OPENING CHAPTER
Jon 1:1 Now the word of Jehovah came unto Jonah the son of Amittai, saying,
2 Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry against it; for their wickedness is come up before me.
3 But Jonah rose up to flee unto Tarshish from the presence of Jehovah; and he went down to Joppa, and found a ship going to Tarshish: so he paid the fare thereof, and went down into it, to go with them unto Tarshish from the presence of Jehovah.
(ASV)
If there is a book in the Bible no unsaved person believes, it is a toss up between Genesis and Jonah.
God creating the world? No, no. That was a god particle that did it.
A world wide flood? No, no. All that geological mess was created by the ice ages. What? Where did the water go when the ice melted? It slowly seeped away. Sudden ice age that froze the mammoths with flowers in their mouths. SLOOOOW melting temp change.
Anyway, we begin one of the shorter books of the Bible. Hemingway's book, I'll call it. Short, to the point. Maybe it's the James Patterson Chapters. Pop, Pop, Pop, Pop, done.
But the import of the story rests in a number of facts the story doesn't spend a lot of time on. It assumes we know about Nineveh and the Assyrians and something about the history. So a brisk history lesson touching on what we can in limited space.
From Spuregon's Devotional Commentary I draw an opening quote and the inspiration for my blog title:
Jon 1:1-4:11
As we read about Jonah on his visit to Nineveh we may note the honest way in which he describes himself, and reveals his own infirmities and faults.
It is the story of a man who ran from God's mission. I'll let John Wesley Notes on The Old and New Testaments outline chapter 1 for us:
JONAH. CHAP. I.
Jonah disobeys the command of God, ver. 1-3.
Is arrested by a storm, ver. 4-6.
Discovered to be the cause of the storm, ver. 7-10.
Cast into the sea and swallowed by a fish, ver. 11-17.
God gives him a direct order. Do this. Go to a city of sinners and deliver an evangelical message.
Anyway, we begin one of the shorter books of the Bible. Hemingway's book, I'll call it. Short, to the point. Maybe it's the James Patterson Chapters. Pop, Pop, Pop, Pop, done.
But the import of the story rests in a number of facts the story doesn't spend a lot of time on. It assumes we know about Nineveh and the Assyrians and something about the history. So a brisk history lesson touching on what we can in limited space.
From Spuregon's Devotional Commentary I draw an opening quote and the inspiration for my blog title:
Jon 1:1-4:11
As we read about Jonah on his visit to Nineveh we may note the honest way in which he describes himself, and reveals his own infirmities and faults.
It is the story of a man who ran from God's mission. I'll let John Wesley Notes on The Old and New Testaments outline chapter 1 for us:
JONAH. CHAP. I.
Jonah disobeys the command of God, ver. 1-3.
Is arrested by a storm, ver. 4-6.
Discovered to be the cause of the storm, ver. 7-10.
Cast into the sea and swallowed by a fish, ver. 11-17.
God gives him a direct order. Do this. Go to a city of sinners and deliver an evangelical message.
Commissioned, not merely instructed. A soldier, one under orders, As such, he would have been given God's blessing and been empowered and would have known his mission was very likely to succeed. But then, many other prophets had been given missions with no guarantee of their survival; in fact, it was sometimes a death sentence.
Some of you may not have read this yet so we will leave Jonah's motives for the discussion of the last chapter. I will say commentators suggest there was fear behind it. He was going alone into a generally dangerous territory where the word Jew would likely have been greeted roughly as it was in Nazi territory in World War II. We'll focus on the other mystery: Why save them in the first place?
Nineveh was the capitol of Assyria, located on the left bank of the Tigris River about forty miles north of the Zab junction. (For a map: http://www.britannica.com/place/Tigris-Euphrates-river-system) It was a city state. They were known for conquest. When they conquered an area, captives heads were cut off and piled in a pyramid on the road leading into the conquered city. The Assyrians are said to be the nation from which the Roman's eventually took the idea of crucifixion.
Later that same Assyria appeared in prophecy made against Israel
Amos 7:14 Then Amos in answer said to Amaziah, I am no prophet, or one of the sons of the prophets; I am a herdman and one who takes care of sycamore-trees:
15 And the Lord took me from the flock, and the Lord said to me, Go, be a prophet to my people Israel.
16 Now then, give ear to the word of the Lord: You say, Be no prophet to Israel, and say not a word against the people of Isaac.
