Jonah 3:4-10; 4:1-2 Do these verses indicate that biblical prophets sometimes make mistakes??

Question

Jonah's prediction about the destruction of Nineveh did not come to pass ( Jonah 3:4-10, 4:1-2 . Clearly, then, a bibilical prophet made a mistake in this case. Some argue that if Jonah was not condemned, neither should modern "prophets" ( such as the Watchtower Society ) be condemned for making false prophecies.

Answer 1

Jonah most certainly did NOT make a mistake. Since he was speaking directly for God, and God cannot lie, then there is no room for mistakes.

Furthermore, according to Deuteronomy 18:20-22, where God laid down the law regarding false prophets, God says we are not to heed someone who claims to speak for God yet his words do not come to pass. He is a false prophet and God's judgement upon Him is nothing less than death.

Now, let's analyze Jonah's situation: First of all, he is swallowed by the big fish and God SAVES him. God does not put him to death in accordance with his own law regarding false prophets. Wouldn't this have been the perfect opportunity to let him die, if he were indeed a false prophet?

Now, let's analyze the situation in Ninevah. What did God say? He told Jonah to go to the city and preach a call to repentance. God told Jonah that they would not be destroyed if they accepted that call and repented of their sins. Did they? Yes, they did! So, God turned back His anger, just as He had promised He would do if they repented.

This is most certainly not a case of a prophet making a "mistake", because according to God's law there is no such thing as someone making a mistake if they really speak for Him. What we have here was a simple case of God relenting from passing judgement due to people's repentance and it is a prototype of how God operates with us today. We were all under the death sentance because of our sin (Romans 5:12), but because Christ died in our stead, we are not put to death. Rather, we are able to approach God directly (Hebrews 4: 14-16), repent of our sins (1 John 1: 9), and not come under condemnation (John 3:18; 5:24).

Answer 2

All religions have an idea of what the future holds for mankind.
Some believe the earth will burn up. They will all go to heaven. Some believe the majority of humans will burn in hell for an eternity. Some find that repulsive and untrue.
Having freedom of religion in this country I guess they can believe anything they want.
They certainly would not be the first religion to change certain things about the last days.
In reading the bible it leads me to believe that the apostles thought the end was coming in their day. The urgency with witch they write makes it sound like they thought it was coming before their death. John the Babtist asked Jesus are you the messiah or should we expect another?
They all thought that when the messiah came he would change the world. Possiblely get him out of prison.
there has never been a time in human history when they didn't believe it was the last days.
During the year 1000CE they sold homes and herds and went to monastaries and awaited the change thinking after 1000 years Jesus would come back and take over the world.
when it didn't happen did they give up? The next generation awaited the coming of Christ.
1 corinthians 7:29 The apostle Paul told the early Christians the time left is reduced. Those who have wives be as those who have none. Even ignoring their wives to preach the good news.
Was Paul a false prophet because he said the time left is reduced. Telling the men in that day to just concentrate on their preaching. We have little time to do this.
Others have that same urgercy from Peter to Luke we read this. So if that is the case then they were all false prophets.
Paul was wrong about the date, but he was not a false prophet.
Jesus said no one knows the day or the hour. So all religions are just guessing. So does that make them all false?

Answer 3

Jon 3:2 Rise up, go to Nineveh, the great city, and cry out to it the proclamation that I am declaring to you.

Key verse. This was the message God sent Jonah with. He didn't make it up nor did God give him a vision of destruction to declare, he simply told them what God said.

Jon 4:10 And Jehovah said, You have had pity on the plant for which you had not labored, nor made it grow, which was the son of a night and perished the son of a night,
Jon 4:11 and should I not have pity on Nineveh, the great city in which are more than a hundred and twenty thousand of mankind who do not know between the right and the left hand, and many cattle?

Another key verse. God knew the men of Nineveh would repent, that was His plan all along. He had plans to use Assyria later on, concerning Israel.

The time of prophets ended with Christ.
Heb 1:1 In many ways and in various ways of old, God spoke to the fathers in the prophets;
Heb 1:2 in these last days He spoke to us in the Son, whom He appointed heir of all; through whom He indeed made the ages;

Answer 4

God is moved when people repent. Also Elijah prophecied a person would die. But then the person prayed to God about it, so God gave the person many more years of life.

Also. Jesus confirmed Jonah & the whale story. By comparing this with when Jesus would die & be in the center of the earth. So? It was important for Jonah to die in the whale & then come back to earth. And that repentence is a key. Ninevah repented.

But to predict the time of the return of Jesus Christ (then it didn't happen) or to have some very obvious errors, just means that we don't need to be afraid (or respect) of these Prophets because they didn't hear the LORD. If a prophets goal was to lead people away from the gospel of Christ or from the LORD God, then that Prophet is a false Prophet that is purposely trying to lead people astray.

