Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Jonah 3:1
And the word of the LORD came unto Jonah the second time, saying,
1 4. Jonah’s Preaching
1. the second time ] Like St Peter (Joh 21:15-17), Jonah is not only forgiven, but restored to his office, and receives anew his commission.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Ch. Jon 3:1-10. Jonah’s Preaching and its result
Sent a second time by God on a mission to Nineveh, Jonah promptly obeys, Jon 3:1-3 a. He enters into Nineveh and delivers his message, Jon 3:3 b4. The Ninevites believe God and repent, Jon 3:5-9; and are spared, Jon 3:10.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
And the word of the Lord came a second time to Jonah – o Jonah, delivered from the whale, doubtless went up to Jerusalem to pay his vows and thank God there. Perhaps he hoped that God would be content with this his punishment and repentance, and that He would not again send him to Nineveh. Anyway, he was in some settled home, perhaps again at Gath-hepher. For God bids him, Arise, go . But one who is on his way, is not bidden to arise and go. God may have allowed an interval to elapse, in order that the tidings of so great a miracle might spread far and wide. But Jonah does not supply any of these incidents . He does not speak of himself , but only of his mission, as God taught him.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Jon 3:1-2
And the Word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, saying.
The restored commission
Here we learn what God is to those who truly repent. God may even restore all that has been forfeited. For those who have done grievous wrong, it is encouraging to think that there is honour, and glory, and a blessed restoration to the full love of God, if only they return out of the darkness into the presence from which they have departed. God sent Jonah on the very same mission in which he had failed before,–and yet with a marked difference distinguishing the second from the first call. The changed command, though full of restored confidence, implies a warning to be exact in fulfilling the will of God–to be careful as to giving the message exactly as he received it. It seems to say, Risk not any further disobedience even in the least particular of the mission on which you are sent.
1. The exceeding mercy of God shown in this, that He offers renewed opportunities to those who fail to profit by the first opportunity; and it may be even opportunities of the same kind. They may have to be followed after a different manner, but yet the same object, the same end may be set before us till finally accomplished.
2. There is this further wonder in the forgiving and forbearing of God, that He causes the trials of the returning penitent to be the means of good. Those who have passed through the experience of such penitential struggles and fears may become afterwards a blessing to others, because they can tell of the dangers that beset them, and of the mercy through which they have been saved. The grace of God not only restores a man generally, as it were, but renews him in the very point in which he had sinned and failed. Take courage then, you who are beset with some special sin. Let us learn from the long catalogue of those who have fallen and have been recovered to take hope for ourselves. God desires a perfect, not an imperfect work. Grace crowns acts of penitence and faith. (T. T. Carter.)
The preacher of judgment
Jonah, the runaway prophet, is now before us as Jonah the successful preacher.
1. Sin in God s servants is a great hinderer.
2. Faithlessness in the servant does not necessitate failure to the Master. Chastisement may lead to consecration, and that to successful service.
3. Moral delinquency repented of is no impassable barrier to former favour, privilege, and honour. God does not take advantage of our weakness to cut us off for ever. He is patient, pitiful, forgiving, and will restore His penitent servants to forfeited blessings and dignities.
4. The preachers true function is to declare what God commands him. The message as well as the commission must bear the impress of Divinity. Divine thoughts, purposes, desires, truths, and not human notions, creeds, sentiments, opinions, fancies, must ever fill the mind, inspire the tongue, constrain the utterance, and fire the eloquence and enthusiasm of every ambassador of the Cross. Note that Jonah was obedient at last to the holy orders. He did what he should have done at first. Obedience is true or false according to the temper in which we act. Notice the method and matter of his preaching. His method was earnest, courageous, impressive. He cried. His matter was adapted to rich and poor. It was solemn, humiliating, definite, merciful. We have the practical fruits of the preaching,–repentance and reformation. Ninevehs repentance was well timed, well grounded, well evidenced, by self-denial, self-abasement, earnest prayer, personal reform. Learn that genuine repentance averts the punitive purposes of God. God watches for genuine indications of moral reform. Behold them, He refrains from executing His threatenings. Repentance is a wonderful power in the domain of moral government. (J. O. Keen, D. D.)
The history of Jonah set before the young
The prophet Jonah opposed the will of God, and would not do what God commanded him, as did Balaam; but there was this difference between them,–that Jonah did fear and love God. God destroyed Balaam. He only punished Jonah, and brought him to repentance. It is then a very good thing to love and serve God; because those who do so cannot quite turn away from God, and Cod will never quite turn away from them. If they sin, they will be punished, like Jonah was; but those who love and serve God are still under His care, and like Jonah are brought back to repentance. If there are among you any that are wishing to serve God, but are yet sometimes tempted to disobey Him, you may learn much by thinking of what happened to Jonah.
1. God gave him a command to go and tell the people of Nineveh that He was about to destroy them. It was a very hard command for him to fulfil. Jonah could not tell what might happen to him, if he ventured into that great foreign and heathen city. But God could take care of him. He knew that God was a loving Father to him. Whenever we are disposed to do wrong, then we are afraid of the Bible; we are afraid of every thing that tells us of our sin; we are afraid of pious persons; we cannot bear to pray. Whenever you are disposed to do what is wrong, you feel equally disposed to flee from the presence of the Lord. You act like Jonah. Therefore our best way is to love and serve God with all our hearts, and ask Him for grace to do all our duty, as Jonah ought to have done. When the lot fell upon Jonah, they asked him what he had done; and he was obliged to tell them how he had been shrinking from doing his duty, and was trying to escape from God, who followed him, and who knew where he was, and what he was doing. It must have made him more miserable to have seen how much better the heathen were than he. For he had brought them into danger, and they were trying to save his life. At last, at his own wish, they took him up, and threw him into the sea. Ungodly persons, when they are brought into trouble, cannot pray. Now there is not a place on earth, and there is not a degree of guilt in which we may be living, in which our believing prayer cannot reach the ear and heart of God: for when Jonah cried unto the Lord, in the midst of his troubles, God heard him, and caused the fish to vomit him out upon the shore of his own land. How humble and grateful he must have felt that day! He was not left, however, to be indolent and inactive. Jonah was brought through all his troubles, to just this point, that he must obey the commands of God. Gods commands never alter. Our sins will not alter them; our troubles will not alter them; our deliverance will not alter them. God commands you to love and serve Him with all your hearts; God commands you to confess Jesus Christ in the world, to make the Bible your rule of life, and to live by faith and in prayer. Jonah was brought to Gods command a second time; and if he had refused, he would have been brought to it a third time. He must do Gods will. When he accomplished the will of God, and found it so easy, doubtless he thought, Why did I not do it at first? (Baptist W. Noel, M. A.)
Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.
Jonahs first and second commission
What are the points of difference between them? One respects Jonah himself. Formerly he knew the message that he was to deliver. Now he is simply told that a message will be given him, but he is not to know it until he arrives at the place. It may be the same. It may be milder; it may be sterner. Undoubtedly this change has reference to his former disobedience. The message was different in its substance also, to meet the change in Nineveh. When the message was given, it proved to be the never varying cry, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be destroyed. Some think he preached on this as a text; but as the cup of Ninevehs iniquity was now full, what was proper to the case was just a cry of coming judgment, brief and plain, startling, stern, unalterable, except by quick and unfeigned repentance. Probably Jonah did not add to this message by the faintest hint or suggestion. The simplest interpretation is the truest. This message makes us think.
1. Of the exceeding sinfulness of sin.
2. How inflexible is the justice of God.
3. What a stupendous power a city has for good or evil. (A. Raleigh, D. D.)
A missionary message
Jonah was foolish, Jonah was wise; foolish to expect to balk God, wise to learn so quickly his folly. Misery, calamity, peril, and the sense of an ever present God who had brought them, did their work; and the prophet, back again at the starting-point, heeds the Divine voice, and turns with an obedient heart to fulfil the mission which he had thought to escape.
I. Gods authority. The Being who speaks is conscious of His right. He does not mince words. Gods demand on Jonah now is precisely what it was in the first place. There is no effort to compromise because of Jonahs former flight. Now comes the command again, plain, stern, uncompromising–Arise, go, preach. The slight change of form in the expression seems full of meaning. Arise, go, and preach the preaching that I bid thee. See that thou preach no other message than Mine. God owns men. All that we are, all that we have, all the service of our lives belongs to God. We delude ourselves with any sense of self-ownership. We get the idea that we own what God only loans to us.
II. Gods way with the disobedient. See how God goes to work to bring this mans will into subjection to His own. What a complex of world-wide, universe-wide machinery the Sovereign of all can set in motion for the subduing of a human spirit! Jonah is not more obdurate than Pharaoh. The storms, the seas, the worse tumults in his own bosom, the upbraidings of the crew, his thoughts of his past, his fear,–all are Gods instruments, and under His direction each does its unconscious part toward the subjection of Jonah, and the salvation of the Assyrian capital. Jonah is a changed man. From a coward he has become a dauntless hero and prophet. Jonah thought himself free when he fled, but in fact his first real enjoyment of freedom came when he started to fulfil Gods command.
III. Gods missionary message and its effect. Jonah was the first foreign missionary. The men of far-off Nineveh were to learn of God, His love and holiness. The very heart of our conception of God as a moral being is His holiness. The holiness of God compels Him to insist upon holiness in all men. In Nineveh sin had taken on its most frightful developments. Nineveh had much, but it lacked just one element of fortune–righteousness. Ninevehs cup of iniquity was well-nigh full. Jonahs preaching was plain, earnest, effective, impressive. God went into the city with Jonah, but God had also gone before. The men of Nineveh were ready for the missionary. The people believed God. To believe God is a great thing. The best possible evidence of the Ninevites belief in the missionarys sermon was their conduct. They acted. They bestirred themselves as if they believed that the sin of their hearts and lives was endangering them. The ringing cry of Jonah reaches even the royal palace, and the king, humbled, joins his subjects in their plea for Gods mercy. The people turned from their sin, and cried for mercy.
IV. Gods mercy. Gods heart was moved; doom was averted; Nineveh was saved. God was merciful to Jonah in following him through all his flight, in bringing him back to the starting-point, in using him though he had shown himself unworthy. God was merciful to Nineveh in sending the messenger to warn the city, and in preparing the hearts of the people for the message. And God is merciful in listening to their cry for forgiveness. God repented. His attitude toward Nineveh was changed. What changed it? Ninevehs attitude toward sin. What is meant by Gods repentance? Speaking to man, God must use language with which man is familiar. Repentance means a changed attitude. The whole attitude of the Ninevites toward sin, and so, toward God, being changed, in that same hour Gods attitude toward them was changed. (John H. Mason.)
Conditions of ministerial success
I. The character of the sermon; or the objective elements of success.
1. It should be argumentative. To expect men to believe without proof is to expect them to become irrational.
2. It must be positive; mainly concerned in the teaching of truth, rather than in the refutation of error.
3. It is doctrinal. The larger part of those who compose our congregations depend upon the preacher for all the knowledge they will ever have of these great theological truths. That preaching is the most practical which indoctrinates the hearers with the fundamental elements of the Christian faith.
4. It should be systematic. As there is a logical coherence between all the parts of the religion we teach, why should we exclude system from our mode of exhibiting it?
5. A bold, unflinching testimony to the great doctrines of Gods sovereignty, mans inability, election, and other unpopular doctrines of the Gospel.
II. The character of the man; or the subjective elements of success.
1. Individuality.
2. Earnestness is self-evidencing.
3. Consciousness on the part of the speaker that he is speaking to his audience. Some preach for the sake of the sermon. Others preach for the sake of the people.
4. The good preacher speaks with authority. Which may be derived from–
(1) Consciousness of official dignity.
(2) Unwavering conviction of the truth.
(3) Consciousness of personal acceptance with God.
5. The manner of delivery should be in accordance with the rules of good speaking. Delivery is an art, and is based upon scientific principles.
6. The preacher must have weight of personal character; not only piety, but weight of character. Who of us is sufficient for these things? (J. W. Pratt, D. D.)
Preaching to great cities
The Lord seems to say to Jonah, Begin where you were when you started out to have your own way. Come back to the very point at which we were, and start again. But the Lord distrusted him a little still, notwithstanding the discipline to which he had been subjected. Now God is more definite. The preaching that I bid thee. There must be no mistake, no dodging, no evasion. Man may disobey God in two ways. He may not go, may plead excuses, and refuse to try to do the work. Or he may not do what God tells him to do, may do something somewhat like it, but not it. It is against this second kind of disobedience that God guards His servant. It is not difficult to obtain men, in this age, who are quite ready to go to great cities. But there are many who, when they go, do not do what God tells them to do. There is preaching enough, but when you come to take out of it the theological dialectics, and the wranglings, and the discussions of the secular phases of life, and the material interests of the Church, and the meddling with current events, you find that the bulk of Gods preaching is comparatively small, and often of weak portent. The great question which lays itself down at the door of our hearts is, Are we doing our whole duty to the city?–not to ones self simply, but to the city? We are here upon Gods errand. Is the city being saved? Is it being saved as we might save it? As God expects us to save it?
I. What are the methods with which we are to go into this great city as appointed by the Almighty? God sends us with a definite commission, and there is to be decisiveness of action on our part. There is to be activity, earnestness. We are to impress upon these sinners round that we can die for them, but we can never leave them unsaved. This indefiniteness, this far-off century, this millennium dawning out of small faith is not of the Gospel. That is for the prophets of evolution, of aesthetics and social culture, for the false prophets. Within the Church are the leverages and forces to bring the millennium to this sinking world.
II. What about the place; what about the exact methods; what about the appliances of the Gospel? If we are to preach to people the preaching God bids us to preach them, how are we to reach them? Jonah was to preach street preaching. Jesus Christ preached in the streets. The preaching of the Gospel should be just as accessible to men as when it is preached in the streets and in the fields. Christ expects men and women to be able to come to the preaching of the Gospel with as much freedom as they go along the highways. There should be nothing in the Churches or in the preaching of the Gospel that shall embarrass in the slightest degree any poor man, or plainly clad man, who may want to find Jesus Christ. We have built our churches away from the people. We imitate a useless, liturgical style of architecture. We let pews to the well-to-do. When men come to the altar of God, and it is their home, how they then throng about their minister; they dont hide away from him.
III. What shall we preach? The Gospel. Just simply the plain old Gospel of the old time. You and I are to preach that very same Jesus who went into Rome, and into Athens, and into Asia-Minor, and whom our fathers preached, and whom our fathers revered. Human nature needs it as much as ever it did. Preach to it the Crucified One; not a petty little philosophy of salvation, or a poetic story of a perfect Man Christ. But preach a God Christ, a Divine Christ, who was torn, lacerated by a devil-world; a risen Christ, risen by His own power, which He will exert in due time for all who die in Him. Preach a Gospel of conviction of sin, of repentance, of regeneration, of the witness of the Spirit, by which human hearts are made new, human character is transformed, human faces are transfigured, and dying mortals are translated into that glory where all are always like Him. (J. R. Day, D. D.)
Effect of Jonahs preaching
There was never a mission undertaken apparently more unpromising than this of Jonah to Nineveh. Here was.–
I. A most unsuitable missionary.
1. To begin with, he was thoroughly unwilling to go. His reason he gives in Jon 4:2. He was fearful that the heathen would repent at his preaching, and in that case God would have compassion, and forgive and spare them. What a fear to be entertained by a missionary!
2. Unsuitable because of the self-deception which he could practise on himself, and his moral confusion and compromise. Let us not think worse of Jonah than the case demands. He has his good traits. At least he is honest, and he is as severe on himself as he is on others.
3. It would have seemed unfavourable also that Jonah should be sent on such a mission entirely alone.
II. Nineveh was a very difficult field. Perhaps the most discouraging thing about it was that its people already knew Jonahs country, his race, and his religion, and thoroughly despised them all. It was to the proud metropolis of a resistless empire, overflowing with wealth and numbers, filled with insolence and luxury, that the lonely man from the village of Gath-hepher was sent. And did it not make matters worse that God had bidden Jonah to carry to Nineveh such a disheartening, exasperating message?
III. Yet the mission of Jonah was a success. A success scarcely paralleled in ancient or in modern times. Nineveh believed God. It is not possible to tell the extent or the permanence of this national repentance. Learn–
1. All races of men have been in Gods loving care.
2. We see the method of Gods mercy to the heathen.
3. We may cherish great expectations concerning the hardest fields of the heathen world.
4. The religious use of fear.
5. The moral power of leaders, whether social or political.
6. Learn Christs own lessons from this history. (Arthur Mitchell, D. D.)
Jonahs commission
The eye of God is always on man. We seem to act as if God retired into the distance of heaven, and took no cognisance of the actions of man. But if Gods eye does look upon man, the disposition of God is to show mercy to man. For do we not see here the messenger sent to Nineveh? If God has a disposition to show mercy, God is one whose patience has limits. We are not to suppose that we can trifle with God; that we can go on with our iniquity, and that God will never vindicate His honour. Learn also that we may hope in preaching to the very worst and most abandoned. Wicked Nineveh listened to the voice of warning. The text further teaches us the duty of the Church, the duty of all Gods people. They are to arise and go and preach the preaching which God bids.
1. We are to arise and go. Here at once activity is demanded at our hand. There must be no lethargy and no lukewarmness.
2. Besides showing activity, the Church is to be aggressive. Jonah was to go away into the haunts of wickedness, and there to scatter in the midst of those people the warnings of Almighty God. So we are to go unto the dark places, and carry that light which God has communicated to man.
3. The Church is to be as the salt of the earth. What does that involve? That it is to influence everything that it touches. And how many are the stimulants to urge us to this active, aggressive work! And observe that we are to preach the preaching that God bids. The preaching must be only what God wants. There must be no addition on our part, no fancies or imaginations of our own. Three parts in preaching.
(1) A warning to the people.
(2) We are affectionately to expostulate.
(3) We must speak the language of comfort and encouragement. (Canon Hussey.)
Christian enterprise
This is an age of enterprise. The world is more active and energetic than ever before. Gigantic schemes, of which the world scarcely dreamed in days gone by, are being hourly put into practical effect. This spirit also pervades the Church of Christ.
I. Christian enterprise is Divinely commanded. Arise and go is the Divine command to every church, to every society, to every Christian to-day.
II. The object of Christian enterprise. It is included in Gods command to Jonah, Arise, go . . . and preach . . . that I bid thee. The work of the Church is to preach, to proclaim what God commands it–all the word of God. Nothing can be accomplished without time, trouble, expense, and labour.
III. The effect of Christian enterprise.
1. It had its proper effect upon the people toward whom it was directed. They believed God, they repented in sackcloth and in ashes.
2. It received the approval of God. God was pleased with Jonah and with the people. He heard their cry of repentance. (S. H. Doyle.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
CHAPTER III
Jonah is sent again to Nineveh, a city of three days’ journey,
(being sixty miles in circumference, according to Diodorus
Siculus,) 1-4.
The inhabitants, in consequence of the prophet’s preaching,
repent in dust and ashes, 5-9.
God, seeing that they were deeply humbled on account of their
sins, and that they turned away from all their iniquities,
repents of the evil with which he had threatened them, 10.
NOTES ON CHAP. III
Verse 1. And the word of the Lord] The same oracle as that before given; and which, from what he had felt and seen of the justice and mercy of the Lord, he was now prepared to obey.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
And, after that Jonah had been well disciplined for his contumacy, and was set at liberty,
the word of the Lord came; the command, or the prophetic Spirit: see Joh 1:1.
The second time; the first time Jonah rebels against the command, now, better prepared and humbled, he is tried again, God doth give him the gift of prophecy, and by that signifies his reconciliation to him, and admits him into his old station.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time,…. Jonah having been scourged by the Lord for his stubbornness and disobedience, and being humbled under the mighty hand of God, is tried a second time, whether he would go on the Lord’s errand, and do his business; and his commission is renewed, as it was necessary it should; for it would have been unsafe and dangerous for him to have proceeded upon the former without a fresh warrant; as the Israelites, when they refused entering into the land of Canaan to possess it, upon the report of the spies, and afterwards reflecting upon their sin, would go up without the word of the Lord, and contrary to the advice of Moses, many of them perished in the attempt, being cut off by the Amalekites,
Nu 14:1; and this renewal of Jonah’s commission shows that he was still continued in his office as a prophet, notwithstanding his failings; as the apostles were in theirs, though they all forsook Christ, and Peter denied him, Mt 26:56; and that the Lord had heard his prayer, and graciously received him, and took away his iniquity from him, employing him again in his service, being more fitted for it:
saying; as follows:
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
The word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, to go to Nineveh and proclaim to that city what Jehovah would say to him. : that which is called out, the proclamation, (lxx). Jonah now obeyed the word of Jehovah. But Nineveh was a great city to God ( le’lohm ), i.e., it was regarded by God as a great city. This remark points to the motive for sparing it (cf. Jon 4:11), in case its inhabitants hearkened to the word of God. Its greatness amounted to “a three days’ walk.” This is usually supposed to refer to the circumference of the city, by which the size of a city is generally determined. But the statement in Jon 3:4, that “Jonah began to enter into the city the walk of a day,” i.e., a day’s journey, is apparently at variance with this. Hence Hitzig has come to the conclusion that the diameter or length of the city is intended, and that, as the walk of a day in Jon 3:4 evidently points to the walk of three days in Jon 3:3, the latter must also be understood as referring to the length of Nineveh. But according to Diod. ii. 3 the length of the city was 150 stadia, and Herodotus (v. 53) gives just this number of stadia as a day’s journey. Hence Jonah would not have commenced his preaching till he had reached the opposite end of the city. This line of argument, the intention of which is to prove the absurdity of the narrative, is based upon the perfectly arbitrary assumption that Jonah went through the entire length of the city in a straight line, which is neither probable in itself, nor implied in . This simply means to enter, or go into the city, and says nothing about the direction of the course he took within the city. But in a city, the diameter of which was 150 stadia, and the circumference 480 stadia, one might easily walk for a whole day without reaching the other end, by winding about from one street into another. And Jonah would have to do this to find a suitable place for his preaching, since we are not warranted in assuming that it lay exactly in the geographical centre, or at the end of the street which led from the gate into the city. But if Jonah wandered about in different directions, as Theodoret says, “not going straight through the city, but strolling through market-places, streets, etc.,” the distance of a day’s journey over which he travelled must not be understood as relating to the diameter or length of the city; so that the objection to the general opinion, that the three days’ journey given as the size of the city refers to the circumference, entirely falls to the ground. Moreover, Hitzig has quite overlooked the word in his argument. The text does not affirm that Jonah went a day’s journey into the city, but that he “began to go into the city a day’s journey, and cried out.” These words do not affirm that he did not begin to preach till after he had gone a whole day’s journey, but simply that he had commenced his day’s journey in the city when he found a suitable place and a fitting opportunity for his proclamation. They leave the distance that he had really gone, when he began his preaching, quite indefinite; and by no means necessitate the assumption that he only began to preach in the evening, after his day’s journey was ended. All that they distinctly affirm is, that he did not preach directly he entered the city, but only after he had commenced a day’s journey, that is to say, had gone some distance into the city. And this is in perfect harmony with all that we know about the size of Nineveh at that time. The circumference of the great city Nineveh, or the length of the boundaries of the city of Nineveh in the broadest sense, was, as Niebuhr says (p. 277), “nearly ninety English miles, not reckoning the smaller windings of the boundary; and this would be just three days’ travelling for a good walker on a long journey.” “Jonah,” he continues, “begins to go a day’s journey into the city, then preaches, and the preaching reaches the ears of the king (cf. Jon 3:6). He therefore came very near to the citadel as he went along on his first day’s journey. At that time the citadel was probably in Nimrud ( Calah). Jonah, who would hardly have travelled through the desert, went by what is now the ordinary caravan road past Amida, and therefore entered the city at Nineveh. And it was on the road from Nineveh to Calah, not far off the city, possibly in the city itself, that he preached. Now the distance between Calah and Nineveh (not reckoning either city), measured in a straight line upon the map, is 18 1/2 English miles.” If, then, we add to this, (1) that the road from Nineveh to Calah or Nimrud hardly ran in a perfectly straight line, and therefore would be really longer than the exact distance between the two parts of the city according to the map, and (2) that Jonah had first of all to go through Nineveh, and possibly into Calah, he may very well have walked twenty English miles, or a short day’s journey, before he preached. The main point of his preaching is all that is given, viz., the threat that Nineveh would be destroyed, which was the point of chief importance, so far as the object of the book was concerned, and which Jonah of course explained by denouncing the sins and vices of the city. The threat ran thus: “Yet forty days, and Nineveh will be destroyed.” , lit., overturned, i.e., destroyed from the very foundations, is the word applied to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. The respite granted is fixed at forty days, according to the number which, even as early as the flood, was taken as the measure for determining the delaying of visitations of God.
(Note: The lxx, however, , probably from a peculiar and arbitrary combination, and not merely from an early error of the pen. The other Greek translators (Aquil., Symm., and Theodot.) had, according to Theodoret, the number forty; and so also had the Syriac.)
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| Jonah’s Mission Renewed; The Prophet’s Mission to Nineveh. | B. C. 840. |
1 And the word of the LORD came unto Jonah the second time, saying, 2 Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee. 3 So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the LORD. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days’ journey. 4 And Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
We have here a further evidence of the reconciliation between God and Jonah, and that it was a thorough reconciliation, though the controversy between them had run high.
I. Jonah’s commission is renewed and readily obeyed.
1. By this it appears that God was perfectly reconciled to Jonah, that he employed him again in his service; and the commission anew given him was an evidence of the remission of his former disobedience. Among men, it has been justly pleaded that the giving of a commission to a criminal convicted is equivalent to a pardon, so it was to Jonah. The word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time (v. 1); for, 1. Jonah must be tried, whether he do indeed repent of his former disobedience or no, and whether he have gotten the good designed him both by his strange punishment an by his strange deliverance. He had deserted his work and duty, and had been under arrest for it, had received a sentence of death within himself; but, upon his submission, God had released him, had given him his life, had given him his liberty; but it is upon his good behaviour that he is released, and he must again be put upon the trial whether he will follow the will of God or his own will. After he has been thrown into the sea, and thrown out of it again, God comes and asks him, “Jonah, wilt thou go to Nineveh now?” For when God judges he will overcome, he will gain his point; he will bring the disobedient stubborn child to his foot at last. Note, When God has afflicted us, and delivered us out of affliction, we must hear his voice, saying to us, Now return to the duties which before you neglected, and which by these providences you are called to. God now said, in effect, to Jonah, as Christ said to the impotent man, when he had healed him, “Now go and sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee (John v. 14), a worse thing than lying three days and three nights in the whale’s belly.” God looks upon men, when he has afflicted them and has delivered them out of their affliction, to see whether they will mend of that fault, particularly, for which they were corrected; and therefore in that thing we are concerned to see to it that we receive not the grace of God in vain, neither in the correction nor in the deliverance, for both are designed to be means of grace. (2.) Jonah shall be trusted, in token of God’s favour to him. God might justly have said concerning Jonah, as we should concerning one that had cheated us and dealt treacherously with us, that though we would not proceed to the rigour of the law against him, nor ruin him, yet we would never again repose a confidence in him; justly might the Spirit of prophecy, which Jonah had resisted and rebelled against, depart from him, with a resolution never to return to him any more. One would have expected that though his life was spared, yet he would be laid under a disability and incapacity ever to serve the government again in the character of a prophet. But, behold! the word of the Lord comes to him again, to show that when God forgives he forgets, and whom he forgives he gives a new heart and a new spirit to; he receives those into his family again, and restores them to their former estate, that had been prodigal children and disobedient servants. Note, God’s making use of us is the best evidence of his being at peace with us. Hereby it will appear that our sins are pardoned, and we have the good-will of God towards us; does his good word come unto us, and do we experience his good work in us! if so, we have reason to admire the riches of free grace and to own our obligations to the Lord Jesus, who received gifts for men, yea, even for the rebellious also, that the Lord God might dwell even among them, and employ them in his word, Ps. lxviii. 18.
2. By this it appears that Jonah was well reconciled to God, that he was not now, as he had been before, disobedient to the heavenly vision, did not flee from the presence of the Lord, as he had done. He neither endeavored to avoid hearing the command, nor did he decline obeying it; he made no objections, as he had done, that the journey was long, the errand invidious, the delivery of it perilous, and, if the threatened judgment did come, he should be reproached as a false prophet, and the impenitence of his own nation would be upbraided, which he had objected, ch. iv. 2. But now, without murmuring and disputing, Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord, v. 3. See here, (1.) The nature of repentance; it is the change of our mind and way, and a return to our work and duty, from which we had turned aside; it is doing that good which we had left undone. (2.) The benefit of affliction; it reduces those to their place that had deserted it. Jonah might truly say with David, “Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now have I kept thy word; and therefore, though it was dreadful, though it was painful to me, and for the present not joyous, but grievous, yet it was good, very good, for me, that I was afflicted.” (3.) See the power of divine grace working with affliction, for otherwise affliction of itself would rather drive men from God than bring them to him; but God by his grace can turn the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, and make those willing in the day of his power, freely willing to come under his yoke, whose neck had been as an iron sinew. (4.) See the duty of all those to whom the word of the Lord comes; they must in all points conform themselves to it, and yield a cheerful faithful obedience to the orders God gives them. Jonah arose, and did not sit still in sloth or sullenness; he went directly to Nineveh, though it was a great way off, and a place where, it is likely, he never was before; yet thither he took his journey, according to the word of the Lord. God’s servants must go where he sends them, come when he calls them, and do what he bids them; whatever appears to be the word of the Lord we must conscientiously do according to it.
II. Let us now see what was the command or commission given him, and what he did in prosecution of it.
1. He was sent as a herald at arms, in the name of the God of heaven, to proclaim war with Nineveh (v. 2): “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city,” that metropolis, and preach unto it, preach against it, so the Chaldee. What is against us is preached to us, that we may hear it and take warning; and what is preached to us, if we do not give ear to it, and mix faith with it, will prove to be against us. Jonah is sent to Nineveh, which was at this time the chief city of the Gentile world, as an indication of God’s gracious intentions in process of time to make the light of divine revelation to shine in those dark regions. God knew that if Sodom and Gomorrah, Tyre and Sidon, had had the means of grace, they would have repented, and yet he denied them those means, Mat 11:21; Mat 11:23. He knew that if Nineveh had now the means of grace they would repent, and he gave them those means, sent Jonah, though not to preach repentance to them expressly (for we find not that he had that in his commission), yet to preach them to repentance, for that was the happy effect of what he had in commission. If God thus in dispensing his favours, in giving the means of grace to some places and not to others, and the spirit of grace to some persons and not to others, acts by prerogative and in a way of sovereignty, who may say unto him, What doest thou? May he not do what he will with his own? He is debtor to no man. Go, and preach (says God) the preaching that I bid thee. That is, (1.) “The preaching that I did bid thee when I first ordered thee to go thither (ch. i. 2); go, and cry against it; denounce divine judgments against it; tell the men of Nineveh that their wickedness has come up to God, and God’s vengeance is coming down upon them.” This was the message Jonah was then very loth to deliver, and therefore flew off and went to Tarshish; but, when he is brought to it the second time, God does not at all alter the message, to gratify him, or make it the more passable with him; no, he must now preach the very same that he was then ordered to preach and would not. Note, The word of God is an unalterable thing, and will not be made to bend to the humours either of its preachers or of its hearers; it shall never comply with their humours and fancies, but they must comply with its truths and laws. See Jer. xv. 19. Let them return unto thee, but return not thou unto them. Or, (2.) “The preaching that I shall bid thee when thou comest thither.” This was an encouragement to him in his undertaking, that God would go along with him, that the Spirit of prophecy should abide upon him, and be ready to him, when he was at Nineveh, to give him all the further instructions that were needed for him. This intimated that he should hear from him again, which would be his great support in this hazardous expedition; as, when God sent Abraham to offer up Isaac, he gave him a similar intimation, by telling him he must do it upon one of the mountains which he would afterwards direct him to. The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord; he leads his people step by step, and so he expects they should follow him. Jonah must go with an implicit faith. Though he knows whither he goes, he shall not know, till he come thither, what message he must deliver, but, whatever it is, he must deliver it, be it pleasing or displeasing. Thus God will keep us in a continual dependence upon himself, and the directions of his word and providence. What he does, and what he will have us do, we know not now, but we shall know hereafter. Admirals, sometimes, when they are sent abroad, are not to open their commission till they have got so many leagues off at sea; so Jonah must go to Nineveh, and, when he comes there, shall be told what to say.
III. He faithfully and boldly delivered his errand. When he came to Nineveh he found his diocese large; it was an exceedingly great city of three days’ journey (v. 3); a city great to God, so the Hebrew phrase is, meaning no more than as we render it, exceedingly great; this honour that language does to the great God that great things derive their denomination from him. The greatness of Nineveh consisted chiefly in the extent of it; it was much larger than Babylon, such a city, says Diodorus Siculus, as no man ever after built. It was 150 furlongs long and 90 broad, and 480 in compass; the walls 100 feet high, and so thick that three chariots might go a-breast upon them; on them were 1500 towers, each of them 200 feet high. It is here said to be of three days’ journey; for the compass of the walls, as some relate, was 480 furlongs, which, allowing eight furlongs to a mile, makes sixty miles, which may well be reckoned three days’ journey for a footman, twenty miles a day. Or, walking slowly and gravely as Jonah must when he went about preaching, it would take him up at least three days to go through all the principal streets and lanes of the city, to proclaim his message, that all might have notice of it. When he came thither he lost no time; he did not come to look about him, but applied closely to his work; and, when he began to enter into the city, he did not retire into an inn, to refresh himself after his journey, but opened his commission immediately, according to his instructions, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown. This, no doubt, he had particular warrant and direction to say; whether he enlarged upon this text, as is most probable, showing them the controversy God had with them, and how provoking their wickedness was, and what reason they had to expect destruction and give credit to this warning, or whether he only repeated those words again and again, is not certain, but this was the purport of his message. 1. He must tell them that this great city shall be overthrown; he meant, and they understood him, that it should be overthrown, not by war, but by some immediate stroke from heaven, either by an earthquake or by fire and brimstone as Sodom was. The wickedness of cities ripens them for destruction, and their wealth and greatness cannot protect them from destruction when the measure of their iniquity is full and the measure of their vengeance has come. Great cities are easily overthrown when the great God comes to reckon with them. 2. He must tell them that it shall shortly be overthrown, at the end of forty days. It has a reprieve granted. So long God will wait to see if, upon this alarm given, they will humble themselves and amend their doings, and so prevent the ruin threatened. See how slow God is to wrath; though Nineveh’s wickedness cried for vengeance, yet it shall be spared for forty days, that it may have space to repent and meet God in the way of his judgments. But he will wait no longer; if in that time they turn not, they shall know that he has whet his sword, and made it ready. Forty days is a long time for a righteous God to defer his judgments, yet it is but a little time for an unrighteous people to repent and reform in, and so turn away the judgments coming. The fixing of the day thus, with all possible assurance, would help to convince them that it was a message from God, for no man durst be so positive in fixing a time, however he might prognosticate the thing itself; it would also startle them into preparation for it. It may justly awaken secure sinners by a sincere conversion to prevent their own ruin when they see they have but a little time to turn in. And should it not awaken us to get ready for death, to consider that the thing itself is certain, and the time fixed in the counsel of God, but that we are kept in the dark and uncertainty about it in order that we may be always ready? We cannot be so sure that we shall live forty days as Nineveh now was that it should stand forty days; nay, I think it is more probable that we shall die within thirty or forty days than we should live thirty or forty years; and so many years in the day of our security we are apt to promise ourselves.
| Fleres, si scires unum tua tempora mensem; Rides, cum non sit forsitan una dies. |
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| We should be alarmed if we were sure not to live a month, and yet we are careless, though we are not sure to live a day. |
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
JONAH – CHAPTER 3
JONAH’S RECOMMISSION TO NINEVEH
Verses 1-10:
Jonah’s Run For God
Verse 1 certifies for a second time that this book and message is of and from the Lord, directed to Jon 1:1-2; Heb 1:1; 2Pe 1:21. Our Lord recognized Jonah, his call, his experiences, and sanctioned his writings, Mat 12:39-41.
