by
Damien F. Mackey
Part
One:
During
the reign of Ahab
“[Jonah] is said to have attained a very advanced age (more than 120
years
according to Seder 'Olam; 130 according to Sefer Yuḥasin) …”.
Jewish Encyclopedia
At Zarephath in
Phoenicia
Zarephath
is located about 8.5 miles (13.5 km) south
of Sidon and 14 miles (23 km) north of Tyre: https://www.bibleplaces.com/zarephath/
It was at this location that we first - at least
according to Jewish tradition - encounter Jonah, as the son of the widow of
Zarephath:
Elijah, the widow and the widow's son
1 Kings 17:17-18 After this the son
of the woman, the mistress of the house became ill. And his illness was so
severe that there was no breath left in him 18 And she said to Elijah,
"What have you against me, O man of God? You have come to be to bring my
sin and remembrance and to cause the death of my son!"
Victor H. Matthews suggests that the woman "uses
sarcasm which is designed to shame the prophet for being the cause of her son's
death." Elijah does not try and rationalise with the grieving woman and takes
the son up to his bedroom where he prays to God asking for his help.
1 Kings 17:21-22 And he stretched
himself upon the child three times, and cried unto the Lord, and said, "O
Lord my God, I pray thee, let this child's soul come into him again". 22
And the Lord heard the voice of Elijah; and the soul of the child came into him
again, and he revived.
He then takes the child downstairs
again and presents him, living, to his mother. This causes her to declare "Now
by this I know that thou art a man of God" (v24), Elijah therefore
"regains his honor and his status."[1]
Rabbi Eliezer ben
Hyrcanus, also known as Rabbi Eliezer Hagadol, relates that the son raised by
Elijah was none other than the prophet Jonah, most notably associated with the incident involving a
giant fish.[2] Commentators have noted verbal
parallels with the raising
of the son of the widow of Nain in the Gospel
of Luke.[3] The miracle is represented in the Dura synagogue murals.[4]
[End of quote]
What I am going to suggest here, though, is that the
miracle involving the widow’s son – who, I believe, was not Jonah – might have been the springboard for Jonah’s first call
to Nineveh.
For I further suggest that Elijah was Jonah. See my
article:
Comparisons
between Elijah and Jonah
The prophet would later be a sign for the scribes and
pharisees (Matthew 12:39-40): ‘An evil and adulterous generation
craves a sign. Yet no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet
Jonah, because just as Jonah was in the
stomach of the sea creature for three days and three nights, so
the Son of Man will be in the heart of the earth for three days and three
nights’.
But
Jesus had also, prior to his Passion, raised Lazarus from the dead (John
11:1-44).
So
here at Zarephath is the ancient prophet raising a child from the dead, and
then entering - albeit unwillingly - into his own ‘death and resurrection’, in
the belly of the whale.
Commentators find Jonah to be so very like Elijah, and
the Jonah narrative to be so like those associated with Elijah.
Yet, by the same token, Jonah comes across as an
“anti-Elijah”:
Jonah appears again as an “anti-Elijah” when
we consider that in 1 Kings 19 Elijah runs – not because he begrudges Yahweh’s
gracious characteristics, as does Jonah (cf. 4:2) – but because he is on
Jezebel’s hit list. At this point Yahweh’s question to the defeated Elijah is,
“What are you doing here?” (1 Kings 19:9). This is very close to the captain’s
anxious cry in Jonah 1:6, “What are you doing in a deep sleep?” Jonah’s “deep
sleep” goes far beyond the exhausted sleep of Elijah when he is on the run from
Jezebel (cf. 1 Kings 19:5 and the words “and he laid down and slept”). All of
the special care with which Yahweh takes care of Elijah – a plant to shade him
(1 Kings 19:4]), angels to accompany him (1 Kings 19:5) and ravens to feed him
(1 Kings 19:6) –find connections in Jonah, in even more miraculous forms.
That is because the normally obedient and God-fearing
prophet (Elijah) suddenly ‘chokes’ and radically departs from his usual modus operandi when called (as Jonah) to
preach at Nineveh.
Zarephath might also have been the perfect launching pad
for Jonah because it is close to the great port city of Tyre, from where ships
left bound for Tarshish (Ezekiel 27:25), were it not for the fact that Jonah
had hired his Tarshish ship at the port of Joppa (Jonah 1:3).
