“A Journey with Jonah: One Gospel for Many Nations”

1. “A Journey with Jonah: One Gospel for Many Nations” Reed Lessing M.Div., S.T.M., Ph.D. Director of the Graduate School Associate Professor of Exegetical Theology Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, MO

2. Outline of Presentation • Introduction • Many Nations • One Gospel • The Book of Jonah

3. Part 1 Introduction

4. Introduction Jonah doesn’t seem to have a lot in common with any book in the Old Testament. Terrace Fretheim writes of Jonah: “It has no exact counterpart in the Old Testament or in known literature from the ancient Near East.” The book is as elusive as it is deceptive. Augustine’s response to an inquiry made by a potential Christian convert perhaps gets at this best. “What he asks about the resurrection of the dead could be settled … But if he thinks to solve all such questions as … those about Jonah … he little knows the limitations of human life or of his own.”

5. Introduction Father Mapple in Herman Melville’s Moby Dick states: “Even though Jonah is one of the smallest strands in the mighty cable of the Scriptures, the book is one of the most puzzling and intriguing of the entire Old Testament.” Though there are only 689 words in the Hebrew text of Jonah, numerous complexities abound. Did the sailors really convert? And speaking of conversion, did the Ninevites really convert? And speaking of the Ninevites did their animals really repent? And speaking of animals, what’s this deal about a fish – could such an animal really swallow Jonah? And speaking about Jonah … well, you get the idea! In this puzzling and intriguing book we will journey with Jonah and meet a huge storm on the Mediterranean Sea, a hot east wind over distant lands, take a tour of Sheol, discover the insides of a great fish and watch a plant come and go in a day. Most surprising we will meet a God who has more love and grace and patience than we could ever imagine in his pursuit of reluctant and stubborn people like us. Let’s get started – or, to begin the punning – anchors away!

6. Part 2 Many Nations

7. Many Nations Garry Wills’ Pulitzer-Prize winning study on Abraham Lincoln’s most famous speech indicates the power of 272 words to bring about change; it is entitled Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words That Remade America. Wills’ thesis is that Lincoln reframed how Americans ever since 1863 have construed their nation’s history and that he did this through a brilliant and polished speech that successfully and irrevocably reframed our history. Wills writes: “Both North and South strove to win the battle for interpreting Gettysburg as soon as the physical battle had ended. Lincoln is after even larger game—he means to “win” the whole Civil War in ideological terms as well as military ones. And he will succeed: the Civil War is, to most Americans, what Lincoln wanted it to mean. Words had to complete the work of the guns.”

8. Many Nations Lincoln begins reframing American history at the very start of his speech when he declares, “Four score and seven years ago.” By using this seemingly benign, biblical-sounding way of naming a date for America’s beginnings—instead of more baldly stating, “In 1776...” —Lincoln creates a sense that they are looking backward into America’s hallowed origins. By inviting those present to consider their “hallowed past,” Lincoln makes it possible for them to transcend the actual events that have brought them to this cemetery, to step outside of the tragic moment long enough to consider the conception and birth of the United States of America.

9. Many Nations So what has been reframed? After all, the United States celebrates the Fourth of July as a national holiday, annually marking its country’s birthday. So, other than being an interesting turn-of-phrase, what is the significance of Lincoln’s opening words? The importance of “Four score and seven” is that Lincoln sneaks in a different date for the origin of the American nation than the one in use by the people of his day, which was that of the Ratification of the Constitution. It is not so much that the country had ever been in the habit of celebrating “Constitution-Signing Day”, but that many if not most Americans in the mid-nineteenth century regarded the Constitution as the founding covenant of the United States, and as a result regarded the nation as being bound together by a signed compact between sovereign states.

10. Many Nations The difference between, on the one hand, seeing the origins of the United States as issuing from a contractual agreement among separate parties—an agreement that presumably can be renegotiated and/or dissolved—and, on the other hand, regarding the origin as the creation of “a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal”—this difference is, so to speak, all the difference in the world. In the latter case, the United States begins its existence as an organic unity—a nation that undergoes a birth—springing from the transcendent state of liberty and christened by the likewise transcendent principle of equality. In this framework, the idea of individual states trying to secede from this one nation becomes akin to the idea of a hand, an ear, or an eye seeking to secede from its body.

11. Many Nations Wills goes on: “But that was just the beginning of this complex transformation. Lincoln has prescinded from messy squabbles over constitutionality, sectionalism, property and states. Slavery is not mentioned, any more than Gettysburg is. The discussion is driven back and back, beyond the historical particulars, to great ideals that are made to grapple naked in an airy battle of the mind. Lincoln derives a new, a transcendental, significance from this bloody episode.”

