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» Christian Message Boards   » Bible Studies   » Bible Topics & Study   » THREE [3] DAYS & THREE NIGHTS (Page 1)

 
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Author Topic: THREE [3] DAYS & THREE NIGHTS
barrykind
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ENOUGH SAID!
\

[thumbsup2]


[hug]


[wave3]

--------------------
The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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oneinchrist
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Good Morning Caretaker,
I agree with you as far as proper emphasis.
I do not consider myself wise enough to be able to reconcile all the apparent confusion/contradiction. One thing that does seem clear to me, though, is that Sunday is not the third day after Jesus' death(if Jesus' death was on a Friday). No matter what anyone argues about (the day, month, time, etc.) I am convinced that the resurrection did take place on the third day after Jesus' death. When Jesus said "and after 3 days I will rise again" I assume He meant 3 days after His death on the cross....not 2. I believe that 3 days is meant to be taken literal(but not necessarily exactly 72 hours) in this context...........dont you?

I find it of no benefit to go to all lengths to prove what I believe, I just believe what I believe. I wouldnt even attempt to argue for a particular day or for a specific number of hours.

With love in Christ, Daniel

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Carol Swenson
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The Crucifixion was on Passover.

The Resurrection was not on Passover, but The Festival of First Fruits.

Celebrated each year on the-day-after-the-Sabbath-after-the-Passover, The Festival of First Fruits is always on a Sunday.

Our Lord Jesus Christ celebrated the Festival of First Fruits by offering Himself as the first fruits to all future generations (Matthew 27:52-53).

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Caretaker
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quote:
Originally posted by Caretaker:
Romans 14:

5 One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.
6 He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord; and he that regardeth not the day, to the Lord he doth not regard it. He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, for he giveth God thanks; and he that eateth not, to the Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks.
7 For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself.
8 For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord's.
9 For to this end Christ both died, and rose, and revived, that he might be Lord both of the dead and living.

quote:


Very early in the life of the Church, disputes arose as to which date Pasch or Easter (called "Pascha" in Greek and Latin) should be celebrated. Disputes of this kind came to be known as Paschal/Easter controversies. The first recorded such controversy came to be known as the Quartodeciman controversy.

In the early period, Easter was always held on a date near the middle of the Jewish month of Nisan. In the mid–second century A.D., the practice in the Roman province of Asia was for the pre-Easter fast to end on the eve of the 14th day of Nisan, the day on which the Passover sacrifice had been made when the Second Temple stood, and "the day when the people put away the leaven"[2] (such as Jews, Jewish proselytes, and Jewish Christians). Nisan 14 itself was commonly, if somewhat confusingly, also called Passover; technically it is Preparation Day for the seven-day Feast of Unleavened Bread that begins on Nisan 15, now also called Passover. The Asian custom became known as "Quartodecimanism" among the Latins. Melito of Sardis (d. c.180) was a notable Quartodeciman.

The practice elsewhere was to continue the fast until the eve of the Sunday following; the objection to the Quartodeciman practice was that the 14th of Nisan could fall on any day of the week. Outside of Roman Asia, Christians wished to associate Easter with Sunday, the day on which Jesus rose from the dead according to all the Gospels, and which had long been a Christian holy day[3], known as the Lord's Day. According to the writings of Irenaeus (d. c. 202), the Roman church had celebrated Easter on a Sunday at least since the time of Bishop Xystus (Sixtus I, 115–125).[4]

Irenaeus, who followed the Sunday custom, also stated, however, that bishop Polycarp (a disciple of John the Apostle) of Smyrna (c.69-c.155) in Asia Minor, one of the Seven churches of Asia, was Quartodeciman, celebrating on Nisan 14. Shortly after Anicetus became bishop of Rome in about 155, Polycarp had visited Rome, and among the topics discussed was this divergence of custom. But, Irenaeus noted,

Anicetus could not persuade Polycarp to forgo the [Quartodeciman] observance inasmuch as these things had been always observed by John the disciple of the Lord, and by other apostles with whom he had been conversant; nor did Polycarp persuade Anicetus to keep it: Anicetus said that he must hold to the way of the elders before him.

Neither Polycarp nor Anicetus was able to persuade the other to his position, but neither did they consider the matter of sufficient importance to justify a schism. Indeed, Irenaeus also noted that "Anicetus conceded to Polycarp in the Church the celebration of the Eucharist, by way of showing him respect"; Anicetus and Polycarp parted in peace leaving the question unsettled.[4][5]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quartodecimanism


quote:


Scholars disagree about the controversy's details. They do agree that its arguments revolved around whether the primary Christian spring festival should happen on Nisan 14 (the Passover day) or annually on a Sunday.

Eusebius is our primary source for the controversy between Polycarp and Anicetus. Polycarp knew the apostle John and was of such stature that many considered him John's spiritual, though not apostolic, successor in Asia Minor. Polycarp believed that Nisan 14 was the correct time for the spring festival, but Anicetus, bishop of Rome, favored Sunday.

But what were some Christians doing on Nisan 14 and others doing on "Easter"? Were some observing the Passover as the only time for the Lord's Supper, while others were observing a pagan holiday? If so, how did each view the other?

A careful reading of the evidence shows that an annual Lord's Supper was not the issue, neither was Easter, or at least what we think of as Easter. No one was arguing that the Lord's Supper should only be kept once a year. And no one was arguing over Easter bunnies and colored eggs.

Furthermore, none of the Quartodecimans claimed that it was wrong to celebrate Jesus' resurrection. To the contrary, the evidence indicates that both Polycarp and Anicetus celebrated Jesus' resurrection. Polycarp's claim seems to have been that the best day to do so was on Nisan 14. Anicetus argued for Sunday.

What is more intriguing for us is that Polycarp claimed his practice came to him from the apostle John. In other words, Polycarp essentially argued that the practice of celebrating Jesus' resurrection on Nisan 14 was an apostolic practice, at least for the apostle John. His argument was not so much scriptural as it was traditional.

Eusebius, in his Ecclesiastical History, chapters 23 to 25, makes it plain that the Quartodeciman controversy involved in part when to celebrate Jesus' resurrection. He tells us that the churches in Asia Minor, focusing on the crucifixion as of primary importance, argued for Nisan 14 as the day to commemorate the entire story of Jesus' death, burial and resurrection. The church at Rome, focusing on the resurrection, argued that there was no need to depend on the Jewish calendar and that Sunday was the most appropriate day of all.

http://www.gci.org/church/holidays/passover


To celebrate the day of the week of the death burial resurrection of our precious Lord.

To celebrate the anniversary date of the death, burial, resurrection of our precious Lord.

To celebrate the FACT of the death, burial, resurrection of our precious Lord.


One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.

Greater than us have been debating this for centuries, almost two millenium, and will continue to do so until our Lord speaks directly to us in person.

I would say lay it aside and let each be pursuaded in their own mind.

There are a great many apologists who support the Roman Catholic cult's tradition of Good Friday, with the use of extensive scriptural gymnastics to validate it, ie "Day does not mean day". As Carol has so comprehensively provided.

Not everyone who believes the straight forward reading of the Word, and understands the Jewish cultural considerations, has been influenced by the Armstrong cult.

The true celebration of the resurrection of our Lord should be the celebration in the hearts of His children.

Why celebrate the resurrection of our Lord on a different day far removed from the true day, just so it can be held on Sunday?

Jesus is the Passover Lamb of God!!!

Why so desperate to follow Roman Catholicism's divorcement from the Jewish celebration of the original Passover, and the true time of the death, burial, resurrection of our precious Lord and Savior?

--------------------
A Servant of Christ,
Drew

1 Tim. 3:
16: And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh..

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Carol Swenson
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THE DAY OF THE RESURRECTION

Samuele Bacchiocchi, Ph. D., Andrews University

Is the Easter-Sunday Resurrection a Biblical fact or an ecclesiastical fable? Wednesday Crucifixionists believe that it is a fable fabricated by "the so-called ‘apostolic fathers’ . . . to justify a pagan tradition of the Sunday resurrection of Nimrod, the pagan savior!"1 In their view Christ’s Resurrection occurred, not early on Sunday morning, but late on Saturday afternoon.

The "clinching proof" for the Saturday afternoon Resurrection of Christ is supposedly found in Matthew 28:1, 5-6. The text reads: "In the end of the sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulchre . . . And the angel answered and said unto the women, Fear not ye: for I know that ye seek Jesus, which was crucified. He is not here: for he is risen, as he said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay" (KJV).

This text allegedly pinpoints the time of the Resurrection on Saturday afternoon. The reasoning runs as follows: Since Matthew tells us that when the two Marys went to the sepulchre "in the end of the sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week," they discovered that Christ had already risen, this means that His Resurrection occurred in the last part of the Sabbath before the next day began.

