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The Sign of Jonah
By Bobby Neal Winters
I first learned of the story of Jonah from my Grampa Sam, only he called it the story of Jonah and the Whale. Grampa was from the old oral tradition and recited the story from memory. It was later that I learned there was no whale in the story as the Bible said it was a fish, it was much later that I learned there was more to the story after Jonah was spit up by the fish, and it was much, much later I learned of the parallels Jesus drew between Jonah’s mission and his own.
My aim in this essay is to explore those parallels to a greater extent, but before doing so I would like to recap the story. Those who wish to read it for themselves can do so from the book of Jonah in the Old Testament.
When it was originally pointed out to me that everything in Jonah is backwards, it was as if the scales fell from my eyes. When a prophet of the Lord is called, his answer is supposed to be “Here I am,” and he is then supposed to go do God’s will. Jonah, by way of contrast, got into a boat and headed toward Tarshish, which was used to denote a place very far away like the other end of the world. The boat encounters a storm, and the sailors are terrified. Jonah says it is because he is running from the Lord. Counter to all literary expectations, the sailors only reluctantly cast him into the sea in spite of the fact that he volunteers.
Jonah is then swallowed by a fish and is spit up after three days and nights. Jonah repents his earlier actions and goes to Nineveh where he preaches to them so they might repent. Then, again against all literary expectations, the people of Nineveh do repent.
Meanwhile, Jonah, who is greatly disappointed that the hated people of Nineveh have escaped destruction, goes off to a hill above the city to mope. God causes a gourd vine to grow and shade him from the sun. This makes Jonah happy. Then God sends a cutworm to kill the vine, whereupon Jonah weeps over the loss of the gourd.
God then chides Jonah for weeping over the death of a plant when he had called for the destruction of the city which would not only have caused the death of the people but all their cattle as well.
In the 12th chapter of Matthew and the 11th chapter of Mark, Jesus refers to the sign of Jonas (the word Jonah losing an ‘h’ and picking up an ‘s’ on its way through Greek). The quote from Matthew reads as follows:
But he answered and said unto them, An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas. For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
Christians take this to be a prophecy of Jesus’ death on the Cross and his Resurrection.
I’ve begun to wonder whether the parallels with Jesus ministry stop there. I believe there are a number of other points of correspondence that might confirm the Sign of Jonah for the current evil and adulterous generation.
One of the points of correspondence between Jesus and Jonah would be his reluctance to begin his mission. This is spoken to in John, chapters 2 and 7, where he said that his time has not yet come. Even when his mission begins, it is narrowly focused as we see in this exchange with a woman who was seeking help for her daughter:
But he answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us.
But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me.
But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs.
This is not quite getting on a boat and heading toward the other end of the world, but it certainly reluctance. Indeed, it is only after Jesus’ death and a dream that Peter had in the 10th chapter of Acts that the church enlarged its mission to include Gentiles.
So Jesus, like Jonah, didn’t preach to the Gentiles until after emerging from three days and nights in the heart of the earth.
Historically, Israel divided into two kingdoms, a northern kingdom called Israel and a southern kingdom called Judah. Israel was conquered by Assyria. Then the Medes conquered Assyria and Judah. This was followed by Persia conquering the Medes. It’s much like one of those posters of a minnow being eaten by a larger fish which is about to be eaten by an even larger fish.
Nineveh was the capital of Assyria. One could think of Nineveh having the relationship to Israel and Jonah that Rome had with Judea and Jesus. The analogy is clear and there is precedent for it as Peter refers to Rome as Babylon in 1 Peter Chapter 5, as we recall Babylon was the capital city of the Persian Empire.
If we accept the correspondence between Nineveh and Rome, then we need to ask whether it is born out. Nineveh repented. Did Rome? The answer is in the affirmative as Christianity grew so quickly that by the fourth century AD it became the recognized religion of the Roman Empire.
Rome converted to Christianity, which itself was the true Israel after the Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed.
I will now argue that this was part of Jesus’ plan all along. I base this on the following pair of parables from the 13th chapter of Matthew.
Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field:
Which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof.
Another parable spake he unto them; The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.
It has been noted that mustard is a weed. It is scattered via its tiny seeds and is hard to get rid of. Looking at this from a poetic point of view, one might think of a seed as a Christian missionary and a mustard plant like the church he started.
Just as leaven is worked through the whole loaf, so are Christians as they travel through the Empire. This brings us to another point: The importance of a mission to the city of Rome. While one might convert the entire Empire a city at a time through random wanderings, it would be much more efficient to establish a church in Rome. The world came to Rome to work and then went home to retire. All roads lead to Rome. If a church were established in that city, members of it would be spread all over the Empire, just like yeast in a loaf of bread spreads out from a central source.
So Rome, the Empire, was converted in the story of Jesus just like Nineveh, the city, was in the story of Jonah.
The irony here is that history does not record that Nineveh was ever converted by Jonah. One might argue [and argue and argue] that Jonah is a fictional story with a teaching purpose. Yet in Jesus, the Word of God made flesh, the story is carried out in verifiable historical detail.
(Bobby Winters is Professor of Mathematics and Assistant Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Pittsburg State University in Pittsburg, Kansas.)
