Jonah and the Whale

[Phillip_Rolfes]

This is just another example of the tactics of the gainsayers. When confronted with evidence which irrefutably confounds their case, they refuse to yield and submit to that authority, but instead err further by actually altering the commonly understood terminology of language.
When faced with this kind of obstinance there is invariably only one remaining option, to cease dialogue.

:banghead:

Consider dialogue ceased. Peace to you, brother.

 

[petrel]

Sacred Tradition isn’t the sum quotes of a handful of saints (and you’ve only provided and handful, which I’ve shown don’t necessarily affirm what you want them to affirm). Tradition is living and in need of constant interpretation.

This is utterly wrong. The Sacred Tradition is static and unchanging, just like the Sacred Scripture there is no shadow of turning in Sacred Tradition. It is not always in need of constant interpretation. Are you suggesting that the Word of God be subjected to our changeable interpretations. Absolutely not.

You are right in saying that Sacred Tradition is more than a few quotes from saints. In fact it includes the testimony of Saints ( by which I have given uppercase to denote the veneration that we as Catholics give to their lives, teachings and examples) but extends to the entire testimony of the general assembly of the Catholic church. Therefore the greatest evidence I can give of the veracity of the Book of Jonah and the truth of these literal events, is that the GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH has testified to the reality and historicity of these as true events for almost 2000 years, and before that the Jews who held the oracles of God before Christ, who likewise by an unchanging testimony attested that this was an account of real events. THAT is Sacred Tradition. Those gainsayers who argue against the reality of the story of Jonah are not just denying the scripture but are rejecting the Sacred Tradition also.

This whole debate and the circle of modern exegesis which surrounds it is just a painful example of people paying lip service to Scripture and Sacred Tradition at the same time as they turn it upside down and rattle it to see what other contrary nuances of meaning they can shake out of it.

 

[petrel]

:banghead:

Originally Posted by petrel
This is just another example of the tactics of the gainsayers. When confronted with evidence which irrefutably confounds their case, they refuse to yield and submit to that authority, but instead err further by actually altering the commonly understood terminology of language.
When faced with this kind of obstinance there is invariably only one remaining option, to cease dialogue.

Sorry I hope that you did not think I was directing that at you. As you have many times said, you believe in the Story of Jonah and the Whale. I was talking in a general sense about those modern exegetes who advance these kinds of arguments.

Peace be with you also. I believe that we can have a heated exchange on this subject and not break fellowship. So if I have pushed to hard and caused offence then I am very sorry and will take a bit of back step on this issue.

 

[patg]

I thought so too, until reading the things in this post!

Well, the OP has thanked everyone for their (name removed by moderator)ut so we are probably just arguing for the sake of arguing. Just in case someone is still following this…

But it is a matter of tradition which teachings were set out in parables. This is totally different than writing a completely fictional book, and putting someone’s name on it that never existed, and passing it off as fact.

You are missing the point - fiction is a valid vehicle for revelation.

This is not dogma. This is a suggested method for scripture analysis.

The contents of something as formal as a *Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation *can just be dismissed as a “suggested method”?

The structure of this argument is odd. Vatican 2 appears to be cited for the proposition that it confers poetic license upon the prophets. This is beyond silly. The prophets conferred tradition and scripture to the men of Vatican 2 and to us. A Church council can no more dictate terms to the prophets than it can direct providence. The prophets recorded their prophecies, and the chronicle writers the chronicles, under the direct guidance of the Holy Ghost. The Jews of old declared the prophecies true, and the Church adopted them. The canon is closed. It cannot be reopened by the expedient method of “reinterpretation” that what was fact is now fiction.

This is beyond silly. You are again confusing the teaching of the truths of revelation with historical truths. * **None ***of the “truths” are being reinterpreted, only the silly notion that everything always was and still must be interpreted as literalistic history.

No diaries have survived from Jonah’s day, except of course Jonah’s book. It stands to reason that we cannot know what the people who heard Jonah in life thought, apart that they realized his extreme holiness.

But we have many eminent scripture scholars who use the guidelines of Dei Verbum to help us understand all this.

Talk about fiction. Stating that one can imagine exactly how “contemporary” readers would have understood Jonah is laughable. From this remove, the only thing we can understand is that they thought the events happened, and that is why they recognized the book as inspired.

Nonsense - the story is full of details that would clearly appear fanciful to the Jew of the time. It is interesting that you continue to ignore anything said about this. The book is a laughable parody of serious prophetic literature.

This makes no sense if one thinks it through. The premise is that the Jews of yore were too narrow minded and stupid to accept a prophecy when preached to them. Therefore, the author had to charm them with a funny story. And, lo and behold, yokels that they were, they fell for it and even put the amusing little anecdote in the collections of inspired writings. That would be a more unusual miracle than if Jonah had actually been swallowed by the whale!

Actually, they did not fall for at all. Clear evidence shows that the revelation contained in the book of Jonah was also unaccepted in Jesus’ life. During Jesus’ earthly ministry, the “chosen People” were still just the Jews. In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus tells his disciples to go only to the house of Israel, and not go to pagan towns. He also says that his own mission is to the house of Israel. It is only after the resurrection that Peter learns through a vision that other nations are also chosen and are to be included in the covenant. In obedience to the Holy Spirit, Peter baptizes gentiles and later has to defend his actions to the other apostles.

Alright. Let’s reason this out together.

Let’s do that…

We ought not believe in Jonah, because it’s outrageous.

Totally wrong - we *should *totally believe in the **truth **of Jonah. If we look into the text itself we see the evidence in the setting, the plot, and the tone that the intent of the author is not to report history.

We ought not believe in Genesis, because “science” has “disproved” it.

Most do not believe literalistically in genesis and the church does not require us to.

We ought not believe that Christ was born of a virgin

We believe this because it is a church dogma.

, or in a stable, or during the reign of Herod, or that a census was underway, or that angels sang to shepherds, or, one supposes, in three wise men or shining stars.

I don’t believe any of this is history and I am not required to. It is clearly composed of Jewish midrash and in the form of the classic infancy narrative (a literary form everyone accepted as fiction). The stories, of course, do teach truth.

All these stories are the fictions of narrow minded, bigoted, “primitives” who, when they weren’t making up nonsensical tales were scratching lice and slaying strangers.

No, these are well constructed literary devices presented to teach the truths of revelation. We are sometimes the bigoted primitives who can’t understand fiction when we see it and who can’t separate real truth from historical truth.

It is said, “literalists” have strange views. Yet here things get really interesting – we should absolutely, positively believe the Church they started is, and has remained, infallible to this very day!

Yes, the truths it teaches are infallible, even to his very day! They are NOT, however, dependent upon the literary form ancient authors used to reveal them to us.

Why, it is so true we can even quote one of its recent councils to prove that Jonah never existed!

As usual, you are misstating everything - there is **no **proof and the church has **not **declared that there is. The church’s scholars (and us) are allowed to study the scriptures and come to that conclusion if the text warrants it.