The father steps up to the lectern and begins his speech (after Herman Melville’s “Moby-Dick”):
Commissioners, this book, containing only four chapters – four yarns – is one of the smallest strands in the mighty cable of the Scriptures. Yet to what depths does Jonah’s soul sink! What a poignant lesson to us is this prophet! What a noble thing is that canticle in the town square! How billow-like and boisterously grand! We see liquor everywhere; rum and vodka all about us, on our rooftops and cobblestone streets, in our backyards and on our porches!
But what is this lesson that the Book of Jonah teaches? Fellow commissioners, it is a two-stranded lesson: A lesson to me as a pilot of the living God, and as sinful men, a lesson to us all, because it is a story of the sin, hard-heartedness, suddenly awakened fears, the swift punishment, repentance, prayers, and finally the deliverance of Jonah. As with all sinners, the sin of this son of Cambridge was in willful disobedience of the command of God. This command, as conveyed to him, was that he would not imbibe more than one alcoholic drink every 30 minutes. This he found a hard command. But all the things God would have us do are hard; hence, he oftener commands than endeavors to persuade. And if we obey God, we must disobey ourselves; herein lies the hardness of obeying God.
With this sin of disobedience in him, Jonah further flouts at God by trying to flee from Him. He thinks that if he only crosses the border into Somerville, he can find bars in which God does not reign, only bartenders. He skulks about the likes of The Burren, seeking as many glasses of beer as he can. He drinks late into the night, past the hour that any Christian city would deem the “last call.” And where is Somerville, commissioners? Not in Cambridge, as we take great pains to clarify! See ye not, commissioners, that Jonah sought to flee from God? Miserable man! Most contemptible and worthy of all scorn; with slouched hat and guilty eye, retreating from his God; prowling down Washington Street like a burglar and a sod. So self-condemning is his look, that, had the police not been so demoralized by Woke, Jonah would have been arrested!
As he crosses the town line, he enters a vile Somerville bar. And yet, as he crosses the threshold, the locals for a moment cease drinking their cocktails, to mark the stranger’s evil eye. Jonah sees this, but in vain tries to look at ease and confident; in vain he shows his wretched smile. Strong intuitions of the man assure the locals he can be no innocent. In their gamesome yet serious way, one whispers to the other, “Jack, it is he who steals hibiscus from our gardens”; “Joe, mark he who purloins cars in Winter Hill”; “Harry lad, he is said to order multiple drinks in the span of 30 minutes.”
“Who’s there?” cries the bartender from his busy desk, hurriedly cracking a PBR for a born townie. ”Who’s there?” Oh! How the harmless question mangles Jonah! For the instant he considers flight. But he remains. “I seek a pint of Guinness, can that be done, sir?” Thus far the busy bartender has not looked up at the man who stands before him now. No sooner does he hear that hollow voice does he cast a scrutinizing glance. “Say, are you not the heathen who ordered a drink but 20 minutes ago? Can you not wait 10 more?” asks the keeper.
“No sooner, sir?” appeals Jonah. ”Soon enough for any honest man to wait for a drink.” Ha! Jonah, that’s another stab. But Jonah does not relent. “I can pay. I’ll pay now for the drink.”
The bartender prepares to test the length of Jonah’s purse, and charges him thrice the usual sum for a drink. When Jonah doth not protest, the bartender knows there is a criminal before him. Yet he resolves to help a flight that paves its rear with gold and so serves Jonah his untimely poison.
As Jonah lifts the glass to his lips, a tide of criminals descends upon the bar. Twenty-year-olds with false IDs, addicts, robbers, charlatans and dreaded vagrants clamor for a drink. The bartender succumbs as the crowd overtakes the taps, pouring themselves drinks late into the night, past even 1 a.m. Men are yelling, and every plank thunders with trampling feet, and Jonah is himself passed out at the bar, sleeping his hideous sleep. He sees not the haven of crime and villainy he has unleashed. Presently the frightened bartender comes to him and shrieks in his ear, “What meanest thou, O sleeper! Arise!” Startled from his slumber by that direful cry, Jonah staggers to his feet and looks upon the chaos unfolding before him. Waves of drunkards spill from the bar onto the quiet residential street, bellowing and howling and vomiting, till the neighbors come nigh to drowning in the sea of sinners.
Terrors upon terrors run shouting through his soul. In all his cringing attitudes, the God-fugitive is now too plainly known. The neighbors mark him as the cause of this great tempest, and how furiously they mob him with questions. “What is thine occupation? From whence comest thou? Thy country? What people?”
“I am from Cambridge,” he cries, then “I fear the Lord the God of Heaven who hath made bars and their tenders!” Fear Him, O Jonah? Aye, well mightest thou fear the Lord God then! He now goes on to make a full confession; whereupon the neighbors became more and more appalled, but still pitiful. When wretched Jonah cries out to them to cast him forth into the street – for he knew that for his sake this great tempest was upon them – they mercifully turn from him and seek by other means to save their city. But all in vain; the indignant gale howls louder. At last, one hand raised invokingly to God and the other ahold of Jonah, they reluctantly take him to the police station themselves.
And now behold Jonah shackled and locked up, when instantly a calmness floats from the east as Jonah carries down the criminals with him, leaving an empty and quiet street behind. Then Jonah prays unto the Lord as he lays there in that cell. For sinful as he is, Jonah does not weep and wail for direct deliverance. He feels that his dreadful punishment is just. He leaves all his deliverance to God, contenting himself with this, that despite of all his pains and pangs, he will still look to His holy temple.
And here, Cambridge Licensing Commission, is true and faithful repentance: Not clamorous for pardon, but grateful for punishment. And how pleasing to God was this conduct in Jonah, as shown in the eventual deliverance of him from the sins of alcohol and its overconsumption. Commissioners, I do not place Jonah before you to be copied for his sin, but I do place him before you as a model for repentance. Sin not; but if you do, take heed to repent of it like Jonah.
Nicholas Marchuk is a local author and engineer. His work is available at major retailers and on his website, nicholasmarchuk.com. Comments and questions can be directed to his contact form and may be responded to in this publication.
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