Jonah 1:1

Jonah's Flight

1 The word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai:^[a]

Jonah 1:1 Meaning and Commentary

Jonah 1:1

Now the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the son of Amittai,
&c.] Or, "and the word of the Lord was" ^F12; not that this is to be considered as connected with something the prophet had on his mind and in his thoughts when he began to write this book; or as a part detached from a prophecy not now extant; for it is no unusual thing with the Hebrews to begin books after this manner, especially historical ones, of which kind this chiefly is, as the books of Ruth, First and Second Samuel, and Esther; besides, the (w) , "vau", is here not copulative, but conversive; doing its office by changing the future tense into the past; which otherwise must have been rendered, "the word of the Lord shall be", or "shall come"; which would not only give another, but a wrong sense. "The word of the Lord" often signifies a prophecy from the Lord; and so the Targum, renders it,

``the word of prophecy from the Lord;''

and it may be so interpreted, since Jonah, under a spirit of prophecy, foretold that Nineveh should be destroyed within forty days; though the phrase here rather signifies the order and command of the Lord to the prophet to do as is expressed in ( Jonah 1:2 ) ; whose name was Jonah "the son of Amittai"; of whom see the introduction to this book. Who his father Amittai was is not known: if the rule of the Jews would hold good, that when a prophet mentions his own name, and the name of his father, he is a prophet, the son of a prophet, then Amittai was one; but this is not to be depended on. The Syriac version calls him the son of Mathai, or Matthew; though the Arabians have a notion that Mathai is his mother's name; and observe that none are called after their mothers but Jonas and Jesus Christ: but the right name is Amittai, and signifies "my truth"; and to be sons of truth is an agreeable character of the prophets and ministers of the word, who should be given to truth, possessed of it, and publish it: saying;
as follows:

FOOTNOTES:

F12 (yhyw) "et fuit", Pagninus, Montanus, Drusius; "factum fuit", Piscator.

Taken from John Gill's Exposition of the Bible

Jonah 1:1 In-Context

1 The word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai:

2 "Get up! Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because their wickedness has confronted Me."

3 However, Jonah got up to flee to Tarshish from the Lord's presence. He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish. He paid the fare and went down into it to go with them to Tarshish, from the Lord's presence.

4 Then the Lord hurled a violent wind on the sea, and such a violent storm arose on the sea that the ship threatened to break apart.

5 The sailors were afraid, and each cried out to his god. They threw the ship's cargo into the sea to lighten the load. Meanwhile, Jonah had gone down to the lowest part of the vessel and had stretched out and fallen into a deep sleep.