The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-07-25
JONAH AND TIE BIG FISH.
DR.. George breaches on the Biblical
Whale Story.

On yesterday evening at the First Meth
odist Episcopal church the Rev. DR.. George
continued his interesting series Of sermons
on "Some Difficult Miracles of the Old
Testament" by preaching on 1.-THE
Prophet Jonah and the Big Fish. Said DR..
George:
The purpose of the writer OF this extraordi-
nary book was evidently not to desctibe a
marvel but to teach moral, not to
excite wonder but to convey truth, and
for the outer dress of the story 1t
matters not whether the literal or allegorical in.
depreciation of Jonah's submarine voyage be
preferred. The idea of a man being preserved
alive in the belly of a fish for three days has, in
many minds, from early times, excited ridicule,
aud some, to escape difficulty, have supposed
that the prophet was rescued from watery
grave by a ship called the Whale, or that he
swan ashore to an inn called the Whale and
uttered his prayer while engulfed in the waters.
Admitting the miraculous element the
literal is as easy as the categorical
explanation. In the narrative the merely mar
veIous is relegated to the background and
Jonah in his prayer (chapter . dwells with
gratitude more on his escape from death itself
than the manner thereof, which 10 by him
scarcely mentioned. The real marvels OF the
history are that a prophet should be d1sobedlent
to the divine command; that he should think to
ssflee from the presence of the Lord" that at
first he should find the way easy and open; that
he should imagine by "paying the fare from
Joppa to Tarshish" that he had thereby insured
a successful journey; that heather mariners
should have to rebuke and show themselves
better than prophet of Jehovah, and that at
last God should accept OF his penitence, save his
life and restore to him his commission. These
are the greatest wonders of the story and yet
men have sometimes ignored them and debated
the question of whale, shark or sea monster
and the accessories or dress of the story rather
than its moral meanings.
These real wonders formed the staple Of
DIR. Georges discourse and were by him
forcefully applied. He proceeded:
Jonah was real parsonage conjectured by the
rabbis to be the son OF tine widow of Zarephath
or the son of the Shunamite restored to life by
Elijah and Elisha Nineveh, where he was sent
to declare Gods judgments, was real city, OF
which "the very ruins are tremendous" Its
circumference was sixty miles and its popula-
ton oves half million. The work was ardu-
Gus and dangerous, and Jonah also feared that
if the people repented his prophecies would be
unfufilled and himself covered with ridicule,
so he determines to flee to Tarshish. the Span
ish Tartessus and modern Tariffa, where custom
dues were first collected (hence our term tariff.
Other cities, like Carthage and arsus of Cilicia
have claimed the honor, but every place to
which man fees to escape al unpleasant duty
is to him true Tarshish. Sometimes duty is
entirely shirked sometimes an easier Is chosen
for a more iTksome one, but IN every case when
a Christian fears "to take up his cross" the
place to which he fees is his particular Tarshish
Jonah "paid his fare" Then who had
greater right aboard that ship than hel His
right was settled between himself and the
ship master, but when fleeing from God and his
duty, no "fare," though paid ten times over,
could give him right to be anywhere in this
wide world, save at Nineveh, where God had
hidden him CO. Men think sometimes by ZEAL
GUS attention to the lesser duties of life to
escape the obligations of the greater duties, by
loving and serving their neighbor to escape the
duty of slowing God with their whole heart and
serving Him." but these the greater, should they
do and not leave the lesser undone
Jonah 'slept" during the storm, while the
heather mariners were praying every one 10
his god" That truly Is strange, but not
stranger than that men should sleep aud slum-
Der on the brink OF eternal peril.
When his sin had found him out he did not
find the sin out, the sin found him out-he did
the best thing in his power and made frank
confession. Then the mariners, after prayer to
escape blood outlines, cast him overheard
and the sea ceased from her raging All was
still with them and nature was at rest when
the element OF disobedience was cast overheard.
So God controversy with q man is today often
a moral one, aud when He casts overheard the
accused thing His way is made plain and clear.
What could the mariners think but that this
man was a hypoerte, rebeliious prophet, a
sinner surely doomed TO destruction in the
deep. Not so don't be too fast in calling men
hypocrites till you know of their conduct when
alone with God. Poor erring human nature is
ever weak and liable to fall There was Jonah
in the depths pententiy praying to his God,
and God forgaye his sin and restored him to His
favor. 80, perhaps, many Il man who has been
By church and world condemned as scouudrel
and ny pocrite may III the silence of his secret
chamber have returned 10 God and been for
given.
:" There's Wilderness in Gods mercy
Like the Wilderness OF the sea-