ā[ā¦] Now Iāll be honest with you, for a long time when I read this prophecy I kinda went away not all that impressed. Like with all due respect Jesus, I get it three days, three nights, but itās kind of a weak analogy for the Resurrection. And also, to lots of people the story of Jonah is so unbelievable. I mean how can a man live in the belly of the fish for three days with no air, no water, no food. It just sounds like Pinocchio, rightā¦ It sounds more like folklore or fairytale. And so most people donāt think of the Sign of Jonah when they think about Jesusā Resurrection. But then one day I went back and actually read the Book of Jonah, and I looked at it in Hebrew and something leapt out at me. Namely this, if you read the Book of Jonah very carefully you will see Jonah is not alive, heās dead. It says it. Is Jonah alive for three days? Jonah 1 says this:
āAnd the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah; and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the belly of the fish, sayingā¦ Hereās the key. Everyone skips the prayer, watch the prayer.
āI called to the Lord, out of my distress, and he answered me; out of the belly of Sheol I criedā¦ I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me for ever; yet you brought up my life from the Pit, O Lord my God.
Now pause there. In the Old Testament what is Sheol and the Pit? What are those names for? Itās names for the realm of the of the dead. So where does Jonah go? Where does he cry out to the Lord? From the realm of the dead. If you have any doubts look at the next line.
āWhen my soul fainted within meā¦
Literally in Hebrew thatās the nephesh, right, same word we use for soul, his life. In other words, when I died, when my soul expired.
āI remembered the LORD; and my prayer came to thee, into thy holy temple.
So in his dying breath Jonah begs God for mercy. He cries out to the Lord and the Lord responds.
And the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land.
So what does it vomit out? I would suggest to you that it vomits out Jonahās corpse.
Then the word of the LORD came to Jonah the second time, saying, āArise,ā
Same word in Hebrew, the word is cum. Remember when Jesus goes to the little girl, what does he say? Talāitha cuāmi. Little girl what? Arise.
āArise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and proclaim to it the message that I tell you.ā (Jonah 1:17-3:1)
This time Jonah does it, right. Iām not going through that again, okay. So he gets up, he goes to Nineveh, he preaches to the city and the whole city repents. This is the capital of Assyria. These guys are pagans. They are wicked. The Book of Jonah says they donāt know their right hand from their left. In other words, theyāre so immoral they donāt know whatās good and whatās bad. They donāt know whatās up and whatās down. Theyāre completely, completely lost. And yet when Jonah preaches the word to them every single one of them repents, from the pagan king all the way down to the pagan servant at the bottom of the totem pole, everyone in the whole city. Itās a miracle that they all repent.
So with that in mind, now that youāve got the Old Testament, go back to Jesusā words: no sign will be given to this generation except the sign of the prophet Jonah. So what is Jesus saying? Just as Jonah died and went to Sheol, thereās your connection to the Creed by the way. Why do we say Jesus descended into hell? Because hell is the Greek translation, Hades, of the Hebrew word Sheol. It doesnāt mean Jesus was damned, it means he descended to the realm of the dead. He was really dead. His soul and his body separated. His soul went into the realm of the dead. So he descends to the realm of the dead for three days and then on the third day he is raised. And then what does he do? He does exactly what Jonah does. He sends his apostles and he says go forth to all the nations, to the pagans. Teach them everything I told you, baptize them in the name of the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit. And guess what happens? Not just one pagan city converts, but all the pagan cities. Within two centuries the entire Roman empire is converting. Millions and millions and millions of pagans, who for centuries had worshiped idols and false gods and demonic spirits and temples to this goddess and that god, all that collapsed. One by one they all become Christians and they all start to worship not just Christ, but the God of the Jews that they had despised.
So what is the Sign of Jonah? Itās not just a miracle of the Resurrection, itās the miracle of the conversion of the pagans.
ā Thereās more to the article, and to anyone whoās curious, I really recommend reading it in its entirety
