Loading...Now we come to the most famous short story of the entire Bible: Jonah! Again, since it is “short” it does not take long to read – just four brief chapters – and it’s surprising so few people have actually read it. And a pity. It’s a terrific little book that is adventurous and thought-provoking. Here is what I say about it in my textbook The Bible: A Historical and Literary Introduction (Oxford University Press).
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Of the various short stories found in the Hebrew Bible, Jonah is no doubt the best known of all. As it happens, the book is not located among the Writings, as are the other short stories we are considering. Jonah is one of the Minor Prophets, included among “the Twelve” in the Hebrew Bible. To some extent that makes sense, since the book is about Jonah making predictions of a coming destruction brought by God against a sinful people—a motif that we saw repeatedly in the other prophets. Moreover, the main character, “Jonah son of Amittai” (1:1) is named as a prophet in 2 Kings 14:25, where he is reported as having pronounced to King Jeroboam II that his kingdom would be largely extended. But the book of Jonah is not itself a book of prophecy.
It is a short story about a prophet—one who was reluctant to do God’s bidding, was punished for it, learned from the error of his ways, went on to make the proclamation that God demanded him to make, and then was bitterly disappointed when his preaching was effective. Jonah is the only prophet we know of who
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Is Jonah really the best known story of the Old Testament? I think that Noah and the flood, Adam and Eve and the garden of Eden, and the Exodus are much better known. (I cannot prove that, of course, and I understand that you were probably using that mostly as a rhetorical device to introduce your subject and elicit interest.) I think people have heard of Jonah, but they mostly don’t really know the story all that well.
No, it’s not. I think it’s the best known “short story.” The others are all parts of longer narratives; Jonah is a self-standing story (which is what a “short story” is, I think, when talking about a genre of literature)
Is there a scholarly consensus on a date for Jonah? After the Assyrian conquest of Israel perhaps, but before the Babylonian conquest of Nineveh?
It is usually dated to the 5th or 6th century.
Unfortunately, the conversation about Jonah is dominated by “do you believe he was in a fish’s belly for three days” rather than understanding the message. The entire composition is farce; being swallowed and regurgitated by a fish is but one. The bigger farce, to me, is when the “King of Nineveh” proclaims that no human or animal can eat or drink, and all humans and animals must put on sackcloth and pray to be spared, and they do. Imagine all the donkeys, sheep, and goats in sackcloth, repenting! It works: they are spared; Jonah gets mad. Then, a giant vine grows up overnight and gives Jonah shade; he’s happy. But a worm cuts it down, then God sends a sultry wind and sun to roast Jonah. Jonah pouts, wanting to die. Then YHWH reproves him for being concerned about a vine while wanting the people of Nineveh destroyed. The message is that Jonah wants Israel’s enemies destroyed and grieves when they are spared, which hardly embodies “love thy neighbor”. The book reproves the pious who hated other ethnics. Perhaps the author nabbed “Jonah” from Kings and composed the story early in the Persian period. Bart, your opinion?
I think it’s hard to say. My sense is that it was written sometime during the Exile or later; but there are few clues outside what context would make most sense of the storyline.
Dr. Ehrman,
I’ve enjoyed all of your books on the NT as well as your blog. Also listened to your recent presentation at the BAS annual webinar. I’m interested in the ministry of John the Baptist. Do you have any thoughts on the following:
1. Why did Jesus become a follower of John prior to beginning his own ministry? Why didn’t he just begin his ministry without a John discipleship?
2. Why did Jesus break away from John to go on his own? I read in the Gospels that Jesus broke with John prior to his arrest so that couldn’t have been the cause of the break.
The Gospel accounts leave much to wonder about Jesus discipleship with John…are there other documents that shed any light on this?
MY guess is that he hadn’t thought about starting his own ministry until he had been involved with John, and thought that he could do it too — maybe to help spread John’s word? You might be interestd in the book on John the Baptist by Joel Marcus (some time guest poaster on the blog)
Hi Dr Ehrman
What then, do you think, led Jesus to believe himself to be the messiah?
Thank you!
I’m afraid there’s no way to know. Some people feel specially called by God….
Since this story is fiction, is there some significance of having Jonah swallowed by a great fish?
Big fish story? (I’m not sure what kind of significance you mean?)
Sorry. I will try to reword:
1. Why did the writer have Jonah swallowed by a great fish and survive? Even though people now believe that it actually happened, it seems unbelievable then and now.
