There has been some talk recently about a new book by Cambridge University professor Colin Humphreys that proposes the Last Supper was held on Wednesday of Holy Week (GET IT HERE
Regardless of when precisely the Last Supper took place in Holy Week, one thing both the Cambridge professor and the pontiff are agreed upon is that the Crucifixion took place on Friday. There are, however, people who dispute this.
In some Protestant churches, especially Fundamentalist ones, every year at Easter time there are sermons explaining that Jesus didn’t really die on a Friday but on a Wednesday. This claim is based on Matthew 12:40, where Jesus states that “as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, so will the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”
“If Jesus rose from the dead on Saturday night,” the argument goes, “then he couldn’t have been crucified and died on Friday afternoon, because there aren’t three days in there. There’s only one, so we need to back up his death from Friday afternoon to Wednesday afternoon.” This is often accompanied by the claim that Easter is based on a pagan holiday; the “moving” of Jesus death to Good Friday is explained as the result of some unspecified pagan cause.
None of this is true. Easter is not based on a pagan holiday but on a Jewish one: Passover. Easter originated as the first Sunday following Passover, when Jesus was crucified.
Neither is the name Easter derived from the pagan goddess Ishtar. Ishtar was a Mesopotamian goddess who was worshiped over in Iraq, centuries before Christ, not in Medieval England where the English language was born.
In two languages—English and German—the name for Easter may be connected with a Germanic goddess of spring, but this is unclear since her name (Eostre) had already become the name of a whole month on the calendar and there may have been no more pagan significance to the name to Medieval Christians than terms like “Wednesday” (Odin’s Day) or “Thursday” (Thor’s Day) or “January” (Janus’s Month) or “March” (Mars’s Month) have to us. The Medieval English Christian scholar the Venerable Bede, for example, is reported to have observed that pagan feasts for Eostre had died out by his time, even though the name of the month remained, and Christians were now celebrating the resurrection of Christ as a paschal feast in the manner of other Christian countries.
Which brings up an interesting point: Only a speaker of English or German (where the holiday is called Ostern) would even think the holiday has a pagan origin.
In virtually every other language, the name of Easter is derived from the Jewish word Pesach or “Passover.” Thus in Greek the term for Easter is Pascha; in Latin the term is also Pascha. From there it passed into the Romance languages, and so in Spanish it is Pascua, in Italian Pasqua, in French Paques, and in Portugese Pascoa. It also passed into the non-Romance languages, such as the Germanic languages Dutch, where it is Pasen, and Danish, where it is Paaske.
Also, because of the way Christianity spread (from Jerusalem, then around the Mediterranean basin, arriving in far-flung places like England and Germany later on), Christians had long been celebrating Easter—under Passover-derived names—long before English or German came into existence. If, in a couple of countries, new languages happened to use words that had pre-Christian etymologies for the day then that in no way shows that it has pagan roots. Its roots are well known and predate these languages. The holiday was celebrated all over the Christian world long before the names were attached to it in England and Germany.
If Easter is free of pagan origins, so is Jesus’ crucifixion on Friday. The premise of the “three days and three nights” argument — that Jesus rose from the dead on what we would call Saturday night — might well be true. In Jesus’ day, the Jews reckoned the day as beginning at sunset.
When Scripture indicates that Jesus rose on the first day of the week, therefore, it means that he rose on the day that began at sunset on Saturday and lasted until sunset on Sunday. Since we are told his tomb was found empty “after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week” (Matt. 28:1), he must have risen between sunset Saturday and dawn Sunday. Whether this was before or after midnight Scripture does not say. He might have risen either Saturday night or Sunday morning before dawn, though, for purposes of determining when he was crucified, it doesn’t matter.
In the Bible, parts of time units were frequently counted as wholes. Thus a king might be said to have reigned for two years, even if he reigned for only 14 months. In the same way, a day and a night does not mean a period of 24 hours. It can refer to any portion of a day coupled with any portion of a night. The expression “three days and three nights” could be used as simply a slightly hyperbolic way of referring to “three days.”
