442 FISH OF MOSES— JONAH— SOLOMON'S RING 



the development of the higher criticism and of comparative 



mythology hardly draw the tensely interested congregations 



of yore. 



Tylor points out that at the root of the apologue of Jonah 



lies the widely-spread Nature-myth of the sea-monster or 



dragon, of which the fight between 

 Tiamat and Marduk, and of 

 Andromeda and the sea-monster 

 are analogous developments, i 



Cheyne detects the link between 

 the original myth and the story 

 of Jonah in Jeremiah li. 34, " he 

 hath swallowed me up as a dragon : 

 he hath filled his maw with my 

 delicates : he hath cast me out," 

 and again in verse 44, " and I 

 will bring forth out of his mouth 

 that which he has swallowed up." 



Allusions to mythical dragons 

 occur elsewhere, as in Psalm Ixxiv. 

 13, " Thou breakest the heads of 

 the dragons (or sea-monsters) in 

 the water." The curious belief in 

 a dragon or fish that swallows the 

 moon spreads wide. This draws 

 from Mr. R. C. Thompson 2 the 

 comment, " when it is remembered 

 that Jonah was swallowed by the 

 ' great fish ' for three days (the 

 period of the moon's disappearance 

 at the end of the month), the coin- 

 cidence is well worth considering ; 



especially as Jonah is the Hebrew word for dove, and it was 



at Harran, the city sacred to the Moon God, that the dove 



was sacrificed (Al. Nadim, 294)." 



But whatever the " great fish," and whatever the story's 



^ An excellent monograph by Hans Schmidt (Jona Eine Untersuchung 

 Ziir vergleichenden Religionsgeshichte, Gottingen, 1907) gives 39 cuts, 

 « Op. cit.. p. 53. 



JONAH LEAVING THE WHALE'S 

 MOUTH, 



From a 14th Century MS. in 

 H. Schmidt, Jona, p. 94, fig. 17. 



The picture shows that while 

 the whale's gastric juices had 

 completely absorbed Jonah's 

 clothes and curls, they prevailed 

 not, possibly from callosity of 

 hide, against his body. 



