Christchurch Parish News, January 2017
When Jonah delivers God’s message to the Ninevites, their response confounds him.
‘The word of the LORD came to Jonah a second time, saying, “Get up, go to Nineveh, that great city, and proclaim to it the message that I tell you.” So Jonah set out and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the LORD.’ Jonah 3:1-3.
This time Jonah goes. This time he cannot refuse the command of God to go to Nineveh and ‘proclaim to it the message that I tell you.’ But what exactly is the message that God wants him to proclaim? The first time we heard this command in chapter one, it was simply ‘cry out against [Nineveh]’. Second time round, even less detail is given – just that there is a message to proclaim. This helps to build a sense of tension. What exactly will Jonah say when he reaches Nineveh?
Thankfully, we don’t have to wait long. Whilst the journey from the Mediterranean to Nineveh (situated in modern-day, northern Iraq) is some 600 miles, the narrator doesn’t bother with recounting Jonah’s journey. Instead, we jump ahead to Nineveh itself, which is described as ‘an exceedingly large city, a three days’ walk across.’ That’s big! Depending on how we read this story, we could pause and do some literal calculations and work out that the city was some 100 miles in diameter. Alternatively, we can read such details not as the literal description of a cartographer but as that of a narrator who wants to overwhelm us with the sense of just how huge this city of Israel’s enemy was, and thereby how daunting it would have been for Jonah, a prophet of Israel to walk into the midst of it. For to do so would have been to risk life and limb.
Jonah doesn’t make his way as far as the middle of the city. That’s not because he’s prevented from doing so. In fact we’re not told why he doesn’t go all the way to the centre. Instead, he walks only a day’s journey. But that’s far enough for Jonah. There, surrounded by his enemies, he cries out ‘People of Nineveh, repent! Turn to the LORD!’ At least, that’s what you might expect him to say. That’s the kind of spiel prophets come out with, isn’t it? But, no, not on this occasion. That’s not what Jonah says. He makes no call to repentance. Nor does he mention the God of Israel. Instead, he simply says, ‘Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!’ By itself, announcing that there is soon to be an unavoidable geopolitical calamity is not a message designed to win people over. You’d expect a follow-up. Think of the person with a sandwich board walking up and down the high street, just saying ‘The end of the world is nigh!’ No, that’s not the usual message. Normally, it’s ‘Repent! For the end of the world is at hand’. In marketing speak, ‘a call to action’.
So it’s very interesting that this is all that Jonah says. It’s as if, and this interpretation is born out by what Jonah later says in the story, that a) from Jonah’s point of view, it would really be rather marvellous if in forty days time, Nineveh was indeed engulfed by absolute geopolitical calamity; and relatedly b) because he wants this to happen, he’s decided that’s he’s not going to tell the Ninevites what to do to avoid this happening. In other words, he doesn’t tell them to repent and turn to the LORD. Remember what I mentioned in a previous article, that in the worldview of the story, the LORD is sovereign over nature and all geopolitical events. Therefore, if the Ninevites were to change their ways and turn to the LORD, then the LORD would change what was due to happen and disaster would be averted. But Jonah’s terse message of impending doom reveals that, oh boy, he really wants to see the Ninevites get their comeuppance from God.
And without drawing breath, the narrator continues, ‘And the people of Nineveh believed God.’ Just like that. Poor Jonah! It’s the last thing he wants to see happen. All the Ninevites needed to hear was that their city was about to be overthrown and they immediately change their ways. And just in case we’re thinking that they don’t really have a change of heart, the narrator tells us that ‘they proclaimed a fast, and everyone, great and small, put on sackcloth.’ They really meant it! Over the next few verses, as the king of Nineveh hears the news (and notice that this is a grassroots movement – it starts with the people’s repentance and works its way up rather than the other way around), everyone in the city, both human beings and animals alike, are called to repentance. It is decreed that everybody and every animal is to fast. Likewise that everybody and every animal is to wear sackcloth (if the prospect of all the animals of this ancient city walking around covered in penitential sackcloth sounds extreme, that’s because it’s meant to; the hyperbole is deliberate). Not only is there fasting and wearing of sackcloth by all and sundry, but there is also a mighty crying to God. ‘All shall turn from their evil ways and from the violence that is in their hands.’ They know they’ve done wrong and they want to mend their ways. The king’s decree continues, ‘Who knows? God may relent and change his mind; he may turn from his fierce anger, so we do not perish.’
Hang on. Haven’t we heard this before in the story? Yes, we have. In chapter one, in the middle of the raging storm, the non-Israelite sailors say to Jonah, ‘Perhaps [Jonah’s] god will spare us a thought so that we do not perish.’ Shortly after, the sailors pray to the God of Israel and having thrown Jonah overboard and calm having returned to the sea, they offer a sacrifice to the LORD and make vows. Amidst a threat of calamity – in the first half of the story, the storm; in the second half of the story, the fact that Nineveh is about to be overthrown – it is the non-Israelites who immediately recognise the all encompassing sovereignty of God and respond with repentance and obedience. All of which stands in stark contrast with Jonah’s behaviour. And remember, Jonah represents Israel in the story. As such, it doesn’t make comfortable reading for the people of God.
Immediately, the Ninevite king is proven right in placing his trust in the goodness of God. The narrator continues, ‘When God saw what they [the Ninevites] did, how they turned from their evil ways [and here the narrator makes it explicit], God changed his mind about the calamity that he said he would bring upon them and he did not do it.’
If this was a story about the Ninevites, this is where we would expect the narrative to end. The Ninevites have repented and disaster has been averted thanks to God changing his mind in response to the Ninevites’ change of heart. But the story does not end there for this story is not about the Israelites’ enemies, or our enemies for that matter. No, this story is about Jonah and how he responds to the grace of God when extended to his enemies. Just as it is for all those who have read this story down the ages. And that includes us.