09-08-2007, 03:35 AM
Eh... The "sheol" argument is pretty new to me. I don't really find it as strong as Wael's original point. I mean, sure, maybe Jonah felt that he was in a desperate situation, or even perhaps saw himself as dead. Yet, regardless, Jonah wasn't dead. Plus, we can only start to examine all this only if we were certain that "shoel" is meant as grave and not "hell", "pit", or "place of no return".
I don't see a strong connection between:
1- The death of Christ
2- The desperate situation of Jonah that FELT like death.
As Wael has said in his earlier post, Jesus was putting all his eggs in one basket. If that was indeed the case, he'd be really specific with the miracle that was to be performed.
Heck, if we were to look so figuratively into everything then we could interpret any single one of the miracles of Christ as similar to Jonah. I could be wrong, but I believe that Christ was very specific with his words. I've heard Catholics argue that eating the flesh and drinking the blood should be taken literally since Christ was so specific...
*shrugs*