Michael-Grams: M-G: 1.7.20 // Some Observations in Jonah 4:2

Sperm whale (Physeter microcephalus) illustration by Uko Gorter

So he prayed to the LORD, and said, Ah, LORD, was not this what I said when I was still in my country? Therefore I fled previously to Tarshish; for I know that You are a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, One who relents from doing harm.

Jonah could see the response of these wicked people; he could anticipate only two outcomes from the reaction of the inhabitants of Nineveh to the message delivered: be destroyed or be delivered, but we are over the red line of forty days by this chapter which explains the furious anger in Jon 4:1. Whatever the internal dissensions that were weakening the Assyrian’s power in the region became a unified voice of contrition in Nineveh for their wickedness before Jonah’s God.

Ever since that first step towards Tarshish, there was a dark storm brewing within Jonah’s heart (Jon 4:1). The vow made in Jerusalem to Yahweh was addressed while inside the whale (Jon 2:9-10); he fulfilled his promise, but his adamant bad attitude had transformed into anger. One can only imagine Jonah’s negative self-talk after being coughed up by the whale and his arrival to Nineveh.

Well, we know Jonah is “exceedingly displeased” and became angry at Yahweh (Jon 4:1), and he doesn’t even know the ultimate outcome yet (cf. Jon 4:5)! Jonah was no dummy, however; given the culture of the Assyrians, they were doing something totally unheard of – the people of Nineveh believed God (Jon 3:5)!

We learn by Yahweh’s inaction, His knowledge of every man’s heart, that this action wasn’t just assimilation of God into the Assyrian polytheistic culture; He was not being added into the mix. There was a significant shift spiritually from darkness to light within the heart that only God could see, a move from their gods to Yahweh alone. Jonah could see the evidence of this happening all over the place, but to his credit, he continued to preach.

So the people of Nineveh believed God, proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest to the least of them (Jon 3:5).

I am sure not every single soul was humbling themselves, for the darkness of their hearts in unbelief resisted this supposed threat by the God of this unknown prophet of the Hebrews who came out from a great fish! This was the same God who took His people out of the tyrannical grip of Egypt; this was the same God who conquered Canaan; this was the same God who through Jeroboam II (793-753 B.C.] reacquired practically all of the northern territories once held by David and Solomon (see map below).

When the king of Nineveh, Ashur-dan III (773-755 B.C.), finally made his royal decree, everybody went into humble mode to blend in with what was already happening among the people and to be in compliance with the king’s demands (Jon 3:6-9). Only Yahweh knew the real from the counterfeit penitence (Jer 17:9-10).

Again, Jesus characterized their response as “repentance” (Mt 12:41, repented). Many believed in the God of Jonah; some did not (cf. Mt 7:13). The size of the harvest is unknown, but Luke 11:32 may be suggestive that a larger number truly humbled themselves before Yahweh. Things were happening that only Yahweh would know of. He knew the precise number that truly believed in Him even before Jonah showed up on Assyrian soil via whale delivery (Jon 2:10).

Since we know of Jonah’s feelings towards the Assyrians, Jonah remained faithful to his vow and preached precisely what Yahweh instructed for him to do whether he liked it or not (Jon 3:2-4). If Jonah would have had his way, they would all have burned; we know that. But the very reason he ran to Tarshish was happening before his very eyes – the people of Nineveh believed God (Jon 3:5).

So he prayed to the LORD

The only other recorded time he prayed to Yahweh was from inside the whale (Jon 2:1). His disobedience was the predicate for the first prayer; his latter prayer was the root cause of the first prayer and now anger issues surfaced – he became angry (Jon 4:1) … for I know that You (Jon 4:2) at Yahweh! He delivered Jonah from the raging waters of the Mediterranean; He delivered him out of the enormous sperm whale, but Jonah was unwilling to be delivered from himself; he was angry at Yahweh!

Who had a reason to be angry here? Yahweh! God had every right to be angered over the wickedness of the Assyrians but also because of the petulant, ungrateful, and childish antics of His prophet, Jonah. If you read this from a Christian counselor’s point of view, it is depressing to see the dog chasing its own tail.

If we do not learn from this (cf. Rom 15:4), the wood is too wet to light the fire under our bottoms! God is in the business of saving lives, not destroying them as some would have us to believe, but two verses come to mind as sort of a post script to this,

(Eze 18:4) Behold, all souls are Mine; the soul of the father as well as the soul of the son is Mine; the soul who sins shall die.

(Lk 13:5) I tell you, no [referring to Lk 13:4]; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish.

What follows was Jonah making a case as to why he fled to Tarshish as if it was justified (Oh, Yahweh, how so like us!),

Ah, LORD, was not this what I said when I was still in my country? Therefore I fled previously to Tarshish;

Feinberg comments on this, “As though God was unaware of the movements of Jonah’s heart, the prophet explains to the Lord that this was the dominating thought in his mind when the message first came to him in his own country,”1

Was not this what I said when I was still [in Jerusalem]

This is interpreted by formulating a composite picture comprised of fragmentary evidence.

