It seems like it's always been true that when something traumatic is going on, that poets and musicians compose verse and song. Francis Scott Key watches Fort McHenry in Baltimore getting attacked and attacking back in 1814--and writes the poem that becomes our National Anthem, "The Star Spangled Banner". Agonizing over loving his friend George Harrison's wife, Eric Clapton writes "Layla" (Patti was her actual name), expressing his wrenching emotions (Clapton eventually married her after she was divorced from Harrison, and eventually she and Clapton divorced). Having lost his business and his 4-year old son in the Chicago fire in 1871, and his four daughters to drowning when the ship they were on sank in 1873 (his wife survived)--in the depths of this profound personal despair, Horatio Spafford writes "It Is Well With My Soul".
Jonah's words in chapter 2 are a prayer, in a similar form to the Psalms--which is the book of the Bible used in the worship of the Israelites as their hymnal. And as many of the Psalms were written by David, and we know he was a musician--he used to play for King Saul when Saul was having rough times--we have more insight that they were songs. And some of the Psalms are fascinating in their subject matter and timeliness also. After things got rocky in his relationship with King Saul, such that Saul wanted to kill him, David writes some of the Psalms in bizarre circumstances. For example, he's fleeing from Saul, hiding in a cave, fearing for his life, so he writes a song about it, Psalm 142.
Jonah's song here is kind of like David's Psalm 142, except he's not in a cave; he's in the belly of a fish, deep in the Mediterranean Sea. The story tells us that he's in that fish's belly for three days. We don't know which day this song was written--maybe it happened at once; maybe it took all three days (I have written songs that happened in one burst, and others that took years--some aren't finished yet!). But in any case, he's in a completely bizarre unprecedented situation, with no idea what is going to happen, or if he's even going to survive, and yet he says (Jonah 2:2) "I called to the Lord out of my distress, and he answered me; out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and you heard my voice". Even in the belly of a fish, deep in the sea, God hears us.
Jonah's journey isn't finished, as we know. And he's not finished trying to run away from what God wants him to do, even if not literally running away in the opposite direction. But somehow, every step along the way, God stays with him, even if Jonah's not all that "with" God. Jonah is cared for, even while running away. And Jonah seems somehow to know this. There's some insight for us.
OLD TESTAMENT Jonah 2 A Psalm of Thanksgiving
1 Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the belly of the fish, 2 saying,
‘I called to the Lord out of my distress,
and he answered me;
out of the belly of Sheol I cried,
and you heard my voice.
3 You cast me into the deep,
into the heart of the seas,
and the flood surrounded me;
all your waves and your billows
passed over me.
4 Then I said, “I am driven away
from your sight;
how shall I look again
upon your holy temple?”
5 The waters closed in over me;
the deep surrounded me;
weeds were wrapped around my head
6 at the roots of the mountains.
I went down to the land
whose bars closed upon me forever;
yet you brought up my life from the Pit,
O Lord my God.
7 As my life was ebbing away,
I remembered the Lord;
and my prayer came to you,
into your holy temple.
8 Those who worship vain idols
forsake their true loyalty.
9 But I with the voice of thanksgiving
will sacrifice to you;
what I have vowed I will pay.
Deliverance belongs to the Lord!’
10 Then the Lord spoke to the fish, and it spewed Jonah out upon the dry land.