A Man, A Plan, and A Fish
This is not a story about a man being vomited out of a fish. That wasn't central to the original story when it was passed from generation to generation in fireside chats. This is the story of a prophet named Jonah. But it is actually the story of a nation. There was a young man named Jonah. He was probably a little off his rocker. Pay no attention to if he existed or not: it doesn’t matter. It is likely, however, that he was an actual person because the book of Jonah begins that he was the son of Amittai. Whenever the Hebrew scribes included a genealogy, they were trying to establish that this was a real person in history. But that doesn't mean we have to believe the events in the story were literal. I've seen many debates over how it is possible Jonah was swallowed by a whale and survived. They miss the point of the story. Instead, this is a story of an average guy who was later called a prophet. He felt that he heard the "still small whisper in t