Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Argumentum
Commentary on Jonah the Prophet. Introduction.
St. Jerome, in his epistle to Paulinus, says: "Jonah," he says, "that most beautiful dove, by his shipwreck prefiguring the Passion of the Lord, calls the world to repentance; and under the name of Nineveh announces salvation to the nations." You may ask: who was Jonah, what was he like, and when did he live? Certain Hebrews, whom St. Dorotheus follows in his Life of Jonah, assert that Jonah was the son of the widow whom Elijah restored to life from the dead; who, having become a prophet and been sent to Nineveh, afterwards, taking his mother with him, fled to Assyria; for he thought: "In this way I shall remove my reproach, which I acquired by prophesying falsely against Nineveh." "He gave signs concerning Jerusalem and the whole land, namely a stone crying out miserably that the end was approaching, and that when Jerusalem would be trampled by all nations, then that city would be destroyed." So far Dorotheus. The same account in all respects, except the crying stone, is found in St. Epiphanius in his Life of Jonah. Hear also St. Isidore on Jonah: "Jonah, 'dove' and 'grieving,' son of Amathi, is sent from the city of Geth to preach to the nations; being sent he refuses, refusing he flees, fleeing he sleeps; on his account the ship was endangered, but the lot found the sleeper. The Hebrews hand down that he was the son of the widow whom Elijah raised from the dead, whose tomb is shown in a certain village of the cities of Geth, which is at the second milestone of Sepphoris, on the road leading to Tiberias." The Hebrews add in the Seder Olam, and from them Mariana, that Jonah was that young man whom Elisha sent to anoint Jehu as king (4 Kings 9:1), who
Uzziah, or Azariah, was reigning; for thus it is recorded in 4 Kings 14:25: "He (Jeroboam) restored the borders of Israel from the entrance of Hamath, not far from Damascus, to the Sea of the Desert (that is, the Dead Sea), according to the word of the Lord God of Israel, which He spoke through His servant Jonah, the son of Amathi the prophet, who was from Geth, which is in Hepher." For that this Jonah is our prophet is clear, both because in both places the same father Amathi is named, and the same homeland Geth; and because Josephus asserts it (Antiquities IX, ch. 11), as do St. Jerome, Theophylactus, and commonly other commentators here. Note in passing that the Prophets did not write down all their prophecies, or if they did write them, some have been lost. For this prophecy of Jonah about the devastation of Damascus and Hamath, and the restoration of the borders of Israel to be accomplished by Jeroboam, does not exist in the book of Jonah. Again, from the words just cited it is clear that Jonah was a native of Geth. Now this Geth was a city, not that of the Philistines (for Jonah was a Hebrew, not a Philistine), although St. Epiphanius, St. Dorotheus, and Rupert thought so, but that which is in Hepher, belonging to the tribe of Zebulun, concerning which St. Jerome says in his Prologue: "Geth, at the second milestone of Sepphoris, which today is called Diocaesarea, on the way to Tiberias, is a rather small village, where his tomb is also shown. Although others prefer to place his birth and burial near Diospolis, that is, Lydda, not understanding that the addition of Hepher serves to distinguish it from the other cities called Geth, which
is shown even today near Eleutheropolis, or Diospolis." Jonah was therefore a Zebulonite, that is, a Gethite, not a Sareptian: and therefore not the son of the widow of Sarepta.
But the opinion of those authors who hold that Jonah was the son of the widow of Sarepta, and consequently lived in the time of Elijah, is false, and is refuted by the same arguments by which at the beginning of Obadiah I proved that Obadiah did not live in the time of Elijah and King Ahab of Israel. Add that this Jonah lived in the time of Jeroboam, who reigned in Israel at the same time that Uzziah, or Azariah, was reigning in Judah.
praised Jehu for having destroyed the house of Ahab (4 Kings 10:30). Others add that Jonah's father was the prophet Obadiah: for they claim he was the husband of the widow of Sarepta.
Jonah therefore prophesied in the time of Obadiah and the preceding Prophets, namely Hosea, Joel, and Amos, under Jeroboam, Azariah, and their successors. So the Hebrews hand down, as do St. Jerome, Theophylactus, Eusebius in his Chronicle, Clement of Alexandria (Stromata I), St. Augustine (City of God XVIII, 27), Abulensis on 4 Kings 9, Question 3, and others.
said to Elijah when he raised him: "Now by this I know that you are a man of God, and the word of the Lord in your mouth is true" (3 Kings 17:24). But these things are frivolous. For it is clear that literally it was not Jonah's mother but his father who was named Amathi.
Allegorically, Jonah is Christ, who is the Son of Amathi, that is, of truth, because He Himself is the Word of the Father and the begotten Wisdom; for God is truth, says St. Jerome. The son of this Jonah is St. Peter (for he himself was Bar-Jonah), whose truth and faith therefore never fail, as Christ prayed and obtained from the Father for him (Luke 22:32).
Now Jonah prophesied not in the earlier years of the reign of Jeroboam, during which he reigned alongside Amaziah king of Judah, as Castro supposes (Book IV of the Proem, ch. 3); but in the later years, during which Jeroboam reigned alongside Azariah the son of Amaziah. For under Jeroboam and Uzziah, or Azariah, who reigned fifty-two years, Hosea began to prophesy, as is clear from Hosea 1:1, and he was the first of all the Prophets. From this it follows that Jonah prophesied a little before the founding of the city of Rome, namely during the reign of Sardanapalus, whom the historians of the Gentiles place as the last king of the Assyrians. For Sardanapalus lived in the time of Jeroboam king of Israel and Uzziah king of Judah, at which time Procas Silvius, grandfather of Romulus, was reigning in Latium, as Eusebius testifies in his Chronicle, St. Augustine (City of God XVIII, 21), and St. Jerome at the beginning of his Commentary on Amos, about which more at chapter 3, verse 5. From this chronology a great light arises upon the prophecy of Jonah. For from it we see the reason why God, contrary to His usual practice, sent a Hebrew Prophet to the Ninevites, who were Gentiles and very remote. The reason was indeed that at that time the morals of the Ninevites were most corrupt and most shameful, so that they cried out to heaven and demanded vengeance and the thunderbolt, which God here threatens them with through Jonah. That this was so we learn from their king Sardanapalus: for "the whole world is fashioned after the king's example."