12. Many Nations It is astounding how this short speech, lasting perhaps three minutes, could so dramatically, so thoroughly reframe how Americans from that point forward have come to think about their history. Truly, as Wills concludes, “Lincoln had revolutionized the Revolution, giving people a new past to live with that would change their future indefinitely.”

13. Many Nations The parallels between Lincoln’s speech and the book of Jonah are worth exploring. Both are short documents, easily covered in a matter of a few minutes. Both utilize their people’s historical traditions in order to paint a picture, not of some new thing being initiated, but of something bigger; of a history that in fact extends further back than they were cognizant of, a story of how things have always been since the beginning. Most importantly, in reframing history, both give people a new past to live with that would change their future indefinitely.

14. Many Nations Prior to reading the book of Jonah, our ancient reader was, for all intents and purposes, informed by the view of history as put forward by the Pentateuch, a history framed by genealogies and progressive covenants that led the God who created the heavens and the earth ultimately to concern himself with Israel – and Israel alone. This history can be conceived as a series of filters, by which the LORD begins with all of creation; then, from among those who survive the Flood, he chooses Abraham and his descendants; from among these, he “becomes the God” of and for those Hebrews who come up from slavery in Egypt to take possession of the land of Canaan. In this history, the most important of these covenants becomes the last, for it is the most definitive, the most restrictive, the most specific. By positing the equivalence of the God of Creation with the God that chooses Israel, the Pentateuchal history affirms that Yahweh – the LORD – is not merely a tribal god among others, but is in fact the one and only God, the God who is supreme over all creation, all events, all places, and all times … and has selected Israel as His own.

15. Many Nations What we will discover through the book of Jonah is the same equivalence—but with the current running in the opposite direction! Through our journey with Jonah, we will find ourselves being pushed back, back, back in time … all the way back to Noah. And Noah means that this journey has a destination of MANY NATIONS.

16. Many Nations Yes, the Pentateuch tells us that the God of all creation, the God of Noah becomes the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of Israel at Mt. Sinai. Yet here, in the book of Jonah—for the first time— we are offered this assertion in its reverse form: the God of the Hebrews, the God of Israel—has always been the God of Noah, the God of all creation!

17. Many Nations That is to say, the origin for Israel’s history is found not with the covenant at Sinai, nor even in the covenant with Abraham. The first covenant is the one made with Noah, with all subsequent humanity – plus many animals besides – and animals will play a big part in the book of Jonah. Suddenly, the very God who seems to have winnowed out entire peoples and nations and tribes and families in choosing Israel is presented as the God who has always and all along been the compassionate, merciful God of Israel, yes! but also of the Edomites, Ishmaelites, Canaanites, Amalakites — in short, the God of everything and everyone, including, of course … the Ninevites!

18. Many Nations Entering into the belly of this scant, 48-verse story, we will find ourselves spit out with a new history, a story of a people and their God that, like the Ninevites, has utterly been “turned upside-down”! What Lincoln did at Gettysburg, Jonah does for us. In reframing our history he will give us a new past to live with that will change our future indefinitely!

19. Many Nations What are these rapids that take us on a ride toward the life and times of Noah? One answer is found in the presence throughout the book of Jonah of what is termed a "Noahic milieu." There are numerous and, it would seem, intentional connections between the stories of Noah and the book of Jonah.

20. Many Nations The oblique reference to Abraham (the first known "Hebrew") in 1:9 and Jonah's recitation of a passage from Exodus in Jonah 4:2 convey that a steady stream runs back through the God at Mt. Sinai, through the God of the (first) Hebrews, and into a confluence with the God of Noah‑the Primeval God of all creation. With this understanding – and no other – can we build enough consistency in our understanding of the book to comprehend Jonah's intense misery, namely, that it is "just like God!" to care for these violent and questionably repentant Ninevites, simply because God also made them and their animals! The last destination Jonah seeks is MANY NATIONS!

21. Many Nations A technique that has garnered a great deal of recent notoriety in the world of popular music is known as "sampling." Sampling involves taking snippets of other artists' songs and weaving them into a new song. The technique is, in fact, nothing new. Consider the lyrics of the well‑known patriotic song, "You're a Grand Old Flag," which "samples" the much‑older song, "Auld Lang Syne": You're a grand old flag. You're a high flying flag And forever in peace may you wave. You're the emblem of the land I love The home of the free and the brave. Ev'ry heart beats true 'neath the Red, White and Blue, Where there's never a boast or brag. Should auld acquaintance be forgot, Keep your eye on the grand old flag.

