Bible Contradiction? Was Jonah swallowed by a fish or a whale?

Today’s post will tackle another question that the Skeptic Annotated Bible asked: “Was Lot Abraham’s brother or nephew?”

Here are the two answers which the skeptic believes shows a Bible contradiction:

Jonah was swallowed by a big fish.

And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the stomach of the fish three days and three nights. (Jonah 1:17)

Jonah was swallowed by a whale.

for just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. (Matthew 12:40)

(Note: Scriptural quotation comes from the New American Standard Bible)

Here’s a closer look at whether or not there is a contradiction:

1. When dealing with skeptics’ claim of a Bible contradiction it seems one can never be reminded too much of what exactly is a contradiction.  A contradiction occurs when two or more claims conflict with one another so that they all cannot simultaneously be true in the same sense and at the same time.
2. Looking at our passages that mention “big fish” and “whale,” we need to remember that the English translation of both verses comes from two texts that was originally written in two different languages.This should caution the skeptic in making a claim that there’s a Bible contradiction if one haven’t looked at the usage of the term lexically and the range of possible meaning for the terms used to describe the sea creature that swallowed Jonah.  For instance, one way in which we can see the contradiction get resolved is if the word in one language overlap with another word in another language.  Logically speaking the possibility of overlap can be that one word is more general while the other word is more specific; or both words have multiple meanings but among the semantic range they both refer to the same object.   Thus in this post I will focus more on the original languages rather than our English translations per se.
3. Let’s familiarize ourselves with the words in the original languages that is foundational for all that would follow.  As part of the Jewish Old Testament Jonah 1:17 was written in Hebrew and the phrase “big fish” in Hebrew is דָּ֣ג גָּדֹ֔ול, with the word דָּ֣ג being the one translated as “fish,” and גָּדֹ֔ול being an adjective meaning “big, large, etc.”  As part of the New Testament Matthew 12:40 was written in Greek and the word translated in English as “whale” (KJV) or “sea monster” (NASB) is from the Greek word κῆτος.
4. My argument is going to be that there is no contradiction when one studies the semantic range of both the Hebrew and Greek terms being used since they both are referring to the same thing.  What follows below is my argument that starts from the simple and progresses to the more technical aspect of my argument.
5. One doesn’t have to pretend to be a Hebrew and Greek professor to see there’s not a contradiction in the original language in terms of the meaning of the words.  The truth of the matter is, there’s a sense that the scholars between the time of the Old and New Testament would know the languages of Greek and Hebrew better than most of our contemporary language scholars since these are today “dead languages” that we don’t converse with in a day to day manner like the ancients did.  We must then ask whether the religious Jews and early Christians who knew Greek saw a contradiction between the Hebrew word דָּ֣ג (what the English translated as “fish”) and the Greek term κῆτος (what the English translated as “whale” or “sea monster”)?  How would we be able to find out such a thing?  Sometime between the first century BC to first century AD before the dawn of Christianity Jewish scribes and scholars put together a Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament called the Septuagint.  Of course they had to translate the Hebrew word דָּ֣ג into an appropriate Greek term since דָּ֣ג is found three times in the book of Jonah (in our English Bibles, it is in Jonah 1:17, 2:1, 2:10).  What Greek words did they choose?  They chose the Greek word κῆτος.  κῆτος is the same word that is found in Matthew 12:40!  Contrary to our skeptic, these scholars (who knew the language better than our skeptic does) did not see a contradiction between דָּ֣ג and κῆτος.  Since the scholars behind the Septuagint was translating this for Greek speaking Jews this further reinforce our argument that a necessary contradiction of meaning between דָּ֣ג and κῆτος is unlikey lest the people reading it would have raised an eyebrow.
6. We don’t have to depend upon the translators of the Septuagint to clear the contradiction.  Let’s also look at the Hebrew דָּ֣ג a little more closely and note why we don’t have a contradiction.
