Exegetical Analysis of the Book of Jonah's Literary Genre

Introduction

If Jonah is categorized as Prophetic Literature, why is it so different from all the other prophetic books? It contains no actual dating, no information about the monarchy, and no clear indication of where it really takes place. In all the other prophetic books, God speaks to Israel on their behalf, but Jonah goes to a nation that was rebellious and not Israelite. The reason for this may be that Jonah is a different kind of prophet—one who prefigures Christ in His mission to the Gentiles. This exegetical analysis of the Book of Jonah in relation to literary genre will show why the book, when interpreted from the standpoint of the New Testament, reads best as a prefiguring of the Messiah—Who would be to the Jews not what they expected (a political savior) but rather a spiritual, sacrificial Lamb come to redeem them.

Jonah as Satire: Marcus's Anti-Prophetic Reading

As Steven McKenzie notes, the key to interpreting the Book of Jonah is the "determination of the book's genre."¹ David Marcus makes the contention in From Balaam to Jonah: Anti-Prophetic Satire in the Hebrew Bible that the genre of Jonah is satire. Marcus states that even though "we have no way of knowing whether biblical authors were aware of satire as a genre, we believe that it is perfectly reasonable to use the term satire" in describing the Book of Jonah.² His argument is based on the fact that Jonah is so much different from the other prophets. He observes that "in the light of what we know of all other prophets, Jonah's behavior is extraordinary and would 'strike an ancient Israelite audience as discordant, incongruous, and absurd.' A Hebrew prophet who refused to prophesy, regardless of the message, would be regarded in ancient Israel as an oxymoron."³

Marcus admits that numerous events in the Book of Jonah can be "regarded as a precursor to events in the life of Jesus" if one chooses to read Jonah from the perspective of the New Testament.⁴ For example, "Jonah in the fish in New Testament typology refers to Jesus' death and resurrection (Matt. 12:40)."⁵ However, Marcus rejects this interpretation. He instead adopts the position that Jonah was written in jest for a Hebrew audience. He cites, for instance, Jonah 3:8, in which sackcloth was donned not just by the Ninevites but also by their animals, and argues that it would have been nonsensical for animals to be covered in sackcloth. Sackcloth was worn by humans as a means of penance; sackcloth on animals must, in Marcus's interpretation, surely be a joke. However, he is interpreting the book not from the standpoint of the New Testament but rather from a Jewish perspective, imagining that it exists solely within the realm of the Hebrew world and is unrelated to the Christian books that followed. Marcus's overall attitude is skeptical, and Jonah is not the only book he views as satire in the Hebrew Bible. He finds other instances equally difficult to accept at face value, such as the "horrific account of Elisha summoning wild bears to maul forty-two children simply for calling him 'baldy' (2 Kgs 2:23–25)."⁶ Thus, Marcus concludes that the stories of Elisha and Jonah must be told in jest—even though such a conclusion seems to go against the grain of the Bible's overarching seriousness.

The pros of Marcus's interpretation are that it offers a whole new perspective on the Bible and causes the reader to look more carefully at what was once considered straightforward and dramatic. He hones in on certain details that could plausibly be read from a satirical standpoint. The idea of Jonah being swallowed by a fish and spat out on the shore of the very place where he was to preach does seem fanciful. Marcus also makes a reasonable point that the God of the Hebrews showing concern for a group of people who were not Israelites would not have made intuitive sense to a Hebrew audience.

The cons of Marcus's interpretation, however, are significant. It gives little credence to Jonah being read as a prefiguring of Christ, and his mission to Nineveh as a foreshadowing of Christ's mission to the Gentiles. Marcus bases his reading largely on Hebrew pride: a proud Hebrew people would not have believed in a prophet who refused to preach, or that God would have a message for people who were not among His chosen. In doing so, Marcus ignores the obvious parallels between Jonah's mission and Christ's mission to the Gentiles after being rejected by the Jews. If Jonah made no sense to the Hebrews, it is equally fair to say that Christ did not either—the Jews ridiculed, mocked, and scorned Him because He was not what they expected a Prophet or Son of God to be. What both Marcus and the Jews who persecuted Christ were missing was the spirit of God, which was precisely what Christ criticized them for lacking. By insisting on reading the Book of Jonah as satire, Marcus misses the whole point of the story: Jonah is a prefiguring of Christ.

