literal Jerusalem temple";[34] but that is the only temple that any of the Jews of that era knew. As Blaikie put it: "Jonah thinks of the temple (the literal temple), the sacred ark, the mercy seat, the over-shadowing cherubim, the promise of Moses: "There will I meet with you, and I will commune with you from above the mercy seat."[35] At first thought, it appears that Jonah was a bit late remembering God; but remember him he did and therefore received the blessing. PETT, "Verse 7 “When my soul fainted within me, I remembered YHWH, And my prayer came in to you, Into your holy temple. In his desperation he had remembered YHWH, and he had prayed to YHWH towards His holy Temple. And he knew that in that moment YHWH had answered, so that here he was, safe, even though he knew not where. TRAPP, "Jonah 2:7 When my soul fainted within me I remembered the LORD: and my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple. Ver. 7. When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the Lord] And could say, as the Church in Isaiah 63:16, when at lowest, "Doubtless thou art our father, our redeemer, thy name is from everlasting." As there is in the creatures an instinct of nature to do after their kind; so there. is of grace in the saints to run to God. "Yea, in the way of thy judgments, O Lord, have we waited for thee; the desire of our soul is to thy name, and to the remembrance of thee. With my soul have I desired thee in the night; yea, with my spirit within me will I seek thee early," Isaiah 26:8-9. "O Lord," saith Habakkuk, Habakkuk 1:12, "art not thou from everlasting my God, and mine Holy One?" It was a bold question, but God approves and assents to it in a gracious answer ere they went farther: "We shall not die" (say they abruptly), "O Lord, thou hast ordained them" (the Chaldeans) "for judgment"; but us only for chastisement. Here was the triumph of their faith, and this was that which held up Jonah’s hope, though with wonderful difficulty, held head above water. He remembered "the years of the right hand of the Most High," Psalms 77:10; he called to mind his songs in the night season, Jonah 2:6, his former experience, a just ground of his present confidence. He remembered the Lord, his power and goodness, those two pillars, the Jachin and the Boaz, that support faith; and this fetched him again when ready to faint. "I had even fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living," Psalms 27:13. And my prayer came in unto thee] q.d. Though I was so faint I could scarcely utter a prayer, yet thou hearkenedst and heardest, as Malachi 3:16; thou madest hard shift to hear (as I may say); thine ears were in my prayers, as St Peter hath it, 1 Peter 3:12; thou feltest my breathing, when no voice could be heard, Lamentations
- 58. 3:56; thou heldestnot "thy peace at my tears," Psalms 39:12, quando fletu agerem non afflatu; yea, thou heardest the voice of mine affliction, Genesis 16:11. Into thine holy temple] Whether we take it to be the temple at Jerusalem (a type of Christ), Jonah’s prayer was accepted for Christ’s sake; and proved to no less purpose, though made in the whale’s belly, than if he had been pouring it out in God’s holy temple. Or if we understand it to be heaven, the habitation of God’s holiness, and of his glory, his prayers were come up thither for a memorial before the Almighty, Acts 10:4, and like pillars of incense pierced into his presence, Song of Solomon 3:6, neither would they away without their errand, but lay at God’s feet till he should command deliverance out of Zion. SIMEO , "JO AH’S REFLECTIO S I THE WHALE’S BELLY Jonah 2:7-9. When my soul fainted within me I remembered the Lord: and my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple. They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy. But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the Lord. TO take a retrospect of our feelings, under circumstances of peculiar trial, is exceedingly beneficial. There are times when we realize in our minds truths which at other seasons have had no weight, and produced on us no effect. Thus Jonah, after his deliverance from the belly of the fish, called to mind, and transmitted for our good, the reflections which occupied his soul in that peculiarly awful situation, and in the near prospect of death. He here records, I. The mercy vouchsafed— This was such as never was vouchsafed to any other man, either before or since— [The history you well know. But there are some points which we must particularly notice on this occasion. He was delivered, you know, from the belly of a fish. But mark the time when this mercy was vouchsafed to him: it was when he was in the very act of rebellion against God — — — Mark also the means: it was by a miraculous influence of God upon the fish, directing it to go to the sea-shore, and to vomit him forth upon the dry land. The occasion also must especially be noticed: it was in answer to a prayer offered from the bottom of the sea: “When Jonah’s soul fainted within him, he remembered the Lord: and his prayer came in unto God, even into his holy temple.”] Though we have never been in a situation like his, have not we also wonderful mercies to recount? [We have all of us, more or less, been in situations of danger, either by sickness or by accident, when we were in a state most unprepared to meet our God; and when, if we had been taken into the eternal world, we must have for ever perished in our
- 59. sins. On somesuch occasion, perhaps, we have reflected on our state, and felt our need of mercy, and cried unto our God, and obtained mercy at his hands: and here we are living witnesses for God, that “he desireth not the death of a sinner, but rather that he turn from his wickedness and live” — — —] Let us pass on to consider, II. The conviction wrought— Jonah had known, before, the folly of idolatry, and the wisdom of relying wholly upon God. But now he felt this in a way that he had not done before. ow too he felt, that to flee from the presence of God, as he had done, and to decline the service of his God, and to seek happiness in a way of disobedience to God, was folly in the extreme; and that the only way to be truly happy, was to serve, and honour, and obey the Lord. And were not such our convictions, also, in the prospect of death? [ one of us need be told that the creature is but a broken cistern; and that “to forsake the fountain of living waters for cisterns of our own formation, is a great evil [ ote: Jeremiah 2:13.];.” But, whilst we acknowledge this as a speculative truth, who feels it practically, so as to act upon it, and to have his life regulated in accordance with it? In a time of health, we see perhaps what is right, but do it not; nor have in our souls any fixed purpose to carry into effect the dictates of our mind and judgment. But in the near approach of death these truths assume a reality and importance which we never discerned before. Once, perhaps, we could laugh at them, as the dreams of enthusiasm, and the peculiarities of a sect: but in that solemn hour when we are expecting to be summoned into the immediate presence of our God, we bitterly regret that we have given so little weight to these considerations; and we then are convinced, indeed, that “in observing and following lying vanities we have madly forsaken our own mercies.” The convict that is about to perish by the hand of the public executioner, however obdurate he has been in times past, feels this; and the public feel it for him. Would to God that, in our time of health and prosperity, we all felt it for ourselves!] The result of that conviction we shall see in, III. The determination formed— ow would the prophet henceforth praise his God: and, having made vows to God in the hour of his extremity, he would now pay them; and be a living witness for God, that “salvation is of the Lord” for every soul that will seek it, however deep his guilt, or however desperate his condition. These are the determinations, Brethren, which I desire you, in dependence upon God’s help, to form—
- 60. [Look to themercies vouchsafed to you in the hour of your necessity, when you cried unto the Lord: look at your deliverance from death and hell: look at a resurrection vouchsafed to you, from death to life, from misery to peace, from hell to heaven; a resurrection like unto that of Jonah; or rather like to that which was typified by it, the resurrection of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ: and then tell me, whether you should not “sacrifice unto the Lord with the voice of thanksgiving,” and your every word be praise — — — Call to mind, also, the vows which you made in the hour of trouble; how you would live henceforth, not unto yourselves, but to your God; and not for time only, but for eternity. ow, beware that you forget not the resolutions then formed. Beg of God that they may not, as is too generally the case, vanish as the early dew that passeth away. They are all recorded in the book of God’s remembrance; and if violated by you, in return for all the mercies vouchsafed unto you, they will fearfully aggravate your eternal condemnation — — — ow, too, be living witnesses for God, for the encouragement of others. Shew to others what a salvation you have found, and found in your lowest extremity, in answer to the prayer of faith. Who can tell what a blessing you may he to those around you? Doubtless the mercy vouchsafed to Jonah was, under God, the salvation of all that great and populous city to which he preached. His miraculous deliverance gave, so to speak, an irresistible energy to his word; insomuch that all, from the king on the throne to the lowest of the populace, instantly turned in penitential sorrow to the Lord. So you, when you can say to others, “What my eyes have seen, and ears have heard, and hands have handled, of the word of life, the same declare I unto you,” may he instrumental to the honouring of God your Saviour, and to the saving of many souls alive.] On a review of this subject, see, 1. How wonderful are the ways of God! [Who would have thought to what even the rebellion of Jonah should lead; and how the punishing of that should lead to the salvation of his soul, and of the souls of many others? Truly, “God’s ways are in the great deep, and his footsteps are not known.” But from all this we may learn never to despond; but rather, however desperate our condition may be, to say, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him” — — —] 2. How marvellous is the efficacy of converting grace! [See what a change is wrought in Jonah; though, indeed, far less than might have been expected. But to change our rebellious hearts into a frame of obediential love and gratitude; and to renew us in our inner man, so as to make us as lights in a dark world; this is, and must be, the effect of true conversion. See then, brethren, that ye offer unto God the sacrifice of praise continually; and especially for your redemption from all the penal effects of sin, through the blood and righteousness of our Lord Jesus Christ. See, too, that you live to God as his redeemed people, in holiness and righteousness before him all the days of your life; and that you labour, in every possible way, to commend to others the salvation which you yourselves have
