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Jon_4:2 And he prayed unto the LORD, and said, I pray thee, O LORD, [was] not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou [art] a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil.
Ver. 2. And he prayed unto the Lord] i.e. He thought to have done so, but by the deceitfulness of his own heart he quarrelled with God, and instead of wrestling with him, as Jacob, he wrangled with him. The words seem to be rather a brawl than a prayer, which should ever proceed from a sedate and settled spirit, and hold conformity with the will of God. Could Jonah be in case to pray, when he had neither right conceptions of God nor a heart of mercy to men, but that millions of people must perish rather than he be held a false prophet? Say there were something in it of zeal for God’s glory, which he thought would suffer, as if God were either mutable or impotent; say that there were in this outburst something of affection to God’s people, who had then no greater enemy to fear than these Ninevites, whom therefore Jonah would have had destroyed, according to his prediction; yet cannot he be excused for falling so foul upon God, and upbraiding him with that which is his greatest glory, Exo_33:18-19; Exo_34:6-7. The truth is, nothing makes a man eccentric in his motions so much as headstrong passions and private respects. He that brings these into God’s presence shall do him but little good service. The soul is then only well carried when neither so becalmed that it moves not when it should, nor yet tossed with tempests to move disorderly, as did Jonah here, and Job, in that peevish prayer of his, Job_6:8-9. See also Jer_20:7-8.
I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying, &c.] That is, my thought: for whether he worded it thus with God till now it appeareth not; but God heareth the language of men’s hearts, and their silence to him is a speaking evidence.
When I was yet in my country?] And had Jonah so soon forgotten what God had done for him since he came thence? Oh, what a grave is oblivion! and what a strange passage is that (and yet how common!) "Then believed they his words; they sang his praise. They soon forgot his works; they waited not for his counsel." {Psa_106:12-13} Jonah did not surely wait for God’s counsel, but anticipated it. ldcirco anteverti, saith he in the next words (therefore I fled before), and thought he had said well, spoke very good reasoning. It is the property of lust and passion so to blear the understanding of a man that he shall think he hath reason to be mad, and that there is great sense in sinning. Dogs in a chase bark at their own masters; so do people in their passions let fly at their best friends. "They set their mouth against the heavens, and their tongue walketh through the earth," Psa_73:9. Jonah in his heat here justifieth his former flight, which he had so sorely smarted for, et quasi quidam Aristarchus, he taketh upon him to censure God for his superabundant goodness, which is above all praise.
For I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, &c.] This he knew to be God’s name, Exo_34:6-7, but withal he should have remembered what was the last letter in that name, viz. that he will by no means clear the guilty. See Nah_1:2; Nah_1:8. The same fire hath burning heat and cheerful light. Gracious is the Lord, but yet righteous, saith David, Psa_116:5, his mercy goes ever bounded by his truth. This Jonah should have considered; and therefore trembled thus to have upbraided God with that mercy by which himself subsisted, and but for which he had been long since in hell, for his tergiversation and peevishness. But "mercy rejoiceth against judgment," Jam_2:13, and runneth as a spring, without ceasing. It is not like those pools about Jerusalem that might be dried up with the tramplings of horse and horsemen. "The grace of God was exceeding abundant," 1Ti_1:14. It hath abounded to flowing over ( õðåñ åðëåïíáóå ) as the sea doth above the largest rocks. See this in the present instance. Jonah addeth sin to sin, and doth enough to undo himself for ever: so that a man would wonder how God could forbear killing him, as he had like to have done Moses when he met him in the inn. But he is God, and not man; he contents himself to admonish Jonah for his fault, as a friend and familiar, velut cum eo colludens, jesting with him, as it were, and, by an outward sign, showing him how grievously he had offended. Concerning these attributes of God here recited, {See Trapp on "Joe_2:13"} and say, with Austin, Laudent alii pietatem: Dei ego misericordiam. Let no spider suck poison out of this sweetest flower: nor out of a blind zeal make ill use of it, as Jonah doth, for a cloak of his rebellion, lest abused mercy turn into fury.