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thing in it. could conceive of and
creale a great fish capable of swal–
lowing one man - Jonah - for three
days and three nights and of vomil–
ing him safely onshore cau es either
embarrassmenl or a knowing smil e
(like telling the kids abou t Santa
Claus) - and hardly a nyone really
believes
rhar
slory!
The unfortunate assumption on
the part of many is that Jonah was
swa llowed by a
wha/e.
The King
James transla tors of
1611
read the
term for "great fi sh" and.
1
guess.
the greatest fi sh th ey could think of
was a wha le. o they translated it
that way (Matt.
12:40).
Of course
we a ll know. as
f
am ure they did.
that a wha le isn't a fi sh al all. but a
mamma l. The or.iginal story is in th e
Old Te tament book of Jonah.
Jonah was wri tten in Heb rew.
The Hebrew language has a word
for whale
(rannin)
which the narra–
ter could have used had he wished
to repon that the animal which
swallowed Jonah was a whale. but
ins tead he used the Hebrew wo rd
dag,
which is unmistakab ly " fi sh:·
And ohvious ly. since the fish had to
be a siza ble animal to accommodate
a man, the translators added the
word "grea t."
In a book called
The Harmony of
Science and Scriprure
by Harry
Rimmer this is explaincd in detail
with the addition of an unnecessary,
but intcrcsting and hai r-ra ising tale
of an English fi sherman in
1936
who
survived for
48
hours in the innards
of a wha le hark and only suffered
loss of hair and a ye llowing of thc
ski n!
The point. howeve r
i~
n ot
whethcr wc can find some sort ofsea
animal ca pable of pcrfo rmin g this
feat, but lhat
wc
ought lo read th e
texl a little more carefn lly in the
firs t place: "Now th c Lord had pre ·
pared a great
ti .
h to swa llow up Jo–
nah . And Jonah was in the belly of
the fi sh thrce days anci thrcr nights'·
(Jonah
1: 17).
Clearly 1his was no
sta nda rd crcature alrcady known o r
now known to mankind .
It
was a
specia l act of crea tion for a specia l
purpose unique in 1he history of
mankind .
Did God run ou t of ideas. talent.
and power aft er the six days of cre–
ation mentioned in the first chap tcr
of th e Bible? Is there no more va ri-
30
ety po sible in the genetic pool of
present crea tion. or no more pos–
sible varialio ns God cou ld in–
troduce? How long does it take God
to " prepare" a great fi sh? lf he cre–
a ted all the variety and abundancc
of sea life as we ll as all the fowl of
th e air in
24
hours on the fifth day
of creation. he cou ld probably whip
up one great fish in about the time it
took Jonah to fall from the deck to
sea!
This was a super fish. a special.
one-of-a-kind crea tion of God , who
is afte r all the creator. This special
an imal was capable of a symbiotic
relat ionship wit h a man for a given
period of
72
hours. Jonah didn 't
know it a t thc time, terrifying expe–
rience that it must have been. but he
was as afe as
a
pos um in a pouch.
If we could duplicate it. it would
make a great attraction at Dis–
neyland!
At the time. in pitch blackness.
cramped space, with weeds wrapped
a round his head and no prospect of
surviva l. Jonah was ready to accept
God on his term . In hon. he said,
" Look, Lord, if you ge t me out of
this.
1'11
do anything you say!"
God talked to the fi sh and caused
him to spit Jonah out on the beach
- and Jonah. true to his word, car–
ried out the miss ion God ass igned
hi
m.
bu
t
nol withou t reserva tions
and. incredibly. with an angry,
" 1
told you so" to God himse lf before
the job was done.
What was Jonah 's message?
Simple:
Nineveh is going
10
be wiped
Olll
in
forty days.l
However reluctant
the prophet was to proclaim th e
mcssage from God. he was con–
vincing. Everybody wound up be–
lieving him!
Eve,ybody.l
A
n
d
t
h
a
t
ma
d
e
Jo na
h
ma
d
!
Angry mad !
You have to be patient and un–
derstanding with Jonah. After all
God was. If you look a t it from thi s
stanclpoint a nd do not actu ally have
10 personally experience th c trauma
he suffered him el f. the tory of Jo–
nah is humorou and informative in
add ition 10 being problema ti c.
Why wa. .Jonah a ngry when God
didn't
des troy Nineveh? Wcll, Jonah
had to tell a ve ry warlike king and
city that they were going lo be over–
thrown. In addition. there was a
time limit on his prophecy:
40
days.
Now nobody likes to prophcsy
something he
knows
won't happen
- neither did Jonah. He probably
didn't like Nineveh. or Ninevites.
because they were ancient enemies
of Israel and Judah . Besides they
worshipped the wrong gods. And
Jonah
knew
all along that God was
going to be merciful! Th at's why Jo–
nah was upset .
The book doesn ' t mention any–
th ing about Jonah saying "repent -
or you
' 11
be overthrown ." But, just
as he feared at the beginning when
he a ttempted to ftee his responsi–
bility, sure enough Nineveh re–
pe nted. The king. the nobles. the
people, and even the animals fasted.
The peopl e put on sac kc loth ,
begged God 's forgiveness , a nd
hoped for the best. "And God saw
their works. that they turned from
their evil way: and God repented of
the ev il, that he had said that he
would do unto them; and he did it
not! " (Jonah
3: 10.)
Jonah ·was deeply displeased and
ve ry angry: " ... Was this not my
saying, when
1
was yet in my coun–
try? Therefore
1
fted before unto
Tarshish : for
1 knew
that thou arta
gracious God. and merciful. slow to
a nger, and of great kindness. and
repentest 1hee of the evil. Therefore
now. O Lord, take,
1
beseech thee,
my life from me; for it is better for
me to die tha n
LO
live" (Jonah
4:2-
3) .
Now
thar
is being upse t!
Jon ah would rather have died
than to see thosc dirty. rott en, sin–
ning, mean, obnoxious, ev il , lust–
fil lcd. greedy, perverse k.illers of pa–
gan Nineveh forgiven!
So Jona h sa t and sulked on a hill–
top nearby under a temporary shel–
ter of brush he'd made to shie ld him
from the burning sun - waiting.
hoping that God might yet fu lfill his
prophecy of doom. ow. Jonah was
a good guy, basically. He just had a
lot of prejudices to overcome. God
lovcd .Jonah too. as well as th e Nine–
vi les. and he wanled to teach him a
lesson - a lesson we can a ll share.
God !oves a rcpentant sinner. no
matter what his sins. color. creed. or
nationa lity. God's forgi veness is for
every liv ing. breathing human
be ing. God's blood pays for a ll sins
of everyone a t the time of belief and
repcntance.
The
PLAIN TRUTH Seplember 1976