The Book of Jonah

2. In popular imagination the Book of Jonah is all about a big fish swallowing a man who runs away out of fear. But if we read more carefully we see that there’s much more to the story, especially in regards to Jonah, his reasons for fleeing, and his understanding of whom God is and what God is like toward people. How does the end of the book (i.e., cha. 4) challenge Jonah's view of God and his expectations regarding divine-human relationships? 

Thesis: Jonah initially despised the graciousness of God’s unabounding love because he did not want God to extend his mercy to city of Nineveh and he wanted them to be destroyed through God’s wrath.

In the Old Testament one of the most popular stories is Jonah who through popular belief was simply swallowed and spit out by a huge fish. However there are many underlying factors such as the reason for why Jonah fled from God, why he was swallowed and how God tested Jonah’s understanding of what it truly meant to be compassionate and loving. Jonah initially despised the graciousness of God’s unabounding love because he did not want God to extend his mercy to city of Nineveh and he wanted them to be destroyed through God’s wrath.

Jonah is introduced in the first chapter as the son of Amittai. God approached Jonah and presented His word before him. The Lord wanted Jonah to go to the city of Nineveh and “preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before [God]” (Jonah 1:2). Jonah’s initial reaction was to flee as far away as he could from Nineveh because he wanted nothing to do with its people. He chose to head down to Tarshish, which was as far in the complete opposite direction of Nineveh that he could go. Jonah fled because he did not want God to provide mercy to the Assyrians and Nineveh because they were a ruthless nation who worshipped idols, murdered countless people and were a terrible country in general. Jonah boarded a ship leaving from the port of Joppa and proceeded to sail until God “sent a great...