Q. What themes in Jonah resonate or contrast with the sections of Isaiah and Jeremiah that you have studied up to this point?
A. There is much in Jonah that is similar to Isaiah and Jeremiah: God's singling out of a prophet to bring a specific message; a prophet overwhelmed by the summons to speak for God; a pronouncement of judgment (which turns out later to be conditional); God's showing mercy to people who do repent. These themes resonate with much of the material in Jeremiah and Isaiah. They hardly need explanation. It's the contrasts which tell the story.
First, there is no call extended for the Ninevite culture to repent and turn to God, yet it is implicit in Jonah's understanding of God. The Ninevites may not know Yahweh as a God of mercy, but Jonah knows it, which is what makes him reluctant to go. And despite not being called to repentance, the Ninevite leaders still proclaim a time of sackcloth, fasting and prayer, hoping against hope that Yahweh would relent of the threatened judgment. They actually saw prophetic hope where none was announced!
Second, Nineveh takes God very seriously, where God's chosen people do not! It's as if Nineveh's respect for God was greater than Israel and Judah's. It's similar, I suppose, to boys treating their friend's Dad with more respect than the kid himself does. "Familiarity breeds contempt" may be at work. Or perhaps Israel and Judah knew God as merciful, one who "relents from doing harm" as Jonah says, and came to take that mercy for granted, figuring that the threatened punishment would never really come.
Third, while many prophets were nonplussed at being selected by God, and protested their call, their reluctance was based on their own self-assessment: they were unworthy or incapable or not gifted. Jonah's resistance was not based on who he was, but on who GOD was! God's character was the problem! This is really astounding, and shows that Jonah had no "love for the lost", as it were, either. He was more than happy to let sinners get what they deserve. One can imagine a scenario like this today, if God were to call an homosexual-hating preacher to go to a Gay Pride march and preach judgment. He might indeed go, but how awkward for him if they all converted on the spot! He might react like Jonah did and be angry with God about letting a little thing like repentance get in the way of condemnation.
Fourth, God spends more effort on redeeming the reluctant prophet than on redeeming Nineveh. God pursues Jonah, disciplines him, restores him, commands him, confronts him, comforts him, rebukes him and teaches him. The story is really more about the rehabilitation of a recalcitrant believer than about the repentance of evildoers. It's as if God expects far more of the "chosen", than what's expected of those who don't know God. God's mercy is extravagant toward sinners - it always is. God's firm but loving persistence toward those who are called by God, is what is truly remarkable in the book of Jonah. It actually resonates more with God's call of (and both irritation and patience with) Moses, than with God's dealings with Isaiah or Jeremiah. To me, it's the key lesson of the book. It shows God as a loving and patient Father who is also persistent in correction and instruction. Regardless of how annoyed or frustrated God might be with Jonah, God doesn't smack him, or let him off, either. God both bears down and lets up, as needed, to make the lesson stick. That's my idea of an ideal father.
(At least as opposed to the kind of Dad who says: "Aah, who wants to do the hard work, when you can just pop in a video! Let the scruffy little urchins learn their own lessons...") ;)
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