Childs and the Old Testament as Self-Contained Scripture

Brevard Childs was an Old Testament scholar who argued in Introduction to the Old Testament as Scripture that no single interpretation of Jonah was without its weaknesses. Childs himself deviated from canonical interpretation by approaching the subject as though it were whole in and of itself. Yet nothing in the Old Testament or New Testament was ever put forward as being self-contained. The letters to the various churches were not meant to exist apart from all other teachings, and so too the Old Testament books were not meant to exist on their own—nor was the Old Testament meant to exist apart from the New. Childs does not accept this traditional view; instead, he insists on viewing each work individually.

Thus, Childs finds weaknesses in all the views. He states, for instance, that the idea of Jonah as caricature (satire, in the manner of Marcus's theory) does not hold up because there is virtually no support for this interpretation anywhere in the Hellenistic-Hebrew tradition.⁷ He also argues that reading Jonah as a prefiguring of Christ in His mission to the Gentiles is weakened by the lack of "antagonism between Jew and Gentile" in the book, and that because "the role of Nineveh as the enemy of Israel [does not] play any role" in the story, one cannot see it as a prefiguring of the Christian mission to the Gentiles.⁸ This is not a particularly convincing argument for dismissing the Christian perspective. The mere absence of what Childs imagines the story should contain does not mean it ought not to be interpreted as a foreshadowing of Christ's universal mission.

The pros of Childs's approach are that he does spend time on each of the interpretations of the book in an attempt to understand its genre. He also surmises ultimately that the book is a religious text unlike the other prophetic texts, possessing its own unique merits that would have resonated with a Hebrew audience. For instance, he argues that Jonah flees his mission because he does not want to preach to people who are not of the chosen race. His contempt for the Ninevites is evident later when he calls upon God to destroy them, and God instead rebukes Jonah for his rashness. For Childs, Jonah represents the stubborn Hebrew view toward non-Jews—barely able to comprehend that they fit into God's plan, or that God actually cares for them. Childs does well to illuminate this dimension of the text.

The major con of Childs's interpretation is that he rejects any reading that is not self-contained in the text itself. He views the book as a self-contained work that should make sense on its own terms—based on what is known about the people for whom it was written, when it was written, and so on. And yet why should this be so? Much of Scripture would have been a mystery to many of its original readers, just as much of the New Testament remains a mystery to many today—yet they do not reject it, for they recognize its divine origin and accept it even when they do not fully understand its meaning. The Book of Revelation, for instance, is a perfect example of a New Testament book that most Christians cannot claim to fully understand. Perhaps it is a book that will make more sense to a later generation still—just as the Book of Jonah made sense to the generation of Christians who saw in Jonah a reflection of Christ.

Conclusion

If I had more space and time, I would develop these ideas further by exploring more of what the ancients said and seeking pre-Christian interpretations of Jonah for the sake of comparison. The Messiah was not unexpected after all; there were many Jews who accepted Christ because they recognized in Him the Savior foretold by the prophets. Jonah fits among those prophets as a typological prefiguring of Christ, and it would be illuminating to see how many ancient, pre-Christian sources intimate this idea—how many Hebrews understood that Jonah made sense when interpreted in the light of a God Who loved all nations and all peoples, even as He communicated directly with His own chosen people.

Questions for further evaluation would include: if this is the case, why does God have a chosen people in the first place? What is the benefit of communicating only to one select group, of making a covenant with a specific tribe? Why did God not communicate directly with all nations? These are questions that continue to circulate in the mind. They are not a rejection of belief in God but genuine curiosities—not unlike the oddities in the Book of Jonah that Marcus finds so perplexing. However, unlike Marcus, I do not adopt the position that God is not real or that history is not what it is. I accept the mystery to some extent, though I continue to wonder. Not all things will be made clear in time. Much will remain in clouds, requiring an act of faith.

Bibliography

Beale, Stephen. "Nine Ways Jonah Prefigured Jesus." Catholic Exchange, 2014.

Childs, Brevard. Introduction to the Old Testament as Scripture. Fortress Press, 1979.

Ferreiro, Alberto. The Twelve Prophets. InterVarsity Press, 2014.

Marcus, David. From Balaam to Jonah: Anti-Prophetic Satire in the Hebrew Bible. Scholars Press, 1995.

McKenzie, Steven. How to Read the Bible. Oxford University Press, 2009.

Noegel, Scott. "Reviewed Work: From Balaam to Jonah: Anti-Prophetic Satire in the Hebrew Bible by David Marcus." AJS Review Vol. 22, No. 1 (1997): 103–105.

Scott, David R. "The Book of Jonah: Foreshadowings of Jesus as the Christ." BYU Studies Quarterly 53, no. 3 (2014): 10.