Nothing I have spewed has ever been worth scooping up and selling on the open market. But, if I were a Sperm or Pygmy Whale, it would be an entirely different story.
Dried whale vomit, otherwise known as ambergris, is a highly sought after ingredient in the perfume industry. And, depending on where you live on this planet, if you found a hunk of whale vomit it might even set you up for life.
While Australia was in and out of lockdowns during the Covid pandemic, in June 2021, fishermen in Yemen carried on with working the oceans. In the Gulf of Aden, a fishing crew comprising of 35 men reeled in the carcass of a sperm whale.
Inside its stomach was a clump of whale vomit weighing in at 127 kilograms and fetching close to $2 million dollars. Not a bad day’s haul for a group of poverty-stricken fishermen.
A quick rundown on how ambergris (whale vomit) is formed
Sperm whales eat thousands of squid a day.
Did you know that squid have beaks for killing and pulling apart fish? This beak is located in the centre of their group of tentacles, and it is hard and sharp, and perfect for ripping up prey.
All these squid beaks and other hard debris build up within the whale’s four stomach chambers. Normally, this mass of indigestible squid beaks is vomited out, but sometimes it’s swallowed and moves down further into the intestinal tract, creating the perfect conditions for ambergris to be formed.
A lump of ambergris takes years to develop, and grows larger as waste material (faeces) binds itself to the tangled mass of squid beaks.
The mass causes an obstruction, and in order for the whale to survive, it must excrete the ambergris. Sometimes, the lump grows to gargantuan proportions to cause a rupture, killing the whale in the process.
Scientists approximate that only a small percentage (1 to 5%) of sperm whales or pygmy whales produce ambergris, so it is a rare find. And, to label it as ‘whale vomit’ is a misnomer, as it is more accurately described as whale (ahem) poop.
Naturally, a lump of ambergris has an offensive stench when it is fresh, but as it dries out its odour mellows.
Once expelled, it may float on the surface of the ocean for years, solidifying over time before it is washed ashore.
Why is ambergris so valuable?
Ambergris is a highly sought-after fixative in the perfume industry. As an ingredient, it has an ability to ‘fix’ a scent on human skin. Though there are synthetic alternatives, there is strong demand for this organic substance amongst perfume makers worldwide.
The largest lump ever discovered was found on our shores in 1913, and weighed an eye watering 455 kilograms.
However, under Australian law, if you were to discover this ‘floating gold’, you wouldn’t be able to make any profit from its sale. Sperm whales are a protected species, and as such, we are not permitted to export their products.
Laws were set in place primarily due to our exploitation of the species, with Australian whalers severely reducing the whale population during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
So, if you find one of these rare lumps of ambergris as you’re splashing about on our beautiful beaches, you’re better off using it as a door stop, or donating it to a museum because there won’t be any money even to buy a Happy Meal with it.
Was Jonah ‘whale vomit’?
Most of you are familiar with the tale of Jonah and the whale. Perhaps memories of Bible stories being read aloud from picture books during a Sunday school class spring to mind, or a fiery message from the pulpit on this much maligned prophet.
If you haven’t done so by now, have a look and read it for yourself. It’s only four chapters long and a cracker of a story filled with danger, suspense and a bitter protagonist wrestling with God.
Whale or great fish?
Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. Jonah 1:17
The Hebrew word for ‘great fish’—dag gadol—is a generic term. It could refer to any kind of fish, shark, or whale. The breadth of the word also includes sea creatures, sea dragons and leviathans.
It is not outside the realm of possibility that a sperm whale could have swallowed an entire human. Sperm whales have been dissected to reveal sea creatures that have been swallowed whole, such as full grown sharks and squid lodged inside their stomachs.
Now, the creature ‘vomited out Jonah upon the dry land’. As I have mentioned before, whales—sperm whales in particular—spew out lumps of squid beaks and other debris from their gullets.
In 2021, in the waters around Cape Cod, a fisherman went diving out for lobsters. At the bottom of the ocean he encountered a giant mammal. The humpback whale came from nowhere and swallowed him.
Michael Packard felt the beast’s jaws crushing his legs. He could feel the whale’s tongue, and tried to move his legs to get into a position to swim out of its mouth.
He spent a minute in the whale’s mouth before it rose to the surface and spat Packard out. Thankfully, he survived the ordeal with just some tendon damage to one of his legs.
Earlier this year, Rainer Schimpf, a wildlife photographer, was filming a school of sardines off the South African coast. Something grabbed him and pushed his hips together.
It took less than two seconds. He could feel the pressure and knew it was a whale. Everything went pitch black. He was stuck inside the whale’s mouth.
The creature that took him was a Brydes whale. Luckily, instead of diving deeper, the whale let Schimpf go by spitting him out. Schimpf survived without a single scratch.