17 So this is what the Lord has said: Your wife will be a loose woman in the town, and your sons and your daughters will be put to the sword, and your land will be cut up into parts by a line; and you yourself will come to your end in an unclean land, and Israel will certainly be taken away a prisoner out of his land.
(BBE)
Jonah called to save Nineveh from its great wickedness. As Amos foresaw, God used them to destroy Israel years later after the break with Judea. So God was saving them at least for his purpose of correction.
And we hear of Jonah one more place in the Bible concerning his actions before his own book.
2Ki 14:20 And they took his body on horseback and put it into the earth with his fathers in Jerusalem, the town of David.
21 Then all the people of Judah took Azariah, who was sixteen years old, and made him king in place of his father Amaziah.
22 He was the builder of Elath, which he got back for Judah after the death of the king.
23 In the fifteenth year of the rule of Amaziah, son of Joash, king of Judah, Jeroboam, the son of Joash, king of Israel, became king in Samaria, ruling for forty-one years.
24 He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, not turning away from the sin which Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, did and made Israel do.
25 He got back the old limits of Israel from the way into Hamath to the sea of the Arabah, as the Lord had said by his servant Jonah, the son of Amittai, the prophet of Gath-hepher.
26 For the Lord saw how bitter was the trouble of Israel, and that everyone was cut off, he who was shut up and he who went free, and that Israel had no helper.
27 And the Lord had not said that the name of Israel was to be taken away from the earth; but he gave them a saviour in Jeroboam, the son of Joash.
28 Now the rest of the acts of Jeroboam, and all he did, and his power, and how he went to war with Damascus, causing the wrath of the Lord to be turned away from Israel, are they not recorded in the book of the history of the kings of Israel?
29 And Jeroboam went to rest with his fathers, and was put into the earth with the kings of Israel; and Zechariah his son became king in his place.
(BBE)
About the brief history leading to this moment:
Jonah was a *prophet in the land of Israel about 800-750 BC. During this time, an important event happened to Israel. Israel shared its northern border with Syria. When the army of Syria defeated the army of Israel in war, it took some of Israel’s land. Then the army of the country of Assyria defeated Syria in war, which made Syria weak. Then Jeroboam (king of Israel 793-753 BC) was able to get his land back. Jonah had said that God would cause this to happen (2 Kings 14:25).
http://www.easyenglish.info/bible-commentary/jonah-lbw.htm
About the Assyrians, a brief overview up to the time of Jonah. :
Early Period—2000-1800.
The homeland of Assyria was in the northeast corner of the Fertile Crescent where the Tigris River flows southward across the plains, and the mountains of Kurdistan loom up in the background. The city which gave its name to the country and empire, even as it took its own name from the national god, was Ashur. It was located strategically on a low bluff on the right bank of the Tigris at a place now called Qalat Sharqat (cf. Gen. 10, Nimrod).1
Assyria first appeared historically after the time of the Kingdom of Accad to whose sphere of influence it had belonged (2300-2100 B.C., but this early period is vague). The Assyrians had colonies in Asia Minor where they carried on extensive trade (see the Cappadocian Tablets and the unit on the Hittites—see the tablet at ANE #56). These were interrupted by the rise of the Hittite state. There is a governor from the neo-Sumerian period ruling in Assyria (2000-1900 B.C.).
The Old Kingdom--1800-1700.
The Old Kingdom centers on the person of Shamshi-Adad I (1813-1781 B.C.).2 He had inherited a territory near Mari with which he came into conflict. He may have moved against Babylon. At any rate, he captured a town on the Tigris River which opened up Assyria to him. Assyria had just regained her independence from the south. From his Assyrian throne, he moved west and eventually conquered Mari. The whole of upper Mesopotamia was now in his control and the Cappadocian colonies began to show renewed activity. His son, Ishme-Dagon, was able to retain only Assyria. Mari fell back to the original Amorite dynasty through Zimrilim.
Hammurabi conquered Mari and perhaps Assyria and began the Old Babylonian Empire.
The Period of Decline--1700-1300 B.C.
During this period, Assyria was dominated by others. Mitanni seems to have controlled Assyria (see Unit 9 for Mitanni). Mitanni was defeated by the Hittites (1380-1340 B.C.), and thus the Assyrians were free to resume their expansion.
The Middle Kingdom--1300-1100 B.C.