With King Ahab
on Mount Carmel
The prophet Elijah ‘rises like fire’, seemingly out of
nowhere (Sirach 48:1-5):
Then Elijah arose, a
prophet like fire,
and his word burned like a torch.
He brought a famine upon them,
and by his zeal he made them few in number.
By the word of the Lord he shut up the heavens,
and also three times brought down fire.
How glorious you were, Elijah, in your wondrous deeds!
Whose glory is equal to yours?
You raised a corpse from death
and from Hades, by the word of the Most High.
and his word burned like a torch.
He brought a famine upon them,
and by his zeal he made them few in number.
By the word of the Lord he shut up the heavens,
and also three times brought down fire.
How glorious you were, Elijah, in your wondrous deeds!
Whose glory is equal to yours?
You raised a corpse from death
and from Hades, by the word of the Most High.
He is usually designated as “Elijah the
Tishbite, from Tishbe in Gilead” (I Kings 17:1), an unknown location. But this
was not, I believe, the prophet’s place of origin. Elijah was nomadic.
Commentators
try to make sense of this verse (17:1).
For
example: https://www.biblicaltraining.org/library/tishbite
The
KJV trs. 1 Kings 17:1 as “Elijah the Tishbite, who was of the inhabitants of
Gilead...” which is also often rendered “...of the sojourners of Gilead....”
The Heb. toshabē seems to refer to a category or class of people who
are alien residents, but have been accepted as permanent settlers. N. Glueck
feels that a scribal error was responsible for the confusion surrounding the
birthplace of Elijah, and that he was indeed a native of Gilead. He suggests
further that instead of Elijah’s being designated as “Elijah the Tishbite, of the
tosh-bē-Gilead,” that he should be called “Elijah the Jabeshite, from
Jabesh-Gilead” (Judg 21:8-14).
Additional speculation has suggested that the passage might be rendered “Elijah
the Kenite, of the Kenites of Gilead,” a somewhat tenuous viewpoint based upon
the fact that these alien settlers in Gilead, represented by the Rechabites,
assisted Elisha at a later time in his fight against Baal-worship (cf. 2 Kings 10:15), and that Elijah may have in his day been a representative of
the same people, because of his efforts against the Baalism introduced by Ahab.
….
Nor was the prophet from Gath-hepher in Galilee as is
thought of Jonah based on 2 Kings 14:25, “Jonah son of
Amittai, the prophet from Gath Hepher”.
The
chief priests and the pharisees at the time of Jesus well knew that “a prophet does not come out of Galilee”, and they even
challenged Nicodemus to check it out (John 7:52).
Critics such as this one are thus wrong to challenge
this clear statement:
Had these doubters really searched, they would
have found that several prophets came from Galilee:
• Micah was from Moresheth-gath, in Galilee
(Micah 1:1).
• Elijah, of Gilead, was a native of Galilee (I Kings 17:1).
• Jonah was from Gath Hepher, in Galilee (II Kings 14:25; see Joshua 19:13).
• Elijah, of Gilead, was a native of Galilee (I Kings 17:1).
• Jonah was from Gath Hepher, in Galilee (II Kings 14:25; see Joshua 19:13).
Nahum and Hosea may have
hailed from Galilee as well. These people's argument—that no prophet arose from
Galilee—was completely without merit! Most important, their argument totally
neglected Isaiah's prophecy about Christ's own Galilean ministry. He was to
shine as a light in the darkness, in the inheritances of Naphtali and Zebulun,
in "Galilee of the Gentiles" (Isaiah 9:1-2).
….
[End of quote]
Jonah was, as I am going to be suggesting further on,
from Moresheth-Gath in Judah.
At Mount Carmel, the fiery prophet brought rain to end
the drought, but he also wrought destruction on Queen Jezebel’s 450 prophets of
Baal (I Kings 18:16-46).
19:1-2: “Now Ahab told Jezebel
everything Elijah had done and how he had killed all the prophets with the
sword. So Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah to say,
‘May the gods deal with me, be it ever so severely, if by this time tomorrow I
do not make your life like that of one of them’.”
This necessitated yet another change of place for the prophet, as he
now had to flee from Jezebel (v. 3): “Elijah was afraid and ran for his life”.
At Beersheba
and Mount Horeb
(Vv. 3-4): “When he came to Beersheba in Judah, he left his servant
there, while he himself went a day’s journey into the
wilderness”.
Elijah next has a very Jonah
moment at Beersheba, depressed, shaded under a bush, asleep.
