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Matthew Henry's Commentary on Mark 8: Johnson Commentary on Mark 8: Catena Aurea, Patristic Commentary on Mark 8: Coffman Commentary on Luke Sermons and Homilies Commentaries on Matthew Catena Aurea Commentary on Matthew Matthew Henry's Commentary on Luke 1: Jamieson Commentary on Luke 1: Johnson Commentary on Luke 1: Geneva Notes on Luke 1: Sermons, Homilies and Gospel Analyses on Luke 1: Mary Visits Elizabeth - Magnificat - Luke 1: John Calvin Commentary on Luke 1: Geneva Notes - Commentary on Luke 1: Wesley's Notes - Commentary on Luke 1: Jamieson Commentary on St.
Jamieson Commentary on Matthew 1: Johnson Commentary on Matthew 1: John Calvin Commentary on Matthew 1: Johnson Commentary on Matthew 2: Jamieson Commentary on Matthew 2: Jamieson Commentary on John 4: Johnson Commentary on John 4: Jamieson Commentary on Matthew 4: Johnson Commentary on Matthew 4: Jamieson Commentary on John 1: Johnson Commentary on John 1: Jamieson Commentary on John 3: Johnson Commentary on John 3: Johnson Commentary on Mark 6: Catena Aurea Commentary on Mark 1: Matthew Henry's Commentary on Jonah 2. Geneva Notes on Jonah Chapter 2. Matthew Henry's Commentary on Jonah 3.
Jamieson Commentary on John 2: Johnson Commentary on John 2: Jamieson Commentary on John 9: Johnson Commentary on John 9: Jamieson Commentary on John Johnson Commentary on John Sermons and Commentaries for New Sunday. Wesley's Bible Notes on John Jamieson Commentary on John 6: Johnson Commentary on John 6: The Commentary on the Whole Bible on Luke First Thoughts on Luke Wesley's Notes on the Bible Luke 9: Bible Commentary on Luke 9: Contemporary Commentary on Gospel - Luke 9: The call of Jesus.
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It is not credible that Christ would use a mere legendary tale, with no historical basis, to confirm his most solemn statement concerning the momentous fact of his resurrection. Before leaving this chapter, it should be noted that Jonah here appeared as a remarkable type of Israel. Christ of course is the "new Israel," Jonah being also a vivid and instructive type of the Lord Jesus Christ; but it also follows that his life in certain particulars is also typical of the old Israel.
For Jonah's failure, he was "cast overboard"; and for Israel's failure, they were rejected as "the chosen people. Jonah was overruled by God who required him to preach the word to Gentiles; and Israel too in the person of the apostles was required to preach the truth to the Gentiles. Jonah's preaching converted many Gentiles; and Israel's witness to the Gentiles by the Jewish apostles and Paul also converted a host of Gentiles.
Jonah was sorely displeased by the Gentiles' conversion; and secular Israel also stubbornly rejected all allegations that Gentiles should be saved by the gospel. All other rights reserved. Bibliography Coffman, James Burton. Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah , Not from the creation of the world, as say the Jews F16 Pirke Eliezer, c. Of the "balaena", which is one kind of whale, it is reported F17 Philostrat.
Here some begin the second chapter, and not amiss. A printed copy of this work can be ordered from: The fish, through a mistranslation of Matthew Bochart thinks, the dog-fish, the stomach of which is so large that the body of a man in armor was once found in it [ Hierozoicon, 2. Others, the shark [Jebb]. A miracle in any view is needed, and we have no data to speculate further.
Respiration in such a position could only be by miracle. The miraculous interposition was not without a sufficient reason; it was calculated to affect not only Jonah, but also Nineveh and Israel. The life of a prophet was often marked by experiences which made him, through sympathy, best suited for discharging the prophetical function to his hearers and his people. Copyright Statement These files are a derivative of an electronic edition prepared from text scanned by Woodside Bible Fellowship.
This expanded edition of the Jameison-Faussett-Brown Commentary is in the public domain and may be freely used and distributed. Bibliography Jamieson, Robert, D. The thought is this: Jehovah ordained that a great fish should swallow him. The aqualus carcharias L. It is common in the Mediterranean, where it generally remains in deep water, and is very voracious, swallowing everything that comes in its way - plaice, seals, and tunny-fish, with which it sometimes gets into the fishermen's net on the coat of Sardinia, and is caught.