For Sardanapalus was the softest and most effeminate of men. Arbaces, the governor of the Medes, says Justin (Book I), found him among herds of harlots spinning purple wool on a distaff, and in women's clothing, surpassing all women in the softness of his body and the wantonness of his eyes, distributing tasks of wool-spinning among the maidens. Seeing this, Arbaces was indignant that so many men were subject to such a woman, and reported to his companions what he had seen, declaring that he could not obey one who preferred to be a woman rather than a man. And so a conspiracy was formed: war was brought against Sardanapalus. When he heard of it, not like a man ready to defend his kingdom, but as women are wont to do in fear of death, he first looked about for hiding places; then presently advancing to battle with a few disorganized troops, he was defeated, retreated to his palace, and having built a pyre, cast himself and his riches into the fire, in this alone imitating a man." Hence the Greeks called him Sardanapalus, that is, a fool: for his proper Assyrian name was Tonosconcoleros, as Eusebius testifies in his Chronicle, and others. Hence also the name of Sardanapalus has passed into a proverb, signifying a most soft and effeminate man. So Aristophanes in the Birds: "Who is this Sardanapalus?" he says. On his deathbed he composed this epitaph for himself:
"Eat, drink, play; after death there is no pleasure."
And:
"Since you know yourself to be mortal, fill your soul with present delights; after death there is no pleasure."
Or, as Cicero says (Tusculan Disputations III): "How can life be pleasant from which prudence and moderation are absent? From this the error of Sardanapalus, the most opulent king of Syria, is recognized, who ordered inscribed on his tomb:
'These things I have that I ate, and that sated lust consumed; but those many and splendid things lie abandoned.'
"What else," says Aristotle, "would you inscribe on the tomb of an ox, not of a king? He says as a dead man that he has those things which even when alive he had no longer than he was enjoying them." Hence Juvenal, Satire III:
"And with the love-making, and feasts, and cushions of Sardanapalus."
The wealthy citizens, imitating their king, surrendered themselves equally to gluttony and lust, and from there slid into every kind of crime, so that they deserved to be struck from heaven or swallowed up by the gaping earth. Therefore the most merciful God sends Jonah to denounce these crimes and to threaten impending destruction. Jonah, declining this burden, flees to Tarshish: God pursues him from behind, stirs up a storm at sea; the sailors cast lots, and they indicate Jonah as the cause of the waves. He is cast into the raging sea and swallowed by a great fish; in the belly of the fish he calls upon God, is heard, is delivered, and on the third day is vomited up onto the shore. Jonah learns wisdom; obedient to God he goes to Nineveh and cries out with a loud voice: "Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown." The Ninevites are struck with fear, they come to their senses, they do penance in ashes and sackcloth. God, appeased, revokes His threats and spares the city. Jonah is indignant that his oracles are not fulfilled, but God, through the gourd plant and the worm, teaches him that it is an act of clemency to spare the penitent.
Note: Afterwards the Ninevites returned to their former nature and crimes; hence after Jonah, Nahum was sent to them, who again threatened them with destruction, which was in fact inflicted on them, as I shall say on Nahum, chapter 2. This is what Tobias, on his deathbed (ch. 14:13), commands his sons: to flee from Nineveh: "For I see," he says, "that its iniquity will bring it to an end." Where the Septuagint, as St. Jerome reports here in his Prologue, translates: "My son, behold I have grown old, and am about to depart from my life: take your sons and go to Media, my son. For I know what Jonah the prophet spoke concerning Nineveh, that it will be overthrown." From this it is clear that by the repentance of the Ninevites, God's sentence of destruction upon them was not entirely abolished, but only suspended: for when they returned to their crimes, God released His hand, revoked the reprieve, and inflicted upon them the destruction threatened by Jonah.
Hence St. Augustine (City of God XVIII, 30): "Jonah," he says, "prophesied not so much by his words as by a certain suffering of his own, and this surely more plainly than if he had proclaimed His death and resurrection by voice."
Finally, Jonah, illustrious for the holiness of his life, was inscribed in the catalogue of Saints in the Martyrology on September 21. The same is evident from a vision in which, contrary to the usual manner of the Prophets and saints of the Old Testament, he appeared as a saint to a holy monk departing this life. St. Gregory recounts it (Dialogues IV, ch. 34): "A certain religious man of ours," he says, "of very praiseworthy life, when he was dying about four years ago, etc., at the hour of his departure began to see Jonah the prophet, and Ezekiel and Daniel as well, and to call them his lords by name; and while he was saying they had come to him and, with eyes lowered, was paying them the homage of reverence, he was drawn out of the flesh." Moreover, some hold it probable that Jonah rose with Christ among the holy Prophets who were witnesses of Christ's resurrection, and ascended with Him in soul and body into heaven in glory, about which more in chapter 2, at the end.
Allegorically, Jonah, the one among all the Prophets who was sent to the Gentiles, and who was swallowed by a sea-creature and restored on the third day, was an explicit type of Christ calling the Gentiles, suffering, and rising again, as is clear from Matthew 12:40; about which more below, chapter 2, verse 11.