(Vv. 4-5): “He came to a broom bush, sat down under it and prayed
that he might die. ‘I have had enough, Lord’, he said.
‘Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors’. Then
he lay down under the bush and fell asleep”.
At Mount Horeb (Sinai), which I accept as being Har
Karkom near the Paran desert, Elijah - thinking himself to be “the only one
[loyal Yahwist] left” (v. 14) - is given this important charge (vv. 15-18):
The Lord said to him, ‘Go
back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus. When you get there,
anoint Hazael king over Aram. Also, anoint Jehu son of
Nimshi king over Israel, and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to
succeed you as prophet. Jehu will put to death any who
escape the sword of Hazael, and Elisha will put to death any who escape the
sword of Jehu. Yet I reserve seven thousand in
Israel—all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and whose mouths have not
kissed him’.
To Nineveh
The prophet receives a second call to Nineveh (Jonah
3:1-2): “Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah a
second time:
‘Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the
message I give you’.”
There is no indication how much time had elapsed between
the two calls.
As to the Nineveh incident itself, I have (like Jonah)
‘jumped ship’ several times, to quote Elijah, “hobbling between two opinions” (I
Kings 18:21).
I am now inclined to return to a view that the famous
Nineveh incident may have to do with king Ben-Hadad I, a master-king with a
multitude of kings in train, whose extensive sway may well have included the
city of Nineveh – without his necessarily being, at least yet, a king of the
whole of Assyria. In my thesis I had identified Ben-Hadad I with the Assyrian
king Ashurnasirpal II. Ben-Hadad’s ‘repentance’ upon defeat by king Ahab (I
King 20:32): “Wearing sackcloth around their waists and
ropes around their heads, they went to the king of Israel and said, ‘Your
servant Ben-Hadad says: ‘Please let me live’,” which was accepted by King Ahab
(vv. 33-34), absolutely infuriated the prophets, one of whom declaring to Ahab
(v. 42):
“This
is what the Lord
says: ‘You have set free a man I had determined should die. Therefore it is
your life for his life, your people for his people’.”
This
I tentatively put forward again as the background to the Jonah incident, a
situation which had infuriated Jonah himself, caused by the stupidity and
disobedience of king Ahab (v. 43): “Sullen and angry, the king of Israel went
to his palace in Samaria”.
The Nimrud depiction of a fish man at the time of
Ashurnasirpal II I would think must surely be based on Jonah.
At Naboth’s
vineyard
It leads the “sullen and angry” king of Israel now into a
further wicked action, incited by Jezebel, who had noticed his dark mood, and
had asked him (I Kings 21:5), ‘Why are you so sullen? Why won’t
you eat?’
The king was, on this occasion, sulking because Naboth -
not despising Mosaïc Law and giving up the property of his inheritance - had
refused to sell the vineyard that the king so covetted. After Naboth is
murdered and king Ahab goes down to take the vineyard, he is confronted by his
nemesis, the prophet Elijah (= Micaiah), who pronounces the king’s and the
queen’s death sentence (vv. 17-24):
Then the word
of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite: ‘Go down to
meet Ahab king of Israel, who rules in Samaria. He is now in Naboth’s vineyard,
where he has gone to take possession of it. Say to him,
‘This is what the Lord says: Have you not murdered a man and seized his property?’ Then
say to him, ‘This is what the Lord says: In
the place where dogs licked up Naboth’s blood, dogs will lick up your
blood—yes, yours!’
Ahab said to
Elijah, ‘So you have found me, my enemy!’
‘I have found
you’, he answered, ‘because you have sold yourself to do evil in the eyes of
the Lord. He says, ‘I am going to bring disaster on
you. I will wipe out your descendants and cut off from Ahab every last male in
Israel—slave or free. I will make your house like that
of Jeroboam son of Nebat and that of Baasha son of Ahijah, because you have
aroused my anger and have caused Israel to sin’.
‘And also
concerning Jezebel the Lord says: ‘Dogs will devour Jezebel
by the wall of Jezreel’.
‘Dogs will eat
those belonging to Ahab who die in the city, and the birds will feed on those
who die in the country’.’
In Israel with
Ahab again
There is no good reason, I think, why Elijah would not be
the same as the prophet Micaiah, of the same era and of the same ilk. I have
suggested this connection in my article:
Elijah as
Micaiah – why not?
Micaiah was apparently a prophet well-known to king Ahab,
who hated him.