As many as a dozen undigested tunny-fish have been found in a shark weighing three or four hundredweight; in one a whole horse was found, and its weight was estimated at fifteen hundredweight. The captain, however, ordered a gun, which was standing on the deck, to be discharged at the shark, and the cannon-ball struck it, so that it vomited up again the sailor that it had swallowed, who was then taken up alive, and very little hurt, into the boat that had been lowered for his rescue.
The miracle consisted therefore, not so much in the fact that Jonah was swallowed alive, as in the fact that he was kept alive for three days in the shark's belly, and then vomited unhurt upon the land. The three days and three nights are not to be regarded as fully three times twenty hours, but are to be interpreted according to Hebrew usage, as signifying that Jonah was vomited up again on the third day after he had been swallowed compare Esther 4: A great fish — The Hebrew word is, numbered, has appointed him for Jonah's receiver and deliverer.
God has the command of all his creatures, and can make any of them serve his designs of mercy to his people. Copyright Statement These files are public domain and are a derivative of an electronic edition that is available on the Christian Classics Ethereal Library Website.
What the Prophet here briefly relates ought to be carefully weighed by us. It is easily passed over, when we read in a few words that Jonah was swallowed up by a fish, and that he was there three days and three nights: Jonah was cast into the sea. He had been previously not only a worshipper of the true God, but also a Prophet, and had no doubt faithfully discharged his office; for God would not have resolved to send him to Nineveh, had he not conferred on him suitable gifts; and he knew him to be qualified for undertaking a burden so great and so important.
As Jonah then had faithfully endeavored to serve God, and to devote himself to him through the whole of his past life, now that he is cast into the sea as one unworthy of the common light, that he is cut off from the society of men, and that he seems unworthy of undergoing a common or an ordinary punishment, but is exiled, as it were, from the world, so as to be deprived of light and air, as parricides, to whom formerly, as it is well-known, this punishment was allotted — as then Jonah saw that he was thus dealt with, what must have been the state of his mind?
Now that he tells us that he was three whole days in the inside of the fish, it is certain that the Lord had so awakened him that he must have endured continual uneasiness. He was asleep before he was swallowed by the fish; but the Lord drew him, as it were, by force to his tribunal, and he must have suffered a continual execution. God does not indeed slay thee at once, but intends to expose thee to innumerable deaths.
Jonah no doubt continually boiled with grief, because he knew that God was opposed to and displeased with him: Now as he was not slain but languished in continual torments, it is certain that no one of us can comprehend, much less convey in words what must have come into the mind of Jonah during these three days. But I cannot now discuss what remains; I must therefore defer it to the next lecture. Copyright Statement These files are the property of Brian Bell. Text Courtesy of Calvary Chapel of Murrieta. No miracle of Scripture has called forth so much unbelief.
The issue is not between the doubter and this ancient record, but between the doubter and the Lord Jesus Christ. Science, "falsely so called" 1 Timothy 6: To faith, and to true science, miracle is what might be expected of divine love, interposing God in a physically and morally disordered universe. Copyright Statement These files are considered public domain and are a derivative of an electronic edition that is available in the Online Bible Software Library.
I stay not to enquire what fish this was. Our Lord Jesus himself hath said it was a whale. Neither do I consider myself as called upon to show how Jonah could remain the time here spoken of, without being suffocated. The subject itself is miraculous; and as such, he that appointed the means, made it effectual to the end. I only beg the Reader to observe with me, that the time here mentioned of three days and three nights, doth not mean, neither was it ever intended to mean, three whole days and three whole nights; but only part in each, of the first and third of those times, that is to say, one whole day, and part of two others.
For the Jews have no way of expressing a day and a night separately, but together.
So it was by Christ when he lay in the grave; that is, part of the day of his crucifixion, from the time he was taken down from the cross and laid in the tomb; then the whole following day; and then to the next morning before sun rise; for that Christ was risen before the sun is evident from what is said of the godly women. And as Jonah was an express type of the Lord Jesus, it should seem that the time in both events was the same. If Jonah was the only sign given in the days of thy flesh, to an evil and adulterous generation, let my, soul bless the Lord for the sweet testimony this brings with it, to thy sovereign grace and salvation.
