FISH, the Fish which swallowed up Jonah. Interpreters generally believe it was a Whale; and when the Gospel speaks of it, it Matth. xii. 40. Jonah ii. 1. דג גדול Aug. Ep. c. ii. edit. nov. qu. 6. n. 31. p. 284.makes use of the word Cetus, which signifies a Whale. In the Hebrew of Jonah it is said to be only a great Fish. Now we know of no Fish in the sea larger than a Whale; its mouth is of a capacity sufficient to contain many men; and who questions but that the capacity of its throat and belly is answerable to so vast an opening? Quanto hiatu patebat os illud, quod velut janua speluncæ illius fuit? says St. Austin, speaking of a Whale, the bones whereof were seen at Carthage. John Cabri, of the Academy at Florence, mentions a Whale, which was cast ashore upon the coast of Tuscany, and had a mouth so large, that a man on horse-back might enter it with ease. Notwithstanding, this animal does not live upon flesh, but upon weeds, or the froth of the sea, or upon some small white fish, such as anchovies, or others; a circumstance which makes what is said of Jonah’s being swallowed up by a Whale, and his continuing alive three days in the belly of it, to be more credible. A Whale is not armed with teeth and tushes, like the Fish that live on flesh. It might have swallowed up Jonah, without bruising him between its teeth; it might have kept him longer without killing him in its stomach, which is used to digest weeds only, and the lightest and most tender food.
Others1 maintain, that it could not be a Whale, because its throat is too narrow to swallow a man whole. They assert, that its throat is not above a foot and an half wide; and2Bartolin assures us, that the largest, and those whose tongue alone may yield more than eighteen tuns of oil, have so narrow a throat, that a man can scarce thrust his arm into it. These Authors pretend, that the Fish, which received Jonah into its belly, was rather a Sea-dog, called Canis carcarias. This creature has four or five rows of teeth belonging to each jaw. Its gullet and stomach are so large, that sometimes men have been found in it, quite whole. This Fish is likewise called Lamia. Rondelet says, that some of them have been taken at Nice and Marseilles; and men entire, nay one man all in armour, were found in their stomachs. He says, that he has seen some, whose jaws and gullet were so vast, that if their mouths had been kept open with a gag, a dog might have gone down into their Stomachs, to eat what was in them. Hercules is said to have leaped into the belly of some such creature armed all over, from whence he found no way out, till he had torn its entrails in pieces, without suffering any inconveniency himself, besides losing his hair; which was occasioned by the heat of this animal’s stomach. See Bochart, de Animal. Sacr. parte 2. l. 5. c. 12. and our Dissertation concerning the Fish which swallowed up Jonah, printed before our Comment upon the twelve small Prophets.
It is a question with some, how Fishes could present themselves to Adam in Paradise, in order to his giving them their names, and exercising his dominion over them, as well as over other Animals? St. Austin does not believe that they appeared with other Animals before Adam. He says, that the first man, or his descendants, might distinguish them by their names, as they came to his or their knowledge; and that this is sufficient to verify the recital made by Moses. It is impossible that those which live only in the sea, could come to him in the garden of Eden, and the rivers which watered it.
Psal. cii. 26.The Rabbins have asserted, that upon the fifth day of the world, God created two large Fishes, one whereof he will preserve alive to the last day, in order to sport with it, according to this expression in the Psalmist; Draco iste quem formasti ad illudendum ei: and that he killed the other, and keeps it in brine, in order at the end of the world to make an entertainment of it for the Elect. Strange Extravagancies!
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