That sounds very much like Elijah.
I cannot add anything useful at this stage regarding
Micaiah’s patronymic, as “son of Imla[h]”
(I Kings 22:8).
I must even take further this connection of Elijah with
Micaiah, to embrace the prophet Micah. Only chronological considerations have
prevented scholars from identifying Micaiah with the extraordinarily similar
prophet Micah. See my article:
Micaiah and
Micah
It is a step that I have made bold to take based on my
recent suspicion that the Divided Kingdom needs a fair degree of chronological
shortening.
Moreover, the prophet Jonah is considered to have lived
to a great old age.
“He is said to
have attained a very advanced age (more than 120 years according to Seder
'Olam; 130 according to Sefer Yuḥasin) …”: http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/8750-jonah
Part
Two (i):
His
partnership with Jehu
“… Jehu
helped [Jonadab] up into the chariot. Jehu said,
‘Come with me
and see my zeal for the Lord’.
Then he had
him ride along in his chariot”.
2 Kings 10:15-16
To Heaven in a
fiery chariot
This may well be where the name “Jonah” comes in for the
prophet Elijah.
Elijah’s fiery ride upwards (2 Kings 2:1-17) is by no
means the end of the prophet, as is thought. According to my theory, at least,
he would live into the age of (his yet other alter ego) Micah, as late
as the time of king Hezekiah of Judah (cf. Jeremiah 26:18).
He would need all of his 120-130 years of age (as
traditionally accorded to Jonah) to have been able to have accomplished this.
After the prophet (as Micaiah) had foretold the imminent
death in battle of king Ahab of Israel and (as Elijah) of queen Jezebel, he
next emerges, I think - and this is completely new - as Jonadab (Jehonadab) son
of Rechab near Beth-Eked of the shepherds (2 Kings 10:12, 15-17):
Jehu then set out
and went toward Samaria. At Beth Eked of the Shepherds ….
After he left
there, he came
upon Jehonadab son of Rekab, who was on his way to meet him. Jehu greeted him
and said, ‘Are you in accord with me, as I am with you?’
‘I am’,
Jehonadab answered. ‘If so’, said Jehu, ‘give me your hand’. So he did, and
Jehu helped him up into the chariot. Jehu said, ‘Come with me
and see my zeal for the Lord’.
Then he had him ride along in his chariot.
When Jehu
came to Samaria, he killed all who were left there of Ahab’s family; he
destroyed them, according to the word of the Lord
spoken to Elijah.
The meaning of Rekab
(Rechab)
A lot of effort has been expended by scholars in trying
to work out this one.
Who was Jonadab’s ancestor, Rekab?
This is, I now believe, an epithet given to Elijah by his
servant Elisha, when Elijah went up in a chariot of fire (2 Kings 2:12): “Elisha saw this
and cried out, ‘My father! My father! The
chariots and horsemen of Israel!’”
Elijah had become
“The Chariots of Israel”, or Rekeb Yisrael:
יִשְׂרָאֵל֙
רֶ֤כֶב
To use a Hebraïsm, Elijah is now, therefore: a Son of Rekab.
In this case, Rekab is not his father.
According to Elijah as Micaiah, his father (or ancestor)
was Imla[h].
According to Elijah as Jonah, his father (or ancestor)
was Amittai.
The prophet was undoubtedly a Nazirite, foregoing all
strong drink.
His loyal descendants, known at the time of Jeremiah as
“Rechabites”, greatly revered their holy ancestor, or “father” (Jeremiah
35:6-11):
‘We will drink no wine, for Jonadab the son of Rechab,
our father, commanded us, ‘You shall not drink wine, neither you nor your sons
forever. You
shall not build a house; you shall not sow seed; you shall not plant or have a
vineyard; but you shall live in tents all your days, that you may live many
days in the land where you sojourn.’ We have obeyed the
voice of Jonadab the son of Rechab, our father, in all that he commanded us, to
drink no wine all our days, ourselves, our wives, our sons, or our daughters,
and not to build houses to dwell in.
We have no vineyard or field or seed, but we have lived in tents and have
obeyed and done all that Jonadab our father commanded us. But when Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up against the land, we
said, ‘Come, and let us go to Jerusalem for fear of the army of the Chaldeans
and the army of the Syrians.’ So we are living in Jerusalem’.
The meaning of
Jonadab (Jonah)
“Jonadab, is a contracted form of יהונדב,
Jehonadab …”.