To defend this conclusion, the dawning of the first day is interpreted as being the beginning of dusk (evening) rather than of dawn (morning). The reasoning runs as follows: "Since the Sabbath ended at sunset, it would be impossible for ‘dawn’ to mean morning here, for the sun would not rise until some 12 hours later. It could not be in the end of the Sabbath and morning at the same time."2

An Apparent Contradiction. It must be granted that this reasoning represents an ingenious attempt to reconcile what many scholars view as two apparently contradictory statements. The contradiction lies in the fact that the end of the Sabbath at sunset does not mark the dawning of the first day, since the two events are about 12 hours apart.

The above interpretation, though ingenious, cannot be accepted for at least two reasons. First, because the verb "to dawn" (epiphosko) literally means not "to become dusk" but "to grow light," "to dawn." Second, because a figurative interpretation (i.e. to become dusk) in this instance runs against the explicit statements of the other Gospels which tell us that the women came to the empty tomb at daybreak "when the sun had risen" (Mark 16:2; cf. Luke 24:1; John 20:1). Thus other solutions must be found to this apparent contradiction.

I. LATE OR AFTER?

A first solution is suggested by the broader meaning of the adverb "opse" which is translated in the KJV as "in the end of" but in the RSV and most modern translations as "after." The two translations reflect the dual meanings of the term, namely "late" or "after."

An Approximate Time Reference. In the New Testament the term opse occurs only twice again, in Mark 11:19 and 13:35. In Mark 11:19 ("And when evening [opse] came they went out of the city") it is hard to tell by the context whether opse designates the late afternoon of that day or the time after sunset, which, according to the Jewish sunset to sunset reckoning, would be the beginning of the new day.

In Mark 13:35, however, opse ("evening") clearly designates the first watch of the night, from about sunset till about 9 p.m.: "Watch therefore for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening (opse) or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning" (Mark 13:35). The fact that "opse" could mean not only the late hours of the day, but also the early hours of the new day, suggests the possibility that Matthew may have used the term as an approximate time reference simply to indicate that the Sabbath was over when the women went to the sepulchre.3

In the age of quartz watches when even seconds count, we expect the same accuracy from the Bible writers, who had only the sun at their disposal to measure time. The concern of Bible writers, however, seems to have been more with reporting the actual events than with the precise time of their occurrence. Mark, for example, says that Jesus was crucified approximately three hours earlier ("it was the third hour"—Mark 15:25) than John ("it was about the sixth hour"—John 19:16).

Similarly, the visit to the sepulchre occurred "while it was still dark" according to John (20:1) and "when the sun had risen" according to Mark (16:2). The existence of these time approximations in the Gospels suggests the possibility that Matthew also may have used opse loosely, simply to indicate that the women went to the sepulchre after the Sabbath was over and as the first day was dawning.

Late Greek Usage. The latter conclusion is supported by the usage of opse in late Greek writers as meaning "after." While in the ancient Greek, as A. T. Robertson explains, "opse . . . occurs as a preposition with the genitive (Thuc. 4, 93) with the sense of ‘late on,’" later Greek authors, like Philostratus, use the word in "the sense of ‘after,’ like . . . ‘after these things.’"4

Edgar J. Goodspeed, another renowned Greek scholar, makes the same observation. He explains that "the adverb opse is sometimes used in the sense of ‘late,’ with a genitive of time . . . which would mean ‘late on the Sabbath.’ . . . But opse has another sense; it is also used by late Greek writers like Philostratus (second to third century) as a preposition meaning ‘after,’ followed by the genitive, opse touton, ‘after these things’ (Life of Apollonius vi. 10; cf. 4:18: opse musterion ‘after the mysteries’). This is the sense of the word in Matthew 28:1 and at once clears up any difficulty . . . The plain sense of the passage is: ‘After the Sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning.’"5

Standard Greek Lexicons. The same explanation is given in several standard Greek lexicons of the New Testament. Walter Bauer’s lexicon, for example, points out that opse is "used as an improper preposition with genitive [meaning] after, (opse sabbaton) after the Sabbath (Matthew 28:1)."6 Bauer gives several examples of this usage, including one of Polyaemus where the following phrase occurs: "later (opse) than the hour decided upon."7

Unfortunately some translations, such as the Revised Version, have ignored the late Greek usage of opse and thus they have translated Matthew 28:1 as "now late on the Sabbath day." This translation would mean that the women came to the tomb late on a Saturday. "This might be the sense of the Greek words used in the classics," but, as R. C. H. Lenski perceptively points out, "in the koine opse is used as a preposition and means ‘after,’ B.-P. 958; B.-D 164; Stellhorn, ‘long after something;’ Zahn, erst nach; R. 517. Mark agrees, ‘when the Sabbath was past.’"8

The same conclusion is reached by Edward Lohse, though from a different basis. He finds that the phrase opse sabbaton of Matthew 28:1, corresponds to the Rabbinic mosa’e shabbat "and thus means the night from the Sabbath to the first day of the week."9

Toward the Dawn. Further support for the meaning of opse sabbaton as "after the sabbath" rather than "late on the sabbath," is provided by the second time element given by Matthew to date the visit of the women to the sepulchre, namely, "toward the dawn of the first day of the week" (Matt 28:1).

The Greek verb epiphosko literally means "to shine forth," "to grow light," "to dawn." It must be said that this verb is used not only in a literal sense to describe the morning dawning of a new day, but also in a figurative sense to refer to the evening beginning of a day. In Luke 23:54 epiphosko is translated "drew on" (KJV) or "beginning" (RSV), in reference to the approach of the Sabbath at sundown.

In Matthew 28:1, however, expositors are generally agreed that the verb epiphosko is used in its literal meaning of "to dawn." This conclusion is based first of all on the parallel statements of the other Gospels, which explicitly place the visit of the women to the tomb "at early dawn" (Luke 24:1; Mark 16:2; John 20:1). There is no hint in any of the Gospels that the women made two visits to the sepulchre, one on Saturday afternoon and one on Sunday morning. Thus we are justified in concluding that the "dawning" in Matthew is literal as in the other Gospels.

Sabbath’s Travel Restrictions. A second reason is suggested by the prevailing Jewish restrictions on Sabbath travel (Acts 1:12), which would have precluded any visit to the tomb on Sabbath afternoon from a distance greater than 2/3 of a mile. Since Mary Magdalene lived in Bethany, a distance of 2 miles from Jerusalem (Matt 21:1), and since she presumably spent the Sabbath at home (Luke 23:56), she could hardly have traveled to the tomb before the end of the Sabbath.

The same must be said for the evening after the close of the Sabbath. In the East people in general, let alone women, do not travel in the darkness of the night, particularly to a burial place "to see the sepulchre" (Matt 28:1). It is far more true to life for the women to have traveled from Bethany to Calvary early on Sunday morning, as indicated by the Gospels (Mark 16:2; Luke 24:1; John 20:1).

At Passover time the astronomical morning twilight began in the latitude of Jerusalem at about 4:00 a.m. and the sun rose at about 5:30 a.m. This means that if Mary Magdalene arose about the time it began to get light (John 20:1), and walked from Bethany to Christ’s sepulchre, she would have arrived by sunrise (Mark 16:1; John 20:1).

Other Difficulties. Several other difficulties arise if the Resurrection and the visit of the women to the tomb are placed "late on the Sabbath day." The many events which are described in Matthew 28:2-15 and attached to the time designated in verse 1 could hardly have taken place "late on a Sabbath day." For example, it is hard to believe that the risen Christ would tell the women on a late Sabbath afternoon, "Go and tell my brethren to go to Galilee" (Matt 28:10). It would have been against prevailing customs to start out on a trip late on a Sabbath afternoon.

Furthermore, it is difficult to see how the following events could have taken place on a late Sabbath afternoon: the guards going to the city to inform the chief priests about what had happened (v. 11); the chief priests assembling the Council to decide what action should be taken (v. 12); the Council paying the soldiers to fabricate the story of the stealing of Christ’s body by His disciples (vv. 12-13).

More decisive still is the instruction given to the soldiers by the chief priests: "Tell people, ‘His disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep" (v. 13). In view of the fact that the soldiers had been stationed at the sepulchre during the light hours of the Sabbath day (Matt 27:62-66), they could hardly have told the people on Saturday evening that the disciples stole Christ’s body by night, when no night had yet intervened between the beginning of their vigil and the Resurrection.

