Useful Bible Studies > Jonah Commentary > chapter 1
The sailors were now starting to realise that the true God is very different from their ideas about their false gods.
So, the sailors had thought that their gods were like the kings of their countries. In their opinion, like those kings, the gods would sometimes become very angry. That anger might be because of a terrible crime, or because someone had offended them. The sailors thought that the gods showed their anger by the use of magic over the spirit world. That was the sailors’ explanation for the storm.
The sailors’ methods to deal with this, were like their methods to deal with a king’s anger. If someone had carried out a crime, they would punish him. For example, they would kill a murderer. However, if someone had offended the god, for example by an insult against that god, they would offer gifts. They were trying to please the god, even as they would try to please an angry king.
However, the sailors had now heard about the true God. The true God is not like anything that they had imagined. He rules heaven, and he made the land and sea (1:9). So he already owns everything. So no gift, however great it might be, could ever impress him (Micah 6:6-8).
In addition, Jonah’s wrong deed was not something that the sailors could recognise as a crime. They still considered him an innocent man (1:14). They were afraid to punish a man who served such a great and wonderful God.
So, they asked Jonah himself to advise them. They needed to know whether they could do anything to persuade his God to stop the storm.
Next part: Jonah tells the men to throw him into the sea (Jonah 1:12)
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