   1. There is not a necessary contradiction between דָּ֣ג and κῆτος once we understand the lexical range of the Hebrew word דָּ֣ג.  First off, the word דָּ֣ג can be used as a general term for sea creatures and shouldn’t be understood as merely “fish,” as we understand that term in our modern English.
      1. In Genesis 9:2 we read “The fear of you and the terror of you will be on every beast of the earth and on every bird of the sky; with everything that creeps on the ground, and all the fish of the sea, into your hand they are given.”  Here we see that  דָּ֣ג which is translated loosely as “fish” has the meaning of sea creatures in general according to the context.  In Genesis 9 God is making the Noahic covenant which is a universal covenant in which the recipients and benificaries are all of God’s creatures.  To capture the universal aspect of the covenant God addresses creatures in the area of ground, air and sea.  Thus in light of the reference to other creatures of the ground and air is general we should also understand  דָּ֣ג as referring to sea creatures in general.
      2. Brown-Driver-Briggs Lexicon also lists  Psalm 8:9, Hosea 4:3, Zephaniah 1:3 and Ezekiel 38:20 as additional verses that are “opposed to beasts & birds” which contrasts suggests that  דָּ֣ג can be used to refer to sea creatures in general.
      3. The point is this: If  דָּ֣ג can be used as a general term for sea creatures, the thought that Jonah being swallowed by a  דָּ֣ג (which is stated without the adjective “big” in Jonah 2:1 and 2:10) is not contradictory with Matthew 12:40 in which Matthew 12:40 identifies the sea creature more specifically.
   2. While Jonah 2:1 and 2:10 uses the term  דָּ֣ג without any adjectives, it seems that with the adjective “big”  דָּ֣ג can refer to a sea creature that’s a little more specific in Jonah 1:17.  Obviously it is one that is be big enough to swallow Jonah who was an adult male Jewish prophet.  Such a creature definitely matches the description of the Greek word κῆτος and therefore is not a contradiction.
7. Let’s look at the Greek κῆτος a little more closely and note why we don’t have a contradiction.
   1. Koine Greek had more words for sea creatures than Biblical Hebrew does.  Jesus’ deliberate use of the term κῆτος in Matthew 12:40 followed that of the Greek Septuagint and κῆτος is the best term to describe the sea creature in Jonah.  Thus there is no contradiction.
      1. Besides κῆτος, there’s also the word ἰχθύς for “fish.”  But ἰχθύς is often used to refer to little fish or fishes that can be caught, eaten and sold by man (see “ἰχθύς,” New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology and Exegesis 2:564-65).  The word ἰχθύς certainly isn’t fitting to describe the sea creature of Jonah 1-2.
      2. In fact, if Jesus used the term ἰχθύς it would more likely to be a contradiction than if He used the term κῆτος.  Thus the use of κῆτος is contrary to the skeptic’s claim of a contradiction.
   2. What does κῆτος mean then?  They were essentially monsters of the sea.  It is a term that makes it appearances in Greek mythology to refer to large sea creatures.  It appropriately describes the sea creature of Jonah 1-2.  Thus, Jesus used the term in Matthew 12:40 and so do others as the Septuagint attests.
8. The contradiction before us have already been cleared.  However sometimes skeptic persists to say that a whale is not a “big fish.”  But we must not impose our taxonomy and specific break down of animal biology and read them unto the Greek or Hebrew text.  That would be a word study fallacy.  Also, language by nature isn’t always as precise and exacting; it only would be so when the need arises.  We must not make the categorical fallacy of dismissing a general term because a specific one can be later used.  At the same time this does not mean that since language isn’t as exact as it can be (especially at a later date), that doesn’t mean there’s no truth behind what was said for what is the referents remain the same.  Don’t confuse that since a word is not as precise that must mean it is saying something false. One witness said he saw a dog attacked a man.  Another person said a big dog attack a man.  Still another witness says a German Shepherd attacked a man.  All witnesses are telling the truth, though their language might vary with its precision concerning the referent.

If someone tells you this is a Bible contradiction, well now you know something is fishy with their conclusion.