In the light of the above considerations on the language and context of Matthew 28:1, we conclude that this passage offers no support whatsoever to the view of a late Sabbath afternoon Resurrection and visit of the women to the sepulchre. The indications submitted have amply established that the plain sense of Matthew 28:1 is: "After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week" (NIV).

II. SUNRISE TO SUNRISE

A second possible solution to the apparent contradiction between the two time references found in Matthew 28:1 is suggested by the possibility that Matthew here used the sunrise-to-sunrise method of day reckoning. If Matthew used this method, for which there seems to be some support both in the Old and New Testament, then any apparent contradiction would be automatically resolved, because the end of the Sabbath would mark the dawning of the first day.

A host of scholars have for many years argued for the existence in Biblical times of two methods of reckoning the day: one from sunset to sunset and the other from sunrise to sunrise. The data evidencing the existence of the two methods will be examined in the following chapter. The study will show that the support for the sunrise-to-sunrise day reckoning, though less explicit than that from sunset to sunset, cannot be ignored.

Summary of Evidences. Five main types of evidences suggesting the existence of the sunrise reckoning in Bible times are generally presented. Each of these will be considered in the following chapter. At this point we shall briefly state them.

First, there are sacrificial laws which specify that the sacrifice must be eaten on the day upon which it was offered, with nothing left over until the morning. Such statements suggest that the morning marks the end of the previous day and the beginning of the new day.

Second, there is the Passover legislation of Exodus 12 which places both the slaying of the Passover lamb in the afternoon and the eating of it during the following night, on the 14th day of the month (Ex 12:6, 8, 10, 18, 42), thus implying a sunrise reckoning. According to the sunset reckoning the night following the sacrifice of the Passover lamb was no longer the 14th but the15th day of Nisan (Lev 23:5; Num 28:16). In Exodus 12, however, the events of the night following the slaying of the Passover lamb are placed on the 14th in accordance with the sunrise reckoning.

Third, there are about 50 references in which the "day" is mentioned before the "night," which suggests a reckoning whereby the day begins and ends at dawn. Fourth, there are several passages in which the night is reckoned with the previous day, which suggests that the day terminated at sunrise. Lastly, there are statements in Josephus and the Talmud which suggest a sunrise to sunrise reckoning.

Coexistence of Two Reckonings. The study of these evidences suggests, as we shall see in the next chapter, that the two methods of day reckoning may have coexisted side by side in New Testament times. If that is true, and the available indications make it plausible, then Matthew’s statement that the women came to see the sepulchre "in the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week" (Matt 28:1; KJV), makes perfect sense, because the end of the Sabbath would indeed mark the dawning of the first day of the week.

This explanation sheds light also on Mark’s account of the two women who went out to buy spices to anoint Christ "when the Sabbath was past" (Mark 16:1). According to the sunset-to-sunset day reckoning, the women would have gone out to purchase spices on Saturday night after sunset. This may have happened, but it hardly seems true to life because in the East women do not go out to make purchases on Saturday night, in the darkness without street lamps, and when the shops are closed.

According to the sunrise-to-sunrise reckoning, however, the women could easily have gone out to purchase spices early Sunday morning, because in the East people are up and about their business very early, long before most Americans or Europeans leave home for work. Thus the women could easily have slipped into a neighbor’s shop to purchase the spices still needed.

According to Luke, the women had already started to prepare "spices and ointments" on Friday afternoon (Luke 23:56). Thus, it is possible that the women went out very early Sunday morning to buy only those missing ingredients and then they went back home to finish the mixing, before hastening to the tomb. According to Mark "they went to the tomb when the sun had risen" (Mark 16:2). They could hardly have carried out their purpose of anointing Christ’s body at the tomb in darkness. These considerations confirm the possibility that Matthew used the sunrise-to-sunrise reckoning and are true to the prevailing customs of the time.

Conclusion. The conclusion that emerges from the above examination of Matthew 28:1-6 is that this passage offers no support whatsoever for a Saturday afternoon Resurrection. Four main reasons have led us to this conclusion. First, in the New Testament the term opse is used as an approximate time reference which in Matthew could simply mean that the women went to the sepulchre "after" the Sabbath was over and the first day was dawning.

Second, the word opse is used by late Greek writers as a preposition meaning "after." Standard Greek lexicons and modern translations recognize that this is the sense in which the word is used in Matthew 28:1.

Third, several details of the context suggest that the visit of the women to the tomb could not have taken place late on a Sabbath afternoon on account of prevailing Sabbath travel restrictions. Furthermore, the latter would contradict the parallel statements of the other Gospels which place such a visit explicitly "at early dawn" (Luke 24:1; Mark 16:2; John 20:1).

Lastly, there is a possibility that Matthew could have used the sunrise-to-sunrise reckoning which seems to have coexisted side by side with the sunset-to-sunset reckoning. In that case, the end of the Sabbath would mark literally the dawn of the first day of the week when Jesus was resurrected (Mark 16:9).

SUMMARY

The analysis conducted in this book of the three key New Testament texts commonly adduced in support of the Wednesday-Crucifixion/Saturday-Resurrection, has shown, it is hoped to the satisfaction of the most critical minds, that these texts offer no probative support for such a view.

In Chapter 2 we have seen that the sign of Jonah found in Matthew 12:40 consists primarily in the Resurrection event, rather than in the time element of a 72-hour entombment.

We have established that the literal interpretation of the phrase "three days and three nights" is discredited by such factors as the idiomatic use of the phrase "a day and a night" to designate a calendrical day, whether complete or incomplete; the prevalent method of inclusive day reckoning; the identical meaning of the two phrases "after three days" and "on the third day;" Luke’s account of Christ’s appearance on Sunday evening to two disciples (Luke 24:21); and the Gospels’ chronology of the Passion weekend which leave absolutely no room for two Sabbaths to intervene between Crucifixion day and Resurrection day.

In Chapter 3 we have shown that "the day of Preparation of Passover" mentioned in the second key text, John 19:14, was a Friday and not a Wednesday. The main reasons we have cited for this conclusion are: the consistent and exclusive use of the term "Preparation" to designate Friday; the sequence of the days as given in the Synoptics: "Preparation, Sabbath, first day;" the absence of any example of Passover day being ever designated simply as "sabbaton—Sabbath;" the absence of any example of Passover day ever being called "High Day" or "High Sabbath" and the presence of such examples where the weekly Sabbath coincided with Passover; and the absence of any early Christian testimony or hint suggesting the Wednesday-Crucifixion/Saturday-Resurrection.

In Chapter 4 we have ascertained that the visit of the women to the tomb mentioned in the third text, Matthew 28:1-6, took place not on a late Saturday afternoon but on an early Sunday morning. We have reached this conclusion on the basis of the following reasons: the use of the word opse in late Greek writers as meaning "after;" the contextual details which negate the possibility of a late-Saturday-afternoon Resurrection and visit to the tomb; the possible use by Matthew of the sunrise-to-sunrise day reckoning.

The two following chapters are an appendix to the preceding study. Chapter 5 will examine the possible coexistence of two methods of day reckoning in Bible times, and its implication for the time reference of Matthew 28:1. Chapter 6 will address the thorny question of when to begin and end the Sabbath in those parts of the earth where the sun sets very early, or very late, or not at all for a certain period of time.

The conclusion of this investigation, then, is that the attempt to construct a Wednesday-Crucifixion/Saturday-Resurrection theory on the basis of the three texts examined must be regarded as a noble yet groundless effort, because it lacks both Biblical and historical support. The cumulative witness of the Gospels and of history clearly supports the traditional chronology of the Friday-Crucifixion and Sunday-Resurrection of Christ.

Our fervent hope is that the polemic over the time element of Christ’s Crucifixion and Resurrection may not cause some persons to lose sight of the fact that our Christian faith is built not on some esoteric knowledge of the exact duration of Christ’s entombment, but rather on the certainty of the fact that "Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures" (1 Cor 15:3-4).
_________________________________________________

1. Herman L. Hoen, The Crucifixion Was Not on Friday (Pasadena, California: Ambassador College, 1968), p. 14.

2. The Time Element in the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ, published by the Bible Advocate Press of the Church of God (Seventh Day), p. 14.

3. William F. Arndt and F. Wilbur Gingrich note in their lexicon that when "opse" is "used as an improper preposition with genitive, it means . . . after the Sabbath Matt 28:1" (A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament [Chicago, 1979], s.v. "opse").

4. A. T. Robertson, A Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of Historical Research (Nashville, 1923), p. 645.

5. Edgar J. Goodspeed, Problems of New Testament Translation (Chicago, 1945), pp. 43, 45.

6. Walter Bauer, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Chicago, 1979), s.v. "opse," p. 601. See also F. Blass and A. Debrunner, A Greek Grammar of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Chicago, 1964), p. 91; Henry George Liddell and Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon (Oxford, England, 1939), s.v. "opse," vol. II, p. 1282.

