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Jonah in the Fish and Joseph in the Pit Descend the Same Way

Joseph in the pit and Jonah in the fish follow one pattern in Tikkunei Zohar: descent into Egypt's darkness, then a return carrying purpose.

Curated by Arthur · Told by Maggid ·
Table of Contents
  1. Two Men in the Dark
  2. The Sea That Is Also Egypt
  3. What the Fish Contains
  4. What Emerges from the Narrow Place

Two Men in the Dark

Joseph's brothers strip him of his coat and throw him into a pit. The text stops to tell you that the pit is empty, that there is no water in it. Not a cistern. A hole. He is seventeen years old and the world above him goes on without him: his brothers sit down to eat bread a few feet away while he is at the bottom of a dry shaft waiting to learn what comes next.

Jonah boards a ship heading to Tarshish, descends to the hold, falls asleep. A storm rises. He is thrown overboard. A fish swallows him and he spends three days in its belly, a darkness inside a darkness, the sea enclosing the fish enclosing the man who would not go where he was sent.

The Tikkunei Zohar, the kabbalistic companion to the main Zohar compiled in thirteenth-century Castile, treats these two stories as one story. The form is the same. The destination is the same. And the force they are descending into is the same.

The Sea That Is Also Egypt

The key move in the Tikkunei Zohar is the identification of the sea with Egypt. In Hebrew, the name for Egypt is Mitzraim, from a root meaning narrow places, straits, the place of maximum constriction. The sea, in the mystical vocabulary, is the sea of nations, the world of forces that oppose the divine flow. Egypt is the paradigmatic narrow place, the crucible of suffering from which Israel emerged. When Jonah's sailors row hard to return to dry land and cannot, when the sea refuses to let them go, the Tikkunei Zohar reads this as the sea of Egypt asserting itself: you cannot leave this domain simply by choosing to.

Joseph's descent is the same. He is sold into Egypt by his brothers, bought by Potiphar, imprisoned on false charges. Each step takes him deeper into the narrow place. Egypt does not release people. It accumulates them. The dry pit is where Joseph begins, but Egypt is the larger enclosure that receives him, and it will hold him for twenty-two years before he emerges with a clarity he could not have found anywhere else.

What the Fish Contains

The Tikkunei Zohar pushes the identification further. The fish that swallows Jonah contains Egypt within it. When Jonah prays from inside the fish, he is praying from inside the symbolic body of the empire that oppressed Israel. The bowels of the fish are the Egyptians. The darkness of the fish is Mitzraim. Jonah, a prophet of Israel, finds himself enclosed in the very force that enslaved his people, and his prayer from that place is the prayer that penetrates the enclosure.

Joseph does not pray audibly in the pit. But the text tells you that his brothers saw his distress and did not listen (Genesis 42:21). Something was happening in that pit. Something was being broken open in the boy who had been his father's favorite and had not yet had to carry his own weight. The pit does not offer comfort. It offers something more useful: the end of the life you had before.

What Emerges from the Narrow Place

Both men emerge. Joseph comes out of the dungeon to stand before Pharaoh and interpret dreams that no one else can read. Jonah is vomited onto dry land and walks to Nineveh to deliver a message that saves an entire city. Neither emergence looks like what they would have chosen. Joseph does not walk out. He is summoned. Jonah does not swim to shore. He is expelled.

This is part of the Tikkunei Zohar's point. The descent into the narrow place is not something you accomplish. You are placed there. And the emergence is not something you achieve. You are released. What changes in between is the person doing neither the placing nor the releasing, the one who simply has to be in the dark long enough to understand what they were sent there to learn.

In Joseph's case: that his dreams were not about his superiority over his brothers but about his function for them. He would save them. He would feed them. He would be the instrument through which his father's house survived the collapse of the world. In Jonah's case: that his reluctance to extend mercy to Nineveh was his problem, not God's, and that the sea and the fish and the three days of darkness were the cost of holding that reluctance as long as he did.

JonahJosephKabbalahExilePitWhaleZoharRedemption
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From the tradition

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The texts this telling draws on, in full. Open a card to read inline, or expand it for a wider, quieter read.

Tikkunei Zohar 106:6Tikkunei Zohar

The Tikkunei (spiritual repair) Zohar, a central work of Kabbalah, uses the story of Jonah to explore just that feeling. You know, Jonah, the prophet who tried to run away from God and ended up swallowed by a giant fish? (Jon. 1-2)

The verse in Jonah (1:13) tells us, "And the men strove to return to the dry land… and they could not, for the sea… was becoming stormier upon them." The Tikkunei Zohar sees this "sea" as representing the "decree of judgement." A powerful metaphor. It’s not just a storm; it’s the consequence of actions, the weight of destiny, the feeling of being trapped in a situation that seems beyond our control.

What do you do when you're stuck in that kind of storm?

Well, think about Jonah. He's running from his divine mission, and as a result, everyone on the ship is in danger. He's thrown overboard, and then, bam!, "Y”Y appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah" (Jon. 2:1).

The Tikkunei Zohar interprets this "great fish" as the "first exile." Exile, in Jewish thought, isn’t just about physical displacement. It's about spiritual distance, a separation from the Divine Presence.

The text connects Jonah's descent into the belly of the fish with the verse, ".and Jonah descended to the lower parts of the ship." (Jon. 1:5). This is then linked to Jacob's journey to Egypt: "I shall go down with you to Egypt." (Gen. 46:4). It's a fascinating chain of connections. What’s the link?

The sages tell us in the Talmud (BT Megilah 29a), "In every place that Israel are exiled, the Shekhinah (the Divine Presence) is with them." The Shekhinah is the feminine aspect of God’s presence, the Divine Indwelling. Even in the darkest, most isolated places – the belly of the fish, exile in Egypt, or wherever you might be feeling lost – the Divine is still present. Even when Jonah is at his lowest point, swallowed whole, he's not abandoned. And neither are we.