The Jeho- element pertains, of course, to “the Lord”.
Whereas: The graceful verb נדב (nadab) connotes "an uncompelled and free movement
of the will unto divine service or sacrifice …".
The name “Jonah” (יוֹנָה), on the other hand, is taken to mean “dove”, as
explained at:
“There's
something deeply peculiar about the name Jonah. Pretty much all sources derive
it of the root יון, and render the name Dove. Jones' Dictionary of Old Testament
Proper Names, however, makes a striking observation (or perhaps even an error).
Jones suggests that the Hebrew word for dove comes from the verb ינה(yana),
meaning to oppress, vex, do wrong …”.
In our new
context, though, with Jonah identified as Jehonadab (Jonadab), then this latter
name
יונדב
would be the
actual foundation for the name, Jonah.
Part
Two (ii): In the realm of Jehu’s descendant, Jeroboam II
“[Jeroboam II] was the one who restored the
boundaries of Israel from Lebo Hamath
to the Dead Sea, in accordance with the word
of the Lord, the God of Israel,
spoken through his servant Jonah son of
Amittai, the prophet from Gath Hepher”.
2 Kings 14:25
Jeroboam II, of the Jehu-ide dynasty, would follow the
idolatrous pattern of Jeroboam I.
(2 Kings 14:23-24): “Jeroboam son of
Jehoash king of Israel became king in Samaria, and he reigned forty-one years. He
did evil in the eyes of the Lord and did not
turn away from any of the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, which he had caused
Israel to commit”.
To northern
Bethel
It was during this long reign that we hear again about
Jonah, prophesying of Jeroboam II’s success in ‘restoring the
boundaries of Israel from Lebo Hamath to the Dead Sea’.
The prophet Amos was also active during the reign of
Jeroboam II.
And, since I have previously identified the:
Prophet Micah as Amos
and have, in this present series, identified Micah
(Micaiah) further as Jonah (Jonadab = Elijah), then, based on this reconstruction
at least, Amos must be the prophet Jonah.
From the brief autobiography of Amos with which he
provides us in Amos 7, we learn that the prophet was originally ‘a herdsman, a
follower of his flock, and a gatherer of sycamores’ – a very ‘Rechabite’ type of
existence so it would seem. Thus we read (7:10-15):
Then
Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, Amos hath
conspired against thee in the midst of the house of Israel: the land is not
able to bear all his words.
For thus
Amos saith, Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel shall surely be led
away captive out of their own land.
Also
Amaziah said unto Amos, O thou seer, go, flee thee away into the land of Judah,
and there eat bread, and prophesy there: But prophesy not again any more at
Bethel: for it is the king's chapel, and it is the king's court.
Then
answered Amos, and said to Amaziah, I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet's
son; but I was an herdsman, and a gatherer of sycomore [sycamore] fruit:
And the Lord
took me as I followed the flock, and the Lord
said unto me, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel.
Here we learn some valuable added points about the
prophet, who was currently irritating the pseudo-priest of Bethel, Amaziah, in
the same blunt fashion as he (as Elijah) had once done in the presence of king
Ahab of Israel.
We also learn that he was originally not a prophet, nor was he “a
prophet's son”.
That is surprising to learn in
the context of his alter ego, Elijah,
a seeming prophet of prophets.
And we are told that he was (just
like Elijah) nomadic, due to his having “followed the flock”. That is why we
find him “among the herdsmen of Tekoa” (Amos 1:1) when he (as
Amos) was called back into the Lord’s service. Tekoa was not a suitable place
for sycamore trees, nor was it the prophet’s place of origin.
In
the time of Jehu, we had found him (as Jonadab) appropriately in the region of
“Beth Eked of the Shepherds”.
Similarly
Gilead, mentioned in I Kings 17:1 in connection with Elijah, was a land most
suitable for livestock. (Cf. Numbers 32:1)
Some of Amos’s
likenesses to Jonah
First of all, Amos was like Elijah as has
often been observed. For instance:
… when major portions of Amos’ work is overlaid atop Elijah’s narrative … it
becomes apparently clear just how integrated these two texts are. One could
even suggest Amos was, not only quite familiar with, but perhaps utilize the
national memory of Elijah’s ministry while composing his material. As we follow
Elijah’s trek throughout Israel, Judah, and beyond, we will integrate Amos’
writings which occurs [sic] a hundred years later.
