He restored the coast of Israel from the entering of Hamath unto the sea of the plain, according to the word of the LORD God of Israel, which he spake by the hand of his servant Jonah, the son of Amittai, the prophet, which was of Gath-hepher.
He restored the coast of Israel ... Recovering the territory lost by the successful border incursions of Hazael (see the notes at 2 Kings 10:32), he re-established the ancient boundaries of the ten tribes. This result had been predicted by Jonah, of whom the only account transmitted to us is contained in this passage, and in the book called by his name. The prophecies by which he animated the patriotism of Jerobeam II in his long and severe struggles against the kings of Syria have not been recorded; for, although there was an unbroken series of prophets in Israel, none of them committed their predictions to writing; and Hosea, who lived after Jonah, in the latter end of the reign of this Jeroboam, was the first whose prophecies, receiving a permanent form, were afterward admitted into the sacred canon. As to Jonah's supposed parentage, see the notes at 1 Kings 17:17-23. His father's name was Amittai х 'Amitay (H573), true] - a name given him, according to Jewish tradition, in reference to his mother's saying (2 Kings 14:24), "Now I know that the word of the Lord in thy month is truth;" hence, they say, Jonah was called the son Amittai - i:e., the son of truth. Amittai is supposed to have been a prophet himself. If this Jewish tradition have any foundation, the family must have removed from Zarephath, or, at all events, Jonah himself, to Gath-hepher, a town of Zebulun, in lower Galilee.