Jonah - The Hesitant Witness
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Jonah the Prophet
Jonah the Prophet
The Lexham Bible Dictionary (Jonah the Prophet)
JONAH THE PROPHET (יוֹנָה בֶן־אֲמִתַּי, yonah ven-amittay). The main figure in the book of Jonah. Jonah son of Amittai the prophet (יוֹנָה בֶן־אֲמִתַּי הַנָּבִיא, yonah ven-amittay hannavi') was from Gath-Hepher, a town in Galilee about 2 miles northeast of Nazareth. Gath Hepher was in the territory allotted to the tribe of Zebulun (see Josh 19:10, 13), so it is likely Jonah was a member of that tribe.
He is mentioned in connection with the reign of Jeroboam II of Israel (793–753 BC) in 2 Kgs 14:23–25. Jeroboam’s success in extending Israel’s northern border to the Syro-Hittite city of Hamath on the Orontes River, its greatest extent since the time of David and Solomon (1 Kgs 8:65; 1 Chr 13:5), is said to have happened “according to the word of Yahweh, the God of Israel, which he spoke by the hand of his servant Jonah the son of Amittai the prophet, who was from Gath-Hepher” (2 Kings 14:25). Jonah’s message is assumed to have been delivered during Jeroboam’s reign, dating the prophet’s ministry to the mid-8th century BC.
25 He restored the territory of Israel from the entrance of Hamath to the Sea of the Arabah, according to the word of the Lord God of Israel, which He had spoken through His servant Jonah the son of Amittai, the prophet who was from Gath Hepher.
The prophet Jonah is best known from the book of Jonah, which records that after he tried to run away from God’s call to preach to the people of Nineveh, he was swallowed by a big fish and spit out safely on dry ground.
Jonah - the name
Jonah - the name
Jonah’s name means “dove” which may factor in to the symbolism of the book of Jonah (Hauser, “Jonah,” 22n3). Historically the name of the prophet may be incidental, but Hauser argues that the author of the book of Jonah uses the dove symbolism for its overtones of flight and passivity (Hauser, “Jonah,” 22). However, Bolin cautions against attaching too much significance to the etymology of Jonah’s name in interpreting the book (Freedom, 72–73). Stuart also questions whether the meaning of Jonah’s name has any symbolic relevance for understanding the book of Jonah (Hosea—Jonah, 431).
Jonah’s patronymic is also sometimes held to be symbolic with “son of Amittai (אֲמִתַּי, amittay)” interpreted to mean “son of truth” (אֱמֶת, emeth). This interpretation is attested as far back as rabbinic literature where the rabbis speculate that Jonah is the unnamed son of the widow of Zarephath, raised from the dead by Elijah (1 Kgs 17:17–24), linking the “son of Amittai” with the widow’s statement that Elijah’s word was “truth” (Bolin, Freedom, 18).
Jonah - the son of truth
Jonah - the son of truth
17 After this the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, became ill. And his illness was so severe that there was no breath left in him.
18 And she said to Elijah, “What have you against me, O man of God? You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son!”
19 And he said to her, “Give me your son.” And he took him from her arms and carried him up into the upper chamber where he lodged, and laid him on his own bed.
20 And he cried to the Lord, “O Lord my God, have you brought calamity even upon the widow with whom I sojourn, by killing her son?”
21 Then he stretched himself upon the child three times and cried to the Lord, “O Lord my God, let this child’s life come into him again.”
22 And the Lord listened to the voice of Elijah. And the life of the child came into him again, and he revived.
23 And Elijah took the child and brought him down from the upper chamber into the house and delivered him to his mother. And Elijah said, “See, your son lives.”
24 And the woman said to Elijah, “Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.”
Stuart notes that knowing more details about Jonah’s life is unnecessary for following the story in the book of Jonah: “The story is thus self-contained. It is not necessary to know much of anything about Jonah’s life otherwise to appreciate the story. His past and future are not essential to the book’s development” (Hosea—Jonah, 431).
Jonah - the sign
Jonah - the sign
Mt 12:38–42
38 Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered, saying, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.”
39 But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.
40 For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
41 The men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and indeed a greater than Jonah is here.
42 The queen of the South will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and indeed a greater than Solomon is here.
Nineveh - The City
Nineveh - The City
Nineveh is one of the most prominent foreign cities in the Hebrew Bible. Its portrayal is a complex blend of historical reality, symbolic force, and legendary embellishment.
The historical Nineveh was the capital of the neo-Assyrian empire in the late seventh century B.C.E. There was no love lost between the ancient Israelites and Nineveh. The city’s king, Sennacherib, laid siege to Jerusalem in 701 B.C.E. (2Kgs 18:13-19:37, Isa 36-37).
The prophetic book of Nahum is an Israelite taunt-song over Nineveh’s destruction by the Babylonians in 612 B.C.E. For Nahum, Nineveh is a “city of bloodshed” (Nah 3:1). The Assyrians’ ruthless military tactics are also pictured in reliefs from the king’s palace in Nineveh, now in the British Museum.
1 The burden against Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum the Elkoshite.
2 God is jealous, and the Lord avenges; The Lord avenges and is furious. The Lord will take vengeance on His adversaries, And He reserves wrath for His enemies;
8 But with an overflowing flood He will make an utter end of its place, And darkness will pursue His enemies.
11 From you comes forth one Who plots evil against the Lord, A wicked counselor.
1 Woe to the bloody city! It is all full of lies and robbery. Its victim never departs.
The other biblical depiction of Nineveh is in the book of Jonah. There, Nineveh is described as huge—taking three days to walk across—and thoroughly evil. But Jonah gives no specifics about the city’s evil beyond the king’s command that citizens turn away “from the violence that is in their hands” (Jonah 3:8).
Jonah’s Nineveh is thematically connected to Sodom, another biblical city of evil (Gen 18-19). God tells Abraham that the outcry against Sodom is such that he “must go down” to investigate (Gen 18:21). Similarly, God sends Jonah to Nineveh, “the great city,” telling him that its evil “has come up” before him (Jonah 1:2).
21 I will go down now and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry against it that has come to Me; and if not, I will know.”
2 “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry out against it; for their wickedness has come up before Me.”
Gen 19:25 describes God’s destruction of Sodom using a term usually translated as “overthrow,” the same term Jonah uses in his prophetic preaching to Nineveh (Jonah 3:4).
25 So He overthrew those cities, all the plain, all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground.
4 And Jonah began to enter the city on the first day’s walk. Then he cried out and said, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!”
Outside of the Bible, Nineveh was known for having been a great, lawless, and ruined city. Greek literary giants like Herodotus and Aristotle catalog its sinfulness, describing Sardanapalus, its legendary last king, in unflattering (and problematic) terms.
