But there Jonah calls upon God, and marvelous as it is, on the third day, he, like Christ, is delivered. . . . In my own case, what could be said? What defense could be made if I remained unsettled and rejected the yoke of ministry, which, though I know not whether to call it light or heavy, had at any rate been laid upon me. . . . On this account I had much toilsome consideration to discover my duty, being set in the middle between two fears, of which the one held me back and the other urged me on. For a long while I was at a loss between them. After wavering from side to side, and, like a current driven by inconstant winds, inclining first in this direction then in that, I at last yielded to the stronger. The fear of disobedience overcame me.

What then is the story, and wherein lies its application? For, perhaps, it would not be amiss to relate it, for its general validation. Jonah also was fleeing from the face of God, or rather, thought that he was fleeing. But he was overtaken by the sea, and the storm, and the lot, and the whale’s belly, and the three days’ entombment. All this is a type of a greater mystery. He fled from having to announce the dread of the awful message to the Ninevites and from being subsequently, if the city was saved by repentance, convicted of falsehood. It was not that he was displeased at the salvation of the wicked, but he was ashamed of being made an instrument of falsehood and exceedingly zealous for the credit of prophecy, which was in danger of being destroyed in his own person. Indeed most would be unable to penetrate the depth of the divine dispensation in such cases.

The prophet knows, the Holy Spirit teaching him, that the repentance of the Gentiles is the ruin of the Jews. A lover, then, of his country, he does not so much envy the deliverance of Nineveh as will that his own country should not perish. Seeing too that his fellow prophets are sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel to excite the people to repentance, and that Balaam the soothsayer too prophesied the salvation of Israel, he grieves that he alone is chosen to be sent to the Assyrians, the enemies of Israel, and to that greatest city of the enemies where there was idolatry and ignorance of God. Even more, he feared that Israel might be wholly for-saken due to the conversion of the Ninevites through repentance by his preaching. For he knew by the same Spirit whereby the preaching to the Gentiles was trusted to him that the house of Israel would then perish, and he feared that what was at one time to be would take place in his own time.

In trying to run away from the Lord, you show up the fickleness of all who plan flight. A certain headstrong prophet also had run away from the Lord, crossing the sea from Joppa to Tarsus, as if he could escape from God. But God found him not on land or on sea but in the belly of a beast, where for three days he could not die^[1] or even in that way escape from the eyes of God. Is that man not better off who, though he fears the enemy of God, does not flee from but despises him? Who trusts in the protection of God or, if you will, has an even greater fear of God, having stood the longer in his eyes? He says, He is the Lord, he is mighty, all things are his, and wherever I shall be I am in his hands. Let him do what he will, I shall not run away. If he wishes me to die, let him destroy me, as long as I faithfully serve him. Much would I rather bring odium on him, by dying according to his will, than to live by my own cowardice.

Jonah knew better than anyone the purpose of his message to the Ninevites and that, in planning his flight, although he changed his location, he did not escape from God. Nor is this possible for anyone else, either by concealing himself in the bosom of the earth, or in the depths of the sea, or by soaring on wings, if there be any means of doing so, and rising into the air, or by abiding in the lowest depths of hell, or by any other of the many devices for ensuring escape. For God alone of all things cannot be escaped from or contended with. If he wills to seize and bring them under his hand, he outstrips the swift. He outwits the wise. He overthrows the strong. He cuts down the lofty. He subdues rashness. He resists power.

The flight of the prophet may also be referred to that of man in general, who, despising the commands of God, departed from him and gave himself to the world, where subsequently through the storms of ill and the wreck of the whole world raging against him, he was compelled to feel the presence of God and to return to him whom he had fled. Therefore we understand that those things also which men think for their good, when against the will of God, are turned to destruction. And help not only does not benefit those to whom it is given, but those who give it are alike crushed. As we read that Egypt was conquered by the Assyrians because it helped Israel against the will of God, the ship is imperiled which had received the imperiled. A tempest arises in a calm; nothing is secure when God is against us.

