(Audio and Text)
Title: A Whale of a Tale?
What is the nature of this “great fish?”
To attempt to answer this question, let us consider two approaches:
- What commentaries offer
- What the Hebrew language suggests
Commentary Study: A Three-Fold Approach:
Notes from Dave Guzik:
(Decent Exegete, common language speaker)
The LORD had prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah: Some question if this could happen as the Bible says it did; but surely it is not a difficult thing for God to have prepared a great fish, even if that particular fish was a special creation for that moment.
What kind of fish was this? We don’t know.
There is a story of a whaler named James Bartley, who in 1891 reportedly fell into the sea while harpooning a large sperm whale; when the whale was killed and dissected, he was found in the whale’s stomach, unconscious but alive. While some have argued that the incident was carefully investigated and true, the widow of the ship’s captain denied that it ever happened.
(Great point from Guzik) It may be questioned if the story of James Bartley is true or not, but certainly the story of Jonah is true because Jesus said it was true. In Matthew 12:40 we read that Jesus said Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish.
From Charles Spurgeon:
(Solid Exegete, Preaching Language)
Note, God has command of all the creatures, and can make any of them serve his designs of mercy to his people, even the fishes of the sea, that are most from under man’s cognizance, even the great whales, that are altogether from under man’s government.
This fish was prepared, lay ready under water close by the ship, that he might keep Jonah from sinking to the bottom, and save him alive, though he deserved to die. Let us stand still and see this salvation of the Lord, and admire his power, that he could thus save a drowning man, and his pity, that he would thus save one that was running from him and had offended him. It was of the Lord’s mercies that Jonah was not now consumed. The fish swallowed up Jonah, not to devour him, but to protect him.
Out of the eater comes forth meat; for Jonah was alive and well in the belly of the fish three days and three nights, not consumed by the heat of the animal, nor suffocated for want of air. It is granted that to nature this was impossible, but not to the God of nature, with whom all things are possible.
A.R. Fausett
in Jameson, Fausett, and Brown Commentary
(Strong Exegete, Academic Language)
God prepared a great fish–not created specially for this purpose, but appointed in His providence, to which all creatures are subservient. The fish, through a mistranslation of Mat 12:40, was formerly supposed to be a whale; there, as here, the original means “a great fish.” The whale’s neck is too narrow to receive a man.
BOCHART thinks, the dog-fish, the stomach of which is so large that the body of a man in armor was once found in it. Others, the shark [JEBB]. The cavity in the whale’s throat, large enough, according to CAPTAIN SCORESBY, to hold a ship’s jolly boat full of men.
A miracle in any view is needed, and we have no data to speculate further. A “sign” or miracle it is expressly called by our Lord in Mat 12:39. Respiration in such a position could only be by miracle. The miraculous interposition was not without a sufficient reason; it was calculated to affect not only Jonah, but also Nineveh and Israel.
Hebrew Language Study:
“had prepared” “Manah”
a primitive root; properly, to weigh out; by implication, to allot or constitute officially; also to enumerate or enroll:—appoint, count, number, prepare, set, tell.
Other uses of “Manah” in the O.T.
Gen 13:16
“And I will make your descendants as the dust of the earth; so that if a man could number the dust of the earth, then your descendants also could be numbered.”
1Ch 9:29
Some of them were appointed over the furnishings and over all the implements of the sanctuary, and over the fine flour and the wine and the oil and the incense and the spices.
Psa 61:7
He shall abide before God forever.
Oh, prepare mercy and truth, which may preserve him!
Q: Was this great fish “created” for a specific purpose? ( A supernatural, “not common” animal) OR was this a “normal” animal that was “appointed” (assigned to do a very unusual thing?)
A: Because of the origin of the Hebrew word “Manah” meaning “to appoint” and NOT “to create” I tend to lean toward the latter option.
I believe this was a “sea dog” or a whale shark, or a blue whale, that did something amazing, because of God’s providence.
Close: The Point of the Matter
A.R. Fausett:
The life of a prophet was often marked by experiences which made him, through sympathy, best suited for discharging the prophetical function to his hearers and his people. The infinite resources of God in mercy as well as judgment are prefigured in the devourer being transformed into Jonah’s preserver.
Jonah’s condition under punishment, shut out from the outer world, was rendered as much as possible the emblem of death, a present type to Nineveh and Israel, of the death in sin, as his deliverance was of the spiritual resurrection on repentance; as also, a future type of Jesus’ literal death for sin, and resurrection by the Spirit of God.
Close/Q&A