Verse 2 calls upon Jonah to “arise”, suggesting that he may have gone to his home in Gath-hepher, his birth place, or up to Jerusalem to offer thanksgiving and pay his vows before going on to Nineveh, Jon 2:9. He was again directed to go to Nineveh, as in Jon 1:2. His first commission was “to cry against it;” now he is directed to preach or proclaim unto it, perhaps anticipating God’s showing mercy to Nineveh, as He had to Jonah, on the basis of their repentance. He was simply to do what God told him to do, Joh 2:5; Jas 1:22. Here, again, Nineveh, one of earth’s most ancient cities, is referred to as that “great city,” for the time, Gen 4:10-12; Jon 1:2; Jon 4:11. As the capitol of Assyria it was great in influence as well as population and standard of living for the day.
Verse 3 recounts that Jonah did then arise, obey, and go to Nineveh, according to, or in harmony with, the mandate of the Lord. Each person (child of God) is wise when he both understands and does the bidding of the Lord for his life, Eph 5:18; Luk 6:46; Mat 7:21; Pro 3:5-6; Jas 1:22. Nineveh is said, by historians, to have been about 60 miles in circumference, or 20 miles in diameter, much larger than the city of Babylon, Jon 4:11. It had more than 120,000 people so ignorant, or children or mentally incompetent, that they could not discern from their left hand to their right hand. With the mature or competent it was estimated to have had near one million residents at that time, Jews used superlatives, in terms like “mountains of God,” or “cedars of God,” etc. ‘
Verse 4 explains Jonah’s first day of entrance into the city as that of a day’s journey, crossing the city, proclaiming his message as he went, until he reached the east side perhaps opposite from where he had entered, Jon 4:5. His doleful cry as an herald as he went was, “yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown,” apparently an object of his delight, Yet, he also called them to repentance, before the forty days elapsed, and the City was destroyed like Sodom, Gen 19:25; Isa 1:7; Luk 11:30-32; Luk 13:3; Act 17:30.
Verse 5 reports three responses from Jonah’s preaching the message of God: 1) First, they simply believed in God, took Him at His word, as every person should, Hab 2:4; Rom 4:3; Rom 4:5; Joh 8:24; Act 17:30-31; Act 17:2) Second, they announced a fast, as an act of deprivation to show their sincerity in all that they were about to do, and, 3) Third, they put on sackcloth, from youth to old age, as an oriental expression of humiliation, as Ahab had done, bringing a respite or delay of judgment, 1Ki 21:17; 1Ki 20:31-32; Joe 1:13.
Verse 6 relates that even the king of Nineveh heard the Divine call to repentance, descended his throne, lay aside his royal robe, put on sackcloth, and sat in ashes, as an expression of earnest humility, repentance, and sincere subjection to the God of the universe. His costly robes and his royal throne could not bear the judgment of Israel’s God, unless he repented, which he wisely joined the people of Nineveh in doing, for which he will be commended in the day of judgment, Luk 11:30-32. See also Job 2:8; Job 42:6; Eze 27:30; Jer 6:26; Lam 3:29; Mic 1:10.
Verse 7 relates that the king, having heard Jonah’s message from God, believed and responded to it by ordering his deputynobles to cause it to be proclaimed or decreed, throughout all Nineveh, that neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, should taste food or drink water, be fed or watered, from that moment, until God showed and assured mercy. Brute creatures are sharers of the effect of man’s sins, as reflected, Jon 4:11; Rom 8:20; Rom 8:22; yet his tender mercies are also over all his works, as He sustains and preserves all His works, in the province of His will and purpose, Psa 36:6; Psa 145:9; Act 17:27-28.
Verse 8 calls upon man and beast to be covered with sackcloth, a dull, coarse cloth, and ashes, and to cry mightily unto (into) the hands of the Lord, Rom 10:13; Each is charged by the king to acknowledge his sin, repent, or turn from his evil way, and from violence that was in their hand to do, in their vocation of life. Perhaps never an earthly king made a stronger call for his people to repent than did this unnamed king of Nineveh who shall be rewarded in the hour of judgment; For prayer without a change of life is a mockery, see? Isa 58:6; Nah 3:1; Mat 3:8.
Verse 9 raises hope that by repentance, confession, and recommitment to a moral and ethical standard of conduct they may find pardon and mercy instead of death and destruction from God, Job 33:27; Jer 31:18. This indicates that even men, who have long worshipped dumb and lifeless idols, may hear and recognize the voice of God through the witnessing of those He sends to them, see? Joh 20:21; Act 1:8; Joe 2:14; Zec 8;14, 15; Isa 55:10-11; See also Psa 115:4-9; Psa 145:18-19; 1Co 12:2; Gal 4:8; 1Th 1:9.
Verse 10 announces that God was looking on and saw their works, outward and inward expressions of regret, remorse, genuine repentance, and resolution to reform their lives, a thing he sought and did not find in Sodom and Gomorrah, Gen 18:25-33; ch. 19; Job 33:27-28; Luk 11:32. God will in no wise cast out or away any earnest penitent who comes to Him for salvation or pardon in this life. He will also use them thereafter, if they are willing as He did Moses, David, Peter, the Samaritan woman and the former mentally deranged Mary Magdalene, Joh 6:37; Mar 16:9; Psa 145:18-19.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
There is here set before us a remarkable proof of God’s grace, — that he was pleased to bestow on Jonah his former dignity and honor. He was indeed unworthy of the common light, but God not only restored him to life, but favored him again with the office and honor of a prophet. This, as I have said, Jonah obtained through the wonderful and singular favor of God. As he had previously fled, and by disobedience deprived himself in a manner of all God’s favor, the recovery of his prophetic office was certainly not obtained through his own merit.
It must, in the first place, be observed, that this phrase, The word of Jehovah came the second time, ought to be noticed; for the word of God comes to men in different ways. God indeed addresses each of us individually; but he spoke to his Prophets in a special manner; for he designed them to be witnesses and heralds of his will. Hence, whenever God sets a man in some peculiar office, his word is said to come to him: as the word of God is addressed to magistrates because they are commanded to exercise the power committed to them; so also the word of God ever came to the Prophets, because it was not lawful for them to thrust in themselves without being called.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
JONAHS GOSPEL
Jon 2:10 to Jon 3:10
THE last we heard of Jonah was voiced in his wonderful speech made in the belly of the fish while in the bowels of the deep, Salvation is of the Lord. Whether Jonah anticipated that God was so soon to save him out of his perils we may not affirm; but the fact remains that the very next reading is, And the Lord spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land (Jon 2:10).
We believe what is written. No matter how much of quibble a man might make concerning the unlikelihood of such a thing, faith accepts the historicity of this text,And the Lord spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land. To be sure if a man is bent on criticism he could raise a number of questions here. He could ask why a great fish came so near to the shore, since that is not the habit of these monsters; and he could ask how it happened that the fish threw Jonah out on the dry land instead of in water over his head. But the sufficient answer is, The Lord who prepared the fish to swallow up Jonah was still in control of the monster when he threw him up. As one listens to the criticisms of this and other Books of the Bible it gives occasion at least to think upon an illustration employed a while ago by Russell Conwell.
He told the story of a man in Kentucky who lived in the region of the Mammoth Cave. Across the fields of this prosperous farmer there ran a beautiful stream. It quenched his thirst, irrigated his farm and turned his mill, but he was ill-content and decided to have a well dug hard by his door; and at once he was blasting, blasting, blasting; down, down, down and deeper still. At last he put in an overcharge of dynamite which blew the bottom out of the well, for it was a cavernous region, and all the water ran now into the depths below. In a little while the brook began to dry up, and it was found that it seeped through crevices in the rocks into this same bottomless well, and lo, the farm was ruined, its land parched, its mill was motionless, and its owner without water to slake his thirst.
Conwell saw, in this, a picture of those students of the Bible who, instead of drinking therefrom, having their lives irrigated thereby, and all the wheels of human energy turning under the power of the same, go at the Word with pick and dynamite, and dig after Hebrew and Greek roots, and blast in the hope of uncovering its origin, until they have lost the very blessing they once enjoyed.
For my own part I am content with the stream of life flowing through the Book of Jonah; life-giving, rising from beneath the everlasting throne.
Four truths in this third chapter are worthy of attention:
JONAH IS RE-APPOINTED
And the Word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time.
There is such a thing as a Divine appointment to preach. In the Old Testament every Prophet claimed that appointment. In the New Testament every preacher had his commission from Christ. Even the Apostle Paul, entering into the ministry after Christs ascension, stoutly affirmed that he had seen the Risen Christ and received from Him his commission to preach. This record of the Acts, he reaffirmed in his Epistles to the Churches, saying to the Romans, Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an Apostle, separated unto the Gospel of God; to the Corinthians, I am, Paul, called to be an Apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God; to the Galatians, Paul, an Apostle, (not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, and so on!
Men who are to preach the Gospel today can only hope for success in the same by being sure that the Word of the Lord has come to them in a call to preach.
Pastor Stalker says that the soul-winner must be conscious that he is doing Gods work and that it is Gods message that he bears to men.
Unless a man has that conviction there will come to him trials that will take away his foundations; there will come to him such evidences of non-appreciation and ingratitude, and even malignant opposition as will raise in his mind the question, Are men worth ones devotion? Unless he can fall back upon the plain command of God, unless he can find in his own heart an abiding conviction that he must do what he is doing, and say what he is saying, and that God can no more leave his labors unblessed than God Himself can lie, he is unfitted to preach.
I have had people ask me why I entered the ministry, and my answer has been The Word of the Lord came unto me saying, Go and preach the preaching that I bid thee; and in the midst of every temptation, and in the experience of every trial known these fifty years past, the plain consciousness of a call from God has been to me at once foundation and inspirationstanding-ground and secret of strength.
Our chapter also suggests that mans indisposition to preach does not rid him of obligation.
And the Word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time.
God had called Jonah before he ever shipped to Tarshish, but Jonah was unwilling and thought to make an end of the Divine command by refusing obedience to the same, Jonah is not alone in this. There are many men in the ministry who ought to be pleading law, practicing medicine, running a grocery, shaving the faces of their fellows, or plowing corn. They have put themselves in their places, or been put there by over-pious parents. It is quite impossible for one to believe that God has picked out all the preachers who are now filling pulpits. The old farmer had the right of it, whose ambitious boy reported to him that he was going to preach; and when the father asked why he thought he was called to preach, the young man pointed to Mar 16:15, Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature. To which John Ploughman replied, Oh, yes, my boy, the Scripture do say, Preach the Gospel to every crittur; but it dont say Every critter shall preach the Gospel.
While there are men in the ministry who ought to be in other professions, there are men out of the ministry, not a few of them, who well know that God has called them to preach. But, like Jonah, they did not want to do it. They were ambitious for a higher station than the ministry might bring them, for more money than is promised in a ministerial salary, or for more worldly living than is consonant with one who is under command from the Lord.
Fifty years ago I sat on the porch of a country home and talked with a young man, who was on his vacation from college, about this call to the ministry. After we had retired he communicated to me his own conviction of a call to preach and his deliberate purpose not to do it. As I tried to show him the folly of fighting against God, he desperately replied, God gives me no peace about this thing and sometimes I think if I dont preach He will never permit me to enter Heaven. But I am determined to practice law even though it results in sending my soul to perdition. He went on in the practice of law; he lost his faith, drank, gambled, and in his dealing with men was generally regarded as a rascal; finally landed in an insane asylum.
Mr. Moody said, If God should offer me whatever I willed, it would not take me a minute to say, Lord, I dont will anything; but Thy will be done, for I know Thy will for me is best.
Do you know that, my brother? Do you, my sister? Are you ready now to say, Oh, God, show me the way of life that I may walk in it?
It is written to the eternal credit of Jonah, So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the Word of the Lord.
A second truth!
JONAH PREACHED IMPENDING JUDGMENT
Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days journey.
And Jonah began to enter into the city a days journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown (Jon 3:3-4).
His message was not man-made.
He cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
That was exactly what God had commissioned Him to say. The only ministry that is true is that of the preacher who is preaching according to the Word of the Lord; who is preaching the preaching that God has bidden him preach. A minister is a messenger, As it is written in the Prophets, Behold, I will send My messenger before Thy face. What is the business of a messenger?
One came to my house the other night and brought a message. It was a sad message; it was a message that I would much have preferred not to hear. It contained the announcement of the death of one of my dearest friends, of one of the Lords most efficient servants. But I knew the messenger-boy was not responsible. He had merely performed his part of medium in bringing it to me. He had changed it in nowise, but delivered it just as he received it; and that is the business of every minister. It is ours to carry to men what God has said.
There are two ways of receiving this message; the one is to hold the messenger responsible for it, and if it does not suit you, behead him. That is the way Herodias did with John the Baptist, Gods messenger, who brought to her Gods Word regarding chastity.
The other way to receive it is illustrated in the life of the old Prophet Eli, who, you remember, called young Samuel into his presence and said, Samuel, my son, * * What is the thing that the Lord hath said unto thee? I pray thee hide it not from me. When Samuel told him all that God had said regarding him, how he was going to come against the Prophet in judgment, to perform against Eli all the things which had been spoken concerning his house, how God declared that when He began a judgment He would make an end, Eli answered, It is the Lord.
That is the better way to treat Gods messenger. That is the better way to receive Gods message. The most unwelcome message may be the most needful one; and, if it comes from God, it is the most needful one.
You have a right to quarrel with a minister who brings you a man-made gospel, but you have no right to object to his message, however unwelcome it may be, however deeply it may wound your pride, however clearly it may uncover your evil purposes, however severely it may condemn your evil practices, if it is according to the Word of the Lord.
In one of my former pastorates there was an exceptionally sweet woman whose husband owned and operated a saloon. Many a time she sat through an arraignment of the bad business, and the preacher sympathized with her unfortunate station, and sorrowed to speak the words that he knew must wound. But one day she gave indisputable proof of her Christianity. At the close of a sermon in which Gods woe to the man who put the bottle to his neighbors lips had been urged, she sought me out and said, Pastor, you can hardly understand the shame I feel whenever this subject of the saloon is mentioned, but I want you to know that however much I may suffer, I would not have you change or curtail what God has said.
Jonahs message gave no promise of mercy.
Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown. There are those to whom a preacher has no right to present mercy. They are subjects for justice. They have so long rejected God; they have gone so deeply into iniquity that justice is the very Gospel to be preached to them. I have met men, ere now, who had been Gospel-hardened by hearing of Gods love and Gods grace. Universalism is the natural outcome of such one-sided preaching, and even the vilest sinner comes to feel that his conduct is no occasion of fear.
The longer I live the more I am impressed with the necessity of presenting judgment. Since I came to this pulpit there have been two or three tragic instances of men listening to the Gospel of mercy in this very room, and going out feeling God is good and He will forbear yet a little, and, ere they dreamed it, death was doing its work and they were being dragged by his merciless hand before the Judge of all the earth; and as I have thought upon their going, unprepared, as some of them have been, I have felt that it was my business to preach judgment as well as mercy. I think there are some men who must come to Sinai and hear the thunderings and threatenings thereof before they will ever see the necessity of Calvary.
At one time when Mr. Moody was holding a meeting in New York he found in the inquiry room a personal worker pleading with a skeptic, and as Mr. Moody stopped and listened to the proud defiance of this man, and read in his face the evident pleasure he was getting from the argument, Moody said to the worker, If that is the way he feels, dont waste your time on him. There is no hope for him. Instantly the skeptic was alarmed and said, Do you really think there is no hope for me? None whatever, said Mr. Moody, while you feel that way. The man went to his room, fell down upon his knees and began to plead with God, and ere morning dawned the light of an everlasting day had broken in upon his darkened heart.
NINEVEH REPENTS IN SACKCLOTH
So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.
The whole city was convicted of sin.
We have long talked of Pentecost, and supposed it to have occurred at Jerusalem ten days after our Lords ascension; and we have long held up Peter as the peerless evangelist. But the Pentecost of Acts 2 fades to insignificance before the Pentecost of Jonah 3, and the result of Peters preaching that day was small indeed when compared with the consequences of this days work on the part of this so-called minor Prophet. Three thousand convicted of sin, asking Men and brethren, what shall we do? is a sight to astonish mortals; but six hundred thousand brought to sackcloth and ashes in a single day in consequence of the preaching of one man, is a sight to astonish angels! And yet that is the record, All Nineveh, from the least to the greatest.
It was a walled city sixty miles in circumference. Jonah could just walk across it in a single day. One hundred and fifty stadia, or nineteen miles, was a days journey. One cannot read the words of Jonah in the original, Od arbaim yom venineveh nehpacheth without being reminded of Daniels words, Mene, mene, tekel, upharsin. While Daniels words struck terror to the heart of the king, this single sentence from Jonah alarmed the Ninevites from the greatest of them even unto the least of them.
Repentance reached even to the throne.
For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes.
And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water:
But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God (Jon 3:6-8),
It is a great revival when it reaches even to the throne. There are a great many people in this country discussing the question, How to reach the common people; how to reach the laboring men; how to reach the working girls. That is not the difficult question. It is comparatively easy to reach these. A free church, a cordial reception, and a plain, pungent Gospel will answer that question for these classes. The hard question is, How to reach the self-constituted upper ten.
When Mr. Moody began his work in this country the common people heard him gladly. It took twenty years, however, for him to get any hearing from the educated and wealthy. It was only after he became world-famed that they were interested in him, all of which makes one afraid that the interest was not spiritual but secular instead; the interest of standing alongside of and being associated with a man of a great name.
If there is any one thing we need to pray for in this country it is a revival that shall reach up and bring to humility and repentance the proud, and the scholarly, the queens of fashion and the kings of finance. We ought to pray for such a revival, for the souls of these are precious in the sight of our God, and their sins are the sins of Nineveh: fraud, violence, worldliness in every form. Oh, for a revival that might reach to the kings of finance, and to the queens of fashion!
We are told that when Maud Ballington Booth lectured in one of the popular theaters of Paris, the fashionable habitues of the place went to hear her out of idle curiosity, and she reached their hearts and humbled them to their knees in penitence and prayer. Oh, that we might see it so in our day and in our land!
The genuineness of this repentance is proven by reformation. The kings decree was let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands (Jon 3:8).
Sardanapalus understood that God could not be deceived, that no repentance would be accepted of him, save that which reformed a life. Every now and then people come to me and say with reference to some one who has just confessed Christ, Do you think he is converted? It is not my business to answer that question. Wait a few weeks or months and the individuals themselves will answer that question. If the repentance is genuine, it will manifest itself in reformation. The sinful habits will be given up and the Spirit of God will get right of way in the heart, and by their fruits ye shall know them99,
GOD RESPONDS IN MERCY
And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that He had said that He would do unto them; and He did it not (Jon 3:10).
God is merciful in character.
This heathen king seems to have understood that fact, for when he called upon his people to turn from their evil ways he added, Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from His fierce anger, that we perish not? (Jon 3:9). No man who knows anything of the mighty Jehovah can call in question the mercifulness of His character.
Do you remember in Hugos Les Miserables what he makes the good priest to say? It was a note on the margin of one of Myriels books, Oh, thou who art! Ecclesiastes names Thee Almighty; Maccabees names Thee Creator; the Epistle to the Ephesians names Thee Liberty; Baruch names Thee Immensity; the Psalms name Thee Wisdom and Truth; John names Thee Light; the Book of Kings names Thee Lord; Exodus calls Thee Providence; Leviticus, Holiness; Esdras, Justice; creation calls Thee God; man names Thee Father; but Solomon names Thee Compassion, and that is the most beautiful of all Thy Names.
God is merciful in practice.
Even in the preaching of judgment by Jonah His message was, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown. Why this withholding of judgment for forty days? They were Gods days of grace. They were Ninevehs opportunity for repentance. It was according to Gods practice. Go back, if you will, to that first time when the world was filled with sin in Genesis 6, to that time when the sons of God lusted after the daughters of men, and the Lord said, My Spirit shall not always strive with men. Yet, yet! This same little word yet. Yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.
Gods practice of mercy; even Sodom had her chance of repentance and her preacher of righteousness. But Jesus Christ said of the cities of His time that they had enjoyed better opportunities still, and upon them rested the greater condemnation.
I must remind many of you of my Gods provision for your repentance. Nineveh heard but one Prophet. To how many of Gods prophets have you been privileged to listen? Nineveh was privileged only a single warning; how many hundreds have you known already? Nineveh was proffered forty days in which to get right. Some of you have already wasted twenty, thirty, and even forty years! And yet you feel your lives to be wrong before God. My friend, in the day of judgment what shall you answer for having refused His grace, for having closed your ears to His warning, for having let the time set for repentance pass unimproved?
It is penitence and penitence only that puts one in the way of salvation. Sardanapalus, the king, understood that, and you understand it.
Go over to that fifteenth chapter of Luke and read the parable of the prodigal son, and no matter who you are, you will find your picture there. If you are just starting out to enjoy the world by indulging in its wickedness, you are portrayed by the words, Father, give me the portion * * that falleth to me. If you have been some time in the swirl of iniquity, wasting your substance with riotous living, you are pictured there; if you have spent all and are in want; if you have come even to hunger; if you have gone into the basest employment and unto swinish associations, still you may see yourself in that marvelous parable; and, if tonight you realize your situation; if, like that younger son, you have come to yourself and are thinking upon Gods great bounty; if in your heart you are saying, I will arise and go to my Father, and will say unto Him, Father, I have sinned against Heaven, and before Thee, and am no more worthy to be called Thy son, still you have only to look into this text to see the reflection of your own face; and, if there are those who have the good sense and the courage to resist Satan, and in true purpose turn back to God, then that parable contains a picture, precious above any known to the galleries of earth or ever imagined by the mind of man. It is the picture of the compassionate Father running to meet His unworthy child, falling upon his neck in the fullness of His affection, His heart overflowing in kisses!
And that is the picture I would have you to see God standing ready to receive every repentant one.
Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley
CRITICAL NOTES.]
Jon. 3:2. Arise] J. might not imagine that God would send him again. But he appears to have some settled home, and an interval seems to have elapsed before the second commission, to give time for the report to spread. Preach] Lit. proclaim.
HOMILETICS
JONAH A SIGN TO THE NINEVITES.Chap. Jon. 3:1, and Luk. 11:30
Jonah would obey the second commission with renewed strength and Divine authority. He would appear in Nineveh as a sign, an outward proof of a Divine purpose in his life and work (cf. Luk. 11:30).
I. A sign of Gods mercy towards men. As in a mirror, we see much of God and men, of sin and grace, in the history of Jonah. God proved that he was reconciled.
1. In forgiving sin.
2. In restoring a backslider.
3. In reinstating a runaway prophet. If we abuse the confidence of our fellow-creatures, they seldom forgive and employ us again. But God freely forgives, restores to favour after rebellion, and grants commission to unworthy servants. I have blotted out as a thick cloud thy transgressions, and as a cloud thy sins; return unto me, for I have redeemed thee.
II. A sign of Gods inflexible justice towards men. Gods servant must be punished and corrected. The sincerity of his penitence, and the honour of his God, must be vindicated. Nineveh must be threatened, and her sin forsaken. Pardon gives no licence to disobedience. Neither the righteous nor the wicked can sin with impunity. God will be glorified in the life of his people, and the law magnified in the destiny of nations.
III. A sign of Gods unchangeable purpose towards men. Gods plans are made in wisdom, and must be accomplished. He does not alter them to gratify the whims and caprice of man. He is of one mind, and who can turn him? Nineveh must be warned, and Jonah must go. All pleas and excuses are in vain. God gives to every one his work, and expects him to do it. If he runs away he must be fetched back. Treachery and cowardice God has determined to scourge. He that knoweth his Masters will and doeth it not, shall be beaten with many stripes.
THE SECOND CALL.Jon. 3:1-2
If Jonah doubted whether after sin like his he would ever be restored to favour and service again, he had not long to wait for an answer; for The word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time. This second call was
I. Divinely given. The prophet might be ready, but he had need to be certain that God required him to go. If we are willing, we require instruction in duty. The spring of action is not mere religious feeling, but apprehension of Gods word. Emotion will not ensure consistent life, without faith in Divine truth. God had to speak again. The first verse, says Luther, is therefore written that we may bear in mind that nothing is to be undertaken without Gods word and command. For the first command of God having been violated by disobedience, had not God renewed it, Jonah would not have known whether he should do it or not.
II. Urgent to immediate service. Arise, go, are terms of incitement, and indicate that he was not girded for work, but resting in contentment and ease.
1. The duty was imperative. The more quickly we perform, the better for our souls. Delays are signs of distrust, and impeachment of Divine wisdom. We must prove the sincerity of our profession by prompt obedience. Be ready to every good work.
2. The communication was suspended. The exact message seems not to be given at first. Immediate departure to Nineveh was required, and further revelations were delayed. God thus cultivates the dependence and tries the faith of his servants. His own authority in prescribing duty must be sufficient. His simple word is entitled to respect and compliance. Present duty should be enough for us. God will give enlarged views, greater strength, and more consolation, if we practise what we already know. If any man will do the will of God, he shall know, &c.
III. Specific in directions.
1. The destination was still the same. To Nineveh, that great city. The trial is not abated, the dangers are not hidden. He is again reminded that it was a great, proud, and heathen city, to which he was sent. A city whose inhabitants were pre-eminently wicked and violent, and whom he was to threaten with speedy and complete ruin. But God had given Jonah proofs of his love, and Jonah should give not less evidence of his obedience.
2. The message would be given him. The denunciation that I shall speak to thee. He was not to concern himself about his message and its results. That would be given to him when he was ready for it. He is to add nothing, nor diminish nothing. The Christian minister is not left to his own discretion, nor must he study to gratify the taste of the people. He must preach the Wordthe message from God to himearnestly and faithfully. If he tries to explain away or soften down what is severe to the ungodly, he takes upon himself a double responsibilityresponsibility for the salvation of the souls entrusted to him, and responsibility for his own disobedience. Many may speak to us smooth things, but we must not please men, for how can we then be servants of God? Jonah must be faithful:
(1) In the matter of his preaching. The unwelcome message must be delivered. Nineveh was to be denounced for sin.
(2) In the manner of his preaching. He was to cry. Cry in compassion for perishing men, as a proof of his own sincerity, to rouse a careless and sinful people. Proclaim the preaching that I shall bid thee.
(3) A second call summoned him. Ingratitude and failure had disgraced his conduct. But God had chastised and forgiven him. His experience was a preparation for service. Before we can proclaim mercy to man we must receive it ourselves. Profound repentance and perfect restoration to Divine favour will qualify us for a proper discharge of duty. Repeated acts of grace to us are a ground of hope for others. Severe trials and deep sorrow are often forerunners of great trust and high distinction. Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation, and uphold me with thy free spirit. Then will I teach transgressors thy ways, and sinners shall be converted unto thee.
HOMILETIC HINTS AND OUTLINES
Jon. 3:1. God does not utterly reject him who has failed once; but he rather gives him a new opportunity of correcting former faults [Lange].
The most prominent lesson in this verse is that God gives to men successive opportunities for the accomplishment of their life-work. We are not crushed by the weight of our first sin or failure. If so, few would have anything like hope for the future. Life would be a dreary foreboding, lest any message committed to our care should be neglected, and entail final condemnation. The world would be full of wretched mortals, upon whom would rest the woe of unfulfilled mission [Exell].
Jon. 3:2. Jonah would resume his work with a new obedience.
1. As a sinful man, whose sin had been eminently forgiven. He would accept his mission in a spirit of gratitude, reverence, and submission.
2. As a prayerful man, whose prayer had been eminently answered. Prayer answered was (a) a testimony to him of his sincerity and integrity; (b) It would inspire him with the assurance that he was not returning alonethat he had One who would carry him through all danger, and give him success in his work.
3. As an afflicted man, whose affliction had been eminently blessed. Like the Psalmist, before he was afflicted, he went astray, but was chastened and subdued. He knew the goodness and severity of God, and was fitted to teach them to others [H. Martin].
The preaching. Nothing should be more sacred to the preacher of Gods word than truth, and simplicity, and inviolable sanctity in delivering it [Pusey]. The grand doctrines of the New Testament are eternally fixed. We must preach them, all, faithfully and fully; should we alter, add, or diminish, we do not preach unto the people the preaching which the Lord bids us. If, instead of this, we preach another gospel, we shall bring down upon us a curse and not a blessing [Jones].
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 3
Jon. 3:1-3. This is substantially the same commission, and yet different. The second call to a man is never exactly the same as the first. The third is never a repetition of the second. Another tone is in the voice of the speaker, firmer or milder. Other shades of meaning are in the message. If it is the second time, still more if it is the seventh time, or the seventy-and-seventh time, there will be changes in the message corresponding with changes which time has brought in circumstances and in character. It may seem a refinement, but, properly understood, it is but a simple truth, that he never receives exactly the same command or invitation from God more than once. If slighted once, the season fair can never be renewed [Raleigh].
A great city. Nineveh covered a great extent of ground. Historians say that its walls were 480 stadia, or 60 miles, in circumference. It was great in population. Jonah mentions 120,000 who could not discern between their right hand and their left. It was great in splendour and power. The researches in the mounds have astonished Europe with the barbaric grandeur of the statuary, and the full details of life and history sculptured on marble, or stamped in arrow-headed characters upon the bricks. But it was morally great to God on account of the human souls, and their spiritual condition. In Gods sight, grandeur, territory, and architectural beauty, are nothing to immortal souls, and the influence which they exert. The material worlds, the sun with its satellites, are not so great as a man. Try to realize how great you are in the sight of God.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
GODS MESSENGER RUNNING WITH GODTHE COMMISSION RENEWED
TEXT: Jon. 3:1-3
1
And the word of Jehovah came unto Jonah the second time, saying,
2
Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.
3
So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of Jehovah. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city, of three days journey.
QUERIES
a.
Why was Jonah now ready to go to Nineveh?
b.
What is the meaning of a . . . city of three days journey
PARAPHRASE
And Gods word came to Jonah a second time. God commanded Jonah, Arise and go to Nineveh. I warn you as I did before, Nineveh is a great metropolis, and you are to preach to its inhabitants the message that I alone shall give you to preach. So the converted Jonah arose and journeyed to Nineveh just as the Lord had commanded him. Now Nineveh was such a large metropolis that it would take a man three days to walk all the way across it.
SUMMARY
God gives Jonah another chance to surrender to His will for the prophets life. Jonah obeys.
COMMENT
Jon. 3:1 . . . THE WORD OF JEHOVAH CAME UNTO JONAH THE SECOND TIME . . . Jonah has had a conversion experience! He has been raised to a new life. Physically he had come to the point of no returnexcept by the power of God he had returned! Spiritually he had died to himself and was raised a new spiritual man. John Noble, the American who spent over ten years in Russian prison camps relates a similar conversion experience in his book, I Found God In Soviet Russia.
Mr. Noble, when first imprisoned, was forced to go nine days without even the slightest morsel of food. Here is what he says: With my last strength, I struggled onto my knees and earnestly asked the Lord simply to close my eyes this night and release me from my mortal suffering. I said, in effect, Dear Lord, I give up; I cant go on any longer. I have no way out but through Thee. Lord, close my eyes and take me to Thee, or if it be Thy will that I must go on, give me the strength to do so, and lend me Thy hand to guide me. My will is broken, Thy will be done. Amen. I committed my soul entirely to the hands of the Lord. Unworthy of His grace though I was, I felt prepared to die. This time, I had not prayed that my will be done but that the Lords will be done. I was completely submissive to that will . . . By committing my life to Christ without reservation, I had the amazing experience of being born again of the Spirit . . . It was the most wonderful, miraculous sensation I have ever experienced.
This is somewhat the same experience Jonah describes himself feeling in the belly of the great fish when he had no other place to turn than God. After his experience in the sea, he probably preached like one raised from the dead. Macaulay characterized Demosthenes oratory as reason made red hot by passion. Jonahs was the Word of God made red hot by conversion of the orator, The prophet had died, as it were, and been brought back to life again. It always requires an experience like Jonahs to make a good preacher!
So God called Jonah again to go to Nineveh. God would not suspend His concern for the souls of that great city just because one of His prophets disobeyed. Furthermore Gods mercy and love is long-suffering toward the wayward prophet. God is rich in mercythe riches of His goodness and forbearance and longsuffering . . . leads to repentance (Rom. 2:4) if we will but respond.
Jon. 3:2 . . . PREACH UNTO IT THE PREACHING THAT I BID THEE . . . What was the preaching that God bade Jonah preach? At the first command God told the prophet to preach against that wicked city. His task was to preach against wickedness. Then we learn from Jon. 3:4 that he cried, Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. All this, of course, was to the end that the people would repent. This message of repentance still needs to be preached today. Jesus referred to Jonahs preaching comparing it to His message, for His message was, Repent for the kingdom of God is at hand. Peter on the day of Pentecost preached, Repent and be immersed, everyone of you . . . Paul, to the philosophers of Athens preached, . . . now he commandeth all men everywhere to repent . . . The reason these men preached repentance was they preached . . . the preaching that God bade them preach. This is still good advice for all preachers: preach only that which God commands. Preach His Word, from His Book. We live in an age in which society tends to dictate to the preacher, and social pressures and modern theological trends seek to obscure the propositional revelation of God, His Word, the Bible. Peter wrote, If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God (1Pe. 4:11). Men who do not declare from the pulpit, Thus saith the Lord, are not fit to stand in that sacred spot.