22. Many Nations Such "samples" act as accents to the song itself as well as bring in the musical and affective associations that the listeners have with those songs being sampled. Sampling is a frequent practice in rap and hip‑hop music; its role is explained by Daddy‑0, of the group Stetsasonic: “We sometimes use the words 'recontextualization' or 'revivification,' but it means the same thing, which is to take something old and make it new again. The strong point of what sampling does for us, as a music form, is to establish some soul groove and some old funk that's lost with today's music.”

23. Many Nations All such samplings represent a kind of "musical intertextuality," and, although a newly created song can be enjoyed on its own merits without listener knowledge of any other tunes, samples provide the aware audience with additional, potentially meaningful dimensions to their musical experience. In the case of "You're a Grand Old Flag," the use of "Should auld acquaintance be forgot" brings to a musical affirmation of patriotism the feeling of community, by evoking a song traditionally sung by close friends and family seeing in the New Year together.

24. Many Nations Just so, the book of Jonah can be said to "sample" the account of Noah found in the book of Genesis. And, although the book of Jonah can be appreciated without any awareness of these "samples," recognition of the Noahic connections that sprinkle throughout the story will take this convention to one destination – MANY NATIONS. What follows is a list of phrases, characters, and images found in the stories of Noah drawn from Genesis 5:28‑10:32 that find resonance within the book of Jonah.

25. Many Nations 1. One hundred twenty years (Gen 6:3) – this is the length of time allotted to mortal life by Yahweh; it is also how many thousands of people are in Nineveh at the story's end. 2. Yahweh was sorry (Gen 6:6) – literally Yahweh repented (that he had made humankind); relenting/repenting is what the Ninevites bank on and what Jonah is upset with Yahweh for doing in Jonah 3 and 4. 3. “... people together with animals” (Gen 6:7). This phrase occurs throughout the Noah stories; the book of Jonah is remarkable for its very deliberate inclusion of animals along with people, both in how the Ninevites repent and in how God presents his final question to Jonah.

26. Many Nations 4. Violence (Gen 6:11) – this is the reason given for God's decision to destroy the earth and its inhabitants by means of the Flood; it is also the sin that the Ninevites recognize as their own, and repent of. 5. Evil (Gen. 6:5) is used throughout the book of Jonah and is one of its framing words. 6. The ark (Gen 6:14) is the means that God provides Noah for the protection of him, his family, and the animals from the impending flood; there is a connection between the ark and the ship that Jonah boards, and even more so with the great fish‑which turns out to be the "vessel" that God provides Jonah to protect him from the overwhelming flood waters.

27. Many Nations 7. Forty days (and forty nights) (Gen 7:4) – this is the period of time that the rains last, destroying all human and animal life that is not with Noah in the ark; similarly, this is the amount of time from the moment of Jonah's prophecy until Nineveh is to be "turned upside‑down." The association of "forty days" as a period for destruction is a link to these two stories. 8. Flood of waters ... the great deep (Gen 7:6, 11) ... These are two equivalent phrases for the watery torrent that drowns creation in the Genesis story; in the psalmic prayer that Jonah utters (Jonah 2), these same terms are used. 9. The word, "great," occurs frequently throughout both texts.

28. Many Nations 10. The waters ... dry land. (Gen 7:20‑22) ... While it is almost a commonplace in the Old Testament to pair “waters” and “dry land” in the story of Noah, the distinction between the two is utterly crucial (life and death); likewise, in the book of Jonah, the prophet identifies Yahweh as the one who made "the sea and dry land" and, indeed, the distinction between the waters and the dry land onto which the great fish vomits Jonah is critical. 11. And God made a wind blow (Gen 8:1). God is portrayed as actively controlling individual winds for specific purposes (this time, for the purpose of causing the flood waters to subside); in the book of Jonah, God hurls a wind into the sea to create a storm and, later, sends a searing wind from the east that adds to Jonah's misery.

29. Many Nations 12. Then he sent out the dove ... the dove found no place to set its foot ... it returned to him ... again he sent out the dove from the ark (Gen 8:8‑ 10). Noah uses a dove in the story “to see if the waters had subsided from the face of the ground”"; the name “Jonah” is Hebrew for “dove.” Moreover, the structure of the book of Jonah involves God sending Jonah out; the prophet does not alight on dry ground (specifically ending up in the waters) in his first journey; and, of course, he is then sent out again. 13. “Offered burnt offerings on the altar” (Gen 8:20). Noah, once on dry land, offers up burnt offerings to God; the mariners, once they are delivered from the great storm, “offer offerings” to Yahweh – as Jonah pledges to do, once he recognizes that Yahweh has delivered him “from the Pit.” In all cases, Noah as well as the mariners and Jonah, their offerings to Yahweh are a thanksgiving for their deliverance from death‑by‑drowning.