- 61. found — ——] PULPIT, "His prayer was heard. When my soul fainted within me; literally, was covered—referring, says Pusey, to that physical exhaustion when a film comes over the eyes, and the brain is mantled over. The clause is from Psalms 142:3 or Psalms 143:4. I remembered the Lord. That was his salvation (Psalms 119:55). He turned in thought to thine holy temple (Psalms 143:4), the sanctuary where God's presence was most assured, like the psalmist in the wilderness (Psalms 63:2). or like the exiles by the waters of Babylon when they remembered Zion (Psalms 137:1-9). 8 “Those who cling to worthless idols turn away from God’s love for them. BAR ES, "They that observe lying vanities - , i. e., (by the force of the Hebrew form , that diligently watch, pay deference to, court, sue, “vanities of vanities,” vain things, which prove themselves vain at last, failing the hopes which trust in them. Such were actual idols, in which men openly professed that they trusted Such are all things in which men trust, out of God. One is not more vain than another. All have this common principle of vanity, that people look, out of God, to that which has its only existence or permanence from God. It is then one general maxim, including all people’s idols, idols of the flesh, idols of intellect, idols of ambition, idols of pride, idols of self and self-will. People “observe” them, as gods, watch them, hang upon them, never lose sight of them, guard them as though they could keep them. But what are they? “lying vanities,” breath and wind, which none can grasp or detain, vanishing like air into air. And what do they who so “observe” them? All alike “forsake their own mercy;” i. e., God, “Whose property is, always to have mercy,” and who would be mercy to them, if they would. So David calls God, “my mercy.” Psa_144:2. Abraham’s servant and Naomi praise God, that He “hath not forsaken His mercy” Gen_24:27; Rth_2:20. Jonah does not, in this, exclude himself. His own idol had been his false love for his country, that he would not have his people go into captivity, when God would; would not have Nineveh preserved, the enemy of his country; and by leaving his office, he left his God, “forsook” his “own mercy.” See how God speaks of Himself, as wholly belonging to them, who are His. He calls Himself “their own mercy” . He saith not, “they who” do “vanities,” (for Ecc_1:2. ‘vanity of vanities, and all things are vanity’) lest he should seem to condemn all, and to deny mercy to the whole human race; but “they who observe, guard vanities,” or lies; “they,” into the affections of whose hearts those “vanities” have entered; who not only “do vanities,” but who “guard” them, as loving them, deeming that they have found
- 62. a treasure -These “forsake their own mercy.” Although mercy be offended (and under mercy we may understand God Himself, for God is Psa_145:8, “gracious and full of compassion; slow to anger and of great mercy,”) yet he doth not “forsake,” doth not abhor, “those who guard vanities,” but awaiteth that they should return: these contrariwise, of their own will, “forsake mercy” standing and offering itself.” CLARKE, "They that observe lying vanities - They that trust in idols, follow vain predictions, permit themselves to be influenced with foolish fears, so as to induce them to leave the path of obvious duty, forsake their own mercy. In leaving that God who is the Fountain of mercy, they abandon that measure of mercy which he had treasured up for them. GILL, "They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy. They that worship idols, who are nothing, mere vanity and lies, and deceive those that serve them, these forsake the God of their lives, and of their mercies; and so do all such who serve divers lusts and pleasures, and pursue the vanities of this life; and also those who follow the dictates of carnal sense and reason, to the neglect of the will of God, and obedience to his commands; which was Jonah's case, and is, I think, chiefly intended. The Targum, Syriac version, and so Jarchi, and most interpreters, understand it of worshippers of idols in general; and Kimchi of the mariners of the ship Jonah had been in; who promised to relinquish their idols, but did not; and vowed to serve the Lord, and sacrifice to him, but did not perform what they promised. But I rather think Jonah reflects upon himself in particular, as well as leaves this as a general instruction to others; that should they do as he had done, give way to an evil heart of unbelief, and attend to the suggestions of a vain mind, and consult with flesh and blood, and be directed thereby, to the disregard of God and his will; they will find, as he had done to his cost, that they forsake that God that has been gracious and merciful to them, and who is all goodness and mercy, Psa_144:3; which to do is very ungrateful to him, and injurious to themselves; and now he being sensible of his folly, and influenced by the grace and goodness of God to him, resolves to do as follows: HE RY, " He gives warning to others, and instructs them to keep close to God (Psa_ 9:8): Those that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy, that is, (1.) Those that worship other gods, as the heathen mariners did, and call upon them, and expect relief and comfort from them, forsake their own mercy; they stand in their own light; they turn their back upon their own happiness, and go quite out of the way of all good. Note, Idols are lying vanities, and those that pay that homage to them which is due to God only act as contrarily to their interests as to their duty. Or, (2.) Those that follow their own inventions, as Jonah himself had done when he fled from the presence of the Lord to go to Tarshish, forsake their own mercy, that mercy which they might find in God, and might have such a covenant-right and title to it as to be able to call it their own, if they would but keep close to God and their duty. Those that think to go any where to be from under the eye of God, as Jonah did - that think to better themselves by deserting his service, as Jonah did - and that grudge his mercy to any poor sinners, and pretend to be wiser than he in judging who are fit to have prophets sent them and who are not, as Jonah did - they observe lying vanities, are led away by foolish groundless fancies, and, like him, they forsake their own mercy, and no good can come of it. Note, Those that
- 63. forsake their ownduty forsake their own mercy; those that run away from the work of their place and day run away from the comfort of it. JAMISO , "observe lying vanities — regard or reverence idols, powerless to save (Psa_31:6). mercy — Jehovah, the very idea of whom is identified now in Jonah’s mind with mercy and loving-kindness. As the Psalmist (Psa_144:2) styles Him, “my goodness”; God who is to me all beneficence. Compare Psa_59:17, “the God of my mercy,” literally, “my kindness-God.” Jonah had “forsaken His own mercy,” God, to flee to heathen lands where “lying vanities” (idols) were worshipped. But now, taught by his own preservation in conscious life in the fish’s belly, and by the inability of the mariners’ idols to lull the storm (Jon_1:5), estrangement from God seems estrangement from his own happiness (Jer_2:13; Jer_17:13). Prayer has been restrained in Jonah’s case, so that he was “fast asleep” in the midst of danger, heretofore; but now prayer is the sure sign of his return to God. K&D, "8 They who hold to false vanities Forsake their own mercy. 9 But I will sacrifice to Thee with the call of thanksgiving. I will pay what I have vowed. Salvation is with Jehovah. In order to express the thought emphatically, that salvation and deliverance are only to be hoped for from Jehovah the living God, Jonah points to the idolaters, who forfeit their mercy. אְו ָי־שׁ ֵל ְב ַה ים ִר ְ ַשׁ ְמ is a reminiscence of Psa_31:7. אְו ָי־שׁ ֵל ְב ַ,ה worthless vanities, are all things which man makes into idols or objects of trust. ים ִל ָב ֲה are, according to Deu_32:21, false gods or idols. Shâmar, to keep, or, when applied to false gods, to keep to them or reverence them; in Hos_4:10 it is also applied to Jehovah. ם ָ ְס ַח signifies neither pietatem suam nor gratiam a Deo ipsis exhibitam, nor “all the grace and love which they might receive” (Hitzig); but refers to God Himself, as He whose government is pure grace (vid., Gen_24:27), and might become the grace even of the idolatrous. Jonah, on the contrary, like all the righteous, would sacrifice to the Lord be qōl tōdâh, “with the voice or cry, of thanksgiving,” i.e., would offer his sacrifices with a prayer of sincere thanksgiving (cf. Psa_42:5), and pay the vow which he had made in his distress (cf. Psa_ 50:14, Psa_50:23). These utterances are founded upon the hope that his deliverance will be effected (Hitzig); and this hope is based upon the fact that “salvation is Jehovah's,” i.e., is in His power, so that He only can grant salvation. CALVI , "Here Jonah says first, that men miserably go astray, when they turn aside to vain superstitions, for they rob themselves of the chief good: for he calls whatever help or aid that is necessary for salvation, the mercy of men. The sense then is that as soon as men depart from God, they depart from life and salvation, and that nothing is retained by them, for they willfully cast aside whatever good that can be hoped and desired. Some elicit a contrary meaning, that the superstitious,