Jon. 3:3 SO JONAH . . . WENT UNTO NINEVEH . . . AN EXCEEDING GREAT CITY, OF THREE DAYS JOURNEY . . . This time Jonah went according to the word of the Lord. There is no running away this time. There is not even any reluctance. He has learned his lesson . . . he has a new heart in the matter . . . he is a new man for God.
Because archeologists have not yet found evidence that Nineveh is as extensive a city as three days journey would seem to indicate, some scholars have accused this book of being historically inaccurate. But must we assume that we know all there is to know about the metropolis of Nineveh and pronounce the book of Jonah irrevocably inaccurate?! There are a number of possible answers to this alleged problem; (a) the statement could refer to the circumference of the city; (b) the statement could mean that journeying leisurely, stopping to preach at likely spots, it would take three days to journey the length or breadth of the city; (c) or, more likely, it could mean that a journey across greater Nineveh, including its suburbs (of which we spoke on Jon. 1:2), would take three days. The city was great, not because it impressed God by its size or fame, but because God was concerned with the many souls in it which were lost and because it would be an almost overwhelming task, in the eyes of Jonah, to preach against it.
QUIZ
1.
How had Jonah changed? What experience had he undergone?
2.
Why did God not cast Jonah off after one disobedience?
3.
What did God bid Jonah preach? Is there a lesson for us in that?
4.
Is the note about a city of three days journey inaccurate?
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
JONAH’S PREACHING AND NINEVEH’S REPENTANCE, Jon 3:1-10.
Jehovah repeats the command to Jonah, to preach to Nineveh (Jon 3:1-2). This time Jonah obeys and delivers the message, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown” (Jon 3:3-4). The preaching results in the conversion of king and people, who give every evidence of heartfelt repentance (Jon 3:5-9); whereupon Jehovah withholds the judgment (Jon 3:10).
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
1-4. The preaching of Jonah. Jon 3:1, is almost identical with Jon 1:1, the only difference being the addition of “the second time” and the omission of “the son of Amittai”; Jon 3:2 a, is identical with Jon 1:2 a; but Jon 3:2 b is different.
Preach The same word as in Jon 1:2, “cry”; “preaching,” derived from the same root, occurs only here in the Old Testament. The message is to be determined by Jehovah.
Jonah has learned a lesson; and, though still rebellious in heart (Jon 4:2), he proceeds immediately to carry out the divine commission. The narrative of Jonah’s preaching is interrupted by a brief description of Nineveh’s greatness (Jon 3:3; compare Jon 4:11).
Was Definitely expressed in Hebrew; may indicate that Nineveh was no longer a “great city,” when the description was written (see p. 335).
An exceeding great city Literally, a city great unto God, that is, great even in the estimation of God (compare Gen 10:9); Kautzsch renders in German “unmenschlich gross” (superhumanly great). Probably an anticipation of Jon 4:11, where the size of the city and the number of the inhabitants are given as a reason for God’s desire to save it.
Three days’ journey It seems more natural to interpret this of the diameter than of the circumference. True, some of the classical writers make it appear that the diameter was only one day’s journey, while the circumference was approximately three days’ journey. But, as Marti suggests, there is no reason why Herodotus and the Book of Jonah should agree on this point; besides, if we should interpret “three days’ journey” of the circumference, and make the diameter only one day’s journey, Jonah must have passed through the entire city before delivering his message, while Jon 3:4 declares that he “began to enter into the city a day’s journey,” which expression certainly presupposes that there was considerable distance to traverse before he could reach the other end (see further on Jon 3:4). It seems best, therefore, to interpret “three days” of the diameter. The extent of the city walls is given by C.H.W. Johns as follows: “The city on the river side of the Tigris extended about two and one half miles; its north wall measured about seven thousand feet, the eastern wall was nearly three miles long, and the southern about one thousand feet. The actual extent of Nineveh proper is about eighteen hundred acres. Outside this citadel city lay the ‘outskirts.’ Farther afield, and apparently close to Khorsabad, lay Rebit Ninua.” The latter is perhaps the Rehoboth-Ir of Gen 10:11. In order to get a city three days in diameter or three days long, it is necessary to include all the cities mentioned in Gen 10:11-12, Rehoboth-Ir, Calah, and Resen, which, though not all identified, must have been in the immediate neighborhood of Nineveh proper. Koenig insists that even this combination would fail to give the required size (see p. 317).
Began to enter into the city a day’s journey A day’s journey is still called a beginning, because two more were beyond. The natural interpretation seems to be that he journeyed one day; then, having found a suitable place, he delivered his message. Others give a different interpretation. “He began to perambulate the city, going hither and thither, as far as was possible in the first day.” While thus going from street to street, and market place to market place, he is thought to have delivered his message again and again. While the former is the more natural interpretation of the Hebrew, the latter has this advantage, that, with it, Jon 3:4 throws no light on the meaning of “three days’ journey” in Jon 3:3. It would be possible, then, to understand the extent indicated of the circumference, which would reduce the size of the city, and thus remove a geographical difficulty.
Yet forty days A very simple message, but one destined to create consternation. Apparently the words of Jonah contained an unconditional announcement of judgment; but later developments showed that it was conditional, that the execution depended upon the people’s attitude toward the prophetic message.
Several modern commentators insert Jon 4:5, after Jon 3:4. Jonah, after having delivered his message, is thought to have left the city to await further developments. Jon 4:5, would make a good continuation of Jon 3:4, but the transposition is not necessary.
Marti’s statement, “Undoubtedly Jonah did not await the coming of the fortieth day in the city, but left the same previously,” is not conclusive.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘And the word of YHWH came to Jonah the second time, saying,’
In the mercy of God Jonah was being given a second chance. God is gracious with His servants. And so ‘the word of YHWH’ came to Jonah a second time.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
A Changed Jonah Obeys God And Goes To Nineveh Proclaiming Its Overthrow Within Forty Days, With The Result That (To Jonah’s Chagrin) Nineveh Repents ( Jon 3:1-10 ).
Jonah was no longer rebellious. He had learned his lesson. So when YHWH came to him again and told him to go to Nineveh to proclaim His word, Jonah did as he was bid. Unlike the seas and the fish he did it by free choice. And the consequence of his preaching was that the people of Nineveh repented deeply, and sought and found mercy from God.
Analysis of Jon 3:1-10 .
a
b So Jonah arose, and went to Nineveh, according to the word of YHWH. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, of three days’ journey, and Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey, and he cried, and said, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh will be overthrown” (Jon 3:3-4).
c And the people of Nineveh believed God, and they proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them (Jon 3:5).
d And the news reached the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and laid his robe from him, and covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes (Jon 3:6).
c And he made proclamation and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, “Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything. Let them not feed, nor drink water, but let them be covered with sackcloth, both man and beast, and let them cry mightily to God, yes, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in his hands” (Jon 3:7-8).
b “Who knows whether God will not turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger, that we perish not?” (Jon 3:9).
a And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way, and God repented of the evil which he said he would do to them; and he did not do it (Jon 3:10).
Note that in ‘a’ Jonah is to preach to Nineveh what YHWH tells him, and in the parallel the Ninevites have listened to what YHWH had said. In ‘b’ he proclaimed that in forty days Nineveh would be overthrown, and in the parallel the hope is that he will show mercy. In ‘c’ the people proclaim a fast and put on sackcloth, and in the parallel they are called on by their king to fast and be covered in sackcloth. Centrally in ‘d’ the king himself covered himself with sackcloth and mourned over his sin.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Jon 3:1-10 Jonah Preaches in Nineveh In Jon 3:1-10 we have the account of Jonah preaching to the people of Nineveh, followed by their response of repentance.
Jon 3:4 And Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
Jon 3:4
Jon 3:5 So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.
Jon 3:5
Jon 3:6 For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes.
Jon 3:7 Jon 3:8 Jon 3:8
Jon 3:10 And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.
Jon 3:10
Jer 18:8, “If that nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them.”
Micah’s prophecy was delivered to Judah and Hezekiah repented, thus turning away divine judgment and the utter destruction of Jerusalem (Jer 26:19).
Jer 26:19 Did Hezekiah king of Judah and all Judah put him at all to death? did he not fear the LORD, and besought the LORD, and the LORD repented him of the evil which he had pronounced against them? Thus might we procure great evil against our souls.
Jon 3:10 Comments – In Rick Joyner’s book The Call he meets Lot in a heavenly vision. Lot then explains that many perished in Sodom and Gomorrah because of Lot’s silence. Lot goes on to explain that he thought that he would be able to just live a godly life in front of these people, thus being enough of a warning of God’s judgment. [17] It is the power of the spoken word that the Holy Spirit uses to convict man of sin. It is not enough just to live different in the midst of an ungodly world. In contrast to Lot, Jonah did lift up his voice and witness to the people of Nineveh. They repented at the preaching of Jonah and God spared their city. Did not our Lord Jesus Christ say that He would have spared Sodom and Gomorrah if they had heard the preaching of the judgment of God? (Mat 11:23-24)
[17] Rick Joyner, The Call (Charlotte, North Carolina: Morning Star Publications, 1999), 42-3.
Mat 11:23-24, “And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hell: for if the mighty works, which have been done in thee, had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I say unto you, That it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment, than for thee.”
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Jonah’s Message to the Ninevites and Its Results.
v. 1. And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, saying, v. 2. Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, v. 3. So Jonah arose and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord, v. 4. And Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey, v. 5. So the people of Nineveh believed God, v. 6. For word came unto the king of Nineveh, v. 7. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, v. 8. but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, v. 9. Who can tell if God will turn and repent, v. 10. And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way,
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
EXPOSITION
Jon 3:1-10
Part III. JONAH‘S PREACHING IN NINEVEH; THE REPENTANCE OF THE NINEVITES.
Jon 3:1-3
1. Jonah is sent a second time to Nineveh, and obeys the command.
Jon 3:1
The second time. He is forgiven and restored to his office, and the commission formerly given is renewed. Commentators have supposed that he went up to Jerusalem to pay his vows, and that the word of the Lord came unto him there. But all unnecessary details are omitted from the account, and we know nothing about this matter. The beginning of the next verse, “arise,” seems to imply that he was then in some settled home, perhaps at Gath-hepher.
Jon 3:2
That great city (see note on Jon 1:2). Preaching; rendered “cry” in Jon 1:2; Septuagint, . This time the proclamation is unto it, as interested in the message, not “against it,” as doomed to destruction (Pusey).
Jon 3:3
Arose, and went. He was now as prompt to obey as formerly to flee. Was; i.e. when Jonah visited it. Nothing can be argued from the past tense here as to the date of the composition of the book. It is a mere historical detail, and cannot be forced into a proof that Jonah wrote after the destruction of Nineveh. An exceeding great city; literally, a city great to God; ; great before Godin his estimation, as though even God must acknowledge it. So Nimrod is called (Gen 10:9) “a mighty hunter before the Lord;” and Moses, in Act 7:20, is said to have been” beautiful to God.” The expression may also mean that God (Elohim, God as Governor of the world) regarded this city with interest, as intended in the Divine counsels to perform an important part. For he is not the God of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles (Rom 3:29). Of three days’ journey; i.e. in circumferenceabout sixty miles (see note on Jon 1:2). Or the writer may mean that it took Jonah three days to visit the various quarters of this huge place. The area of the vast quadrangle containing the remains of the four cities comprised under the name Nineveh is estimated by Professor Rawlinson at two hundred and sixteen square miles. We ought, however, to omit Khorsabad from this computation, as it was not founded till Sargon’s time, B.C. 710.
Jon 3:4
2. Jonah, undeterred by the danger of the enterprise, executes his mission at one, and announces the approaching destruction of the city. Began to enter into the city a day’s journey. Jonah commenced his day’s journey in the city, and, as he found a suitable place, uttered his warning cry, not necessarily continuing in one straight course, but going to the most frequented spots. At the time of Jonah’s preaching the royal residence was probably at Chalah: i.e. Nimrud, the most southern of the cities. Coming from Palestine, he would reach this part first, so that his strange message would soon come to the king’s ears (verse 6). Yet forty days. “Forty” in Scripture is the number of probation (see Gen 7:4, Gen 7:12; Exo 24:18; 1Ki 19:8; Mat 4:2). The LXX. has, , “yet three days” owing probably to some clerical error, as writing instead of . St. Augustine (‘De Civit.,’ 18.44) endeavours to explain the discrepaney mystically as referring to Christ under different circumstances, as being the same who remained forty days on earth after his resurrection, and who rose again on the third day. Shall be overthrown. This is the word used for the destruction of Sodom (Gen 19:25, Gen 19:27; Amo 4:11). The prophet appears to have gone on through the city, repeating this one awful announcement, as we read of fanatics denouncing woe on Jerusalem before its final destruction (Josephus, ‘Bell. Jud.,’ 6.5. 3). The threat was conditional virtually, though expressed in uncompromising terms. In the Hebrew the participle is used, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh overthrown,” as though he saw at the end of the specified time the great city lying in ruins. One sees from Isa 36:11, Isa 36:13, that Jonah could readily be understood by the Assyrians.
Jon 3:5-9
3. The Ninevites hearken to the cry of Jonah, believe in God, and repent.
Jon 3:5
Believed God; believed in God, which implies trust and hope; Vulgate, crediderunt in Deum. They recognized Jonah as God’s messenger; they recognized God’s power as able to execute the threat, and they had confidence in his mercy if they repented. This great result has seemed to some incredible, and has occasioned doubts to be east upon the history. But, as we have seen in the Introduction, Jonah’s mission occurred probably at a time of national depression, when men’s minds were disposed to expect calamity, and anxious to avert it by any means. Other considerations led to the same result. They had heard much of the God of the Hebrews, much of the doings of his great prophets Elijah and Elisha; and now they had in their midst one of these holy men, who, as they were informed, had been miraculously preserved from death in order to carry his message to them; for that it was thus that Jonah was “a sign unto the Ninevites” (Luk 11:30) seems most certain. They saw the Divine inspiration beaming in his look, dictating his utterance, animating his bearing, filling him with courage, confidence, and faith. The credulity with which they received the announcements of their own seers, their national predilection for presages and omens, encouraged them to open their ears to this stranger, and to regard his mission with grave attention. Their own conscience, too, was on the prophet’s side, and assisted his words with its powerful pleading. So they believed in God, and proclaimed a fast. Spontaneously, without any special order from the authorities. Before the final fall of Nineveh, the inscriptions mention, the then king ordered a fast of one hundred days and nights to the gods in order to avert the threatened danger. Put on sackcloth (comp. Gen 37:34; 1Ki 21:27; Joe 1:13). The custom of changing the dress in token of mourning was not confined to the Hebrews (comp. Eze 26:16).
Jon 3:6
For word came; and the matter came; , “the word came near”. The tokens of penitence mentioned in Jon 3:5 were not exhibited in obedience to any royal command. Rather, as the impression made by the prophet spread among the people, and as they adopted these modes of showing their sorrow, the news of the movement reached the king, and he put himself at the head of it. The reigning monarch was probably either Shalmaneser III. or one of the two who succeeded him, Asshur-danil and Asshur-nirari, whose three reigns extended from B.C. 781 to 750. His robe (addereth); the word used for the “Babylonish garment” in Jos 7:21. The magnificence of the Assyrian kings attire is attested by the monuments. Sat in ashes (comp. Job 2:8; Est 4:3).
Jon 3:7
He caused it, etc.; literally, he caused proclamation to be made, and said, i.e. by the heralds. The decree. The word used here (taam) is an Accadian term, which had become naturalized in Assyria, Persia, and Babylonia, and was applied to a mandate issued with royal authority. It is found in Dan 3:10, Dan 3:29; Dan 4:6; Ezr 4:8, etc. Jonah introduces it here as being the very word employed in describing the proclamation. And his nobles. The monarchs of Assyria were absolute; and if the king in the present case associated the magnates with himself, he did it in an humility occasioned by alarm, and because he saw that they were of the same mind as himself (comp. Dan 6:17). Saying. The decree extends from here to the end of verse 9. Man nor beast; i.e. domestic animals, horses, mules, distinct from herd and flock. These great cities contained in their area immense open spaces, like our parks, where cattle were kept. The dumb animals were made to share in their masters’ fast and sorrow, as they shared their joy and feasting; their bleating and bellowing were so many appeals to Heaven for mercy; the punishment of these innocent creatures was a kind of atonement for the guilt of their lords (comp. Hos 4:3; Joe 1:20; and note how the brute creation is said to sham in the happiness of paradise regained, Isa 11:1-16). The commentators quote Virgil, ‘Ecl.,’ 5:24, etc; where, however, the point is that the grief of the shepherds hinders them from attending to the wants of their flocks. Herodotus (9:24) mentions an instance of the Persians cutting the manes and tails of their horses and mules in a case of general mourning.
Jon 3:8
Let man and beast be covered with sackcloth. As we put trappings on horses in funerals. The LXX. wrongly makes this verse give an account of the execution of the edict instead of being part of the edict itself; thus: “And men and beasts were clothed with sackcloth,” etc. Cry mightily; i.e. let man cry mightily; Septuagint, , “with intensity;” Vulgate, in fortitudine. Let them turn every one from his evil way (Jer 25:5; Jer 36:3, Jer 36:7). The edict recognizes the truth that outward acts of penitence are worthless without moral reformationa truth which the Jews themselves had been very loth to admit (see Isa 58:1-14). And from the violence that is in their hands. The acts of violence that their hands have committed (Job 16:17; Psa 7:3). This is the special sin of the Assyrians, always grasping after empire, oppressing other nations, and guilty of rapine and avarice at home (see Isa 10:13, Isa 10:14; Isa 37:24, etc.; Nah 2:11, Nah 2:12; Nah 3:1).
Jon 3:9
Who can tell? (2Sa 12:22). An expression of hope that the Divine, wrath may be averted by the timely repentance. It is the same form of words as in Joe 2:14, “Perhaps God would thereby indicate that he had himself put it into their mouths” (Pusey; comp. Jer 18:11). If God; i.e. the one God, whom the king and his people now acknowledge as supreme, like the idol worshippers at Carmel, when they fell on their faces, crying, “Jehovah, he is the God” (1Ki 18:39).
Jon 3:10
4. God accepts this repentance, and the threatened destruction is averted. God saw their works. There is no notice in the inscriptions of this “repentance,” or of any change in the polytheistic worship of the Ninevites. But the existing records of this period are singularly meagre, and show a state of calamity and depression, of internal commotions and famine. Nor is it usual in the monumental history to find mention of any events but wars and the execution of material works; moral reformations are not recorded. God repented of the evil (Exo 32:14). This is an anthropopathical mode of speaking; God acted as if, taking man’s view of the transaction, he repented. The sentence was conditional, as Jonah well knew (Jon 4:2), in accordance with the great principle laid down in Jer 18:7, etc; viz. that if a nation against which sentence is pronounced turn from its evil way, the sentence shall not be executed. God does not change, but he threatens that man may change (see note on Amo 7:3; and observe the same principle applied to individuals, Eze 33:8, Eze 33:13-16). He did it not. The evil day was postponed. This partial repentance, though it was not permanent and made little lasting impression on the national life, showed that there was some element of good in these Assyrians, and that they were not yet ripe for destruction. It has been considered to be a proof of the unhistorical character of the Book of Jonah that no mention of any of the incidents is made in the Books of Kings and Chronicles; but there is nothing strange in this. Those records never touch external politics except as closely connected with Israel’s fortunes; and, derived as they were from national annals, it would have been unnatural for them to have narrated events happening so far away, and not likely to be introduced in the documents on which their history was founded.
HOMILETICS
Jon 3:2
City preaching.
In Palestine there were no great cities. The population was scattered through pastoral regions or gathered in small and unimportant towns. This fact gave a character to the national life of the Hebrews and to their national religiousness. It was a strange experience for a Jew like Jonah to be brought into contact with city life upon a grand, colossal scale. We modern Englishmen are more familiar with, this development of human existence and activity. We need to study the relations of religion to city life, its occupations, temptations, and opportunities.
I. THE PREACHER IN A GREAT CITY NEEDS TO HAVE HIS IMAGINATION AND HIS HEART FILLED WITH AN IMPRESSION OF ITS MAGNITUDE AND IMPORTANCE. In the view of the Almighty all things earthly may well seem diminutive; yet Jehovah is represented as commissioning Jonah to preach unto Nineveh”that great city.” The population, the wealth, the industry, the political importance of a metropolis should be pondered by one who is required to discharge a public ministry among its inhabitants. Thus he will be more likely to rise to the due height of seriousness, of sympathy. He who labours in “an exceeding great city” needs to fill his soul with a conviction of the spiritual necessities and the spiritual possibilities of such a population.
II. THE PREACHER IN A GREAT CITY NERDS TO FULFIL A MINISTRY OF WITNESS. “Cry unto it the cry.” Such is the exact language in which Jehovah commissioned his servant. In the university, the private chapel, the select and cultivated congregation, there may be room for argumentative, emotional, poetical, or philosophical preaching. What a great city needs is a voice, a cry, a preaching, in the proper sense of that word. A plain and powerful witness to man’s sin and need, to God’s grace and power to save, a summons to repentance and surrender,such is what the population of a great city for the most part needs.
III. THE PREACHER IN A GREAT CITY NEEDS AN UNMISTAKABLE DIVINE COMMISSION AND MESSAGE. “The preaching that I bid thee,“such was to be the burden of the prophet’s utterances. It is only the Word of the Lord which should be proclaimed by the minister of religion in any position, in all circumstances. But when standing in the midst of a great metropolis, how can a man, justly sensible of his own ignorance and powerlessness, proceed in his ministry, unless he is assured that the Lord has sent him, unless he can commence his testimony with the preface, “Thus saith the Lord”?
Jon 3:5
National repentance.
No doubt repentance is an individual exercise of heart; yet when the bulk of a community is pervaded by similar sentiments, it may be a national exercise also. Such seems to have been the case with the population of Nineveh; Jonah’s witness was believed by one and by another, until belief became general; and, as penitence, fear, and supplication spread from man to man, the city seemed moved by one common impulse, leading the whole population to the feet of God.
I. SUCH REPENTANCE BEGINS IN FAITH. The inhabitants of the great city credited the message of the Hebrew prophet; that is, they believed that the Supreme Ruler and Judge was displeased with them because of their sinfulness; that they wore liable to the punishment which the godless, the vicious, the criminal deserve; and perhaps also that, notwithstanding their dangerous condition, there was some hope for them in the Divine mercy, if they would but turn unto God. Certainly the gospel of Christ does not ask the sinner to yield his belief merely to the tidings of God’s justice and holiness; it invites him also to give credence to its offers of salvation.
II. SUCH REPENTANCE MANIFESTS ITSELF IN CONTRITION AND IN ALL THE SIGNS OF SINCERE REGRET AND DISTRESS BECAUSE OF SIN. There is something very affecting in the spectacle of a nation mourning and lamenting because of a great bereavement, when an honoured sovereign, a trusted minister, a mighty warrior, passes away. But the pathos and the moral significance of that national mourning are far greater which is prompted by a general consciousness of sin, by a conviction of national wrong doing, by humiliation before an omniscient and righteous God. The tokens of such contrition, as recorded in the text to have been displayed in Nineveh, were appropriate to that time and community, and accorded with the customs of the East, But whatever be the manifestations of sorrow, the first essential is that it be real, as in the sight of the heart searching God.
III. SUCH REPENTANCE PERVADES THE WHOLE COMMUNITY. In most cities are individuals who sigh and cry for the abominations done by the people. Even a few are as salt to preserve the mass from corruption. For the sake of a very few a city may be spared the doom deserved. But a nation in mourning for sin is a sight as sublime as it is affecting. Nineveh is in this respect an example to other sinful cities. The king led the way, and his subjects followed. Even the least, the lowest, joined in the solemn act of penitence. Such repentance is indeed repentance unto life; it cannot be unheeded or unrewarded by Heaven.
Jon 3:6
A king’s contrition.
It is an illustration of the power of truth, of the commanding majesty of the faithful and fearless preacher, which we witness in this narrative. An unknown Hebrew, with nothing to recommend him, nothing to enforce attention, comes to a foreign city, passes through the public places, reproaches the citizens for their sins, denounces destruction upon the inhabitants as the punishment due to them because of their wickedness. And what is the result? Is it neglect, or derision, or incredulity? On the contrary, the people feel the justice of the rebukes, acknowledge their ill desert, humble themselves before God, and entreat mercy, forbearance, pardon. What a testimony to the reality of the moral law, to the authority of conscience! Jonah preaches, and the king of a mighty empire divests himself of the insignia of power and rule, abases himself before God in sackcloth and ashes!
I. KINGS ARE SOMETIMES THE LEADERS OF THEIR PEOPLE IN SIN. Surrounded by everything that can minister to selfish gratification, beset by flatterers, possessed in some instances of absolute power, it is not to be wondered at that the occupants of thrones are often the foremost in cruelty, in vice, in self-indulgence. They may blame, but in a just estimate their perilous circumstances will be considered. Their temptations are many, and their faithful friends are few.
II. KINGS ARE ACCORDINGLY SOMETIMES RESPONSIBLE FOR THE MISERIES OF THEIR SUBJECTS. When royal ambition has led to culpable warfare and slaughter; when headstrong purposes have issued in national disaster, impoverishment, and disgrace; when luxury in palaces has entailed hunger upon the occupants of hovels;in such cases sovereigns have a terrible account to render to him who is no respecter of persons, who is King of kings and Lord of lords.
III. KINGS ARE SUITABLY EMPLOYED IN HEADING EVERY ELEVATING AND PROFITABLE MOVEMENT. Happily there are many examples of such conduct on the part of those occupying the very highest stations. Institutions and agencies for imparting knowledge, for refining life, for relieving suffering, are better deserving the “patronage” and the attention of royalty than schemes of pleasure or methods of destruction.
IV. WHEN KINGS AS WELL AS SUBJECTS HAVE SINNED IT BECOMES ALL TO UNTIL IN SACRIFICES OF CONTRITION AND IN VOWS OF REFORMATION, The frank, dignified, fight-minded conduct of the King of Nineveh raises him in our esteem. No man is disgraced by admitting his faults. And every man, even though he be a king, is in his right place when low on his knees in penitence and in prayer.
Jon 3:7, Jon 3:8
Ceremonial and moral repentance.
It must have been a striking and picturesque spectacle that was presented by Nineveh when the decree of the king and nobles was carried out, when a general fast was observed, when sackcloth and ashes were worn by man and beast, and when general prayer ascended in a mighty cry to Heaven. But to the reflective mind it must have been still more interesting to observe the population turning from their evil ways and refraining from acts of violence.
I. THE OUTWARD SIGNS OF PENITENCE AND CONTRITION ARE GOOD WHEN, AND ONLY WHEN, THEY ARE THE EXPRESSION OF GENUINE FEELING AND PURPOSE. We feel this to be the case with reference to ordinary human sorrow. The mere garb and semblance of mourning, being but conventional, is of little value. It is felt to be appropriate when the mourner can say
“I have that within which passes show,
These but the trappings and the signs of woe.”
How much more do the religious interest and value of “sackcloth and ashes,” “fasting and prayers,” depend upon the sincerity of the emotions thus expressed!
II. RESOLUTIONS TO REFORM AND AMEND ARE THE BEST EVIDENCE OF THE GENUINENESS AND ACCEPTABLENESS OF REPENTANCE. It is very much to the credit Alike of the prophet and of those to whom he preached, that the Ninevites should have felt and expressed the absolute necessity of moral amendment in order to the enjoyment of forgiveness, favour, and acceptance with God. There must have been something searching in Jonah’s preaching, and something very responsive in the heart and conscience of the Ninevites, to have produced such a state of mind as that here indicated. It is especially observable that the citizens turned “every one from his evil way.” The ways of sin are devious, numerous, and varied; sinners have turned every one to his own way; true repentance shows itself in a resolve on the part of each individual offender to forsake his own sins. “Violence,” whether proneness to national schemes for attacking other peoples, or assaults upon peaceful citizens, seems to have been the prevailing sin; for of this, it is said, the people chiefly repented.
APPLICATION. The whole nature, body and soul, is implicated in sin; and the whole nature accordingly should concur in repentance.
Jon 3:9
Hoping for mercy.
The pathos of this question is increased as we call to mind the ignorance of the Ninevites regarding the true God. Their own religion was as likely to conceal as to make known the real character of the Deity. And what they had heard from Jonah was but very slender ground upon which to proceed in their approaches to Heaven. Hence the uncertainty, the commingling of fear with hope in the language they employed: “Who can tell,” etc.?
I. THE NEED OF MERCY. This appears from considering
(1) human sin;
(2) Divine justice; and
(3) the express threatenings of the Divine Word.
All this was very apparent in the case of the Ninevites, and accounts for their attitude of contrition and supplication. But the same holds good of men of every nation and in every state of society.
II. THE GROUND OF HOPE.
1. With the Ninevites this could have been nothing but some instinct in their own heart. A Creator who has implanted pity in the Breasts of his creatures cannot surely be destitute of that quality himself.
2. With those to whom the gospel is preached the case is otherwise; they have not to ask, “Who can tell?” for the Lord of all has made himself known to them as delighting in mercy, and has given his own Son to be the Mediator and the Pledge of mercy.
III. THE OBJECT OF ENTREATY.
1. With regard to God, the aversion of his anger. Applying human language to the infinite God, the suppliants hoped for his turning and repentance.
2. With regard to themselves, the suppliants desired that they might not perish, that the doom deserved and threatened might not come upon them, that, in a word, they might be saved. It is not easy to form any judgment as to the measure in which desire for spiritual blessing entered into the prayers of the men of Nineveh. But enlightened Christians are constrained to feel that the salvation which they seek is not merely release from suffering and penalty, but restoration to the favour and the obedience of God.
Jon 3:10
Man’s repentance and God’s.
The simplicity with which this great fact is recorded is quite in accordance with the usual style in which the Old Testament is written. Inspired men wrote of God as they would have written of a great king. Thus only, indeed, can we receive or communicate intelligible ideas regarding the Supreme. It is easy to criticize such statemants as that of this text by nailing them “anthropopathic;” but the fact is that it is not degrading but exalting the conception of God to attribute to him, not merely reason and will, but the capacity of the highest, purest, and tenderest emotions.
I. HUMAN REPENTANCE THE CONDITION OF THE DIVINE.
1. Repentance involves the turning with loathing from the paths of sin. Yet this is very difficult to account for. How, why, should those who have addicted themselves to sin, because of its pleasantness or its profitableness, regard it in a quite different, a contrary light?
2. Repentance involves an apprehension of the majesty and justice of the moral law. Whilst men look earthward they will never repent, i.e. of sin itself; but when they direct their gaze heavenward, and perceive the splendour and beauty of an eternal, an inflexible law of right, thou, by comparison with that, their own sin seems odious and degrading.
II. DIVINE REPENTANCE IS THE RESPONSE TO THE HUMAN.
1. The repentance attributed to God does not involve any real change in the character or the purposes of God. He ever hates the sin, and pities and loves the sinner; this is so both before and after the sinner’s repentance.
2. Divine repentance is therefore the same principle acting differently in altered circumstances. If the prospect of punishment answers the same purpose as that intended by the punishment itself; there is no inconsistency in its remission; for punishment is not an end, it is only a means to goodness, to the reign of the law of righteousness.
3. Divine repentance is apparent in the forgiveness and acceptance of the contrite sinner.
4. And also in the moral influence which it exercises over the hearts of those who are reconciled. Gratitude is excited, love is awakened, consecration is elicited, obedience is confirmed.
APPLICATION. It is to be observed that these great principles of the Divine government are exhibited in all their power in the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. In the cross God summons mankind to repentance; in the cross God shows how he himself can repent.
HOMILIES BY J.E. HENRY
Jon 3:1-3
Peremptory reiteration and prompt obedience.
We see Jonah entering here on the second stage of his strange career. And it is adjusted logically to the first. His recent experiences and their resulting sentiments form an obvious preparation for the duty next to hand. He has sinned and suffered and repented. He has deserted, and been captured and surrendered unconditionally. He has prayed, and been forgiven and set free. And it is natural that duty should be faced from a different standpoint henceforward. He is in another mind now, and ready for a new departure in personal effort and official tactics. And the opportunity to make it is promptly furnished.
I. THE SPIRITUAL DESERTER‘S RETURN IS FOLLOWED BY HIS RE–ENGAGEMENT. Jonah had discarded much and been stripped of more. He had refused to act, and had ipso facto forfeited his commission. Now with a return to his right mind there is reinstatement in his lost calling, and re-employment in his forsaken work. We account for this on the principle that:
1. There is forgiveness with God, that he may be feared. There is a forgiveness that only encourages transgression. Such is weak forgiveness, implying a want of firmness in the forgiver, on which there is the temptation to make further aggressions. Such is careless forgiveness, that takes no hostages for the future, nor even makes terms. Such is inequitable forgiveness, in which principle is ignored, and the offence hushed up without regard to the claims of justice. But the Divine “more excellent way” of pardon is at once equitable and defined and strong. Amends for the past and amendment for the future are both exacted sternly. God forgives when he has punished, and on the unbending condition that the offence cease. Then punishment is mingled with so much of mercy, and requirement is sweetened by such]promise of grace, that gratitude mates with reverence, and obedience is the firstborn issue of the happy tie. The insubordinate, mutinous Jonahs having been ironed and subdued, are at length released, that in after action they may exemplify obedience unquestioning and without a semblance of the old self-will.
2. Spitual office attaches to existing spiritual relation. The Divine government is paternal God’s officers are first, of all his children. Their fitness for the discharge of spiritual functions is due to their previous endowment, with spiritual gifts. If unspiritual men and whilst unspiritual they may be formally in office, but are incapable of spiritual work. When Jonah fell for the time being out of the spiritual connection, he ceased to be a prophet of God. He could not be at once a recruiter and a deserter, an ambassador and a rebel. Now he has come back, and in resumed spiritual relations he finds the condition of restored religious functions. He may again speak for God now that again he is on God’s side. No man goes legitimately on God’s errand who cannot do it con amore. Spiritual officers are to be sought exclusively by promotion from the spiritual ranks. Every true shepherd has been first of all a sheep in God’s fold, and to each relation has come in by Christ, the Door.
II. GOD‘S PROGRAMME IS STEREOTYPED, WHATEVER ELSE MAY CHANGE. (Verse 2) God has not changed, although Jonah has. The prophet’s mutinous outbreak has not moved him a hairbreadth from his purpose. What he meant at first he means still, and will have. So the prophet is brought back exactly to the point at which he had broken away, and told to begin where he had left off.
