From: Jonah 3:1-10
Jonah preaches repentance in Nineveh
The people of Nineveh do penance
[6] Then tidings reached the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, re-
moved his robe, and covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. [7] And
he made proclamation and published through Nineveh, “By the decree of the
king and his nobles: Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything;
let them not feed, or drink water, [8] but let man and beast be covered with sack-
cloth, and let them cry mightily to God; yea, let every one turn from his evil way
and from the violence which is in his hands. [9] Who knows, God may yet repent
and turn from his fierce anger, so that we perish not?”
[10] When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God re-
pented of the evil which he had said he would do to them; and he did not do it.
*********************************************************************************************
Commentary:
3:1-4:11. The second part of the book has a similar structure to the first — God
and Jonah (3:1-3; cf. 1:1-3); Jonah and Gentiles (3:4-10; cf. 1:4-16); Jonah and
God (4:1-11; cf. 1:17-2:10). However, the reader is now psychologically prepared
for what will happen: Jonah’s preaching will produce the desired result and the
Ninevites will be converted. So, the story is geared to the last chapter which po-
ses and solves the question that chapter 3 provokes. The episode described in
this second part is therefore a practical illustration of the scope of God’s mercy.
It was used as such in the debate with the Gnostics who argued that there was
a difference between the good God (the God revealed in the New Testament) and
the God revealed in the Old Testament: “See how the stress is laid on the grea-
test name and quality of God, his Mercy; that is, God is patient with evildoers,
and rich in mercy and compassion for those who recognize their faults and re-
pent them, as the Ninevites did. If such a Being as he is so good, you […] have
to admit that he can do no evil for, as Marcion himself once said, a good tree
cannot bear bad fruit” (Tertullian, “Adversus Marcionem”, 2, 24).
3:1-4. God renews his command to Jonah. And this time Jonah obeys. Maybe
the vows he promised to fulfil in 2:9 had to do with this — going to preach in Ni-
neveh. Anyway, the success of his mission is assured, because it depends not
on Jonah but on the Lord: it would take three days to cross Nineveh (v. 3), but
he has only gone one day in his journey and the people convert (cf. 3:5).
3:5-10. The account of the conversion of the Ninevites looks like a straight copy
from other biblical passages, particularly from the prophet Jeremiah: Jeremiah is
the “prophet to the nations” (Jer 1:5), and Jonah is sent to the archetypal Gen-
tile city. There are many little things in this passage that are reminiscent of Jere-
miah: in the book of Jeremiah, Jerusalem is called the “great city”, which is what
Nineveh is called here (1:2; 3:2; cf. Jer 22:8-9), and both books have similar turns
of phrase such as “let every one turn from his evil way”, and “man and beast”,
“from the greatest to the least” (3:5, 8; cf. Jer 6:14; 8:10; 36:3, 7), etc. This pas-
sage is particularly reminiscent of the call for a fast made by Jeremiah in the time
of King Jehoiakim; in Jeremiah 36 we are told how the prophet warned of misfor-
tunes to come and proclaimed a fast for conversion (Jer 36:9), but the king re-
fused to listen. Jonah, too, announces the destruction of Nineveh, but it is the Ni-
nevites themselves who proclaim a general fast, as if God were speaking through
them. Their own king establishes what the fast will involve, and he issues a de-
cree that sounds just like something a prophet would have said (vv. 7-9); cf. Joel
2:12-14). Furthermore, the king of the Ninevites seems to be quite familiar with
biblical teaching, for he is well aware (cf. Jer 36:3, 9) that displays of penance
will not automatically stay God’s hand; the king has a genuine change of heart
and is ready to submit to God (v. 9), and when God sees that these people are
ready to mend their ways, he revokes his decision to punish them (v. 10). The
episode bears out Jeremiah’s teaching about repentance (cf. Jer 18:7-8).
