Jonah 1:13-17 - The Lord appointed a great fish

1:13

The sailors on the boat come out of this quite well. Despite it becoming apparent that Jonah was the cause of the danger, and his willingness to be jettisoned along with the cargo, they did not want to do this and sought to get the boat to shore. But God was against them, or rather against Jonah, so it was all in vain.

1:14-16

Having tried everything else, they eventually realised that there was no other option but to throw Jonah overboard. We need to realise that when we act in rebellion against God we have a bad effect on other people. The sailors prayer to God for safety and that God would not hold them guilty. So Jonah was thrown over the side and immediately the storm stopped. We know that Jesus likened his days in the tomb to Jonah’s days in the big fish, maybe the sailors here can be seen to be to some extent parallel to the Romans in Jesus’ day. The event led the sailors to fear God and offered a sacrifice. In the same way some of the Roman soldiers recognised that Jesus was th Son of God.

1:17

“Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah”. Traditionally we talk about the whale, but the Hebrew actually says “big (or great) fish”. Before looking at the matter of how this could happen, let’s look at what is actually going on. Jonah has received an instruction from God, and one that involves God’s concern for the nations, in this case Nineveh. Jonah has deliberately disobeyed this command and gone to great lengths to, as he sees it, to make it impossible for him to have to do obey God’s command. However, God is God and it is not possible to escape from Him, no matter how hard we try. God imposed judgement upon Jonah, but He also made provision for Jonah to return, as we see here with the fish. The human race as a whole goes to great lengths to avoid having to submit to God, Israel as a nation has done the same. God does judge, but He has also provided a solution.

There are various explanations of how Jonah could be swallowed by a great beast. I do not intend to go into these, but just to accept it. There are isolated incidents of God working through animals. He spoke to Balaam through a donkey, and fed Elijah by ravens. The significance of three days and nights is that a person was considered truly dead after three days.