1. God is moved still by the same compassion for the doomed. “That great city.” The repetition of these words on each occasion of the mention of Nineveh is significant. It shows that God had regard to the tact of its size; that all through the arrangement of measures for its warning he was moved by the thought of its teeming population given over to death. Hence it is styled in verse 3 “a great city to God,” i.e. in his estimation, and in Jon 4:11 the Divine compunction is directly connected with the existence of its hundred and twenty thousand children, not yet responsible, but bound to perish with it. The Divine compassion is a glorious factor in human life. Its attitude is catholic. It embraces in wide paternal arms the heathen that knows not God, the infant that could not know him if revealed. Its outflow is unstinted, averting myriad evils altogether, softening the inevitable, indemnifying the past by the amends of rich compensatory good. Believe in God’s pity. It is a splendid fact. It is hunger’s provision, and pain’s anaesthetic, and misery’s comforter, and humanity’s good Samaritan in the darkest reaches of its Jericho journey, and the most calamitous experiences by the way.
2. God‘s prescribed step remains the fitting one to take. What other methods it was within the resources of Divine omnipotence to use for the conversion of the Ninevites, we cannot tell. What we know is that the proclamation of the truth was the ordinary method, and that God keeps to it. “The sword of the Spirit,” with which he pierces the soul and kills its sin, is the “Word of God.” “The foolishness of preaching” is that special presentment of the Word by which in all ages it has pleased God to save them that believe. And there is, if we could see it, the perfection of fitness in this ordinance. Truth is light revealing things as they are and as they ought to be. Truth is motive, presenting considerations that move intelligence to seek that better state. Truth is force, conveying to the soul and constituting in it the Divine omnipotent energy in the strength of which the new man arises, and the new life is lived. Truth is comfort, unfolding the soul rest and joy of the free which climb the throne of being when the new regime of righteousness begins. Then truth preached with the living voice and personal element is all this and more. To the influence proper to the abstract truth is added its influence as concreted in a human life. As light it is intensified by the added ray of an illustrative experience. As power it is reinforced by the impulse of a cooperant human will. As comfort it is at once confirmed and sweetened by personal testimony and fellow feeling. There is no conceivable substitute in the enginery of grace for the personal preaching to sinners of the word of life.
3. Repentance is best proved by obedience in the matter at which there was stumbling before. Jonah had passed through a severe discipline for the conquest of his self-will. Whether or not it was really overcome, this reiterated commission would test. And there was a needs be that the point should be settled. All judgment is “unto righteousness;” to bring us to it if afar from it, to restore us to it if we have strayed. And it is this not in the general, but in the particular. It is to check particular faults and produce the opposite virtues. In this object God will see that it succeeds… He cannot fail as men fail. His chains must bind. He gives no disputable instructions, nor moves to their observance by futile action. In tow of his disciplinary privataeers when they return to port, will be formal, as a prize of war, every skulking craft that had been trying to do the enemy’s work. The proof that his measures have not been nugatory is the circumstantial realization of their purpose. The iniquity he visits with the rod he must see put away. The forsworn task he enforces with the strong arm he must see done. “God looks upon men when he has afflicted them and has delivered them out of their affliction, to see whether they will mend of that fault particularly for which they were corrected; and therefore in that thing we are concerned to see to it that we receive not the grace of God in vain” (Matthew Henry).
III. THE DISCIPLINED SERVANT IS AN IMPROVED SERVANT. (Verse 3) The stern discipline has done its work at last. The rebellious fit is over, and the unruly servant is pliant to his Master’s will. What evils of terror and pain and agony he might have escaped if he had only done this at first! But God bends all things to his purpose, and Jonah’s rebellious freak among the rest. His message to Nineveh is not only done, but better done than it could possibly have been at first.
1. Jonah is better prepared for it than he was. He has sinned and been forgiven, has suffered and been delivered, has prayed and received an answer. And each experience is of the nature of a qualification for the better doing of his work. “Rejoicing in the sweetness of a fresh and full reconciliation; lightened in spirit by tasting in God a mercy larger than he could formerly have thought of; cleansed from the darkness that brooded over his soul, and the countless images of terror and of evil which rose up before him while be was fleeing from his God in rebellion, and his God was pursuing him in wrath” (Martin), he would approach his Master’s work as never before. Reverence for a God so great and good, and gratitude to a God so merciful and kind, would spring together and work together the new mind and way. Affliction, moreover, had left its mark on him. He was subdued and chastened. He knew experimentally his impotence and God’s omnipotence. He could speak by book of the terrors of the Lord, and the fatuity of hoping to defy him and escape. And his preaching would have a reality and vividness about it attainable only by way of his late experience. Then “he had called upon the Lord in circumstances almost fitted to shut out the possibility of hope.” If there be a case on record pre-eminently fitted to confirm the declaration, “Men ought always to pray, and not to faint,” it is his. Would he not resume his post with livelier loyalty and implicit sense of duty, when he could resume it with the blessed protestation, “I love the Lord, because he hath heard the voice of my supplication: because he hath inclined his ear unto me, I will call upon him as long as I live”? (Martin).
2. He does it implicitly. (Verse 3) “So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh: Submission is now as thorough as at first self-will was resolute. The change is excellent, and its occurrence a vindication of the treatment that has brought it about. An infinitely wise and holy will is God’s. The ideal of a man’s life is to believe in that will, and will it, and find his joy in doing it. From irreconcilable variance to absolute harmony with that ideal is Jonah’s change, a change that means his spiritual readjustment. It will mean no less to us all “The felicity of heaven greatly consists in perfect submission in all things to the government of Jehovah the Saviour. The misery of this world is the want of that temper of mind; the very end and desert of grace is to restore us to it; and so far as we are under the influence of the grace of life, we are brought back to it; the more grace the more submission; and grace will not cease its operation in the saints till every thought is brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ” (Jones). A man following absolutely the lines of the infinitely perfect will; a man moving thereon with fullest faith and sympathy and zest; a man starting therein as a child starts for the haven of a mother’s arms; a man incapable of other thought than following them to the highest good, and till his life’s end;that is a man in the highest sense, and to the highest spiritual effect.
3. He goes closely by his instructions. (Verse 3) According to the word of the Lord. This terse record is instinct with suggestiveness. He went because he was told, and where he was told, and when he was told, and as he was told, and to do the thing he was told, and in the way he was told. His conduct now was exemplary as before it was intolerable. And his case is typical. His instructions were the preacher’s instructions for all lands and times. “Preach the preaching that I bid thee.” It was this Moses preached (Deu 18:18), and Jeremiah (Jer 1:7), and Paul (1Co 11:23), and Christ himself (Joh 7:16; Joh 12:50). It is this we must preach. What else is worth preaching, or can or dare be preached? As to the substance of his message, the preacher has no discretionary power. He is not to preach science, nor philosophy, nor sentiment, nor his own notions, nor human knowledge. He is rightly to divide the Word of life. That is all, “There is not the greatest minister, not the most learned or acute, But must observe this rule; not James, not John, not Peter, not all the troop of the apostles, my once vary from this: he who shall bring other doctrine, let him be accursed by us; he who speaketh of himself, let him be refused by us; howsoever godly or holy he do pretend himself, yet if he decline that word which should be his direction, let him be declined by us” (Abbot). Here is an admirable maxim for universal use, “according to the Word of the Lord.” It is good, and wise, and true, and pertinent to every case, the key to every puzzle of life. Are you a sinner? there is salvation for you, full, and free, and present, and “according to the Word of the Lord.” Are you a seeker? expect to find, for salvation is in Christ, and of those that come to him there are none cast out, “according to the Word of the Lord.” Are you a saint? then fight and persist and hope; for that you are “kept by the power of God,” and will yet “reap if you faint not,” is “according to the Word of the Lord.”J.E.H.
Jon 3:4-10
A heathen city in sackcloth.
Let us try to realize the scene. An Eastern city sleeps in the rosy morning light. Its moated ramparts tower a hundred feet in air, and, dotted with fifteen hundred lofty towers, sweep around it a length of over sixty miles. Already the gates are open for the early traffic, and conspicuous among the crowd a stranger enters. The stains of travel are on his dress, and he looks with curious awe at the figures of winged colossal bulls that keep silent symbolic guard over the gate by which he passes in. Within, things new and strange appear at every step. The houses, sitting each in its own grounds, are bowered in green. The streets are spanned at intervals with triumphal arches, whose entablature is enriched by many a sculptured story. On every eminence is a palace, or monument, or idol temple, guarded by symbolic monsters in stone, and adorned in carving of bas-relief with sacred symbols. The markets fill, the bazaars are alive with multifarious dealing, soldiers and war chariots parade the streets, and the evidences of despotic power and barbaric wealth and heathenish worship, with their inevitable accompaniments of luxury, corruption, and violence, abound on every side. The stranger is deeply moved. Surprise gives place to horror, then horror warms into righteous indignation; and with trumpet voice and dilating form and eye of fire he utters the words of doom, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be destroyed.” Through street, and park, and Barrack, and bazaar the direful message rings. There is momentary incredulity, then swift alarm, then utter consternation. Like wildfire the news, and with it the panic spreads. It reaches the nobles in their palaces. It penetrates to the king upon his throne. It moves society to its depths. And the result is the scenes of mourning and self-abasement our text records.
I. REPENTANCE COMES READILY TO UNTUTORED MINDS. Never did preacher see better or speedier fruit of his labours than Jonah did in heathen Nineveh. By a single sermon but a few sentences long he sent the entire city into penitence and sackcloth. Granted that there was much to account for this in the preaching itself. It was bold and oracular and explicit, and spoken with the conviction that is most of all contagious. It was enforced by such a narrative of his own recent history as made him nothing less than a sign to the men of Nineveh (Luk 11:1-54 :80). Granted too “the great susceptibility of Oriental races to emotion, the awe of one Supreme Being which is peculiar to all the heathen religions of Asia, and the great esteem in which soothsaying and oracles were held in Assyria from the very earhest times” (Keil). Yet still the repentance, so widespread, so real, so sadden, has in it something phenomenal in the religious sphere. Not thus did the prophets and their utterances move the Jews. They “beat one, and killed another, and stoned another,” and disregarded all as a general rule (Mat 21:35). A greater than Jonah, the Truth himself, spoke to them, and spoke in vain (Mat 12:41). Unbelieving and lengthened contact with truth had no doubt produced the exceptional hardness of the Jewish nature. The works done in vain in the gospel hardened Chorazin or Bethsaida would, as we know, have Brought Tyre and Sidon to repentance in dust and ashes. Even filthy Sodom would have cleansed its way, and been spared on earth, had it seen the mighty works by which Capernaum was yet utterly unmoved (Mat 11:20-24). So when the soil of the Jewish nature, plied with the truth seed till trodden hard by the sowers’ feet, refused utterly to produce, the apostles found a fertile seed bed in the virtu soil of the Gentile mind (Act 13:44-48). An analogous fact is the success of Christ among the common people (Mar 12:37), when the scribes and Pharisees, who were more familiar with revelation, remained uninfluenced almost to a man (Joh 7:48, Joh 7:49). It would seem as if Divine truth, like potent drugs with the body, is effective most of all in its first contacts with the soul. Lengthened and frequent contact with truth, if it does not regenerate, only thickens the spiritual skin, and much hearing means little heeding as a general rule.
II. REPENTANCE IMPLIES A RELIEF OF THE TRUTH. (Verse 5) Belief of the truth is a logical first step to every religious attainment (Heb 11:6). Truth is the revelation of things as they areof character, of destiny, of duty. Until that has been received there can be no spiritual beginning. While not only danger but the disease itself is disbelieved in, the patient will take no step toward cure. “He that cometh to the Lord must believe that he is.” This is the least modicum of knowledge conceivable in any intelligent comer. So he that comes away from sin must believe that sin is. Unless he does, and until he does, he has no reason for moving. He that comes by repentance and faith, moreover, must believe in the propriety and dutifulness of these acts. Forecasting the possible result of Timothy’s ministry in the turning of the wicked, Paul says, “If God peradventure will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth.” This aspiration brings out the point exactly. Repentance and the acknowledging of the truth imply and involve each other. Impenitence is largely the result of incredulity. If a man really believed what God says about sinits demerit, deformity, and destroying characterthe grief and hatred and turning which constitute repentance must arise. The impenitent man either does not believe God at all, or he gives him a weak and heedless credence that is never acted on, and so is practical disbelief. Let God’s word of dogma, God’s word of promise, be truly and adequately believed, and God’s word of precept will be infallibly obeyed. A man may contemplate his sin indifferently and commit it with even pulse, but the power to do so means that the Scripture testimony against it has been silenced, or the witness put out of the court of conscience altogether. “It is to be observed that faith operates differently according to the matter believed, When faith looks to the redeeming love of Christ, faith worketh by love. ‘We love him who first loved us.’ When faith looks to the infinite wrath of God, faith worketh fear, and we ‘flee for refuge to the hope set before us.’ When faith looks at Christ, beating in his love the wrath from which he calls us to flee, faith worketh by grief; and, ‘looking on him whom we have pierced, we mourn.’ And all these operations of faithlove, fear, griefenter into that repentance unto salvation which true faith produces” (Martin).
III. REPENTANCE IS AT ONCE DEEPENED BY FEAR AND SWEETENED BY HOPE. The Ninevites feared to “perish” through the “fierce anger” of God, yet hoped he might “turn away” from it and “repent.” Fear is a rather ignoble emotion, but it is not without its place and power in the religious sphere. A man’s life, in the widest sense, is his most precious trust. To gain the whole world would not compensate for the loss of it. Hence the universal instinct of self-preservation. “All that a man hath will he give for his life.” And by appealing to this instinct, as it so often does, the Scripture assumes its lawfulness (Luk 13:3; Mat 10:28). The less of soul and body in hell is a loss unparalleled and irreparable, and which it would be madness not to fear. The Ninevites feared it. Their dread of it was a chief cause of the penitence they showed. And naturally so. To a man as yet unspiritual, the bearing of his sin on his own fate is the supreme consideration. When he becomes better he will be amenable to higher motives, but fear as opposed to carnal security, is always a prominent factor in the early stages of the religious life. But the Ninevites repentance did not spring from fear alone; it based on hope as well. “Who can tell,” etc.? (verse 9). The hope here was far from assured. It was a mere glimmer in the soul Yet still it was hope. Escape was deemed not impossible,that was all And there was a shadow of ground for hope, which the keen eye of the doomed did not fail to detect. They had an intuitive idea that God would make some difference between a penitent city and an impenitent one. Then the catastrophe was not to come for forty days, and, in the granting of so long a respite, they would see the door left open for a possible change before its close. Besides, Jonah’s own deliverance in s more dire extremity still, and of which he evidently told them in his preaching (Luk 11:1-54 :80),would suggest the possibility of a like escape to them with like repentance. If the preacher had been saved in tits very moment of imminent death, the fact was ground of hope to the people who had forty days’ reprieve. Thus the faith in which the Ninevites’ repentance originated “wrought by fear and hope combined. The evil dreaded was sufficient to break and humble all their pride. And the hope they entertained was sufficient to prevent their fear from turning into mere despair” (Martin). It is the element of hope in it that marks off the sorrow which worketh only death from the sorrow which worketh repentance to salvation. There is a persuasion of men which bases on the terrors of the Lord, and a beseeching of them also by the mercies he has shown. And what is this but to make fear and hope the limbs of a stable arch to carry the repentance “that needeth not to be repented of”?
IV. REPENTANCE INCLUDES GRIEF FOR THE PAST AND REFORMATION FOR THE FUTURE. The Ninevites “put on sackcloth,” etc; and “turned them every one from his evil way.” There was Compendious logic in this. Sackcloth and ashes were the conventional livery of abasement and grief (2Co 7:9, 2Co 7:10), and these have a distinct place in the spiritual connection (Joe 2:13). But they must be spiritual. Not the result of wounded pride, or baffled purpose, or ruined prospects. These things are utterly carnal. They involve no sense of sin’s demerit, no horror of its impurity. They are merely aspects and expressions of selfishness. Every detected rogue can see that he has blundered in his sinuing, and from that standpoint grieves. Saul does it, exclaiming, in the bitterness of failure, “I have played the fool exceedingly.” But the sorrow “after a godly sort” is a radically different thing, and done in a different spiritual atmosphere altogether. And David crying with contrite and humbled spirit, “I acknowledge my transgression, and my sin is ever before me,” is a perfect moral contrast. His is a sorrow that has God in it. Sin is viewed in its relation to God, from God’s standpoint, and with feelings like to God’s. Job sorrowed thus with God when he said, “Now mine eye sooth thee; wherefore I abhor myself,” etc. Such sorrow has hope in it, and so “the promise and potency” of a reformed life. Under its impulse the Ninevites “turned every one from his evil way.” Reformation is the work meet for repentancethe crystalline form revealing the genuine metal. “Numbers will do everything in religion but turning from sin to the Saviour; and where this is not done, all the rest is lost labourtheir religion is hypocrisy, their hope is mere delusion, and their latter end is bitterness and woe; for all who refuse to depart from sin must perish in sin. In vain shall we fast for sin, if we do not fast from sin; and what blessings can all our prayers bring down while we refuse to turn from our evil ways?” (Jones).
V. REPENTANCE CRIES TO GOD IN PRAYER. The words of Jonah were like an earthquake in the vast city. From king to beggar there was consternation and dismay. The destroying armies of heaven were at hand. Men can neither disbelieve, nor doubt, nor resist, nor fly, nor survive. What remains but to submit and beg for mercythe last resort of the sinner, but the very first command of God? And so the king descends from his throne, and the beggar rises from his straw, and a stricken universal cry for help goes up in the ear of Heaven. In such an exercise true repentance is at home. Prayer is the spontaneous, the instinctive expression of the soul’s new found need. A true sense of sin, together with an apprehension of God’s mercy in Christ which all genuine repentance includes, leads logically to prayer. Given a sick man thoroughly alarmed, and a willing physician accessible, and the application for help will infallibly follow.
“On bender knees, replete with godly grief,
See where the mourner kneels to seek relief;
From his full heart pours forth the gushing plea,
God of the lost, be merciful to me!’
The light of life descends in heavenly rays,
And angels shout and sing, ‘Behold, he prays!'”
VI. REPENTANCE IS TO BE NATIONAL WHEN THE SIN IS NATIONAL. The Ninevites’ was a “public, general, royal fast.” So when the Divine judgments menaced Jerusalem in the reign of Jehoiakim, all the people proclaimed a fast (Jer 36:9). Then it was observed by all the people in accordance with a royal edict. So Jehoshaphat “feared and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah” (2Ch 20:3) when Moab and Ammon invaded the kingdom. In the nature of the case, the repentance must correspond to the transgression. The people must repent who have sinned, and in the character and relations in which the sin has been committed. That their action in the matter was suggested and shaped by royal edict detracted in nothing from the value of the Ninevites’ repentance. The obligations of religion rule every relation of life. Each community ought to be religious, and the rulers of each to consider their office sacred to the accomplishment of this result. Monarchs should reign for the glory of God, and they do so when they “take order” for the observance of religious worship with due regard to the prerogatives of the Church, and to the right of private judgment. “It is an evil and dangerous principle that would exempt the rulers of a kingdom from being in subjection in their public capacity to the Word of Christ, and from being under obligation in their government to rule for the promotion of his kingdom. It strikes at the root of all family as well as national religion; and while it would confine Christ to the separate consciences of individual men, it would refuse him the right to govern the households and communities into which in Providence they are combined” (Martin). The practical lesson of this is read to us by Jesus Christ (Luk 11:32). The existence of saints in the world is a virtual condemnation of all the sinners. With similar privileges and opportunities, why are these spiritually changed, and those not? Unless the believers have done more than their duty, the unbelievers have fallen woefully short. Every saint in a Christian congregation will stand up in the judgment a silent but damning witness against its unconverted members who remain so under equal inducements to repentance. And the case is worse when the balance of privilege was on the unbelievers’ side. It was so as between Nineveh and Israel. The one was brought to repentance by means incomparably less than those which had proved entirely inoperative with the other. It will be so as between each of them and us, if we are blind to our greater light, and insensible to our more potent spiritual agencies. “A greater than Jonah is here”greater in person, greater in office, greater in power, and greater in influence. Have we resisted him? Have we withstood his mightier striving? Then who so inexcusable, who so hopeless, as we? What guilt so deep, what condemnation so great, as ours (Heb 10:28)?J.E.H.
HOMILIES BY W.G. BLAIKIE
Jon 3:1-4
Jonah’s second call.
“And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, saying, Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee,” etc.
I. REINSTATEMENT OF THE PROPHET. “The word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time.” Jonah’s rebellion had had a twofold effect on his relations to Godbroken up his personal fellowship with him, and suspended his official function as a prophet. God’s grace restored him both personally and officially, as afterwards in the case of Peter; but, as in this case, the restoration of the first did not necessarily include that of the second. Servants of God who have fallen need a second call to public service; it needs to be shown that God trusts them with his work again. It is natural for ministers who have been publicly dealt with and censured to desire to be reponed; but this cannot be rightly done without some token that God again calls them.
II. THE NEW COMMISSION. “Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.” We know not where Jonah waswhere he had been landedwhat had happened in the interval. Imagination can picture the prophet on the shore making for Gath-hepher, and probably arriving there. Again the message is preceded by the word of stimulation, “Arise;” brace thyself, prepare for arduous work; and this time it would bring a lesson of warningremember how easily you were turned aside before! The work was not to be made easier out of regard to the prophet’s proved weakness, but the prophet must seek a higher strength. The greatness of Nineveh is again dwelt on”Nineveh, that great city””an exceeding great city, and great unto God” (verse 3). “Think of a whole vast city, full of this humanity, of this God-breathed life; and is it surprising that a great city should be great unto God? What flashings of intellectual lights in one day!as many almost as the separate rays of the sun. What throbbings of moral or immoral purpose, the moral faculty acting in each! What a sighing of wandering spirits, unconsciously or blindly seeking the lost portion! What a swell and heave of the great tide of animated life composed of the blended individual streams I London is like a great and wide sea of life. The daily agitations which stir in her bosom are felt in feebler pulsings even in far off shores; and in multitudes which no man can number her thoughts and acts, and in these her checkered moral history, are going up to God’s heaven. Such was Nineveh of old, and for such reasons as we have named, it was still, as at first, a city great to God” (Raleigh). The message is somewhat different from before: “Preach the preaching literally, ‘cry the cry’] that I bid thee.” This may either mean, “the cry that I will bid thee at the time,” or “the cry that I already bade thee.” Either Jonah was to go, like an admiral, with sealed orders to be opened at a certain place; or he was to say what he had been ordered to say before, but had shrunk from saying. The latter view is probably correcta further trial of Jonah’s sincerity and submissivenessin the very matter which had dissatisfied him before, he was called to place himself in God’s hands, and to engage to do precisely as God would direct. In all cases, true preaching is “the preaching that I bid thee.” It is a simple message from God; it becomes effectual when it is given as such. All very well to be able to reconcile it with reason and commend it to the conscience, and to set it forth with the enrichments of learning and, the embellishments of art; but there is danger lest its true simple nature be thereby disguised; nothing should be allowed which prevents it from being presented as a simple message from God: “the preaching that I bid thee.” “How often did our Lord disclaim the authorship of all that he said, and assign it continually to the Father! ‘Jesus answered them, and said, My doctrine is not mine, but his that sent me; the words that I speak unto you, I speak not of myself’ (Joh 7:16). Himself personally cognizant of all truth, he acts as the Church’s Teacher under the responsibility and within the exact limits of his office. Officially ordained the Father’s Ambassador, he confines himself to a declaration of the Father’s words . Exactly as the Father had said unto him, so he speaks” (Martin).
III. THE OBEDIENCE OF THE PROPHET. “So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord.” “How different every way from what he was when he fled to Tarshish? We see him no more consulting with flesh and blood, but yielding prompt obedience to the heavenly call. No more running away, but asking, ‘Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? Here am I; send me.’ The Lord saith, ‘Go to Nineveh;’ he instantly goes without gainsaying or resistance” (Jones). “In the present case, Jonah would resume his commission with a new obedience; with a meekness, a faith, a courage, to all of which his punishment and pardon had been the signal means of disciplining him. He would resume his work and mission with another spirit
(1) as a sinful man, whose sin had been eminently forgiven;
(2) as a prayerful man, whose prayer had been eminently answered;
(3) as an afflicted man, whose affliction had been eminently blessed” (Martin). “The Word says, ‘Arise,’ and Jonah arose; the Word says, ‘Go,’ and Jonah went. It is beautiful It is grand. We must not indeed exaggerate. For we know that there is something dark and bitter in this man still, which will break out again. But meantime, and in this act of obedience, so far as we see it, there is a grandeur like that of an angela simplicity like that of a child” (Raleigh).
IV. THE MESSAGE DELIVERED. “And Jonah began to enter into the city, a day’s journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.” Jonah in Ninevehwhat a contrast to Gath-hepher, Joppa, or even Jerusalem! What temples! what tombs! what monuments!what new impressions of its vastness and power! Perhaps new impressions of its horrible treatment of those who opposed themselves to it. It was no uncommon sight to witness a row of prisoners, each impaled alive on an iron spike; or men of mark flayed alive; or captives, with hooks in nose, dragged by halters, carrying the bleeding heads of their kings or nobles. Anyhow, pictures of such things abounded. They made no undue impression on Jonah. “Strong in faith,” he went boldly forward and delivered the message. “He cried, and said”lifted up his voice like a trumpetunder the windows of the rich, in the resorts of the poorbefore the proud military arraybefore nobles and judges and all His message was more specific and startling than before. Stern, but faithful and honest preaching; no flattery; no shrinking from exposure of the true mind of God. They might do with him as they pleased; he had not a single friend in that vast multitudeno protection but God’snevertheless, he would proclaim the message. As John Knox said long afterwards, “I am in the place where I am commanded of God to speak the truth; and the truth I will speak, impugn it whoso list.” Contrast the feeling of Jonah now and when he fled to go to Tarshish. His soul tumultuous and agitated then, in peace and serenity now. “He that sayeth his life shall lose it, and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.” Acknowledge the reality of Divine protection and strengthsense of peace and proof of it, for, after all, fidelity to God is the true policy. “Them that honour me, I will honour” (1Sa 2:30).W.G.B.
Jon 3:5-9
The repentance of Nineveh.
“So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them,” etc. Here is Jonah in Nineveh alone against the world. Oh, the moral grandeur of the sight!resting on God alone”according to his faith it was to him”marvellous success of his preaching, through Divine power working in him and through him. Observe the contrast to Noah and to Lot. He is like John the Baptista torch, setting all on fire. We notice the effects of his crying the cry which God bade him.
I. THE PEOPLE OF NINEVEH BELIEVED GOD. (Verse 5) Apparently “the people” were first impresseddeep religious impressions commonly begin with them, and rise from them to the upper class”the common people heard Jesus gladly.” There are many hindrances among men of wealth and station to religious impression, but Providence gives compensations”the poor have the gospel preached unto them.” They believed God. They saw in Josiah only a messengerthe messenger of God, who made the earth and the sea. Probably they had heard his history, for “Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites.” Before one, in whose person there had been given such tokens of the Divine power, both to punish and to save, they stood in awe. “The busy crowd is by and by arrested; a solemn awe steals over the minds of the people, they press around the preacher to know who and whence he is, and why he utters such an ominous cry in their streets; and hearing as they now do, that, so far from lightly denouncing this doom against them, he had already, at the hazard of his life, shrunk from executing the charge committed to him, that he had been cast out for his wilful resistance into the mighty deep, and miraculously restored only that he might be sent forth anew to utter the cry they now heard of approaching destructionlearning all this concerning Jonah and his burden, how solemn and perilous must their situation have appeared in their eves!” (Kitto). He whom they now heard proclaiming his warning was the messenger of that God who had roused the storm and cast him overboard; who had prepared the great fish to swallow him, keep him alive within its huge body, and then vomit him on the dry land; and who had sent him back to deliver his message, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be destroyed.” The whole community were actuated by a common feeling. “Word came to the king.” All ranks and classes were moved by the message of the strange preacher; all realized that the anger of God and the coming destruction of the city were awful calamities; as of the Pharisees at John’s baptism, the question might have been asked, “Who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?” When God makes his voice heard, he bows the hearts of the people like the heart of one man.
II. PROCLAMATION OF A FAST. An external token of distress is deemed fittingheathen fasts extended to animals as well as men. “It was a custom among the ancient heathen to withhold food from their cattle as well as from themselves in times of mourning and humiliation; in some instances they cut off the hair of their beasts as well as their own” (Kitto). Attitude of the king, great and noble (verse 6)all his pride and vain glory laid asidehe humbles himself openly before Godcontrast this with spirit of Sennacherib afterwards (2Ki 18:1-37; 2Ki 19:1-37)kings never so great as when they pay honour to him by whom kings reignthe King of Nineveh rose above all shame and vanity, saw only the dread reality, and acted accordingly. Kings are in their noblest attitude when leading their people to honour God.
III. PRAYER DEMANDED. “Let them cry mightily unto God.” All their own gods are to be set asidethis God only is to be recognized. No one seems to have said a word for the Assyrian gods”Our God is in the heavens: he hath done whatsoever he hath pleased” (Psa 115:3). Prayer is often derided by the worldin time of pressing danger the praying people are the wise, the patriotic, the true people. Real prayer is no barren form”let them cry mightily to God”throw their whole souls into the exercisepray as for dear life. The true idea of prayer is beseeching God’s mercybeseeching it as the one only resourcewhat alone can save from misery and ruin.
IV. MORAL REFORMATION DEMANDED. “Let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands.” The humiliation of the people more than external”Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts” (Isa 55:7)instinctive recognition of the holiness of Godit is unholy acts and an unholy spirit that excite his displeasure (see Isa 58:5-7). Violence specifiedthe rapacious cruelty which characterized the people, and the cry of which had come up before God. When once conscience was roused, it would condemn these acts of violence very loudly. Interesting and beautiful sightall classes hastening to put away their evil ways, and reversing them, doing the very opposite to what they had been wont to do.
“Sinners listened to Jonah,
And each one confessed his sins.
The polluted city heard him,
And quickly put off its abominations.
Masters also heard him,
And proclaimed freedom to their bondmen:
At the voice of Jonah honourable women
Brought down their pride in sackcloth:
The repentance was indeed sincere
When haughty women put on humility!…
The gay laid restraint upon their eyes,
That they might not gaze on women.
Women laid aside their ornaments,
That those who looked on them might not stumble.”
(Ephraem Syrus, translated by Burgess)
Abiding picture of what ought to be the attitude of kings and people in times of national calamitysin is then felt to be a curse and a poison: “Search us, O God, and know our hearts; try us, and know our thoughts, and see if there be any wicked way in us, and lead us in the way everlasting.”
V. REASON FOR THESE STEPS. (Verse 9) “Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce wrath, that we perish not?” Only a possibility”Who can tell?” But in time of extreme peril a possibility ought to be acted on. “We cannot plead this on the score of justice, neither can we ply his faithfulness with any specific assurance of mercy, given to meet the necessities of our case; we have nothing to encourage us but the general character of God himself, as manifested in his dealings with men on earth. But still we have that, and the matter is not altogether hopeless. For why should God have sent his prophet to admonish us of sin, and foretell his impending judgmenta prophet too who has himself been the subject of singular mercy and forbearance? If destruction alone had been his object, would he not rather have allowed us to sleep on in our sinfulness? And why in particular should these forty days have been made to run between our doom and our punishment? Surely this bespeaks some thought of mercy in God; it must have been meant to leave the door still open to us for forgiveness and peace” (Fairbairn). The proclamation and the reason for it were not perfectdid not go beyond the spirit of fear and tremblingbut the Ninevites acted on their light. “if there be first a ready mind, it is accepted according to what a man hath, and not according to what he hath not” (2Co 8:12). Whoever faithfully follows the light he has may look for more”to him that hath shall be given.” It is interesting to think how Jonah’s prophecy would affect the young, and it is the property of childhood to receive testimony with full belief in it. Possibly the emotion of the children may have helped to move the parents. Prospect of speedy death is naturally more terrible to young than old. The following picture of the scene by Ephraem Syrus may be quoted:
“The children inquired while weeping
Of their fathers, in the midst of their tears,
‘Narrate to us, O parents,
How many days yet remain
Prom the time which that Hebrew preacher
Hath determined for us?
And what hour he hath indicated
When we shall go down below to Sheol?
And in what day will it be
That this fair city shall be destroyed?
And further, when will the last day be,
After which we shall not exist?
When will the season arrive,
When mortal pangs shall seize on all of us?
And when, throughout the world
Shall fly the tidings of our ruin?
And the passing spectators shall gaze upon
The city overthrown upon its masters?’
“When the parents listened to these things
From the mouth of their little ones,
Their tears most bitterly
Overflowed, and suffused their children,
And dropped at the same time on the persons
Of the speakers and the hearers.
And the fathers were not able
To find utterance through sighing;
For their grief had closed up
The straight path of words;
And their speech was interrupted
By the weeping of their beloved ones?”
Read the analogy between threatened destruction of Nineveh and destruction of sinners at the last day. Reasons for repentance in one case infinitely stronger in other. Natural indifference and unbelief of men in reference to the latter. Accumulated guilt of those who refuse him that speaketh from heaven. “The men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with the men of this generation, and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah: and behold, a greater than Jonah is here.”
(1) They had but one preacher, and that a stranger.
(2) They heard but one message, and it was wrath.
(3) They had but a vague hope of mercy.W.G.B.
Jon 3:10
God repenting.
“And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that be had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.” Merciful character of God vindicated. “He retaineth not anger forever, because he delighteth in mercy;” “I said, I will confess my transgression unto the Lord; and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin;” “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
I. THE CAUSE OF THE CHANGE. “God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way.” He not only heard their professions, but saw from their acts that these were real; they believed Godbelieved that on account of their sins his “fierce anger” rested on them, and they showed their faith by their works; and the particular kind of works was their turning from their evil waynot resorting to matters of will worship, such as self-mutilation or making children pass through the fire, not stretching forth hands or making many prayers, but abandoning the sin that had offended God; not giving money to build or ornament temples or buy God’s favour, but tearing the idol from their heartsturning from their evil way. The real test of repentance is giving up sinfavourite sin, pleasant sinsins of sensuality and indulgence and display; giving them up as acts, and trying to give them up as objects of desire; seeking to have the heart cleansed as well as the hands; to have the natural love of them subdued by the thought that they excite against us the fierce wrath of God; and in our case, under the light of the gospel, by all the considerations derived from the cross of Christ, and God’s display of love and grace in him. Was the repentance of Nineveh complete, inward, spiritual? This is not said, nor is it necessary to believe it was. Probably it did not last long. It was repentance, however, according to their light and circumstancesthe expression of deep national concern for sins that had come up before God, and against which God had sent his prophet to testify. It was an acknowledgment of the God of Jonah as the God of the whole eartha submission of themselves to himsuch submission as would have saved Egypt and Pharaoh, had it been made, in Moses’ time, with accompanying tokens of sorrow and sincerity. Higher quality of repentance is demanded from an individual than from a nation; fellowship of reconciled God with the individual is much more intimate and spiritual than with the nation; such fellowship is impossible, save in case of regenerate hearts; in “repentance unto life” there must be genuine hating of what God hates, and loving what he loves.
