Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-x24gv Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-25T18:07:27.128Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The Sign of Jonah

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2009

Extract

Modern scholarship has accustomed us to recognise the profundity of thought and the breadth of meditation that lie crystallised in even the briefest words of our Lord's and the beauty with which he presents the sublimest Gospel in the simplest way, so that even the barest saying yields fruit an hundredfold. Indeed it seems probable that He deliberately framed His teaching in this way, to be received at different levels of understanding. It may be the parables that have prepared the way for the recognition of this fact since there remain in the recorded words at least two authentic explanations of these and there may be yet a third preserved for us by tradition.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 1962

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

page 288 note 1 cf. Matt. 13.10–17 and the quotation of Psalm 78.2 in Matt. 13.35.

page 288 note 2 The parable of the Sower, Matt. 13.1–9 (explanation 13.18–22); the parable of the Tares, Matt. 13.24–30 (explanation 13.27–43); for the third (the parable of the Good Samaritan) see Daniélou, J., Origéne, 1948, p. 196 and note, where he quotes Origen, comm. in Matt., 16.9 and Hom, in jah., VI, 4. It is usually suggested that these explanations are later additions since they turn the parable into an allegory and obscure the moral point of the story, but our Lord Himself may have intended the moral to be carried both by the original parable and the allegory although perhaps not himself bringing out the allegory.

page 288 note 3 See Wright, A., A Synopsis of the Gospels in Greek (Macmillan, 1903), p. 77.Google Scholar Luke has a trace of the earlier occasion in 11.16. There seems no reason to suggest along with Loisy and Streeter that the Marcan single account is the only true one, apart from the ease of the solution.

page 289 note 1 cf. John 2.18 and 6.30.

page 289 note 2 e.g. Plummer, A., St. Matthew (Scott, 1920), p. 183Google Scholar; McNeile, A. H., St. Matthew (Macmillan, 1915), p. 182.Google Scholar

page 289 note 3 That this was a cause of some difficulty may be gathered from a marginal note in min. 899 (Uppsala Univ. Gr. 4) quoted in Stendahl, K., The School of St. Matthew, p. 133 n. 1.:Google Scholar.

page 289 note 4 Assuming that Mark 10.33b–34 and similar passages are later glosses.

page 289 note 5 e.g. Easton, B. S., St. Luke (T. and T. Clark), 1926, p. 187.Google Scholar

page 290 note 1 Manson, T. W., The Sayings of Jesus (S.C.M., 1949), p. 90Google Scholar: ‘Jonah himself was the only sign to the people. That can only mean that he and his message were such that of themselves they carried conviction to the Ninevites. People listening to Jonah recognised the voice of God… Jesus himself is the sign, the only sign that will be given, once more God is speaking through the Son of man.’

page 290 note 2 Mark 16.1–4. See critical apparatus. (sah.) (boh.) all omit verses 2b–3. Zahn suggests (see McNeile, , St. Matthew, p. 235)Google Scholar that it is due to Papias.

page 291 note 1 It is regarded as an editorial note by Wright, , Synopsis of the Gospels, p. 219.Google Scholar

page 291 note 2 . Jonah 2.1 (LXX).

page 292 note 1 ‘unto it’ Matthew 16.4; ‘to it’ Luke 11.29; ‘to it’ Matt. 12.39; ‘to you’ codex Bezae Matt. 12.39, the word ‘generation’ having gone before.

page 292 note 2 Kilpatrick, G. D., The Origins of the Gospel according to St. Matthew (O.U.P., 1946), p. 103Google Scholar; ‘our community was Greek speaking’, p. 105:‘the slight knowledge of Hebrew shown could be traditional and, as distinct from a knowledge of Aramaic, would be a little academic’.

page 292 note 3 Knight, G. A. F., A Biblical Approach to the Doctrine of the Trinity (Oliver and Boyd, 1953), pp. 6673.Google Scholar

page 293 note 1 For the review see J.T.S. vol. V (Oct. 1954), pp. 238–9.

page 293 note 2 Midrash on Canticles 1.15, 2.14, 4.2 and 5.2.

page 293 note 3 Midrash on Canticles, translated by Maurice Simon (Soncino Press, 1951), Intro., p. vii.

page 294 note 1 Gittin 45a.

page 295 note 1 Baba Quamma 93a. To these may be added an incidental reference in the Targum quoted by DrDaube, in The New Testament and Rabbinic Judaism (Univ. of London Press, 1956), p. 31Google Scholar: ‘Ye, the wings of a dove’ (Ps. 68.14) becomes: ‘Ye, the congregation of Israel, which resembles a dove, overshadowed by clouds of glory.’ It is the incidental character of these allusions which make the final argument more convincing.

page 295 note 2 R. Johanan is Johanan bar Nappaha, ca. 175/180—ca. 290. See Strack, H. L., Introduction to the Talmud and Midrash, 6th ed. (in English) (Meridian Books, 1959), pp. 121122.Google Scholar

page 295 note 3 Briggs, C. A. and E. C, , The Book of Psalms (I.C.C.) (T. and T. Clark, vol. II, 1909), p. 156.Google Scholar Professor Knight, Biblical Approach to the Doctrim of the Trinity, says that the Moffat Bible (Hodder and Stoughton) reads in this verse: ‘Leave not thy dove, Israel, to a brutal power.’

