For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
All Commentaries on Matthew 12:40 Go To Matthew 12
Rabanus Maurus
AD 856
He shows that the Jews were as criminal as the Ninevites, and that unless they repented they would be destroyed. But like as punishment was denounced against the Ninevites, and at the same time a remedy was set before them, so neither should the Jews despair of pardon, if at least after Christ’s resurrection they should do penitence. For Jonah, that is The Dove, or The mourner, is a sign of Him on whom the Holy Spirit descended in the form of a Dove, and “who bare our sorrows.” The fish which swallowed Jonas in the sea, hews forth the death which Christ suffered in the world. Three days and nights was the one in the whale’s belly, the other in the tomb; the one was cast up on dry land, the other arose in glory. So that not even by taking in those six hours, three of darkness, and three of restored light, can we establish the computation of three days and three nights. It remains therefore that we find the explanation in that usual manner of Scripture of putting a part for the whole.