II. THE CHANGE ON THE PART OF GOD. “God repented of the evil, that he had said he would do unto them; and he did it not.” It is frequently objected that this implies fickleness on the part of God, as if he were mutableas if he were a son of man that he should repent. But fickleness or mutability implies change of action while circumstances remain the same; immutability demands change of action when circumstances change. Immutability is tested by principles on which one acts rather than on the outward actions one performs; hence there is no fickleness on part of God in opposite actions, as when he placed man in Paradise and afterwards drove him forth. When God said by Jonah, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be destroyed,” he meant that NinevehNineveh if it continued the same, black with guilt, impenitent, unreformed. He did not mean that another Nineveh would be destroyedNineveh fasting, penitent, transformed. At the end of forty days old Nineveh did not exist; the corruption that would have drawn down the Divine judgment was removedin a sense that old Nineveh was destroyedit had passed away. Consequently, the denunciation ceased to be applicable; the doom threatened was not inflicted. This was the whole amount of the change on the part of God. The phrase, “God repented,” is an anthropomorphism; God acted as man would have done if he had repentedregarded it no longer as a case for infliction of judgment. God’s denunciations of judgment are directed rather against states of mind and conduct than particular places or communitiesimplying, usually, a chance of repentance, In some cases the time for repentance had passed, and denunciation of doom became absoluteas in the case of our Lord weeping over Jerusalem. In rejecting him they had filled up the measure of their iniquities. Their house was left desolate. “We are ever to guard against assigning human imperfection to God. But we are equally to guard against assigning to him such a character or nature as would render living, intelligible, friendly intercourse between him and his people impossible. But impossible utterly all such intercourse may be, if I may not speak to God in the same forms and phrases and feelings in which I would offer a request, or state my case to a fellow man, though of course retaining unreserved submission and unlimited adoration of the Mighty One of Israel. My adoration unbounded; my surrender of myself to God unreservedly;these are tributes to the searchless glory of his Godhead which I may not withhold, and yet profess to worship him. Nevertheless, with these I must be allowed, in condescension to my weakness, to ask God to be ‘attentive to the voice of my supplications;’ to ‘behold and visit me;’ to ‘stretch out his hand’ for my help; to ‘shine upon me with the light of his countenance;’ to ‘awake; ‘ to ‘arise;’ to ‘draw near; ‘to’ come and dwell with me.’ All these expressions and requests are after the manner of men. I must be allowed to spread out my sorrow and my trial before him, precisely as if my design and expectation were to work on his feelings, and move and induce him in his pity to deliver me” (Martin).
III. NINEVAH IS SPARED. Picture the city as the fortieth day approached; when it dawned; afterwards, when it passed away and Nineveh remained. Picture universal relief and joyold and youngcongratulationslife appearing before them with a new brightnessthe day breaks, and the shadows flee away. Symbol of what may be realized when the anger of God due to sin is averted: “In that day thou shalt say, O Lord, I will praise thee: though thou wast angry with me, throe anger is turned away, and thou comfortest me” (Isa 12:1). “What, then, must we expect will be the sweet surprise and transport of the departed soul on his first entrance into glory; when translated of a sudden from this material world to the world of spirits; from among men into the immediate presence of God? What must be his sensations, delight, and astonishment, when first conducted into the presence of the Saviour reigning on the throne of heaven? What will be his feelings when he sees around the throne a company which no man can number, all arrayed in white robes, and wearing brilliant crowns that never fade; all in transport of joy, singing of redeeming love, and celebrating the praises of the Lamb that was slain, and their voices like the sound of many waters? When the soul first joins this company, and reviews the dangers it has escaped in the world below, its love will kindle into a burning flame, and its song will be eternal.”W.G.B.
HOMILIES BY G.T. COSTER
Jon 3:1-4
Jonah in Ninevah.
I. A GREAT RESTORATION. After his recreancy to duty, who had been surprised if Jonah had been thrust out of the prophet’s office? The guilt of his flight, the moral insensibility into which he had sunken, rendered him, many would think, unfit to be God’s spokesman to men. But God had mercy on him. And saved, he had presently the assurance of it. He was reinstated in the prophet’s office, and solemnly commissioned anew to the prophet’s work. A “second time” bidden go, he went. It was a great restoration, and openly marked by the great errand on which he was sent. The work showed that the worker was restored. For that still the backslider is recovered. Not for mere personal enjoyment in religion. Not merely to have the assurance of individual safety. But also to “show” what great things God hath done for him. Was Peter restored? Let him prove it: “Feed my sheep . my lambs.” So was Jonah comforted; restored, he had the assurance of it in the renewed commission, “Go to Nineveh.”
II. A GREAT SPHERE FOR WORK. God himself, in giving this commission, spoke of Nineveh as “that great city.” Jonah knew from human testimony that the city was great. But God says it is. Then let Jonah be ready for difficulties. It is no little work to which he is bidden. And is the greatness of Nineveh mentioned only to prepare him for the magnitude of the task before him? Is there not implied therein a reason, should the people repent, for the Divine compassion? “Should not I spare Nineveh, that great city?” (Jon 4:11). In a town, with its many homes, families, cares, virtues, vices,how much to impress a human imagination, to affect a human heart! But in great cities, throbbing with restless life, each man of the millioned multitude with his own history, his own destiny, how the solemn interest is deepened! Great cities are great to God. Religion is the only protection of city or state. The repentance of the Ninevites averted the doom of Nineveh; its wealth, valour, fame, availed not to effect this. This punishment of nations as such comes in this world. The sins of nations have destroyed them. May our own nation know the time of its visitation, that it perish not!
III. A GREAT EXAMPLE. Jonah is here seen at his best. There is a moral sublimity in his promptitude. “Arise, go.” He went. The difficulty of obedience always grows by delay, it may be hard at the beginning, but it will be easier then than ever after. “God loveth a cheerful giver,” whatever be the gift. Bold was Jonah. Wisely bold. As soon as Nineveh was reached he began his solemn cry. Bold, though alone. He had no human companion to encourage him, to help him. Bold, to utter the cry of woe. Destruction was the burden of his oft-repeated message. Nothing in that to gather affection to himloving, joyful attention. May his courage be ours! We have glad tidings to tell; and no such lonely path to tread as he. With such a message, and with the viewless presence of the Messenger, we may well be of good courage.G.T.C.
Jon 3:2
The preaching that God bids.
1. Not the message of our own imagination.
2. Not what me, desire and what will be palatable to them.
3. But what God bids. To the messenger he gives the messagefrom his Word; by his Spirit.
His gospelnot altered, not added to, not diminishedis to be preached “to every creature.” With faithfulness, simplicity, persistencewhether men hear or whether men forbear. Like Luther, “I can do no other; God help me!”G.T.C.
Jon 3:5-9
Jonah’s successful ministry in Nineveh.
With a quick and marvellous success was Jonah’s ministry crowned. Doubtless the Ninevites knew how he had sought to escape his mission to them, and all the perilous and miraculous consequences of his flight. This seems clearly implied in our Lord’s words, who says that Jonah was “a sign unto the Ninevites.” And he only could be this in so far as they were acquainted with his history. He was “a sign” that Jehovah was not to be trifled with. If he, a friend of Jehovah, had been punished, what might the enemies expect? “A sign “also of Jehovah’s mercy as well as justice. If he had been saved, might not they? If their case had been utterly hopeless, why had he come at all? So, though they had seen no miracle, they “believed God.” That doom was at hand; doom that mightwho could tell?be averted, if they “battered the gates of heaven with storms of prayer.” They proclaimed a fast; “the people;” for then, as always, national repentance and reformation worked its way upward. Here, from the people, at length reaching the nobles and the king. He, too, was a man and in peril, and, like his subjects, must repent. And, by royal proclamation, all were bidden fast, be clad in sackcloth; the creatures, too, dependent on them, by their mute misery were to share in the national humiliation. Above all, let the people “cease to do evil,” and show a changed heart by an altered life. The humiliation of the Ninevites was
I. ROOTED IN FAITH. “They believed God.” What were Asshur and their many gods to them now? Jehovah was the living God. All else were dead. They believed in his power to punish; and also that if they turned from their evil way, he would turn from the fierceness of his anger, and they should perish not. Not “idle words” were Jonah’s. Not heard with critic ear. Not questioned, much less opposed. Jonahwho was he? God’s messenger. They believed God. Hence their repentance. Had they not believed, they had been unrepentant. How they rebuke many among us today! Those who have heard many of God’s messengers: why turn they not from their evil way? Because they believe not God. This is the capital count in the Divine indictment against man. He makes God a liar. He believes not the testimony God has given in his Son. The terrible testimony against sin as the dark, dreadful evil it is. The gracious testimony to his unutterable love, that only could be truly vocal as it spoke in the sorrow, sufferings, and death agonies of his Son. Did man believe with the heart this, it would be to repentanceto righteousness. “Believe God.” Rooted in faith, the conduct of the Ninevites was
II. FRUITFUL IN REPENTANCE. True belief and true repentance are ever connected as root and fruit.
“If faith produce no works, I see
That faith is not a living tree.”
The Ninevites fasted, put on sackcloth, cried mightily to God. And is the expression of our repentance to be the same as theirs? Are we to fast? If given to the pleasures of the table, to fulness of bread, abstinence will be welL. Whatever hinders the soul must be avoided. If gay clothing is a temptation to us, we must watch against that peril. The soul must be supreme. Let it “cry mightily.” Cry that it may be truly repentant. For “godly sorrow” is the gift of God. The doom coming on the Ninevites was averted. By what? Not the fasting; not the sackcloth; not even the mighty crying, though a whole city was at prayer. God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way” (verse 10). That plucked them from the peril. There was repentancea change of mind; reformationa change of life. All is nothing without that. Turn from all evil. Have you wronged another .9 Confess it; make restitution. Be the changed mind seen in the changed life. The way of sin is an evil way and ends in evil. Turn from it. “Lord, make me pure and holy, but not now,” prayed the unconverted Augustine. It must be now. Turn from sin, and “who can tell if God will turn?” “Tell?” You knowas did not the Ninevitesthe glorious gospel, that God waits to be gracious; that for Christ’s sake he will forgive you. Be not shamed and condemned by the repentant Ninevites. “They repented at the preaching of Jonah; and, behold, a greater than Jonah is here.”G.T.C.
Jon 3:10
Missions to the heathen.
1. The heathen are capable of salvation.
2. God purposes their salvation.
3. The Jews were the divinely appointed first preachers of salvation to the Gentile heathens.
Jewish Jonah, the first of the prophets, was sent to heathen Nineveh. A real example thin of the genius of the gospel.” And the Jewish apostles were sent to preach Jesus Christ to “every creature? He died for all!G.T.C.
Jon 3:10
God repenting.
It is another people in Nineveh that God now looks down upon. These have “ceased to do evil.” “God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way.” Then is the threatened doom to come? No; “God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.” And yet in other Scriptures God is said not to repent. Words can only faintly portray a human friend. How feeble, then, are all words to declare God! Words that seem to us to contradict each other are necessary to convey to us a fuller, clearer view of him. If in one Scripture God is said not to repent, or “change his mind” (as the word means), that is true. If in another he is said to do so, that is also true. The Scripture fearlessly declares both.]t makes no attempt to harmonize them. We may be unable to do so. And yet we may believe both; confident that they are in harmony if we cannot harmonize them. Men repent, or change their mind, in reference to sin. God repents, or changes his mind, in reference to the sinner.
I. IN HIS OWN NATURE GOD IS CHANGELESS. What changes there are in earth and sky, the seasons, human life and experience! “Man continueth not in one stay.” With God” is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.” He never ceases to be almighty, omniscient, “the only wise God.” He says, “I am the Lord, I change not” (Ma Jon 3:6). This was the Divine message by Balaam to Balak: “God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent; hath he said, and shall he not do it?” etc. (Num 23:19, Num 23:20). In other words, no enchantment, no divination, could avail against Israel. What were Balak’s bribes to God? He could fulfil his promises to Israelfor he was almighty; he would, for he was faithful. Further, in various Scriptures (Gen 6:3; Jer 18:7; as well as here) we are taught
II. THAT GOD REPENTS, OR CHANGES HIS MIND. Some would limit this to God’s altered dealings with men; to his acts, never to his feelings. They hold that in his feelings he is ever the same to men; that none of the affections found in us have any counterpart in him; that he looks down upon all human changessorrows, joys, conflicts, defeats, triumphscold, calm, unmoved, immovable! What! a God only thought, only will? No mercy, no pity, no sympathy, no love? Unlovely creed! “God is love.” Then he has the feelings of love, without, indeed, the imperfections that may mingle with ours. He is “the Father of our spirits.” Our emotions are the image of his; in him “without spot,” or defect,” or any such thing.” It is no mere figure of meaningless speech that speaks of him as “angry with the wicked” as “pitying them that fear him,” as rejoicing over his penitent creatures; as repenting concerning Nineveh. With no idle threatening was Jonah sent to the Ninevites. God then meant destruction. And had the people not repented, it would have come. But the very threatening was blessed to them. They saw the greatness of their sin in the greatness of the imminent punishment. And when their state of rebellion and defiance ceased, their city came into a new relation to God, “and room was made for the word to take effect; ‘the curse causeless shall not come.'” God knew that the city would be spared. Yes. But he also knew that, when spared, it would be another citya city not of violent rebels against him, but of penitent subjects. God is righteous in all his ways. He rewards every man according to his works. It was in accordance, then, with his nature, that when the Ninevites turned from their evil courses with true heart sorrow, he should turn from the fierceness of his anger. There is warning here. God’s threatenings are not to be trifled with. Remember the destroyed sinners “in the days of Noah;” ultimately these very Ninevites; and the Jew, “tribe of the wandering foot and weary breast,” is witness today through all lands to the tact that when a warned nation repents not, God is faithful to his warning. And so with the individual. Let the warned sinner “flee from the wrath to come.” What consolation, too, in this narrative! God is “not willing that any should perish; but that all should come to repentance.” How willinghow revealed in Christ, who came to “call sinners to repentance”! Turn from sin. God will turn to you. From afar he will see you. He will run to meet you. He will kiss into forgetfulness all your sins. He waits to be gracious. “He delighteth in mercy.”G.T.C.
Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary
CHAPTER 3
[The Renewal of Jonahs Commission (Jon 3:1-2). His Preaching to the Ninevites (Jon 3:3-4). Humiliation and Reformation of the Ninevites (Jon 3:5-9) Reversal of the Divine Sentence (Jon 3:10).C. E.]
1And the word of the Lord [Jehovah] came [was communicated] unto Jonah the second time, saying, 2Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto 3it the preaching [make the proclamation to it] that I bid thee. So [And] Jonah arose, and went unto [to] Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord [Jehovah]. Now [And] Nineveh was an exceeding great city [a great city to God] of three days journey. 4And Jonah began to enter into the city a days journey [a journey of one day], and he cried1 [proclaimed], and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall 5be overthrown. So [And] the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them. 6For [And] word came [had come] unto [to] the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he [omit he] laid his robe from him [put off his robe from him], and covered him [himself] with sack cloth, and sat in ashes. 7And he caused it to be proclaimed and published [and said] through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let 8them not feed, nor drink water:2 But [And] let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea [and] let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands. 9Who can tell3 [knoweth] if [but that] [the] God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger 10[glow of anger], that we perish not? And [the] God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil that [which] he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Jon 3:1-9. The preaching of Repentance by Jonah in Nineveh and its Result.
Jon 3:1-2. God sends the prophet, the second time, to make his proclamationhis Krahagainst Nineveh; the same that was to be put in his mouth. , part. fut. as in Isa 5:5. [ signifies, according to the idiomatic use of the participle, about to tell, and suggests the idea of a proximate futurity.C. E.]
Jon 3:3. Jonah is made wiser by the chastisement which he experienced, and does not again attempt to evade the call.
Now Nineveh was a great city (comp. the Introduction, p. 9) before God [fr Gott]. The ,dativus ethicus designates not an inward peculiar relation of Nineveh to God, as in the passage (Act 7:20) quoted by Hitzig; but it corresponds to the phrase before God, which is applied to Nimrod, the founder of the city (Gen 10:9), and denotes here the world-position of the city, there of the person. Men may appear great to their people; cities to their possessors, or spectators, and still not occupy a world-position. (Deu 1:28). [ , a city great to God. This phrase has been variously explained. Some, with Kimchi, deem it merely a superlative form; Gesenius construes the instrumentally, great through God, i. e., through his favor. Others consider it to be equivalent to before God, Gen 10:9. Thus the Targum . Of this last interpretation I approve, as it was most natural to refer the size of a city, of which the Hebrews could form no adequate conception, to the Divine estimation. I have accordingly rendered the words literally, as our preposition to is often used to note opinion, or estimate. Henderson On Jonah.
But Nineveh was a great city to God (lelhm), i. e., it was regarded by God as a great city. This remark points to the motive for sparing it (cf. Jon 4:11) in case its inhabitants hearkened to the word of God. Keil and Delitzsch.
Nineveh was an exceeding great city; lit. great to God, i. e., that would not only appear great to man who admires things of no account, but what, being really great, is so in the judgment of God who cannot be deceived. God did account it great, who says to Jonah, Should not I spare Nineveh that great city, which hath more than six score thousand that cannot discern between their right and their left? It is a different idiom from that, when Scripture speaks of the mountains of God, the cedars of God. For of these it speaks, as having their firmness or their beauty from God, as their Author. Pusey.
The phrase an exceeding great city, stands in the Hebrew, a city great to God, i. e., great before Him,great as to Him, in his estimation. The Hebrews were accustomed to express their highest ideas of the superlative degree by using the name of God, e.g., mountains of God, etc. The sense of this passage may be somewhat more specific, representing the city as great in its relations to God, and not merely as very great apart from these relations. Cowles.
See Lange on Gen 10:9; also the note by T. L.C. E.]
Three days journeyaccusative of measure, as in Gen 14:4.
Since (comp. on Jon 1:2) the direct diameter of the city was only a days journey, then the circumference is either designated by (this signification of , though consistent with the statement that the circumference of the city was four hundred and eighty stadia in extent, cannot be maintained), or the way (comp. Eze 42:4), which united together the market-places of the different individual cities forming the great aggregate [complexes], and which it was, therefore, necessary to travel over, in order to go entirely through the city. Jon 3:4, in which designates the way which Jonah travelled over, during the first day ( , Ges. sec. 120, 4), points to the latter supposition. So certain is he of his message, and so impressed with the urgency of his mission, that he immediately begins to enter into the city, before obtaining a survey of it, and commences to preach on the first days journey. His sermon is short, but powerful: Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. Forty days are here a round number, meaning after a short time, whose term Jonah measures by the period of the deluge. The LXX. translate it by a still more rigid formula,Yet three days. This shortening of the time, however, would not harmonize with the facts of the case, since no time would have been left to the Ninevites for repentance,4 for Jonah required three days to go through the city. The word employed to denote the destruction is the old prophetical technical term , evertere (Isa 1:7; Isa 13:19), which everywhere points back to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrha. (Original passage, Gen 19:25)
[Jon 3:4. Its greatness amounted to a three days walk. This is usually supposed to refer to the circumference of the city, by which the size of a city is generally determined. But the statement in Jon 3:4, that Jonah began to enter into the city the walk of a day, i. e., a days journey, is apparently at variance with this. Hence Hitzig has come to the conclusion that the diameter of the city is intended, and that, as the walk of a day in Jon 3:4 evidently points to the walk of three days in Jon 3:3, the latter must also be understood as referring to the length of Nineveh. But according to Diod. ii. 3 the length of the city was one hundred and fifty stadia, and Herod. (v. 53) gives just this number of stadia, as a days journey. Hence Jonah would not have commenced his preaching till he had reached the opposite end of the city. This line of argument, the intention of which is to prove the absurdity of the narrative, is based upon the perfectly arbitrary assumption that Jonah went through the entire length of the city in a straight line, which is neither probable in itself, nor implied in . This simply means to enter, or go into the city, and says nothing about the direction of the course he took within the city. But in a city, the diameter of which was one hundred and fifty stadia, and the circumference four hundred and eighty stadia, one might easily walk for a whole day without reaching the other end, by winding about from one street into another. And Jonah would have to do this to find a suitable place for his preaching, since we are not warranted in assuming that it lay exactly in the geographical centre, or at the end of the street which led from the gate into the city. But if Jonah wandered about in different directions, as Theodoret says, not going through the city, but strolling through market places, streets, etc., the distance of a days journey over which he travelled must not be understood as relating to the diameter or length of the city; so that the objection to the general opinion, that the three days journey given as the size of the city refers to the circumference, entirely falls to the ground. Moreover, Hitzig has quite overlooked the word in his argument. The text does not affirm that Jonah went a days journey into the city, but that he began to go into the city a days journey, and cried out. These words do not affirm that he did not begin to preach till after he had gone a whole days journey, but simply that he had commenced his days journey in the city when he found a suitable place and a fitting opportunity for his proclamation. They leave the distance that he had really gone, when he began his preaching, quite indefinite; and by no means necessitate the assumption that he had only begun to preach in the evening, after his days journey was ended. All that they distinctly affirm is, that he did not preach directly he entered the city, but only after he had commenced a days journey, that is to say, had gone some distance into the city. And this is in perfect harmony with all that we know about the size of Nineveh at that time. The circumference of the great city Nineveh, or the length of the boundaries of the city of Nineveh in the broadest sense, was, as Niebuhr says (p. 277), nearly ninety English miles, not reckoning the smaller windings of the boundary; and this would be just three days travelling for a good walker on a long journey. Jonah, he continues, begins to go a days journey into the city, then preaches, and the preaching reaches the ears of the king (cf. Jon 3:6). He therefore came very near to the citadel as he went along on his first days journey. At that time the citadel was probably in Nimrod (Calah). Jonah, who would hardly have travelled through the desert, went by what is now the ordinary caravan road past Amida, and therefore entered the city at Nineveh. And it was on the road from Nineveh to Calah, not far off the city, possibly in the city itself, that he preached. Now the distance between Calah and Nineveh (not reckoning either city), measured in a straight line upon the map, is eighteen and a half English miles. If, then, we add to this, (1) that the road from Nineveh to Calah or Nimrod hardly ran in a perfectly straight line, and therefore would be really longer than the exact distance between the two parts of the city according to the map, and (2) that Jonah had first of all to go through Nineveh, and possibly into Calah, he may very well have walked twenty English miles, or a short days journey, before he preached. The main point of his preaching is all that is given, namely, the threat that Nineveh should be destroyed, which was the point of chief importance, so far as the object of the book was concerned, and which Jonah of course explained by denouncing the sins and vices of the city. Keil and Delitzsch.C. E.]
Jon 3:5. Then the men of Nineveh believed God. That the Babylonians had a great respect for divination, so that what is here related does not appear strange (Keil), may appear apologetically an important observation; but this was probably not in the mind of the writer: it was his intention to relate something extraordinary. Moreover, he would not have employed the expression believe, but the more common , fear, or a similar word. (See moreover below at Jon 3:8.) The word believe here, as often elsewhere, is used with special reference to the appropriation of prophetical instruction to the souls inner life (Isa 7:9; Hab 2:4), without however excluding the element of justification, when confidence is exercised in the mercy of God. Its fruits, Jon 3:5 ff., are those which are required from preaching, repentance, and conversion (Joe 2:15 ff.). And this repentance was indeed a general one, a repentance of the people, as it was carried out by bringing over to it all the inhabitants, the king, and even the beasts. Jon 3:6 ff. is only a fuller recital of the brief historical statement in Jon 3:5, and should, according to the context, be rendered in the pluperfect: For the matter had come to the King of Nineveh, etc, to Jon 3:9. Our author is fond of such pluperfect adjuncts (Jon 1:5-10). Following the natural, epic character of the narrative, we have retained the aorist in the translation. The king rises from his throne (comp. 2Sa 13:31), and lays aside his royal robe (comp. Jos 7:21), puts on a mourning-dress and sits in ashesall a sign of sorrow and repentance (Eze 26:16).
The verbs in Jon 3:7 ff. have the indefinite subject one: one proclaimed and said in Nineveh by the command of the king and his nobles also, etc. The royal heralds are meant, to whom the execution of the (a north-Semitic word = , comp. Dan 3:29 f.) was committed. That the beasts were included in the public humiliation is nothing unusual in the East. When Masistios fell at Plata, the Persians, in honor of him, sheared the hair from their horses. (Herod. ix. 24. Comp. Brissonius, De Regni Persarum Principiis, II. c. 206). Horses hung with black were, in the time of Chrysostom, frequently seen at funeral processions, and they are frequently to be seen at the present day. The custom has its foundation in the lively feeling of the mutual adaptation of man and nature. (Comp. Joe 1:18, and the description of the great grief in the fifth Eclogue of Virgil [also neid, 11:89, c. e.].) Besides it is especially mentioned here as a reason, just as great and small Jon 3:5, that not merely repentance of sin, but also compassion toward guiltless creatures should move God to spare them (Jon 4:11). But it is not required to press to the utmost the separate applications of the royal edict, in the interest of the fides historica, otherwise we would be obliged to infer from Jon 3:8 that the cattle were clothed in mourning and that their lowing was taken for prayer, which was certainly not so. The strength of the expressions paints the depth of the repentance, and Jon 3:8 b shows the reason of their use by the king and by the narrator, who reproduces the edict: and let them turn every one from his evil way (Eze 18:23), etc., that we perish not (comp. Jon 1:6). It is too strongly asserted that this result of Jonahs denunciation of doom is psychologically incomprehensible in itself (Hitzig), because he spoke as a foreigner to a foreign people in a foreign language. But the esteem of antiquity for the oracles of the gods [Gtterstimmen] is known; and the fact that the limits of national worship were thereby left undetermined, in proof of which we cite the well-known fact that Crsus consulted the Grecian oracles (comp. Ezr 1:1 ff.; Genesis 41; Numbers 22; Luke 7). And the more threatening these oracles were, the more certain were they to obtain belief, as is natural, since the threatenings of divine punishment have a powerful ally in the conscience of man. If one reflects on the excitement, which ruled the souls of men about the year 1000 A. D.; on the results which the discourses of a Peter of Amiens, Capistrano, and others of their time had, though delivered in a language not understood; and considers that awe in which holy men were held by antiquity, of which even profane writers afford frequent examples, then the psychological difficulty vanishes, and there is no need of bringing the affinity of the Hebrew and Assyrian languages to our help, in order to find the result possible. It is injudicious to remove, in the interests of apologetics, everything miraculous from the narrative; but it is equally so to push, in the interest of polemics, the miraculous to silliness. Another psychological motive to repentance on the part of the Ninevites our Lord indicates, Luk 11:30, when by the expression , he undoubtedly brings to light that the account of the wonderful events of his life formed an essential part of Jonahs sermon on repentance. (Comp. Luk 11:32, and the Ob. of Luther on Jon 3:4 below.)
With reference to , Jon 3:9-10 (comp. Jon 1:6) Burck remarks: Non hic adhibetur nomen Jehovah, quia de populo gentili ser mo est. Jehov cognitio sublimior, quam Dei.
Jon 3:10. The Compassion. As faith expects, so it comes to pass. (Comp. Exo 32:12; Exo 32:14.) God looked upon the Ninevites: He turned his countenance, with kind thoughts, toward them. (Comp. Jon 3:9; Jon 3:1; Jon 3:6.)
[But however deep the penitential mourning of Nineveh might be, and however sincere the repentance of the people, when they acted according to the kings command; the repentance was not a lasting one, or permanent in its effects. Nor did it evince a thorough conversion to God, but was merely a powerful incitement to conversion, a waking up out of the careless security of their life of sin, an endeavor to forsake their evil ways which did not last very long. The statement in Jon 3:10, that God saw their doing, that they turned from their evil ways; and He repented of the evil that He had said that He would do to them, and did it not (cf. Exo 32:14), can be reconciled with this without difficulty. The repentance of the Ninevites, even if it did not last, showed, at any rate, a susceptibility on the part of the heathen for the word of God, and their willingness to turn and forsake their evil and ungodly ways; so that God, according to his compassion, could extend his grace to them in consequence. God always acts in this way. He not only forgives the converted man, who lays aside his sin, and walks in newness of life; but He has mercy also upon the penitent who confesses and mourns over his sin, and is willing, to amend. The Lord also directed Jonah to preach repentance to Nineveh; not that this capital of the heathen world might be converted at once to faith in the living God, and its inhabitants be received into the covenant of grace which He had made with Israel, but simply to give his people Israel a practical proof that He was the God of the heathen also, and could prepare for Himself even among them a people of his possession. (Keil and Delitzsch.)
Dr. Pusey expresses himself unwarrantably, when he says: But, what Scripture chiefly dwells upon, their repentance was not only in profession, in belief, in outward act, but in the fruit of genuine works of repentance, a changed life out of a changed heart. Their whole way and course of life was evil; they broke off, not the one or other sin only, but all, their whole evil way. Dr. P. has inserted the adjective whole before evil way. It is not used by the sacred writer. The repentance of the Ninevites wasthough in some instances, it may have been morea public confession and humiliation ordered by the king and his nobles.C. E.].
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL5
See Introduction, p. 5 ff.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
The repentance of the Ninevites, a model of a genuine national repentance.
1. It hears Gods proclamation and asks not why? Jon 3:1-4.
2. It springs from faith and is accompanied by faith? Jon 3:5; Jon 3:9.
3. It bows itself under the curse of the common guilt, and not a single person asks: how much have I deserved? Jon 3:6 ff.
4. It is united with the purpose of amendment.
On Jon 3:1. The Lord does not withdraw his calls. (Comp. Joh 21:16.) It is a great and enduring grace to be called by Him. Jon 3:2. No one should undertake, of his own absolute power, to threaten others with the Divine wrath and punishment. Preachers, who speak from their own mind, have no right to do so. Therefore, consider well and pray for the Holy Spirit, and entirely humble thyself, and forget thyself, if thou hast in mind to, or must perform such a duty.
Jon 3:3. Whoever feels that he is sent of God should not be afraid of the greatest city. As many a the Lord intends shall hear Him, will hear Him.
Jon 3:4. Speak promptly and delay not. In Gods kingdom every moment is precious. The time, when He puts his word in thy mouth, is the right time; not that which thou fanciest for thyself.
Jon 3:5. Because the Ninevites believed, they repented. Repentance comes not from the law alone; but from the law and faith. From the law alone comes death. Children are not innocent.
Jon 3:6. It becomes a king, who takes precedence in everything, to take the lead also in repentance. (Psalms 51) In repentance and especially before God, all are on a level; purple is of no avail, but only a broken heart. Magistracy is of Gods appointment; but those who possess it are nevertheless sinners.
Jon 3:7. It is a good work and belongs to the office of the magistrate to foster true piety. The state has not merely the negative duty of providing that those who observe their religious festivals [Feiertage] be not disturbed, but also a positive duty. There is no state conceivable with out having duties to discharge to religion and the church. The kingdom of God can subsist without it, but not the reverse. To repentance belongs necessarily the purpose of amendment.
Jon 3:9. The heathen do not despair of Gods mercy, though they do not yet know Christ. It is worse than heathenish to doubt that God is gracious and ready to forgive.
Jon 3:10. The repentance of God is included in his gracious decree. It is the harmonizing of [die Auseinandersetzung zwischen, lit., the settlement between] wrath and forgiveness, justice and love. Wrath is not the final end; but it has for its end and object, love. Law without the Gospel would be an ungodly thing: the Old Testament cannot subsist without the New. Woe to him who makes light of the wrath of God: he can never taste of love.
Luther: Jon 3:1. It is therefore written that we may bear in mind, that nothing is to be undertaken without Gods word and command. For the first command, of God having been violated by disobedience, had not God renewed it, Jonah would not have known, whether he should do it, or not. (Comp. Num 14:1 ff.; Deu 1:41 f.) The Israelites at first would not fight at Gods command; afterward they wished to do so of their own accord and were beaten. (1Pe 4:11.)
Jon 3:2. Nineveh, the city of God. God cares also for the heathen. (2Ki 5:1; Jer 25:9.)
Jon 3:4. He doubtless did not confine himself in preaching to these words; his proclamation is briefly reported.
Jon 3:5. They do some things, which God does not command. Therefore He, afterward, Jon 3:10, does not commend their fasting and sackcloth, but that they turned from their evil way. God saw their earnestness; therefore He permitted the foolish thingsthat the animals should fast, etc.,to be acceptable to Him, which He would not have beheld with favor, had the earnestness been wanting. Free will, or our own power, does not produce such earnestness; but faith by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Jon 3:9. The king speaks as if he doubts. But he doubts not; for doubt does not call upon God and employ such earnestness. A truly penitent heart stands with fear in the contest, and fights against despair; but as it has not yet won, it speaks as if it were uncertain. If there were no faith, it would not hold out amidst such toil and trouble. Therefore, words are rather a sign that faith is there.
Jon 3:10. Here the works are commended; what shall we say against it? Here the legalists have the advantage, yes, a fine advantage! Look at the text. It says, God saw their works, that is, they pleased Him. But what kind of works were they? The text shows: They turned from their evil way. Such works do and teach, then we will not refuse to thee the praise of works; but we will help thee to extol them. To turn from ones evil way is not a trifling work; it includes, not fasting and sackcloth, but faith in God from the heart, and the loving of our neighbor as ourselves; that is, it requires the whole man to be pious and just in both body and soul. For God requires the whole man, and dislikes half-converts and hypocrites.
Starke: Jon 3:1. Gods purpose and command must succeed and be accomplished; for it cannot be hindered or frustrated by any human designs. God by means of the ministry saves sinners by sinners.
Jon 3:2. God even during the time of the Old Covenant, sought the salvation of the heathen.
Jon 3:3. Nineveh, a great city to the Lord, should surely have been devoted to God: God had wrought for it (Jon 4:10). , , nocumenta, documenta, poor in spirit, rich in faith (armselig macht gottselig, Isa 28:19). God can well tolerate great cities, if they only give place to Him and his word.
Jon 3:4. Since God has still his own everywhere, these most likely were the first to have been awakened, and to have served as coadjutors in the preaching of repentance.
Jon 3:5. Credidit Ninive et Israel incredulus perseverat; credidit Prputium, et circumcisio permanet infidelis. Where the Word of God is preached sincerely and purely, there it brings fruit in its season, if not in all, at least in some. (1Th 2:13.) Jonah did in his mission, as did the Apostles. Wherever they came, they did not seek first permission from the magistrate; but they rested [their authority] upon the command of Christ.
Jon 3:7. It is well for the masses of a community, when pious magistrates have also pious servants around them. It is a strong proof of sincere repentance for sins committed to remove every occasion to lust out of the way.
