I once heard someone refer to Jonah as the patron saint of recalcitrant prophets. But calling Jonah a saint would be a bit of a stretch. Saying "no" to God is not very saintly.

Jonah is never even referred to as a prophet in the book of Jonah. In fact, depending upon how one translates the Hebrew, his only prophecy doesn't come true. I guess he became a prophet by association since this book is listed among the twelve minor prophets in the Bible.

This book is unique among the prophetic books. It tells a story that is filled with humorous word plays, exaggerations, and ridiculous, impossible, and inappropriate actions. If Anderson Cooper had been around back then, Jonah would have made the "Ridiculist" for sure!

The story begins with the word of God coming to Jonah telling him to get up and go to Nineveh, cry out against it, because of the evil that the Ninevites had done. Jonah responds by getting up and going in the opposite direction. Things rather quickly get off to a rocky start.

Jonah books passage on a ship that will take him in the opposite direction God has called him to go. This will actually be a major theme of the story. Over and over again in this short book the opposite of what one expects happens.

No sooner had they set sail when a monstrous storm came upon them and threatened to drown everyone at sea. The sailors, all of whom happened to be pagans, cried out to their various gods and goddesses. They threw anything and everything that wasn't bolted down overboard in order to lighten the load. And while all this is going on, Jonah is fast asleep in the hold.

The captain finds him and tells him to wake up and start praying to whatever deity he believes in. Meanwhile the crew is casting lots to try to figure out whose fault it is that the storm has come upon them. The lot falls upon Jonah.

They discover that Jonah is an Israelite fleeing from God. Jonah himself suggests that they throw him overboard so the storm will abate. But these men, pagans though they be, are unwilling to throw him overboard just yet, so they row as hard as they can in a vain attempt to reach land. Eventually, as it seems that the sea will swallow them all, they throw Jonah overboard.

Suddenly the sea is calm. The storm is over. The sailors offered a sacrifice in thanksgiving to Yahweh. And they made vows. Some later Jewish commentators will say that these pagan sailors converted that day. The story simply says that they did what Jonah had failed to do. They prayed to Yahweh, expressed reverence and gratitude to Yahweh, and made some kind of vow. This would be exemplary behavior is they had been Israelites. It is unexpected and surprising that pagans would here be showing believers how they should behave towards God.

Meanwhile, Jonah is nowhere to be found. He's been swallowed up by a fish where he is about to enjoy a three day weekend in its stomach. Many of us have probably heard that Jonah was swallowed by a whale. The Hebrew word here, however, is the common word for fish. There were many folktales about heroes who got swallowed by a fish back then. Perhaps this was their way of saying that these people had hit rock bottom, and in that experience discovered the power to turn their life around. Maybe it's just an intuition that before someone can achieve something great they must first go through a time of deep trial. Or maybe they just wanted to make this story really ridiculous!

Now that he is in the belly of the fish Jonah starts to pray. The prayer that the author put on his lips seems to be a collection of phrases from various psalms. It certainly is not the prayer one would expect in such a situation. It is not a plea for deliverance. It does not express regret for one's behavior. Rather, it is fairly conventional psalm of thanksgiving for deliverance.

Now one may say that it is an expression of great faith in such a situation to go to a place of thanksgiving and gratitude for a deliverance that hasn't yet happened. On the other hand one could also argue that it's more in keeping with the structure of the whole story to portray Jonah as praying something completely inappropriate and absurd. Or it could be a clue to the context of the story.

After his three days are up, the fish vomits up Jonah onto dry land. The Hebrew word here implies an element of disgust. That fish was really disgusted at Jonah. Now the word of God comes to him a second time calling him to go to Nineveh. This time he goes.

Nineveh was the capitol of the Assyrian Empire. The Assyrians had conquered and occupied Israel in the eighth century BCE. Not only were they pagan foreigners, they were also military conquerors and oppressors. They were not exactly well-liked. One can understand why an Israelite would not look forward to going there. By the time this story was written down, the Israelites had seen the Assyrians defeated by the Babylonians who then invaded and occupied their land, sending more of them off into exile. And they had witnessed their return to the land and the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem thanks to the generosity and compassion of King Cyrus. Yet the occupation and exile continued to be a painful memory. It was something they would have had to heal from in order to move on.

