Jonah

Jonah is the story of a rebellious prophet who runs from God’s call to preach repentance to Nineveh. The book confronts human pride and our understanding of God’s grace. It also challenges us to share God’s grace with people very far from him.

Authorship

Jonah appears in only one other place in the OT (2 Kin. 14:25), where the text states that he served during the reign of Jeroboam II (782-753 BC). Jonah himself was most likely the author of this book, writing it towards the end of his life. If this is the case, then Jonah would be writing in the third person, just as Moses did (see comments on Exodus 6:26-27). If Jonah did write it, then he must have understood God’s rhetorical question at the end of the book, which summarizes the entire book, “Should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left—and also many animals?” (Jon. 4:11)

Stuart^[1] considers this “highly unlikely” on the basis that “the story is so consistently critical of Jonah.” This seems like a rather weak argument in favor of Jonah being the author. After all, the Bible is consistently critical of its heroes, and this same logic would rule out the traditional authorship of the gospels. After all, the gospel authors make themselves look like obstinate fools—yet they recorded this without blushing.

Date            

Based on 2 Kings 14:25, Jonah served during the reign of Jeroboam II (782-753 BC). This would place him in the 8^th century BC. Some critical scholars have placed the book as late as the 3^rd century BC.[2] But there are no good reasons to late-date the book, as we’ll see below.

The Assyrians

The Assyrians were a particularly wicked nation. Jonah only mentions the violence of Nineveh once (Jon. 3:8), but Nahum explains that the Ninevites plotted evil against the Lord (Nah. 1:11), committed continual cruelty (Nah. 2:13; 3:1; 19), committed prostitution and witchcraft (Nah. 3:4), and engaged in commercial exploitation (Nah. 3:16).

The Assyrians “were well known in the ancient world for brutality and cruelty.” For instance, “Ashurbanipal, the grandson of Sennacherib, was accustomed to tearing off the lips and hands of his victims. Tiglath-Pileser flayed victims alive and made great piles of their skulls.”^[3] Archaeologists have discovered drawings of Assyrians holding the severed heads of the people in the nations they conquered. OT scholar and archaeologist James Hoffmeier writes,

As battles rage, the brutality of the Assyrians is on display. Soldiers are shown beheading enemy troops, while others hold up the decapitated heads of the enemy for all to see. Further victims are impaled—the Assyrian mode of capital punishment. These inhumane practices were designed to intimidate the opposition and shake the confidence of those trying to fend off the Assyrian attack… It was this Assyrian war machine that demolished and deported the Israelites and seriously debilitated Judah in the late eighth and seventh centuries BC.^[4]

The Assyrians boasted in their evil to intimidate others. It makes sense why Jonah was reluctant to preach forgiveness to such people. When he arrived home after preaching, what would his people think?

Furthermore, the Assyrians were a massive empire. Hoffmeier writes, “The size of the Assyrian army is reported to have been just over 70,000 in Tiglath-Pileser’s day, and over 200,000 during Sennacherib’s reign (705-681 BC), if their figures are reliable… This area represents the largest empire in the ancient Near East up to this time.”^[5]

God called Jonah to preach judgment against these people. Unlike other prophets, however, God called Jonah to travel to Assyria to preach in their own country. (This would be like Gandalf asking Frodo to criticize Sauron’s foreign policy in Mordor!)

Is Jonah history or allegory or something else entirely?

Is Jonah midrash? Trible^[6] argues that this is midrash—a Jewish practice of interpreting Scripture. Specifically, Jonah is one long midrash on Jonah 4:2 regarding his citation of Exodus 34:6. Such a view is untenable. For one, this would be the earliest midrash in existence.^[7] The genre of midrash didn’t appear until much later. Moreover, this would be one long midrash to interpret one verse. But rather than interpreting the verse, it simply quotes it.

Is Jonah a parable? This genre analysis is flawed. Parables are not normally four chapters long,^[8] and the story is far more complex than most parables.^[9]

Is Jonah an allegory? This view is popular among critical scholars. Indeed, Norman Geisler once said, “The difference between liberals and conservatives is that liberals allegorize Jonah, while conservatives allegorize the Song of Solomon.” There is no good reason to allegorize either.