(1) the word of Yahweh came to Jonah, Jon 1:1

(2) Jonah received that word in Jerusalem based on the “manifest presence” theory, in other words, those who knew of the God of the Hebrews knew that His presence was associated with the temple in Jerusalem. In Joppa, Jonah informed the mariners he was running from the presence of the LORD (Jon 1:10). The word of the LORD came to Jonah in Jerusalem (Jon 1:1).

(3) The only conversation recorded was Yahweh’s (Jon 1:2).

(4) Apparently, Jonah agreed to go by making a vow. We see this by Jonah’s prayer from within the whale (Jon 2:9, I will pay what I have vowed).

God being omniscient, knew the movements of Jonah’s heart. Jonah was conflicted to go to Nineveh though he agreed to go. Who says “No” to God, right? But these mental machinations caused Jonah to run from the will of God (Jon 1:3). There is no verbal articulation recorded by Jonah so we are left to believe it was bundled up in his thinking. My vision to continue with M-G was nothing more than a two-dimensional pictograph that answered the inquiries of my heart without any verbalization from Yahweh.

How the word of the LORD came to Jonah did not require it to be audible though it could have been in the natural understanding of the expression (cf. second calling in Jon 3:2). Jonah had to have known God knew his thinking without verbalizing it (cf. Psa 139:2b, 4) – was not this what I said.

Now, is Jonah articulating this prayer (Jon 4:2) mentally or speaking aloud? Mixed with anger (Jon 4:1), I am inclined to think that he verbalized this second prayer. He is venting rather than suppressing it. Yahweh knows whether we suppress our thinking or express our thoughts verbally (cf. Psa 139:2b, 4).

Some take the phrase when I was still in my country as referring to

(1) The northern kingdom (he was a prophet there).

(2) Gath Hepher (his hometown in the northern kingdom, approx. 3 miles from Nazareth located in the northern kingdom).

(3) The southern kingdom (he received his commission to go to Nineveh in Jerusalem, the capital of the southern kingdom) based on Yahweh’s manifest presence generally understood to be located in Jerusalem (cf. Jon 1:10). This is my preference.

(4) Since he was a prophet of God, my country could have included both kingdoms as a whole in contrast to being on foreign soil, though we only know of him prophesying in Samaria and Nineveh.

Click on to Enlarge/source: preceptaustin.org/bible_maps

Therefore I fled previously to Tarshish; for I know that You are a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, One who relents from doing harm.

Feinberg further observed as we did on why Jonah took off in the opposite direction of Nineveh, “namely, that God, being gracious, merciful, longsuffering, full of lovingkindness, and ready to stay His hand in judgment upon repentance, would spare the city of Nineveh if she did turn to the Lord.”2

Here we see Jonah is justifying his flight to Tarshish based on the character of God and quarreling with Him over sparing Nineveh before the forty days are up (Jon 4:5)! Think upon that for a minute. Jonah, who apparently made a vow before Yahweh to go to Nineveh, took off in the opposite direction of God’s will for Tarshish because of the possibility of Yahweh sparing the city of Nineveh.

Jonah wanted no part of it! He wanted that Assyrian city destroyed, right? That, my friends, is the billion-dollar question! Why did he want Nineveh decimated? In the eyes of Yahweh, there were no legitimate reasons regardless of the atrocities! We see the truth of this; never are we more like God than when we forgive. Speaking for myself, this hits me between the eyes!

Disagreement is not mutiny, but if such a disagreement prevents us from doing God’s will for our life, such a disagreement is rebellion or sin, a clash of wills between God and ours. His will is unilateral or one-sided in nature, not optional or negotiable. Whether Jonah vowed or not, as a prophet of God, because the word came unto him, he wasn’t given a buy-out. His position as a prophet and consent (vow) was his moral obligation to execute the will of God immediately and completely.

For I know that You are a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, One who relents from doing harm.

These words about Yahweh in this context simply shuts down the disparaging claim that the God of the Old Testament being the GOWO, the “God of Wrath Only.” The immutability of Yahweh means that the God of yesterday, today, tomorrow, and forever will be the same (cf. Mal 3:6; Heb 13:8). Any artificial demarcations of the character of God between the testaments are flagrant, irresponsible, and bogus. Jonah was confident in his character assessment of God – for I know that You are.

It is ironic that Jonah makes the observation that Yahweh is slow to anger. It was central in his thinking upon receiving his commission to Nineveh, and it stands out like a sore thumb in the context of chapter four being negatively charged by Jonah’s anger. How do we claim to be of and like God if we do not think and act like Him?

Here we have all of these Ninevites, who believed God, behaving rightly before God, and God’s man of the hour was acting unwisely, like a man who didn’t know God, before Him! That’s ugly and hypocritical. <><