Jonah did resemble thee, when delivered to the raging sea for the salvation of the people. Thou didst indeed bear the overwhelming torrents of thy sufferings, when the vials of justice were poured out upon thy devoted head, and when thou didst tread the wine-presses, of thy Father's wrath alone. And although in thy holy nature there was no shadow of guile; and never wert thou otherwise from one eternity to another than the unceasing object of thy Father's love; yet, as the sinner's surety, like Jonah, thou didst stand the only cause of the dreadful storm; and all the cataracts of tempest came in upon thy soul, until thou wert sorrowful even unto death, sore amazed, and very heavy.
And hence those cries of soul; I sink in deep water where there is no standing; I am come into deep waters where the floods overflow me. And as often as I read of Jonah's being cast forth, and the tempest of the sea ceasing in consequence, may I feel my soul refreshed in the contemplation; Jesus I will say was made this and infinitely more for me, that I might be made the righteousness of God in him! Bibliography Hawker, Robert, D. Now the Lord had prepared a great fish ] A whale, Matthew Pliny tells of one taken that was six hundred feet in length, and three hundred and sixty in breadth; when they swim and show themselves above water, annare insulas putes, saith the same author, you would think them to be so many islands.
So many mountains, saith another; who also addeth, that when they grow old they grow to that size and weight, that they stay long in a place. Insomuch as ex collectis et condensatis pulveribus frutices erumpere cernantur, the dust and filth gathered upon their backs seems to be an island, which while shipmen are mistaken and think to land at, they incur a great deal of danger Sphinx Philid. Such a great fish God prepared ] Either at first, when in creating of whales, creavit vastitares et stupores, as one saith; or he now commanded this great fish to be ready to ship Jonah to the shore, and to afford him an oratory in the mean while.
And Jonah was in the belly of the fish ] Where interpreters note a concurrence of these four miracles. That he could in such a close prison breathe and live without the common use of air and light. That he was not killed up with intolerable stench in so loathsome an outhouse. That he could there frame such an excellent prayer, or rather song of thanksgiving; for Jonah was the true Arion whom the poets feign to have been a minstrel cast into the sea by the mariners, and saved by a dolphin.
Three days and three nights ] Part of them at least; as Christ was in the grave, Matthew The Rabbis have a saying that there is a mountain of sense hangs upon every apex of the word of God. And so great is the depth of the Holy Scriptures, saith Augustin, that I could profit daily in the knowledge thereof, though I should set myself to search them from my childhood to decrepit old age, at best leisure, with utmost study and a far better wit. John Trapp Complete Commentary. We have no external history of the days spent by the prophet in his living grave.
Neither he nor anyone else can tell how far he travelled, how long he rested, what were the aspects of the scenery, how many "small and great beasts" were met on the journey—that strange but fruitful journey "through the paths of the seas. There was evidently a great and sudden quickening of consciousness. The man who speaks in this holy psalm hardly seems the same person whom we have seen in flight—dark, moody, silent, despairing. Now, and all at once, he seems to leap again into life—clear, fervent, passionate life.
The burial of his body is the resurrection of his soul. Rapidly this new consciousness became distressful. His soul fills itself fuller than the sea, with affliction. The reserved sorrow of long sinning comes all at once. He feels "cast out of God's sight," and shivers in the utter loneliness. Then he began to "look"—upwards to earth, eastwards to the Temple where he knew that the lost Presence was richly manifested. If I might see but once again the priest, the altar, and the mercy-seat! I could then be content to die. But at any rate I will look. If I die looking, still I shall look till I die.
He began to be grateful. There was daybreak in the land of the shadow of death. The sweet bloom of the morning smote down into the rayless depths, and revealed there the strangest sight those depths have ever disclosed—a living oratory and a thankful worshipper. Then, apparently, his soul passed into the more active state of renewed personal consecration to God.
The final state of his mind is a state of entire dependence, involving a quiet and trustful surrender of the whole case to God. Menzies, Christian World Pulpit, vol. Jonah 1—Parker, City Temple, vol. Foster, Lectures, 2nd series, p. Blaikie, Homiletic Magazine, vol. Bibliography Nicoll, William R. Now the Lord had prepared a great fish — That there are fishes large enough to swallow a man, there can be no question; the Scripture calls this a great fish, in the general, and therefore there is no need to confine it to a whale.