Jon 3:8. One must prove his repentance by external acts. It is a peculiar instance of Divine justice that God suffered Israel to be destroyed by the same people, who repented at the voice of his prophet, while on the contrary, the Israelites had despised all the prophets from Samuel down. Gods decree has always a fundamental reference to conversion [hat die Ordnung der Bekehrung immer zum Grunde].
Pfaff: God does not change his commands. He repeats his calling grace. He calls the sinner twice, thrice, yea, even to the end.
Jon 3:4 : A preacher must speak the truth frankly [deutsch], and not sugar it over and deprive it of its power by ornaments and flattery. One must plainly say to sinners that they are hastening to destruction.
Jon 3:7. Here we find established the right of the magistrate in spiritual things; especially in regard to the externals of Divine worship and its right ordering.
Jon 3:9-10. It is certain that God bestows his grace upon the penitent.
Quandt: Jon 3:1. With God nothing is impossible. Truly, the heart must suffer itself to be broken, otherwise even God cannot break it by his Almighty power. The same word of God, which was rejected and despised by us in former times, is received by us with devotion, when it comes to us the second time and we in the meantime have become different persons. Many individuals and families want nothing but the cross to bring them back.
Jon 3:3. Alas! Jonah has more followers in the way of flight than in the way of obedience.
Jon 3:4. Three ways may be pursued on receiving such a terrible messagedespair, frivolous mockery, repentance and conversion. The Ninevites chose the third.
Jon 3:9. Faith disappoints nobody.
Jon 3:10. That Nineveh was converted was a wonder. With us, it is a wonder, if we are not converted.
Marck: Jon 3:1. God is so good and so indulgent to the weaknesses of his servants, that even after repeated proofs of his grace, He makes known his will to them, not once, but oftener, in order that they may have no pretext of ignorance, but may know the true object of their redemption, namely, to obey the commands of their Redeemer and to manifest his glory.
Burck: God does not utterly reject him, who has failed once; but He rather gives him a new opportunity of correcting former faults.
Rieger: To him, who comes out of trouble, danger, and sickness, God commonly permits an opportunity soon to occur, when he can pay his vows.
Schlier: In renewing the command, God says not a word about the guilt of Jonah; for Jonah is humbled. In the miracle of his deliverance he has learned what obedience is, although he does not yet know what Divine compassion toward the perishing heathen is.
Burck: Jon 3:4. Preaching is usually efficacious, from the very first, among those who do not receive the Word in vain. There is very little hope of those, who have heard the Word of God proclaimed by the same messenger, not merely many days, but years, without becoming better, even if they should have the opportunity of hearing the same preaching a thousand years.
Marck: Jon 3:5. There is not only a very close connection between evil, guilt, and punishment, so that they are commonly mutually dependent, but also the good is connected by intimate bonds, since from one virtue of one man other virtues of others flow, and the Divine blessing follows virtue. This is illustrated by the obedience of Jonah, with which the repentance of the Ninevites and the Divine compassion were closely connected.
Rieger: The exercises of repentance are here described for the most part by the outward circumstances that accompanied them,quite different from what is practiced at the present day, when one would perform the several acts of repentance, devotion, and prayer, in such a quiet way as to be scarcely perceived by those who are nearest about him. But where there is genuine earnestness within, there the outward manifestation is not so readily suppressed.
Burck: Jon 3:6. There is a difference between a court, which is a stranger to the true religion, and one that is attached to it in only a hypocritical way. The former is more easily moved; the latter, in consequence of Gods decree, is more hardened.
Bochart: Jon 3:7. This edict, issued to the Ninevites, in order to appease the anger of God; the edict of Darius (Dan 6:26 ff.); that of Nebuchadnezzar (Dan 3:20), and others, were just so many preparations for the conversion of the heathen, which followed the advent of Christ. In this way Gods goodness and glory became gradually, and in a certain measure, known to the nations, which were strangers to Israel (Exo 5:2).
Schmieder: Jon 3:8. The understanding may call the penitential acts on the part of the beasts foolish; but the heart will seize upon them, because they show deep contrition of heart; and this is certainly the main point here.
Hieronymus: Jon 3:10. God soon changed his purpose, because He saw that their works were changed. He did not hear words, such as Israel was wont to say: All that God has said will we do (Exo 19:8; Exo 24:3); but He saw works. He will rather that the ungodly turn from their evil way, than that they should die. (Eze 18:23; Eze 18:32).
Talmud: Dear brethren, sackcloth and fasting avail nothing; but repentance and good works. For it is not said of the Ninevites, etc.
Burck: How far are Gods thoughts removed from the thoughts of man, even from the thoughts of men, who seem unto others to be sound in the faith.
Rieger: The Lord Jesus bears testimony to this repentance of the people of Nineveh (Mat 12:14), that, in its good consequences, it will extend to the day of judgment; and hence, in sparing them, God must have been sincerely and kindly in earnest. But because Nineveh fell back into its former sins, it was overthrown by the wrath of Jehovah scarcely a century after this salutary conversion: so also it befell Jerusalem, because it did not acknowledge and receive Him, of whom Jonah was a type.
[Calvin: Jon 3:3. He went, then, according to the command of Jehovah; that is, nothing else did he regard but to render obedience to God, and to suffer himself to be wholly ruled by him. We hence learn how well God provides for us and for our salvation, when he corrects our perverseness; though sharp may be our chastisements, yet as this benefit follows, we know that nothing is better for us than to be humbled under Gods hand, as David says in Psalms 119.
Jon 3:10. God had respect to their workswhat works? not sackcloth, not ashes, not fasting; for Jonah does not now mention these; but he had respect to their works, because they turned from their evil way.
Fairbairn: Why should God have sent his prophet to admonish us of sin, and foretell his approaching judgment, a prophet, too, who has himself been the subject of singular mercy and forbearance? If destruction alone had been his object, would he not rather have allowed us to sleep on in our sinfulness? And why, in particular, should these forty days have been made to run between our doom and our punishment? Surely this bespeaks some thought of mercy in God; it must have been meant to leave the door still open to us for forgiveness and peace. So undoubtedly they reasoned, and, as the event proved, reasoned justly.
Pusey: Jon 3:10. And he did it not. God willed rather that his prophecy should seem to fail, than that repentance should fail of its fruit. But it did not indeed fail, for the condition lay expressed in the threat.
Cowles: Jon 3:10. Works meet for repentance will infallibly secure the reversal of threatened and impending doom. Gods immutability is that of principlenot of plan and action. He immutably hates and punishes sin: hence, when a sinner becomes a penitent, God turns from threatened vengeance to free pardon.C. E.]
Footnotes:
[1][Jon 3:2., that which is proclaimed, proclamation; , (LXX.); prdicatio (Vulgate).
[2][Jon 3:7. = , Dan 3:10; Dan 3:29, a technical term for the edicts of the Assyrian and Babylonian kings.
[3][Jon 3:9., who is knowing?C. E.]
[4]For the Heb. Text are Aqu., Symm, Theodot., Syr.; also, Hieron., Theodoret, Aug. Lange, Bibelwerk O. T., 19.
[5][ [Reichsgedanken, see note, p. 20.C. E.].
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
CONTENTS
We have here the Lord again calling Jonah to the service of preaching to the men of Nineveh. The Prophet executeth the commission. And this Chapter records the effect.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Reader! I pray you observe the grace and condescension of the Lord in again calling Jonah to this service. Was it because the Lord had no other servant to employ? that is impossible. But because the Lord will send by whom he will send. Methinks here is a sweet and gracious lesson for ministers. How condescending is it in the Lord to employ any; and more especially such as have before slighted, or run from his service, and done the work of the Lord negligently, Mal 1:13-14 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Repentance (For Ash Wednesday)
Jon 3:5
Among all the passages in the picturesque narratives of the Old and New Testaments, there is none that, as a picture, is more wonderfully illustrative of the repentant life than is this. It brings before us three well-defined points.
I. First, as to the cause which leads a man to repentance. The people of Nineveh are here said to have believed God. I want to submit to you that this curious statement about this people strikes one more forcibly the more one contemplates it. We could imagine the people turning at the sound of the Prophet’s voice and seeing there a stranger, and asking each other what it was he was saying. ‘Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown? What nonsense this man says! He must be beside himself.’ But they say nothing of the sort. Instead, I find that they accepted, according to this story, exactly the judgment that the Prophet foretold. They heard not his voice alone, but they caught the very voice of God, speaking through the Prophet. And, says the story, they believed God. That belief in God was, to the men of Nineveh, the start of their repentance.
II. Then, secondly, here there are recorded the characteristics of the repentant life. Now the vision of God, what is it to you and me? In one way of viewing it, it is the recognition by the mind of man of all that God means. In one very real sense it may be said that God’s attributes are Himself. When we think of God, what do our minds realize but His perfect goodness, His perfect holiness? In fact, you may take every attribute, every ideal, and in that which we call God, that attribute, that ideal has its perfect existence. Now when I go and stand beneath that great life and let my mind go out to the recognition of all that God means, and I catch the vision of His perfect goodness, what does that vision do but drive my mind inwards upon itself and make me recognize my own utter badness? When I look upon God as the perfection of all that is merciful, beautiful, holy, what does it do but make me recognize my own absolute failure in His sight, and I stand in the vision of God through the Holy Spirit’s agency to see myself lost, and undone, a creature without hope except what hope I have in Him, my Ideal? That vision inevitably creates the sternest sorrow that ever invades the life of a man. Repentance turns the mind from sorrow to prayer. Did you notice that the men of Nineveh, led by their king, were told to cry mightily unto God? Prayer is a characteristic of the life of repentance. We go to a trusted minister of Christ, and we open our grief to him, and tell him our fears; but all that he can do is to guide us to this. ‘Cry mightily,’ he says, ‘to God.’ Out of the depths the soul lifts up its voice to God, that He may hear its prayer; and if there is a prayer that ever comes from the soul of man and ascends to the Throne of God, that He cannot turn away from, that He must stretch out His Hand readily and immediately to help, it is the prayer of the repentant soul.
References. III. 5. J. M. Neale, Sermons Preached in Sackville College Chapel, vol. iii. p. 194. W. Howell Evans, Sermons for the Church’s Year, p. 73. III. 10. J. M. Neale, Sermons Preached in Sackville College Chapel, vol. iii. p. 202.
Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson
IV
THE BOOK OF JONAH
Jonah is both the author and the hero of the book by this name. He was the son of Amittai, a reference to whom is also found in 2Ki 14:25 : “He [Jeroboam II] restored the border of Israel from the entrance of Hamath unto the sea of the Arabah, according to the word of Jehovah, the God of Israel, which he spake by his servant Jonah the son of Amittai, the prophet, who was of Gath-hepher.” There can be no doubt as to the identity of this Jonah and the one mentioned in Jonah I: I since this name occurs nowhere else as the “son of Amittai, the prophet.” This passage not only accords with Jon 1:1 in giving the father’s name but it also gives us Jonah’s place of residence and the times in which he prophesied. The place of his birth was Gath-hepher, a town in Zebulun (Jos 19:13 ) about three, miles northeast of Nazareth which shows that he was a prophet of the Northern Kingdom. The time in which he lived is clearly shown to be the reign of Jeroboam II, the “Indian Summer” of Israel’s history after the division of the kingdom (2Ki 14:23-29 ).
There are several traditions relating to Jonah. (1) It is claimed by some that “Jonah”‘ means grieving and “Amittai” means true, from which arose the improbable opinion that Jonah was the son of the widow of Zarephath, whom Elijah raised to life, because of what she said when she received him from the dead (1Ki 17:24 ). (2) It is also supposed by some that Jonah was the boy who attended Elijah into the wilderness. (3) There is another tradition that he was the young man sent to anoint Jehu. (4) And singularly enough, there is the tradition that he was the husband of the Shunammite woman who extended hospitality to Elisha. (5) Respecting his burial place, there is a tradition that he was buried pear Nineveh and another, that he was buried at Gathhepher, his birthplace. It is needless to say that these traditions are without foundation in history but they indicate somewhat the impress of this striking character upon the literature of the world.
There is a reference to this prophecy of Jonah in Tobit 14:4-6; Tobit 14:15, an apocryphal book, in which Nineveh is said to have been overthrown according to this prophecy of Jonah. There are three references to Jonah the prophet in the Koran, viz: In chapter X, p. 157, there is a reference to the repentance of the Ninevites at the preaching of Jonah; in chapter XXXVII, p. 338, there is an account of Jonah’s commission, disobedience, and experience in the sea; in chapter LXVIII, p. 421, there is a reference to his sea experience, God’s mercy to him and his election unto righteousness. In Josephus’ Jewish Antiquities IX, 10:1-2, we have an account of Jonah’s prophecies, both to Jeroboam II and his call and prophecy to Nineveh. He adds several items of detail to the story of Jonah’s extraordinary experience in the sea, giving his objective as Tarsus in Cilicia and the point of landing as the Euxine Sea. There is little weight of authority to these statements but they indicate a conviction as to the historicity of the book of Jonah.
There are three legends that illustrate the extraordinary features of the book of Jonah, viz: (1) Hesione and Hercules, (2) Andromeda and Perseus, and (3) Saint George and the Dragon. These legends, the scenes of which are located on the Mediterranean Sea, reflect, perhaps, the impression made upon the ancient mind by this story of Jonah.
There are several scriptural references to the book, viz: 2Ki 14:25 ; Mat 12:39-41 ; Mat 16:4 ; Luk 11:29-30 , the import of which is that the book is historical and that Jonah is typical of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The purpose of this book is threefold: (1) To teach the bigoted Israelites that salvation is for the Gentiles as well as for the Jews; (2) to give a genuine lesson on repentance, as illustrated, (a) in Jonah, (b) in the Ninevites and (c) lad God himself; (3) to typify Christ. I
The occasion of this prophecy against Nineveh was the moral corruption of the Ninevites, “For their wickedness is come up before me” (Jon 1:1 ). To this, other prophets add their testimony: “Woe to the bloody city I” (Nah 3:1 ). “This is a joyous city that dwelt carelessly, that said in her heart, I am, and there is none else besides me” (Zep 2:15 ).
The annals of Assyria are nothing but a register of militarycampaigns, spoilations, and cruelties. Their monuments display men of calm and unmoved ferocity, whose moral and mental qualities are overborne by the faculties of the lower, brutal nature.” LATARD, Nineveh and Babylon , p. 631.
The style of this book is simple, pure Hebrew. The author believed that God prepared everything and the book bears the stamp of a simple, truthful narrative. It is not prophecy, in the strict sense of the word, but history, inserted among the prophets because written by a prophet. There is no moralizing I and no reflection. The tale is told graphically and has quite a dramatic interest, advancing in regular stages to the conclusion, and leaving an impression upon the mind as though its various scenes had been enacted before the eyes of the reader.
The miraculous element of the book is twofold: (1) the physical, (2) the moral. The physical miracles are the experience of Jonah in the sea and the incident of the gourd.
The moral miracle is the salvation of the Ninevites. There are three great doctrines illustrated in the incidents of the book. (1) There is the great doctrine of the resurrection set forth in this book symbolically. No one can doubt this who reads Mat 12:39-41 . (2) There is set forth here in the most dramatic action the great doctrine of genuine repentance. Man and beast together wear the symbols of penitence. (3) There is here illustrated God’s great, forbearing mercy, and loving-kindness. See his forbearance toward wicked Nineveh and his great loving kindness as here displayed toward a lost world.
Nineveh, the great city here referred to, was founded by Nimrod, a descendant of Ham (Gen 10:11 ; Mic 5:6 ), as a colony from Babylon which is proved by the monuments of Assyria. After this simple statement in Genesis the record is silent respecting Nineveh for a long time. The next mention of these people we find in the prophecy of Balaam (Num 24:22 ; Num 24:24 ), that Assyria should carry Israel away captive and the ships from Greece should afflict Assyria. The next reference to Assyria is found in Psa 83:8 which finds its historical reality in 2Ch 20:1-4 . This is an account of Assyria under Shalmaneser II joining with Moab and Ammon against Israel under Jehoshaphat at which time the Israelites were victorious. This is the real beginning of Assyria’s strength and greatness. Her power is now beginning to be felt for the first time in her history. This brings us in the Bible account of Assyria up to the time of Jonah and Jeroboam II, where Nineveh again enters by name on the biblical record. This reappearing of the name Nineveh is incidental, and shows that the Bible does not profess to give an orderly and systematic history of the world. The record here in Jonah says that Nineveh was a “great city.” It was located on the Tigris River and in the shape of a parallelogram, sixty miles around and three days’ journey on a straight line through it. Its walls were sixty feet high, with 1,500 towers, 200 feet high. The walls were broad enough on top to receive three chariots driving side by side. It is almost certain that this city was larger than Babylon, especially if we include in the estimate its suburbs. Jonah calls it “an exceeding great city of three days’ -journey” and with 120,000 infants, all of which indicate that Nineveh was no ordinary city.
Nineveh was destroyed by the combined forces of the Medes and Babylonians, the Median king being Cyaxares and the city was complete. Xenophon with 10,000 Greeks passed by it two centuries later and did not even mention it, unless he referred to it as one of the “uninhabited” cities of which he speaks. The remains of this city must have been in evidence in the days of the Roman emperors, since Tacitus refers to a Nineveh on the Tigris, and there is another reference to it as late as the thirteenth century.
The ruins now present a rampart and foss, four miles in circuit, with a moss-covered wall about twenty feet high. The archaeologists in recent years have done much to make Nineveh live before the minds of this generation. Their discoveries of the libraries have thrown a flood of light on the history of these people of the Far East; but the Bible account of Nineveh and the rest of the Oriental empires remains unmolested. The Ninevites worshiped the fish god and in excavating in this vicinity many stone images of a fish have been found with a man coming out of its mouth. There is evidently a connection between Jonah’s experience and these stone images. This seems to be a confirmation of the story of Jonah as a sign to the Ninevites. Since they worshiped the fish god, the Lord accredited Jonah unto them by means of such a miracle as would leave no doubt in their minds as to the superior power of Jehovah over their object of worship.
There is an abundance of literature on this book but I will name only a few of the very best helps to its interpretation. The boat commentaries are Pusey’s Minor Prophets and the “Pulpit Commentary.” The “Expositor’s Bible” is the worst that could be mentioned. Dr. A. J. Rowland’s monograph on Jonah is very fine. The article on Jonah in Smith’s Bible Dictionary is a pretty fair article. Sampey’s Syllabus is fine. A sermon on Jonah by Melville, a Scotch preacher, is able and good. Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown, and Matthew Henry are also good.
The chapters constitute the divisions of the analysis of this book, as follows:
I. Jonah’s mission, disobedience, and punishment (Jon 1:1-17 )
1. His call, commission, and flight (Jon 1:1-3 )
2. God’s intervention and Jonah’s revelation (Jon 1:4-10 )
II. Jonah’s prayer, thanksgiving, and deliverance (Jon 2:1-10 )
1. His prayer (Jon 2:1-7 )
2. His thanksgiving (Jon 2:8-9 )
3. His deliverance (Jon 2:10 )
III. Jonah’s recall, obedience, and success (Jon 3:1-10 )
1. His recall (Jon 3:1-2 )
2. His obedience (Jon 3:3-4 )
3. His success (Jon 3:5-10 )
IV. Jonah’s displeasure and correction (Jon 4:1-11 )
1. His displeasure (Jon 4:1-5 )
2. His correction (Jon 4:6-11 )
The word “now” (Jon 1:1 ), is the same word in the Hebrew that is translated “and” at the beginning of several of the historical books and forms a connecting link, thus showing a continuation of history, or, as in this case, connecting revelation with revelation.
We come across the expression, “the word of Jehovah,” in our Bible first in Gen 15:1 and there it means the Son of God, the Logos of Joh 1:1 . There seems to be the same meaning here. The word of Jehovah came “saying.”
We find three parallels in the Bible to Jon 1:2 , “their wickedness has come up before me,” viz: (1) the case of Cain, (2) the case of the flood, and (3) the case of Sodom and Gomorrah, in each of which most solemn judgment followed. The striking difference in this case and those mentioned above is the repentance of the Ninevites which moved God to repentance and averted the awful judgment.
In his going from the presence of Jehovah, Jonah renounced his prophetic office; he went away from “standing before Jehovah”; gave up his credentials and “took to the woods” (waters), to Tarshish, a city in Spain, far away from the Jehovah country. Thus he thought to leave the land of Jehovah was to get away from the call of Jehovah. Alas! many a man has tried the policy of Jonah to his own sorrow. Jonah did not want to go to Nineveh, (1) because of his hatred for the idolatrous Gentiles, (2) because of his fear that God would show them mercy and his prediction would be discredited, (3) because of Nineveh’s growing strength and if spared she would become Israel’s rival and (4) because, perhaps, he feared ill treatment at the hands of the cruel and ferocious Assyrians.
In Jon 1:4 , “he paid the fare thereof,” we have a picture of the preacher renouncing his call of God upon which he must pay his own way, a hard fare indeed when one has lost the divine favor. But he sends a messenger after him, viz: a storm, and sometimes the fires of affliction are kindled all about him and sore distress comes upon him. God must be obeyed. See Psa 107:23-32 . But what the significance of “cast forth the wares” (Jon 1:5 )? This expression illustrates the fact that there is something to do besides to pray. Work is the handmaiden of prayer. Jonah’s being asleep is an illustration of a man who is guilty of sin, more especially the backslider. Sin stupefies and therefore they need to be aroused. A fine text: “O sleeper, arise.” Casting lots was one way of finding out the will of Jehovah. Compare Act 1:26 et multa al. This was simply a method of casting the vote. Jonah, understanding fully that the trouble was all on account of him, asked that they dispose of him by casting him into the sea and let him take the chance for his life, but the sailors saw only death for Jonah in such procedure and were not willing to take the risk of having upon them innocent blood. As the last resort they yielded.
There are three distinct things affirmed in Jonah 2:16, which need special notice, viz: (1) that they feared Jehovah, (2) that they offered sacrifice unto Jehovah, and (3) that they made vows, the explanation of which is, that Jonah had convinced them that Jehovah had brought the storm and therefore he was the one who was to be appeased. As to the nature of their fear, sacrifice, and vows we are not told but we are not to suppose that it was the reverential fear that brings salvation. It is probable that they acknowledged Jehovah as one of their gods after this event but there is nothing here to show that they accepted Jehovah as the only God to the exclusion of their own gods.
The fish that swallowed Jonah may have been a whale of the kind found in the Mediterranean Sea which is able to swallow a man whole, or it may have been the white shark of the same waters, as it is sometimes found in this section twenty-five feet long and has been known to swallow a man whole, and even a horse. There have been found in this sea three kinds of sea-animals that could easily swallow a man, viz: the Great Spermaceti Whale, the White Shark, and the Rorqual, one specimen of which has been found in this sea seventy-five feet long. So the contention that no whale or fish that could swallow a man is found in these parts is utterly baseless.
Jonah’s hymn is evidently made up of quotations from other passages of Scriptures which a comparison of the following passages will prove: Jon 2:2 equals Psa 120:1 ; Jon 2:3 equals Psa 42:7 ; Psa 18:4 ; Jon 2:4 equals Psa 31:22 ; Jon 2:5 equals Psa 18:40 ; Psa 18:5 ; Jon 2:7 equals Psa 18:6 (last clause) and Psa 142:3 ; Jon 2:8 equals Psa 31:6-7 . These correspondences could not have been fortuitous: the one poet must have had sounding in his mind the language of the other. Jonah evidently was well acquainted with the Psalms. “Lying vanities” in Jon 2:8 means idolatry and indicates a strong characteristic of heathen worship.
The second commission to Jonah is recorded in Jon 3:1-2 : “And the word of Jehovah came unto Jonah the second time, saying, Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.” The circumstances of this second commission are as follows: Jonah had had his extraordinary experience in the sea and had, doubtless, returned home, allowing sufficient time for the news of this great and singular event to reach Nineveh, thus preparing the way for Jonah’s preaching by accrediting Jonah to them in a way that would impress them with the superiority of Jonah’s God over their fish god. There are three distinct things here relative to God’s relation to the ministry that need to be emphasized, viz: (1) God calls his ministers by a direct appeal to them: “and the word of Jehovah came unto Jonah, saying”; (2) God selects the field of labor for his ministers: “Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city”; (3) God gives the message: “and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.” This is a fine example of what the preacher ought to be, viz: God-called, God-appointed, and God-instructed. With these three essentials in his life and work the minister knows no failure.
The “yet” in Jon 3:4 indicates an implied promise; that this was not an announcement of an absolute decree of God, but was a conditional decree. God repented when they repented. Note that there are three particular cases of repentance in this book: (1) the preacher repents; (2) the people repent; (3) God repents. Observe the order. When the preacher repents, the people generally repent, and when the preacher and the people repent, God always repents. The “yet” here indicates God’s attitude toward a sinner. Though he thunders the law of Sinai over the sinner’s head, it is only that the sinner may be prepared to hear the voice from Calvary. “Yet forty days and “Nineveh shall be overthrown,” but the “forty days” furnish space for repentance.
“Believed God” in Jon 3:5 is equivalent to “believed on God” and is saving faith, as with Abraham. Fasting and sackcloth are external evidences of repentance. In Jon 3:7 we see the call to real fasting and repentance. In Jon 3:8 the animals lowing for fodder were crying to God. The prayers of the people and the crying of the cattle make a powerful appeal to God. But praying and crying were not enough. “Let them turn every one from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands” and show by this his real earnestness, as in the New Testament exhortation: “Let him that stole steal no more but return what he has stolen.” Restitution is a law of forgiveness. This passage is equalled in the New Testament by John the Baptist’s preaching and Paul’s preaching at Ephesus. This is both a moral and spiritual miracle. It is the biggest case of conversion in the Old Testament on a foreign field. Jonah was the first foreign mission preacher and had but one credential. Some say people cannot be moved religiously by fear but it is a mistake. People are influenced both by the fear of punishment and by the hope of reward. The motive in Luk 15 is “Joy in heaven.” “Ye shall likewise perish except ye repent.” Preach love always, but don’t leave out hell.
Jonah was much displeased with and angry at the Lord’s attitude, but the Lord dealt gently with him giving him the lesson of the gourd (Jon 4:6-11 ). It was not right for Jonah to be angry at what God did, nor is it ever right to be angry at what God does, especially in the salvation of the people. In this connection he gives the reason for his unwillingness to go to Nineveh at the outset, but he was wrong in his attitude toward the people of Nineveh. This attitude culminated in madness at Jehovah’s attitude toward them and went to the extent of wishing for death. But it is a very cowardly thing to wish for death under such circumstances.
To this foolishness of Jonah the Lord answered that Jonah’s regard for the gourd was but a small matter compared to his regard for the 120,000 infants and the much cattle of Nineveh. This is a beautiful lesson of God’s attitude toward the irresponsible and gives us a splendid Old Testament view of God’s attribute of mercy.
As Jonah, after his resurrection, became a missionary to the Gentiles, so Christ after his resurrection declared his “all authority” and commissioned his church to go to the ends of the world. The resurrection had a marvelous effect in enlarging the commission.
QUESTIONS
1. What are the traditions relating to Jonah?
2. Who was Jonah and what the time of his writing?
3. What references to this book in literature and what is the testimony in each case?
4. What three legends may be mentioned as illustrating the extraordinary features of the story of Jonah?
5. What are the scriptural references to the book and what the import of their teaching?
6. What is the purpose of this book?
7. What is he occasion of this book and how is it proved from the history of Nineveh?
8. What of the style and character of the book?
9. What of the miraculous element of the book?
10. What doctrines illustrated by the incidents of the book?
11. Give an account of Nineveh.
12. What the form of idolatry in Nineveh at this time and what the evidence of Jonah’s impress on the Ninevites?
13. What helps on this book commended?
14. What is the analysis of this book?
15. What is the force of the word “now” of verse I?
16. Where do we first find the expression, “the word of Jehovah,” in the Bible and what does it mean there?
17. What parallels to Jon 1:2 , “their wickedness is come up before me,” do we find elsewhere in the Bible and what striking difference in this case?
18. What is the meaning of “Jonah rose up to flee unto Tarshish from the presence of Jehovah”?
19. What Jonah’s reasons for not wanting to go to Nineveh?
20. What is the meaning and application of Jon 1:4 , “he paid the fare thereof”?
21. What is the significance in Jon 1:5 of “cast forth the wares”?
22. What is the suggestion from Jonah’s being asleep?
23. What of casting lots in Jon 1:7 ?
24. What is the remedy for the case as proposed by Jonah and how did it meet the approval of the sailors?
25. How do you explain, their fearing Jehovah and sacrificing unto him?
26. What of the fish that swallowed Jonah?
27. What is the relation of Jonah’s hymn to other passages of Scripture?
28. What is the meaning of “lying vanities” in Jon 2:8 ?
29. What Jonah’s second commission, what its circumstances and what three things in this commission, illustrative of God’s relation to the minister and his work?
30. What is the force of “yet” in Jon 3:4 ?
31. What are the points of Jon 3:5-10 ?
32. How did Jonah receive the fact of the conversion of the Ninevites and God’s mercy to them and how did God deal with him?
33. Was it right for Jonah to be angry, what the extent of his madness and what do you think of his wish?
34. What was Jehovah’s answer to all this foolishness of Jonah?
35. How is the relation of the resurrection and the commission of Christ illustrated in this book?
Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible
Jon 3:1 And the word of the LORD came unto Jonah the second time, saying,
Ver. 1. And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time ] Jonah is a sinner, but not a castaway. God lays him not by as a broken vessel, treads him not to the dunghill, as unsavoury salt; but receives him upon his return by repentance, and restores him to his former employment, gives him yet a name and a nail in his house; yea, sends him a second time on his message to Nineveh; and counting him faithful, puts him again into the ministry, who was before a runagate, a rebel, &c. But he obtained mercy, 1Ti 1:13 , as did likewise the apostles, after that they had basely deserted our Saviour at his passion; and Peter, after he had denied him, see Joh 20:22-23 ; Joh 21:15-17 . The penitent are as good as innocent, Quem poenitet peccasse, pcene est innocens (Sen. Agam.). “Return, ye backsliding children” (saith the Father of mercies), “and I will heal your backslidings,” Jer 3:22 . The Shulamite returning is as lovely in Christ’s eye as before; and all is as well as ever between them, Son 6:4 . There is a natural Novatianism in the timorous conscience of convinced sinners to doubt and question pardon for sins of apostasy and falling after repentance; but had they known the gift of God, and who it is that saith to them, “Be of good cheer, thy sins are forgiven thee,” they would have conceived strong consolation.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Jonah
THREEFOLD REPENTANCE
Jon 3:1 – Jon 3:10
This passage falls into three parts: Jonah’s renewed commission and new obedience Jon 3:1 – Jon 3:4, the repentance of Nineveh Jon 3:5 – Jon 3:9, and the acceptance thereof by God Jon 3:10. We might almost call these three the repentance of Jonah, of Nineveh, and of God. The evident intention of the narrative is to parallel the Ninevites turning from their sins, and God’s turning from His anger and purpose of destruction; and if the word ‘repentance’ is not applied to Jonah, his conduct sufficiently shows the thing.
I. Note the renewed charge to the penitent Prophet, and his new eagerness to fulfil it.
His deliverance and second commission are put as if all but simultaneous, and his obedience was swift and glad. Jonah did not venture to take for granted that the charge which he had shirked was still continued to him. If God commands to take the trumpet, and we refuse, we dare not assume that we shall still be honoured with the delivery of the message. The punishment of dumb lips is often dumbness. Opportunities of service, slothfully or faintheartedly neglected, are often withdrawn. We can fancy how Jonah, brought back to the better mind which breathes in his psalm, longed to be honoured by the trust of preaching once more, and how rapturously his spirit would address itself to the task. Duties once unwelcome become sweet when we have passed through the experience of the misery that comes from neglecting them. It is God’s mercy that gives us the opportunity of effacing past disobedience by new alacrity.
The second charge is possibly distinguishable from the first as being less precise. It may be that the exact nature of ‘the preaching that I bid thee’ was not told Jonah till he had to open his mouth in Nineveh; but, more probably, the second charge was identical with the first.
The word rendered ‘preach’ is instructive. It means ‘to cry’ and suggests the manner befitting those who bear God’s message. They should sound it out loudly, plainly, urgently, with earnestness and marks of emotion in their voice. Languid whispers will not wake sleepers. Unless the messenger is manifestly in earnest, the message will fall flat. Not with bated breath, as if ashamed of it; nor with hesitation, as if not quite sure of it; nor with coldness, as if it were of little urgency,-is God’s Word to be pealed in men’s ears. The preacher is a crier. The substance of his message, too, is set forth. ‘The preaching which I bid thee’-not his own imaginations, nor any fine things of his own spinning. Suppose Jonah had entertained the Ninevites with dissertations on the evidences of his prophetic authority, or submitted for their consideration a few thoughts tending to show the agreement of his message with their current opinions in religion, or an argument for the existence of a retributive Governor of the world, he would not have shaken the city. The less the Prophet shows himself, the stronger his influence. The more simply he repeats the stern, plain, short message, the more likely it is to impress. God’s Word, faithfully set forth, will prove itself. The preacher or teacher of this day has substantially the same charge as Jonah had; and the more he suppresses himself, and becomes but a voice through which God speaks, the better for himself, his hearers, and his work.
Nineveh, that great aggregate of cities, was full, as Eastern cities are, of open spaces, and might well be a three days’ journey in circumference. What a task for that solitary stranger to thunder out his loud cry among all these crowds! But he had learned to do what he was bid; and without wasting a moment, he ‘began to enter into the city a day’s journey,’ and, no doubt, did not wait till the end of the day to proclaim his message. Let us learn that there is an element of threatening in God’s most merciful message, and that the appeal to terror and to the desire for self-preservation is part of the way to preach the Gospel. Plain warnings of coming evil may be spoken tenderly, and reveal love as truly as the most soothing words. The warning comes in time. ‘Forty days’ of grace are granted. The gospel warns us in time enough for escape. It warns us because God loves; and they are as untrue messengers of His love as of His justice who slur over the declaration of His wrath.
II. Note the repentance of Nineveh Jon 3:5 – Jon 3:9.
The impression made by Jonah’s terrible cry is perfectly credible and natural in the excitable population of an Eastern city, in which even now any appeal to terror, especially if associated with religious and prophetic claims, easily sets the whole in a frenzy. Think of the grim figure of this foreign man, with his piercing voice and half-intelligible speech, dropped from the clouds as it were, and stalking through Nineveh, pealing out his confident message, like that gaunt fanatic who walked Jerusalem in its last agony, crying, ‘Woe! woe unto the bloody city!’ or that other, who, with flaming fire on his head and madness in his eyes, affrighted London in the plague. No wonder that alarm was kindled, and, being kindled, spread like wildfire. Apparently the movement was first among the people, who began to fast before the news penetrated to the seclusion of the palace. But the contagion reached the king, and the popular excitement was endorsed and fanned by a royal decree. The specified tokens of repentance are those of ordinary mourning, such as were common all over the East, with only the strange addition, which smacks of heathen ideas, that the animals were made sharers in them.