2. Why did he have Jonah in the great fish for three nights?
3. Since we believe that Jesus was likely thrown in a common grave pit, when the gospel writers created (or retold) the Jesus tomb story, did they get their three nights in the grave for Jesus from the Jonah story?
1. It’s meant to be a story, not a biography; and like most stories, it does not depend on actual likelihood; 2. Possibly because it was sometimes thought that after three in the tomb there was no hope of return (as in the Lazarus story in John 11; Jesus stays away long enough so he arrives only on the *fourth* day; 3. I’ve often thought so; more scholars think Hosea 6:2 was more influential. But the *ideas* in the two passages may be related.
Did people at that time think that the whale was a kind of big fish?
I suppose so. Most people still do — and back then, of course, zoological knowledge was a bit, well, undeveloped.
I’ve always enjoyed this summation of Jonah written by David Plotz, the author of “Good Book”:
“Jonah really is the perfect Bible story. God is demanding yet merciful, wise yet tricky. The tale is suspenseful from beginning to end. The hero is deeply flawed, mostly learns his lesson, and behaves with both the grace and selfishness that are in all of us.”
“ What the original author of this psalm is most concerned about is being able again to see God’s holy Temple (2:4), a matter of no concern to the Jonah of this story”
Why is this true?
Because the Jonah of this story is known only from this story; it’s not a statement about what a historical Jonah may have been interested in (since there wasn’t one), but about what this figure is concerned with. It’s kind of like saying that the David Copperfield of the novel has no interest in the United States. It just means that a main concern of one part of the story does not reflect the rest of the story and vice versa.
Hello Bart. My request is off topic, but I wish that the search function for this blog included comments added since one’s last visit. I’m always keen to read your responses to various readers comments, but finding them is the old “needle in the haystack” routine. Is it possible that such a function may be added ?
I love this blog.
A Happy New year to you and all blog members. In fact, a Happy New year to the whole planet, solar system, galaxy, universe…………
I don’t know! But I’ll find out!
I’ve heard it suggested that Jonah is actually a parody of prophets: Jonah runs away, has to end up as fish vomit, and when his preaching succeeds (unlike most prophets). he’s upset about it! We read a lot into it, but maybe it was all just a joke.
It’s certainly humorous. And can indeed be a kind of spoof.
I think that Jesus’ use of Jonah is particularly enigmatic – ““This generation is an evil generation; it asks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah.” See Luke 11:29-32. Jesus makes it clear that the “sign of Jonah” was Jonah’s proclamation to Nineveh. Did this mean that all the miracle stories are “imported” from elsewhere? Or that Jesus stopped doing signs and miracles when he realized that people paid attention to the showy stuff and not to the message? Of course, Matthew tries to avoid this conundrum by inserting an extra verse that indicates that the sign of Jonah was his three days in the belly of the fish, and Jesus would be three days in the heart of the earth. See Mt 12:38-42. But this insertion (besides being bad arithmetic) directly contradicts what Jesus says in the rest of the passage, so it’s fairly easy to decide that the difference here is because Matthew (or his source) added to this passage, not because Luke took out this irrelevant reference to Jonah’s time in the fish.
It’s usually interpreted to mean that Jonah is a prefiguratoin of Jesus (disappeared from sight for three days and then returned to preach salvation), and that no other miracles are necessary, apart from Jonah/Hesus.
Hi, Randy. I agree that the Lukan version more likely original. We discussed this here in the Readers Forum.
I attended high school in Nineveh and on the other side of the street (from the school) was a grand old mosque known as The Mosque of the Prophet Jonah (Al-Nabi Yunus in Arabic, where nabi=prophet and Yunus=Jonas or Jonah). Folkore legends and traditions have it for generations that Jonah died there and was buried there also. Unfortunately, this ancient mosque and many other ancient sites thousands of years old were destroyed due to the unstable situation that happened after the 2003 US invasion of Iraq. It is usually shocking to me how things change with the passage of time creating a mythical/dreamy entity in our heads (the past). As Heraclitus had it” no man steps in the same river twice, for it is not the same river and he is not the same man”.
Wow. Amazing.
First, let me say that I am reading and very much enjoying your book “The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture.” (Hey everyone, you can appreciate his logic and arguments without being able to understand all the Greek!) Second, if Matthew’s added verse re the Sign of Jonah were not apparently so old (I see no alternate versions noted), it might qualify as one of your “proto-orthodox” anti-Gnostic corruptions – the proclamation of (knowledge from) Jesus is not enough, you need him in (and out of) the tomb as well.
