The fish is the least surprising part of Jonah. The prophet was angry that God forgave his enemies

Jonah is the only prophet in the Bible who succeeds and is furious about it.

The story is familiar to every Sunday school child. God tells Jonah to go to Nineveh, the capital of Assyria, and preach against it. Jonah goes the opposite way, boarding a ship at Joppa bound for Tarshish, “from the presence of the Lord” (Jonah 1:3). A storm hits, the sailors cast lots, Jonah is thrown overboard, and “the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah” (1:17). After three days and nights he prays, and the fish spits him onto dry land.

Why he ran

We learn Jonah’s reason only at the end. Nineveh was the capital of Israel’s enemies, a violent empire. Jonah did not want them to have the chance to repent.

The shortest sermon

On the second call, Jonah goes. His message is brief: “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown” (3:4). There is no mention of mercy in it. Yet the people of Nineveh believe, the king puts on sackcloth, and the whole city fasts. “And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not” (3:10).

The angry prophet

“But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry” (4:1). Then he explains: “I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness” (4:2). He ran because he knew God would forgive. He asks to die.

The plant

Jonah sits outside the city to see what will happen. God makes a plant grow to shade him, and Jonah is “exceeding glad”. The next day a worm kills the plant, and in the heat Jonah again asks to die.

God’s reply closes the book: “Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for the which thou hast not laboured… And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?” (4:10 to 11).

The question left open

The book ends with God’s question. We never hear Jonah’s answer. The reader is left to answer it.

Lessons

Jonah’s story challenges anyone who wants God’s mercy for themselves and judgment for their enemies. It shows God’s concern for a foreign people, and even for their animals. Jesus referred to “the sign of the prophet Jonas” (Matthew 12:39 to 41), comparing Jonah’s three days in the fish to his own death and resurrection.

Most readers remember the fish. The book wants them to remember the question, and to notice that God asked it gently.