As Protestant Bible scholar R. T. France notes: “Three days and three nights was a Jewish idiom to a period covering only two nights” (Matthew, 213).
Similarly, D. A. Carson, another highly esteemed conservative Protestant Bible scholar, explains: “In rabbinical thought a day and a night make an onah, and a part of an onah is as the whole. . . . Thus according to Jewish tradition, ‘three days and three nights’ need mean no more than ‘three days’ or the combination of any part of three separate days” (Expositor’s Bible Commentary, 8:296).
If Jesus was crucified and died Friday afternoon, that would be the first day; at sundown on Friday the second day would begin; then at sundown on Saturday the third day would begin. So Jesus was indeed “raised on the third day” (Matthew 20:19).
Scripture repeatedly tells us that Jesus was crucified on “the day of preparation,” which was the first-century Jewish way of referring to Friday, the day of preparation for the Sabbath. This is why the women were not able to anoint his body before he was buried — because Jesus was hurriedly buried late in the afternoon, just as the Sabbath was beginning. The women thus had to rest until the Sabbath was over (Luke 23:56).
We are also told that the Jewish leaders asked Pilate to order the legs of the crucifixion victims broken so they would die faster (from asphyxiation due to an inability to push themselves up on their crosses and take a breath), “in order to prevent the bodies from remaining on the cross on the Sabbath” (John 19:31).
Some advocates of a Wednesday crucifixion concede that Jesus was crucified on the day before a Sabbath, but deny that this was the regular, weekly Sabbath. In later times, the phrase “day of preparation” came to be used to refer to the day before Passover and, this argument goes, Passover counted as a Sabbath in the sense that it was a day of rest, even though it usually did not fall on the weekly Sabbath. Thus Jesus was crucified on the day before Passover and had to be buried hurriedly on that account.
But this explanation will not do. For a start, I am unaware of anything in biblical or post-biblical Jewish tradition that regards Passover as a “sabbath.” Indeed, later rabbinic tradition held that if Passover fell on a Saturday that it overrode the Sabbath laws (so you could do the work needed to kill and eat the Passover lamb, e.g.). However that may be, in the first century, “the day of preparation” referred to Friday, not the day before Passover. Further, we know from Scripture that the Sabbath following Jesus’ crucifixion was the regular, weekly Sabbath, the seventh day of the week: “Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the sepulcher” (Matt. 28:1).
We can thus reconstruct the chronology of the crucifixion, death and Resurrection of Christ as follows:
Friday, the Day of Preparation: Jesus is crucified with two thieves. From noon to three in the afternoon, a darkness covers the land (Matthew 27:45). Then, “[s]ince it was the Day of Preparation, in order to prevent the bodies from remaining on the cross on the Sabbath ... the Jews asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away” (John 19:31). Then Joseph of Arimathea obtains Jesus’ body and buries it: “It was Preparation Day [that is, the day before the Sabbath]. So as evening approached, Joseph of Arimathea, a prominent member of the Council, who was himself waiting for the kingdom of God, went boldly to Pilate and asked for Jesus’ body” (Mark 15:42-43, NIV).
Saturday, the Sabbath: “On the Sabbath they [the women] rested according to the commandment” (Luke 23:56b). Also on this day, “that is, after the Day of Preparation, the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered before Pilate” and asked for a guard to be placed on the tomb (Matthew 27:62).
Sunday, the first day of the week: “Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the sepulcher” and found that Jesus had risen from the dead (Matthew 28:1).
The time of Christ’s death is indeed Good Friday, not a hypothetical Crucifixion Wednesday.
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A part day counts as a day for various legal purposes today, eg if I am admitted to hospital (or prison) today and released tomorrow have I spent one or two days inside?