The Middle Assyrian Kingdom arose in the 14th and 13th centuries. It was reconstituted about 1100 B.C. Names appear here which are better known in the New Assyrian Kingdom: Ashur-uballit (I), Adad-nirari (I), Shalmaneser (I), Tiglath-Pileser (I). There was a decline from 1100 to 900 B.C.3
The New Kingdom--900-600 B.C.
Assyria rose to the height of its power at the time of the New Kingdom. The Assyrians subjugated all of Mesopotamia, including Babylonia, and the border regions. They also extended their rule over a part of Asia Minor, all Syria, and, for a while, even over Egypt.
The rise of the New Assyrian Kingdom began in the 9th century under the kings Ashurnasirpal II (884-859 B.C.) and Shalmaneser III (859-824 B.C.) who energetically advanced as far as middle Syria without being able to establish lasting control there.
Then the succession of the great Assyrian conquerors began with Tiglath-Pileser III (745-727 B.C.). They conquered Syria and Palestine, as well as other lands, and undertook frequent campaigns there. They include Shalmaneser V (727-722 B.C.), Sargon II (722-705 B.C.), Sennacherib (705-681 B.C.), and Esarhaddon (681-669 B.C.ANE#121) who undertook several campaigns against Egypt and occupied the Delta and the old royal city of Memphis.
The last goal of Assyrian expansion, the overthrow of Egypt, was brought very close. Esarhaddon’s son and successor, Ashurbanipal (669-631 B.C.), could indeed still garrison the upper Egyptian royal city of Thebes, but, under him, the Egyptian adventure soon came to an end, and the decline of the Assyrian might began.
This decline came about swiftly under his successors. In 612 B.C., the Assyrian capital city of Nineveh fell to a combined attack of the Medes and Neo-Babylonians. In Mesopotamia, and in Syro-Palestine, the Neo-Babylonian Empire then succeeded the Assyrian Kingdom.
( can find a more extensive examination of the Assyrians and the Israelis there. Fascinating history with little to do with Jonah except to establish some reasons to hate them.)
The Assyrians had a number of conquests and a standard way to handle things: Assyrian imperialism was of a particularly harsh variety. The tribute exacted from vassal kingdoms seems to have been very heavy. It did nothing to promote the economic welfare of the subject peoples, as can be seen in the impoverished remains of many towns and cities of the period; and it provoked repeated revolts, despite the cruel fate awaiting defeated rebels.
By contrast, the remains of cities in the Assyrian homeland reveal a magnificence and luxury unparalleled in the ancient Middle East up to that time. This clearly indicates that the Assyrian imperial system was an engine for hoovering up wealth from the provinces for the benefit of the ruling class.
Mass deportation
From the mid-8th century the Assyrians practiced a policy of mass deportation. Conquered towns and districts were emptied of their inhabitants, who were resettled in distant regions, to be replaced by people brought in by force from other countries. The most famous example was the destruction of the kingdom of Israel in 722 BC, described in the Bible.
The aim of this policy was to punish rebels, prevent rebellions by undermining local loyalties, to populate new towns, either in conquered countries or in the Assyrian heartland to develop agriculture in under-populated regions, and to provide the Assyrian state with the troops, labourers, craftsmen, and even civil servants it needed. The deportees were not slaves; they had the rights and duties of other subjects of the Assyrian king; and there is evidence that they were to prove amongst the more loyal subjects of the Assyrians.
A new lingua franca
It has been estimated that four and a half million people were forcibly relocated in this manner. The bulk of deportations involved Aramaic speakers, and as a result this policy greatly contributed to the Aramaization of large parts of the Middle East. Aramaic was to remain the most widely used language in this region for centuries; for example, Jesus would have spoken Aramaic in everyday life. It was only with the coming of Islam that Arabic began to replace it as the language for millions of people.
Aramaic was an easy language to learn, and also had an alphabetic script, closely related to Phoenician and Hebrew. This made learning to read and write much easier than with the old cuneiform scripts of Sumeria and Akkad, which the Assyrians had previously used. Paradoxically, therefore, the policy of deportation must have greatly helped the spread of literacy in the Middle East.
As for the Assyrians, they too also began to speak Aramaic (their original language having been Akkadian). The ruling class may have continued to speak Akkadian to some extent, and they certainly used its cuneiform script (in a smaller, more refined style than previously) in government and administration. However, Aramaic made headway even in these exalted circles, and in 752 BC it was made an official language of administration alongside Akkadian.