There is great significance in that ‘believed God’ Jon 3:5. The foundation of all true repentance is crediting God’s word of threatening, and therefore realising the danger, as well as the disobedience, of our sin. We shall be wise if we pass by the human instrument, and hear God speaking through the Prophet. Never mind about Jonah, believe God.
We learn from the Ninevites what is true repentance They brought no sacrifices or offerings, but sorrow, self-abasement, and amendment. The characteristic sin of a great military power would be ‘violence,’ and that is the specific evil from which they vow to turn. The loftiest lesson which prophets found Israel so slow to learn, ‘A broken and a contrite heart Thou wilt not despise,’ was learned by these heathens. We need it no less. Nineveh repented on a peradventure that their repentance might avail. How pathetic that ‘Who can tell?’ Jon 3:9 is! We know what they hoped . Their doubt might give fervour to their cries, but our certainty should give deeper earnestness and confidence to ours.
The deepest meaning of the whole narrative is set forth in our Lord’s use of it, when He holds up the men of Nineveh as a condemnatory instance to the hardened consciences of His hearers. Probably the very purpose of the book was to show Israel that the despised and yet dreaded heathen were more susceptible to the voice of God than they were: ‘I will provoke you to jealousy by them which are no people.’ The story was a smiting blow to the proud exclusiveness and self-complacent contempt of prophetic warnings, which marked the entire history of God’s people. As Ezekiel was told: ‘Thou are not sent . . . to many peoples of a strange speech and of an hard language. . . . Surely, if I sent thee to them, they would hearken unto thee. But the house of Israel will not hearken unto thee.’ It is ever true that long familiarity with the solemn thoughts of God’s judgment and punishment of sin abates their impression on us. Our Puritan forefathers used to talk about ‘gospel-hardened sinners,’ and there are many such among us. The man who lives by Niagara does not hear its roar as a stranger does. The men of Nineveh will rise in the judgment with other generations than that which was ‘this generation’ in Christ’s time; and that which is ‘this generation’ to-day will, in many of its members, be condemned by them.
But the wave of feeling soon retired, and there is no reason to believe that more than a transient impression was made. It does not seem certain that the Ninevites knew what ‘God’ they hoped to appease. Probably their pantheon was undisturbed, and their repentance lasted no longer than their fear. Transient repentance leaves the heart harder than before, as half-melted ice freezes again more dense. Let us beware of frost on the back of a thaw. ‘Repentance which is repented of’ is worse than none.
III. We note the repentance of God Jon 3:10.
Mark the recurrence of the word ‘turn,’ employed in Jon 3:8 – Jon 3:10 in reference to men and to God. Mark the bold use of the word ‘repent,’ applied to God, which, though it be not applied to the Ninevites in the previous verses, is implied in every line of them. The same expression is found in Exo 32:14 , which may be taken as the classical passage warranting its use. The great truth involved is one that is too often lost sight of in dealing with prophecy; namely, that all God’s promises and threatenings are conditional. Jeremiah learned that lesson in the house of the potter, and we need to keep it well in mind. God threatens, precisely in order that He may not have to perform His threatenings. Jonah was sent to Nineveh to cry, ‘Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown,’ in order that it might not be overthrown. What would have been the use of proclaiming the decree, if it had been irreversible? There is an implied ‘if’ in all God’s words. ‘Except ye repent’ underlies the most absolute threatenings of evil. ‘If we hold fast the beginning of our confidence firm unto the end,’ is presupposed in the brightest and broadest promises of good.
The word ‘repent’ is denied and affirmed to have application to God. He is not ‘a son of man, that He should repent,’ inasmuch as His immutability and steadfast purpose know no variableness. But just because they cannot change, and He must ever be against them that do evil, and ever bless them that turn to Him with trust, therefore He changes His dealings with us according to our relation to Him, and because He cannot repent, or be other than He was and is, ‘repents of the evil that He had said that He would do’ unto sinners when they repent of the evil that they have done against Him, inasmuch as He leaves His threatening unfulfilled, and ‘does it not.’
So we might almost say that the purpose of this book of Jonah is to teach the possibility and efficacy of repentance, and to show how the penitent man, heathen or Jew, ever finds in God changed dealings corresponding to his changed heart. The widest charity, the humbling lesson for people brought up in the blaze of revelation, that dwellers in the twilight or in the darkness are dear to God and may be more susceptible of divine impressions than ourselves, the rebuke of all pluming ourselves on our privileges, the boundlessness of God’s mercy, are among the other lessons of this strange book; but none of them is more precious than its truly evangelic teaching of the blessedness of true penitence, whether exemplified in the renegade Prophet returning to his high mission, or the fierce Ninevites humbled and repentant, and finding mercy from the God of the whole earth.
Fuente: Expositions Of Holy Scripture by Alexander MacLaren
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Jon 3:1-4
1Now the word of the LORD came to Jonah the second time, saying, 2Arise, go to Nineveh the great city and proclaim to it the proclamation which I am going to tell you. 3So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh according to the word of the LORD. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, a three days’ walk. 4Then Jonah began to go through the city one day’s walk; and he cried out and said, Yet forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown.
Jon 3:1 the word of the LORD came to Jonah This reflects Jon 1:1. Jonah is structured in such a way that Jonah’s first commission (chapters 1-2) is contrasted with his second commission (Jonah 3-4).
the second time Oh, the grace of God, both to Jonah and to Nineveh!
Jon 3:2 Arise, go These two Qal IMPERATIVES parallel Jon 1:2. God repeats His mandate.
the great city See note on great (BDB 152) at Jon 1:2.
proclaim The Qal IMPERATIVE (BDB 894, KB 1128) parallels Jon 1:2.
The content of the proclamation is not stated here. In Jon 1:2 the subject of the revelation was that the wickedness of Nineveh had risen up before God.
to There is a slight, but theologically significant, change from Jon 1:2. The PREPOSITION has changed from against (BDB 752) in Jon 1:2 to to (BDB 39) here. God is opening the door to the possibility that the Ninevites might respond appropriately to His word of judgment.
Jon 3:3 This opening sentence is quite a contrast with Jonah’s actions in Jon 1:3. What a difference a room in the fish hotel can make!
exceedingly great city The Masoretic Text includes to God (see note below). This shows God’s care for all humans (cf. Gen 12:3; Gen 22:18; Gen 26:4; Exo 19:5; Eze 18:23; Eze 18:32; Joh 1:29; Joh 3:16-17; Joh 4:42; 1Ti 2:4; 1Ti 4:10; 2Pe 3:9; 1Jn 2:2; 1Jn 4:14)! The author of Jonah uses the ADJECTIVE great often. See note at Jon 1:2.
NASB———
NKJV———
NRSV———
TEV———
NJB———
JB (footnote)great before God
ABPSbefore God
PESHITTAin the presence of God
Rotherhambefore God
Young’s Literalbefore God
JPSOA
(footnote)literally, ‘a large city of God’
Exactly why the major English translations leave out the phrase, to God, is uncertain. It is also uncertain what this means or implies. Nineveh’s sin had risen to God, but also its accomplishments.
The other option is to see the phrase as to gods, which would speak of Nineveh’s idolatry and sin. However, the change of the PREPOSITION from against in Jon 1:2 to to in Jon 3:2 seems to depreciate this option.
a three days’ walk There has been some controversy about the physical dimensions of Nineveh. Ancient non-biblical Latin writers described it as sixty miles in circumference with 1500 towers built into the walls. The walls themselves were 100′ high and wide enough for three chariots to ride side by side (Diodurus Sicucus of the 4th century). Modern archeology has determined the size as just under eight miles in circumference. This phrase includes the city and its suburbs. The three days can (1) mean part of two days and one whole day; (2) refer to Jonah walking around the city and preaching at several places; or (3) include the city and its surrounding communities.
Jon 3:4 he cried out This VERB (BDB 894) is a Qal IMPERFECT. One assumes he spoke in Aramaic. He only spoke five words. This was not a turn or burn sermon. This was just a burn proclamation.
forty days This is a very common number in the Bible to denote a long period of indefinite time (longer than a lunar cycle, but shorter than a season, e.g., Exo 24:18; Exo 34:28; Num 13:25; Deu 9:9; Deu 9:11; 1Sa 17:16; 1Ki 19:8). It often is associated with a period of testing or judgment:
1. Noah’s flood, Gen 7:4
2. wilderness wanderings of Israel, Exo 16:35; Psa 95:10
3. Moses’ fasting, Exo 24:8; Deu 9:9; Deu 9:11
4. Philistine domination of Israel, Jdg 13:1
5. Elijah’s fasting, 1Ki 19:8
6. Ezekiel’ symbolic actions, Eze 4:6
7. God’s judgment on Nineveh, Jon 3:4
8. Jesus’ fast, Mat 4:2
Surprisingly, the Septuagint has yet three days.
overthrown This same VERB (BDB 245, KB 253, Niphal PARTICIPLE) is used of God destroying Sodom in Gen 19:29 (the NOUN at BDB 246). It can imply
1. positive (turn, i.e., vast majority of usages, cf. Hos 11:8-9)
2. negative (overturned or overthrown, which did happen in 621 B.C.)
It is possible, in light of God’s character (cf. Jon 4:2), that God’s message through Jonah had a hint of a good outcome, that even Jonah recognized (cf. Jon 3:2; Jon 4:1-4).
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
the word of the Lord. See note on Jon 1:1.
The LORD. Hebrew. Jehovah, App-4.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Chapter 3
So the word of the LORD came unto Jonah the second time, saying, Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee. So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh ( Jon 3:1-3 ),
God brings us back so many times to the place of failure, and that is where we start again. I call it oftentimes back to zero. I wonder how many times God has brought me back to zero, back to that place of failure and then He says, “Okay.” And there is where we start again. I can’t really go on until I conquer in this area of my failure. I can’t continue on in the progress of God in my life until God has worked out this particular area. And when He brings me back to it, then I’m facing the same issues again, but this time with obedience to the Lord and then I move on.
So Jonah arose, and went to Nineveh according to the word of the LORD. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days’ journey ( Jon 3:3 ).
That is, it would take you three days to walk from one end to the other.
And Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown. So the people of Nineveh believed God ( Jon 3:4-5 ),
What a remarkable thing! Jonah, no doubt, in his heart was not happy with what he was doing. This is something that is revealed further on in the text. Jonah’s anger at God for not destroying Nineveh. He still hated these people. He still didn’t want God to work in their lives. He was only there because it was preferable to dissolving in the gastric juices of the whale. Notice there was no hope laid out in his message at all, no call to repentance, no loving exhortations, just a message of judgment. “Forty days, and Nineveh is going to be overthrown.” But the people believed God much to Jonah’s chagrin.
they proclaimed a fast, they put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them. For word had come to the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid off his robe from him, and covered himself with sackcloth, and he sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water: But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands ( Jon 3:5-8 ).
What a tremendous call to the people to repentance, even to the animals, “Don’t feed them. And as the cattle are lowing for hunger, let it be as a cry unto God for mercy.” So the cattle as they are getting hungry, you can hear them through the streets-mooo. Let that be a cry unto God for mercy. The general, total repentance of the people as they were there in sackcloth and crying out to God, repenting and crying out unto God for mercy.
Now the second reference that Jesus made to Nineveh was as He was talking to the scribes and the Pharisees and He said, “The men of Nineveh will rise in judgment with this generation and they will condemn it. For they repented at the preaching of Jonah and behold a greater than Jonah is here” ( Mat 12:41 ). The men of Nineveh repented at the preaching of this angry prophet who only preached the judgment of God. Here Jesus, the Son of God, had come declaring to the people the love of God, encouraging people to experience God’s love and to come to God’s love, but yet, they did not repent. So the men of Nineveh in the day of judgment will be standing, and they will be pointing a finger at this generation, those who have not repented, those who have not sought God, and they will be condemning this generation for they repented at the preaching of Jonah. Repent they did, complete sackcloth, even to the king laying aside his robes and putting on this itchy sackcloth, putting it over their animals, everybody joining in this citywide repentance.
On what basis did they repent? Jonah didn’t say, “Repent or destruction comes.” He didn’t preach repentance at all. In fact, he didn’t want them to repent. He became angry when they did repent. One of the only preachers in history who was hoping that he would not have a successful ministry. But they repented on the slim basis of,
Who can tell if God will turn and change, and turn away his fierce anger, that we perish not? ( Jon 3:9 )
Who can tell? Maybe if we repent God will have mercy. We don’t know. No promise of mercy. No promise of grace to these people, only a message of judgment, and yet, on just the slimmest of threads they were willing to hang their hope. Who can tell? Maybe. Hey, you don’t have to hang your faith or your hope on that slim thread. I can tell you tonight that if you will repent God is gracious, God is merciful, God will forgive. You don’t have to hang your hope on a maybe. I can assure you from the Word of God tonight that God will forgive if you will repent and turn from your wicked ways and turn from your sinful path. God will be gracious and merciful unto you and you will be washed and cleansed of your sin and be made a child of God. I declare that unto you on the basis of God’s unchanging Word.
These people did not have that kind of a hope. They did not have that kind of a message. All they had was a maybe. Who knows? Maybe. And on that slimmest of threads they hung their hope as they turned and repented.
And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil ( Jon 3:10 ),
Now, again, this is the problem we have of describing the action of God. All we have is human terms. God is the infinite eternal God, but we are the finite man. And as we talk to each other we have to use terms that are dealing in the finite realm of man because we don’t have the infinite terms, and there are things of which we cannot even speak, because there are not words or languages that even relate to these things that we could understand.
Jesus was trying to speak to Nicodemus concerning spiritual things and He finally said, “Look, Nicodemus, you’re a teacher of the Jews and all and if I speak to you of earthly things and you cannot understand them, how in the world can I ever speak to you of heavenly things?”
Paul the apostle after his trip to heaven when he came back he said, “Hey, whether in the body or out of the body, I don’t know, but I know I was caught up to the third heaven and I heard things that are impossible to describe. In fact, it would be a crime if I tried to describe them. It would be an injustice, because there aren’t any words that can describe the ecstasy, the things that I felt, the things that I heard, the things that were there. It’s impossible. Words have not been created or formed.”
So that we are limited in talking about God to the finite terminology of man, so that when judgment did not come, the promised judgment, we have to use terms that apply to man, but are not truly applicable to God, because God does not change. “Behold God is not a man that He should lie, nor the Son of man that He should repent: hath He not spoken and shall He not make it good?” ( Num 23:19 ) “Behold I am the Lord God, I change not” ( Mal 3:6 ), He has declared.
So here was an obvious change. The prophet had said, “Forty days and then comes destruction.” The people all repented. The destruction did not come. So we in using our finite terms to describe it say, “Well, it repented God,” or, “God changed and He did not destroy them.” No, God knew all the time that they were going to repent, that’s why He sent Jonah to them. God knew all the time that the judgment would not come. But yet, had they not repented, the judgment would have come. But God knows the end from the beginning. And you say, “Oh, but I can’t understand it.” Of course you can’t, because you have only finite, limited understanding and God is infinite. God says, “My ways are not your ways: My ways are beyond your finding out.” And so it’s only an exercise of frustration to try to understand the full aspects of the character and nature of God. “
Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary
Jon 3:1-2. And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, saying, Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.
There is no preaching like that which Gods bids us. The preaching that comes out of our own heads will never go into other mens hearts. If we will keep to the preaching that the Lord bids us, we shall not fail in our ministry.
Jon 3:3. So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the LORD. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days journey.
For those times, Nineveh was an exceeding great city, but it is far exceeded in size by this modern Nineveh of London.
Jon 3:4. And Jonah began to enter into the city a days journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
His message was short and sharp, there was not a word of mercy in it. There was nothing to distract the attention of the hearers from the one point and the one subject; and there is a great deal in that. We may sometimes say too much in a single sermon, and give our hearers a field of wheat instead of a loaf of bread. But Jonah said what he was bidden to say, no more and no less: Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
Jon 3:5-9. So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them. For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything: let them not feed, nor drink water: but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands. Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger, that we perish not?
Note that the only message they had heard was a prophecy of impending judgment. God had sent his servant to warn them of the coming destruction; and, since he had warned them that he meant to destroy them, they could infer that he might possibly intend pity towards them should they repent, but there was as yet no verbal declaration of mercy or hope. these people went to God with nothing better to sustain them than this, Who can tell? How much more guilty than these Ninevites are they who refuse to humble themselves before God, even when they have distinct injunctions from God, and explicit promises that whosoever shall confess and forsake his sins shall find mercy! these men of Nineveh will rise up in judgment against the men of London, and the men of this generation, and condemn them, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now men do not repent even at the testimony of Jesus Christ the Son of God. To despise the prophet Jonah, would have involved these people in certain destruction; of how much sorer punishment shall they be thought worthy who despise the Christ of God, and do despite unto the Spirit of grace.
Jon 3:10. And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.
There is no change in God, absolutely considered, but there is often an apparent change, that which he threatens, while men remain in sin, is not executed upon them when they repent and turn to him. He is always the same God. from the beginning, he has been the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin. If he did not pardon sin, when men turn from it with sincere repentance, he would have changed his method of dealing with the penitent; but when he does forgive, it is according to his way from the beginning, for he has ever been a tender, and compassionate, and gracious God.
This exposition consisted of readings from Jonah 3; Jon 4:1-2; and Romans 5.
Fuente: Spurgeon’s Verse Expositions of the Bible
Jon 3:1-3
GODS MESSENGER RUNNING WITH GOD-
THE COMMISSION RENEWED
TEXT: Jon 3:1-3
God gives Jonah another chance to surrender to His will for the prophets life. Jonah obeys.
Jon 3:1 . . . THE WORD OF JEHOVAH CAME UNTO JONAH THE SECOND TIME . . . Jonah has had a conversion experience! He has been raised to a new life. Physically he had come to the point of no return-except by the power of God he had returned! Spiritually he had died to himself and was raised a new spiritual man. John Noble, the American who spent over ten years in Russian prison camps relates a similar conversion experience in his book, I Found God In Soviet Russia.
Mr. Noble, when first imprisoned, was forced to go nine days without even the slightest morsel of food. Here is what he says: With my last strength, I struggled onto my knees and earnestly asked the Lord simply to close my eyes this night and release me from my mortal suffering. I said, in effect, Dear Lord, I give up; I cant go on any longer. I have no way out but through Thee. Lord, close my eyes and take me to Thee, or if it be Thy will that I must go on, give me the strength to do so, and lend me Thy hand to guide me. My will is broken, Thy will be done. Amen. I committed my soul entirely to the hands of the Lord. Unworthy of His grace though I was, I felt prepared to die. This time, I had not prayed that my will be done but that the Lords will be done. I was completely submissive to that will . . . By committing my life to Christ without reservation, I had the amazing experience of being born again of the Spirit . . . It was the most wonderful, miraculous sensation I have ever experienced.
This is somewhat the same experience Jonah describes himself feeling in the belly of the great fish when he had no other place to turn than God. After his experience in the sea, he probably preached like one raised from the dead. Macaulay characterized Demosthenes oratory as reason made red hot by passion. Jonahs was the Word of God made red hot by conversion of the orator, The prophet had died, as it were, and been brought back to life again. It always requires an experience like Jonahs to make a good preacher!
So God called Jonah again to go to Nineveh. God would not suspend His concern for the souls of that great city just because one of His prophets disobeyed. Furthermore Gods mercy and love is long-suffering toward the wayward prophet. God is rich in mercy-the riches of His goodness and forbearance and longsuffering . . . leads to repentance (Rom 2:4) if we will but respond.
Zerr: Jon 3:1. Having “learned his lesson and been restored to the land, Jonah was ready to receive renewed instructions from the Lord; accordingly the divine word came to him the second time. There is no mention in the text of the event just closed, and as far as the record is concerned the Lord delivered his command just as if nothing had happened to the prophet.
Jon 3:2 . . . PREACH UNTO IT THE PREACHING THAT I BID THEE . . . What was the preaching that God bade Jonah preach? At the first command God told the prophet to preach against that wicked city. His task was to preach against wickedness. Then we learn from Jon 3:4 that he cried, Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. All this, of course, was to the end that the people would repent. This message of repentance still needs to be preached today. Jesus referred to Jonahs preaching comparing it to His message, for His message was, Repent for the kingdom of God is at hand. Peter on the day of Pentecost preached, Repent and be immersed, everyone of you . . . Paul, to the philosophers of Athens preached, . . . now he commandeth all men everywhere to repent . . . The reason these men preached repentance was they preached . . . the preaching that God bade them preach. This is still good advice for all preachers: preach only that which God commands. Preach His Word, from His Book. We live in an age in which society tends to dictate to the preacher, and social pressures and modern theological trends seek to obscure the propositional revelation of God, His Word, the Bible. Peter wrote, If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God (1Pe 4:11). Men who do not declare from the pulpit, Thus saith the Lord, are not fit to stand in that sacred spot.
Zerr: Jon 3:2. We are given the added detail that Jonah was to say whatever was stated to him when he arrived in the city of Nineveh. The report does not show any objections to his preaching hence we must conclude that the declaration Jonah made was what the Lord had bidden him to deliver.
Jon 3:3 SO JONAH . . . WENT UNTO NINEVEH . . . AN EXCEEDING GREAT CITY, OF THREE DAYS JOURNEY . . . This time Jonah went according to the word of the Lord. There is no running away this time. There is not even any reluctance. He has learned his lesson . . . he has a new heart in the matter . . . he is a new man for God.
Zerr: Jon 3:3. This time Jonah went in the direction of his duty according to the word of the Lord. Three days’ journey might have referred to the distance round the city or across it either, as far as the expression of the text goes. But the rule of consistency indicates that the latter is meant, for the same days journey is used in the next verse in connection with Jonahs entry into the city and across it. As to what a days journey is would depend upon the means of journeying that is being used at a given time. Journey is from mahalak which Strong defines, A walk, i.e. a passage or a distance. It is the word for “walk in Eze 42:4 where we know it was a place in which men traveled on foot. So the conclusion is that a man would walk across the city of Nineveh in three days at the ordinary speed of such a mode of travel.
Because archeologists have not yet found evidence that Nineveh is as extensive a city as three days journey would seem to indicate, some scholars have accused this book of being historically inaccurate. But must we assume that we know all there is to know about the metropolis of Nineveh and pronounce the book of Jonah irrevocably inaccurate?! There are a number of possible answers to this alleged problem; (a) the statement could refer to the circumference of the city; (b) the statement could mean that journeying leisurely, stopping to preach at likely spots, it would take three days to journey the length or breadth of the city; (c) or, more likely, it could mean that a journey across greater Nineveh, including its suburbs (of which we spoke on Jon 1:2), would take three days. The city was great, not because it impressed God by its size or fame, but because God was concerned with the many souls in it which were lost and because it would be an almost overwhelming task, in the eyes of Jonah, to preach against it.
Questions
1. How had Jonah changed? What experience had he undergone?
2. Why did God not cast Jonah off after one disobedience?
3. What did God bid Jonah preach? Is there a lesson for us in that?
4. Is the note about a city of three days journey inaccurate?
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Immediately Jonah was again charged to go to Nineveh. There is a fine revelation of the patient grace of God toward His servant in the statement, “The word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time.” With a new sense of the authority of Jehovah, Jonah arose and obeyed.
It was a strange and startling thing for Nineveh, this arrival of a man who had been cast into the deep; and it is easy to understand how the monotony of his declaration, that within forty days Nineveh would be destroyed, would fill the hearts of the people with terror. They heard; they believed; they were filled with fear, and repented, from the greatest to the least. Their repentance was answered by the repentance of God, so that the doom was averted and the city spared.
Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible
a Repentant City
Jon 3:1-10
Peter was not only forgiven, but restored to his office; so also was Jonah again sent to Nineveh. Thank God for our second chances! There was no hesitancy this time. The prophet arose and went. The story of his deliverance seems to have reached Nineveh and to have prepared its people to receive his word, Luk 11:30. We must deliver Gods messages and preach only as He bids us. He will tell us what to say.
Nineveh is said to have been sixty miles in circuit, the distance of a three days journey. It was full of violence and cruelty. But the sight of that strange figure, clad in a rude sheep-skin mantle, smote its conscience. The alarm spread from the streets to the palace. Even the great king felt it within his sculptured chambers. It stirred him to action, so that king and court, peers and people, and even the brute creation, became united in one act of common humiliation. The repentance was city-wide in its scope, Jon 3:5; was practical, Jon 3:8; and directed toward God, Jon 3:9. What a contrast to Israel! There, prophet after prophet was exposed to refusal and even to cruel usage. Whatever fear there may have been upon mans side, there was no hesitation upon Gods. He abundantly pardoned! See Isa 55:7.
Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary
Chapter 3
Death And Resurrection
It is of all importance, in studying the typical characters of the Old Testament, to distinguish between a man in his individual and in his official aspect. In other words, one may be a type of the Lord Jesus, if looked at officially, who, if viewed morally, may be a most marked failure. This is strikingly illustrated in the case of David. As the anointed of the Lord, he is preeminently a type of the true King, the Anointed of Jehovah, yet to be set upon the holy hill of Zion; but actually there is much in his life that is altogether opposed to the holiness and perfections of Him who was truly the Man after Gods own heart. In the present instance the same principle applies. Jonahs history is, as we have seen, sad and sorrowful in the extreme; but grace delights to take up just such as he: and so we find the Divine Expositor Himself declaring that His own death and resurrection were set forth in symbol in the experience that the prophet from Galilee passed through. It is as the one who has thus tasted death, but triumphed over it, that Jonah becomes the bearer of Jehovahs message to the Ninevites.
All his waywardness had not altered the thoughts of God as to his being sent to preach to these impious people. The servant might fail, but he is a servant still, as in the instances of Abraham and Job. The former was to intercede for Abimelech, for he is a prophet, though he had just denied his wife. The latter, restored in soul, no doubt, prays for his friends, though he had justified himself rather than God. There is a solemn and serious lesson here for those put in trust with the gospel, or who have a special ministry to the people of God. They are judged of the Lord, not merely as saints, but as servants. Nor does failure relieve them of responsibility to serve, but calls all the louder for self-judgment, that they may be in a right state of soul to minister in holy things. In so writing, I have no thought of countenancing clerical pretensions, or making of servants of Christ a special class who are supposed to be above the frailties common to men, and even to saints. But I only press what Scripture frequently insists on, that he who serves should do so because called of God to his particular ministry; and when so called, he has a most grave responsibility to walk accordingly. A one-man ministry is rightly rejected by many as unscriptural. An any-man ministry is equally so. He who runs unsent has failed even in his very start.
Jonah had been called of God to his mission. He is given the command the second time to Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee. In response there is apparently no hesitation now, for we read, So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. His obedience now is as conspicuous as his former lack of it; but we know from the next chapter that he had not yet judged the point of departure from God. It is a serious thing to realize that people may become outwardly correct in their demeanor and zealous in the work of the Lord after a failure, so that none may realize that they are not yet restored in soul, while in reality the evil remains unjudged. The root of the matter is unreached. Certain acts may be confessed, and the confession may be real and genuine, so far as it goes; but the state of soul that led to these acts has not been faced in the presence of God. This was the great lack here, and a vital one. But God will have His own way of exposing the true state of His servant to himself, and of restoring his soul.
Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown, is the burden of his message to the voluptuous city. The result is just as he had feared. For himself, he had gladly proven that salvation is of the Lord. The people of Nineveh shall prove the same; but so perverse is the human heart, even though it be the heart of a saint, that it fills Jonah with anger to see mercy going out to the repentant city. In a few graphic sentences the story of the great awakening is told. So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them. For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything: let them not feed, nor drink water: but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands. Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from His fierce anger, that we perish not? (vers. 5-9).
It is an open question if all the annals of revival-history could furnish a scene to parallel this. From the greatest to the least, all are crying to God. It is noticeable that it is not to the Lord-that is, Jehovah-that they direct their prayers, nor of whom they speak. Here, as in all Old Testament Scripture, Elohim (God) and Jehovah are used with scrupulous exactness. Foolish men may stumble at the use of the two names: but it is because they are blinded by the god of this age, and thus they fail to see that Jehovah is the covenant name that links God with His people in known relationship, while Elohim speaks rather of sovereignty and Creatorship. Hence the sailors of chapter one rightly use the broader title, or name, until, instructed by the erring prophet, they cry to Jehovah not to hold them accountable for his blood. And so, too, these Ninevites address their petitions to Elohim; and, as a result, we are told that God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented Him of the evil, that He had said He would do unto them; and He did it not (ver. 10). Would any find a difficulty here? Let them know that He with whom judgment is a strange work is ever ready to repent Himself, and manifest His grace upon the least evidence of a breaking down before Him, and contrition of heart because of sin.
His is love, tis love unbounded,-
Without measure, without end.
Human thought is here confounded,
is too vast to comprehend.
Alas, that Jonah was in no condition of soul to enter into and enjoy such love and grace! His is the spirit of the elder son in the parable, as the next chapter makes manifest.
Fuente: Commentaries on the New Testament and Prophets
Jon 3:1
I. From Joppa the prophet probably went up to Jerusalem, to appear in the Temple, to which he had looked from the deep, to sacrifice to God with the voice of thanksgiving, to pay what he had vowed. Then, probably, he returned to Gath-hepher, his former home. And there, as it would seem, he was living when he received the second commission to go to Nineveh. Notice the points of identity between the first and the second commission. (i) God still needs to speak. (ii) Nineveh is still a great city. Therefore that is the place for Him to speak. There are also points of difference between the first and the second commission. (1) One respects Jonah himself, and glances, not reproachfully, but still in a spirit of fatherly faithfulness at his recent disobedience. “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, preach the preaching that I bid thee.” Formerly he knew the message that he was to deliver. Now he is simply told that a message will be given him, but he is not to know it until he arrives at the place. He is relegated, as it were, from the position of the “friend who knoweth his Lord’s will,” to, or towards, that of the “servant who knoweth not.” (2) The message is different in its substance also, to meet the change in Nineveh.
II. From Jonah’s preaching in Nineveh we see: (i) The exceeding sinfulness of sin. The horror of great darkness which settles down with the night upon Nineveh is all brought by sin. (ii) The inflexible justice of God. (iii) The stupendous power a city has-power for good and power for evil.
A. Raleigh, The Story of Jonah, p. 189.
References: Jon 3:1-4.-W. G. Blaikie,Homiletic Magazine, vol. vi., p. 250. Jon 3:2.-J. McC. Hussey, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xiii., p. 177; J. Keble, Sermons from Lent to Passiontide, p. 279. Jon 3:4.-Spurgeon, My Sermon Notes: Ecclesiastes to Malachi, p. 333; J. Vaughan, Sermons, 15th series, p. 85.
Jon 3:5
I. Our Lord tells us that “Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites.” He was a sign (1) of the impartiality and inflexibility of the Divine justice. Prophet though he was, raised to a higher place of life than common men, admitted to a knowledge of some of the secrets of the Divine government of the world; in favour, as might be supposed, in the celestial court, he no sooner swerves and turns from the way of obedience, than God turns upon him the arrestive and vindicative powers of His government. He is pursued, convicted, cast into the deep. It will appear manifest to them that all nature serves God for His just occasions; that the nets of capture are already woven-spread wherever there can be the footsteps of flight; that storms are brooding in the air and vengeance sleeping in the sea, for those who choose to awake them. (1) He was also a sign of Divine mercy. For he is alive! He has been delivered. From sea and grave, and death and hell, he has come forth. He is not merely in life, he is in favour, once more, with God. Let us take this man as a sign of mercy,-repent and pray, and press towards the gate-see if it will not open a little wider. So the prophet was “a sign” unto them.
II. Notice the effects which are produced upon the city by Jonah’s progress through it. They are such as no man ever produced in a single day, either before or since. They are such as could flow only from the presence and action of the mighty power, and the still mightier grace of God. A sense of God soon filled the city. It was shed from group to group, from street to street. It was awful, painful, at the first, like a “resurrection of condemnation,” to their spirits. It turned them away from their own gods as effectually as the sailors in the ship were turned from theirs. “They believed God.” Possessed of that faith, all that follows is natural and inevitable.
III. The proclamation which was the faithful exposition of the true sentiments, both of king and people, bears certain marks which we may briefly note. (i) We cannot fail to be struck with the comprehensiveness of it. The prohibition is over every human being, and over all the animals possessed by and related to man. (ii) Fasting was the first part of the decree. Fasting has been a religious exercise in the East as far back as history takes us. The efficacy of it will be more or less, according to climate, individual temperament, and other circumstances. (iii) The covering with sackcloth was the next part of the decree. In its nature and purpose it is closely allied to fasting-with this difference, that it is visible. (iv) Each person is to utter a mighty cry. The Eastern nations have always been addicted to vocal demonstration for the expression of the stronger emotions. The “might,” no doubt, is to be in the desire more than in the mere voice that utters it. (v) But by far the most striking and satisfactory characteristic of this proclamation is the last-that which requires from every man a personal and practical reformation: “Let them turn every one from his evil way.”
A. Raleigh, The Story of Jonah, p. 216.
References: Jon 3:5-9.-J. Menzies, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xi., p. 100. Jon 3:5-10.-W. G. Blaikie, Homiletic Magazine, vol. vi., p. 295. Jon 3:8.-J. N. Norton, Golden Truths, p. 152. Jon 3:9.-Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. v., No. 275.
Jon 3:10
I. In the last verse of the third chapter we come upon a difficulty which has exercised the faith and called forth the ingenuity of interpreters. The difficulty is this, there are passages in Holy Scripture which assert in the strongest way that God cannot repent, and that He never does. There are certain other passages (of which this is one) which assert, just as strongly, that He can repent, and that, in fact, He has often done so.
II. If the question is put, “Why was not Nineveh destroyed? how can we reconcile the sparing of the city with Divine veracity, since there is no condition or qualification in the denouncing cry?”-the answer is, that the condition was involved and understood. The possibility of mercy was clearly understood by Jonah, for he was displeased with it. It was understood also by the Ninevites, for they cried for long days and nights. If God had made unreserved announcement of destruction, the city must have been destroyed, for He is in one mind, and who can turn Him? “Hath He said it, and shall He not do it?” “But He knew that the city would repent: why then did He threaten without any expressed reference to this eventuality?” The answer is, that He knew that the city would repent under the shadow of the Divine commination. Not otherwise. The commination was uttered because it was deserved, because it suited the moral condition of the people, because it was necessary in the perfect government of God. Also, God foresaw its good effect; and therefore, in all truth and sincerity, it was put forth. “God knows that His believing children will persevere unto the end: why, then, does He speak to them as if they might not-as if they might apostatize and drawback unto perdition?” The answer is, because they might. It is a clear possibility that they might; and very likely the realization by them of this awful possibility is one of the elements which compose and complete the certainty of perseverance unto the end.
