The Sign of Jonah in Luke, Acts, and Matthew
By (author) J. Tyler Brown
Paperback (Forthcoming)
(December 2026)
ISBN: 9783162007742
6.1 x 9.13 inches
Price: $134.00
J. Tyler Brown uncovers the surprising reach and narrative centrality of the Sign of Jonah in Luke, Acts, and Matthew. Set alongside the prophet’s wider ancient Jewish and Christian reception, Jonah’s mysterious Sign emerges as a positive one, summoning Israel to repentance.
J. Tyler Brown challenges prevailing views of the Sign of Jonah, arguing that the Sign matters more to the Lukan writings and Matthew’s Gospel than is conventionally recognized, in both the extent of its influence and its narrative centrality. Whereas much scholarship regards Jonah’s Sign as fundamentally condemnatory, both Evangelists understand it as a positive sign provoking Israel to repentance.
Adopting a synthetic and intertextual approach, the author examines for the first time the complete range of Jonah’s influence throughout Luke, Acts, and Matthew, including explicit references and literary allusions. He situates them within Jonah’s ancient Jewish reception and in eastern Mediterranean sources spanning the Second Temple period through late antiquity, notably the neglected Pseudo-Philonic De Jona.
Ancient Jewish interpreters of Jonah typically foreground divine mercy, understand Nineveh’s salvation as affirming rather than subverting Israel’s election, and integrate Jonah’s deliverance into the whole narrative, with multiple sources linking it to the Red Sea crossing.
In Luke’s Gospel and Acts, the Sign unfolds as a scripturally ordained sequence: suffering, resurrection on the third day, proclamation of repentance to all nations. Jonah uniquely prefigures this sequence in order. For Matthew, the Sign is the Son of Man’s burial in the earth’s heart for three days and nights, addressed especially to the scribes and Pharisees. Each Evangelist’s stilling-of-the-storm pericope foreshadows his version of Jonah’s Sign.
Reception-historical analysis of the Evangelists’ ancient Christian interpreters attests these findings; at the same time, the study refutes the claim that Matthew and Luke are responsible for later anti-Jewish readings of Jonah.
1. Introduction
1.1 Status Quaestionis
1.2 Methodology
1.3 Order of Presentation
2. Jonah's Ancient Jewish Reception
2.1 Introduction
2.2 The Textual Jonah
2.3 Tobit
2.4 Judith
2.5 Sirach
2.6 Joseph and Aseneth
2.7 3 Maccabees
2.8 Josephus's Jewish Antiquities
2.9 M. Ta'anit
2.10 Hellenistic Synagogal Prayers (Apos. Con. VII 33-38)
2.11 The Ps.-Philonic De Jona
2.12 Mekilta de-Rabbi Ishmael
2.13 Fragment Targum (V) and Targum Neofiti
2.14 Targum Jonathan to the Prophets
2.15 Lives of the Prophets
2.16 Huqoq Synagogue Mosaics
2.17 Chapter Conclusion
3. The Sign of Jonah in Luke's Gospel and Acts
3.1 Introduction
3.2 The Sign of Jonah Pericope
3.3 The Sign of Jonah and the Lucan Opening of the Scriptures
3.4 Peter's Inauguration of the Gentile Mission from Joppa
3.5 The Voyage of Paul to Rome
3.6 The Sign of Jonah and Purported Lucan Supersessionism
3.7 The Stilling of the Storm
3.8 Simeon's "Sign Contradicted"
3.9 Chapter Conclusion
4. The Sign of Jonah in Matthew
4.1 Introduction
4.2 The First Sign of Jonah Pericope
4.3 Matthew's Second Sign of Jonah Pericope
4.4 Simon Peter and the Sign of Jonah?
4.5 Excursus on the Galilean Jonah
4.6 The Stilling of the Storm
4.7 The Rescue of the Sinking Peter
4.8 Gethsemane and Jonah's Death Wish?
4.9 Chapter Conclusion
5. Hearing the Matthean and Lucan Jonah with Ancient Readers
5.1 Introduction
5.2 The Sign of Jonah Sequence in Luke's Opening of the Scriptures (24:44-47)
5.3 A Sign Contradicted
5.4 Stilling the Tempests: The Stilling of the Storm and Jonah 1
5.5 Preachers to the Nations: Jonah and the Paul of Acts
5.6 Out of the Depths: Jonah and the Sinking Peter
5.7 Chapter Conclusion
6. Conclusion
6.1 Synthesis of Main Argument
6.2 Jonah in Ancient Jewish Reception
6.3 The Sign of Jonah and the Core Narrative Events of Luke
6.4 The Sign of Jonah and the Core Narrative Events of Matthew
6.5 The Matthean and Lucan Sign as Challenge to Repentance
6.6 Gentiles and the Sign of Jonah
6.7 Specific Points of Contact with the Ancient Jewish Jonah
6.8 Implications and Methodological Reflections
J. Tyler Brown (Von (Autor))
Born 1990; 2025 DPhil at the University of Oxford; Junior Research Fellow in New Testament Studies, Keble College, University of Oxford.
- By (author) J. Tyler Brown
Other Titles in this Series
Der Heilige Geist bei Lukas
Theologisches Profil, Grund und Intention der lukanischen Pneumatologie
Volume 389
The Ransom Logion in Mark and Matthew
Its Reception and Its Significance for the Study of the Gospels
Volume 327
2 Corinthians – a Letter about Reconciliation
A Psychagogical, Epistolographical and Rhetorical Analysis
Volume 239
Die Starken und die Schwachen in Korinth und in Rom
Zu Herkunft und Funktion der Antithese in 1Kor 8,1-11,1 und in Rom 14,1-15,13
Volume 200
Cosmic Christology in Paul and the Pauline School
Colossians and Ephesians in the Context of Graeco-Roman Cosmology, with a New Synopsis of the Greek Texts
Volume 171
Ephesians and Empire
An Evaluation of the Epistle's Subversion of Roman Imperial Ideology
Volume 573
Thaumaturgic Prowess
Autonomous and Dependent Miracle-Working in Mark's Gospel and the Second Temple Period
Volume 491
Figuren als Handlungsmodelle
Simon Petrus, die samaritische Frau, Judas und Thomas als Zugänge zu einer narrativen Ethik des Johannesevangeliums. Kontexte und Normen neutestamentlicher Ethik / Contexts and Norms of New Testament Ethics. Band VI
What was Mark for Matthew?
An Examination of Matthew's Relationship and Attitude to his Primary Source
Volume 344
Christ as the Telos of Life
Moral Philosophy, Athletic Imagery, and the Aim of Philippians
Volume 371
Allegory Transformed
The Appropriation of Philonic Hermeneutics in the Letter to the Hebrews
Volume 269
Makrothymia im Neuen Testament
Semantik und Ethik einer vergessenen ethischen Norm. Kontexte und Normen neutestamentlicher Ethik / Contexts and Norms of New Testament Ethics. Band XV
Sunde als Zielverfehlung bei Paulus
Eine Studie zum stoisch-sokratischen Kolorit paulinischer Hamartiologie
Volume 614
The Memory of Ignatius of Antioch
The Martyr as a Locus of Christian Identity, Remembering and Remembered
Volume 581
John 4:1-42 among the Biblical Well Encounters
Pentateuchal and Johannine Narrative Reconsidered
Volume 542
Redescribing Jesus’ Divinity Through a Social Science Theory
An Interdisciplinary Analysis of Forgiveness and Divine Identity in Ancient Judaism and Mark 2:1-12
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