Kim Clement has a lot of information about this in his new book, 'Call Me Crazy, but I'm hearing GOD / Secrets to Hearing the Voice of God' http://www.kimclement.com . Because He gets a Word from the Lord & is in the office of Prophet today. And one is in more danger of being deceived if the prophecy comes true & then the false prophet leads people to false gods. In the Old Testament, these prophets were stoned to death.

But to make a mistake because someone thought he heard God, they were to just not be afraid of that self called prophet because he didn't hear God.

In the case of Jonah & Elijah, though, they did hear the LORD God. Too many are afraid of being wrong & it wasn't God. But God wants us to seek God in prayer & to listen.

I believe the Watchtower foundational prophecies were too wrong to have actually been heard from the Lord. So? I don't fear their different that the mainstream Christian teachings as being from God. That was their foundational human understanding of end times.


Also, Kim comments on the coment that all Prophets are 100% correct, in his book. That this has hindered people with real prohetic gifts because they were afraid of condemnation if they were wrong. We have to realize that every Prophet is human. Prophets can have a vision or a dream or a Word & not understand it. And sometimes be wrong about it. We also need discernment of the meaning of the vision or the dream or Word by asking God's meaning in it.

Examples are when my home town Pastor had a vision jsut before 9/11. Of New York, the Statue of Liberty holding up a sword instead of a light. And there were planes & there was thundering & lightening. And he only knew that something bad was going to happen. He should have really asked God for understanding. But many times we don't reallize the importance of understanding. I do believe they prayed for New York.

Then in my husbands child hood Church. A person had a dream of Jesus return & thought it was going to happen as such & such a time. So? This embarrassed my husband when he was a child. And it didn't happen at that time. So? I guess that he had a dream of the Lords return. But didn't get the date right. I am sure that God gave him the dream. But we need to know that it is written that no one knows the hour. We are suppose to be ready because Jesus is coming back soon.

Answer 5

God's prophets sometimes sinned. Jonah disobeyed God when God instructed him to go to Nineveh to warn them of impending judgment. Jonah, however repented after the experience of being in the belly of a great fish for 3 days and finally obeyed God.

Nineveh also repented of their sins and God's judgment was postponed until Nineveh returned to the way that demanded God's judgment in the first place.

Though sinners, God's prophets are a 100% correct when it comes to the accuracy of their prophecies.

Something to think about.. If somebody was trying to make the prophets out to be better than they were.. Do you think that their sins would be recorded in the Bible?

As for self appointed prophets such as Mohammad, Russell, and Smith, etc... Their prophecies are a direct contradiction of the Bible, and history.

Answer 6

Surely Biblical prophets are just the same human like us but they are/were inspired to reveal things ahead of time. (2 Timothy 3:16-17) We never condemn any false cults like the Watchtower Society but we just show how greatly in mistakes they are and hope that they can self-realized and return to the right Bible perspective as what St. Paul admonishes Timothy. (2 Timothy 2:15) So they can also escape God's condemnation in the future when the time comes that He will put all things in order. Be a real Christian that is Bible centered where the Bible really is our final authority in faith and in practice.

Answer 7

Hi Nina,
The reason that Jonah did not want to go to Nineveh was that he knew God, and knew that if the Ninevites repented God would have mercy on them (Jonah 4:2). So Jonah did not make a mistake, he spoke what God told him to speak. Many of God's threats of Judgement, and promises of blessing are conditional on our response, we can either repent and obey or continue to go our own way. False prophets like the Watchtower Society were not speaking God's words in the first place, even though they claimed to be, there is no excuse for them.

Answer 8

It’s true that Jonah's prophecy about the destruction of Nineveh did not come to pass in Jonahs’ life time. There was an implied condition or contingency in Jonah's statement to Nineveh "Unless you repent, God will destroy you." Nineveh was not destroyed because it repented. However, Nineveh’s fall did occur in 612 B.C. After two years of siege, an army of Babylonians destroyed Nineveh.

The false prophesies of Watchtower Society can not be compared with Jonah’s prophecy that was contingent on the repentance of Nineveh.

A false prophet in Old Testament was guilty of death penalty. (Deuteronomy 13:1-5; 18:20-22)

In New Testament, Jesus said, "Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. By their fruit you will recognize them.” (Mathew 7)

Answer 9

If you go to Matthew 12: 41 it states, Men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with this generation and will condemn it , because they repented at what Jonah preached. God before he destroys gives a chance of repentance and they did and was spared. JW's love to use that for cover of failed prophecies but they were spared because of repentance, it does not cover the JW's failed prophesies.

Answer 10

Actually, as with all Biblical prophets, Jonah made no predictions of his own. He merely told the Ninevites what God had told him to tell them. Thus, Jonah is not to blame at all -- and neither is God. The problem was that Jonah forgot, momentarily, that God always provides a method of escape from damnation -- which is, true repentance brings forgiveness.

Jonah 3:10 And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.