Furthermore:
Just as Elijah was
told (I Kings 17:9): ‘Arise, get thee to …’ (קוּם לֵךְ); and as
Jonah was told (Jonah
1:2): “Arise, go to …’ (קוּם לֵךְ אֶל); so, now, is
Amos told (Amos
7:15): “Go prophesy to …’ (לֵךְ הִנָּבֵא אֶל)
We had found that the Bible appears to lack patronyms for
Elijah, also for Micah, and that Jonadab’s presumed father, Rekab, may well
have been, instead, an epithet for Jonadab himself.
On the positive side (patronymic-wise), I wrote:
According
to Elijah as Micaiah, his father (or ancestor) was Imla[h].
According
to Elijah as Jonah, his father (or ancestor) was Amittai.
Whether Imlah is the same person as Amittai, I cannot say
at this stage.
But, as for the name Amittai for Jonah’s father, or
ancestor, my suggestion would be that - with Jonah now identified as Amos -
Amittai refers to king Amaziah of Judah, to whom Amos is said to have been
related: https://meditationsofacopt.wordpress.com/2012/09/08/is-amos-the-prophet-
“Amos, Isaiah’s father was the
brother of King Amaziah of Juda (Talmud tractate Megillah 15a) …”. That may
mean ‘brother-in-law’ through marriage.
And this could be the reason why our composite prophet
bore as well this other name, Amos (Amaziah), in connection with king Amaziah.
Amos will make two statements at least that could connect
him with Jonah.
At an earlier period Amos (as Jonah) had told of
Jeroboam’s success in ‘restoring the boundaries of
Israel from Lebo Hamath to the Dead Sea’.
But
now, with Jeroboam II facing dire punishment for his apostasy, Jonah-as-Amos
will tell of that same geography now to come under severe harassment from
(presumably) the Assyrians. Amos 6:14: “For the LORD God Almighty declares,
‘I will stir up a nation against you, Israel, that will oppress you all the way
from Lebo Hamath to the valley of the Arabah’.”
Again, this prophet had once, as Elijah, run down the
prophets of Baal to Mount Carmel, but had also, as Jonah, tried to escape from
the Lord, ending up in the belly of a sea monster. And so Amos will declare
from past experience (9:3): “Though they hide on the
summit of Carmel, I will search them out and take them from there; And though
they conceal themselves from My sight on the floor of the sea, From there I
will command the serpent and it will bite them’.
Part
Three:
As
Micah during the reign of Hezekiah
“Because of this I will weep and wail; I will go about barefoot and
naked.
I will howl like a jackal and moan like an owl”.
Micah 1:8
King Ahaziah of Israel was immediately able to recognise
that the description of a man uttering prophetic words about him pertained to
Elijah (2 Kings 1:7-8): “The king asked them, ‘What kind of man was
it who came to meet you and told you this?’ They replied, ‘He had a garment of
hair and had a leather belt around his waist’. The king said, ‘That was Elijah
the Tishbite’.”
In this series I have extended the prophet Jonah to
embrace Jonadab the Rechabite; Elijah; Amos; and Micaiah = Micah.
Only two of these names, we have determined, have a
patronymic added: Jonah has Amittai, and
Micaiah has Imla[h]. {Rekab, for
Jonadab, we considered to have been an epithet}.
Neither Elijah, Amos, nor Micah has a father’s name added
– and this applies to Micah also in the Book of Judith (6:15): “… Uzziah
son of Micah, of the tribe of Simeon …”.
As Amos was the father of Isaiah, so again was Amos-as-Micah
the father of Isaiah, who was the “Uzziah” of the Book of Judith.
This was a father and son prophetic combination, uttering
parallel pronouncements.
“The greatest similarity is that Micah 4:1-4 and Isaiah 2:4-6 are almost
identically word for word”: https://biblehub.com/isaiah/20-3.htm
And
Micah’s going barefoot and naked, is
perfectly paralleled, too, by his son Isaiah’s going “stripped and
barefoot” (Isaiah 20:3).
In similar fashion was the prophet Elijah conspicuous for
his distinctive prophetic garb, or lack thereof, his “garment of hair”, or
perhaps he was “hairy” as some have interpreted it.
Prophetically active from Ahab to Hezekiah, our composite
(but real) Jonah had a very long floruit.
But it is biologically possible considering a probably necessary
chronological shortening of this era, plus traditions telling that the prophet Jonah
had lived to 120, or 130.
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