Jesus on Jonah
One of the most compelling arguments to put forward that Jonah’s experience was an actual historical event is to consider what Jesus himself said about the matter.
But he answered and said unto them, An evil and “adulterous generation seeketh after a sign, and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas:
For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgement with this generation, and shall condemn it: because they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and behold, a greater than Jonas is here. Matt 12:39-41
Christ accepted that Jonah did in fact survive after being swallowed by the whale. In Greek, the word whale is ketos, which means ‘a great sea creature’.
He also acknowledged that the repentance of the Ninevites was something that actually happened.
Dead or alive?
In our minds, three days and three nights in the stomach of a great sea creature would mean certain doom, unless of course God intervened. This was the case with Jonah, who experienced a divine miracle.
God kept him alive while he was moldering in the oxygen deprived, dank, and smelly innards of the whale. It was a miracle, and Jesus, who is the great ‘I am’, authenticated the event.
An alternative view is that Job sank to the bottom of the sea and drowned. God then directed a whale to pick up Jonah’s dead body. Then God brought Jonah back to life before the whale spat Jonah out onto dry land.
The waters compassed me about, even to the soul: the depth closed me round about, the weeds were wrapped about my head.
I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; Jonah 2:5,6a
Therefore, the sailors threw Jonah overboard into the ocean, and he sank to sea floor. There Jonah lay at the foot of the mountains with his head entangled by seaweed.
And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the LORD, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice. Jonah 2:2
The word hell used here is the Hebrew word sheol. According to The New Unger’s Bible Dictionary, the general idea is “the place of the dead”; and by this is meant, not the grave, but the place of those who have departed from this life. The term is thus used with reference to both the righteous and the wicked.
This adds weight to the view that Jonah died.
“It seems that the whale does not lead to Jonah’s survival but to his resurrection. When the whale spewed him up, God reunited his spirit and body. This ties in with Jesus’ statement that, just as Jonah was in the belly of the whale, so he would be in the heart of the earth.” David Pawson (2015, 447)
Christ uses Jonah’s predicament as an analogy for His own resurrection. As Jonah was released from his watery jail in the belly of the whale and brought back to the land of the living, so too would Christ rise from his grave on the third day.
Both viewpoints express the same idea—God controls the elements and every living thing. God does the miraculous.
Jonah a minor prophet
As we have seen, just because he was regarded as a minor prophet doesn’t mean that he was inferior to the Major prophets.
Major Prophets simply wrote more than Minor Prophets. And like Job, just because they were minor prophets did not mean that their lives were less exciting than their counterparts. Nor was what they preached of lesser value or insight.
They were still the holy messengers sent from the Lord with weighty words to declare to the people.
Treasure in a whale’s belly
The fishermen from Yemen found treasure—ambergris—which would lift them out of poverty, increase their wealth and buy them freedom.
As Christians, we understand that Jonah and his message was treasure temporarily encased in a whale’s belly.
We discover in this account that God’s compassion is not limited to his chosen people—the Israelites. He also cares about pagans and gentiles. The heart of God treasures people, and so should we.
Join me next time for Whale vomit Part 2.
Bibliography
Author unspecified, 2021, ‘Fishermen make ‘wonderful’ $2 million find in the stomach of whale’ au.news.yahoo.com. Retrieved May 15 2023 from
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https://armstronginstitute.org/315-what-was-the-great-fish-that-swallowed-jonah
Harker, J. 2023 ‘Man who was ‘swallowed’ whole by whale says he only realised what had happened once it went dark’ Ladbible.com. Retrieved May 15 2023 from
www.ladbible.com/news/man-swallowed-whole-whale-dark-933311-20230125
Hortle, E. ‘Ambergris’, Everyday Futures Australia in the Age of Humans. Everydayfutures.nma.gov.au. Retrieved May 15 2023 from
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Pawson, D. 2015, Unlocking the Bible, William Collins, UK.
Stewart, D. ‘Was Jonah swallowed by a Whale?’, Blueletterbible.org. Retrieved May 15 2023 from
https://www.blueletterbible.org/faq/don_stewart/don_stewart_629.cfm
The Quest Study Bible, 1994, Zondervan Publishing House, Michigan.
Tucker, R. 2013, The Biographical Bible, Baker Books, Michigan.
Unger, M.F. 1988, The New Unger’s Bible Dictionary, Moody Press, Chicago.
Yong, E. 2008, ‘A Squid’s beak is a marvel of biological engineering’, Nationalgeographic.com. Retrieved May 15 2023 from
Von Behrens, K. 2023, ‘Rare, valuable whale vomit found on North Coast Beach’, The Daily Telegraph.com.au. Retrieved May 15 2023 fromhttps://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/lismore/rare-valuable-whale-vomit-found-on-north-coast-beach/news-story/bc5adb31ec33e3c123081cc43a3ccf3d