The Tikkunei Zohar isn't just telling us a story. It's offering a profound message of hope. Even when the sea of judgement is raging, even when we feel exiled from ourselves or from God, we are never truly alone. The Divine Presence accompanies us, even in the belly of the beast.

So, the next time you feel like you’re battling a storm too powerful to overcome, remember Jonah. Remember the Shekhinah. Remember that even in the deepest darkness, there is always a glimmer of light.

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Tikkunei Zohar 105:4Tikkunei Zohar

Jewish mystical tradition certainly sees it that way. to a fascinating, and perhaps a little strange, passage from the Tikkunei (spiritual repair) Zohar that paints just such a picture.

The Tikkunei Zohar, a later and more expansive companion to the Zohar, the central text of Kabbalah, is known for its intricate interpretations of the Torah. Tikkun (plural: tikkunei) means "repair" or "restoration," and this book aims to offer pathways towards mending the world and ourselves.

So, what's this passage about?

It speaks of a state where the nefesh (the vital soul), ruach, and neshamah – the soul, spirit, and animating-soul, respectively – are in exile. They’re not where they should be. Specifically, they're said to be exiled in the liver, the gallbladder, and the spleen. Ouch.

Why those organs? Well, these are seen as the seat of our physical and emotional being. And when these aspects of our being are out of alignment all the limbs of the body – which it poetically calls "the holy People" – are distressed and bitter. It's a powerful image, isn't it? The whole body suffering because the soul is displaced.

The soul, the neshamah, should be in the brain, where it's described as a “holy dove,” or yonah in Hebrew. Now, why a dove? The dove is often a symbol of peace, purity, and divine presence. But this dove needs support.

The text continues, saying the soul is like an eagle that sustains the dove "with many prayers and services." The eagle, a powerful and soaring creature, represents the higher aspects of the soul, the part that connects us to the divine. It needs constant nurturing through prayer and good deeds to keep the dove, our inner peace and connection to God, alive and well.

But here’s where it gets even more intriguing.

The passage then draws a parallel to the story of Jonah. Remember Jonah, who was swallowed by a whale? Here, the "boat of Jonah," also yonah – remember, yonah means both "dove" and Jonah – is likened to the cranium, the skull. And inside this "ship," there are "appointed-ones" who direct it: the ears, eyes, nose, and mouth. Seven in total.

According to Midrash Tanchuma, Vayikra Ch.8, these seven appointed-ones correspond to the "seventy languages that were in the ship of Jonah." What does that mean? Well, seventy is a number often used to represent the totality of humanity, all the different ways of expressing and understanding the world. Our senses, our ability to communicate, are all part of navigating this "ship" of our being.

So, what’s the takeaway? This passage from Tikkunei Zohar 105 offers a powerful metaphor for the internal struggle we all face. When our soul is out of place, when we're disconnected from our spiritual center, our whole being suffers. It requires constant effort, prayer, and mindful use of our senses and communication to work through the "ship" of our lives and bring our soul back to its rightful place. It's a call to tend to our inner landscape, to ensure that the nefesh, ruach, and neshamah are aligned and that the dove within us can soar. It's a lifelong journey of tikkun, of repair and restoration.

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Tikkunei Zohar 106:10Tikkunei Zohar

Jewish mysticism, particularly in the Tikkunei (spiritual repair) Zohar, uses the image of a giant fish to explore just that feeling.

The Tikkunei Zohar, a companion volume to the Zohar, explores the deeper meanings of the Torah. In Tikkunei Zohar 106, we encounter this potent image: a great fish, a crocodile even, connected to the story of Jonah and the exodus from Egypt. It's a powerful and somewhat unsettling metaphor.

So, what's this all about?

The verse reads, "All these cycles of decrees were by his hand, and this is. the great fish. of which it is stated: (see Ez. 29:3). the great crocodile." This “great fish” or crocodile, is linked to Egypt, "the fish of Egypt," and significantly, it has a female partner, dagah, "the female fish." Remember Jonah praying "from the bowels of the fish" (Jon. 2:2)? According to the Tikkunei Zohar, those "bowels" represent the Egyptians themselves. We’re already deep in symbolic territory here.

But it goes further. God appoints a "great fish" in the story of Jonah (Jon. 2:1). Here, the Tikkunei Zohar equates this fish with the spleen – yes, the organ – and with Lilith. Lilith, in Jewish folklore, is a complex figure often associated with chaos and the untamed feminine. She's also linked to the 'eirev rav, the "mixed multitude" that left Egypt with the Israelites (Ex. 12:38). Some versions of this text even equate the "great fish" with Samael, a figure often seen as the angel of death or a representation of evil.

This is where it gets really interesting. The spleen, according to this passage, is "the mirth of the fool" (Ecc. 7:6) and the place where "anger lies in the lap of fools" (Ecc. 7:9). So, the fish – representing Egypt, Lilith, the mixed multitude, and even the spleen – becomes a container for negativity, for anger, and for the unrefined aspects of the human psyche. It's the thing that swallows us whole when we give in to those darker impulses.

What can we take away from this intricate web of symbolism?

Perhaps the image of the fish, and particularly its "bowels," represents the internal struggles we face. The anger, the foolishness, the chaotic energy within us that can feel overwhelming, like being trapped inside a giant creature. Maybe it speaks to the parts of ourselves we try to ignore or deny.

The Tikkunei Zohar doesn't offer easy answers, but it does provide a powerful framework for understanding the forces at play within us and around us. And it reminds us that even in the darkest "bowels of the fish," like Jonah, we still have the capacity to pray, to connect with something higher, and ultimately, to find our way out.

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