7. Walter Bauer, note 6.

8. R. C. H. Lenski, The Interpretation of St. Matthew’s Gospel (Columbus, Ohio, 1943), pp. 1147, 1148.

9. Eduard Lohse, "Sabbaton," Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (Grand Rapids, 1971), vol. VII, p. 20
_________________________________________________

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proi: EARLY IN THE MORNING

Mark 16:9
Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast seven devils.

??*janasta;? {V-2AAP-NSM} de; {CONJ} prwi ;> {ADV} prwvth/ {A-DSF} sabbavtou {N-GSN} ejfavnh {V-2API-3S} prw'ton {ADV} Mariva/ {N-DSF} th'/ {T-DSF} Magdalhnh'/, {N-DSF} parj {PREP} hJ'? {R-GSF} ejkbeblhvkei {V-LAI-3S} eJpta; {N-NUI} daimovnia. {N-APN}

The KJV New Testament Greek Lexicon

Strong's Number:
4404

Original Word
prwi

Word Origin
from (4253)

Transliterated Word
Proi

TDNT Entry
None

Phonetic Spelling
pro-ee'

Parts of Speech
Adverb

Definition
in the morning, early
the fourth watch of the night, from 3 o'clock in the morning until 6 o'clock approximately
____________

G4404. πρωΐ prōi; adv. of time, from pro (G4253), before. Early in the morning.

(I) Particularly and in an absolute sense (Matt. 16:3; Mark 1:35; 11:20; 16:2, 9; John 20:1; Sept.: 1 Kings 3:21; Isa. 5:11). With the prep. hama prōi (hama (G260), with, together with), very early, at dawn (Matt. 20:1); apo prōi (apo (G575), from), from morning (Acts 28:23); epi to prōi (epi (G1909), upon), in the morning (Mark 15:1).

(II) Metonymically the morning watch which ushers in the dawn (Mark 13:35).

Deriv.: prōia (G4405), morning; prōimos (G4406), pertaining to the morning; prōinos (G4407), early, at early morning.

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THE DAY OF THE CRUCIFIXION

Samuele Bacchiocchi, Ph. D., Andrews University

Is the Wednesday Crucifixion a fact or a fable? Wednesday Crucifixionists firmly believe that it is a Biblical fact. To support it, they appeal not only to the sign of Jonah examined in the previous chapter, but also to a second key text, namely, John 19:14, where the day of Christ’s Crucifixion is designated as "the day of Preparation of the Passover."

The conclusion drawn from John 19:14 is that Christ was crucified, not on a Friday—the Preparation day for the Sabbath—but on a Wednesday—the Preparation day for the annual ceremonial Passover Sabbath, which that year supposedly fell on a Thursday. Thus, all the references to the "Preparation day" of Christ’s Crucifixion (Matt 27:62; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54; John 19:31, 42) are interpreted in the light of John 19:14 as meaning Wednesday—the day preceding the Passover Sabbath (Thursday)—rather than Friday—the day preceding the regular seventh-day Sabbath.

The three major reasons generally given in support of this conclusion are succinctly stated in the booklet The Time Element in the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ, published by the Church of God (Seventh Day): "Firstly, the day before the weekly Sabbath was never called a ‘preparation’ in the Bible; secondly, the weekly Sabbath (as designated in the Ten Commandments) was never called or referred to as a ‘high day’; and thirdly, the same writer (John) tells us . . . exactly which occasion this preparation day preceded. He said: ‘And it was the preparation of the Passover’ (John 19:14) . . . Thus, after John states this ‘was the preparation of the passover’ (in verse 14), we must understand . . . that ‘the sabbath day’ in verse 31 corresponds to ‘the passover’in verse 14."1

A brief analysis will now be made of the three given reasons in an attempt to determine what is meant by the "Preparation" day mentioned in all the four Gospels as a time reference of the day of Christ’s Crucifixion.

I. PREPARATION DAY

The first reason given for interpreting "the day of Preparation" as meaning Wednesday rather than Friday is that "the day before the weekly Sabbath was never called a ‘preparation’ in the Bible." This reason is puzzling, to say the least, because it flies in the face of the irrefutable Biblical and historical usage of the term "Preparation-paraskeue" as a technical designation for "Friday." In addition to its occurrence in John 19:14, the term "Preparation-paraskeue" is used five times in the Gospels as a technical designation for "Friday" (Matt 27:62; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54; John 19:31, 42).

Mark’s Definition. Mark 15:42 provides what is perhaps the clearest definition of the expression "day of Preparation" by the statement: "It was the day of Preparation, that is, the day before the Sabbath." Note that in Greek the two phrases "the day of Preparation" and "the day before the Sabbath" are each given with a single technical term: "paraskeue-Preparation," and "prosabbaton-Sabbath eve." Translated literally the text reads: "It was Preparation, that is, Sabbath-eve." For the sake of clarity, Mark uses two technical terms here, both of which unmistakably designate what we call "Friday."

The term "prosabbaton-Sabbath eve" was used by Hellenistic Jews to designate explicitly and exclusively "the day before the Sabbath, i.e. Friday" (Judith 8:6; 2 Macc. 8:26).2 Thus Mark, by defining "paraskeue-Preparation" as being the "prosabbaton-Sabbath-eve," gives the clearest possible definition to his Gentile readers of what he meant by "paraskeue," namely, the day before the weekly Sabbath. Clarifications of time references by a qualifying clause are common in Mark, evidently because the author knew that his Gentile readers were generally unfamiliar with Jewish terms and customs.3

A Technical Designation for "Friday." An English reader could fail to see the technical usage of the term "Preparation," because in the English language such a term is a generic noun which does not mean "Friday." The situation was much different in the Semitic Greek of our Palestinian document, however, where the term "paraskeue" was the Greek equivalent of the Aramaic word "arubta-eve," both of which were commonly used to designate "Friday."

In Aramaic, as Charles C. Torrey explains, "the middle days of the week were designated by numbers, ‘third, fourth, fifth,’ but Friday was always arubta; there was no ‘sixth day’ of the week; . . . Its Greek equivalent, paraskeue-Friday, was likewise adopted, from the first, by the Greek Church." 4

The early Christian usage of the term "paraskeue," as a technical designation for Friday is well attested outside the New Testament. The Didache (or The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles), dated between A.D. 70 to 120, enjoins Christians to fast on "the fourth day and Preparation" (8:1), that is, Wednesday and Friday. It is noteworthy that Friday is designated simply as "Preparation-paraskeuen," without the article or the noun "day," thus indicating the technical usage of the term.

By the time of Tertullian (c. A.D. 160-225) paraskeue had already become such a fixed name for Friday that he even argues that this had been the name for Friday since creation.5 These, and similar examples,6 clearly indicate that Christians adopted the Jewish practice of numbering the first five days of the week and of naming the sixth and the seventh as paraskeue and sabbaton—Preparation and Sabbath.

The Need for a Clarification. Christians coming from a Gentile background had to learn this Judeo-Christian nomenclature of the week-days, because in the pagan world the week-days were not numbered but named after the seven planetary deities (dies solis, dies lunae, . . . ). This may explain why Mark, in writing to a Gentile-Christian readership who had only recently learned the Judeo-Christian nomenclature of the week-days, deemed it necessary to clarify what he meant by "paraskeue-preparation," by adding the qualifying phrase, "that is, the day before the sabbath" (Mark 15:42). This clarification may also have been necessitated by the fact that the seven-day planetary week itself had been recently introduced in the Roman world where the eight-day week (nundinum) was still used side by side with the planetary week.7

Additional and conclusive evidence that "paraskeue-Preparation" is used in the Gospels to designate "Friday" and not "Wednesday" is provided by the sequence in which the days of the Passion weekend are given: "Preparation, Sabbath, first day" (Matt 27:62; 28:1; Mark 15:42; 16:1; Luke 24:54-55; 24:1). Both Mark and Matthew explicitly place the beginning of the first day at the end of the Sabbath (Mark 16:1; Matt 28:1). The latter could hardly have been a Thursday Passover Sabbath, because Thursday is not followed by the first day of the week.

A Reason for the Misunderstanding. The failure to recognize the technical usage of the term "Preparation" as the name for "Friday," has caused some to misinterpret John’s phrase "it was the day of Preparation of the Passover" (John 19:14) as meaning "the day of Preparation for the Passover." The latter is in fact the translation of the American Revised Standard Version. On the basis of this misunderstanding, Wednesday Crucifixionists argue that in John "the day of Preparation" means not Friday but the Wednesday preceding the Passover day, which supposedly fell on a Thursday.

