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| Photo by Jim Tracy |
1 Then Jonah prayed unto the I Am his God out of the fish’s belly,
Though the prayer occurred in the whale, Jonah didn’t have a pen and paper with him. This was written later and thus is in past tense.
2 And said, "I cried because of my affliction to the I Am, and He heard me; out of the belly of hell I cried, and You heard my voice.
“Hell” here means grave. Because of this and Jesus comparison of Jonah’s experience to His time in the tomb, some believe Jonah actually died while in the whale and God brought him back to life. There is the problem that Jonah prayed from the whale, a difficult thing to do if you are dead. It is equally likely this was a literary devise to express extreme suffering.
3 "For You have thrown me into the deep, in the midst of the seas; and the floods surrounded me. All Your billows and Your waves passed over me.
He was in the water and drowning.
4 "Then I said, 'I am thrown out of Your sight, yet I will look again toward Your holy temple.
5 "The waters surrounded me, even to the soul. The depth closed around me; the weeds were wrapped around my head.
6 "I went down to the bottoms of the mountains. The Land of Eternity imprisoned me. But you brought me up from destruction, O I Am, my Supreme God!
7 "As my soul was fading away, I remembered the I Am, and my prayer came up to You, into Your holy temple.
8 "Those who worship false idols deny the mercy offered by the true God.
9 "But I will sacrifice to You with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay what I have promised. Salvation is from the I Am."
10 And the I Am spoke to the fish, and it vomited out Jonah onto the dry land.