Jonah 2:6

I went down to the bottom of the mountains,.... Which are in the midst of the sea, whither the fish carried him, and where the waters are deep; or the bottom of rocks and promontories on the shore of

I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with her bars was about me for ever: yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O LORD my God.

I went down, the fish carried him down, to the bottoms of the mountains; as deep in the sea as are the bottoms of the mountains, or into those depths out of which might be supposed that mountains were thence drawn out by the roots; an elegant description of fathomless depths, whirlpools of the seas. The earth with her bars was about me for ever; I seemed to be imprisoned where the bars that secured me were as great and durable as the rocks which they were made of. Yet, notwithstanding all these insuperable difficulties, and my own fears, hast thou brought up; by what was first my danger thou hast wonderfully secured me, what I thought should have been my grave was made a safety to me; by the fish Jonah is in due time fairly and safely set on shore. My life; his life of nature; his life of comfort, and peace, and joy too. From corruption, or the pit; a description of the stale of the dead, whose bodies turn to putrefaction and stench. O Lord; O almighty and eternal Being, Lord and Sovereign over all. My God; mine, saith Jonah, by particular choice, faith, and hope, whom I had served and should not have disobeyed, to whom I prayed, who hath pardoned, whom I will adore, obey, and love for ever.

Jonah 2:6 I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with her bars [was] about me for ever: yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O LORD my God.Ver. 6. I went down to the bottoms of the mountains] That is, of the promontories or rocks of the sea, where the waters are deepest. Thus Mercer after Kimchi. "The channels of waters were seen, and the foundations of the world were discovered," Psalms 18:15. The mountains are said to be under water, Proverbs 8:25, because their foundations are there placed. The earth with her bars was about me for ever] As if resolved there to keep me close prisoner; that though the fish had disgorged me, yet I should never have got to land. The shores are set by God as bars to keep the sea within his bounds, Job 38:8; Job 38:10-11 Jeremiah 5:22. Here then all the creatures seemed to set against poor Jonah, and (which was more than all) the Creator too: so that he might sigh and say, as in the poet (Martial). “ In me omnis terraeque aviumque marisque rapina est, Forsitan et coeli ” Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption] i.e. From the place where I was likely to have lain and rotted. Cum duplicantur lateres, venit Moses: when things are at the worst God appeareth, as it were out of an engine, εκτηςμηχανης. In the mount will the Lord be seen, Ezekiel 37:11 2 Kings 19:3; he stays so long sometimes that he hardly "finds faith on earth," Luke 18:8, and yet comes at last to the relief of his poor people; viz. when they are ripe and ready for it. He is a God of judgment, he knows how and when to deal forth his favours; and even waiteth to be gracious, Isaiah 30:18; Isaiah 28:21. O Lord my God] sc. by the mean and merit of thy Son, in whom alone it is that thou, Lord, art my God, and that I can call thee Abba, Father. It is well observed by an interpreter, that in this short history of Jonah are all things contained which may make to the sound and saving knowledge of God and his will, of ourselves also and our duties.

(6) Bottoms of the mountains.—Literally, ends or cuttings off, as, in margin. So the Vulg. extrema montium. Mountains were in the Hebrew conception the pillars of the world (see Job 9:6; Job 26:11), having their foundations firmly planted in the sea. These “hidden bases of the hills” were therefore the verge of the earth itself, and one lost among them would be close on the under-world of death. The earth with her bars . . .—Literally, the earth her bars behind me for ever; i.e., the earth’s gates were closed upon me for ever, there was no possibility of return. The metaphor of a gateway to sheôl is common (Isaiah 38:10, &c.), but the earth is nowhere else said to be so guarded. Ewald therefore proposes to read sheôl here. But it is quite as natural to imagine a guarded passage out of the land of the living as into the land of the dead. Corruption.—Rather, pit. (See Note, Psalms 16:10.)

Verse 6. I went down to the bottoms of the mountains] This also may be literally understood. The fish followed the slanting base of the mountains, till they terminated in a plain at the bottom of the great deep. The earth with her bars] He represents himself as a prisoner in a dungeon, closed in with bars which he could not remove, and which at first appeared to be for ever, i.e., the place where his life must terminate. Yet hast thou brought up my life] The substance of this poetic prayer was composed while in the fish's belly; but afterwards the prophet appears to have thrown it into its present poetic form, and to have added some circumstances, such as that before us; for he now speaks of his deliverance from this imminent danger of death. "Thou hast brought up my life from corruption."

6. bottoms] Lit., as in margin, “cuttings off,” the mountains being poetically conceived of as stretching away their roots or ridges to the lowest depths of the sea, and there ending or being cut off. her bars] Lit., (as for) the earth, her bars, &c. The idea is that the gates of the earth were not only closed, but barred and made fast upon him, shutting him into the unseen world. The same word is used of Samson carrying away the gates of Gaza, “bar and all,” i. e. probably a wooden beam used to hold fast the gates when they were closed. Judges 16:3. Comp. “Let not the pit shut her mouth upon me,” Psalms 69:15. from corruption] Rather, from the pit. R. V.

I went down to the bottoms, (literally “the cuttings off”) of the mountains - , the “roots” as the Chaldee and we call them, the hidden rocks, which the mountains push out, as it were, into the sea, and in which they end.

6. The bottoms of the mountains — Literally, the cuttings off; the extreme ends. The mountains are thought of as extending their roots to the bottom of the sea (Psalms 18:5).