The Pulpit Commentary — Jonah — Section 52

HOMILIES BY VARIOUS AUTHORS. Vers. 1--4.-...4. t1,nique oratory. "Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God," etc. The key-note of this passage is struck in the first verse. It is the fish, by God's hand made Jonah's preserver instead of his destroyer, that inspires the praise- prayer of the whole chapter. God did not come to help till the prophet had, in imagination, faced the worst; but still he came in time. In the very moment of imminent death he stepped in a Deliverer. And he delivered in his own inimitable way. Natural laws cannot serve bis purpose, and he accomplishes it against them. " The ravens furnish Elijah's table; the lions are tamo and quiet while Daniel is in the den; the violence or fire is gone when believers are in the furnace; the sea, which acts according to its nature towards Pharaoh and his host, is a wall on the right hand and on the left to Moses and to Israel; and the devouring shark preserves Jonah's life" (Rev. Thomas Jones, in Zoe.). And now the prophet realizes that God, after all, is his Friend. He is bringing life out of the jaws of death, converting the voracious sea-monster int-0 a kind protector. .And thus, by judgment and mercy in turn, the obdurate heart is broken, and the sturdy apostate brought to his knees and the praise- song of the restored. We see bere- L How .AFFLICTION OPENS THE MOUTH WHICH SIN HAD SHUT. Jonah's defection was deliberate and persistent. Not for a trifle would be cry, Peccavi! Not by an ordinary obstacle would he be arrested in his course. He seceded most determinedly. He kept bis purpose in unabated strength, through a forty-mile tramp on foot. He overcame difficulty with resourcefnl energy. He slept calmly, going on his way, amidst the crash of an appalling hurricane. He sat sullen and made no sign when even heathen sailors called upon their gods, and wondered at his self-composure. But flesh is flesh, and at length the word came true, " In their affliction will they seek mo early." God has weapons that pierce even armour of proof. The invasion of fiery serpents did it for incorrigible Israel (Numb. xxi. 7). The cut of the Assyrian slave-lash did it for graceless Manasseh (2 Chron. xxxiii. 12, 13). The death of Bathsheba's child did it for David, after a great crime and a whole year of impenitent hardnoss (2 Sam. xii. 13, 16). The Babylonish exile did it for Israel, as Isaiah expresses, "Lord, in trouble they have visited thee; they poured out a prayer when thy chastening was upon them." .And the experiences of a shark's interior did it for Jonah. He would not surrender sooner, but resistance is out of the question now. The victory rests with God. The fires of bis judgment have softened the apostate's iron will. Yet not the Divine severity only, but severity and goodness together have operated here as "the medicine of the mind." It was not imminent death alone but this with miraculous life ou, of death that broke the hideous spell, and opened the lips so stubbornly sealed. It is a wrong way of looking at things t-0 contrast, where both have operated, the value of severity and goodness as motive powers in the religious sphere. Neither probably would be effective by itself. The severity before the goodness did not conquer, and OB. II, 1-10,] THE BOOK OF JON AH. 49