Back to: Jonah: A Deep Dive
It’s easy to just start right into a Biblical book study in a comfortable and ritual manner. But let’s pause for a second and ask some basic questions:
- Where did the Bible come from?
- Who decided that Jonah should be part of it?
- Who wrote Jonah?
- Did God write the Bible?
And at the end of the day, an honest question about the Bible would be, “Why should I care?”
Some might gasp and clutch their pearls at such a blasphemous proposition. But it is one that I asked myself many years ago. My reasoning was simple:
If I’m going to anchor my life and stake my eternity on the teachings of Scripture, I want to know it’s source and veracity.
So let’s take a quick crash course on the Hebrew portion of our Bible
But First: How We Got The Bible
Canon
The first thing to understand is that what we call “The Holy Bible” – a nicely, leather bound book – is actually a collection of books. Who determines what is part of this collection? Stephen Nichols explains.
Two of my favorite experts on this topic are Dr. James White and Dr. Michael Kruger. This is a great conversation in a rare joint appearance. Much of the conversation is around the apocryphal writings and gnostic gospels. Keep in mind that Dan Brown’s ‘DaVinci Code’ was still a hot topic during this time period.
For a more in depth study of this topic, I list many resources in a previous study that can be found here:
Tanakh
For our study of Jonah, we would be concerned with the Hebrew collection known as the Old Covenant (Testament). This collection of scrolls, gathered and preserved over generations of Israelites and Jews, is categorized into 3 collections: The Torah (Law), Nevi’im (Prophets), and Ketuvim (Writings). Taking 2 letters from each of the sections is where the name TaNaKh is derived
Torah
- Genesis
- Exodus
- Leviticus
- Numbers
- Deuteronomy
Nevi’im
- Joshua
- Judges
- I & II Samuel
- I & II Kings
- Isaiah
- Jeremiah
- Ezekiel
- The Twelve
Ketuvim
- Psalms
- Proverbs
- Job
- Song of Songs
- Ruth
- Lamentations
- Ecclesiastes
- Esther
- Daniel
- Ezra-Nehemiah
- I & II Chronicles
There is a great breakdown and treatment of the TaNaKh at Chabad.org, as well as another Bible Project class on the Hebrew Bible.
Manuscripts
This section is primarily for resources supporting the Biblical manuscript record. For example, the image below is a facsimile of The Leningrad Codex: the oldest complete copy of the Hebrew Bible.
While we have hundreds of Hebrew Bible manuscripts from antiquity and the mediaeval era that are earlier than the Leningrad Codex — some containing large portions of the biblical text, others just a few letters — L is the earliest complete manuscript. It contains all 24 books of the Hebrew Bible (Jewish tradition counts the books differently from the way they appear in most English Bibles, although the text is the same) and lies directly behind translations such as the NIV and ESV.
-Kim Phillips, Tyndale House
Oldest Manuscripts: Complete Bible
“The majority of ancient manuscripts contain only small portions of the biblical text, like a book or a portion of a book. Among these manuscripts there are papyrus fragments, which are the remains of the most ancient scrolls, and typically represent only a few pages of text. These papyrus fragments have all been discovered during modern archaeological digs.
Another group of manuscripts is the Uncials, which use all capital letters and are written on parchment or vellum, which is a smoother writing surface than papyrus, and allows for curved letters. The Uncial manuscripts were written between the 3rd and 8th centuries and were often bound as pages in a book, or codex, rather than a scroll. A few of these ancient codices have survived intact, giving us a solid view of the Bible used by the ancient church.
Two of the oldest complete (or nearly complete) manuscripts are the Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus. They are both written on parchment, and have a large number of corrections written over the original text. ” – GotQuestions.org
The Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS)
The Dead Sea Scrolls are arguably one of the greatest archeological discoveries of our time. Certainly, for those who were once skeptical of the accuracy of scriptural transmission, the jars of scrolls now challenge this notion. Here are some sites worth exploring.
