But Jonah rose up to flee. — The motive of the prophet’s flight is given by himself (Jonah 4:2). He foresaw the repentance of the city, and the mercy which would be displayed towards it, and was either jealous of his prophetic reputation, or had a patriotic dislike of becoming a messenger of good to a heathen foe so formidable to his own country.
Tarshish. — This can hardly be any other than Tartessus, an ancient Phœnician colony on the river Guadalquivir, in the south-west of Spain. (See Genesis 10:4; 1 Chronicles 1:7.)
A profound moral lesson lies in the choice of this refuge by Jonah. A man who tries to escape from a clearly-recognised duty — especially if he can at the time supply conscience with a plausible excuse — is in danger of falling all the lower, in proportion as his position was high. Jonah, commanded to go to Nineveh, in the far north-east, instantly tries to flee to the then farthermost west. Often between the saintly height and an abyss of sin there is no middle resting-point. The man with the highest ideal, when unfaithful to it, is apt to sink lower than the ordinary mortal.
From the presence of the Lord. — Rather, from before the face of Jehovah. The words may imply (1) the belief in a possibility of hiding from the sight of God (as in Genesis 3:8), a belief which, as we gather from the insistence on its opposite in Psalms 139, lingered late in the popular conception; (2) a renunciation of the prophetic office. (Comp. Deuteronomy 10:8; 1 Kings 17:1); (3) Flight from the Holy Land, where the Divine presence was understood to be especially manifested. Commentators have generally rejected the first of these as implying ignorance unworthy of a prophet; but, on embarking, Jonah went below, as if still more securely to hide, and used the same expression to the mariners, who would certainly take it in its literal and popular sense.
Joppa. — Heb., Yâpho; now Jaffa, the port of Jerusalem. (See Joshua 19:46; 2 Chronicles 2:16.)
He found a ship. — Probably a Phœnician vessel trading between Egypt and Spain, and accustomed to touch at Joppa.