- 64. when they returnto a sound mind, relinquish their own reproach; for ,חסד chesad, sometimes means reproach. They then think that the way of true penitence is here described, — that when God restores men from their straying to the right way, he gives them at the same time a sound mind, so that they rid themselves from all their vices. This is indeed true, but it is too strained a meaning. Others confine this to the sailors who vowed sacrifices to God; as though Jonah had said, that they would soon relapse to their own follies, and bid adieu to God, who in his mercy had delivered them from shipwreck; so they explain their mercy to be God; but this is also too forced an explanation. I doubt not, therefore, but that Jonah here sets his own religion in opposition to his false intentions of men; for it immediately follows, But I with the voice of praise will sacrifice to thee. Jonah, then, having before confessed that he would be thankful to God, now pours contempt on all those inventions which men foolishly contrive for themselves, and through which they withdraw themselves from the only true God, and from the sincere worship of him. For he calls all those devices, by which men deceive themselves, the vanities of falsehood; (40) for it is certain that they are mere fallacies which men invent for themselves without the authority of God’s Word; for truth is one and simple, which God has revealed to us in his world. Whosoever then turns aside the least, either on this or on that side, seeks, as it were designedly, some imposture or another, by which he ruins himself. They then who follow such vanities, says Jonah, forsake their own mercy, (41) that is they reject all happiness: for no aid and no help can be expected from any other quarter than from the only true God. But this passage deserves a careful notice; for we hence learn what value to attach to all superstitions, to all those opinions of men, when they attempt to set up religion according to their own will: for Jonah calls them lying or fallacious vanities. There is then but one true religion, the religion which God has taught us in his word. We must also notice, that men in vain weary themselves when they follow their own inventions; for the more strenuously they run, the farther they recede from the right way, as Augustine has well observed. But Jonah here adopts a higher principle, — that God alone possesses in himself all fullness of blessings: whosoever then truly and sincerely seeks God, will find in him whatever can be wished for salvation. But God is not to be sought but by obedience and faith: whosoever then dare to give themselves loose reins, so as to follow this or that without the warrant of God’s word, recede from God, and, at the same time, deprive themselves of all good things. The superstitious do indeed think that they gain much when they toil in their own inventions; but we see what the Holy Spirit declares by the mouth of Jonah. The Lord says the same by Jeremiah “They have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and cisterns have they digged for themselves,” (Jeremiah 2:13.) There the Lord complains of his chosen people, who had gone astray after wicked superstitions. Hence, when men wander beyond the word of God, they in a manner renounce God, or say adieu to him; and thus they deprive themselves of all good
- 65. things; for withoutGod there is no salvation and no help to be found. “ Qui vana idola colunt, Felicitatis suae auctorem deserunt — They who worship vain idols, Desert the author of their own happiness.” More literally — “They who attend on the idols of vanity, Their own goodness forsake.” There is a contrast between vain idols and their own goodness, that is, the goodness received by them from God. Grotius gives this paraphrase, “They who worship idols are vain; for they forsake their own mercy, that is, God, who is able to help them in their distress.” Henry suggests another view, “They who follow their own inventions, as Jonah had done, when he fled from the presence of the lord to go to Tarshish, forsake their own mercy, that mercy which they may find in God.” — Ed. COFFMA , "Verse 8 "They that regard lying vanities Forsake their own mercy." The prophet's deep-seated hatred of idolatry appears in this. He had just observed the distressed mariners each appealing to his god; but, as yet, Jonah's attitude toward them would appear to be colored by that detestation in which all the Jews held other peoples. That this was the case appears in Jonah's displeasure when the inevites actually repented and were spared by the Lord. "Lying vanities ..." Dummelow pointed out that this is in every way the equivalent of "idol gods"[36] (Deuteronomy 32:21). The word "vanity" means literally "something evanescent and worthless."[37] It exemplifies a strange trait of human nature that Jonah who himself was not at that time out of danger should nevertheless have uttered these derogatory remarks about the pagan sailors (who seem to be in his thoughts), even addressing such remarks to God himself! Despite the fair and even magnanimous actions of the sailors toward himself, Jonah appears in this passage not to have entertained any generous thoughts concerning them. Banks pointed out the relevance of the teaching against idolatry in this verse by affirming its relevance to our own times: "We do not bow and scrape before heathen images, but we are also idolaters. ot in the crude way of Jonah's time, but in a more subtle, sophisticated, and therefore a more sinister way. We have merely made some substitutions. In the place of Ashtaroth, Baal, Chemosh, Dagon, Diana, Isis, Mammon, Molech and ebo we have put alcohol, ambition, automobiles, greed, Hollywood, jazz, money, nicotine,
- 66. pleasure, science, sportsand sex. Moreover, many in "Christian" America classify themselves as Buddhists, Muslims, etc.; and hundreds of millions in other lands still worship the heathen gods."[38] COKE, "Jonah 2:8. Forsake their own mercy, &c.— "They who worship idols abandon the mercy of God, render it useless, and reject it, even though offered to them and always ready to save them." Houbigant reads the last clause, Have forsaken their benefactor: and he supposes that Jonah applies this to the mariners who prayed to their gods, before they knew that the true God of heaven and earth, who had raised the storm, was the same who appeased it. PETT, "Verse 8-9 Those who regard lying vanities, Forsake their own mercy, But I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving, I will pay what I have vowed. Salvation is of YHWH.” But he acknowledged that he had been clinging on to deceitful vanities as though he was an idolater (for the phrase compare Psalms 31:6 where it probably refers to idolatry). He had actually believed that he could resign his position as the servant of YHWH and simply walk out on Him, as though YHWH was just an idol. And it had caused him forsake the mercy that was available to him from YHWH. He could hardly believe it of himself. But now all that was past. He was restored to his obedience to YHWH, and once he was in a position to do so he would offer his thanksgiving offering with gratitude, and would pay what he had vowed while he was drowning. For now he recognised in a way that he had not before, that Salvation was of YHWH, totally undeserved and freely given. It had to be for he had just experienced it in that way himself. ‘Salvation is of YHWH.’ This is the message of the whole prophecy. It is God Who saves and God alone. And He does it to whomever He will. o one, not even Jonah, could interfere. Once he had learned that lesson he was free to go. BE SO , "Verse 8-9 Jonah 2:8-9. They that observe lying vanities, &c. — They that seek to, or trust in, idols, (often called by the names of vanity and lies,) forsake their own mercy — Forsake him who alone is able to show mercy to them, and preserve them in time of danger: who, to all that depend upon him, is an eternal fountain of mercy, even a fountain of living waters which flow freely to all that seek unto him for them. But I will sacrifice unto thee, &c. — I will offer to thee those thanks which I solemnly promised to pay in the time of my trouble, and which will be as acceptable to thee as the sacrifices of slain beasts. TRAPP, "Verse 8 Jonah 2:8 They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy.
- 67. Ver. 8. Theythat observe lying vanities] That listen to sense and reason in matters of God, and make provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof, as Jonah had done to his cost, till, having paid for his learning, he descried them all to be but "lying vanities," or most vain vanities, empty nothings. Forsake their own mercy] Are miserable by their own election, because sinners, in a special manner, "against their own souls," as were Korah and his accomplices, umbers 15:38; as was Pope Silvester, who gave his soul to the devil for seven years’ enjoyment of the popedom; and as are all those wilful wicked persons, that refusing to be reformed, and hating to be healed, choose to spend the span of this life after the ways of their own hearts, though they thereby perish for ever. These are those fools of the people, that prefer an apple before paradise, a mess of pottage before the inheritance of heaven, their swine before their Saviour, turning their backs upon those blessed and bleeding embracements of his, and cruelly cutting the throats of their own poor souls by an impenitent continuance in sin; so losing, for a few bitter sweet pleasures, or paltry profits in this vale of tears, for an inch of time, that fulness of felicity at God’s right hand, through all eternity. It is written of them who tame the tiger, that when they have taken away the young one, knowing that presently they shall be pursued by the old tigress, they set lookingglasses in the way by which they flee; whereunto when she cometh and seeth some representation of herself, she lingereth about them a good space, deceived by the shadow, and detained in a vain hope to recover the young again; meanwhile the hunter most speedily posteth away with his prey. Likewise deals Satan with the men of this world (saith mine author); he casts before them the deceitful lusts of profit, pleasure, and preferment, the worldling’s trinity, those "lying vanities," being none other than shadows and semblances of good; yet are men so delighted with these that they dote about them, having no care to pursue the enemy for recovery of that image of God, the Divine nature, that Satan hath beguiled them from. He setteth them to the tree of knowledge, that they may not taste of the tree of life. He putteth out their eyes with the dust of covetousness, and shutteth their ears against the instructions of life, lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their hearts, and should be converted, and God should heal them, Matthew 13:15. In all which there is not anything more to be lamented than this, that people should "love to have it so," Jeremiah 5:31; be active in their own utter undoing, Hosea 13:9; wittingly and willingly forsake God, the fountain of living waters, their own mercies, as he is here called, and elsewhere, Psalms 144:2, and hew themselves out "cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water," Jeremiah 2:13. ELLICOTT, "(8) They that observe lying vanities.—See ote, Psalms 31:6. Forsake their own mercy—i.e., forfeit their own share of the covenant grace. In Psalms 37:28 it is said that Jehovah does not forsake his chasîdim; they, however, by forsaking Jehovah (Himself called Israel’s mercy, Psalms 144:2, margin) and His law (Psalms 89:30) can forfeit their chesed or covenant privilege.
