By Edward W. H. Vick
A Commentary on the Sabbath School Lesson for September 27–October 3, 2003, "Biblical Prophets, Modern Critics"
What is the message of the "book?" That is the important question about Jonah. What does the writing say?
The book is a narrative. Writers produce narratives for various reasons. One is to state facts about what happened. Another is to make a point, convey a meaning. One type of narrative is historical narrative. The other is narrative symbol. Of course, historical narrative may serve as symbol. But narrative does not have to be historical or literal to serve as symbol.
The message of the book is the same whether or not we take the incidents it relates to be literal. And it is the message that is important. There are many biblical examples of stories told with the intention of presenting meaning whose details we would never think of taking literally. There are also stories that do both things: relate facts and, by means of the facts they relate, make a point, convey important meanings. So narratives that make a point might be real life incidents or they might not. It would be just foolishness to say, "If the details of the story are not factual, I cannot accept the meaning of the story as valid."
Jonah provides the occasion, should we so wish, to raise the question concerning the relation of the divine to the world, to nature, to the realm with which the physical sciences deal. To the extent that you make God transcendent to the world of nature, to that extent you have the problem of saying how he acts within the natural world, how things that take place in the world are divine acts.
That is a very important problem in its own right. Indeed it is the problem of theology. What is a divine act? If you think of God as cause, how does that cause get into the physical stream of events? If I do something that produces an event that would not otherwise have happened, for example, make a plant grow or save someone from drowning, you can give a physical explanation of cause and effect.
Physical effects are physically caused. What does it take to alter the complex network of causes to make happen what otherwise would not have happened? If the supernatural connects with and alters the physical we can quite legitimately demand an explanation as to how it does. We need a physical explanation of what happened.
But you need not have settled that problem to get the message of this writing. Indeed, you need not believe in miracles to understand the point of a miracle story. It is also true of course that need not believe that the details of every story that makes a point are literally true, or verifiable. So it is not intelligent to ask in this case about piscine biology. It is irrelevant.
God cannot do anything and everything we like to think up or tell stories about. God cannot do what is impossible. He cannot, for example, make the past not to be. So what is physically impossible, given that nature is an ordered system subject to consistent laws? God cannot do what is physically impossible.
Some fundamentalists (not the most thoughtful or intelligent) will say, "The fact that the Bible is inspired guarantees its authority and that carries with it the factuality of its stories (all its stories?). What is presented in historical form is historical." But that is simply not true. That the Bible is inspired does not entail that it has authority. The Bible has a particular kind of authority, a religious kind, for some people and not for others. Moreover, to accept the authority of the Bible, on whatever grounds, is not identical with accepting its literal veracity. Authority is a social concept.
So don’t worry about the fish, the magical gourd, and the unpredictable worm. Rather ask the important question, "What does the writing say for us?" But there is a preliminary question namely, "What would it have said to the hearers or readers in the first instance?"
The time is about the fourth century B.C. Think what the Assyrians had done to Jerusalem and its inhabitants (wrought death and destruction), and later what the Jews had suffered at the hands of the Babylonians (a long captivity). Then think what natural reaction would be to such "enemies." When they returned from exile they resolved to preserve the law, to emphasize the importance of the keeping of the Torah. That led to exclusiveness: to think that God is your God, and you are his special people. How can the Hebrews be the special people of Yahweh, and yet Yahweh extend his mercy and acceptance to those outside the circle of the chosen, and especially to their enemies?
That was Jonah’s problem. He said to himself, "God does not agree with my theology (actually prejudice, but Jonah would not understand that). So I must remove myself from him. I must go in the opposite direction."
He, like his people, should have learned from the prophets that God’s mercy was conditional. They should also have learned that God has relations with peoples outside the chosen circle. Those people were God’s instruments. Yahweh included others beside the chosen little few in his purposes. Had not their prophets told them that God punishes them at the hands of those others?
The message of Jonah is simple: God loves. But he will destroy you if you do not do what he demands. It is the first part that is the crux. Surely God cannot love the enemy of Israel! Surely he cannot act toward that enemy as he acts toward them! The message is directed against that prejudice that claims "We are the people and God treats us exclusively with his favor. God knows us as he knows no others (to use the biblical term)." Strange as it may seem, that includes God’s displeasure and "punishment." The function of the story of Jonah in its historical context is thus quite clear. It is directed against just this attitude: Yahweh is ours, nobody else’s.
The writing is unique in that it is about the prophet rather than by the prophet. The reaction of the prophet is typical of the reaction of the people. So God has to deal with the prophet and get him to change his mind, get him converted to a universal God. The trappings of the story, fascinating as they are, subserve this message. The people, to the extent they are petulant, prejudiced, and pained at the thought of God’s universal hesed, need to change their minds.
But what is the message of the book of Jonah for those of us who stand on this side of the revelation of God in Jesus Christ and the long process of experience and understanding to which the revelation of God in Christ through the Spirit has produced. Is it compatible with—a stage in the way toward—the Christian understanding of God as love? Do we recognize the God of Jesus Christ in the God who threatens destruction upon the city of Nineveh?
Do we recognize ourselves in the petulant prophet, whose prejudice has dictated to him what God will and will not do, can and cannot do? Do we reserve the message of judgment for those outside our circle? Do we find it hard to believe in a God who says "Obey me or I will not accept you. You are my friends if you do what I command you" (John 15:14). Also, are we able to accept a God who must work astonishing (incredible?) miracles to get his will done? What alternative do we have?
Perhaps we need to consider the concept of miracle. Is it a nonrepeatable exception to physical laws? Is it a religious name for an event that has religious significance, however caused?
1. Would you accept something as possible in the past that you would consider impossible in the present, and if so why. What does consistency demand?
2. What does the claim that the Bible has (religious) authority entail? What does it not require?
The author deals with some of the important issues raised in this commentary in his small book, History and Christian Faith, recently published and available from the author.
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