But we shall speak more on this subject, when we come to Matthew See also Calmet's dissertation on the subject, and Scheuchzer. We may just observe farther, that the Hebrew language has no one word to express what we call a natural day: But on this point we shall say more when we come to speak of our Saviour's resurrection. The prophet's name and parentage: The word of the Lord came unto him, bidding him arise, and go to Nineveh, that great city, the metropolis of the Assyrian empire, where wickedness abounded, as in great cities it usually does, the multitudes of sinners serving to embolden and stimulate each other to commit iniquity.
It was now ripe for vengeance, and he must go and cry aloud in the streets, to give the inhabitants warning of their approaching doom unless they repented. He rose up to flee from the presence of the Lord, from the chosen land, where God was pleased in an especial manner to reveal himself, to Tarshish; either Tarsus in Cilicia, or the sea, determined to ship himself in the first vessel, and fly any where rather than go to Nineveh.
Either he dreaded the dangers of the service; or rather, as he suggests, chap. A ship was ready to sail as soon as he arrived at Joppa, and he instantly paid the fare and embarked. Providence seemed to concur with his desires: God sends a mighty tempest on the ship in which the prophet sailed, so that it seemed ready each moment to founder.
Such storms does sin raise in the conscience; and the poor sinner in despondence is ready to give himself up for lost, little suspecting that the very tempest, which he imagines will be his ruin, is only designed to drive him to the haven of rest. Jonah alone seemed unconcerned about the danger. The mariners, affrighted, ran to their prayers, and cried to their idols for help: Worldly goods are nothing worth when death stares men in the face: When will men be wise?
The roaring billows, which terrified the heathen seamen, joined perhaps with the grating sorrows of his mind, served but to rock Jonah asleep: Into such stupefaction does sin sometimes lull the conscience of the back-slider. He appears to have lost all apprehension of danger; and even the judgments which make others tremble, he seems to pass over unaffected.
From such blindness and hardness of heart, good Lord, deliver us! The ship-master rouses him from his slumbers, and upbraids him with his insensibility. What meanest thou, O sleeper? Strange that a prophet of the Lord should need reproof even from the mouth of a heathen! Arise, call upon thy God: They had cried to their gods in vain; perhaps his was more able to help them; if so be that God will think upon us that we perish not, as, without immediate help, they knew they must. Note; No danger is so great, but, if God think upon us, he is able to save us to the uttermost.
The storm increasing, notwithstanding all their endeavours and prayers, they began to suspect that there might be among them some atrocious sinner, on whose account the divine displeasure pursued them. As was usual with the heathens, therefore, they resolved to inquire which of them it was, and to refer the decision to the lot; and God so ordained that the lot fell upon Jonah. Thus is the iniquity of the sinner often found out by means that he never suspected, and when he thinks himself most secure and best concealed from detection.
They hereupon strictly interrogate the prophet. The lot had said, This is the man, and he is called upon to acknowledge his crime, that they might know for whose cause, or for what cause, this evil was upon them; what he had done to provoke God; what was his occupation; whence he came; and to what country he belonged. Note; In order to get our troubles removed, we must search diligently into our sins, which are the cause of them.
Jonah, without reserve, makes confession of his crime; and probably, now convicted in his own conscience, desired to take to himself all the shame and punishment which he felt that he had deserved.
He declares himself by nation and religion a Hebrew, which was an aggravation of his guilt; his occupation was that of a prophet of the Most High, I fear the Lord Jehovah, the God of heaven, which hath made the sea and the dry land; which, though it added to his sin, yet he owns to God's glory, and in order to the instruction of the heathen mariners, who blindly worshipped many gods, instead of the one true and living Jehovah. His crime he owns: Note; When we have sinned, nothing remains but to justify God in his judgments, and with penitence to bow into the dust.
The seamen appear exceedingly affected with his narrative. Probably they had heard what the God of the Hebrews had done of old; and this increased their terrors. With just upbraidings, therefore, of the prophet, who by his wickedness had brought them into this imminent danger, they expostulate with him, Why hast thou done this? They who profess religion, and act unsuitably, deserve to be reproached. None know how extensive and dangerous the consequence of even a single sin may be. They refer the matter to himself. Since he was a prophet of the God of the Hebrews, he best could inform them what was the likeliest means to appease his anger, and thereby, obtain deliverance from the storm, which raged more furiously than ever.