This conclusion ignores the fact, cogently stated by Norval Geldenhuys, "that at the time when John wrote, the Greek term paraskeue (‘preparation’) was already for a long time the technical term used to indicate ‘Friday,’ the equivalent of the Hebrew erebh shabbath." 8 The recognition of this fact is evident in the right translation which is found in the A.V., R.S.V., and N.I.V., namely "the day of Preparation of the Passover."

This means, as Geldenhuys explains, "that the day of the Lord’s crucifixion was the Friday of the Passover, the Friday that falls during Passover week, i.e., Passover Friday (Good Friday). It is a grammatically correct rendering and all the evidence is in favor of it." 9

The foregoing considerations make it abundantly clear that in the Gospels, as stated by Moulton and Milligan, noted authorities on the Greek language: "paraskeue is a technical designation for Friday."10 Thus, the first reason, which claims that "the day before the weekly Sabbath was never called a ‘preparation’ in the Bible" must be regarded as false, because, as we have shown, the very opposite is true.

II. A HIGH DAY

The second reason given for interpreting "the day of Preparation" as referring to Wednesday rather than Friday is based on John’s definition of the Sabbath day which followed the Preparation day of Christ’s Crucifixion. John explains: "that sabbath was a high day" (John 19:31). It is argued that since "the weekly Sabbath (as designated in the Ten Commandments) was never called or referred to as a ‘high day,’"11 then the latter must have been not the regular weekly Sabbath but the annual ceremonial Passover Sabbath (Lev 23:5-7).

In support of this conclusion, a third reason is given, namely, that John 19:14 "tells us exactly which occasion this preparation day preceded. He says: ‘And it was the preparation of the passover.’"12 Thus the "high day" Sabbath of John 19:31 is interpreted as being the "Passover" day of John 19:14, and by the same token "the day of Preparation" of verse 31 is interpreted as being the Passover day of verse 14. Since in the year of Christ’s Crucifixion, Passover day supposedly fell on a Thursday, the day of preparation for the latter would obviously be a Wednesday.

A Ceremonial Sabbath. The reasons given in support of this conclusion rest on three major mistaken assumptions. First, it is assumed that since certain annual feasts such as the Day of Atonement are designated as "sabbath" (Lev 23:24, 32, 39), then all the references to the Sabbath found in the Passion narratives must refer not to the weekly Sabbath but to the annual ceremonial Passover Sabbath.

This assumption is discredited by the fact that the day of atonement is designated by the compound expression shabbath shabbathon, meaning "a sabbath of solemn rest" (Lev 23:32; 16:31). But this phrase is rendered in the Septuagint by the compound Greek expression "sabbata sabbaton," which is different from the simple "sabbaton" used in the Passion narratives. It is therefore linguistically impossible to interpret the latter as a reference to the day of the Passover or to any other annual feast day, since these are never designated simply as "sabbaton."

High Day: Passover or Sabbath? The second mistaken assumption is that the term "high day-megale hemera," used in John 19:31, is employed in the Scripture to designate the annual Passover feast (a ceremonial Sabbath), rather than a special weekly Sabbath. Unfortunately, no Biblical or extra-Biblical examples are cited to support this assumption—the reason being simply that no such examples exist .

Israel Abrahams, a noted Jewish scholar, finds no instance before John 19:31 of the use of the term "high day" or "Great Sabbath" in Rabbinical literature. His opinion is that the later Rabbinic use of the term "Great Sabbath" to designate the Sabbath of the Passover season was borrowed from the church.13 While the latter is difficult to prove, it is a well-known fact that the church coined the terms "Good Friday" and "Holy Saturday" as designations for the special days of Christ’s Crucifixion and burial. It is noteworthy that Georgius Codinus (15th century) gives the official term for "Good Friday" as "he megale paraskeue—the great Preparation."14 This suggests the possibility that even the Sabbath of the Passion week came early to be known by Christians as a "high day" or a "Great Sabbath."

Note should be taken also of the fact that, according to examples given by Strack and Billerbeck, in later Rabbinic literature the seventh-day Sabbath is regarded as a "high day" if it fell on Nisan 15, since that was the first day of the Passover festival, or if it fell on Nisan 16, because on that day the omer or first sheaf of barley was offered according to Pharisaic tradition. 15

This information is important because it disproves the claim that "the weekly Sabbath was never called or referred to as a "high day." Rabbinical sources seem to indicate that the weekly Sabbath was called a "high day" when it coincided with Passover, because, as well stated by Charles C. Torrey, "its inherent solemnity was greatly heightened by the celebration of the foremost feast of the year."16

III. PREPARATION OF THE PASSOVER

The third mistaken assumption is that the term "Preparation" found in John 19:14, "It was the day of Preparation of the Passover" is used as a technical designation for the day before the Passover. It is also assumed that this "Preparation" day fell on a Wednesday because Passover day allegedly fell on a Thursday. On the basis of these assumptions, it is further assumed that all the other five references to the "Preparation" day (Matt 27:62; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54; John 19:31, 42) must be interpreted in the light of John 19:14 as meaning Wednesday.

Friday of the Passover Week. These assumptions are false on several counts. First of all, because, as Charles C. Torrey explains, "There is no evidence to show that that word [Preparation] was used in the time of the Gospel writers for the ‘eve’ of other festal days than the Sabbath." 17 Milligan and Moulton emphasize the same point, saying: "It has never been shown that the day before the Passover was called ‘The preparation of the Passover.’"18 Leon Morris expresses the same view, saying: "The fact must be faced that no example of the use of paraskeue is cited for any day other than Friday." 19 Moreover, as J. H. Bernard points out, if "Preparation" meant "the Preparation day of the Passover" we would expect a definite article in Greek, which, however, is absent. 20

An additional indication that John meant "Friday" by the phrase "Preparation of the Passover" (v. 14) is provided by the usage of the same term "paraskeue" twice again in the same chapter. In verse 31 John explains that the Jews did not wish the bodies to remain on the Cross "on the Sabbath, because it was Preparation" (literal translation). Here John not only mentions the Sabbath explicitly, but also refers to the preceding day by the technical term "paraskeue—Preparation" without the article, thus meaning: "because it was Friday."

Similarly, in verse 42, John reports that Jesus was placed in a garden tomb near the place of His Crucifixion "because of the Preparation of the Jews." In this context the term "Preparation" is used again by itself, not in a generic sense, but in a temporal sense as a technical designation for Friday. What John is saying is that Jesus was buried in the garden tomb because it was near and because it was late Friday (Preparation) when the Sabbath was about to start. In the light of the above considerations, the expression "the day of Preparation of the Passover" (John 19:14), simply means, as most scholars acknowledge, "the Friday of the Passover week."

The Testimony of the Synoptics. Further support for this conclusion is provided by the Synoptics where the same "Preparation" day mentioned by John is unmistakably identified with Friday, the day before the weekly Sabbath (Mark 15:42; Matt 27:62; Luke 23:54).

Any attempt to interpret the Synoptic references to the day of "Preparation" in the light of John 19:14 as meaning "Wednesday," is unwarranted for at least two reasons. First, because, as shown earlier, the term "Preparation" was never used as a technical designation for the day preceding the Passover. Second, because, even granting that John used the term "Preparation" to mean "Wednesday Passover-eve," such a meaning cannot be automatically read back in the parallel references found in the Synoptics, because the Matthean, Marcan, and Lucan communities understood this term, not in the light of what John wrote later, but in the light of its context in their respective Gospels and in the light of its prevailing usage.

Undisputed Tradition. A final and equally important consideration is the fact that Christian tradition has unanimously held to the Friday-Crucifixion/Sunday-Resurrection chronology. This is all the more surprising in view of the fact that some early Christian writers did place the Last Supper on Tuesday evening rather than Thursday evening. With regard to the Crucifixion, however, no early Christian writer ever disputed or doubted its occurrence on Friday.

The absence of any early Christian polemic regarding the day of Christ’s Crucifixion and Resurrection, offers, in our view, overwhelming proof of the trustworthiness of the traditional chronology of the Crucifixion and Resurrection. If indeed Christ had risen on a Saturday afternoon, seventh-day Sabbathkeepers would have capitalized on this fact to discredit the Resurrection argument frequently used in early Christianity to defend Sundaykeeping. Such an argument, however, never appears in the polemic over the theological superiority of the two days.

