In the story of Jonah, the elements are prophetic. The fish can represent death or a proverbial monster or ruler. The belly of Shel and the heart of the sea is also an expression in Jonah 2:
(2) And he said:
“ I cried out to the LORD because of my affliction,
And He answered me.
“ Out of the belly of Sheol I cried,
And You heard my voice.
(3) For You cast me into the deep,
Into the heart of the seas,
And the floods surrounded me;
All Your billows and Your waves passed over me.
However, it also refers to the belly of Sheol.
Further, Jesus compares Himself not to Jonah being in the heart of the seas, but Jonah in the belly of the fish.
In Jonah 2:2, the "belly" is referring to that of Sheol/Hades, which was represented by the fish. Otherwise, where in the story of Jonah was Jonah in the belly of Sheol/Hades like Jonah 2 says? You would have to theorize that Jonah died in the belly of the fish and went to Sheol, unless the fish itself is meant as Sheol. Hades by comparison was a place in Greek mythology presented as deep in the earth where the souls of the dead went.
Sheol was also presented as under the earth.
The concept of the heart of the earth comes up in Psalm 74, where the KJV puts it as midst:
For God is my King of old, working salvation in the
midst of the earth. Psalm 74:12
Further, in 1 Peter 1, Jesus visits the souls imprisoned in Sheol:
1 Peter 3:18-19 (DRB) Because Christ also died once for our sins, the just for the unjust: that he might offer us to God, being put to death indeed in the flesh, but enlivened in
the spirit, in which also coming he preached
to those spirits that were in prison...
Further, in the Passion, Jesus died during the miraculous temporary darkness/"night" over the earth, after which the daylight returned. So the first night, if we count death as the belly and the darkness as night, would start on Good Friday, and the second night at the end of Good Friday, and the 3rd night at the end of Holy Saturday.
Another theory, by the Talk Genesis site, is that it refers to Jesus speaking to the hearts of the people or rulers of the earth:
Earthly Rulers and Judges
This brings me to my thesis, that
heart of the earth is a reference to earthly rulers and judges. A clue for this theory might be found in the Book of Deuteronomy where Moses reminded the Israelites what God did to the ruling authorities in Egypt. Notice the metaphor.
Deut. 11:3 the signs he performed and the things he did in the heart of Egypt, both to Pharaoh king of Egypt and to his whole country; 4 what he did to the Egyptian army, to its horses and chariots, how he overwhelmed them with the waters of the Red Sea as they were pursuing you, and how the LORD brought lasting ruin on them.
He quotes Luke 24 for support, when it counts Jesus' arrest as part of the 3 days:
Luke 24:20
The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; 21…. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place.
The Talk Genesis article continues:
All of the passages below reference Christ’s incarceration in conjunction with his crucifixion and resurrection on the third day.
- “suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law,“ crucified, resurrected third day (Matt. 16:21)
- “delivered into the hands of men,” crucified, resurrected third day (Matt. 17:22)
- “delivered over to the chief priests and the teachers of the law,” crucified, resurrected third day (Matt. 20:18-19, Mark 10:33-34)
- “suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law,”crucified, resurrected third day (Luke 9:21-22)
- “delivered over to the Gentiles,” crucified, resurrected third day (Luke 18:32-33)
- “delivered over to the hands of sinners,” crucified, resurrected third day (Luke 24:7).
This makes sense, based on the Heart of Egypt phrase in the Torah. I remember at least one Church father counting the days as starting with the Last Supper and the time when Jesus sweated blood in Gethsemane.
The article goes on to argue that Jesus rose after the end of the night of Holy Saturday, after the daylit Yom Day of Easter Sunday started. He argues that the daylit day starts in the dawn hours before sunrise when the sky has started to brighten but the sun is not yet up directly over the horizon.
He notes that "dawn" begins "begins 30-45 minutes prior to sunrise", and then argues based on John 20 and Mark 16, that Jesus rose on Sunday morning in the dawn before sunrise.