30. Many Nations 14. “I will require a reckoning for human life. Whoever sheds the blood of a human, / by a human shall that person's blood be shed" (Gen 9:5‑6). This is a statute that God puts down for all humanity and the sailors demonstrate an awareness of it when they plead with Yahweh not to kill them as a punishment for throwing Jonah overboard, into the sea.

31. Many Nations 15. “I am establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you, and with every living creature ... my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh" (Gen 9:8‑17). In this covenant God specifically includes not only humankind but also animals, domestic and wild; this means that the umbrella of this covenant is extended to non‑Israelite humans (the Ninevites) as well as their animals, whose donning of sackcloth and bleating perhaps serve to remind God of this eternal promise. 16. Shem, Ham, and Japheth are the sons of Noah; and from these the whole earth was peopled. The descendants of Ham include Nimrod who he went into Assyria, and built Nineveh, the great city (Gen 9:18‑19, 10:6‑12). Here it is made explicit that any covenant extending to Noah and to his descendants extends to Assyria, to Nineveh, and to its residents. The book of Jonah takes it as a given that this covenant is operative, and that the Ninevites (and Assyrians), even given their violence, are included in it.

32. Many Nations The question is posed by this sampling is exactly the one posed by St. Paul, “Is he only the God of the Jews? Is he not also the God of the Gentiles?” (Rom. 3:29). The Greek of the text demands an emphatic YES! And that means our destination is not just Israel, not just the church – no. Our destination is MANY NATIONS … and this means and includes especially … Nineveh!

33. Part 3 One Gospel

34. One Gospel But if our destination is to MANY NATIONS, our conviction is that we have only ONE GOSPEL. Let’s talk about that. By a word-association, “Jonah” would undoubtedly prompt the reaction of … “whale,” but a subject that takes up only three verses out of a total of forty-eight cannot be regarded as the book’s main concern. Campbell Morgan penned these wise words: “Men have been looking so hard at the great fish that they have failed to see the great God.” In the book of Jonah, the name Yahweh is mentioned 22 times, Elohim or El 13 times, and the combination Yahweh Elohim four times for a total of 39 references to the deity in 48 verses. This is clearly a story about the God of Israel.

35. One Gospel And this God is the God who delivers. The sailors are saved from the raging storm; Jonah is saved from drowning in the sea; the Ninevites are saved from destruction; ironically in the end, even though the LORD provides a plant to save Jonah (4:6), the prophet appears to thwart the idea. Although justice demands that the idolatrous sailors, the prodigal Jonah and the evil Ninevites perish – mercy prevails and grants a new life. This ONE GOSPEL is summed up in 3:1, “Now the word of the LORD came to Jonah a second time …” We treasure, extol, share, celebrate and yes, care passionately about this gospel because it shows us that the Creator is the God of the second chance. Mark 16:7, “Go tell his disciples and Peter …” Peter, Peter … after the cave-in, the curses, the cowardly actions … you get a second chance.

36. Part 4 The Book of Jonah

37. CHAPTER ONE – VERSE ONE – The word of the LORD came to Jonah son of Amittai: The expression “And the word of the LORD came to …” is found in the OT only when contexts and circumstances regarding the prophet and his mission are already established in previous statements. This point is as big as the book’s fish! It means that the story of Jonah actually begins in another place; i.e. 2 Kings 14:25. This account anchors Jonah in the 8th century B.C. as a court-prophet of the Israelite king Jeroboam II (786-746 B.C.). “He [Jeroboam II] restored the border of Israel from Lebo-hamath [i.e. Aram/Syria] as far as the Sea of the Arabah [i.e. the Gulf of Aqabah], according to the word of the LORD, the God of Israel, which he spoke by the hand of his servant Jonah son of Amittai, the prophet, who was from Gath-hepher.”

38. Jonah is the Hebrew word for dove (Gen. 8:8-12; Song of Solomon 1:15; 4:1, etc.). There is nothing exceptional about a name derived from the animal world, whether in Hebrew or in other ancient Near Eastern languages; yet, since biblical names often indicate the nature of a person, Hosea 7:11 is instructive. “Ephraim became like a dove (hn"AyK. ), silly and brainless. They called to Egypt, they went to Assyria.” The phrase translated “brainless” has connotations of discernment, not simply intelligence. Rather, the aimless activity of the dove here, flying from one place to another, suggest that it is a confused and frightened bird.