By Bobby Neal Winters
I first learned of the story of Jonah from my Grampa Sam, only he called it the story of Jonah and the Whale. Grampa was from the old oral tradition and recited the story from memory. It was later that I learned there was no whale in the story as the Bible said it was a fish, it was much later that I learned there was more to the story after Jonah was spit up by the fish, and it was much, much later I learned of the parallels Jesus drew between Jonah’s mission and his own.
My aim in this essay is to explore those parallels to a greater extent, but before doing so I would like to recap the story. Those who wish to read it for themselves can do so from the book of Jonah in the Old Testament.
When it was originally pointed out to me that everything in Jonah is backwards, it was as if the scales fell from my eyes. When a prophet of the Lord is called, his answer is supposed to be “Here I am,” and he is then supposed to go do God’s will. Jonah, by way of contrast, got into a boat and headed toward Tarshish, which was used to denote a place very far away like the other end of the world. The boat encounters a storm, and the sailors are terrified. Jonah says it is because he is running from the Lord. Counter to all literary expectations, the sailors only reluctantly cast him into the sea in spite of the fact that he volunteers.
Jonah is then swallowed by a fish and is spit up after three days and nights. Jonah repents his earlier actions and goes to Nineveh where he preaches to them so they might repent. Then, again against all literary expectations, the people of Nineveh do repent.
Meanwhile, Jonah, who is greatly disappointed that the hated people of Nineveh have escaped destruction, goes off to a hill above the city to mope. God causes a gourd vine to grow and shade him from the sun. This makes Jonah happy. Then God sends a cutworm to kill the vine, whereupon Jonah weeps over the loss of the gourd.
God then chides Jonah for weeping over the death of a plant when he had called for the destruction of the city which would not only have caused the death of the people but all their cattle as well.
In the 12th chapter of Matthew and the 11th chapter of Mark, Jesus refers to the sign of Jonas (the word Jonah losing an ‘h’ and picking up an ‘s’ on its way through Greek). The quote from Matthew reads as follows:
But he answered and said unto them, An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas. For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
Christians take this to be a prophecy of Jesus’ death on the Cross and his Resurrection.
I’ve begun to wonder whether the parallels with Jesus ministry stop there. I believe there are a number of other points of correspondence that might confirm the Sign of Jonah for the current evil and adulterous generation.
One of the points of correspondence between Jesus and Jonah would be his reluctance to begin his mission. This is spoken to in John, chapters 2 and 7, where he said that his time has not yet come. Even when his mission begins, it is narrowly focused as we see in this exchange with a woman who was seeking help for her daughter:
But he answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us.
But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me.
But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs.
This is not quite getting on a boat and heading toward the other end of the world, but it certainly reluctance. Indeed, it is only after Jesus’ death and a dream that Peter had in the 10th chapter of Acts that the church enlarged its mission to include Gentiles.
So Jesus, like Jonah, didn’t preach to the Gentiles until after emerging from three days and nights in the heart of the earth.
Historically, Israel divided into two kingdoms, a northern kingdom called Israel and a southern kingdom called Judah. Israel was conquered by Assyria. Then the Medes conquered Assyria and Judah. This was followed by Persia conquering the Medes. It’s much like one of those posters of a minnow being eaten by a larger fish which is about to be eaten by an even larger fish.
Nineveh was the capital of Assyria. One could think of Nineveh having the relationship to Israel and Jonah that Rome had with Judea and Jesus. The analogy is clear and there is precedent for it as Peter refers to Rome as Babylon in 1 Peter Chapter 5, as we recall Babylon was the capital city of the Persian Empire.
If we accept the correspondence between Nineveh and Rome, then we need to ask whether it is born out. Nineveh repented. Did Rome? The answer is in the affirmative as Christianity grew so quickly that by the fourth century AD it became the recognized religion of the Roman Empire.
Rome converted to Christianity, which itself was the true Israel after the Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed.
I will now argue that this was part of Jesus’ plan all along. I base this on the following pair of parables from the 13th chapter of Matthew.
Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field:
Which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof.
Another parable spake he unto them; The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.
It has been noted that mustard is a weed. It is scattered via its tiny seeds and is hard to get rid of. Looking at this from a poetic point of view, one might think of a seed as a Christian missionary and a mustard plant like the church he started.
Just as leaven is worked through the whole loaf, so are Christians as they travel through the Empire. This brings us to another point: The importance of a mission to the city of Rome. While one might convert the entire Empire a city at a time through random wanderings, it would be much more efficient to establish a church in Rome. The world came to Rome to work and then went home to retire. All roads lead to Rome. If a church were established in that city, members of it would be spread all over the Empire, just like yeast in a loaf of bread spreads out from a central source.
So Rome, the Empire, was converted in the story of Jesus just like Nineveh, the city, was in the story of Jonah.
The irony here is that history does not record that Nineveh was ever converted by Jonah. One might argue [and argue and argue] that Jonah is a fictional story with a teaching purpose. Yet in Jesus, the Word of God made flesh, the story is carried out in verifiable historical detail.
(Bobby Winters is Professor of Mathematics and Assistant Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Pittsburg State University in Pittsburg, Kansas.)