- 68. MACLARE , "‘LYIG VA ITIES’ Jonah 2:8. Jonah’s refusal to obey the divine command to go to ineveh and cry against it is best taken, not as prosaic history, but as a poetical representation of Israel’s failure to obey the divine call of witnessing for God. In like manner, his being cast into the sea and swallowed by the great fish, is a poetic reproduction, for homiletical purposes, of Israel’s sufferings at the hands of the heathen whom it had failed to warn. The song which is put into Jonah’s mouth when in the fish’s belly, of which our text is a fragment, represents the result on the part of the nation of these hard experiences. ‘Lying vanities’ mean idols, and ‘their own mercy’ means God. The text is a brief, pregnant utterance of the great truth which had been forced home to Israel by sufferings and exile, that to turn from Jehovah to false gods was to turn from the sure source of tender care to lies and emptiness. That is but one case of the wider truth that an ungodly life is the acme of stupidity, a tragic mistake, as well as a great sin. In confirmation and enforcement of our text we may consider:- I. The illusory vanity of the objects pursued. The Old Testament tone of reference to idols is one of bitter contempt. Its rigid monotheism was intensified and embittered by the universal prevalence of idolatry; and there is a certain hardness in its tone in reference to the gods of the nations round about, which has little room for pity, and finds expression in such names as those of our text-’vanities,’ ‘lies,’ ‘nothingness,’ and the like. To the Jew, encompassed on all sides by idol-worshippers, the alternative was vehement indignation or entire surrender. The Mohammedan in British India exhibits much the same attitude to Vishnu and Siva as the Jew did to Baal and Ashtoreth. It is easy to be tolerant of dead gods, but it becomes treason to Jehovah to parley with them when they are alive. But the point which we desire to insist upon here is somewhat wider than the vanity of idols. It is the emptiness of all objects of human pursuit apart from God. These last three words need to be made very prominent; for in itself ‘every creature of God is good,’ and the emptiness does not inhere in themselves, but first appears when they are set in His place. He, and only He, can, and does, satisfy the whole nature-is authority for the will, peace for the conscience, love for the heart, light for the understanding, rest for all seeking. He, and He alone, can fill the past with the light in which is no regret, the present with a satisfaction rounded and complete, the future with a hope certain as experience, to which we shall ever approximate, and which we can never exhaust and outgrow. Any, or all, the other objects of human endeavour may be won, and yet we may be miserable. The inadequacy of all these ought to be pressed home upon us more than it is, not only by their limitations whilst they last, but by the transiency of them all. ‘The fashion of this world passeth away,’ as the Apostle John puts it, in a forcible expression which likens all this frame of things to a panorama being unwound from one roller and on to another. The painted screen is but paint at the best, and is in perpetual motion, which is not arrested by the vain clutches of hands that would fain stop the irresistible and tragic gliding past. These vanities are ‘lying vanities.’ There is only one aim of life which, being pursued
- 69. and attained, fulfilsthe promises by which it drew man after it. It is a bald commonplace, reiterated not only by preachers but by moralists of every kind, and confirmed by universal experience, that a hope fulfilled is a hope disappointed. There is only one thing more tragic than a life which has failed in its aims, and it is a life which has perfectly succeeded in them, and has found that what promised to be bread turns to ashes. The word of promise may be kept to the ear, but is always broken to the hope. Many a millionaire loses the power to enjoy his millions by the very process by which he gains them. The old Jewish thinker was wise not only in taking as the summing up of all worldly pursuits the sad sentence, ‘All is vanity,’ but in putting it into the lips of a king who had won all he sought. The sorceress draws us within her charmed circle by lying words and illusory charms, and when she has so secured the captives, her mask is thrown off and her native hideousness displayed. II. The hard service which lying vanities require. The phrase in our text is a quotation, slightly altered, from Psalms 31:6 : ‘I hate them that regard lying vanities; but I trust in the Lord.’ The alteration in the form of the verb as it occurs in Jonah expresses the intensity of regard, and gives the picture of watching with anxious solicitude, as the eyes of a servant turned to his master, or those of a dog to its owner. The world is a very hard master, and requires from its servants the concentration of thought, heart, and effort. We need only recall the thousand sermons devoted to the enforcement of ‘the gospel of getting on,’ which prosperous worldlings are continually preaching. A chorus of voices on every side of us is dinning into the ears of every young man and woman the necessity for success in life’s struggle of taking for a motto, ‘This one thing I do.’ How many a man is there, who in the race after wealth or fame, has flung away aspirations, visions of noble, truthful love to life, and a hundred other precious things? Browning tells a hideous story of a mother flinging, one after another, her infants to the wolves as she urged her sledge over the snowy plain. o less hideous, and still more maiming, are the surrenders that men make when once their hearts have been filled with the foolish ambitions of worldly success. Let us fix it in our minds, that nothing that time and sense can give is worth the price that it exacts. ‘It is only heaven that can be had for the asking; It is only God that is given away.’ All sin is slavery. Its yoke presses painfully on the neck, and its burden is heavy indeed, and the rest which it promises never comes. III. The self-inflicted loss. Our text suggests that there are two ways by which we may learn the folly of a godless life-One, the consideration of what it turns to, the other, the thought of what it departs from. ‘They forsake their own Mercy,’ that is God. The phrase is here almost equivalent to ‘His name’; and it carries the blessed thought that He has entered into relations with every soul, so that each man of us-even if he have turned to ‘lying vanities’-can still call Him, ‘my own Mercy.’ He is ours; more our own than is anything without us. He is ours, because we are made for Him, and He is all for us. He is ours by His love, and by His gift of Himself in the Son of His love. He is ours; if we take Him for ours by an inward communication of Himself to us in the innermost depths of our being. He becomes ‘the Master-Light of all our seeing.’ In the mysterious
- 70. inwardness of mutualpossession, the soul which has given itself to God and possesses Him, has not only communion, but may even venture to claim as its own the deeper and more mysterious union with God. Those multiform mercies, ‘which endure for ever,’ and speed on their manifold errands into every remotest region of His universe, gather themselves together, as the diffused lights of some nebulæ £oncentrate themselves into a sun. That sun, like the star that led the wise men from the East, and finally stood over one poor house in an obscure village, will shine lambent above, and will pass into, the humblest heart that opens for it. They who can say, as we all can if we will, ‘My God,’ can never want. And if we turn to the alternative in our text, and consider who they are to whom we turn when we turn from God, there should be nothing more needed to drive home the wholesome conviction of the folly of the wisest, who deliberately prefers shadow to substance, lying vanities to the one true and only reality. I beseech you to take that which is your own, and which no man can take from you. Weigh in the scales of conscience, and in the light of the deepest necessities of your nature, the whole pile of those emptinesses that have been telling you lies ever since you listened to them; and place in the other scale the mercy of God, and the Christ who brings it to you, and decide which is the weightier, and which it becomes you to take for your pattern for ever. PULPIT, "Jonah contrasts the joy and comfort arising from the thought of God with the miserable fate of idolaters. They that observe (Psalms 31:6); court, pay deference to, reverence. Lying vanities; Septuagint, µάταια καὶ ψευδῆ, "vain things and false." Idom (comp. Jeremiah 18:15; Hosea 12:11; 1 Corinthians 8:4). Their own mercy; i.e. their state of favour with God—the mercy shown to them, as "the mercies of [shown to] David" (Isaiah 55:3); or God himself, the Fountain of mercy and goodness (Psalms 144:2). Henderson translates, "forsake their Benefactor." 9 But I, with shouts of grateful praise, will sacrifice to you. What I have vowed I will make good. I will say, ‘Salvation comes from the Lord.’” BAR ES, "But (And) with the voice of thanksgiving will I (would I fain)
- 71. sacrifice unto Thee;what I have vowed, I would pay - He does not say, I will, for it did not depend upon him. Without a further miracle of God, he could do nothing. But he says, that he would nevermore forsake God. The law appointed sacrifices of thanksgiving; Lev_7:12-15. these he would offer, not in act only, but with words of praise. He would “pay what he had vowed,” and chiefly himself, his life which God had given back to him, the obedience of his remaining life, in all things. For (Ecclesiasticus 35:1) “he that keepeth the law bringeth offerings enough; he that taketh heed to the commandments offereth a peace-offering.” Jonah neglects neither the outward nor the inward part, neither the body nor the soul of the commandment. Salvation is of (literally to) the Lord - It is wholly His; all belongs to Him, so that none can share in bestowing it; none can have any hope, save from Him. He uses an intensive form, as though he would say, strong “mighty salvation” . God seems often to wait for the full resignation of the soul, all its powers and will to Him. Then He can show mercy healthfully, when the soul is wholly surrendered to Him. So, on this full confession, Jonah is restored, The prophet’s prayer ends almost in promising the same as the mariners. They “made vows;” Jonah says, “I will pay that I have vowed.” Devoted service in the creature is one and the same, although diverse in degree; and so, that Israel might not despise the pagan, he tacitly likens the act of the new pagan converts and that of the prophet. CLARKE, "But I will sacrifice unto thee - I will make a sincere vow, which, as soon as my circumstances will permit, I will faithfully execute; and therefore he adds, “I will pay that which I have vowed.” Salvation is of the Lord - All deliverance from danger, preservation of life, recovery from sickness, and redemption of the soul from the power, guilt, and pollution of sin, is from Jehovah. He alone is the Savior, he alone is the Deliverer; for all salvation is from the Lord. GILL, "But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving,.... Not only offer up a legal sacrifice in a ceremonial way, when he came to Jerusalem; but along with it the spiritual sacrifice of praise, which he knew was more acceptable unto God; and thus Christ, his antitype, upon his deliverance from his enemies, Psa_22:22; I will pay that I vowed; when he was in distress; as that he would sacrifice after the above manner, or behave in a better manner for the future than he had done; and particularly would go to Nineveh, if the Lord thought fit to send him again: salvation is of the Lord; this was the ground of the faith and hope of Jonah when at the worst, and the matter of his present praise find thanksgiving. There is one letter more in the word rendered "salvation" (g) than usual, which increases the sense; and denotes, that all kind of salvation is of the Lord, temporal, spiritual, and eternal; not only this salvation from the devouring waves of the sea, and from the grave of the fish's belly, was of the Lord; but his deliverance from the terrors of the Lord, and the sense he had of his wrath, and the peace and pardon he now partook of, were from the Lord, as well as eternal salvation in the world to come, and the hope of it. All temporal salvations and deliverances are from the Lord, and to him the glory of them belongs; and his name should be praised on account of them; which Jonah resolved to do for himself: and so is