Note; When by our sins we have raised a storm of wrath around us, it highly imports us to inquire how it may be appeased. Jonah pronounces his own doom. He well knew himself to be the troubler, and that, till he was cast into the sea, there could be no hope of the storm's abating; and therefore he bids them throw him overboard: They who truly know the evil of sin, and are deeply humbled under it, are ready to submit to any shame or suffering, whereby God may be glorified, and reparation be made to the injured.
When sin has raised a storm, we must never hope for peace till the accursed thing is removed. Very unwilling to execute this grievous sentence, the mariners rowed hard for land; but the more they strove, the more the sea wrought, and was tempestuous; so that despair took place in every countenance, and nothing remained but this last experiment, with which they felt the more reluctance to comply on account of the noble simplicity and deep humiliation which now probably appeared in the penitent prophet. When a gracious man, overtaken with a fault, with frank acknowledgment takes shame to himself, he is entitled to our greatest compassion; nor should we ever by severity aggravate his distress.
There is no striving against God's counsels: Before they execute the dread decree, they present their importunate supplications to God, that he would not impute to them innocent blood, nor cause them to perish for taking away this man's life; when they had desired to know his will, and acted now, according to the best of their light, in conformity thereto; it appearing to be his pleasure that Jonah should be cast into the sea. In all our emergencies we must have recourse to God in prayer.
When we follow, according to our best knowledge, under the guidance of Divine Providence, what appears to be God's will, we are bound with satisfaction to trust him with the issue. Jonah is cast into the sea, and, to the astonishment of the mariners, instantly the storm ceased. They feared the Lord exceedingly, amazed at the sudden change; and, filled with thankfulness, offered an immediate sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving, and made vows of future oblations whenever they should reach the shore.
Thus, sometimes, our greatest loss proves our greatest gain. The acquaintance which they hereby gained with Israel's God amply compensated for the damage that they had sustained by the storm. By a miracle the prophet's life is preserved. God, who designed not to destroy but save him, had prepared a great fish which swallowed him alive; and by almighty power he was preserved three days and three nights, at least part of three days, unhurt in the fish's stomach, a monument of divine mercy, and an illustrious type of him, who, when he had given his life a ransom for others, lay so long in the grave, and rose again the third day, Matthew Thomas Coke Commentary on the Holy Bible.
A great fish; a whale, as we read, Matthew To swallow up; not to chew upon him, but to take him down whole. Bibliography Poole, Matthew, "Commentary on Jonah 1: The great fish was probably a shark. He who sent the storm prepared the fish. Life is full of contrivances on the part of the great Lover of men. To plunge beneath the wave is to fall into His arms. More than once the body of a man has been found in the belly of a shark in the Mediterranean.
This is a tool used by writers, and especially the Biblical writers. The mariners now that all earthly fears were removed, "feared the Lord exceedingly. John Calvin Commentary on Luke 1: Neither do I consider myself as called upon to show how Jonah could remain the time here spoken of, without being suffocated. Hence, Jonah, at God's command, "rose up," not to obey, but to disobey and to flee.
Even those who hold that this story is an elaborate parable must admit that it is probably founded on such a fact. The psalm which follows is very helpful to those who have brought themselves into the depths by their wrongdoing. God will hear such out of the depths of Sheol. When you think you are cast out of His sight forever, if you will look toward His holy temple, you will find that His love is gradually extricating you from the pit.
To trust in your own efforts and expedients is to regard lying vanities and to forsake your own mercy. The big sharks and the tiny minnows are alike at the behest of God for the help of man. Bibliography Meyer, Frederick Brotherton. Meyer's 'Through the Bible' Commentary". Meanwhile YHWH had not forgotten YHWH and as God of land and sea had already made provision for Jonah by arranging for a large fish to be in the area, so that as Jonah began to drown in the turbulent seas, the fish might swallow him.
He had not deserted His prophet, but had arranged for his rescue. They did not know the physiology of whales. Jonah, who had found himself drowning in the sea, and being dragged down into the depths, was, once he found himself alive and well and able to breathe in what appeared as some kind of chamber, grateful to God, and the psalm in chapter 2 expresses his gratitude. He probably did not quite know what had happened to him, or where he was he would find that out later , but he knew that he was alive and was therefore confident that if he repented God intended to spare his life.
Ironically he found himself in the same position as the Ninevites to whom he had refused to go, as one who was under sentence and deserving of death, but with an opportunity of repentance. The Psalm adequately expresses this position, and is a necessary part of the story. The identity of the great fish remains a mystery since the only record of what it was is in this story, and that description is general. The Hebrew word dag , translated "fish," describes a variety of aquatic creatures.