The difference in the Jewish and Roman reckoning of when the day begins could have caused ‘translation’ confusion when the first Aramaic oral tradition was written down in Greek. This causes confusion nowadays eg this year Passover fell on the Tuesday of Holy Week. On Tuesday night I wished a Jewish friend for Passover, only to be gently reminded that I was a day late!
Re the apparent discrepancy between John’s chronology and the synoptics. It seems that not all Jews (eg the Essenes) celebrated the Passover according to the reckoning of the Temple priests/Saducees who were regarded by many as corrupt and collaborating with the Roman occupiers.
As far as the traditional Christian chronology is concerned, Maundy Thursday night, when we commemorate the Last Supper, is the same day as Good Friday according to the Jewish reckoning. The Last Supper and the Crucifixion happened on the same Jewish day - yet another connection between the Eucharist and Sacrifice on Calvary.
This is also an issue (somewhat) raised by Pope Benedict’s new book when he discusses the dating of the Last Supper. Ultimately, I think that the key is simply recognizing that Jews in Jesus’ time used the term “Passover” interchangeably to refer to the day when the Lambs were eaten as well as to the entire week long Feast of Unleavened Bread. It’s a very interesting subject to me, and I’ve read a whole lot about it. Very interesting stuff.
Heresies and grave errors concerning the Resurrection of Jesus Christ can be refuted by the Scriptures in light of the Faith.
And if the Holy Shroud is Jesus’ Shroud - though I don’t believe it is Jesus’ Shroud - it would be empirical evidence of the Resurrection.
Those who don’t understand scientific investigation don’t believe this.
Those who think faith cannot be proven or disproven don’t believe this.
Those who think faith is belief without proof don’t believe this, either.
May God deliver us from heresy and grave error!
I have always wondered who would have had the guts to wake up King Herod and Pontius Pilate “Good Friday morning, still in the middle of the night” to demand that they pass judgement on a “petty Jewish blasphemer?” Two hearings before Pilate.
I have suspected recently that those “hearings” and the scourging and crowning with thorns took place on Thursday during the day.
These arguments remind me of my children who will have ‘fights’ over how many days until a long awaited feast (such as Easter). Some insist they count the day of the argument while others don’t include that day but start on the next or better yet when do they actually get to start saying they are, for example 7 and 1/2?? Do they wait until the exact 6 month mark before the birthday or do they start saying it at 4 months.
In other words, petty arguments over details that can - if we let them - distract us from what matters. Jesus died for us in a horrific way and then rose from the dead. The ‘when’ does make a difference unless you want it to.
Tradition has it right about Spy Wednesday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Resurrection Sunday and citing protestants is supposed to be probitive?
Lord have Mercy.
Look, one second of any day constituted a day and so when, at midnight, when Jesus resurrected and left His image on the Shroud, that was the Third day, and the Shroud is a Vera Icon and it was Dr Michael Tite who substituted cuttings of the Cope of St Louis for the samples taken from the Shroud and, once again, putatively faithful Christians let faux “science”” lead them by the nose into error.
Stick with Tradition and ecclesiastical history and slough-off the protestant “experts.” If they were Biblical “experts” they would not be protestants - or, is that too simple a concept to grasp?
If the day of the crucifixion was marked with a lunar eclipse, then the date should be definitively ascertainable.
In regards to the day of the week that the Last Supper was celebrated, St. Thomas Aquinas in his commentary on John 13 argues that the discrepancy between the Gospels about whether the Last Supper was on the Passover or on the day of the Passover can be explained by how you consider the day. As you mentioned, the Jews normally count the days as going from evening to evening in which case the Last Supper happened on the first evening of the Passover. However, you might consider the Last Supper as being before the Passover, as St. John does, if you consider the Passover as the first full day, not just the evening. In the same way we might consider the Easter Vigil as being on Easter or before Easter depending on the way we mark the days. Is there something, of which I’m not aware, that is wrong with the soundness of his argument?