Conclusion

The foregoing analysis of John 19:14, the second key text of the Wednesday Crucifixion theory, has shown that such a theory is based on human fantasy and not on a Biblical fact. We have submitted abundant evidence indicating that John’s expression "the day of Preparation of the Passover" (John 19:14), simply means, as most scholars acknowledge, "the Friday of the Passover week." Thus the Crucifixion took place on Friday and not on Wednesday. _________________________________________________

1. The Time Element in the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ, published by the Bible Advocate Press of the Church of God (Seventh Day), p. 20.

2. See William F. Arndt and F. Wilbur Gingrich, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament (Chicago, 1979), s.v. "prosabbaton."

3. See, for example, Mark 1:32, 35; 4:35; 13:24; 14:30; 15:42; 16:2.

4. Charles C. Torrey, "The Date of the Crucifixion according to the Fourth Gospel," Journal of Biblical Literature 50 (1931): 234-235.

5. The Writings of Tertullian, Ante-Nicene Christian Library, vol. III, p. 309.

6. See, for example, The Martyrdom of Polycarp, 7, 1.

7. On the origin and adoption of the Planetary week in the Roman world, see Samuele Bacchiocchi, From Sabbath to Sunday (Rome, 1977), pp. 241-251.

8. Norval Geldenhuys, Commentary on the Gospel of Luke, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, 1983), p. 664.

9. Loc. cit.

10. W. Moulton and W. F. Milligan, Vocabulary of the Greek New Testament (New York, 1928), p. 545.

11. The Time Element (n. 1), p. 20.

12. Loc. cit.

13. Israel Abrahams, Studies in Pharisaism and the Gospels (Cambridge, 1924), vol. II, p. 68.

14. De Officiis 13,1.

15. H. L. Strack and P. Billerbec, Kommentar zum Neuen Testament aus Talmud und Midrash (Munich, 1922-1928), vol. 2, pp. 581f. and 847.

16. Charles C. Torrey (n. 4), p. 235.

17. Charles C. Torrey, "In the Fourth Gospel the Last Supper was the Paschal Meal," The Jewish Quarterly Review, 42 (January 1952): 241.

18. W. Milligan and W. F. Moulton, Commentary on the Gospel of St. John (Edinburgh, 1898), on John 19:14.

19. Leon Morris, The Gospel According to John, The New International Commentary on the New Testament, (Grand Rapids, 1971), p. 777.

20. J. H. Bernard, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel According to St. John (Edinburgh, 1928), on John 19:14.
_________________________________________________

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Carol Swenson
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prosavbbaton: THE DAY BEFORE THE SABBATH

42 And now when the even was come , because it was the preparation, that is, the day before the sabbath,

Kai; {CONJ} h~dh {ADV} ojyiva? {A-GSF} genomevnh?, {V-2ADP-GSF} ejpei; {CONJ} h\n {V-IXI-3S} paraskeuhv, {N-NSF} o& {R-NSN} ejstin {V-PXI-3S} prosavbbaton , {N-NSN}

The KJV New Testament Greek Lexicon

Strong's Number:
4315

Original Word
prosavbbaton

Word Origin
from (4253) and (4521)

Transliterated Word
Prosabbaton

TDNT Entry
None

Phonetic Spelling
pros-ab'-bat-on

Parts of Speech
Noun Neuter

Definition
the day before the sabbath


Dr. Robinson, Harmony p. 222, and Keil, Evang. des Matt., pp. 522 sqq. The Mishna prescribes that "on Sabbaths and festival days no trial or judgment may be held;" but on the other hand it contains directions and regulations for the meetings and actions of the Sanhedrin on the Sabbaths, and executions of criminals were purposely reserved to great festivals for the sake of stronger example. In our case, the Sanhedrin on the day after the crucifixion, which was a Sabbath and "a great day," applied to Pilate for a watch and caused the sepulchre to be sealed, Matt. 27:62 sq.

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barrykind
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Enough said!

--------------------
The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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WildB
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quote:
Originally posted by barrykind:
Betty says:


quote:
Barrry YOU DO JUDGE others by the day they worship. NONE of us JUDGE YOU. You make it clear that if I do not agree with you that I am ignorant.
I don't care what you think, the Gospels spell it out Jesus rose on Sunday. You and your mini cult can believe what you will. You place so much emphases on Saturday being the day Jesus rose again, that you forget the important JESUS DID RISE AGAIN.
betty

Yes i will judge you betty, by the scripture:

You will know them by thier fruit!

Yes it is ok to judge , not to hell, nor the lake of fire, that is YHWH's judgement, not mine; but to judge things is rightfully mine to do:

You make false statements, i will not let them pass, i will challange them on every side..
i w ill defend the truth as best i can.

Proverbs, Chapter 8, 13: The fear of the LORD is to hate evil: pride, and arrogancy, and the evil way, and the froward mouth, do I hate.

These six things doth the LORD hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him: he that soweth discord among brethren is the abomination.

Half truths are lies and for you to make such a arrogant and forward post consider yourself reproved a 2nd time.

And one more thing If you wan't to post other peoples post out of context please included the source so others can verify your handy work.
[rapture]

--------------------
That is all.....

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Carol Swenson
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Here's some Armstrong to gag on...

I. THE DURATION OF THE ENTOMBMENT

What is the sign of Jonah that Christ gave to His unbelieving generation as a proof of His Messiahship? Wednesday Crucifixionists firmly believe that the sign consisted not simply of the resurrection which Christ, like Jonah, would experience after a temporary burial, but primarily of the exact period of 72-hour entombment in the heart of the earth.

An Exact Length of Time. This conviction is emphatically expressed, for example, in the booklet The Resurrection Was Not on Sunday, published by the Department of Theology of Ambassador College: "Jesus offered but one evidence [of His Messiahship]. That evidence was not the fact of the resurrection itself. It was the length of time He would repose in His grave, before being resurrected."1

The implication of this contention is clearly stated in the next paragraph which reads: "Jesus staked His claim to being your Savior and mine upon remaining exactly three days and three nights in the tomb. If He remained just three days and three nights inside the earth, He would prove Himself the Savior—if He failed in this sign, He must be rejected as an impostor."2

72-Hour Entombment. Statements such as the ones just quoted clearly reveal the fundamental importance attached to a 72-hour duration of Christ’s entombment. This conviction rests on the assumption that when "days and nights" are explicitly mentioned in the Bible, they represent literal 24 hour days. Appeal is made to the creation week where each day consists of "evening and morning" that is, of a day and a night.

The designation of each creation day as "evening and morning" is seen as "the only Bible definition which explains and counts up the amount of time involved in the expression ‘the third day.’ It includes three dark periods called ‘night’ and three light periods called ‘day’—three days and three nights, and Jesus said they contained twelve hours for each period [John 11:9-10]—a total of 72 hours."3


II. THE SIGN OF THE RESURRECTION

The interpretation which views the sign of Jonah as being primarily an exact 72-hour period of Christ’s entombment is discredited by three major reasons. These, as we shall now show, indicate that the sign of Jonah consisted not in a 72-hour entombment but in the miracle of the Resurrection.

Absence of Time Reference. The first significant reason is the absence of any time reference in the other two passages mentioning the sign of Jonah (Matt 16:4; Luke 11:29-32). In Luke 11:29-30 Jesus says: "This generation is an evil generation; it seeks a sign, but no sign shall be given to it except the sign of Jonah. For as Jonah became a sign to the men of Nineveh, so will the Son of man be to this generation."

Note should be taken of the fact that in Luke there is no reference to the length of time Jonah survived in the whale’s belly. If the sign of Jonah consisted of the time factor, Luke could hardly have ignored it. The comparison in Luke between Jonah and Christ is not in terms of identical duration of entombment, but of similar miraculous Resurrections: "as Jonah . . . so will the Son of man be."

The book of Jonah suggests that Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites through the miraculous way in which God raised Jonah out of the whale’s belly and cast him alive on shore. This experience gave Jonah the compulsion to preach, and the Ninevites the conviction to repent. In the same way as God’s rescue of Jonah revealed Jonah’s prophetic mandate which led many Ninevites to repent, so Christ’s Resurrection would reveal His Messiahship which would lead many to believe.

The vast majority of commentaries consulted agree in viewing the sign of Jonah as being primarily the sign of Christ’s Resurrection. Norval Geldenhuys, for example, writes in The New International Commentary on The Gospel of Luke: "Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites, because he appeared there as one sent by God after having been miraculously saved from the great fish (as it were raised from the dead) as a proof that he was really sent by God. So also Jesus will by His resurrection prove conclusively that He has been sent by God as the Christ, the promised Redeemer."4

A Parallel Example. A second significant reason is found in the similar passage of John 2:19 where in response to the same request by the Jews for a sign Jesus replied: "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." In this statement Christ makes His Resurrection the unmistakable sign of His Messiahship. By virtue of the parallelism between this text and Matthew 12:40 (in both places a sign is asked for and given), it seems legitimate to conclude that the sign of Jonah is essentially the same in both places, namely, the sign of the Resurrection, which is implicit in the first text and explicit in the second.

