(A) The above-cited symbolic tales may be imi- tated in the Book of Jonah (cf. especially the Sarallelism between Hos 1- 3' and Jon 1' 3', also >,k 3-^ etc.). As Ezekiel was bound, etc., as the representative of the people (3^ 4'"'- S'"- etc.), so in the Bk. of Jonah it was related how Jonah under- took a mission to the goyim, etc. This might happen all the more rea<lily that elsewhere the people of Israel and the prophetic order are identi- fied with one anotlier ; the servant of J", who, according to Is 41' etc., is the people of Israel, is a designation in 42' etc. of the servant of Uod who is to brin^, i.e. proclaim to the goyim aententiam et normam ludurii or lucem (Is 42° 40", cf. 43'"), and so also the people of Israel is called the son of God (Ex 4--, Hos H'). This .servant of God was in many waj-s also blind, and de.af (Is 42"), and dumb (56'") ; cf. Jon 1'. Further, the captivity of Israel is several times compared to a grave from which they are to come forth again alive ; Ezk 37'"- ' These bones are the lokole house of Israel ' (rightly interpreted even by Uengstenberg, Ckristolonie, ii. p. 5SS, not ' ii. p. 125 ' as Bertholet cites it, Kurzer Hint/com. zu Ilcsekiel, 1897, p. 184) ; cf. Ezk 19» 33'" SO". Again, the captivity of Israel is com- pared to being devoureci, ' Nebuchadnezzar hath swallowed me up like a sea-monster (tannin), and he hath lilled his belly' (Jer 51"; cf. v." 'ly^s-nx, and in Is 27' the comparison of the secular power to a liri/nfJuin (crocodile) and a tannin ; see esp. (;. A. Smith, 1S98, pp. 52.3-.'526). Note also that Israel's deliverance from exile is compared to a new birth (Is 06") and a dream (Ps 12(5'). Further, as pre-exilic Israel was wont to decline its missionary call (Jon I'), so a part of exilic and post-exilic Israel discovered in this mission only a call to threaten the go</im (cf. Jer 29'", Ezk 18^ 33-'°, Ps 137», Is 34 f. 63'"'-, Ob ""■, Mai P'- 3'^ Jon 3'"-). But in this same exilic and post-exilic period there are also voices to be heard calling for prayer to God on behalf of the goyiin (Jer 29') and giving expression to the universalistic tendency of the theocracy (Zee 8^, cf. Jon 3'" 4" ; see below, 7 a). The voice of such a preacher may be heard also in the Bk. of Jonah, whose author m.'iy h.ave selected the individualistic presentation of his idea because this was least likely to miss making an impression. This, which for shortness may be called the sym- bolU-al interprutation of the Bk. of Jonah, is in the main upheld by Hardt, Kleinert (Commentary,
1.S74), Bloch (Studi'-n zur Gcxrh. der Samml. d. althcb. Lit. 1876, p. 72 If.), Chcyne (art. in Th--ol. Rev. 1877, p. 214 11.), C. H. H. Wright (Bibliral
Kxsn,i.i, T. and T. Clark, 1886, p. 45 11.),* Ed.
Konig (Einleitunij, 1893, p. 380), Kleinert (Com- military, 1893, p. 18 11'.), G. A. Smith (1898, p. 502ir.).t
• WriKlit clt« (p. xxv) the following p*au(;:M : 2 S 12"f- (Nathan'H parable) U"*'- (the ivoralmlifal narrative o( the wine woman of Ti-koa), 1 K 'JO**-*! (the pambuUcal talo of Uie prisoner who wa« allowed to encapc). Tlieae, however, do not fumuh real parallels to the Bk. of Jonah, for, like all parahlea, they
have an unknown, f^eneral eiibject. N' *' ' tticyiiliow
that in Israel it wa» customary to in'' ' • — '■-
In the form of Individiialistic iaU-s. '1 . factor In the ori(fin of narratives niMUt rvai 1 K 'i'.:>v» ami of Amos ami Ezekiel.
♦ Similar is the Juiltpnent of AuKtwti {Kinltitxmq, 1827, I 226), Ilitzij; (in the Preface to his Ex|>08ltlon of the Uook of Jonah in Kunnrf. ri'y. Ihl'^-/,.). Illeek {Kiutnlumj, KT8, 1220), RIabm (klnleUuiiff, XtH:.'.), ii. |sl, ' Der Inhitll des Uuchei Ut eine reine DIchtunk''), Iteusa (>>>kA. d. A. Sc/ir. Aft, InUU, I 407), «f alii, who have not n'cofrniied the analog of the sjiu- *x>IIr*) oarratlves of the pn^phets.
lOW
t'trutlu :i is also a -. line thoae of
(c) The choice of the name Jonah as the subject of this symi«)lical narrative may also (see above, 3, p. 746") have been favoured by the follo^ving circumstance. Jonah was an inhabitant of the kingdom of Samaria, and ' the name Jonah signifies a dove. Epiiraim, the Northern kingdom, the kingdom of Israel as distinguished from that of Judah, is termed by Hosea, the only other pro- phetic \vriter who belonged to that kingdom, "a silly dove" (.iji' Hos 7"}; and when that prophet predicts the Return frotn Captivity, he speaks of Ephraim as returning as "a dove (.iji') out of the land of Assyria" (U").' C. H. H. Wright, from whose Biblical Essays (1886, p. 45) these words are quoted, has not, however, recalled cpTi oSk nj" (Ps 56'), which is most probably interpreted columba (silentii = ) silins percgrinorum loi:orum = inter etj>ropter pcregrinos (on the .silence of b after TO see Konig, Syntax, § 330m). This expression in Ps 56' is already referred by the Talmud to K~f j? 'ji '^KiB'n, by the LXX to 6 \o6s 4 dirj Tiic aylav fjLciuiKpviifUi'i]!, and so .also by the Arabic {'iim- matun) and the Ethiopic('-/i<'c€6 = populus). [Well- hausen (in Haupt's SBOT) changes ctn into c"k, but this suggestion lacks probability). A remark- able coincidence between Israelitish and foreign conceptions may be discovered in the analogy be- tween the sojourn of the dove ('"iji') in the iish'a belly, and the descent of the 'dove' Semiramis from the fish-woman (cf. the ancient picture in Vigouroux, Die Bibel nnd die neueren Entdeck- uiigcn, iii. 355) Atargatis or AepKcru or DercetLs, ■nho also had a temple at Ashkelon, cf. Ovid, Metam. iv. 45 fl". —