B-368347 fram 4Q76
B-368345
One of the best Bible Project podcast series that echoes a lot of how I have come to approach studying scripture is expressed in a series called The Paradigm.
It challenges one’s preconceived notions of faith and dogma.
Again, I would encourage every believer to take the time and traverse this critical road of faith & history.
Historicity of Jonah
When talking about the historicity of Jonah, we can probably intersperse the book of Jonah, with the prophet Jonah. Meaning, we can attempt to establish that Jonah was a real person, and that the written events we have, he actually experienced.
Timeline
Since Jonah prophesied during the reign of Jeroboam II (782–753 B.C.; see 2 Kings 14:23–28), and since Sirach 49:10 (from the 2nd century B.C.) refers to the “twelve prophets” (namely, the 12 Minor Prophets, of which Jonah is the fifth), the book of Jonah was written sometime between the middle of the eighth and the end of the third centuries. No compelling evidence leads to a more precise date.
TGC, Intro to Jonah
“While the book’s author is unknown, we know the prophet Jonah was at work during the reign of Jeroboam II (ca. 782–753 BC) (2Kgs 14:25). The book’s events did not necessarily take place during that reign, since Jonah might also have lived before or after it, but most Israelites would naturally associate Jonah with this general period.” — Jay Sklar, TGC
The prophet Jonah ministered in the eighth century BC. He is known for the extraordinary story in which God caused a huge fish to swallow the prophet and “Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights” (Jonah 1:17). God orchestrated this unusual event in consequence of the prophet’s initial refusal to preach a message of repentance to the Ninevites. Jonah was written shortly after the events it describes, around 760 BC.
Understanding the evidence that points to Jonah’s authorship helps determine the time of the book’s composition. To this end, the prophet identifies himself in the book’s first verse. It reads, “The word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai.” Second Kings 14:25 is the only other verse in the Bible that refers to Amittai, and there, as in Jonah 1:1, he’s mentioned simply as the prophet’s father.
However, other books of the Bible shed light on Jonah’s background, which help date his ministry, including when he wrote the book named for him. Second Kings indicates that Jonah was born in Gath Hepher, a town in the region of Zebulun in the northern kingdom of Israel. He prophesied during the reign of Jeroboam II, who ruled from about 793 to 753 BC. This suggests that Jonah was likely born around 800 BC (2 Kings 14:24–25). Though the Bible doesn’t record the date of Jonah’s death, historical context suggests he likely died around 750 BC. These dates help support the view that the book of Jonah was written around 760 BC.
Biblehub Articles
Fragments of Jonah appear among the Dead Sea Scrolls (4Q76 = 4QXIIᶜ; 2nd century BC), demonstrating the book’s circulation well before Christ and confirming that its text was fixed and respected. The Septuagint translation (3rd–2nd century BC) likewise attests the book’s authenticity within the Jewish canon. Together with the Masoretic Text and later Codex Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, these manuscripts exhibit remarkable consistency, indicating the community regarded Jonah not as allegory to be reshaped but as reliable history. — BibleHub
A secular treatment of Jonah
Historical Setting: Nineveh, Assyria
Where was Nineveh and who were the Assyrians?
Nineveh was transformed by King Sennacherib (reigned 705–681 BC) into a metropolis whose size and splendour would astonish the ancient world. It covered 7 square kilometres and its palaces and temples were adorned with colossal sculptures and brilliantly carved reliefs.
An intricate system of canals and aqueducts watered the king’s pleasure gardens and game parks. Sennacherib’s grand residence, the ‘Palace Without Rival’, was built ‘to be an object of wonder for all the people’.
Visitors entered the palace through massive gateways flanked by colossal human-headed winged bulls (called lamassu) that protected the king from dangerous supernatural forces.
Nineveh was the capital of the powerful ancient Assyrian empire, located in modern-day northern Iraq.
Up Next: The Literary Context of Jonah
This is where a lot of the ‘controversy’ exists: Fact or Fiction?
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