The Testimony of the Catacombs. A third reason is provided by the early Christians’ pictorial representation of the sign of Jonah. In numerous frescos of the catacombs, Christ’s Resurrection is symbolically represented as Jonah being spewed out by the whale. In fact, the scene of Jonah (known as "Jonah’s cycle" because it consists of different scenes) is perhaps the most common symbolic representation of Christ’s Resurrection.

The catacombs indicate, then, that the early Christians identified the sign of Jonah with the event of the Resurrection and not with its time element. Paul himself indirectly confirms this view when he writes that Christ was "designated Son of God in power . . . by his resurrection from the dead" (Rom 1:4).

In the light of the above considerations we conclude that the sign of Jonah given by Christ as a proof of His Messiahship consists primarily in His future Resurrection and not in an exact 72-hour entombment. Christ’s Resurrection was the unmistakable vindication of His Messiahship, of which the emergence of Jonah from what was a temporary living burial was in some sense a foreshadowing.


III. INCLUSIVE RECKONING

The literal interpretation of the phrase "three days and three nights" as representing an exact period of 72 hours ignores the abundant Biblical and Rabbinical evidence on the idiomatic use of the phrase "a day and a night," to refer not to an exact number of hours or of minutes, but simply to a calendrical day, whether complete or incomplete. Matthew, for example, writes that Jesus "fasted forty days and forty nights" in the wilderness (Matt 4:2). The same period is given in Mark 1:13 and Luke 4:2 as "forty days," which does not necessarily require forty complete 24 hour days.5

It is important to note that in Biblical times a fraction of a day or of a night was reckoned inclusively as representing the whole day or night. This method of reckoning is known as "inclusive reckoning." A few examples from the Bible and from Rabbinic literature will suffice to demonstrate its usage.

An Abandoned Egyptian. 1 Samuel 30:12 speaks of an abandoned Egyptian servant who "had not eaten bread or drunk water for three days and three nights." The idiomatic usage of this expression is shown by the following verse, where the servant states that his master had left him behind "three days ago" (v. 13). If the "three days and three nights" were meant to be taken literally, then the servant should have said that he had been left behind four days before.

Esther’s Visit to the King. Another explicit example of inclusive day reckoning is found in the story of Esther’s visit to the king. When Queen Esther was informed by Mordecai about the plan to exterminate the Jews, she sent this message to him: "Go, gather all the Jews to be found in Susa, and hold a fast on my behalf, and neither eat nor drink for three days, night or day. I and my maids will also fast as you do. Then I will go to the King" (Esther 4:16).

If Esther intended the three days and three nights to be taken literally as a 72-hour period of fasting, then she should have presented herself before the King on the fourth day. However, we are told a few verses later that Esther went before the king "on the third day" (Esther 5:1). Examples such as these clearly show that the expression "three days and three nights" is used in the Scriptures idiomatically to indicate not three complete 24-hour days, but three calendric days of which the first and the third could have consisted of only a fraction of a day.6

Rabbinical Literature. Explicit examples for inclusive day reckoning are also found in Rabbinic literature. Rabbi Eleazar ben Azariah, who lived about A.D. 100, stated: "A day and a night are an Onah [‘a portion of time’] and the portion of an Onah is as the whole of it."7 There are other instances in Rabbinic literature where the "three days and three nights" of Jonah 1:17 are combined with Old Testament passages which mention events that took place "on the third day."8 "It is in this light," writes Gerhard Dilling in the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, "that we are to understand Matthew 12:40."9

Jewish Practice. The practice of inclusive day reckoning, according to The Jewish Encyclopedia, a standard Jewish reference work, is still in vogue among the Jews today. "In Jewish communal life part of a day is at times reckoned as one day; e.g., the day of the funeral, even when the latter takes place late in the afternoon, is counted as the first of the seven days of mourning; a short time in the morning of the seventh day is counted as the seventh day; circumcision takes place on the eighth day, even though on the first day only a few minutes remained after the birth of the child, these being counted as one day."10

The examples cited above clearly indicate that in Biblical times the expression "a day and a night" simply meant a day, whether complete or incomplete. Thus, in the light of the prevailing usage, the expression "three days and three nights" of Matthew 12:40 does not require that Jesus be entombed for 72 hours, but for a full day and two partial days.


IV. ON THE THIRD DAY

A conclusive confirmation of the Biblical method of inclusive day reckoning is provided by the two most common Greek phrases used in the Gospels to describe the time between the Crucifixion and the Resurrection, namely, te trite hemera and meta treis hemeras, which can be literally translated as on the third day and after three days, respectively. The latter phrase, which is used four times in the Gospels (Mark 8:31; 9:31; 10:34; Matt 27:63), if taken in isolation would confirm the literal interpretation of "three days and three nights" (Matt 12:40), since the latter requires the Resurrection to take place after three whole days from the time of the Crucifixion.

A Parallel Usage. This interpretation, however, is discredited by the fact that the very same statement of Christ which contains the phrase "after three days" in one Gospel, is reported in another Gospel with the phrase "on the third day." To clarify this point, in the following table we shall set out the occurrences of these two phrases in the parallel passages of the Synoptic Gospels:

Mark 8:31 "after three days rise again"

Matthew 16:31 "on the third day be raised"

Luke 9:22 "on the third day be raised

Mark 9:31 "after three days he will rise"

Matthew 17:23 "he will be raised on the third day"

Mark 10:34 "after three days he will rise"

Matthew 20:19 "he will be raised on the third day"

Luke 18:33 "on the third day he will rise"

Identical Meaning. This comparison clearly indicates that Matthew and Luke understood Mark’s "after three days" as meaning "on the third day." Further evidence for the basic identity of the two phrases is provided by Matthew 27:63-64. In verse 63 the Jewish leaders tell Pilate that Christ had said, "After three days I will rise again." In actual fact, up to this point only the expression "on the third day" occurs in Matthew (16:21; 17:23; 20:19), which suggests the identical meaning of the two phrases.

Verse 64 provides additional confirmation when the Jewish leaders request Pilate to have the tomb guarded "until the third day." David Clark keenly observes in his article "After Three Days," published in The Bible Translator, that "Unless this expression [‘until the third day’] referred to a space of time identical with, or at least as great as, that referred to by ‘after three days’ in the previous verse, then the guard would not extend over the whole of the critical period, and the entire paragraph would thus lose its point."11

The same author expresses astonishment at the fact that translators of all major English versions have entirely overlooked "the awkward fact that after three days/three days later does not mean the same thing in English as on the third day."12 Thus, for the sake of accuracy, Clark proposes to use the phrase "on the third day"consistently in all the passages mentioned above.


V. FIRST DAY APPEARANCES

The literal interpretation of the "three days and three nights" is also discredited by Luke’s account of Christ’s appearance on Sunday evening to the two disciples who were going to the village of Emmaus. Christ, whom they had not recognized caught up with them and asked them, "What is this conversation which you are holding with each other as you walk?" (Luke 24:17).

The two men, surprised at Jesus’ unawareness of what had happened in Jerusalem, recounted to Him "how our chief priests and rulers delivered him [Christ] to be condemned to death, and crucified him. But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is the third day since this happened" (Luke 24:21).13

Third Day on Sunday Evening. To appreciate the significance of the last statement, notice must be taken of two facts. First, the statement was made on the "evening" of the first day when the day was "far spent" (Luke 24:29). Second, "the third day" refers specifically to the events mentioned in the immediate context, namely, Christ’s condemnation and Crucifixion. It is obvious, then, that if Christ had been crucified on a Wednesday afternoon, those two disciples could not have referred to that event on a Sunday night, saying: "It is now the third day since this happened." According to the Jewish inclusive day-reckoning, it would have been the fifth day and not the third.


VI. CHRONOLOGY OF PASSION WEEKEND

The chronology of the Passion weekend provides further evidence of the idiomatic usage of the phrase "three days and three nights." The days of the Crucifixion, entombment, and Resurrection are given in clear sequence and with considerable clarity in the Gospels as Preparation day, Sabbath, first day.

Mark, who writes for a Gentile readership less familiar with Jewish terminology, explains with utmost clarity that Christ was crucified on "the day of Preparation, that is, the day before the Sabbath" (Mark 15:42). In the following chapter it will be shown that both the term "preparation" (paraskeue) and "Sabbath-eve" (pro-sabbaton) are two technical terms used unmistakably to designate what we call "Friday."

