Jona 1:17

Lutherbibel

Aber der HERR verschaffte einen großen Fisch, Jona zu verschlingen. Und Jona war im Leibe des Fisches drei Tage und drei Nächte.

Parallel Translations

Schlachter Bibel (1951)
Jonas Berufung, Flucht und Bestrafung Das Wort des Herrn erging an Jona, den Sohn Amittais, also: Mache dich auf, gehe nach Ninive, in die groáe Stadt, und predige wider sie; denn ihre Bosheit ist vor mein Angesicht heraufgekommen! Da machte sich Jona auf, um von dem Angesicht des Herrn hinweg nach Tarsis zu fliehen, und ging nach Japho hinab und fand daselbst ein Schiff, das nach Tarsis fuhr. Da gab er sein Fahrgeld und stieg ein, um mit ihnen nach Tarsis zu fahren, hinweg von dem Angesicht des Herrn . Aber der Herr schleuderte einen starken Wind auf das Meer, so daß ein großer Sturm entstand und das Schiff zu scheitern drohte. Da fürchteten sich die Schiffsleute und schrieen, ein jeder zu seinem Gott, und warfen die Geräte, die im Schiffe waren, ins Meer, um es dadurch zu erleichtern. Jona aber war in den untersten Schiffsraum hinabgestiegen, hatte sich niedergelegt und war fest eingeschlafen. Da trat der Schiffskapitän zu ihm und sprach: Was schläfst du so fest? Stehe auf, rufe deinen Gott an! Vielleicht wird dieser Gott unser gedenken, daß wir nicht untergehen. Und sie sprachen einer zum andern: Kommt, wir wollen das Los werfen, damit wir erfahren, um wessen willen uns dieses Unglück begegnet ist! Und sie warfen die Lose, und das Los fiel auf Jona. Da sprachen sie zu ihm: Sage uns doch, um wessen willen uns dieses Unglück begegnet ist! Was ist dein Gewerbe, und wo kommst du her? Welches ist dein Land, und von welchem Volk bist du? Er sprach: Ich bin ein Hebräer und fürchte den Herrn , den Gott des Himmels, welcher das Meer und das Trockene gemacht hat. Da gerieten die Männer in große Furcht und sprachen: Warum hast du das getan? Denn die Männer wußten, daß er vor dem Angesicht des Herrn floh; denn er hatte es ihnen kundgetan. Und sie fragten ihn: Was sollen wir mit dir machen, damit das Meer uns in Ruhe lasse? Denn das Meer tobte immer ärger. Er sprach zu ihnen: Nehmt mich und werft mich ins Meer, so wird das Meer sich gegen euch beruhigen! Denn ich weiß wohl, daß dieser große Sturm um meinetwillen über euch gekommen ist. Da strengten sich die Leute an, das Ufer wieder zu erreichen; aber sie vermochten es nicht; denn das Meer tobte immer ärger gegen sie. Da schrieen sie zu dem Herrn und sprachen: «Ach, Herr ! laß uns doch nicht um dieses Mannes Seele willen untergehen, rechne uns aber auch nicht unschuldiges Blut zu; denn du, Herr , hast getan, was dir wohlgefiel!» Darauf nahmen sie Jona und warfen ihn ins Meer; und das Meer hörte auf mit seinem Wüten. Da bekamen die Männer große Ehrfurcht vor dem Herrn und brachten dem Herrn ein Schlachtopfer und taten Gelübde.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

the Lord: Jonah 4:6, Genesis 1:21, Psalms 104:25, Psalms 104:26, Habakkuk 3:2

in: Matthew 12:40, Matthew 16:4, Luke 11:30

belly: Heb. bowels

Reciprocal: Exodus 2:5 - when she 1 Samuel 30:12 - three days Psalms 124:3 - swallowed Jonah 2:10 - General Jonah 4:8 - that God Matthew 17:27 - and take Mark 8:31 - and after 1 Corinthians 15:4 - according