page 295 note 4 The Jewish Encyclopaedia (Funk and Wagnalls), 1907.Google Scholar

page 296 note 1 Cullmann, O., Christus und die Zeit. Die urchristliche Zeit und Geschichtsauffassung (1946), p. 100.Google Scholar Quoted in Gosta Lindeskog, The Theology of the Creation in the Old and New Testaments.

page 296 note 2 Lindeskog, G., The Theology of the Creation in the Old and New Testaments, in Fridrichsen, A., et al. , The Root of the Vine (Dacre Press, 1953).Google Scholar

page 296 note 3 Manson, T. W., The Teaching of Jesus (C.U.P., 1st ed. 1931), pp. 227228.Google Scholar

page 296 note 4 Lindeskog, G., The Theology of the Creation in the Old and New Testaments, p. 7.Google Scholar

page 296 note 5 Deuteronomy 32.6; 18; Isaiah 63.16, 64.8; Jeremiah 3.19, 31.9; Malachi 1.6 and 2.10.

page 297 note 1 R. Akiba (ca. A.D. 50–132) in Abot III.14. Quoted in Moore, G. F., Judaism (C.U.P., 1927), vol. II, p. 203.Google Scholar

page 297 note 2 Taylor, V., The Names of Jesus (Macmillan, 1954), p. 65.Google Scholar

page 298 note 1 Article on ‘Dove’ in Jewish Encyclopaedia.

page 298 note 2 vonDobschütz, E., Eschatology of the Gospels, pp. 111112.Google Scholar

page 298 note 3 Knox, W. K. (ed. Chadwick, H.), The Sources of the Synoptic Gospels, vol. II St. Luke and St. Matthew (C.U.P., 1957), p. 64.Google Scholar

page 299 note 1 Bultmann, R., Die Geschichte der Synoptischen Tradition (Göttingen, 1921 and 1931), p. 124.Google Scholar

page 299 note 2 Studia Theologica, 5 (Lund, 1951), pp. 119131Google Scholar (I have not been able to read the article).

page 299 note 3 J.T.S., vol. 21 (Jan. 1920), pp. 146–59.

page 299 note 4 Moxon, C., in Expository Times, vol. 22 (Sept. 1911), pp. 566–7; Cheyne, T. K., article on ‘John the Baptist’ in the Encyclopaedia Biblica (Adam and Charles Black, vol. II, 1901), col. 1501–2, which assumes the mistake without much evidence. The same author in the same work in the article on ‘Jonah’ takes the reference to be to Jonah the prophet (ibid.., col. 2570); and Bacon, B. W., The Fourth Gospel in Research and Debate, p. 350 n. 1, and p. 361 n. 3.

page 300 note 1 Moxon, C., p. 567.

page 300 note 2 Michael, J. H., op. cit., p. 151.

page 300 note 3 Findlay, J. A., in Amicitiae Corolla, ed. Wood, H. G. (Univ. of London Press, 1933), pp. 5771.Google Scholar Lagrange, M. J., may be mentioned as maintaining that the verse is genuine and that Luke avoided it because of the theological difficulty of the three nights (St. Matthieu, 1927).

page 301 note 1 Stendahl, K., The School of St. Matthew (G. W. K. Gleerup, Lund (Uppsala), 1951).Google Scholar Seeesp. pp. 132–3.

page 301 note 2 Taylor, V., The Formation of the Gospel Tradition (Macmillan, 1933).Google Scholar

page 301 note 3 Stendahl, K., The School of St. Matthew, esp. Intro, pp. 1135.Google ScholarDaube, D., in New Testament Studies, vol. 5, No. 3, p. 174.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 301 note 4 Dibelius, M., Die Fomgeschichte der Evangeliums (Tübingen, 1919 and 1933).Google Scholar

page 301 note 5 Kilpatrick, G. D., The Origins of the Gospel according to St. Matthew.

page 302 note 1 In the terminology of DrDodd, C. H. this would be the ‘kerygma’, the exposition being the ‘didache’ (Gospel and Law, 1951, pp. 6 and 10–11).Google Scholar This is not the place to try and sort out the confusion which has arisen from trying to equate these with the Rabbinic halakah and haggadah—which can only be done very loosely, as in what follows here. Dr Dodd would make the ‘didache’ the equivalent of the Jewish halakah, but strictly speaking halakah was not merely ethical teaching, it was the expounding of Scripture to draw out in the broadest sense the rules for living, which were then considered as divine pronouncements. It would therefore just as nearly approach the ‘kerygma’. Haggadah is any other form of exposition still based on Scripture but not meant to result ‘in se’ in rules of conduct although it may ‘per se’ result in them. So it is only loosely that our Lord's words may be called halakah since in many cases they may be haggadah, and his deeds themselves may be looked upon as halakah or haggadah depending on the use made of them. All that can be said is that there are signs of the use of the Rabbinic method of exegesis, based not on Scripture but on our Lord's deeds and words, and this may result in something approaching halakah or haggadah.

page 302 note 2 Daube, D., The New Testament and Rabbinic Judaism, p. 68.Google Scholar See also esp. Part II, chapter iii: ‘On the whole what a patriarch or pious king—or, as we shall see, even God—had done on a particular occasion was considered all important as far as “derekh' eres”, the good life in general was concerned… But it was not by itself an adequate basis for halakah’ (p. 69).

page 303 note 1 cf. Luke 2.46–47.