This confusion seems to come from a simple failure to historicize, i.e., to understand historical subjects in their appropriate context. True, if we were to say “on the third day” today, we might mean something different: but since the Incarnation, and then the Crucifixion, occured within human history (i.e., at a specific time and place), then they were discussed according to the rules of their particular circumstances. This is why it can be so easy to misinterpret Scripture, because even as it tells eternal truths, it tells them in a particular way, directed towards certain groups depending on the time and place of composition. It’s part of why we have four primary gospels, plus a bunch of non-canonical ones.
solar calendar : Tuesday - before sundown - 13 Nissan : preparation for the Passover ( Mark 14:12-16)
About sundown 14 Nisan: Ladt supper ( Passover meal , Mark 14:17-25) Vs Luni - solar calendar( official) 11 Nisan
Night : arrest ; interrogation before Annas ( Mark 14:53a ; John 18:13); Peter’s denial led to Caiphad ( John 18:24)
Wednesday - before sundown: 14 Nissan : first appearance before the Sanhedrin ( Mark 14:55) vs Luni- solar calendar ( official) 11 Nisan
At sundown: 15 Nissan vs Luni- solar calendar 12 Nisan
Thursday - before sundown : 15 Nisan : second appearance before the Sanhedrin ( Mark 15:1a ) Jesus is led to Pilate ( Mark 15:1b) Jesus is sent to Herod ( Luke 23:6-12) People are stirred up to demand Barabbas’ release ( Mark 15:11) vs. Luni- solar calendar 12 Nisan
At sundown 16 Nissan vs.Luni -solar calendar 13 Nisan
Night :Dream of Pilate’s wife ( Matthew 27:19) vs. Luni - solar calendar 13 Nisan
Friday- before sundown :16 Nisan : Jesus is led to Pikate again ( Luke 23:13) Barabbas released ( Mark 15:15) Jesus delivered to be crucified ; death on the cross ( Mark 15:15-37) vs Luni- solar calendar 13 Nisan : preparation for the Passover ( John 18:28)
At sundown :17 Nisan : Sabbath Jesus in the tomb ( Mark 15:42-46) vs Luni- solar calendar :14 Nisan : Sabbath and Passover( John 19:31)
Saturday - before sundown: 17 Nisan : Sabbath , Jesus in the tomb vs Luni- solar calendar : 14 Nisan: Sabbath
According to this solution , Jesus would have eaten the Last supper according to the solar ( Essene) calendar ( about sundown on 14 Nisan, Tuesday Evening ) and been crucified according to the Luni - solar calendar on ( 13 Nissan, the preparation day of both the Passover and the Sabbath)
The johannine Gospel,where Jesus seems to have celebrated three passovers. ,no attempt should be made to harmonize the synoptic Gospels and Johannine traditions. The upshot is that we cannot answer the question when the historical Jesus ate the Last Supper or whether he ate it as a Passover meal. In the Lucan Gospel the Last Supper is understood as a Passover Meal.,it must be interpreted in this form in this Tradition of the Gospel( commentary on the Gospel of Luke)
Peace to all
Apparently, on his old website Mr. Akin has an article addressing some of the interesting related issues to which I referred: http://www.cin.org/users/james/questions/q060.htm
Very grateful for this excellent discourse. The text and sourcing makes the history clear. However I need to know Jimmy Akin’s response to the alligation that Matthew’s Gospel was not written by Matthew. My Pastor preaches this and he teaches Scripture at Steubenville. Jimmy, what’s your take on this?
Michael F Brennan
St Petersburg Fl
We Christian Catholics are now being told, by the Pope, speaking as a private theologian, that some anonymous presbyter named John wrote St John’s Gospel, and now I read that Matthew did not write his Gospel, and the non-Matthew author wrote his gospel after Mark.
IOW, if the enemy can get the Catholic Church to confess it got it wrong about the authorship of the Gospels, and it can get the Catholic Church, contrary to Tradition, to confess the Bible is only inerrant as it pertains to the question of our salvation, then the enemy, Satan, the Spiritual Sapper, will have made a great deal of progress in undermining the Catholic Church and such a confession will cause others to ask - if The Catholic Church got this wrong for 2000 years what else has she got wrong and when will she admit it?