- 72. spiritual and eternalsalvation; it is of Jehovah the Father, as to the original spring and motive of it, which is his grace, and not men's works, and is owing to his wisdom, and not men's, for the plan and form of it; it is of Jehovah the Son, as to the impetration of it, who only has wrought it out; and it is of Jehovah the Spirit, as to the application of it to particular persons; and therefore the glory of it belongs to all the three Persons, and should be given them. This is the epiphonema or conclusion of the prayer or thanksgiving; which shows that it was, as before observed, put into this form or order, after the salvation was wrought; though that is related afterwards, as it is proper it should, and as the order of the narration required. HE RY, " He solemnly binds his soul with a bond that, if God work deliverance for him, the God of his mercies shall be the God of his praises, Jon_2:9. He covenants with God, (1.) That he will honour him in his devotions with the sacrifice of thanksgiving; and God has said, for the encouragement of those that do so, that those that offer praise glorify him. He will, according to the law of Moses, bring a sacrifice of thanksgiving, and will offer that according to the law of nature, with the voice of thanksgiving. The love and thankfulness of the heart to God are the life and soul of this duty; without these neither the sacrifice of thanksgiving nor the voice of thanksgiving will avail any thing. But gratitude was then, by a divine appointment, to be expressed by a sacrifice, in which the offerer presented the beast slain to God, not in lieu of himself, but in token of himself; and it is now to be expressed by the voice of thanksgiving, the calves of our lips (Hos_14:2), the fruit of our lips (Heb_13:15), speaking forth, singing forth, the high praises of our God. This Jonah here promises, that with the sacrifice of thanksgiving he will mention the lovingkindness of the Lord, to his glory, and the encouragement of others. (2.) That he will honour him in his conversation by a punctual performance of his vows, which he made in the fish's belly. Some think it was some work of charity that he vowed, or such a vow as Jacob's was, Of all that thou hast given me I will give the tenth unto thee. More probably his vow was that if God would deliver him he would readily go wherever he should please to send him, though it were to Nineveh. When we smart for deserting our duty it is time to promise that we will adhere to it, and abound in it. Or, perhaps, the sacrifice of thanksgiving is the thing he vowed, and that is it which he will pay, as David, Psa_116:17-19. 7. He concludes with an acknowledgment of God as the Saviour of his people: Salvation is of the Lord; it belongs to the Lord, Psa_3:8. He is the God of salvation, Psa_68:19, Psa_68:20. He only can work salvation, and he can do it be the danger and distress ever so great; he has promised salvation to his people that trust in him. All the salvations of his church in general, and of particular saints, were wrought by him; he is the Saviour of those that believe, 1Ti_4:10. Salvation is still of him, as it has always been; from him alone it is to be expected, and on him we are to depend for it. Jonah's experience shall encourage others, in all ages, to trust in God as the God of their salvation; all that read this story shall say with assurance, say with admiration, that salvation is of the Lord, and is sure to all that belongs to him. JAMISO , "I will sacrifice ... thanksgiving — In the believing anticipation of sure deliverance, he offers thanksgivings already. So Jehoshaphat (2Ch_20:21) appointed singers to praise the Lord in front of the army before the battle with Moab and Ammon, as if the victory was already gained. God honors such confidence in Him. There is also herein a mark of sanctified affliction, that he vows amendment and
- 73. thankful obedience (Psa_119:67). CALVI, "Jonah therefore rightly adds, But I, with the voice of praise, will sacrifice to thee; as though he said While men as it were banish themselves from God, by giving themselves up to errors, I will sacrifice to thee and to thee alone, O Lord. And this ought to be observed by us; for as our minds are prone to falsehood and vanity, any new superstition will easily lay hold so us, except we be restrained by this bond, except we be fully persuaded, — that true salvation dwells in God alone, and every aid and help that can be expected by us: but when this conviction is really and thoroughly fixed in our hearts, then true religion cannot be easily lost by us: though Satan should on every side spread his allurements, we shall yet continue in the true and right worship of God. And the more carefully it behaves us to consider this passage, because Jonah no doubt meant here to strengthen himself in the right path of religion; for he knew that like all mortals he was prone to what was false; he therefore encouraged himself to persevere: and this he does, when he declares that whatever superstition men devise, is a deprivation of the chief good, even of life and salvation. It will hence follow, that we shall abominate every error when we are fully persuaded that we forsake the true God whenever we obey not his word, and that we at the same time cast away salvation, and every thing good that can be desired. Then Jonah says, I will sacrifice to thee with the voice of praise. It must be noticed here farther, that the worship of God especially consists in praises, as it is said in Psalms 1:1 : for there God shows that he regards as nothing all sacrifices, except they answer this end — to set forth the praise of his name. It was indeed his will that sacrifices should be offered to him under the law; but it was for the end just stated: for God cares not for calves and oxen, for goats and lambs; but his will was that he should be acknowledged as the Giver of all blessings. Hence he says there, ‘Sacrifice to me the sacrifice of praise.’ So also Jonah now says, I will offer to thee the sacrifice of praise, and he might have said with still more simplicity, “Lord, I ascribe to thee my preserved life.” But if this was the case under the shadows of the law, how much more ought we to attend to this, that is, — to strive to worship God, not in a gross manner, but spiritually, and to testify that our life proceeds from him, that it is in his hand, that we owe all things to him, and, in a word, that he is the Source and Author of salvation, and not only of salvation, but also of wisdom, of righteousness, of power? And he afterwards mentions his vows, I will pay, he says, my vows. We have stated elsewhere in what light we are to consider vows. The holy Fathers did not vow to God, as the Papists of this day are wont to do, who seek to pacify God by their frivolous practices; one abstains for a certain time from meat, another puts on sackcloth, another undertakes a pilgrimage, and another obtrudes on God some new ceremony. There was nothing of this kind in the vows of the holy Fathers; but a vow was the mere act of thanksgiving, or a testimony of gratitude: and so Jonah joins his vows here with the sacrifice of praise. We hence learn that they were not two different things; but he repeats the same thing twice. Jonah, then, had declared his vow to God for no other purpose but to testify his gratitude.
- 74. And hence headds, To Jehovah is, or belongs, salvation; that is, to save is the prerogative of God alone; Jehovah is here in the dative case, for prefixed to it is ,ל lamed. It is then to Jehovah that salvation belongs; the work of saving appertains to no other but to the Supreme God. Since it is so, we see how absurd and insane men are, when they transfer praises to another, as every one does who invents an idol for himself. As, then, there is but the one true God who saves, it behaves us to ascribe to him alone all our praises, that we may not deprive him of his right. This is the import of the whole. It follows — COFFMA , "Verse 9 "But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that which I have vowed. Salvation is of Jehovah." "I will sacrifice ..." These are bold words indeed for one in the precarious situation of Jonah at the time he uttered this promise; and Deane must surely be correct in pointing out that "The Hebrew words here denote rather, `I would fain sacrifice,' as it depended not on him but upon God whether or not he would be able to worship again in the Holy Land."[39] Livingston commented that, "The true act of sacrifice is an expression of gratitude to God, rather than an effort to appease His wrath."[40] However, the experience through which Jonah had so immediately lived surely indicates that penalties exacted for sin and disobedience are directly connected with the appeasement of the wrath of God, as when Jonah's being cast overboard was followed by the great calm. Thus, there is an element of propitiation, and not merely expiation alone, both in the experience of Jonah the type, and in the greater wonder of the atoning death of the Christ upon Calvary. TRAPP, "Verse 9 Jonah 2:9 But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay [that] that I have vowed. Salvation [is] of the LORD. Ver. 9. But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving] q.d. Let others do as they think good; let them make a match with mischief till they have enough of it; let them walk till they have wearied themselves in the ways of their hearts and in the sight of their eyes; but let them know (I speak it by woeful experience) that for all these things God will bring them to judgment, Ecclesiastes 11:9. The best that can come of sin is repentance: and that is not in man’s power but in God’s gift, 2 Timothy 2:25. If he had not melted my hard heart, and brought me back to himself with a strong hand, I had pined away in mine iniquities, and perished for ever. But now having been so miraculously delivered from so great a death, "I will sacrifice unto the Lord with the voice of thanksgiving"; I will set up my note and sing aloud unto God my Saviour, who hath thus beyond all desert delivered such a miserable wretch, rebel, and regegade as myself.