An allegory is not typically an “extended analogy” that stretches on for four chapters (contra Ezek. 17; 23; Zech. 11:4-17). Indeed, “It would be an unusual allegory indeed that waited to the end (the fourth chapter in the case of Jonah) to reveal the point of its hero’s actions… The figures in an allegory are patently symbolic and fictional, and the audience must realize this at once if the allegory is to be effective. Jonah does not fit this pattern, either.”^[10]

Furthermore, early allegorical interpretations have been overturned with time. For example, critics who held this view asserted that Jonah being in the belly of the whale allegorically represented the Babylonian Exile. Today, however, commentators understand this to be “an instrument of deliverance, not punishment.”^[11] Moreover, “in the Old Testament it is evident that the exile of Judah occurred not for failure to carry the message of God to the Gentiles but for unfaithfulness to the covenant by acts of idolatry and immorality.”^[12]

Furthermore, because Jonah’s name means “dove,” critics believed that he represented Israel (Jer. 48:28; Nah. 2:7). But today, few commentators would see significance in Jonah’s name, and more importantly, the author never draws attention to any symbolism whatsoever.

Is Jonah history? Yes. First, Jesus understood Jonah to be historical (Mt. 12:38-41; 16:4; Lk. 11:29-30). Page writes, “Clearly Jesus did not see Jonah as a parable or an allegory.”^[13]

Second, Jonah is identified as a historical figure in the book of Kings (2 Kin. 14:25). Alexander writes, “This naturally raises the question, why, if they never actually occurred, did the author apparently associate the events recorded in the book of Jonah with a known prophet? Is it not strange that having invented the entire plot the author did not likewise invent his central character?”^[14]

Third, Josephus also affirmed this account as historical (Antiquities 9.206-214). He writes, “Since I have promised to give an exact account of our history, I have thought it necessary to recount what I have found written in the Hebrew books concerning this prophet.”

Fourth, the church fathers “treated the book not only as history but also as prophecy confirming the power of God to raise the dead.”^[15] As Alexander asks, “Were these earlier generations completely blind to features which we are asked to believe are immediately apparent?”^[16] Prior to the 19^th century, “virtually every biblical scholar and reader of the book assumed that it at least claimed to recount actual events.”^[17]

Consulted Commentaries

H. L. Ellison, “Jonah,” in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Daniel and the Minor Prophets, ed. Frank E. Gaebelein, vol. 7 (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1986).

T. Desmond Alexander, Obadiah, Jonah and Micah: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 26, Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988).

Franklin S. Page, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, vol. 19B, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995).

Douglas Stuart, Hosea-Jonah, vol. 31, Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1987).

^[1] Douglas Stuart, Hosea-Jonah, vol. 31, Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1987), 432.

[2] The book cannot be dated later than this because it is mentioned in Ecclesiasticus 49:10.

^[3] Billy K. Smith and Franklin S. Page, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, vol. 19B, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995), 225.

[4] James Karl Hoffmeier, The Archaeology of the Bible (Oxford: Lion, 2008), 105.

[5] James Karl Hoffmeier, The Archaeology of the Bible (Oxford: Lion, 2008), 105.

^[6] Billy K. Smith and Franklin S. Page, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, vol. 19B, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995), 211.

^[7] Billy K. Smith and Franklin S. Page, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, vol. 19B, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995), 211.

^[8] Douglas Stuart, Hosea-Jonah, vol. 31, Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1987), 436.

^[9] Billy K. Smith and Franklin S. Page, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, vol. 19B, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995), 214.

^[10] Douglas Stuart, Hosea-Jonah, vol. 31, Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1987), 436.

^[11] Donald J. Wiseman, T. Desmond Alexander, and Bruce K. Waltke, Obadiah, Jonah and Micah: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 26, Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988), 77.

^[12] Billy K. Smith and Franklin S. Page, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, vol. 19B, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995), 212-213.

^[13] Billy K. Smith and Franklin S. Page, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, vol. 19B, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995), 218.

^[14] Donald J. Wiseman, T. Desmond Alexander, and Bruce K. Waltke, Obadiah, Jonah and Micah: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 26, Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988), 82.

^[15] Billy K. Smith and Franklin S. Page, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, vol. 19B, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995), 218.

^[16] Billy K. Smith and Franklin S. Page, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, vol. 19B, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995), 218.

^[17] Billy K. Smith and Franklin S. Page, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, vol. 19B, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995), 217.