I wish that The Catholic Church would return to a healthy sense of Triumphalism and confront these manifest errors head-on but what chance is there of that if we have Our Holy Father, with his title of “POPE” on his books , running around publicly speculating as though he were just a professor of Theology and not our Pope and it simply beggars credulity to hear the defense It is just his personal opinion” - when his books have “POPE” in their titles.
Man-on-man am I glad there is the FFSP and the SSPX and the other Traditional Orders which defend Tradition.
The new - “Ignatius Catholic Study Bible “- and the old - Dom Orchard’s 1954, “A Catholic Commentary” 1954 - and the really old - “The Douay Rheims”-and the Sainted - St. Aquinas and St. Chrysostom - all hold to the traditional dates and events of Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Holly Saturday, and Easter/Resurrection Sunday
And why oh why did the Pope agree to a radio interview that would be played on Good Friday? To what good purpose are all of these modern papal novelties; from praying with animists, to non-Gospel-Preaching visits to synagogues, to the Assisi confabs, to world youth days, to the Pope publishing as both a private theologian and a Pope and now the radio interview accepting questions from anonymous individuals?
Most of this Biblical revision began in the 18th Century and yet we Christian Catholics, I guess, are just supposed to cast-off all certitude about what we have been taught for eighteen centuries because some nut-job protestant named Evanson in 1792 started to attack it?
Really?
The Pope’s new book was written under his name Joseph Ratzinger, but it is difficult for people to separate the private Joseph Ratzinger from the very public Pope Benedict XVI. The book was written by Joseph Ratzinger, professor and Catholic believer. This book is NOT considered official church magisterium, ex cathedera, etc. The publishers put his title “Pope” on the cover to sell books.
Dear Edl That defense is untenable. I made the mistake of buying his first Volume, “Jesus of Nazareth,” and “Joseph Ratzinger” is in a small letters compared to the bold and much bigger, “Pope Benedict XVI” and it is ineluctable that will cause confusions (just like his condom comments did) because this is the first time n the history of the Catholic Papacy - over 2000 years and 264 Popes - and this is THE FIRST TIME that any Pope has published his theological speculations while he is Pope.
Of course people will think that what The Pope writes and publishes is what The entire Catholic Church thinks about thus and such. He is the Pope. This new novelty will continue to erode respect for the Papacy and The Holy Father is undermining his own authority and undermining the authority of the Papal Office. I think he is being very selfish. He is no longer a private theologian or university professor and if he wants to write and publish his own professorial speculations, let him resign the Office and return to the University.
When he was elected Pope he accepted the burden of speaking in the Papal, “We,” and he should be humble enough and respectful enough of the office of the Papacy not to personally profit from it unlike the other 264 Popes who preceded him.
There appears to be no reaching the end of tolerance for any novel action by our modern Popes; and the vast vast majority of Catholics not only accept these novelties but they praise them: highly.
Since the death of Pope Pus XII the modern Popes have undertaken a series of novel actions and by every single objective measurable standard of Catholic Belief, Priests, Nuns, Mass Attendance, Real Presence Belief, etc etc etc it has been revealed that there has been a sharp decline in every category and all during that time we have been told that there is a new springtime.
Look at page 6 of his first volume. He writes “This naturally entails the further expectation that the new Moses will be the mediator of a greater covenant..”
Well, it is not only greater it is THE NEW COVENANT and the old Covenant has been superseded and it no longer exists.
Oh well, I accept the reality I am in a teeny tiny obscure small minority.. C’et la vie.
Being the scientific and mathematical-minded type, I remember arguing the “3 days” figure with my teachers in grade school. They were probably the same ones I was frustrated with for being unable to explain to my satisfaction why nuns did not have babies. :-)
“Man-on-man am I glad there is the [...] SSPX and the other Traditional Orders which defend Tradition.”
