The Lord shamed Jonah by the obedience

[Mary Naeem]

Pope Shenouda III

The Lord shamed Jonah by the obedience of the Ninevites, the faith and righteousness of the mariners and also by the obedience of the inanimate objects and the irrational creatures.
How marvelous it is to see all these on divine missions and official errands which they performed to the best and most perfect degree.
What were those irrational creatures that were beneficial elements in accomplishing the Divine purpose?
When Jonah went down into the ship, the Divine Inspiration tells us: "But the Lord sent out a great wind on the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship was about to be broken up" (Jon. 1:4).
The wind performed its duty. It was a messenger sent by the Lord. It led people to prayer so that everyone cried out to his god. The prophet went down into the ship, unconcerned about calling people to prayer, whereas this stormy wind succeeded in what the prophet failed. In this is a fulfillment of the words of the Psalm: "Stormy wind, fulfilling His word" (Ps. 148:8). We sing these beautiful words twice a day in the fourth antiphon, contemplating this wind which fulfils His word.
In the same way that this stormy wind performed its duty at the beginning of the story, so it performed another duty at its end, where the Holy Bible says: "And it happened, when the sun arose, that God prepared a vehement east wind, and the sun beat on Jonah's head so that he grew faint. Then he wished death for himself" (Jon. 4:8), and we have discussed this issue before here on st-takla.org in other pages. Thus Jonah came to reasoning with God which ended in his reconciliation to God. This was due to that stormy wind which was fulfilling His word. Is it not beautiful that this wind is described with more or less the same expression given to the mighty in strength, the angels of God, "who do His word, heeding the voice of His word" (Ps. 103:20)