The difference between the Ninevites and the Israelites can be seen in the use
that Jesus makes of this passage when he compares his Jewish contempora-
ries with their ancestors: “The men of Nineveh will arise at the judgment with this
generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and be-
hold, something greater than Jonah is here” (Mt 12:41). It is not surprising, then,
that in Christian tradition, the Ninevites are referred to as a model of repentance:
“Let us cast our minds back over the history of men, and see how the Lord, in
one generation after another, granted a time of penance to those who desired to
be converted to him. Noah preached salvation, and those who listened to him
were saved. Jonah told the Ninevites that their city would be destroyed, and they
repented of their sins and asked God for forgiveness and were saved by the po-
wer of their pleading, even though they were not part of the chosen people” (St
Clement of Rom, “Ad Corinthios”, 7, 5-7).
And another text by a great Father of the Eastern Church says: “Do not dwell on
how little time you have, but on the love of the Master. The inhabitants of Nine-
veh cooled God’s wrath in three days. They did not despair at how little time was
left to them; their troubled souls won over the goodness of the Master, and he
brought about their salvation” (St John Chrysostom, “De incomprehensibile Dei
natura”, 6).
*********************************************************************************************
Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.
Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.
From: Luke 10:38-42
Martha and Mary Welcome Our Lord
*********************************************************************************************
Commentary:
38-42. Our Lord was heading for Jerusalem (Luke 9:51) and His journey took Him
through Bethany, the village where Lazarus, Martha and Mary lived — a family for
whom He had a special affection, as we see in other passages of the Gospel (cf.
John 11:1-14; 12:1-9).
St. Augustine comments on this scene as follows: “Martha, who was arranging
and preparing the Lord’s meal, was busy doing many things, whereas Mary pre-
ferred to find her meal in what the Lord was saying. In a way she deserted her
sister, who was very busy, and sat herself down at Jesus’ feet and just listened
to His words. She was faithfully obeying what the Psalm said: ‘Be still and know
that I am God’ (Psalm 46:10). Martha was getting annoyed, Mary was feasting;
the former coping with many things, the latter concentrating on one. Both occu-
pations were good” (”Sermon”, 103).
Martha has come to be, as it were, the symbol of the active life, and Mary that
of the contemplative life. However, for most Christians, called as they are to sanc-
tify themselves in the middle of the world, action and contemplation cannot be re-
garded as two opposite ways of practising the Christian faith: an active life forget-
ful of union with God is useless and barren; but an apparent life of prayer which
shows no concern for apostolate and the sanctification of ordinary things also
fails to please God. The key lies in being able to combine these two lives, with-
out either harming the other. Close union between action and contemplation can
be achieved in very different ways, depending on the specific vocation each per-
son is given by God.
Far from being an obstacle, work should be a means and an occasion for a
close relationship with our Lord, which is the most important thing in our life.
Following this teaching of the Lord, the ordinary Christian should strive to attain
an integrated life — an intense life of piety and external activity, orientated to-
wards God, practised out of love for Him and with an upright intention, which ex-
presses itself in apostolate, in everyday work, in doing the duties of one’s state
in life. “You must understand now more clearly that God is calling you to serve
Him in and from the ordinary, material and secular activities of human life. He
waits for us every day, in the laboratory, in the operating room, in the army bar-
racks, in the university chair, in the factory, in the workshop, in the fields, in the
home and in all the immense panorama of work. Understand this well: there is
something holy, something divine, hidden in the most ordinary situations, and it
is up to each of you to discover it [...]. There is no other way. Either we learn to
find our Lord in ordinary, everyday life, or else we shall never find Him. That is
why I can tell you that our age needs to give back to matter and to the most tri-
vial occurrences and situations their noble and original meaning. It needs to re-
store them to the service of the Kingdom of God, to spiritualize them, turning
them into a means and an occasion for a continuous meeting with Jesus Christ”
(St. J. Escriva,”Conversations”, 114).
*********************************************************************************************
Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.
Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.