I picked three little exerpts which spoke to me which all fit together as they come from the Bible. “And God created great whales,” from Genesis, “Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah,” from Jonah, and “There go the ships; there is that Leviathan whom thou hast made to play therein,” from Psalms.

“And God created great whales,” from Genesis. Whales have been around since the beginning of time, they were created and have a purpose on this planet as they swim through our vast oceans. Many may believe that whales within Christianity symbolize a prophetic movement as they communicate with song through the oceans; they are like messangers who travel and bring that news with them. Whales are the largest animal in the ocean and they are very majestic creatures which we can also see within Moby Dick. But that whale is a lot more aggressive than what can normally be seen in nature.

With the line, “Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah,” that fish which the Lord made made to swallow Jonah was most likely a very large whale. All devine intervention from God that Jonah end up in that situation and even write about it. Like how Jonah had the experience with the large sea creature, in Moby Dick we see the sailors and Ahab fighting against the whale throughout the story. The situation that Jonah ended up in with the whale made in ponder, reflect and repent as then the creature spits him back out to land. As we will come to read that Ahab deals with the agression of the whale and most likely we will see his thoughts as we read through the book.

“There go the ships; there is that Leviathan whom thou hast made to play therein,” from Psalms. This immediately made me think of how giant Moby Dick is described in the book and how destructive the whale must be. The whale having the whole ocean to play in and the boats and ships being minuscule compared to the size of the whale. The “leviathan” in the Bible is in reference to God’s people’s enemies that will bring destruction and havoc which we can also see within Melville’s classic too. A giant ocean being coming to terrorize the men on the boat.

I can’t wait to dive into the book this week!