Now the word of Yahweh came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying,
"The word of Jehovah came unto Jonah the son of Amittai ..." There is no sacred record of just how God spoke to Jonah, the great fact revealed being that God indeed spoke to him and that Jonah recognized the validity of God's message.  "God having of old time spoken unto the fathers in the prophets by divers portions and in divers manners, etc."   (Hebrews 1:1) gives the only clue we have as to how God spoke to the prophets.  Nevertheless, "The basis of the prophet's life is the confidence that God is able to communicate with man, making known to him his will.  Without a revelation of God there can be no prophet."[6]  Strangely enough, this is the primary evidence of the supernatural in the whole book, but it seems to be curiously inoffensive even to some who vehemently reject the miracles of the same book.  Granted that the infinite God is the one who spoke to Jonah and dealt with him as revealed in this history, there can actually be no problem whatever with the miraculous element in the record.