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah,.... Not from the creation of the world, as say the Jews p; for this is to be understood, not of the formation or making of it; but of the ordering and disposition of it by the providence of God to be near the ship, and its mouth open to receive Jonah, as soon as he was cast forth from thence: and a great one it must be, to take him at once into its mouth, and swallow him down its throat, and retain him whole in its belly; and such great fishes there are in the sea, particularly the "carcharias", or dog fish; the same with Triton's dog, said to swallow Hercules, in which he was three days; and which fable perhaps took its rise from hence. In Matthew 12:40, it is said to be a "whale"; but then that must be understood, not as the proper name of a fish, but as common to all great fishes; otherwise the whale, properly so called, it is said, has not a swallow large enough to take down a man; though some deny this, and assert they are capable of it. Of the "balaena", which is one kind of whale, it is reported q, that when it apprehends its young ones in danger, will take them, and hide them within itself; and then afterwards throw them out again; and certain it is that the whale is a very great fish, if not the greatest. Pliny r speaks of whales six hundred feet long, and three hundred and sixty broad; and of the bones of a fish, which were brought to Rome from Joppa, and there shown as a miracle, which were forty feet long; and said to be the bones of the monstrous fish to which Andromede at Joppa was exposed s; which story seems to be hammered out of this history of Jonah; and the same is reported by Solinus t; however, it is out of doubt that there are fishes capable of swallowing a man. Nierembergius u speaks of a fish taken near Valencia in Spain, so large that a man on horseback could stand in its mouth; the cavity of the, brain held seven men; its jaw bones, which were kept in the Escurial, were seventeen feet long; and two carcasses were found in its stomach: he says it was called "piscis mularis"; but some learned men took it to be the dog fish before mentioned; and such a large devouring creature is the shark, of which the present bishop of Bergen w, and others, interpret this fish here; in which sometimes has been found the body of a man, and even of a man in armour, as many writers x have observed. Some y think it was a crocodile, which, though a river fish, yet, for the most part, is at the entrance of rivers, and sometimes goes into the sea many miles, and is capable of swallowing a man; some are above thirty feet long; and in the belly of one of them, in the Indies, was found a woman with all her clothes on z:

and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights: that is, one whole natural day, consisting of twenty four hours, and part of two others; the Jews having no other way of expressing a natural day but by day and night; and to this the antitype answers; namely, our Lord's being so long in the grave; of whose death, burial, and resurrection, this was a type, as appears from Matthew 12:40; for which reason Jonah was so miraculously preserved; and a miracle it was that he should not in this time be digested in the stomach of the creature; that he was not suffocated in it, but breathed and lived; and that he was able to bear the stench of the creature's maw; and that he should have his senses, and be in such a frame of mind as both to pray and praise; but what is it that the power of God cannot do? Here some begin the second chapter, and not amiss.

p Pirke Eliezer, c. 10. fol. 10. 2. q Philostrat. Vit. Apollonii, l. 1. c. 7. r Nat. Hist. l. 32, c. 1. s Nat. Hist. l. 9. c. 5. t Polyhistor. c. 47. u Nat. Hist. l. 2. c. 26. apud Schotti Physics Curiosa, par. 2. l. 10. c. 10. sect. 9. w Pantoppidan's History of Norway, par. 2. p. 114, 116. x Vid, Lipen. Jonae Displus, c. 2. th. 6. in Dissert. Theolog. Philol. tom. 1. p. 987. y Vid. Texelii Phoenix, l. 3. c. 6. p. 242, 243. z Mandelsloe in Harris's Voyages and Travels, vol. 1. B. 1. c. 2. p. 759.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Now the Lord had (literally “And the Lord”) prepared - Jonah (as appears from his thanksgiving) was not swallowed at once, but sank to the bottom of the sea, God preserving him in life there by miracle, as he did in the fish’s belly. Then, when the seaweed was twined around his head, and he seemed to be already buried until the sea should give up her dead, “God prepared the fish to swallow Jonah” . “God could as easily have kept Jonah alive in the sea as in the fish’s belly, but, in order to prefigure the burial of the Lord, He willed him to be within the fish whose belly was as a grave.” Jonah, does not say what fish it was; and our Lord too used a name, signifying only one of the very largest fish. Yet it was no greater miracle to create a fish which should swallow Jonah, than to preserve him alive when swallowed . “The infant is buried, as it were, in the womb of its mother; it cannot breathe, and yet, thus too, it liveth and is preserved, wonderfully nurtured by the will of God.” He who preserves the embryo in its living grave can maintain the life of man as easily without the outward air as with it.