So the ideas communicated in the Bible are correct. More, they actually resulted in spreading the language Jesus would speak and the language of his Early followers.
The Assyrians shared in the religion of the Mesopotamian civilization at large. This involved the worship of many gods, though with the god Ashur, the national god of Assyria, taking the chief place in the pantheon.
Like all Mesopotamians, the Assyrians had a deep and all-embracing belief in signs and omens. The gods, they felt, were always wishing to communicate their wishes to men, and did so through the movements of sun, moon or stars, the flight of birds, the state of chicken livers and so on. No major decision was taken without consulting priests on whether it was in the will of the gods. This included major issues of state, and the king had a staff of expert astrologers to aid him in his policy-making,
In Popular Religion by Anthony Green, we hear how an ancient Babylonian myth portrays a series of "fish cloaked" figures who appear throughout ancient history one in particular draws Green's interest: "Most striking is the instance of the fish-cloaked man who can be recognized well enough in the description of Babylonian belief given by Berossa, priest of Marduk at Babylon in the third century BC, In the first book of his Babylonica , he tells how in the first year of the reign of the legendary Alorus a monster named Oannes rose from the sea: "It's entire body was that of a fish, but a human head had grown under the head of the fish and human feet likewise had grown from the fish's tail. It also has a human voice. It now seems certain that Oannes is to be identified with Adapa, the first man of Assyro-Babylonian mythology and since Adapa was an apkallu."
About the apkallu:
The creatures above are the apkallu and are considered as antediluvian demigods, semi-divine beings attending the Tree of Life. One of their functions was as protective spirits against disease and demons. The fish men were created or sent by Enki to bestow humanity with moral codes and the arts of civilization (through the me). For the Sumerians these creatures were called the Ab.gal "big fish." You might recognize the Babylonian fish man who is called Oannes ...
(Note: a New Age source so no links.)
I suggest there were several reasons that God wanted them delivered from his immediate wrath.
1) The cross.
Britannica reports that the first historical record of Crucifixion was about 519 BC when "Darius I, king of Persia, crucified 3,000 political opponents in Babylon" (Encyclopaedia Britannica, crucifixion)
Some further detail is given in "The Eerdman's Bible Dictionary", Rev. Ed., 1975: CROSS ... Crucifixion is first attested among the Persians (cf. Herodotus, Hist. i.128.2; iii.132.2, 159.1), perhaps derived from the Assyrian impalement. It was later employed by the Greeks, especially Alexander the Great, and by the Carthaginians, from whom the Romans adapted the practice as a punishment for slaves and non-citizens, and occasionally for citizens guilty of treason. Although in the Old Testament the corpses of blasphemers or idolaters punished by stoning might be hanged "on a tree" as further humiliation (Deut. 21:23), actual crucifixion was not introduced in Palestine until Hellenistic times. The Seleucid Antiochus IV Epiphanes crucified those Jews who would not accept Hellenization (Josephus Ant. xii.240-41; cf 1 Macc. 1:44-50).
http://www.bible.ca/d-history-archeology-crucifixion-cross.htm
They originated the idea for the form of death which would suit God's need. They had to be there for the idea to propagate over the centuries and reach fruition.
2) The language.
Aramaic was throughout the empires and made it easier to spread the Gospel. It likely wouldn't have been so without the Assyrians.
3) The deportation.
Without their conquest, no dispersion, though Babylon would have assured Daniel, Ezra, and Nehemiah. More important, God prophesied it. They had to exist to complete the prophesy.
But two other points give us pause.
1) It appears, no matter what God has planned for a life, the person, people, nation in the plan can actually go so far into sin that God will destroy it rather than use it. Assyria lived in all forms of immorality, but, significantly, God never describes EXACTLY what sins went too far or EXACTLY how often they had to occur or EXACTLY the nature of their destruction. No definition of the limits of the sins we do before He will not tolerate it, because, frankly, many of us would sin up to the nearest degree then repent. He doesn't want us playing that game; some of us play it already, dabbling, touching base with our sin then leading off a little to see if God will pick us off with a quick throw from home (Baseball season is upon us.) We know he destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah when their sin couldn't be tolerated, Whether it was the sin itself or also the diseases coming from it, the sin itself stood out. What we know of Nineveh was they went too far. Whatever it was, we know now that a nation can: a) sin to its own destruction (Certainly Israel found it out again and again.) ; b) be redeemed.
