Charles Spurgeon Commentary Jonah 4:2

"And he prayed unto Jehovah, and said, I pray thee, O Jehovah, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I hasted to flee unto Tarshish; for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in lovingkindness, and repentest thee of the evil." — Jonah 4:2 (ASV)

And he prayed to the LORD, and said, I pray You, O LORD, was not this my saying when I was still in my country? Therefore I fled before to Tarshish: for I knew that You are a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and You repent of the evil.

This was as much as if he had said to the Lord, "I went and did Your bidding, and told the Ninevites that they would be destroyed; but I knew in my heart that, if they repented, You would not carry out Your threat, and now You are too gracious, too kind, to these wicked people." It is a strange thing, is it not, that Jonah was angry because his message was blessed to his hearers? As a good commentator says, "When Christ sees of the travail of his soul, he is satisfied; but when Jonah saw of the travail of his soul, he was dissatisfied."

There are some men who stop preaching because they do not succeed; but here was one who was ready to give up because he did succeed. It is strange that such a good man as Jonah was should fall into such a foolish state of mind; but God still has a great many unwise children. You can find one if you look in the right place; I mean, in a mirror. We are all foolish at times; and it should be remembered that, although Jonah was foolish, and wrong in certain respects, there is this redeeming trait in his character – we might never have known the story of his folly if he had not written it himself.

It shows what a true-hearted man the prophet was, that he just unveiled his real character in this Book. Biographies of men are seldom truthful, because the writers cannot read the hearts of those whom they describe; and if they could read them, they would not like to print what they would see there. But here is a man, inspired of God to write his own biography, and he tells us of this sad piece of folly, and does not attempt in the least degree to mitigate the evil of it.