The same Divine Will preserves in being the whole creation, or creates it. The same will of God keeps us in life by breathing this outward air, which preserved Jonah without it. How long will men think of God, as if He were man, of the Creator as if He were a creature, as though creation were but one intricate piece of machinery, which is to go on, ringing its regular changes until it shall be worn out, and God were shut up, as a sort of mainspring within it, who might be allowed to be a primal Force, to set it in motion, but must not be allowed to vary what He has once made? “We must admit of the agency of God,” say these men when they would not in name be atheists, “once in the beginning of things, but must allow of His interference as sparingly as may be.” Most wise arrangement of the creature, if it were indeed the god of its God! Most considerate provision for the non-interference of its Maker, if it could but secure that He would not interfere with it for ever! Acute physical philosophy, which, by its omnipotent word, would undo the acts of God! Heartless, senseless, sightless world, which exists in God, is upheld by God, whose every breath is an effluence of God’s love, and which yet sees Him not, thanks Him not, thinks it a greater thing to hold its own frail existence from some imagined law, than to be the object of the tender personal care of the Infinite God who is Love! Poor hoodwinked souls, which would extinguish for themselves the Light of the world, in order that it may not eclipse the rushlight of their own theory!

And Jonah was in the belly of the fish - The time that Jonah was in the fish’s belly was a hidden prophecy. Jonah does not explain nor point it. He tells the fact, as Scripture is accustomed to do so. Then he singles out one, the turning point in it. Doubtless in those three days and nights of darkness, Jonah (like him who after his conversion became Paul), meditated much, repented much, sorrowed much, for the love of God, that he had ever offended God, purposed future obedience, adored God with wondering awe for His judgment and mercy. It was a narrow home, in which Jonah, by miracle, was not consumed; by miracle, breathed; by miracle, retained his senses in that fetid place. Jonah doubtless, repented, marveled, adored, loved God. But, of all, God has singled out this one point, how, out of such a place, Jonah thanked God. As He delivered Paul and Silas from the prison, when they prayed with a loud voice to Him, so when Jonah, by inspiration of His Spirit, thanked Him, He delivered him.

To thank God, only in order to obtain fresh gifts from Him, would be but a refined, hypocritical form of selfishness. Such a formal act would not be thanks at all. We thank God, because we love Him, because He is so infinitely good, and so good to us, unworthy. Thanklessness shuts the door to His personal mercies to us, because it makes them the occasion of fresh sins of our’s. Thankfulness sets God’s essential goodness free (so to speak) to be good to us. He can do what He delights in doing, be good to us, without our making His Goodness a source of harm to us. Thanking Him through His grace, we become fit vessels for larger graces . “Blessed he who, at every gift of grace, returns to Him in whom is all fullness of graces; to whom when we show ourselves not ungrateful for gifts received, we make room in ourselves for grace, and become meet for receiving yet more.” But Jonah’s was that special character of thankfulness, which thanks God in the midst of calamities from which there was no human exit; and God set His seal on this sort of thankfulness, by annexing this deliverance, which has consecrated Jonah as an image of our Lord, to his wonderful act of thanksgiving.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Jonah 1:17. Now the Lord had prepared a great fish — דג גדול dag gadol. This could not have been a whale, for the throat of that animal can scarcely admit a man's leg; but it might have been a shark, which abounds in the Mediterranean, and whose mouth and stomach are exceedingly capacious. In several cases they have been known to swallow a man when thrown overboard. See the note on Matthew 12:40, where the whole subject of this verse is considered at large. That days and nights do not, among the Hebrews, signify complete days and nights of twenty-four hours, see Esther 4:16, compared with Esther 5:1; Judges 14:17-18. Our Lord lay in the grave one natural day, and part of two others; and it is most likely that this was the precise time that Jonah was in the fish's belly.