When the SSPX returns to full communion with the Church and obedience to the pope, then I’ll count them as defenders of tradition. Until then, no, chasing after one’s own version of orthodoxy isn’t ‘traditional’ (i.e., orthodox) Catholicism.
Jesus died and was taken down from the cross the day Pesach was to begin,before sundown.
This article seems to misunderstand that sabbath means day of rest (a break in the week). On the year of the Lord’s crucufixion there was the high sabbath (passover) which was Nisan 15 as always. Preperation day was of course the day before Nisan 14, the day he was crucified. You have to take the time to understand that each day started at 6pm the previous day to our western mindset. Nisan 16 would have been what I think we mistaken call Good Friday (no offense) this is the day the women would have been allowed to go out and buy the spices to put on the tomb of Jesus. Nisan 17 would have been the weekly sabbath and the 3rd day and 3rd night (Matthew 12:40). Nisan 18 would be the first day of the week and the day the women would have been allowed to go visit the tomb. When the got there of course He had already risen because the 3rd day and 3rd night had been completed.
I’m not closed minded to the cultural and timeline differences from today but it really seems to hard to argue that Jesus came into Jerusalem the same time the lambs who were to be sacrificed were also coming into Jerusalem (Wednesday) and slaughtered the day before the high sabbath, put into the tomb before the sabbath began at 6pm that night then for 3 full days and nights (Thursday, Friday, and Saturday) was in the tomb and then rose again at 6pm after the end of the 3rd day (remember night is before day in the Hebrew life).
As far as when Easter is, it changes every year based on the lunar vernal equinox not based on the passover.
I look at Easter as the celebration of the resurrection which technically should be celebrated from Saturday 6pm to Sunday 6pm but not trying to be too technical. Jesus died and rose again so I could have relationship with my Heavenly Father and for that I ;ift Him up and give Him the honor and the glory! Now I want to be His new creation and pray He use me for His honor and glory to reach those around me who may be lost and looking for the peace that passes understanding! Have a Happy Easter and Passover week.
Sadly, Vermont Crank sounds like a “sedevacantist” which is a misguided belief that all the Popes since Pope Pius XII are illegitimate Popes, thus the seat has been vacant. Even the Traditionalist “Remnant” newspaper has denounced sedevacantism. Robert Moynihan, editor of “Inside the Vatican” magazine, made a good summary of Pope Benedict’s pontificate:
“But what has been the essence of this teaching?
The essence of[Pope Benedict’s] teaching has been Christ.
It is a “Christo-centric” pontificate, oriented toward Christ, centered on Christ, with Christ at the center of all its activity and preaching.
And this explains why the Pope has published two lengthy books on Jesus of Nazareth, books which take up in a profound way the question of who Jesus was, and what he means for the world and human reality.
This “Christo-centrism” is also a “Logos-centrism,” since Christ is the Logos, the “Word” of God.
In this view, there can be no ultimate conflict between reason and faith, as Christ himself is reason, and so reason stems from and finds its deepest expression precisely in Christ.”
A typical argument from the christian theological “elite” espousing dogma with no substance. Even via this article’s attempts at “correcting” time (something that the Bible redactors and editors have done very well at for well over a 1000 years now) it should be obvious to anyone that their rendition of time and history s pure bull puckey. Can the world PLEASE see the obvious: christianity was created as a “state religion” in the 3rd century ce. The town of Nazareth never existed until the 13th century when suddenly, the church realized it wasnt there and had never been there, so they founded one. (that is a true story, look it up PLEASE). Furthermore, no church representing Christ would condone the widespread slaughter that Catholicism (and Protestantism) did toward the “unbelievers” during the dark ages and even beyond the dark ages. IF you believe in christianity, then you are an accomplice to the following: rape, genocide, torture, racism, murder, abuse, assault, bigotry, judgmentalism, negativism, and an close-minded point of view toward life. There are all things that JESUS PREACHED AGAINST. Have a happy “easter” you people are the scourge of modern humanity. May your JESUS come back and curse you all to the hell you belong within.
