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A student suggests that Jonah 2:4 is at the center of a chiasm that goes from 1:17 to the end of chapter 2. In 2:4, Jonah says that he looks toward the temple of Yahweh, and the centrality of that statement supports the notion that Jonah-in-the-fish is a type of Israel-in-exile (within the belly of the Gentile sea monster). As Solomon instructed (1 Kings 8), Jonah looks toward the temple while in exile and is spat back out on dry land. But the Jonah who looks to the temple in "exile" does not have mercy on the Gentiles, and the unfinished ending of Jonah confronts the Jews with the question of whether or not they will proclaim the kingdom of Yahweh to the Gentiles after they are spat back to land by Cyrus.
Another student suggests that Nineveh means "house of the fish." ISBE has this: "To all appearance Nineveh took its name from the Babylonian Nina near Lagas in South Babylonia, on the Euphrates, from which early foundation it was probably colonized. The native name appears as Ninua or Nina (Ninaa), written with the character for 'water enclosure' with that for 'fish' inside, implying a connection between Nina and the Semitic nun, 'fish.'" The word for "fish" in Jonah, however, is DAG, as in Dagon.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Wednesday, December 14, 2005 at 10:15 AM
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