In Nineveh, Jonah proceeds to offer his God-given message that he had been so reluctant to give earlier. It had taken a storm at sea, three days in the belly of a fish, and a time of prayer, but he had finally turned his rebellion into faithfulness and here he is giving his big message to Nineveh and he says, "Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!" Not the stirring oratory I was hoping for. Most prophets would have taken at least two chapters to say that! But much to his chagrin, the people of Nineveh, from the least to the greatest, repent. They begin a time of fasting. They wear sackcloth and sit in ashes. They even make their cattle fast and wear sackcloth! They vow to turn from their evil ways and from their violence in the hope that Yahweh would repent and not destroy the city. And God did repent, and did not destroy Nineveh. And Jonah was very displeased.

You would think that he would be, at the very least, somewhat satisfied that he had been so effective. Instead he gets ticked-off at God and says to God, essentially, "I told you so! I told you this was going to happen. I didn't even want to come here because I knew you were going to be all nice and merciful and compassionate, full of love and forgiveness, ready to relent from giving them the punishment they deserve. Kill me now, God, just get it over with and let me die!"

God responds saying, "Is it right for you to be angry?"

Jonah doesn't know what to say to that, so he goes outside the city and sulks. He is waiting to see what is going to happen to the city, perhaps on the off chance that God might decide to destroy the city after all. But it's very hot, and the sun beats down on Jonah. So God decides to make a tree spring up overnight and give shade to Jonah. This makes Jonah happy. But the very next day God appoints a worm to attack the tree so that it withers and dies. This gets Jonah tick-off again.

In the final paragraph of the book God says to Jonah;

So the book of Jonah ends with a question. Should God not be concerned with pagan foreigners, even those who once violently oppressed God's own people, and show them compassion and mercy?

The historical Jesus preached a message of love in action and called on people to not only love their neighbors, but to love their enemies. Here, in the Hebrew scriptures, we have a story that offers a foundation for the radical love ethic of Jesus. We are to love our enemies because God loves our enemies.

This story is first and foremost about God's extravagant forgiveness, mercy and loving-kindness. It is also a call to repentance in which all the people one would expect to say "no" to this call respond affirmatively, and the one who should have said "yes" at the very beginning, takes a while to come around, and then still has a lot of anger to resolve.

Saying "yes" to a call usually requires that we let go of something. It may be an old and outdated identity. It may be a way of doing things that no longer works. It may be old resentments, old hurts, old battles. The call is to wake-up, to arise and move in a new direction. All this is possible because of a universal love and compassion that surrounds all of us and continually invites us into new life.

Now the word of Yahweh came to Jonah son of Amittai, saying, 'Go at once to Nineveh, that great city, and cry out against it; for their wickedness has come up before me.' But Jonah set out to flee to Tarshish from the presence of God. He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish; so he paid his fare and went on board, to go with them to Tarshish, away from the presence of God.

But Yahweh hurled a great wind upon the sea, and such a mighty storm came upon the sea that the ship threatened to break up. Then the mariners were afraid, and each cried to his god. They threw the cargo that was in the ship into the sea, to lighten it for them. Jonah, meanwhile, had gone down into the hold of the ship and had lain down, and was fast asleep. The captain came and said to him, 'What are you doing sound asleep? Get up, call on your god! Perhaps the god will spare us a thought so that we do not perish.'

The sailors said to one another, 'Come, let us cast lots, so that we may know on whose account this calamity has come upon us.' So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah. Then they said to him, 'Tell us why this calamity has come upon us. What is your occupation? Where do you come from? What is your country? And of what people are you?' 'I am a Hebrew,' he replied. 'I worship Yahweh, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.' Then the men were even more afraid, and said to him, 'What is this that you have done!' For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of Yahweh, because he had told them so.

Then they said to him, 'What shall we do to you, that the sea may quiet down for us?' For the sea was growing more and more tempestuous. He said to them, 'Pick me up and throw me into the sea; then the sea will quiet down for you; for I know it is because of me that this great storm has come upon you.' Nevertheless, the men rowed hard to bring the ship back to land, but they could not, for the sea grew more and more stormy against them. Then they cried out to Yahweh, 'Please, O God, we pray, do not let us perish on account of this man's life. Do not make us guilty of innocent blood; for you, Yahweh, have done as it pleased you.' So they picked Jonah up and threw him into the sea; and the sea ceased from its raging. Then the men feared God even more, and they offered a sacrifice to Yahweh and made vows.

But God provided a large fish to swallow up Jonah; and Jonah was in the belly of the fish for three days and three nights.