They threw overboard the wares that were in the ship into the sea; but the ship was not getting any lighter, because the entire cargo still remained within it, the body of the prophet, the heavy cargo, not according to the nature of the body but from the weight of sin. For nothing is so heavy and onerous to bear as sin and disobedience.

And they drew lots between them, and so forth. Neither because of this example, nor because the prophet Jonah was found out by lot, are we to believe indiscriminately in lots, since the prerogative of individuals, as Jerome says, can in no way make a general law.^[1] For in that instance pagan men were compelled by a storm to seek by lot the source of their danger. Matthias was chosen by lot so that their choice of the apostle would not appear to be out of harmony with the command of the old law, where it was ordered that the high priest be sought.

It was not likely that such a prophet should be ignorant of the design of God, which was to bring about, by means of threat, the escape of the Ninevites from the threatened doom, according to his great wis-dom and unsearchable judgments and accord-ing to his ways which are beyond our tracing and finding out. . . . To imagine that Jonah hoped to hide himself at sea and escape by his flight the great eye of God is surely utterly absurd and stupid, and unworthy of credit, not only in the case of a prophet but even in the case of any sensible person, who has only a slight perception of God, whose power is over all.

Tell me, are you running away from the master? Then wait a little bit and you will learn from the state of affairs themselves that you will be unable to escape even from the hands of his servant, the ocean. For as soon as Jonah set foot on the ship, the ocean raised its waves up high and raised itself to a great height. And just as a considerate handmaid, discovering that her fellow slave has run away because he stole something of her master’s, does not revolt as previously mentioned but submits the individuals who captured him to myriads of troubles until she seizes him and brings him back, likewise, the ocean found her fellow slave and recognized him.

Jonah surely teaches us that the sea and stars are moved under God’s control. By vainly seeking to flee from God the controller of all things whom none can escape, he aroused the anger of both sky and sea. Nature, which belongs to the almighty Lord, realized that [Jonah] was revolting, and it was afraid to play conspirator by transporting the guilty man safely through its domain; it chained the runaway with winds and waves.

From where, my beloved, came the foresight of the prophet? From the economy of God. God made these things happen so that the prophet might learn from them to be a lover of humanity and be subdued. Only to him did he cry out and say, Imitate the sailors, the naïve men, who neither despise a single soul nor neglect a single body, yours. And you would allow to be destroyed, on your part, an entire city with myriads of inhabitants. These sailors, when they discovered who was responsible for all the evils that confronted them, still were not eager to condemn him; but you, who have no charge brought against you by the Ninevites, would convict and annihilate them. Yet when I commanded you to go and, through preaching, summon them back to salvation, you disobeyed. They who were not accountable to anyone did all things and exerted themselves so that you, who are accountable should be punished. Although the ocean condemned him and the lot exposed him, when he implicated himself and confessed his flight, they still were not in a hurry to annihilate the prophet; rather, they demonstrated toleration and constraint and did everything possible to keep him from the fury of the ocean after such proof of his guilt. However, the ocean did not permit even this, or better yet, God did not allow this to happen, because he wanted to sober him through the sailors in the same way as through the whale. For this reason when they heard, Take me up and cast me into the sea, and the seas will be calm to you, they strained to reach the shore, although the waves did not allow it.

The ship’s pilot . . . understood from his experience that the storm was not a usual one, but that the blow was God-sent, and that the billowy ocean was vastly superior to human skill, and that the hands of the helmsman were of no advantage. In this situation a greater pilot was required, the One who governs the whole world, and the assistance from above was critical. For this reason, they abandoned the oars, the sails, the ropes, and everything else; they drew their hands back to themselves and raised them to heaven and entreated God.

The sailors and the passengers in the book of Jonah say, We beseech you, O Lord, do not destroy us on account of this man and lay not upon us innocent blood, for you, O Lord, have done as it pleased you. They do not know the reasons why the prophet, a fugitive servant, deserved to be punished. And yet they justify God and acknowledge the blood of him whose deeds they do not know to be innocent. And in conclusion, they say, You, O Lord, have done as it pleased you. They do not question the justice of the judgment of God but acknowledge the veracity of the just Judge.

