Jonah and the Whale 2 A Revision Class in Theology.

Sometime around 1978, I came across this book on Jonah in the now long gone Free Church Book Shop on the Mound, in Edinburgh. It cost me £2.50. I spent the following day reading it cover to cover, and over the next few days re-reading and making notes. Alongside it I read the then new commentary on Jonah by Leslie Allen. Later that year I preached four sermons on Jonah in Partick Baptist Church, Glasgow, my first full time pastorate.

Summer of 1979 I was invited to lead the Bible studies at Kilcreggan, a residential Christian holiday centre on the Firth of Clyde. I decided to explore Jonah as a text that taught us not about mission as such, but about the nature of the God who sends, the missionary God. I wanted to test-drive Fretheim's intriguing suggestion that Jonah is about the creative fusion of mercy and mission in the nature of God.

Anger and judgement are primary colours in the weaving of the Jonah story. But, Fretheim argued, they are woven within the overall pattern of God's mission and mercy. In 1979 Leslie Allen's commentary was one of the best and most up to date around. He gave significant exegetical support for understanding Jonah as a parable about the nature of God and God's ways with a world where evil and anger, hate and violence, grievance and vengeance are realities that destroy human flourishing and frustrate God's good purposes in creation.

I remember very clearly being anxious about folk getting hung up on the historicity of the book, straining at the word parable and swallowing a whale of a story. More seriously, many evangelicals stop listening to the message of Jonah at the first questioning of its historical credentials, whale, outsized Nineveh, gourd, worm, and all. But not that week.

Over that week of teaching I tried to enthuse people with the brilliance of the story, and the theological power of mission earthed in mercy. I wanted them to discover the utter surprise that God's grace is a scandal, and our being offered that grace is itself scandalous. And so to rejoice in a God who faces humanity's worst, and comes as mercy to those who see their own worst selves, and are rescued by mercy and grace that came looking for them. Mission and Mercy.

I needn't have worried. The whale was barely spotted, and was the least of our concerns. Each day I taught for about 40 minutes, and then 20-30 minutes discussion all together or in smaller groups. Most folk wanted to talk more about grace to the undeserving, and about a God whose judgement is always provisional, and to think through the message of reconciling love urging repentance, precipitating change and giving birth to faith, - life changing faith in the grace, compassion and mercy of God. 

Jonah has been in my system ever since. Jonah 4.2 is the moment of unveiling, a denouement to which the story has been leading, and from which it will flow on into an interrogation of Jonah, and the reader, whether you, me, or whoever.

Jonah prayed to the Lord, "It is just as I feared, Lord, when I was still in my own country and it was to forestall this that I tried to escape to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, long-suffering, ever constant, always ready to relent and not inflict punishment."

This is the recurring and core truth of Israel's faith. The words 'gracious' and 'compassionate' occur repeatedly in the Old Testament, always with God as their reference. Together they capture the meaning of 'hesed', the long-suffering faithfulness and covenant loyalty of God.

But it isn't all done and dusted.

Now and then I share Jonah's perplexity.

I too have questions, hesitations, and at times a grudging Jonah heart.

There's a question of fairness in a world where evil can flourish, prosper and defy God, and then at the last minute, grace opens eyes, touches consciences, and there is genuine repentance and pardon. What's the point of being good in a world like that?

There's a question of theodicy, of how all the victims of all the Ninevehs from then to now, ever get justice, and receive recompense for suffering. How is it that evil acts and evil people don't get what they deserve, finally and fully, because there's a get out clause of repentance and mercy?

There's a question of how we find meaning in our existence if we do not live in a moral universe in which good is good, evil is evil, and each has consequences beyond themselves. Why should anyone bother about whether they are doing good or evil if, in the end, evil doesn't get its come-uppance?     

Oh there are answers to these questions, good ones. The disturbing genius of Jonah is that in one short story all our questions are reconfigured and answered by a theology which isn't about justice, vengeance, punishment and ultimate destruction.

Instead there is a revision class in theology. Mercy, gracious compassion, constant willingness to relent - God is like that - for everyone. Including us, me, you...and them, whoever 'them' happens to be. 

More has to be said. The story of Jonah isn't a Reader's Digest comfort story. But for now perhaps it is enough to allow ourselves to be interrogated by the story, and unsettled by the God who is the main protagonist of both the Jonah story, and our own story.

The God who is "a gracious and compassionate God, long-suffering, ever constant, always ready to relent and not inflict punishment."

That God, and his killer, life-giving question, "Do you do well to be angry?"

Comments

[Dave Summers]

"...straining at the word parable and swallowing a whale of a story." I loved that!
Jonah is my favourite OT prophet. I well remember many years ago at an SU camp, introducing one of the kids to the story of Jonah and the plant. (He knew about the whale - don't we all?) I forget what led up to it, but it was some conversation about how we get more hung up on petty discomfort than big issues of justice, or something like that. Anyway, I pointed him to Jonah ch4, he read it, and burst out laughing at Jonah's absurdity. A right response, I think, to this most humorous of Biblical books.