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Jonahיונה
786 BCE – 746 BCE · Northern Kingdombiblical
Description
Jonah or Jonas was a Jewish prophet from Gath-hepher in the Northern Kingdom of Israel around the 8th century BCE according to the Hebrew Bible. He is the central figure of the Book of Jonah, one of the minor prophets, which details his reluctance in delivering the judgment of God to the city of Nineveh in the Neo-Assyrian Empire. After he is swallowed by a large sea creature and then released, he returns to the divine mission.
Facts
| Born | 9th century BCE, Gath-hepher, Kingdom of Israel |
| Died | 8th century BCE |
| Venerated in | Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Baháʼí Faith, Rastafari |
| Major shrine | Tomb of Jonah (destroyed), Mosul, Iraq |
| Father | Amittai |
| Feast | 21 September (Catholicism) |
Life & work in brief
Summarised by section — one row per topic, for fast reading.
| Topic | Summary |
|---|---|
| Book of Jonah | Jonah is the central character in the Book of Jonah, in which God commands him to go to the city of Nineveh to prophesy against it "for their great wickedness is come up before me", but Jonah instead attempts to flee from "the presence of the Lord" by going to Jaffa (sometimes transliterated as Joppa or Joppe). |
| Religious views | The Book of Jonah (Hebrew: יונה, Yonah) is one of the twelve minor prophets included in the Hebrew Bible. |
| Scholarly interpretations | The story of a man surviving after being swallowed by a whale or giant fish is classified in the catalogue of folktale types as ATU 1889G. |
| The fish | Though art and culture often depicts Jonah's fish as a whale, the Hebrew text, as throughout scripture, refers to no marine species in particular, simply saying "great fish" or "big fish". |
| Cultural influence | In Turkish, "Jonah's fish" (yunus balığı) is the term used for dolphins. |
| Suggested connections to legends | Joseph Campbell suggests that the story of Jonah parallels a scene from the Epic of Gilgamesh, in which Gilgamesh obtains a plant from the bottom of the sea. |
Prophecies
Key prophetic utterances and visions attributed to Jonah, with sources.
| Prophecy / vision | Source |
|---|---|
| Yet forty days and Nineveh is overthrown | Jonah 3:4 |
| Three days and three nights in the belly of the fish | Jonah 1:17 |
| God relents from disaster; should I not pity Nineveh? | Jonah 4:11 |