Dear Edl. I maintain the Bonds of Unity in Worship, Doctrine, and Authority. I am not a sedevacantist in any of its forms.
It is true however, that I reflexively cringe when I read these four words beginning any sentence - “In a Papal first..”
http://cantuar.blogspot.com/2008/08/saint-jerome-on-deuterocanonical-books.html
notfallingforthehype is confusing Christians(sinners, like all humans) with Jesus Christ(sinless). Christianity is flawed because people are flawed, and all we can do is place our hope in Jesus Christ. We all belong in hell, but Jesus is about forgiveness for sins. While nailed to the cross, Jesus asked God to forgive his accusers. Obviously, notfallingfor… does not understand this, but Jesus will forgive!
Dear Vermont Crank, Sorry about the sedevacantist label, but when you wrote"Since the death of Pope Pius XII, modern Popes…“raised alarm bells!
Dear EDl Thanks
Three Days and Three Nights in the Tomb
Passover is a movable feast. This fact has been causing some confusion as to when Christ was crucified and when he rose from the dead. However, because it is simply what’s in the Bible—-that Jesus and his apostles ate the Passover meal (making Thursday the Passover) and proceeded to the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus was taken prisoner, beaten and spent the night in a Jewish military prison and was crucified the next day. At the ninth hour on Friday, which is three o’clock in the afternoon Jesus died and the Pharisees went to Pontius Pilate and asked that the legs of the condemned to be broken so as to hasten their death so that the executions would not extend into the hours of the Sabbath, which began at sundown or the 12th hour, that being 6 p.m on Friday. Now three days and three nights were involved. Thursday night, Friday night and Saturday night. The three days involved were Friday day, Saturday day and part of the day on Sunday. (Sunday, or the “first day of the week” starting at 6 PM on Saturday.) As the Bible says: “On the first day of the week”, meaning the day after the Sabbath, “Mary Magdalene went to the tomb”; this being our Sunday daytime. So the Bible doesn’t name the days of the week but it says that Jesus spent three days and three nights in the tomb; and they don’t have to be the day and night of three consecutive days, just three days and three nights. The Jewish day: Sunset marks the start of the 12 night hours, whereas sunrise marks the start of the 12 day hours. Length of nights and days vary by season.
I’ve read COLIN J. HUMPHREYS AND W. GRAEME WADDINGTON’s dating of the crucifixion based on astronomical data. They make a good case for why the dating in John make sense. Using their method places the year of the crucifixion at a time when the extra-biblical historical facts support the biblical account.
Scientific proof, engaged in the support of reason will always support what our faith tells us. When a fact can be proven scientifically it will always support the Truth, because we have a God who entered the world at a specific historical time and engaged in specific historical activities that, though they have a transcendental dimension, were real occurrences.
notfallingforthehype quotes anti-Christian propaganda created mere centuries ago while ignoring the true historical record. Vermont Crank, who is certainly not anti-Christian, does however make similar mistake in assuming that the standard for Popal behaviour established by the Post-reformation captive papacy was the norm. Popes have been performing firsts since Peter hung on a cross upside down, if not before. Every time a Pope gave his assent to an order with a new chrism or allowed the universal application of a local liturgical custom or practice he was performing a first.
Dear TerryC. Well, gosh. I wisht I had thunk that first :)
Was it a first when Pope John Paul II went to a Synagogue and did not preach Christ? Yep. Peter was the first Pope to go to a Synagogue and preach Christ and John Paul II was the first Pope to go to a Synagogue and not preach Christ
That was what I was getting at. I obviously failed to communicate that.
However, now that I have written that, are you ok with This current Pope, and his predecessor, going to Synagogues and not preaching Christ?
“Preach the gospel always, if necessary use words.” St. Francis of Assisi.