- 75. I will sacrifice]Heb. I will slay, sc. those birds and beasts in use for feasts and sacrifices at Jerusalem, with the voice of thanksgiving] Heb. of confession, that is, I will confess and acknowledge God to be what he is, to do what he doth, and to give what he giveth. ow to offer a sacrifice at such a confession or thanksgiving added much to the solemnity thereof; and made it more honourable in itself, and more acceptable to God. To these gratulatory sacrifices the word slaying is attributed, as hero, to show that even in gratulation expiation must be made; and that by the blood and sacrifice of Christ all our offerings are accepted in heaven. I will pay that I have vowed] ot my general vow only as a covenanter, to devote myself to his fear and service all my days; but those particular, personal, voluntary vows made in my distress; such as was that of Jacob, Genesis 28:20; Hannah, 1 Samuel 1:11; David, Psalms 132:1-2, &c. In affliction men are wondrously apt to promise great matters, if they may but be delivered. See Psalms 78:36. Pliny, in an epistle to one of his friends, that desired rules from him how to order his life aright; I will, saith he, give you one rule, that shall be instead of a thousand: Ut tales esse perseveremus sani, quales nos futuros esse profitemur infirmi: That you be sure to be the same when well that you vowed to be when you were sick. But this is few men’s care. See Jeremiah 34:10-11. Sons of Belial break these bonds as Samson did the green withes, and cast away those cords from them; if they could, at least; being worse herein than those mariners, Jonah 1:16, than Saul, that made great conscience of violating his vow, 1 Samuel 14:21, than Turks and Papists, who are superstitiously strict this way. Jonah knew it to be as bad, if not worse, than perjury, to vow and not to perform, umbers 30:3, and that God is the avenger of all such, Deuteronomy 23:21. He therefore, not merely for fear of punishment, but chiefly for hatred of that sin, saith, I will pay that I have vowed] The Hebrew word Ashallemah seemeth to imply two things. First, that his vow till paid was incomplete, it was an imperfect thing; the better part of it was yet wanting. ext, that till that chare were done he could not be at peace within himself, he could not be quiet; for vows are debts; and debts, till they be paid, are a burden to an honest mind, and do much disease it. Salvation is of the Lord] Salus omnimoda, as the Hebrew word Jeshugnathah (having one letter more than ordinary in it) importeth; {Hebrew Text ote} all manner of salvation, full and plentiful deliverance, "is of the Lord"; who is therefore called, the "God of salvation," unto whom belong the issues from death, Psalms 68:20. A quo vera salus non aliunde venit. This Jonah speaketh, as he doth all else in this holy canticle, not by reading, or by rote, but out of his own feeling and good experience; his whole discourse was dug out of his own breast, as it is said of that most excellent 119th Psalm, that it is made up altogether of experiments; and it
- 76. therefore hath verbanon legenda sed vivenda, words not so much to be read as lived, as one said once of it. Dives thought that if one went from the dead to warn his wicked brethren they would never be able to resist such powerful rhetoric. Behold, here is Jonah raised from the dead, as it were, and warning people to arise, and stand up from dead courses and companies, that Christ may give them light; why do they not then get up and be doing at it, that the Lord may be with them? Shall not the men of ineveh rise up in judgment with this evil generation, and condemn them, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah, Matthew 12:41, but these do not, though they have may Jonahs, that both preach and practise, non verbis solum praedicantes sed et exemplis, as Eusebius saith Origen did, that live sermons, and not teach them only? PULPIT, "But I—who know better than idolaters, and who have learned a new lesson of trust in God—I will sacrifice. Pusey notes that the Hebrew denotes rather, "I fain would sacrifice," as it depended, not on him, but on God, whether he was able to worship again in the Holy Land. His sacrifice of thanksgiving (Le 7:12, etc) should be offered with prayer and praise (Psalms 42:5). That which I have vowed (Psalms 1:1-6 :14; Psalms 66:13). Salvation is of the Lord. This is the conclusion to which his trial has brought him, the moral of the whole canticle (Psalms 3:8; Psalms 118:14, Psalms 118:21; Revelation 7:10). The LXX. and the Vulgate join this clause to the preceding, thus: "That which I have vowed I will pay to the Lord for my salvation." This is tame, and not in strict accordance with the Hebrew. 10 And the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land. BAR ES, "And the Lord spake unto the fish - Psa_148:8. Wind and storm fulfill His word. The irrational creatures have wills. God had commanded the prophet, and he disobeyed. God, in some way, commanded the fish. He laid His will upon it, and the fish immediately obeyed; a pattern to the prophet when He released him. “God’s will, that anything should be completed, is law and fulfillment and hath the power of law. Not that Almighty God commanded the fish, as He does us or the holy angels, uttering in its mind what is to be done, or inserting into the heart the knowledge of what He chooseth. But if He be said to command irrational animals or elements or any part of the creation, this signifieth the law and command of His will. For all things yield to His will, and the mode of their obedience is to us altogether ineffable, but known to Him.”
- 77. “Jonah,” says Chrysostom,“fled the land, and fled not the displeasure of God. He fled the land, and brought a tempest on the sea: and not only himself gained no good from flight, but brought into extreme peril those also who took him on board. When he sailed, seated in the vessel, with sailors and pilot and all the tackling, he was in the most extreme peril: when, sunk in the sea, the sin punished and laid aside, he entered that vast vessel, the fish’s belly, he enjoyed great fearlessness; that thou mayest learn that, as no ship availeth to one living in sin, so when freed from sin, neither sea destroyeth, nor beasts consume. The waves received him, and choked him not; the vast fish received him and destroyed him not; but both the huge animal and the clement gave back their deposit safe to God, and by all things the prophet learned to be mild and tender, not to be more cruel than the untaught mariners or wild waves or animals. For the sailors did not give him up at first, but after manifold constraint; and the sea and the wild animal guarded him with much benevolence, God disposing all these things. He returned then, preached, threatened, persuaded, saved, awed, amended, stablished, through that one first preaching. For he needed not many days, nor continuous exhortation; but, speaking these words he brought all to repentance. Wherefore God did not lead him straight from the vessel to the city; but the sailors gave him over to the sea, the sea to the vast fish, the fish to God, God to the Ninevites, and through this long circuit brought back the fugitive; that He might instruct all, that it is impossible to escape the hands of God. For come where a man may, dragging sin after him, he will undergo countless troubles. Though man be not there, nature itself on all sides will oppose him with great vehemence.” “Since the elect too at times strive to be sharp-witted, it is well to bring forward another wise man, and show how the craft of mortal man is comprehended in the Inward Counsels. For Jonah wished to exercise a prudent sharpness of wit, when, being sent to preach repentance to the Ninevites, in that he feared that, if the Gentiles were chosen, Judaea would be forsaken, he refused to discharge the office of preaching. He sought a ship, chose to flee to Tarshish; but immediately a tempest arises, the lot is cast, to know for whose fault the sea was troubled. Jonah is taken in his fault, plunged in the deep, swallowed by the fish, and carried by the vast beast thither whither he set at naught the command to go. See how the tempest found God’s runaway, the lot binds him, the sea receives him, the beast encloses him, and, because he sets himself against obeying his Maker, he is carried a culprit by his prison house to the place whither he had been sent. When God commanded, man would not minister the prophecy; when God enjoined, the beast cast forth the prophet. The Lord then “taketh the wise in their own craftiness,” when He bringeth back to the service of His own will, that whereby man’s will contradicts Him.” “Jonah, fleeing from the perils of preaching and salvation of souls, fell into peril of his own life. When, in the ship, he took on himself the peril of all, he saved both himself and the ship. He fled as a man; he exposed himself to peril, as a prophet” . “Let them think so, who are sent by God or by a superior to preach to heretics or to pagan. When God calleth to an office or condition whose object it is to live for the salvation of others, He gives grace and means necessary or expedient to this end. For so the sweet and careful ordering of His Providence requireth. Greater peril awaiteth us from God our Judge, if we flee His calling as did Jonah, if we use not the talents entrusted to us to do His will and to His glory. We know the parable of the servant who buried the talent, and was condemned by the Lord.” And it vomited out Jonah - Unwilling, but constrained, it cast him forth as a burden to it . “From the lowest depths of death, Life came forth victorious.” “He is swallowed by the fish, but is not consumed; and then calls upon God, and (marvel!) on
- 78. the third dayis given back with Christ.” “What it prefigured, that that vast animal on the third day gave back alive the prophet which it had swallowed, no need to ask of us, since Christ explained it. As then Jonah passed from the ship into the fish’s belly, so Christ from the wood into the tomb or the depth of death. And as he for those imperiled in the tempest, so Christ for those tempest-tossed in this world. And as Jonah was first enjoined to preach to the Ninevites, but the preaching of Jonah did not reach them before the fish cast him forth, so prophecy was sent beforehand to the Gentiles, but did not reach them until after the resurrection of Christ” . “Jonah prophesied of Christ, not so much in words as by a suffering of his own; yet more openly than if he had proclaimed by speech His Death and Resurrection. For why was he received into the fish’s belly, and given back the third day, except to signify that Christ would on the third day return from the deep of hell?” Irenaeus looks upon the history of Jonah as the imaging of man’s own history . “As He allowed Jonah to be swallowed by the whale, not that he should perish altogether, but that, being vomited forth, he might the more be subdued to God, and the more glorify God Who had given him such unlooked for deliverance, and bring those Ninevites to solid repentance, converting them to the Lord Who would free them from death, terrified by that sign which befell Jonah (as Scripture says of them, ‘They turned every man from his evil way, etc. ...’) so from the beginning, God allowed man to be swallowed up by that vast Cetos who was the author of the transgression, not that he should altogether perish but preparing a way of salvation, which, as foresignified by the word in Jonah, was formed for those who had the like faith as to the Lord as Jonah, and with him confessed, “I fear the Lord, etc.” that so man, receiving from God unlooked for salvation, might rise from the dead and glorify God, etc. ... This was the longsuffering of God, that man might