You know anyone who has gone too far? They walked down the wide road and became more and more lost. Well, they haven't gone too far. The friend who lays on a slab in the morgue is the only one gone too far, The living can be redeemed.
2) We can flee God's missions but He will pursue us and turn us back in the direction he wishes us to go. You may say,"But God hasn't given me an audience and told me directly what to do so I'm waiting on Him to tell me."
I have a contention. We know God gave us glimpses of Jesus in the Old Testament. The Angel of the Lord, Melchizedek, as one of the three visitor to Abraham, as the angel who wrestled with Jacob, as the visitor who meets Joshua on the road. My contention is that God also gives us precursors of Christians, people who act as we Gentiles act when given God's orders centuries later.
So let me be a messenger of God to you:
Mark 16:15 And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to the whole creation.
John 14:15 "If you love Me, keep My commandments.
John 14:23-24 Jesus answered and said to him, "If a man loves Me, he will keep My Word. And My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him. He who does not love Me does not keep My words, and the Word which you hear is not Mine, but the Father's who sent Me."
John 14:31 "But that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father has given Me commandment, even so I do. Arise, let us go away from here."
John 15:9-10 "As the Father has loved Me, so I have loved you; continue in My love. If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love, even as I have kept My Father's commandments and abide in His love."
(For more: http://www.yourtruelifenow.com/)
And this one:
Matthew 5:43 You have knowledge that it was said, Have love for your neighbour, and hate for him who is against you:
44 But I say to you, Have love for those who are against you, and make prayer for those who are cruel to you;
45 So that you may be the sons of your Father in heaven; for his sun gives light to the evil and to the good, and he sends rain on the upright man and on the sinner.
46 For if you have love for those who have love for you, what credit is it to you? do not the tax-farmers the same?
47 And if you say, Good day, to your brothers only, what do you do more than others? do not even the Gentiles the same?
48 Be then complete in righteousness, even as your Father in heaven is complete.
(BBE)
Our neighbors are a part of our world. Our families. Our friends.
And that guy down the street that borrowed your tools and never returned them. That jerk who cut you off on the freeway. That midget leader of North Korea. The leaders of Isis. The folks in the Temple in Salt Lake City. The guys in the mitres in Vatican City. The Republican next door with the "Hilary Lied and Four Died" bumper sticker. Th Democrat with the "Cheney Lied and Thousands Died And Counting" sticker. The Chicano at work. The Caucasian pumping his gas next to your car.
The guy wearing a swastika or the guy wearing a Star of David or yarmulke. The junkie who killed your best friend. The con man who stole your daughter's money and led to her suicide.
Hey, wait a minute!!!
Yes, before we get all up in Jonah's face about not doing God's work, before we say he shouldn't have run from God's order, let's consider if some of us aren't running from God's commission, too, by sitting in the armchair, living in the gym, Before that, maybe we should consider him an example to us to turn from running, to turn from whatever has us going the wrong way.
I'm certain I lost my job of 31 years to turn me back to God from my ennui, my belief that God had others to do my job if I wasn't doing it. It took me a long time to forgive my boss for the lay off. When I heard he had become very ill with prostate cancer, it was then possible for me to pray for him and mean it. Though he seems to have been healed from that, the years of smoking have ravaged his lungs and he needs an oxygen tank to breathe. Continued prayer for our enemies seems to be part of the process. I'm also certain God has specific things for all of us to do to help spread the Word.
Because, again, the living can be redeemed.
Later, we'll discuss a process of forgiveness, but for now our concern is the running away part.
I hope I can keep myself focused on running toward God instead of away. I pray this blog helps us all keep that focus.
Now take a look at Jonah's flight plan:
Farthest corners of the world come to mind. Also a certain Apostle:
for one called Saul of Tarsus; or Saul "by name the Tarsian". So it is said (l) of Bigthan and Teresh, Esther 6:2 that they were , "two Tarsians", perhaps citizens of Tarsus, as Saul was. Tarsus was a city in Cilicia, and which Solinus (m) calls the mother of cities, and is the same with the Tarshish of the Old Testament; here Saul was born, and of it he was a citizen; Acts 21:39 and therefore is here called Saul of Tarsus, or Saul the Tarsian:
http://biblehub.com/acts/9-11.htm
So we are immediately reminded of the Apostle who got stoned to death and rose from it.
And went through a shipwreck of his own.
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