The text does not say that God created this fish out of nothing ex nihilo nor does what the fish did require such an explanation. There are many types of fish capable of swallowing a human being whole. Occasionally today we hear of someone who has lived for several days in a fish or in some other large animal and has emerged alive. See Harrison, pp , or Keil, 1: Some Bible students have faulted some commentators for documenting instances of large fish swallowing people who have survived, as if such suggestions slight God"s power.
They do not necessarily. How would even Jonah himself have known? Can we assume that he caught a glimpse of it as it turned back to sea after vomiting him out on shore Jonah 1: How much could he have understood of what had happened to him when he was swallowed? These questions have no answer. To ask them is to ignore the way the story is told. What sorts of fish people can live inside is not an interest of the scripture.
Significantly God saved Jonah"s life by using a fish rather than in a more conventional method such as providing a piece of wood that he could cling to. Thus this method of deliverance must have some special significance. The Jews were familiar with the mythical sea monster Ugaritic lotan , Heb.
The Hebrews did not believe that leviathan really existed any more than we believe in Santa Claus. Yet the figure was familiar to them, and they knew what it represented. For Jonah to relate his experience of deliverance in his ancient Near Eastern cultural context would have impressed his hearers that a great God had sent him to them. It is probably for this reason that God chose to save Jonah by using a great fish. Here God controlled the traditionally uncontrollable to spare Jonah"s life.
The God who is great enough to control it could control anything, and He used His power for a loving purpose. This is more remarkable since Jonah , as God"s servant, had rebelled against his Master. God"s method of deliverance therefore reveals both His great power and His gracious heart. Campbell Morgan, The Minor Prophets, p Jonah was able to calculate how long he was in the fish after he came out of it. Obviously he lost all track of time inside the fish. Ancient Near Easterners viewed the trip to the underworld land of the dead as a three-day journey.
The three-day time was significant also because Jonah"s deliverance became a precursor of an even greater salvation that took three days and nights to accomplish Matthew God restored Jonah to life so he would be God"s instrument in providing salvation to a large Gentile and indirectly Jewish population under God"s judgment for their sins. He raised Jesus to life so He would be God"s instrument in providing salvation for an even larger population of Gentiles and Jews under God"s judgment for their sins. However, it is a well-attested fact, that there are fishes, sharks, for instance, that grow to a size capable of swallowing and containing a man.
The Scripture calls this a great fish in the general, and therefore there is no need to confine it to a whale; in which view, much of the wit thrown out by persons disposed to be merry on the Scripture is quite foreign to the purpose. See more in the note on Matthew Therefore the space of time consisting of one whole revolution of twenty-four hours, and a part of two others, is fitly expressed in that language by three days and three nights. It served to spread the knowledge of the true God, the whole transaction having this tendency: Hence, to appoint, as in Job 7: Never means to create.
Large enough to swallow him. No need for any name. Not therefore kept alive in the fish " s mouth, as some imagine. When thus swallowed up, Jonah must have died, and thus became a type of Christ. The "as" and "so" in Matthew He would have been no type if he had been miraculously kept alive. See further notes below. The Hebrew idiom "three days" can be used for parts of three days and even of years: Bibliography Bullinger, Ethelbert William. Bullinger's Companion bible Notes". Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah.
And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights - not created specially for the purpose, but appointed in His providence, to which all creatures are subservient. The prophet, in the simplicity of faith, does not stop to tell us how God performed the miracle. It is enough for him that God willed it; and what God wills He has no lack of means for accomplishing. Miracles were as much fore-ordered by God as the ordinary course of so-called nature.
They are no more incongruous interruptions of nature than are the acts of man's freewill, whereby he modifies nature's course. Nature is simply God's will. If a man will not believe until he has solved all difficulties by his reason, he will never believe; and eternity, with all its momentous issues, will overtake him before he has settled on what is to be the main principle of his life. God could as easily have kept Jonah alive in the sea as in the fish's belly.
In the first instance, he did sink to the "bottom" of the sea, and felt 'the seaweed wrapped about his head. But then God "prepared" a great fish to be his living grave, in order to prefigure the three days' burial and resurrection of the Saviour. The whale's neck is too narrow to receive a man.