pass through all, and acknowledge his ways; then, coming to the resurrection and knowing by trial from what he had been delivered, might be forever thankful to God, and, having received from Him the gift of incorruption, might love Him more (for he to whom much is forgiven, loveth much) and know himself, that he is mortal and weak, and understand the Lord, that He is in such wise Mighty and Immortal, that to the mortal He can give immortality and to the things of time eternity.” CLARKE, "And the Lord spake unto the fish - That is, by his influence the fish swam to shore, and cast Jonah on the dry land. So the whole was a miracle from the beginning to the end; and we need not perplex ourselves to find out literal interpretations; such as, “When Jonah was thrown overboard he swam for his life, earnestly praying God to preserve him from drowning; and by his providence he was thrown into a place of fish - a fishing cove, where he was for a time entangled among the weeds, and hardly escaped with his life; and when safe, he composed this poetic prayer, in metaphorical language, which some have wrongly interpreted, by supposing that he was swallowed by a fish; when דג dag should have been understood, as a place of fish, or fishing creek,” etc. Now I say the original has no such meaning in the Bible: and this gloss is plainly contrary to the letter of the text; to all sober and rational modes of interpretation; and to the express purpose for which God appears to have wrought this miracle, and to which Jesus Christ himself applies it. For as Jonah was intended for a sign to the Jews of the resurrection of Christ, they were to have the proof of this semiosis, in his lying as long in the heart of the earth as the prophet was in the belly of the fish, and all interpretations of this kind go to deny both the sign and the thing signified. Some men, because they cannot work a miracle themselves, can hardly be
- 79. persuaded that Godcan do it. The text, and the use made of it by Christ, most plainly teach us that the prophet was literally swallowed by a fish, by the order of God; and that by the Divine power he was preserved alive, for what is called three days and three nights, in the stomach of the fish; and at the conclusion of the above time that same fish was led by the unseen power of God to the shore, and there compelled to eject the prey that he could neither kill nor digest. And how easy is all this to the almighty power of the Author and Sustainer of life, who has a sovereign, omnipresent, and energetic sway in the heavens and in the earth. But foolish man will affect to be wise; though, in such cases, he appears as the recently born, stupid offspring of the wild ass. It is bad to follow fancy, where there is so much at stake. Both ancients and moderns have grievously trifled with this prophet’s narrative; merely because they could not rationally account for the thing, and were unwilling (and why?) to allow any miraculous interference. GILL, "And the Lord spake unto the fish,.... Or gave orders to it; he that made it could command it; all creatures are the servants of God, and do his will; what he says is done; he so ordered it by his providence, that this fish should come near the shore, and be so wrought upon by his power, that it could not retain Jonah any longer in its belly. It may be rendered (h), "then the Lord spake", &c. after Jonah had finished his prayer, or put up those ejaculations, the substance of which is contained in the above narrative: and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land; not upon the shore of the Red sea, as some; much less upon the shore of Nineveh, which was not built upon the seashore, but upon the river Tigris; and the fish must have carried him all round Africa, and part of Asia, to have brought him to the banks of the Tigris; which could not have been done in three days' time, nor in much greater. Josephus (i) says it was upon the shore of the Euxine sea; but the nearest part of it to Nineveh was one thousand six hundred miles from Tarsus, which the whale, very slow in swimming, cannot be thought to go in three days; besides, no very large fish swim in the Euxine sea, because of the straits of the Propontis, through which they cannot pass, as Bochart (k) from various writers has proved. It is more likely, as others, that it was on the Syrian shore, or in the bay of Issus, now called the gulf of Lajazzo; or near Alexandria, or Alexandretta, now Scanderoon. But why not on the shore of Palestine? and, indeed, why not near the place from whence they sailed? Huetius (l) and others think it probable that this case of Jonah gave rise to the story of Arion, who was cast into the sea by the mariners, took up by a dolphin, and carried to Corinth. Jonah's deliverance was a type of our Lord's resurrection from the dead on the third day, Mat_12:40; and a pledge of ours; for, after this instance of divine power, why should it be thought a thing incredible that God should raise the dead? HE RY, "We have here Jonah's discharge from his imprisonment, and his deliverance from that death which there he was threatened with - his return, though not to life, for he lived in the fish's belly, yet to the land of the living, for from that he seemed to be quite cut off - his resurrection, though not from death, yet from the grave, for surely never man was so buried alive as Jonah was in the fish's belly. His enlargement may be considered, 1. As an instance of God's power over all the creatures. God spoke to the fish, gave him orders to return him, as before he had given him orders to receive him. God speaks to other creatures, and it is done; they are all his ready obedient servants. But to man he speaks once, yea, twice, and he perceives it not, regards it not, but turns a deaf ear to what he says. Note, God has all creatures at his command, makes
- 80. what use hepleases of them, and serves his own purposes by them. 2. As an instance of God's mercy to a poor penitent, that in his distress prays to him. Jonah had sinned, and had done foolishly, very foolishly; his own backslidings did not correct him, and it appears by his after-conduct that his foolishness was not quite driven from him, no, not by the rod of this correction; and yet, upon his praying, and humbling himself before God, here is a miracle in nature wrought for his deliverance, to intimate what a miracle of grace, free grace, God's reception and entertainment of returning sinners are. When God had him at his mercy he showed him mercy, and did not contend for ever. 3. As a type and figure of Christ's resurrection. He died and was buried, to lay in the grave, as Jonah did, three days and three nights, a prisoner for our debt; but the third day he came forth, as Jonah did, by his messengers to preach repentance, and remission of sins, even to the Gentiles. And thus was another scripture fulfilled, After two days he will receive us, and the third day he will raise us up, Hos_6:2. The earth trembled as if full of her burden, as the fish was of Jonah. JAMISO , "upon the dry land — probably on the coast of Palestine. K&D, "“Then Jehovah spake to the fish, and it vomited Jonah upon the dry land.” The nature of God's speaking, or commanding, may be inferred from the words וגו א ֵקָ ְ.ו Cyril explains the thought correctly thus: The whale is again impelled by a certain divine and secret power of God, being moved to that which seems good to Him.” The land upon which Jonah was vomited was, of course, the coast of Palestine, probably the country near Joppa. According to Jon_2:1, this took place on the third day after he had been swallowed by the fish. CALVI , "The deliverance of Jonah is here in few words described; but how attentively ought we to consider the event? It was an incredible miracle, that Jonah should have continued alive and safe in the bowels of the fish for three days. For how was it that he was not a thousand times smothered or drowned by waters? We know that fish continually draw in water: Jonah could not certainly respire while in the fish; and the life of man without breathing can hardly continue for a minute. Jonah, then, must have been preserved beyond the power of nature. Then how could it have been that the fish should cast forth Jonah on the shore, except God by his unsearchable power had drawn the fish there? Again, who could have supernaturally opened its bowels and its mouth? His coming forth, then, was in every way miraculous, yea, it was attended with many miracles. But Jonah, that he might the more extol the infinite power of God, adopted the word said. Hence we learn that nothing is hard to God, for he could by a nod only effect so great a thing as surpasses all our conceptions. If Jonah had said that he was delivered by God’s kindness and favor, it would have been much less emphatical, than when he adopts a word which expresses a command, And Jehovah spake, or
- 81. said, to thefish. But as this deliverance of Jonah is an image of the resurrection, this is an extraordinary passage, and worthy of being especially noticed; for the Holy Spirit carries our minds to that power by which the world was formed and is still wonderfully preserved. That we may then, without hesitation and doubt, be convinced of the restoration which God promises to us, let us remember that the world was by him created out of nothing by his word and bidding, and is still thus sustained. But if this general truth is not sufficient, let this history of Jonah come to our minds, — that God commanded a fish to cast forth Jonah: for how was it that Jonah escaped safe and was delivered? Even because it so pleased God, because the Lord commanded; and this word at this day retains the same efficacy. By that power then, by which he works all things, we also shall one day be raised up from the dead. ow follows — COFFMA , "Verse 10 "And Jehovah spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land." "Jonah's deliverance is the only pleasant usage of the word vomit in the whole Bible."[41] We do not know, of course, exactly where Jonah was deposited on dry land; but Josephus stated that it was upon the shore of the Euxine sea.[42] If that was true, the great fish passed through the Dardenelles before depositing him, thus following the strong current which is mentioned in Jonah's prayer. Some have quibbled about how Jonah got his information about being in the fish "three days and three nights"; and we cannot give a positive answer to that either; however, as an inspired prophet of God he accurately foretold the calm that would follow his being thrown overboard; and it appears that this was a far more wonderful knowledge than that of the exact time he was inside the fish. We may therefore trust the holy record implicitly. An ancient poem attributed to Tertullian describes Jonah's deliverance thus: "His sails ... the intestines of a fish; Himself shut in by waters, yet untouched; In the sea's heart, and yet beyond its reach; Mid wrecks of fleets Half eaten, and men's carcasses dissolved In putrid disintegrity: in life Learning the process of his death; but still- To be a sign hereafter of the Lord,