The Pope does preach Christ every time he meets with those of other faiths. Sometimes he preaches it in words, as he did at Westminster Hall, basically calling out the Church of England on St. Thomas More in the very spot where he was condemned.
Sometimes he does it through action, as when he prayed vespers with Orthodox clergy, which he has done several times.
Other times he does it by his very presence, as when he attends ecumenical meetings with the members of non-Christian faiths, often to work toward common goals in the secular sphere. That too is his responsibility, because sometimes preaching Christ is working toward feeding the hungry, making peace between enemies and setting prisoners free. You don’t do that by only talking to people who agree with you.
Dear TerryC. I am not surprised at your response. The actions of the modern Popes have contributed to a growing indifference and so who really cares if the Vicar of Christ goes to Synagogues and does not preach Jesus and the necessity of accepting Him as one’s Saviour?
The REALLY important thing is the here and now and peace; even though peace means the tranquility of order which can not happen when a State or Govt does not render right worship to Jesus, the King of Kings.
Terry. You have sold salvation for the pottage of politics
“...only one Passover lunar eclipse was visible from Jerusalem while Pilate was in office (30). It occurred on April 3, 33 AD, the Day of the Cross.”
from the website http://www.bethlehemstar.net/day/day.htm, which carefully considers the astronomical signs and wonders of the time.
It goes on: “Kepler’s equations indicate that the moon rose already in eclipse, already bloody, fulfilling Joel’s vision. Necessarily, this means that the eclipse commenced before moonrise. With software we can look below the horizon and see Earth’s shadow begin the eclipse. When we do, we find that at 3 PM, as Jesus was breathing his last on the cross, the moon was going to blood.
The sky at Christ’s birth can be viewed as a kind of visual poetry, with the new moon symbolically “birthed” at the foot of Virgo, the virgin. To complete that celestial poem, on the night of Jesus’ death the moon had returned to the foot of the virgin. But now it was a full moon. A life fully lived, blotted out in blood.”
In other words, the moon was a bloody red color that night (kind of like the orangey red moons we had this year before Easter.)
The really important thing is preaching the gospel and bringing people to Christ. How many people do you think you’re going to bring to Christ if your method is to say to them, “Listen to me and do it the way I tell you or you’re going to Hell?”
Screaming “You’re going to Hell!” doesn’t work very well in a society where people don’t believe in Hell or the concept of sin.
Some people might be willing to write such people off. “They’ve heard the Word. It’s their decision. They should go to Hell.” The Pope doesn’t have that luxury. The Church doesn’t have that luxury. It is called to evangelize. That doesn’t always mean talking at people.
It should be pretty obvious if the Pope is invited to a Synagogue and his only message is preached as in your face, “you’re going to Hell because you don’t accept Christ as your Savior,” his next invitation to speak at a Synagogue will be the day after never. On the other hand exposure to the Vicar or Christ, as the leader of the True Church, living the Noahide Laws, might bring more than a few pious Jews to look into this Jesus Christ fellow.
There’s nothing political about that. We don’t just talk to those who agree with us. We don’t make converts by screaming doctrine at them. We are called to preach to all, and in your face self-righteousness make fewer converts that Christian service.
I know I’m a bit late to this discussion, but all I want to do is thank you. Around Easter I was engaged in a discussion with a group of non-Christians on a Mom’s board that insisted that Easter was a pagan holiday, dated by dates related to Ishtar and named after Eoster. Your commentary matched my argument, almost point by point, which was summarily dismissed as folly. It is breathtakingly heartwarming to know that I am not ignorant or foolish to believe that Easter is the celebration of the resurrection of the Lord and that its timing is based on the Jewish Passover not any pagan feast celebrated at the time.
(I even used my granddaughter’s birthday, which she shares with a famous rock star. I asked: “Should we not celebrate her birthday on her birthday because it might be construed as celebrating his birthday?”)
Thanks, again.
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