Jonah and the Big Fish (Part 1)

The Book of Jonah is very short, only four chapters long. It tells of a prophet named Jonah who was told by God to go to the great city of Nineveh and warn them of a coming judgment. Jonah goes the opposite way on a ship, but a violent storm ends with Jonah being tossed overboard by the sailors because they learn he is fleeing from God. Jonah is swallowed by a great fish, and after three days and some prayers of repentance, he is spit out at Nineveh. [1] He gives his short warning and waits for God to destroy the evil inhabitants. However, the Ninevites repent, and God spares them from the judgment. Jonah is upset with God, Who reminds Jonah that He (God) has every right to pity those in the city. The book abruptly ends with no further response from Jonah.

You may be surprised to learn that there are many good reasons to believe this is an actual accounting of history, rather than a parable. The following is not an exhaustive study on the totality of evidence, but should help the reader understand that there is more to this book than a simple parable. [2]

Jonah

The Book of Jonah is not the only place in the Bible where Jonah is mentioned. In 2 Kings 14: 23-28, the author is recounting the Israelite kingship of Jereboam II, who “…restored the border of Isreal from Lebo-hamath as far as the sea of the Arabah, according to the word of the Lord, the God of Isreal, which He spoke by His serveant Jonah the son of Amittai, the prophet, who was from Gath-hepher.” We are, by that passage, able to identify Jonah as being a prophet in Israel between 782 and 753 B.C. The fact that both Biblical references to Jonah as the son of Amittai provide strong evidence that this is the same Jonah.

Israel

At the time of Jereboam II, Israel was the northern kingdom and had suffered under the mighty Assyrian empire, which was located to the north. The Assyrians were known for especially harsh treatment of those they conquered, using torture tactics like skinning captives, torturing children, and other gruesome means to bring about human suffering. They had attacked Israel on a repeated basis over the preceding years, and took the lands of Gad, Reuben, and Manasseh (Kings 10:32-33), and significantly reduced Israel’s military (Kings 13:7). In the 2 Kings passage, Jonah prophesied that Israel would expand its borders under King Jeroboam. How did that occur?

Nineveh, of Assyria

Nineveh was an ancient and major city that was a part of the Assyrian kingdom. Each city had its own ruler, but they ultimately reported to the Assyrian king. Jonah’s prophecy, and the later fulfilment, of an expansion of Israel during King Jeroboam II’s time, starts to make sense when you look at the records of Assyria at the same time. According to the Assyrian Eponym Canon and the Bur-Sagale eclipse record, Assyria (including Ninevah) was in the midst of a massive and sudden unrest and decline at the time of Jereboam II’s reign. This was caused by major plagues in 765 and 764 BC, political instability in major cities, and a solar eclipse that occurred on June 15, 763 BC.

Like many other cultures at the time, the eclipse was often seen as a sign of divine judgment to come. While we don’t know for certain what year Jonah would have been transported to Ninevah by the appointed fish to warn of coming divine appointed doom, it would make sense that he could have come at the same time all of these events would have been rattling the people of Ninevah and wider Assyria. They would likely have been much more apt to heed the warnings of an Israeli claiming to speak on behalf of the God of the universe with a warning of pending destruction.

Archaeology

So, the Biblical references to Jonah and the Assyrian records match up as far as who Jonah was and how Assyrians in Ninevah were faring at the time of Jonah’s likely visit. However, the city of Nineveh was eventually lost to history and was believed by many to be a work of fiction by a later writer. Even with references to Ninevah by ancient historians Xenophon and Herodotus, because the ruins were lost to time, many academics believed Ninevah to be a myth. In 1820, however, Claudius Rich discovered ruins near Mosul, Iraq, that he believed belonged to Ninevah. Austen Henry Layard developed the site further and discovered massive palace walls, cuneiform tablets, and the library of Ashurbanipal, confirming this was indeed the city of Nineveh. [3] Further excavations revealed that the massive scale of the city recorded in Biblical and other ancient records was accurate. Nineveh became one of the many cities lost to time, doubted by scholars, and later discovered by archeologists to affirm the Biblical account.

The Hill of Jonah

While Nineveh was destroyed in about 612 BC, evidence of our Jonah remained overlooking the hidden ruins for the centuries that followed. The Tell Neby Yunus, as it has been known to locals for centuries, was known to be the ancient burial site of Jonah, who was brought to Nineveh as a messenger of God to warn of impending doom. While the city was not visible because of the nature of its destruction, the Hill of Jonah remained.

Muslims who lived in the area maintained the story for generations, as Jonah and his story are also mentioned in the Koran. A mosque was built on the hill in 1365 AD, which covered over an ancient Assyrian Christian church that marked Jonah’s grave. In July 2014, ISIS militants attempted to destroy the mosque because they believed the site was a place of apostasy. They also began digging in the area, looking for religious or ancient artifacts they could sell on the black market. They stumbled into the Neo-Assyrian palace built by King Sennacherib (705-681 BC).[4]

What’s Next

In my first attempt, I quickly realized that I could not do justice to this summary of the evidence for the Book of Jonah in one short paper. I will therefore follow this up with a summary of the related fulfilled prophecies of Nahum, the clear foreshadowings of Christ in the story, how we know the book was written in Jonah’s time and not later, and perhaps even how it is that one can confidently believe that a man swallowed by a fish for three days lived to tell about it.

References:

[1] [Editor’s Note: The text doesn’t say the fish spat up Jonah at Nineveh, but rather that he was spat up on dry land (Jonah 2:10). While that could have been near Nineveh of the fish swam around to the Tigris river. The more likely locale, barring another miracle, would have been the shores of the Mediterranean sea.]

[2] For a short but sweeping summary of the amazing evidence for the history of Jonah and Nineveh, I encourage the reader to seek out the book, The Authenticity of the Book of Jonah, by author and historian Bill Cooper (2012).

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nineveh

[4] https://israel365news.com/314204/palace-biblical-king-sennacherib-discovered-beneath-isis-destruction-jonahs-tomb/

Recommended Resources:

Debate: What Best Explains Reality: Atheism or Theism? by Frank Turek DVD , Mp4 , and Mp3

How to Interpret Your Bible by Dr. Frank Turek DVD Complete Series , INSTRUCTOR Study Guide , and STUDENT Study Guide

Counter Culture Christian: Is the Bible True? by Frank Turek ( Mp3 ), ( Mp4 ), and (DVD)

Miracles: The Evidence by Frank Turek DVD and Mp4

Tony Williams is a retired police officer from Southern Illinois and currently lives in Kentucky with his family. He has been studying apologetics in his spare time for two decades, since a crisis of faith led him to the discovery of vast and ever-increasing evidence for his faith. Tony received a bachelor’s degree in University Studies from Southern Illinois University in 2019. His career in law enforcement has provided valuable insight into the concepts of truth, evidence, confession, testimony, cultural competency, morality, and most of all, the compelling need for Christ in the lives of the lost. Tony plans to pursue postgraduate studies in apologetics in the near future to sharpen his understanding of the various facets of Christian apologetics.

Originally posted at: https://bit.ly/3QsCpem