III. The mind of God is the one perfect mirror reflecting without the least distortion or refraction, every object, act, state, being, in the universe, just as it is. God morally regards us at any one moment just as we are. If we repent of all sin and grow into all goodness, His thought and feeling will rise with us; and as, repenting, He spared Nineveh, so will He spare us, and we shall live and not die.
A. Raleigh, The Story of Jonah, p. 241.
References: 3:10-4:1.-J. Menzies, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xi., p. 117; W. G. Blaikie, Homiletic Magazine, vol. vi., p. 297. Jonah 3-Preacher’s Monthly, vol. iii., p. 103. Jon 4:1-4.-W. G. Blaikie, Homiletic Magazine, vol. vi., p. 356. Jon 4:2.-S. Cox, Expositions, 2nd series, p. 75.
Fuente: The Sermon Bible
CHAPTER 3
Jonah Preaching in Nineveh
1. The repeated commission and Jonahs obedience (Jon 3:1-4)
2. The repentance and salvation of Nineveh (Jon 3:4-10)
Jon 3:1-4. And now after Jonahs death and life experience the Word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, telling him to arise and go to Nineveh to preach there what the Lord would command him. And now he is obedient. Jonah arrived in the great city of three days journey, and advancing a days journey into it he cried out his message, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown. Following is the objection of higher criticism as to this statement: If we were reading a historical description the narrative would be full of difficulties. A strange prophet announced the impending destruction as he traveled through the vast city for one day, and the huge population immediately believed and repented. The king, who is not named, heard, put on sackcloth, sitting in ashes. If this were history, Jonah did what no prophet, no apostle, what Christ Himself never did. Never did a days preaching bring a vast strange city to repentance. But we repeat, it is not history; it is a story with a meaning, an allegory; it is the great announcement that God cares for the heathen world, and calls it to repentance, and whenever men anywhere repent, His compassion is kindled towards them (New Century Bible). We reserve the answer to the supposed difficulties in this historical account for the typical unfolding of this event.
Jon 3:4-10. The people of Nineveh believed God. The news that a strange prophet had appeared with the message of doom must have spread like wildfire and hundreds upon hundreds must have passed it on so that in a very short time it reached every nook and corner of the great city; it reached the palace of the king and the prisoners in the dungeon. That this is real history has been confirmed by archaeology. For just about that time Nineveh was in great trouble and facing a crisis, which made them eager to believe the message and return to God. They evidenced their faith by a universal fast and humiliation before God. The king laid aside his royal robe and humiliated himself as every one of his subjects did. He issued a proclamation to abstain from food and drink, in which the dumb creation was included. What a solemn time the great city had, when hundreds and thousands humbled themselves and when the lowing and groaning of the domestic animals was heard throughout the city. The people acknowledged all their wickedness and turned away from their evil ways and deeds of violence, expressing the hope of Gods mercy. Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from His fierce anger, that we perish not. And God answered and was merciful to them.
The Typical Application
1. As to the Lord Jesus. Jonah who typifies in his experience the death, burial and resurrection of our Lord, preached the message as one who had been in a grave and came to life out of that grave. In Luk 11:29-30; Luk 11:32, our Lord makes the application: For as Jonah was a sign unto the Ninevites, so shall also the Son of Man be to this generation … The men of Nineveh shall rise up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and, behold, a greater than Jonah is here. Christ was not preached as a Saviour to the Gentile world till He had died and risen from the dead. The Greeks who inquired after Him Joh 12:1-50 received no answer. But the Lord spoke of Himself at that time as the corn of wheat which was to die to bring forth the abundant fruit. Christ died for the sins of His people Israel, for that nation, but He also died as a member of the nation, from which He came according to the flesh, so that He might rise and become the Saviour of the Gentiles. Christ preached as having died for our sins, buried and risen on the third day, is the true gospel and carries with it the power of God in the salvation of sinners.
2. As to the Nation. The third day is the day of Israels spiritual and national resurrection. When that day comes converted Israel will be, according to Gods gifts and calling, a holy nation, a nation of priestly functions, a kingdom of priests. They are then fit to show forth the Lord and His glory, and to bring the message, not of judgment, but of life and glory, to the nations of heathendom. The statement in the New Century Bible quoted above is quite correct in one particular– that Jonah did what no prophet, no apostle, what Christ Himself never did–that never a days preaching brought a vast strange city to repentance. And we might add that no preaching today, during this age, can ever bring such results. The case is unique; it never happened again, that a man who was disobedient, who turned against the divine commission, became a castaway, was miraculously preserved and delivered, led a great world city to God and to true repentance. But if we take into consideration the fact that this true history is a prophecy, all these invented higher critical difficulties vanish altogether. When the nation is reinstated in the land, filled with the Spirit, they will fulfill their calling and go forth in bringing the message to the nations of the world. Then Mat 28:19 will be accomplished. Then and not before will the world be converted, and all the nations will be joined in the kingdom to Israel, His kingdom people.
And as for repenting Nineveh there came a day of joy and gladness, as animal creation in that city ceased its lowing and groaning, so will come the day of joy and gladness for this poor world, in that day when even groaning creation will be delivered of its groans and moans.
Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)
the word: Jon 1:1
the second: Joh 21:15-17
Reciprocal: Gen 10:11 – Nineveh 1Sa 7:6 – fasted Hag 1:8 – and build Act 9:15 – Go
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
THE SECOND TIME
The word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, Arise, go unto Nineveh and preach.
Jon 3:1
I. The second time. This implies that there had been a first time.Jonah must have paused after writing these first words of a new chapter in his life-history, and gone back in thought to the earlier call at Gath-hepher, and the terrible consequences of its rejection. He must have wondered that Jehovah had not cast him off for ever for his perversity. But he was to have another opportunity of making his calling and election sure. He had not yet committed the unpardonable sin, nor had another been called to take his office. A fresh start in his prophetic life was open to him, and the tide of Divine favour and blessing was once again at the flood. How rarely this happens we all know; but Jonahs life and history, rather than his message, were to be the gospel to the Ninevites.
II. The second time. The words suggest the Divine Sovereignty.We are slow to realise the sacredness of Divine law. It seldom occurs to us what an appalling thing it is to break even one of the least of Gods commandments. We forget that the universe depends, for its continued existence and well-being, on the strictest conformity to law and order. The Church, being a purely spiritual community, could not exist without absolute obedience to the laws of its Divine Head. The welfare and happiness of our own lives are conditioned by obedience to the law of our Creator. But all the more sacred and inviolable ought those laws to appear to us, to whom their wisdom has been explained, and their necessity made clear, by their Divine Author and Executor, the Son of God Himself. We ought to recognise that the Divine Will must be paramount, and we must yield to it prompt and willing obedience. His word comes the second time whenever it has been disregarded the first time; and it will continue to come until it has prospered in the thing whereto He has sent it.
III. The second time. The words suggest the Divine Clemency.Jonah must have felt what St. Peter felt when he was commanded to Feed the Lambs of Christ, when he was thereby forgiven for his delinquency and restored to his apostleship; he must have felt that Gods thoughts were not as mans thoughts; he was pardoned without reproach, and restored without upbraiding. Jonah was not asked where he had been, or what he had been doing, or what he had now to say for himself, but told to arise, and go to Nineveh. Who is a God like unto Thee?
IV. The second time suggests the Divine Love.It was love, not only to Jonah, but to Nineveh with its sixty-thousand children. God so loves the world. The first message had been miscarried, but in pity and love He sends a second. If there is threat of stern judgment in the message, there is a full gospel in the pardoned messenger. There was forgiveness with God that He might be feared, and love that He might be trusted and obeyed.
Illustration
We must not presume on this, but we may take it to our hearts for their very great comfort. Gods word may come to us the second time. Jonah evaded it the first time, but he was permitted to have a second opportunity of obeying it. Thus it was with Peter; he failed to realise the Lords ideal in the first great trial of his apostolic career, but the Lord met him on the shore of the lake, and His word came to him a second time. God is not waiting to notice our first failure and thrust us from His service. He waits, with eager desire, to give us the joy and honour of being fellow-labourers with Himself. He waits to be gracious. Therefore, when, in our madness, we refuse to do His bidding, and rush off in another direction, He brings us back, amid bitter experiences, and says, Go again to Nineveh with the message that I gave thee originally.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
On to Nineveh
Jon 3:1-10
INTRODUCTORY WORDS
1. Our opening verse says, “The Word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time.” These words bring to us the thought of a second chance. We are reminded of the story of the potter. Only lately, we were in North Carolina in a rustic, old-fashioned pottery house. Before our very eyes, the potter took a large lump of clay, started his wheel, which he ran with a foot pedal. With his hands, he molded a beautiful vase. We stopped him, and said, “You make us think of the potter in the Word of God who was making a vessel and it was marred, so he made it again.”
Jesus Christ has made many a Christian over again. He is not saving them over again, but He is refashioning, remolding, and recommissioning them.
You will remember the Scripture which says that we are changed into His own image, “from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.”
Jonah, instead of obeying God, in his first commission, went down to Joppa and took ship to Tarshish. God immediately put Jonah into the school of affliction. He was graduated the hour that the fish vomited him out upon the land. Then it was that he had his second commission. We remember how Peter wandered from the Lord. However, Peter was recommissioned, given back his work. Indeed, it was Peter who preached that remarkable sermon at Pentecost.
We remember as a youth, in college, a song we sang. It ran like this:
“I walked through the woodland meadow,
Where sweet the thrushes sang;
And found on a bed of mosses,
A bird with a broken wing:
I healed its wing, and each morning,
It sang its old sweet strain,
But the bird with the broken pinion,
Never soared so high again.
“I saw a young life stricken
By sin’s seductive art,
And, touched with a Christlike pity,
I took him to my heart;
He lived with a noble purpose,
And struggled not in vain,
But the life with the broken pinion
Never soared so high again!”
My boyhood song may be true, so far as the birds are concerned. It is not true so far as saints are concerned. Sometimes, I think that a Christian who has wandered from God, and been healed, and filled with the Spirit, may soar higher after his healing than before his temporary wandering.
This was truly so with Peter, He never preached before he followed afar off, as he did after he had been restored to his fellowship with his Lord. Jonah was unwilling to go to Nineveh at first, and we are not sure that he went happily the second time. However, he went obediently. He had learned that to obey is better than sacrifice, and obedience than the fat of rams.
2. Our opening verse also carries with it the thought of the all-powerfulness of God. He who hath stretched forth His hand will not draw it back, because of the unfaithfulness of some human servant. God will either prepare His servant to fulfill His will, or He will set His servant aside and secure another.
God was about to destroy Nineveh; however, before so doing, His eternal purpose determined on giving the Ninevites a solemn and true warning. Thus it was that He said to Jonah: “Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.”
Here is a wonderful lesson; God at first called Israel to be His witness unto the world. Israel was disobedient to the call. Israel was broken off, therefore God grafted in the Church, and gave to her the commission: “Go * * and preach the Gospel to every creature.” If the Church is truant, as was Israel, she also shall be broken off.
The heart of God enclosed in its love even so wicked a city as Nineveh. It also encloses New York, and Paris, and London, and Petrograd.
Another lesson we need to learn is that we must preach what we are told to preach. We must not go to lost men, and fabricate our own message. A social gospel may appeal to our intellect. An ethical message may appeal to the people, but the Prophet that hath God’s Word must preach it faithfully.
I. JONAH AROSE AND WENT (Jon 3:3)
How refreshing are the words of our key text! Here is the first suggestion that they bring to us.
1. Prompt obedience to any and every command of God. This gives God glory. It is not ours only to obey, but to obey gladly.
When the Word of the Lord came unto Abraham, he arose and went out not knowing whither he was to go. Ours is not to reason why, ours is but to do, or die.
Onward and never back,
Along the beaten track,
Onward and never back.
May I the prize not lack,
At Heaven’s dawn!
When that man sent forth His two sons, one son said, “I will not; but afterward he repented, and went.” The other said, “I go, sir: and went not.” Which of these two did the will of his father?
Jonah who said figuratively, “I will not.” afterward arose and went. Prompt obedience is best. Obedience, however, if delayed, is always good. God grant that it may never be necessary to cast us into a whale’s belly, in order to induce us to obey. Jesus says, “He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me.” He also says, “If ye love Me, keep My commandments.”
2. True obedience will overcome every obstacle. Our key verse says, “Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days’ journey.” The three days’ journey stands in the Bible for death, and burial and resurrection. It was this kind of journey that Christ took when He died, was buried, and arose again.
Perhaps, once more, we see a little further into the deeper meaning of the word: “As Jonas * * so shall the Son of Man.” We are happy that Jonah did not now hesitate. He took the journey without any further side-stepping.
3. A profitable thought will lie in God’s deeper purpose in Jonah’s delay. We believe that the three days and the three nights in the whale’s belly, with the added three days of journeying on the part of Jonah, all had their bearing on Nineveh’s repentance. Jonah, in fleeing from Nineveh, thought, perhaps, that he would make certain Nineveh’s overthrow, for Jonah had no love for Nineveh. Instead, however, of making certain its overthrow, he was making more certain its repentance.
During the six days that elapsed, between Jonah’s being cast overboard, and Jonah’s passage through the city of Nineveh, the Ninevites had, beyond any doubt, received word from the captain of the ship, on which Jonah had fled, relative to Jonah’s commission, the great storm, his overthrow into the sea, and his being swallowed of the fish. All of this prepared the heart of Nineveh, ahead of time, to receive Jonah.
II. YET FORTY DAYS AND NINEVEH SHALL BE OVERTHROWN (Jon 3:4)
1. When Jonah began to enter into the city. The key verse says, “Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey.”
Let us try to imagine the scene. A Prophet plodding along. A Prophet plodding along without any love in his heart. A Prophet crying out vengeance, and this against a city and a people for whom he had no pity. Surely there was nothing in Jonah’s message to make the Ninevites love him. Jonah sounded forth no word of pity, gave no ray of hope. His one message was judgment.
The second day’s journey through the great city brought no change, either to Jonah’s mien, or to Jonah’s message. It was the same word given on the first day, and given in the same way. What then made Nineveh repent? It was the fact that she had heard the whole story of Jonah.
Nineveh knew that Jonah had been swallowed by the great fish, and yet Nineveh saw him coming down the road. It was just as if we had seen a man die, had seen him buried; and then, to our amazement, we had seen him alive, sounding out a warning from Heaven.
2. Why did Nineveh repent? Let us go deeper into this theme. We think the New Testament will afford us an answer. Let us go to Pentecost, and stand with the great multitude who heard Peter preach (Act 2:22-24).
We believe the repentance of the multitude at Pentecost was not due to anything that lay in Peter. They knew how Peter had cringed before a maid, and denied his Lord. For Peter, personally, they had but little real admiration. The reason that the people repented was because of Peter’s words, This Jesus, whom “ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain: whom God hath raised up.”
To the people of that day there was no discounting the literalness of the resurrection. A dead Christ had actually broken the bands of death. They all knew how the Roman soldiers had fallen back in fear, as the stone was rolled away. It was this that made the 3,000 turn to the Lord.
In Nineveh it was the fact that a man, to all purpose dead and digested in the belly of a fish, was actually walking down the street of Nineveh. It was this that first startled, and then convinced the Ninevites.
III. NINEVEH’S FAITH AND REPENTANCE (Jon 3:5-6)
1. The people of Nineveh believed God. They did not believe Jonah, for Jonah’s sake. They believed the One who had sent him. Let those of us who preach the Gospel never seek again to tie the people to ourselves. We have come to be what John the Baptist said he was, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness.” We have come to be the signpost along life’s highway, pointing men to God. Paul said, “We preach not ourselves, but Christ.”
2. The people of Nineveh proclaimed a fast. They put on sackcloth from the greatest of them, even to the least. Even the king of Nineveh arose from his throne, laid his robe aside, and covered himself with sackcloth and ashes.
It is written and it is true that a broken and a contrite heart God will not despise. If we would receive anything from the Lord, we must come as the publican came, beating upon our breast, and suing for mercy.
Just recently, down in the Carolinas, a man asked us if repentance should be preached in our day. He thought that the call to repentance belonged to the Ninevites, or to the people in the days of the Apostles. The Word of God, however, says, “The times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every where to repent.” In the Book of Romans, we read, “Despisest thou the riches of His goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?”
In the Epistle to Peter we read that God is longsuffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. The truth is, the Name of our Lord, as given by the angel to Mary, was Jesus, because He should save His people from their sins. We had just as well say that believing God belonged alone to the people of Nineveh, as to say that repentance belonged alone to them. God is still saying to us all, “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him.” Repentance apart from faith can never save, but a true faith in Jesus Christ necessitates a genuine repentance.
IV. THE GENUINENESS OF THE PEOPLE OF NINEVEH (Jon 3:7-8)
There was no doubting that the king and the people of Nineveh meant what they did. The king, and his nobles, sent out a decree, saying, “Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water: but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands.”
We agree heartily with those who teach the blessed story of salvation by grace through faith, and not of works. We know that sackcloth and ashes, and turning from evil ways, cannot save us. However, we know also that God looks down from above and does not despise the yearning of a sin-burdened heart. We believe that sorrow and a tear are a mighty telescope through which we may view the dying Son of God.
The fact of the business is that men who come by faith to Jesus Christ and receive Him as Saviour, do of necessity come confessing themselves as sinners. Why should they seek salvation, if they are not lost? Why should they trust in the cleansing Blood, if they were not sinners in need of washing and forgiveness? So it is, that every lost soul who believes and is saved recognizes not alone his Christ as Saviour, but himself a sinner.
Thinkest thou not that God meant what He said, when He uttered those memorable words: “Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish”?
Let us go to the 10th chapter of Acts. There was a man named Cornelius who was a centurion of the Italian band. He was a devout man who feared God with all his house, who gave much alms to his people, and prayed to God always. Did God despise his prayers? Did God despise his devotion, his alms? Nay, He rather sent a vision unto him, telling him to send men to Joppa and call for one Simon whose surname was Peter.
Thus it was that Peter went down with the men, and said, “Ye know how that it is an unlawful thing for a man that is a Jew to keep company, or come unto one of another nation; but God hath shewed me that I should not call any man common or unclean.” After Cornelius had spoken, Peter said, “Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons.” Then he went on and proclaimed the story of Christ, God’s Anointed, how He had been crucified and hanged on the Tree, and how God had raised Him up the third day and showed Him openly. Then he said to Cornelius, “He commanded us to preach unto the people, and to testify that it is He which was ordained of God to be the Judge of quick and dead.” Finally, Peter said, “To Him give all the Prophets witness, that through His Name whosoever believeth in Him shall receive remission of sins.”
Remember, God did not, through Peter, tell Cornelius that his prayers and his alms could save him. He preached to him salvation by faith. However, this centurion did say what he knew, and the alms and prayers of Cornelius came up as a memorial before God. Thus it was with the Ninevites. They cried mightily unto God, and they turned every one from his evil way, hoping that God would turn away His fierce anger, that they perish not.
V. THE BASIS UPON WHICH NINEVEH WAS SPARED (Jon 3:9-10)
In the study of this portion, we must cautiously observe that God did not give to the Ninevites regeneration. He did spare their city.
1. The deeper meaning of the expression, “God repented of the evil, that He had said that He would do unto them; and He did it not.” Whether it be saint or sinner, God rewards every one according to his work; God does not save men according to their works. Please, in your minds, underscore the word, “Reward.”
Even the wicked shall be rewarded according as he hath done. Let us turn to the Book of Revelation, and see the Great White Throne, and Him that will sit upon it. The Book says, “And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another Book was opened, which is the Book of Life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.” The next verse says, “And they were judged every man according to their works.”
Thus it is that if a man who is in sin, and is about to receive the judgment of physical death, repents, God will turn away from what He was about to do. God’s attitude is unchangeable. To those who walk righteously God gives favor. To those, individually or nationally, who walk unrighteously, God sends judgment. If, therefore, the wicked turn from his evil way, and repent, God will, of necessity, be forced from judgment to kindness.
2. Jonah foresaw this Divine attitude in God, and, therefore, he did not want to go to Nineveh. Chapter 4 opens with the startling words, “But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry. And he prayed unto the Lord, and said, I pray Thee, O Lord, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil.”
God is the same today that He was yesterday. We believe that our own nation has been under judgments from God. We saw this some months ago. We passed by the western cornfields which had been ravaged by the grasshoppers. We believe that if our own country would nationally fall upon its knees and turn from her love of gold, her lust for pleasure; that God would save us from the depression, and every national ill that hovers over us.
VI. GOD’S GOODNESS EXPLAINED (Jon 4:5-8)
1. The story of the gourd. When Jonah, in his anger, went out from the city of Nineveh, he made himself a booth and sat under it, in the shadow, until he would see what would become of the city. Whatever Jonah wanted, by the way of a curse for Nineveh, he did not want for himself. He wanted fire to fall upon the city, but he wanted himself sheltered from the heat of the sun.
God easily read the spirit of His Prophet and so He prepared a gourd and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shadow over his head, to deliver him from his grief. When Jonah saw this kindness of God toward him, he was exceeding glad.
Then God prepared a worm, when the morning arose the next day, and it smote the gourd that it withered. God, in addition, as the day came on, prepared a vehement east wind, and, in addition, the sun beat upon the head of Jonah, and he fainted and wished to die.
God then said to Jonah, “Doest thou well to be angry for the gourd?” Then God said, “Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for the which thou hast not laboured, neither madest it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night.” The Lord help us lest we seek favor for ourselves, and the curse upon our neighbors.
VII. THE INSIDE VISION OF THE HEART OF GOD (Jon 4:11)
To us, this is the Joh 3:16 of the Old Testament, in this particular: It gives us the spirit of God toward a world lost in sin. Jonah wanted God to spare the gourd for his sake. God said, “Should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?”
1. Behold the love of God toward little children! Had Nineveh perished, the innocents would have perished with her. God loved Nineveh, because He loves the world. God loved Nineveh because He commendeth His love unto us, in that while we were yet sinners, He loved us. God loved Nineveh because He hath no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but desires that all men shall repent and turn unto God.
How much more then did God love the little children. Let us remember that in Heaven their angels do always behold the face of our Father who is in Heaven. Let us remember that He said, “Suffer the little children to come unto Me, and forbid them not: for of such is the Kingdom of God.”
2. Behold the love of God toward the beasts of the earth. God not only said, “Should not I spare Nineveh, * * wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons,” but He also said, “Much cattle.” Have we not read that His eye is on the sparrow? Doth He not observe its fall? Has not God also said, that “the creature itself shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God”? Have we not read that the lion shall eat straw like the ox; that the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together?
The greatest love verse in the Bible is conceded to be Joh 3:16; and even there the love of God is restricted to those who believe; while those who believe not, perish.
AN ILLUSTRATION
It had been a dull year in the church where Moffat was converted. The deacons finally said to the old pastor: “We love you, pastor, but don’t you think you had better resign? There hasn’t been a convert this year.” “Yes,” he replied, “it has been a dull year-sadly dull to me. Yet I mind me that one did come, wee Bobby Moffat. But he is so wee a bairn that I suppose it is not right to count him.” A few years later Bobby came to the pastor and said, “Pastor, do you think that I could ever learn to preach? I feel within here something that tells me that I ought to. If I could just lead souls to Christ, that would be happiness to me.” The pastor answered, “Well, Bobby, you might; who knows? At least you can try!” He did try, and years later when Robert Moffat came back from his wonderful work in Africa, the king of England rose and uncovered in his presence, and the British Parliament stood as a mark of respect. The humble old preacher, who had but one convert, and who was so discouraged, is dead and forgotten, and yet that was the greatest year’s work he ever did-and few have equaled it.-Publisher Unknown.
Fuente: Neighbour’s Wells of Living Water
Jon 3:1. Having “learned his lesson and been restored to the land, Jonah was ready to receive renewed instructions from the Lord; accordingly the divine word came to him the second time. There is no mention in the text of the event just closed, and as far as the record is concerned the Lord delivered his command just as if nothing had happened to the prophet.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Jon 3:1-3. And the word of the Lord, &c. After Jonah had been well chastised for his disobedience, and was set at liberty, as recorded in the preceding chapter, the divine call to him to prophesy was repeated. He had rebelled against Gods command the first time, but now, being humbled and better prepared, he is tried again. So Hebrew, And, Jonah arose and went into Nineveh He now obeys without reluctance. Such was the blessed fruit of the correction which he had received. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city The Hebrew reads, A great city to God: so the mountains of God are the same with great mountains, Psa 36:6, and the cedars of God are translated goodly cedars, Psa 80:10. Nineveh was the greatest city in the known world at that time; greater than Babylon, whose compass was then three hundred and eighty-five furlongs; but Nineveh was in compass four hundred and eighty furlongs, which makes something more than sixty of our miles. It is said that its walls were one hundred feet in height, and broad enough for three coaches to meet and pass safely by each other: that it had one thousand five hundred towers on its walls, each two hundred feet high. Diodorus Siculus represents it as an oblong figure, the two longer sides of which measured one hundred and fifty stadia, and the two shorter ninety. Ninus, says he, hastened to build a city of such magnitude, that it should not only be the greatest which then existed in the whole world, but that none in succeeding ages, who undertook such a work, should easily surpass it; and his expectation has not been deceived. For no one has since built so great a city; both as to the extent of its circuit, and the magnificence of its wall. According to a report recorded by Eustathius, fourteen myriads of men were employed for eight years in building this city. It is here said, that it was of three days journey; and Diodorus asserts the same; that is, of three days journey in circuit, allowing twenty miles to each day.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Jon 3:4. Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown. The LXX read three days, and they are followed by most of the Greek fathers. But three days is thought to be an error of the scribe, for the Hebrew, the Chaldaic, Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotian have forty days. Justin Martyr also, in his dialogue with Trypho the Jew, reads the same.
Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Jonah 3. The Ninevites Repent at the Preaching of Jonah.When the prophet is bidden a second time to carry Gods message to Nineveh, he knows that it is useless to disobey. Accordingly he takes the tidings that in forty days Nineveh will be destroyed. So huge was the city that three days would be spent in passing through it. Jonah advances one days journey into the city and then announces its doom. His message meets with instant belief from the whole of the Ninevites. The king leaves his throne, strips off his royal robes, and sits in sackcloth and ashes. A great fast is proclaimed for man and beast, and all alike are covered in sackcloth. They cry fervently to God, and turn from their evil ways and the violence of their hands, in hope that God will repent of His fierce anger. And in consequence of their penitence they are not destroyed. It was probably a secondary aim of the book to show that predictive prophecy was not absolute but conditional.
Jon 3:4. LXX reads Yet three days. Several accept this, but probably MT is original. After this verse Winckler inserts Jon 4:5. This may be correct, since we should expect Jonah not to wait for the fortieth day in the city, but to leave it earlier.
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible
3:1 And the word of the LORD came unto {a} Jonah the second time, saying,
(a) This is a great declaration of God’s mercy, that he receives him again, and sends him forth as his Prophet, who had before shown such great weakness.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
A. Jonah’s proclamation to the Ninevites 3:1-4
God gave Jonah a second chance to obey Him, as He has many of His servants (e.g., Peter, John Mark, et al.).
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
The writer did not clarify exactly when this second commission came to Jonah. It may have been immediately after Jonah reached dry land or it may have been sometime later. The writer’s point seems to be that God gave the prophet a second commission, not when it came to him (cf. Jon 1:1-2). God does not always give His servants a second chance to obey Him when they refuse to do so initially. Often He simply uses others to accomplish His purposes. In Jonah’s case God sovereignly chose to use Jonah for this mission just as He had sovereignly sent the storm and the fish to do His will. The sovereignty of God is a strong revelation in this book.
Nineveh was about 550 miles northeast of Samaria, the capital of the Northern Kingdom of Israel.
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
THE REPENTANCE OF THE CITY
Jon 3:1-10
HAVING learned, through suffering, his moral kinship with the heathen, and having offered his life for some of them, Jonah receives a second command to go to Nineveh. He obeys, but with his prejudice as strong as though it had never been humbled, nor met by Gentile nobleness. The first part of his story appears to have no consequences in the second. But this is consistent with the writers purpose to treat Jonah as if he were Israel. For, upon their return from Exile, and in spite of all their new knowledge of themselves and the world, Israel continued to cherish their old grudge against the Gentiles.
“And the word of Jehovah came to Jonah the second time, saying, Up, go to Nineveh, the great city, and call unto her with the call which I shall tell thee. And Jonah arose and went to Nineveh, as Jehovah said. Now Nineveh was a city great before God, three days journey” through and through. “And Jonah began by going through the city one days journey, and he cried and said, Forty days more and Nineveh shall be overturned.”
Opposite to Mosul, the well-known emporium of trade on the right bank of the Upper Tigris, two high artificial mounds now lift themselves from the otherwise level plain. The more northerly takes the name of Kujundschik, or “little lamb,” after the Turkish village which couches pleasantly upon its northeastern slope. The other is called in the popular dialect Nebi Yu-nus, “Prophet Jonah,” after a mosque dedicated to him, which used to be a Christian church; but the official name is Nineveh. These two mounds are bound to each other on the west by a broad brick wall, which extends beyond them both, and is connected north and south by other walls, with a circumference in all of about nine English miles. The interval, including the mounds, was covered with buildings, whose ruins still enable us to form some idea of what was for centuries the wonder of the world. Upon terraces and substructions of enormous breadth rose storied palaces, arsenals, barracks, libraries, and temples. A lavish water system spread in all directions from canals with massive embankments and sluices. Gardens were lifted into midair, filled with rich plants and rare and beautiful animals. Alabaster, silver, gold, and precious stones relieved the dull masses of brick and flashed sunlight from every frieze and battlement. The surrounding walls were so broad that chariots could roll abreast on them. The gates, and especially the river gates, were very massive.
All this was Nineveh proper, whose glory the Hebrews envied and over whose fall more than one of their prophets exult. But this was not the Nineveh to which our author saw Jonah come. Beyond the walls were great suburbs, {Gen 10:11} and beyond the suburbs other towns, league upon league of dwellings, so closely set upon the plain as to form one vast complex of population, which is known to Scripture as “The Great City.” To judge from the ruins which still cover the ground, the circumference must have been about sixty miles, or three days journey. It is these nameless leagues of common dwellings which roll before us in the story. None of those glories of Nineveh are mentioned of which other prophets speak, but the only proofs offered to us of the citys greatness are its extent and its population. {Jon 3:2} Jonah is sent to three days, not of mighty buildings, but of homes and families, to the Nineveh, not of kings and their glories, but of men, women, and children, “besides much cattle.” The palaces and temples, he may pass in an hour or two, but from sunrise to sunset he treads the dim drab mazes where the people dwell.
When we open our hearts for heroic witness to the truth there rush upon them glowing memories of Moses before Pharaoh, of Elijah before Ahab, of Stephen before the Sanhedrim, of Paul upon Areopagus, of Galileo before the Inquisition, of Luther at the Diet. But it takes a greater heroism to face the people than a king, to convert a nation than to persuade a senate. Princes and assemblies of the wise stimulate the imagination; they drive to bay all the nobler passions of a solitary man. But there is nothing to help the heart, and therefore its courage is all the greater, which bears witness before those endless masses, in monotone of life and color, that now paralyze the imagination like long stretches of sand when the sea is out, and again terrify it like the resistless rush of the flood beneath a hopeless evening sky.
It is, then, with an art most fitted to his high purpose that our author-unlike all other prophets, whose aim was different-presents to us, not the description of a great military power: king, nobles, and armed battalions: but the vision of those monotonous millions. He strips his countrys foes of everything foreign, everything provocative of envy and hatred, and unfolds them to Israel only in their teeming humanity.
His next step is still more grand. For this teeming humanity he claims the universal human possibility of repentance-that and nothing more.
Under every form and character of human life, beneath all needs and all habits, deeper than despair and more native to man than sin itself, lies the power of the heart to turn. It was this and not hope that remained at the bottom of Pandoras Box when every other gift had fled. For this is the indispensable secret of hope. It lies in every heart, needing indeed some dream of Divine mercy, however far and vague, to rouse it; but when roused, neither ignorance of God, nor pride, nor long obduracy of evil may withstand it. It takes command of the whole nature of a man, and speeds from heart to heart with a violence, that like pain and death spares neither age nor rank nor degree of culture. This primal human right is all our author claims for the men of Nineveh. He has been blamed for telling us an impossible thing, that a whole city should be converted at the call of a single stranger; and others have started up in his defense and quoted cases in which large Oriental populations have actually been stirred by the preaching of an alien in race and religion; and then it has been replied, “Granted the possibility, granted the fact in other cases, yet where in history have we any trace of this alleged conversion of all Nineveh?” and some scoff, “How could a Hebrew have made himself articulate in one day to those Assyrian multitudes?”
How long, O Lord, must Thy poetry suffer from those who can only treat it as prose? On whatever side they stand, skeptical or orthodox, they are equally pedants, quenchers of the spiritual, creators of unbelief.
Our author, let us once for all understand, makes no attempt to record a historical conversion of this vast heathen city. For its men he claims only the primary human possibility of repentance; expressing himself not in this general abstract way, but as Orientals, to whom an illustration is ever a proof, love to have it done-by story or parable. With magnificent reserve he has not gone further; but only told into the prejudiced faces of his people, that out there, beyond the Covenant, in the great world lying in darkness, there live, not beings created for ignorance and hostility to God, elect for destruction, but men with consciences and hearts, able to turn at His Word and to hope in His Mercy-that to the farthest ends of the world, and even on the high places of unrighteousness, Word and Mercy work just as they do within the Covenant.
The fashion in which the repentance of Nineveh is described is natural to the time of the writer. It is a national repentance, of course, and though swelling upwards from the people, it is confirmed and organized by the authorities: for we are still in the Old Dispensation, when the picture of a complete and thorough repentance could hardly be otherwise conceived. And the beasts are made to share its observance, as in the Orient they always shared and still share in funeral pomp and trappings. It may have been, in addition, a personal pleasure to our writer to record the part of the animals in the movement. See how, later on, he tells us that for their sake also God had pity upon Nineveh.
“And the men of Nineveh believed upon God, and cried a fast, and from the greatest of them to the least of them they put on sackcloth. And word came to the king of Nineveh, and he rose off his throne, and cast his mantle from upon him, and dressed in sackcloth and sat in the dust. And he sent criers to say in Nineveh”:-
“By Order of the King and his Nobles, thus:-Man and Beast, Oxen and Sheep, shall not taste anything, neither eat nor drink water. But let them clothe themselves in sackcloth, both man and beast, and call upon God with power, and turn every man from his evil way and from every wrong which they have in hand. Who knoweth but that God may relent and turn from the fierceness of His wrath, that we perish not”?
“And God saw their doings, how they turned from their evil way; and God relented of the evil which He said He would do to them, and did it not.”