I assume your comment above addresses only Matthew’s version, or do commentators usually miss the fact that in this marvelous short story, the people of Nineveh know nothing of the great fish, and repent solely in response to Jonah’s proclamation? It is a wicked generation that seeks anything more from Jesus, he himself says. As a confirming parallel, the Queen of the South came all the way to listen to the wisdom of Solomon (not to see any signs). Yes, he says “something greater is here” – himself, and his proclamation, and it he seems to think that should be enough!
I was raised by the church to believe that god was everywhere. But interestingly in this short story Jonah believed that he could flee from god’s presence (Jonah 1:3). Did the Israelites believe that god was of finite size?
They believed that once a person died, they no longer existed, and so God was no longer in their lives in any way at all.
I read somewhere that the words interpreted “great fish” can alternately be rendered “the sea”. Is this true? I guess surviving in the sea three days would be a stretch too, but it is not as good a yarn as the fish thing!
I don’t thnk so. Are you sure that’s what it said?
Jonah sailed from joppa (Jaffa, north of Gaza, home of the philistines). A version of the Perseus myth has him saving chained Andromeda from a sea monster in Jaffa harbour. Another version has Perseus swallowed by the sea monster and hacks his way out. Records of these variants are dated later than the book of Jonah; but perhaps there is some shared root.
I think the author of Jonah intended us to believe he had fallen to sheol and the fish episode amounts to a resurrection comparable to other old testament resurrections: that performed by Elijah, Elisha’s bones etc. The gospel writers clearly intend us to believe in their description of the resurrection and Jesus’ calming the storm so it would be odd if likely material had not been intended to be taken literally.
I may have missed the point of your comment so correct me if I have. I do believe that it is perfectly within human nature to use a quote from a character you know is fictional in order to prove a point or understand aspects of your life. This is been going on for millennia starting with, I suppose, the epic of Gilgamesh, continuing through Bhagavad Gita, Homer…. Here is a great, more recent example that I believe sheds light on the human condition: “Isn’t it sad how some people’s grip on their lives is so precarious that they’ll embrace any preposterous delusion rather than face an occasionally bleak truth?”- Calvin (of Calvin and Hobbes). It rings true to the human condition even though it is a fictitious quotation. That doesn’t make it any less profound or quotable. I think Biblical literalists fall into a logical fallacy when they try to say 6 day creation must be true because Jesus and/or Paul used Adam and Eve as an example. The use of known characters to the audience does not mean the speaker thought the story was literally true.
I was just watching the DVD of John Romer’s terrific series “Testament,” and in one part he shows a room with an elaborate ancient mosaic of the story of Jonah. He notes that it was popularly seen as an allegory for Jesus, descending for three days and they being resurrected.
Yup, it was the most popular artistic portryal of Jesus ealry on.
There was a scientific popularization magazine that tried to demonstrate the type of big fish that swallowed Jonah / Jonás: they tried to show by the internal structure that it was not a whale, instead, it could be a whale shark, or a tuna, but not a porpoise, etc. In the end, they commented that it could be a bad translation of Saint Jerome, for using cetacean and the meaning in Latin and Greek being different.
Definitely an interesting fictional prophet story.
It is interesting (sometimes amusing) to me that sometimes conservative bible literalists (I was also raised that way, but not religious anymore) ignorantly state things like “It is known that this is a true historical story and that it was a Blue Whale (the Largest Whale & animal currently alive) that swallowed Jonah…. It reminds me that you also talk about these kind of assumptions in lectures & debates “where people just make stuff up”, and in a confident yet ignorant way.
It is sad that allot of educated & intelligent people will stick to fundemetalist believe and delude themselves instead of thinking and leaning in a critical manner.
I was reminded of this kind of shenanigans when you stated that, the book only referred to a large fish and not a whale. The funny thing is that the writer of this book might not even have had a accurate comprehension of a whale.
The fact that people can literally believe that a man can live inside a whale digestive system for 3 days, and then be spat out unharmed is flabbergastingly funny.
“Jonah decides instead to head the opposite direction to Tarshish—possibly a city in Spain”
And now I want to learn about Spain in the time of Jonah. Curiosity is a terrible thing.