44 lines
2.5 KiB
XML
44 lines
2.5 KiB
XML
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<div2 id="Jonah.i" n="i" next="Jonah.ii" prev="Jonah" progress="84.79%" title="Introduction">
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<h2 id="Jonah.i-p0.1">Jonah</h2>
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<hr/>
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<pb id="Jonah.i-Page_1278" n="1278"/>
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<div class="Center" id="Jonah.i-p0.3">
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<p id="Jonah.i-p1" shownumber="no"><b>AN</b></p>
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<h3 id="Jonah.i-p1.1">EXPOSITION,</h3>
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<h4 id="Jonah.i-p1.2">W I T H P R A C T I C A L O B S E
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R V A T I O N S,</h4>
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<h5 id="Jonah.i-p1.3">OF THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET</h5>
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<h2 id="Jonah.i-p1.4">J O N A H.</h2>
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<hr style="width:2in"/>
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</div>
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<p class="indent" id="Jonah.i-p2" shownumber="no"><span class="smallcaps" id="Jonah.i-p2.1">This</span> book of
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Jonah, though it be placed here in the midst of the prophetical
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books of scripture, is yet rather a history than a prophecy; one
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line of prediction there is in it, <i>Yet forty days, and Nineveh
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shall be overthrown;</i> the rest of the book is a narrative of the
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preface to and the consequences of that prediction. In the midst of
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the obscure prophecies before and after this book, wherein are many
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things dark and hard to be understood, which are puzzling to the
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learned, and are <i>strong meat for strong men,</i> comes in this
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plain and pleasant story, which is entertaining to the weakest, and
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<i>milk for babes.</i> Probably Jonah was himself the penman of
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this book, and he, as Moses and other inspired penmen, records his
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own faults, which is an evidence that in these writings they
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designed God's glory and not their own. We read of this same Jonah
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<scripRef id="Jonah.i-p2.2" osisRef="Bible:2Kgs.14.25" parsed="|2Kgs|14|25|0|0" passage="2Ki 14:25">2 Kings xiv. 25</scripRef>, where we
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find that he was of Gath-hepher in Galilee, a city that belonged to
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the tribe of Zebulun, in a remote corner of the land of Israel; for
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the Spirit, which like the wind, <i>blows where it listeth,</i>
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will as easily find out Jonah in Galilee as Isaiah at Jerusalem. We
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find also that he was a messenger of mercy to Israel in the reign
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of Jeroboam the second; for the success of his arms, in the
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<i>restoring of the coast of Israel,</i> is said to be <i>according
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to the word of the Lord which he spoke by the hand of his servant
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Jonah the prophet.</i> Those prophecies were not committed to
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writing, but this against Nineveh was, chiefly for the sake of the
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story that depends upon it, and that is recorded chiefly for the
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sake of Christ, of whom Jonah was a type; it contains also very
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remarkable instances of human infirmity in Jonah, and of God's
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mercy both in pardoning repenting sinners, witness Nineveh, and in
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bearing with repining saints, witness Jonah.</p>
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</div2>
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