- 82. To witness washe in his very self, ot of destruction, but of death's repulse!"[43]SIZE COKE, "Jonah 2:10. And the Lord spake unto the fish— The power of the Almighty is frequently represented in Scripture, as bringing things to pass by his bare word and command; he speaks, and it is done. Various are the traditions of the Orientals, respecting the place where Jonah was disembogued; but, as Calmet well observes, amidst such doubt and obscurity, the best part is absolute silence, and the sincere declaration that the matter is entirely unknown. Bishop Huet supposes, that Jonah's deliverance from the fish's belly gave occasion to the famous Greek fable of Arion, who, after he was cast into the sea, was conveyed, as the story goes, by a dolphin into the port of Corinth; and it is certain that a great part of the heathen mythology was borrowed from the Scripture history. REFLECTIO S.—1st, ever, to appearance, was situation more desperate than when Jonah was cast into the stormy ocean, unless it were when he descended into the fish's belly: yet even in the lowest state of misery God can save; and Jonah now is as safe in the monster's stomach, as if he were on dry land; and finds both power to pray, and fervent desires after the Lord his God, who thus plainly shewed him that he had not abandoned him to destruction, and thereby engaged him to exercise faith in his pardoning grace and preserving providence. ote; (1.) o place can shut out the soul from communion with God; wherever we are, the way to a throne of grace is open. (2.) Our encouragement to draw near to God is, the humble persuasion that he is our God, reconciled to us, and willing to hear and help us in every time of need. 1. He cried and was heard: I cried by reason of mine affliction. This was the blessed means of driving him to God. Out of the belly of hell cried I, out of the belly of the fish, where he seemed buried as in his grave; and thou heardest my voice, for no prayer of faith returns without an answer of peace. 2. He describes his distressed situation, sunk in the deep, buried in the midst of the seas, compassed with the floods, and all the waves and billows running over him. And this was God's doing. His life appeared in the most imminent danger: he was inclosed with waters, and his head wrapped with sea-weeds; he went down to the bottoms of the mountains, when the fish descended; and the bars of the earth, so deep he sunk, appeared to be about him for ever: his state helpless and hopeless. To such distress are God's dearest children sometimes reduced, to shew them more eminently the power and grace of God engaged for their deliverance. 3. His heart began to fail him. God's displeasure, seen in his wretched case, discouraged him, and he feared that he was abandoned, and cast out of God's sight, as he knew that he had justly deserved to be. Thus when outward trials oppress us, we too often give way to unbelief, and are sore beset with inward fears, as if God had utterly forsaken us, and hid his face in displeasure: but it is our privilege to be
- 83. always happy: thefaithful soul is not thus cast down. 4. His heart is encouraged, notwithstanding, to trust still in God; and, in the exercise of faith he directs his prayer to heaven, whence alone his help could come. When his soul fainted, he remembered the Lord, thought upon his power to save, reflected on the riches of his grace, and his own past experience; and thus his hopes revived, his fears were silenced. And in the same way must every child of God overcome his unbelieving fears; remembering his power and love, who has engaged to save to the uttermost all that trust in him. 5. His prayer was answered; it entered into the holy temple above, and God in mercy regarded his suffering servant, as he gratefully acknowledges to the glory of the Lord his God. Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption; either this he said in the fish's belly, and it speaks the language of his faith, assured that God would interpose to save him; or when he afterwards was cast on the land, and wrote down this prayer and complaint, he added this to the praise of the glory of God, and for the confirmation and encouragement of others in the like case; that they might see that none ever trusted God, and were confounded. 6. He gives a warning to others of the vanity of idols, and declares the blessedness of dependence upon God. They that observe lying vanities, forsake their own mercy: no idols can save after this sort. Perhaps he intended also herein to reflect upon his own folly in flying from God, whose work would have been its own reward, while misery is the sure attendant on every departure from him. 7. He solemnly engages to offer the grateful sacrifice of praise, and to discharge the vow that he had made in trouble; which might be, some sacrifice that he would offer at the temple of Jerusalem, or his resolution to go without delay to ineveh in obedience to God's command. ote; (1.) Thanksgiving and praise are a tribute that we owe, and should without ceasing pay to the God of our mercies. (2.) Every truly penitent backslider who rises from his falls, should set himself with redoubled earnestness to the work and service of God. 8. He concludes with ascribing glory to God, Salvation is of the Lord, and from him alone the temporal, spiritual, and eternal salvation of the faithful is to be expected, even from his power and love, and to be acknowledged to his glory. And they who depend on him for all, shall find, by blessed experience, that he has never failed them who trust him. 2nd, In answer to his prayer, he is discharged from his prison. He who commanded the fish to receive him, now obliges him to disgorge his prey; and once more the prophet is safe on shore, as one raised from the dead. Thus God restores the poor broken-hearted sinner, when he is often ready to despair of himself; and raises him from the death of sin to the life of righteousness. Jonah's deliverance was also a type of the resurrection of Jesus, and is a pledge of ours. When we see what God has done for him, we need not think it incredible that he should raise our bodies from the dust: and this miracle, astonishing as it is, appears the less wonderful, when we
- 84. recollect that itwas intended as a very peculiar type of Christ's resurrection, the ground of all our hopes. The greater exertion of Omnipotence may be expected, where the mission of the Saviour of the world, who is the great Creator and Supporter of the universe, was to be in any measure established thereby. PETT, "Verse 10 ‘And YHWH spoke to the fish, and it vomited out Jonah on the dry land.’ Then the large fish approached land, no doubt under God’s direction, and YHWH then spoke to it and it vomited Jonah out on the dry land. ow at last Jonah knew where he had been, in the innards of a large fish. The message was clear to all. Whether it was a matter of the sea, or of the denizens of the deep, YHWH was in full control of His creation, which did what He bid. BE SO , "Verse 10 Jonah 2:10. And the Lord — This should rather have been rendered, For the Lord; because what follows was not done after the preceding thanksgiving, but before it; and it is mentioned here only to show the cause or subject of the thanksgiving. The Lord spake unto the fish, &c. — God’s almighty power is represented in Scripture as bringing things to pass by his bare will and command: see Genesis 1:3. He willed that the fish should cast Jonah up on the dry land, and the fish did so. Various are the traditions of the Orientals respecting the place where Jonah was disembogued; but, as Calmet well observes, amidst such doubt and obscurity, the best part is absolute silence, and the sincere declaration that the matter is entirely unknown. “The fame of Jonah’s deliverance appears to have spread among the heathen nations; and the Greeks, who were accustomed to adore the memory of their heroes by every remarkable event and embellishment which they could appropriate, added to the fictitious adventures of Hercules, that of his having continued three days, without injury, in the belly of a dog, sent against him by eptune.” — Gray’s Key. Huetius (Demonst. Evang., Prop. 4) supposes that Jonah’s deliverance from the whale’s belly gave occasion to the Greek story of Arion, who, after he was cast into the sea, was conveyed by a dolphin to the port of Corinth. TRAPP, "Verse 10 Jonah 2:10 And the LORD spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry [land]. Ver. 10. And the Lord spake unto the fish] He spake the word and it was done: he is the great centurion of the world, that saith to his creature, Do this, and he doth it. Dei dicere est facere (Aug.). Yea, he is the great, great Induperator, {Imperator} to whom everything saith, Iussa sequi tam velle mihi quam posse necesse esse (Lucan.): I am wholly at thy beck and check. Jonah spake to God, and God to the fish. It may be said of faithful prayer, that it can do whatsoever God himself can do; since he is pleased to yield himself, overcome by the prayers of his people, and to say unto them cordially, as Zedekiah did to his courtiers colloquingly, The king is not he that can deny you anything. Prayer is of that power that it can open the doors of leviathan,
- 85. as we seehere (which yet is reckoned as a thing not feasible, Job 41:14), yea of the all devouring grave, Hebrews 11:35. If the Lord, pricked on by the prayer of his people, set in hand to save them, and shall "say to the north, Give up; and to the south, Keep not back: bring my sons from far, and my daughters from the ends of the earth," Isaiah 43:6, they shall come amain, and none shall be able to hinder them; "Come, therefore" (with those good souls in Hosea, who had smarted for their folly, as well as Jonah), "and let us return unto the Lord: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up. After two days will he revive us: in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight," Hosea 6:1-2. A time we must have to be in the fire, in the fish’s belly, as in God’s nurturing house; but he will take care that we be not there overly long; what is two or three days to eternity? Hold out, faith and patience: "Yet a very little, little while, and he that shall come will come, and will not tarry," Hebrews 10:37. And it vomited up Jonah upon the dry land] And here death was defeated and wiped; it was much more so when it had swallowed up Christ; and little dreamt that itself should have been thereby "swallowed up in victory." Quantum in devoratione mors laetata est, tantum luxit in vomitu (Jerome). But then was fulfilled that of the prophet, O death, I will be thy death. And as there, so here, in a proportion, and as a type, omnia iam inversa, saith Mercer, all things are turned the other way. Before the fish was an instrument of death; now of life, and serves Jonah for a ship to bring him to dry land. This fish useth not to come near the shore, but to sport in the great waters; howbeit now he must, by special command, "vomit up Jonah upon the dry land." "Why then should it be thought a thing incredible with any that God should raise the dead?" Acts 26:8. The sea shall surely give up the dead that were in it; and death and hell deliver up the dead that were in them; and they shall be judged every man according to his works, Revelation 20:13. This some of the heathens believed; as Zoroaster, Theopompus, and Plato. And the Stoics’ opinion was, that the world should one day be dissolved by fire or water; and all things brought to a better state, or to the first golden age again (Sen. at. Quaest. 1. 3, c. 26-30). But we have a more sure word of prophecy; and this that is here recorded may serve as an image and type of our preservation in the grave, and our resurrection from the dead, by one and the same almighty power of God. PULPIT, "Spake unto the fish. The punishment having done its work, the fish is impelled by some secret influence to eject Jonah on the dry land, on the third day after he was swallowed (Jonah 1:17). Some, who regard the Book of Jonah as an historical allegory, see in these three days an adumbration of the period of the Babylonish captivity, during which Israel was buried in darkness, and from which she rose to a new and happier life. They compare, as referring to the same transaction, Jeremiah 51:34, Jeremiah 51:44 and Hosea 6:1, Hosea 6:2. Upon the dry land. Probably on the coast of Palestine, whence he had started.