Facing God’s Questions
Jonah 3, Romans 5:18-21

Today’s Sunday School anniversary is based on the story of Jonah. It’s a colourful tale, lending itself well to children’s performance. The little ones will be dressed in blue with fish headbands and will wave around like the sea. The older ones will be dressed in striped tops like sailors. The kids have been practicing singing sea shanties and a whale song, there is a boat and a mattress behind the choir rail so that when Jonah is dramatically thrown overboard he will land gently! In the Sunday school version of the story the whale is benevolent, not like the Whale of Doom of Leunig’s calendar this past month – are you familiar with it? It is a cartoon I can really identify with as I often lie awake at night in the dark feeling overwhelmed by the problems of today and the uncertainties of tomorrow. But in the daylight, Leunig says, the whale of doom becomes as manageable as a sardine on toast. And despite the distraction of the whale, the message of the Anniversary service will rest firmly and securely, as does the book of Jonah, in the grace and mercy of God.

I thought we might take a more adult look at this book in today’s earlier service though. Not that it is an especially sombre book – there is a lot of humour in it in fact – but it is not the easiest book to interpret.

There is not much agreement about its origin amongst commentaries. Its historical setting, its author, and its date are all uncertain – Old Testament studies range over a 600 year span to answer those questions. The form of the book varies too: some call it a folktale, others a Jewish midrash, a parable or satire. And whichever choice is made about this, one also has to take into account the psalm of thanksgiving in chapter 2, which due to its contradictory statements in relation to the rest of the story was probably added into the story at a later time. As one of the prophetic books it is different to all the other minor prophets: it is a story about a prophet, not a collection of prophetic sayings. In fact the only prophetic sentence of Jonah's is 5 words long in the Hebrew! The story would fit better into 1 & 2 Kings where there is biographical material about prophets, especially Elijah and Elisha, with their encounters with other creatures.  But we can also see similarities between Jonah and Ruth and Esther – stories about God's people dealing with foreign races.

But despite its unique character we know it has been part of the collection of minor prophets, sometimes referred to as “the book of the twelve,” since at least the second century BC. The apocryphal book of Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) refers to the collection of 12 prophets with these words: "May the bones of the 12 prophets send forth new life from where they lie, for they comforted the people of Jacob and delivered them with confident hope."

So just how do the bones of Jonah send forth new life to us in this century from where they lie and whatever story they lived? Who was Jonah and what were the questions that God asked of him?

The author of the book is unknown. It uses a historical figure as the central character, as we hear of Jonah of Amittai in 2 Kings 14:25. That text comes from the 8th century BC and refers to Jeroboam the Second in the verse when it states “he restored the border of Israel from Leb-hamath as far as the Sea of the Arabah, according to the word of the Lord, the God of Israel, which he spoke by his servant Jonah son of Amittai, the prophet, who was from Gath-hepher.” The verse implies that although Jeroboam II was a bad king, “evil in the sight of the Lord” is the stock phrase used of any king who did not act in accordance with the law, nonetheless Jeroboam’s expansionist policy was approved of by the prophet and declared to be in conformity with the Word of God. In Second Kings, then, a theology is expressed that declares salvation and expansion for Israel as a right and an exclusive right, one not extended to other nations. This is interesting background to the story of Nineveh as we find it in Jonah. Because at that time and for centuries afterwards Nineveh was Israel’s enemy, hated and reviled for their cruelty. Hear some words from other minor prophets in this collection of books: Zephaniah says that Yahweh will “stretch out his hand … and destroy Assyria, and he will make Nineveh a desolation, a dry waste like the desert.” The entire book of Nahum spits out Israel’s hatred of the Assyrian city with words like these which were supposedly the message of God to Nineveh: “Ah! City of bloodshed, utterly deceitful, full of booty. I am against you and I will lift up your skirts over your face, and I will let nations look on your nakedness and kingdoms on your shame. I will throw filth at you and treat you with contempt and make you a spectacle.” (Nahum 3)

Certainly at the time of the historical figure Jonah Nineveh was a dominant force, but whenever the book was written Assyria and its capital still personified the dreaded enemy of Israel. The message to announce destruction on the city would have been unsurprising, and in the story as we have it the prophet’s only prophetic message is this bald announcement: “forty days more and Nineveh shall be overthrown.” You get the feeling this was fine by Jonah. Simple condemnation and judgement, no compassion or hope announced at all.

The mention of forty days and the name Jonah may give another clue as to why this historical figure was chosen to be the vehicle for the message of the book. The name Jonah means dove in Hebrew – you will remember that the dove was the messenger of end of the 40 day flood in Genesis; the legendary wickedness of Nineveh matched the wickedness of the world before the flood, and yet in both stories God "repents" from the decision to destroy. By virtue of his name Jonah is ultimately the bearer of good news to the Ninevites, and not judgment.

