Useful Bible Studies > Jonah Commentary > chapter 1

What was Jonah’s crime?

Jonah 1:10

The sailors all believed that God was punishing Jonah for a terrible crime. However, it was difficult for them to understand what that crime was. So, we shall now discuss Jonah’s wrong deed, and how it brought about these troubles.

In the original language (Hebrew) of Jonah 1:10, Jonah says that he had gone away from the ‘face’ of God. That means, from the place where God is present.

God was present in a special way at the temple, his house in Jerusalem. There God lived among his people, Israel, in the land that he had provided for them (Deuteronomy 12:5-7). So, Jonah means simply that he had left Israel.

However, it was not always wrong for some of Israel’s people to leave their own country for a temporary period. They might go abroad for the purposes of trade (Genesis 49:13), war (1 Kings 8:44-45), or because God had given them special work for him (1:2).

Jonah had no proper reason to go to Tarshish. Rather, he was separating himself on purpose from God’s people and their land. He was taking himself away from his relationship with God. So, of course, he could no longer claim God’s protection.

Jonah was also guilty of another wrong act. A servant has a duty to obey his master. As a prophet (holy man), Jonah was a servant of God. However, he had chosen on purpose not to obey God’s command that he should go to Nineveh.

The sailors believed that God was showing his anger in the storm. Of course, God is angry with people’s evil deeds, but his greatest desire is to show kindness. By means of the storm, he allowed the sailors to know him as the true God (1:16). God also used the storm as he brought Jonah back into a right relationship with him. Then, he used Jonah to tell Nineveh’s people to stop their evil deeds. So in the end, God showed kindness to many people.

Next part: The sailors do not know what they should do to Jonah (Jonah 1:11)

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