The text does not say they seized him or that they threw him in, but that they took him, carrying him as one [deserving] respect and honor. They discharged him into the sea not in repugnance; rather, he submitted himself of his own volition into their hands. And the sea ceased [its turmoil] because it found what it sought. When one continues as a fugitive and keeps running away as fast as one can, sooner or later he is caught and stops his running, and whatever was chasing him stands still. It is the same way with the sea, which, absent Jonah, was irritated. But as soon as it lays hold of what is at the center of its desire it rejoices to have it, and from that joy it returns to tranquillity. If we will give consideration to the time before the passion of Christ, [we will see that time as one disturbed by] the errors of the world and the headwinds of various opinions. The entire boat of humanity, that is, the creation of the Lord, was in peril. But then, after his passion, we see a world where there is the calm of faith, a world at peace and secure for everyone. We see a turning toward God. In this way we may understand how, after Jonah goes into the sea, the sea is alleviated of its turmoil.

It is also your duty, O bishop, to follow the examples of those that have gone before and to apply their judgments skillfully to the cases of those who want words of severity or of consolation. Besides, it is reasonable that in your administration of justice you should follow the will of God. As God deals with sinners and with those who return, you should act accordingly in your judging. Now did not God by Nathan admonish David for his offense? And yet as soon as he said he repented, God delivered him from death, saying, Be of good cheer; you shall not die.^[1] So also, when God had caused Jonah to be swallowed up by the sea and the whale upon his refusal to preach to the Ninevites, when yet he prayed to God out of the belly of the whale, he retrieved his life from corruption.

Did Jonah, then, on this account, think that repentance was unnecessary for the pagan Ninevites, when he tried to avoid his duty of preaching? Or was it not, rather, that he foresaw that the mercy of God would be poured out on the heathen also, and so feared it would prove him a false prophet?^[1] Actually it was because of a pagan city, which did not yet know God and which sinned in ignorance, that the prophet was almost lost. And he would have been lost, were it not for the fact that what he endured was a type of the Lord’s suffering, by which pagan penitents also would be redeemed.

They further object: A dead man recently deceased was raised by the living; but show us that it is possible for a man dead and buried for three days to rise again. The testimony we seek is supplied by the Lord Jesus himself in the Gospels, when he says, For even as Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights, so will the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.^[1] Now when we study the story of Jonah the force of the resemblance becomes striking. Jesus was sent to preach repentance. So was Jonah. Though Jonah fled, not knowing what was to come, Jesus came willingly, to grant repentance for salvation. Jonah slumbered in the ship and was fast asleep amid the stormy sea; while Jesus by God’s will was sleeping, the sea was stirred up, for the purpose of manifesting thereafter the power of him who slept. They said to Jonah, What are you doing asleep? Rise up, call upon your God, that God may save us, but the apostles say, Lord, save us!^[2] In the first instance they said, Call upon your God, and in the second, save us. In the first Jonah said to them, Pick me up and throw me into the sea, that it may quiet down for you; in the other Christ himself rebuked the wind and the sea, and there came a great calm.^[3] Jonah was cast into the belly of a great fish, but Christ of his own will descended to the abode of the invisible fish of death. He went down of his own will to make death disgorge those it had swallowed up, according to the Scripture: I shall deliver them from the power of the nether world, and I shall redeem them from death.^[4]

The last question is about Jonah, and it is not put as if it were taken from Porphyry but as if it were a laughingstock of the pagans. It is expressed thus: Please tell me what we are to think about Jonah, who is said to have been three days in the belly of a whale. It is improbable and unbelievable that he should have been swallowed up with his clothing and should have been inside the fish. If it is figuratively said, please explain it.

. . . I have noticed that this sort of question is a matter of much jest and much laughter to pagans. The answer to this is that either all the divine miracles are to be disbelieved or there is no reason why they should not be believed. We should not believe in Christ himself and that he rose on the third day, if the faith of the Christians feared the laughter of the pagans.