This, although a serious message of grace and mercy, is also one of the amusing aspects of the book. There is irony in the fact that Jonah resisted with all his might to being the bearer of that good news. In Israel, prophets fell into two main categories. There were those who brought a message of judgement, and those who brought messages of comfort and promise. Jonah thought his message to Nineveh was of judgement and death. And yet the prophet of doom ends up being the means by which salvation is enabled. What’s more, Jonah is the only Israelite in the story, the only one who had a conscious relationship with Yahweh whose message he was bearing. But the only one in the book who is called and sent by God initially ran in the opposite direction, and then when called again went with exceedingly bad grace to fulfil God’s word. In the meantime, it is pagan sailors and a legendary despotic king who recognise the power of God and respond to it – the sailors by praying, sacrificing and vowing to the Lord and the Assyrian king by repenting in sackcloth and ashes. The one who should be representing a God of love and justice ends up having a tantrum against that God, resentful that his God, the God of Israel, should spare Israel’s worst enemy from destruction. The wonderful words of hope and promise so often spoken by the prophets were turned around by Jonah to be an accusation against God. “I knew it would be like this. This is why I went to Tarshish in the first place. I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing. I can’t stand it. I’d rather die!”

The four chapters in Jonah are quite different in their content. Chapter one is about the irresistible call of God on the prophet’s life: despite Jonah’s desire to evade the call it is clear God is in control of the situation and can’t be ignored. Chapter 2 is a psalm of thanksgiving – in the literary setting it is spoken by Jonah while in the belly of the fish but the words, like many psalms, are able to transcend the setting and apply to anyone who has known God’s hand on their life. Chapter 3 is the description of the prophecy to Nineveh, their response of repentance, and God’s change of mind. In chapter 4 the focus turns back to the disgruntled Jonah. Once again God uses natural forces to teach him a lesson – God causes a plant to grow which gives Jonah shade and then the plant withers and dies and leaves the prophet exposed again and newly angry. Three times Jonah is questioned by God in that chapter. Twice he is asked “Is it right for you to be angry?” It’s important to notice that Jonah is not forbidden to be angry, but rather is invited to reflect on the value of it. When he answers “yes, angry enough to die!” he is expressing a profound truth. Anger does lead to destruction. If anger is suppressed the individual will suffer. If it is expressed those to whom the anger is directed will suffer. Anger is part of being human, but the divine question offers the opportunity to work it through, allowing movement beyond the feeling and possibly a change of heart. God’s final question is not answered by the prophet, or by the book but it concerns this change of heart: “Should I not be concerned about Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also many animals?” It is an abrupt end to the book, but not the end of the story. The divine question awaits an answer. As the readers who have journeyed with Jonah to Tarshish and Nineveh, we are now invited to face the question too. Should old prejudices be laid aside to allow a change of heart? Should God’s concern lie with those outside of our circles?

It is fascinating that in the history of the Jewish people this book has continued to play a vital role. Every year at Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement and the holiest day of the year, the story of Jonah is read in its entirety. Its themes of true repentance and divine forgiveness fit well with the focus of Yom Kippur. But each year the Jews are reminded that the model of repentance is not the Jewish Jonah resisting God, but the outsiders: pagan sailors and penitent Ninevites. Israel learns accountability and responsibility from the transformative deeds of others. Israel learns that God’s compassion is not only for them, but also for the outsiders, even their enemies.

Although the implications for modern-day Israel are clear, we need to focus on our own response today. God’s question is also asked of us – is there anyone that you and I feel is beyond the scope of God’s care and compassion? And do we even recognise the breadth of God’s concern? Isn’t it easier to get so caught up in our own localised troubles and concerns that we forget God’s care is for the whole of creation? In my view one of the most striking artworks in Create to Advocate, the Voices for Justice exhibition at the Parliament House, is entitled “The Patron Saint of Apathy”. It portrays a well-dressed young woman gazing disdainfully into the distance, with a gold halo surrounding her head. The explanatory caption speaks of the difficulty we have in facing up to the reality of inequity in our world, and how it is sometimes easier to ignore it and live our affluent lives as if poverty does not exist. The iconic form of the portrait places the religious issue into question – has our worship and devotion actually participated in this apathy by allowing us to focus on our own needs and spiritual satisfaction while ignoring others?

The study notes in my bible point out that 39 Hebrew words are used in God’s final questioning of Jonah, matching the 39 Hebrew words of complaint Jonah addressed to God earlier in the chapter. God’s speech matches Jonah’s speech in length, but the content is very different from the tone of Jonah’s complaint. God invites Jonah, and us, to see that he is attentive to the needs of the whole of creation, and God invites Jonah, and us, to share those concerns.

I said earlier that there is much humour in this book. Remember the decree of the King of Nineveh that was read to us from chapter 3, that every citizen and every animal in his city shall fast and wear sackcloth. The book ends with the concern of God for even the animals – as my bible puts it “God still can’t get over all those animals running around in sackcloth!” I am thankful for, but also challenged by the wideness of God’s mercy that includes all of creation in its scope.