39. VERSE TWO – "Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me." The entire prophecy of Nahum, delivered sometime before Nineveh’s downfall in 612 BC, gives a picture of this city of bloodshed. It is full of lies, dead bodies without end, a city that could be likened to a shapely harlot out to seduce all nations (Nah. 3:1-4; cf. Zeph. 2:13-15). Nineveh was truly the “chief of sinners.”

40. Nineveh is remembered most for her inhumane warfare. Note these words of one of her kings, Ashru-nasirpal II: “I stormed the mountain peaks and took them. In the midst of the mighty mountains I slaughtered them; with their blood I dyed the mountain red like wool. With the rest of them I darkened the gullies and precipices of the mountains. I carried off their spoil and their possessions. The heads of their warriors I cut off, and I formed them into a pillar over against their city; their young men and their maidens I burned in the fire. I built a pillar over against the city gates, and I flayed all the chief men who had revolted, and I covered the pillar with their skins; some I walled up within the pillar, some I impaled upon the pillar on stakes, and others I bound to stakes round about the pillar.”

41. Assyrian Art

42. VERSE THREE – But Jonah ran away from the LORD and went down to Tarshish. He went down to Joppa, where he found a ship bound for that port. After paying the fare, he went aboard and sailed for Tarshish to flee from the LORD. Jonah says nothing to the LORD but rises to flee. Normally prophets protest their inability to speak – Moses protests that he is not a “man of words” (Ex. 4:10); Jeremiah fears that he “does not know how to speak” (Jer. 1:6); Isaiah insists that his words are unworthy, his lips unclean (Isa. 6:5) – but Jonah in contrast, goes the opposite direction without saying a word! So already in this verse the reader encounters the textual tendency of Jonah to invert biblical tradition. Here the author begins his satire of Jonah and all who embrace his ideas.

44. And all of this leads to a progressive downhill slide. He goes down to Joppa (1:3), goes down to the ship (1:3), goes down into the innermost parts of the ship (1:5), is thrown down into the depths of the sea and then descends to the realm of death or Sheol (2:3, 7). Down, down, down, down …. this is the inevitable path of those who seek to avoid the mission of the church. The only place we go is … down. And going down in the OT depicts a movement toward death (cf. Ps. 88:4-6; Prov. 5:5).

45. The word “fare” actually refers to the ship. The idea here is not that Jonah paid a fare (so all of the English versions), but rather that he hired the ship and its crew. First, that Jonah has access to the ship’s “innermost recesses” (1:5) makes sense if he owned the boat. Second, the sailor’s hesitation to throw Jonah overboard (1:13-14) is understandable because he was their “boss.” Finally, according to most scholars it wasn’t until Roman times that the ancient world had a specific word for “fare” – a charge for the purchase of space in an expedition, seagoing or otherwise. No wonder Jonah didn’t want to go to Nineveh – he’s cashing in on his ministry under Jeroboam II – enough cash that is, to buy a ship and her crew to run away from the LORD’S presence!

46. VERSE FOUR – Then the LORD sent a great wind on the sea, and such a violent storm arose that the ship threatened to break up.

47. “And as for the ship – it had a mind to break up.” The irony is that the sailors fear disaster, the captain of the ship fears disaster, indeed, even the ship thinks it is going to break up. The only character – animate or inanimate – that has no fear is Jonah. The pun then is this: as the ship fears wrecking she becomes a nervous wreck!

48. VERSE FIVE – All the sailors were afraid and each cried out to his own god. And they threw the cargo into the sea to lighten the ship. But Jonah had gone below deck, where he lay down and fell into a deep sleep. The subsequent events will transform the sailors from shear terror, to an awe at the awareness of being in the LORD’S presence, to finally trust, belief and worship of this great God. The word “deep sleep” may be the first indication that Jonah seeks to die (4:3). The same word translated “deep sleep” is used in Judges 4:21. It describes Sisera as in such deep slumber that he didn’t hear Jael coming near to deliver his death blow (Judg. 4:21). Luther calls Jonah’s sleep a “sleep of death” (cf. Ps. 88:4-6), saying, “There he lies and snores in his sins.” As a noun the word describes Adam in Gen. 2:21.

49. VERSE SIX – The captain went to him and said, "How can you sleep? Get up and call on your god! Perhaps he will take notice of us, and we will not perish." Now a new character enters the scene. Many of the human reactions throughout the book deal with the question of life and death. This issue is particularly focused in the use of “perish”.

50. “Perhaps” is indicative of one of the major themes of the book (cf. 1:14b; 3:9). The LORD will act as it pleases him, which may or may not conform to human patterns of actions. No demanding here, just humble awareness that there are two foundational truths to human enlightenment – number one, there is a God; number two, you are not him!