Mark, then, is most precise in explaining that the Crucifixion took place on what today we call "Friday." The next day is designated by Mark as "sabbath" (Mark 16:1) which in turn is followed by the "first day of the week" (Mark 16:2). Mark’s chronological sequence leaves absolutely no room for a two-day interval between the Crucifixion and Resurrection.

Similarly Luke makes it clear that the day of Christ’s Crucifixion was followed, not by a Thursday or a Friday, but by a weekly Sabbath. He writes: "It was the day of Preparation, and the sabbath was beginning" (Luke 23:54). By linking the beginning of the Sabbath to the end of the day of Preparation, and the beginning of the "first day of the week" (Luke 24:1) to the termination of the Sabbath (Luke 23:56), Luke leaves absolutely no room for two full days to intervene between the Crucifixion and Resurrection.

No Two Sabbaths. Some wish to make room for intervening days by arguing that between the Wednesday Crucifixion and Saturday afternoon resurrection there were two Sabbaths: the first, a Passover Sabbath which fell on a Thursday; the second, a weekly Sabbath which fell on the regular Saturday. Such an argument is based on pure speculation because nowhere do the Gospels suggest that two Sabbaths intervened between the day of the Crucifixion and that of the Resurrection.

Support for the two-Sabbath view is sought in the plural form the Sabbath in Matthew 28:1 takes, which literally reads "at the end of the Sabbaths." This text is viewed as "a vital text" which "proves that there were TWO Sabbaths that week with a day in between." The first Sabbath, Thursday, allegedly was "the annual high-day Sabbath, the feast day of the days of Unleavened Bread," while the second was "the weekly Sabbath, Saturday."14

This conclusion is untenable, because, as Harold W. Hoehner points out, "The term Sabbath is frequently (one-third of all its New Testament occurrences) in the plural form in the New Testament when only one day is in view. For example, in Matthew 12:1-12 both the singular and plural forms are used (cf. esp. v. 5)."15 There is then no Biblical basis for a Passover Sabbath which occurred two days before the regular weekly Sabbath.

The clear and uninterrupted chronological sequence of days given in the Gospels is: Preparation day, Sabbath day, and first day. This sequence leaves absolutely no room for a literal interpretation of the phrase "three days and three nights" as representing an exact period of 72 hours.

Conclusion

The foregoing considerations have shown, first, that the sign of Jonah given by Christ to prove His Messiahship consisted not in an exact 72-hour entombment, but in His Resurrection on the third day after His death. Second, the phrase "three days and three nights" (Matt 12:40) is an idiomatic expression which in Bible times meant not necessarily three complete 24-hour days (72 hours), but rather three calendric days, of which the first and the third could have consisted of only a few hours.

The latter conclusion is supported by the prevailing inclusive method of day-reckoning, by the parallel usage of the phrases "after three days" and "on the third day," and by the uninterrupted chronological sequence of days which does not allow for three complete 24-hour days. A recognition of these facts adequately explains how Jesus fulfilled His prediction of a "three days and three nights" entombment by being buried on Friday afternoon and rising early on Sunday morning.
_________________________________________________

1. Herbert W. Armstrong, The Resurrection Was Not on Sunday (Pasadena, California: Ambassador College, 1972), p. 4; emphasis supplied.

2. Ibid., p. 4.

3. Ibid., p. 6.

4. Norval Geldenhuys, Commentary on the Gospel of Luke, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, 1983), p. 334. Similarly Leon Morris comments: "For the Ninevites the sign was the reappearance of a man who had apparently been dead for three days. For the men of Jesus’ day the sign would be the reappearance of the Son of Man on the third day after His death" (The Gospel According to St. Luke, The Tyndale New Testament Commentaries [Grand Rapids, 1982], p. 201.

5. Similar examples are found in Gen 7:4, 12; Ex 24:18; 34:28; 1 Kings 19:8; Job 2:13.

6. For more examples and a discussion of the inclusive reckoning, see Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary, vol. II, pp. 136-137; vol. V, pp. 248-251.

7. Jerusalem Talmud, Shabbath 9, 3; cf. also Babylonian Talmud, Pesahim 4a.

8. See Midrash Rabbah: Genesis 56,1 (on Gen 22:4); Genesis 91,7 (on Gen 42:17-18); Esther 9,2 (on Esther 5:1).

9. Gerhard Dilling, "hemera," in Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (Grand Rapids, 1974), vol. II, p. 950.

10. The Jewish Encyclopedia, s.v. "Day," vol. IV, p. 475.

11. David Clark, "After Three Days," The Bible Translator 30 (July 1979): 341.

12. Ibid., pp. 342, 343.

13. Emphasis supplied.

14. Herbert W. Armstrong (n. 1), p. 13.

15. Harold W. Hoehner, Chronological Aspects of the Life of Christ (Grand Rapids, 1977), pp. 69-70.
_________________________________________________

http://www.biblicalperspectives.com/books/crucifixion/1.html

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Carol Swenson
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As much as I love and respect Caretaker, I'm not willing to turn aside just yet.

barrykind spent a lot of time bashing heretics in another post, yet he wholeheartedly embraces the teachings of Armstrong, a well known cult leader. This 72 hour idea is because of Armstrong's influence.

The people who believe him never stand up to questioning.

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Betty Louise
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I agree Drew. Now if we can get Barry to stop calling everyone ignorant who disagrees with him, we all be fine. I think at my age, I deserve a little respect and while I have never considered myself super smart, I don't think I am ignorant either.
betty

--------------------
Luk 21:28 And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.

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Caretaker
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Romans 14:

5 One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.
6 He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord; and he that regardeth not the day, to the Lord he doth not regard it. He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, for he giveth God thanks; and he that eateth not, to the Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks.
7 For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself.
8 For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord's.
9 For to this end Christ both died, and rose, and revived, that he might be Lord both of the dead and living.

quote:


Very early in the life of the Church, disputes arose as to which date Pasch or Easter (called "Pascha" in Greek and Latin) should be celebrated. Disputes of this kind came to be known as Paschal/Easter controversies. The first recorded such controversy came to be known as the Quartodeciman controversy.

In the early period, Easter was always held on a date near the middle of the Jewish month of Nisan. In the mid–second century A.D., the practice in the Roman province of Asia was for the pre-Easter fast to end on the eve of the 14th day of Nisan, the day on which the Passover sacrifice had been made when the Second Temple stood, and "the day when the people put away the leaven"[2] (such as Jews, Jewish proselytes, and Jewish Christians). Nisan 14 itself was commonly, if somewhat confusingly, also called Passover; technically it is Preparation Day for the seven-day Feast of Unleavened Bread that begins on Nisan 15, now also called Passover. The Asian custom became known as "Quartodecimanism" among the Latins. Melito of Sardis (d. c.180) was a notable Quartodeciman.

The practice elsewhere was to continue the fast until the eve of the Sunday following; the objection to the Quartodeciman practice was that the 14th of Nisan could fall on any day of the week. Outside of Roman Asia, Christians wished to associate Easter with Sunday, the day on which Jesus rose from the dead according to all the Gospels, and which had long been a Christian holy day[3], known as the Lord's Day. According to the writings of Irenaeus (d. c. 202), the Roman church had celebrated Easter on a Sunday at least since the time of Bishop Xystus (Sixtus I, 115–125).[4]

Irenaeus, who followed the Sunday custom, also stated, however, that bishop Polycarp (a disciple of John the Apostle) of Smyrna (c.69-c.155) in Asia Minor, one of the Seven churches of Asia, was Quartodeciman, celebrating on Nisan 14. Shortly after Anicetus became bishop of Rome in about 155, Polycarp had visited Rome, and among the topics discussed was this divergence of custom. But, Irenaeus noted,

Anicetus could not persuade Polycarp to forgo the [Quartodeciman] observance inasmuch as these things had been always observed by John the disciple of the Lord, and by other apostles with whom he had been conversant; nor did Polycarp persuade Anicetus to keep it: Anicetus said that he must hold to the way of the elders before him.

Neither Polycarp nor Anicetus was able to persuade the other to his position, but neither did they consider the matter of sufficient importance to justify a schism. Indeed, Irenaeus also noted that "Anicetus conceded to Polycarp in the Church the celebration of the Eucharist, by way of showing him respect"; Anicetus and Polycarp parted in peace leaving the question unsettled.[4][5]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quartodecimanism


quote:


Scholars disagree about the controversy's details. They do agree that its arguments revolved around whether the primary Christian spring festival should happen on Nisan 14 (the Passover day) or annually on a Sunday.

Eusebius is our primary source for the controversy between Polycarp and Anicetus. Polycarp knew the apostle John and was of such stature that many considered him John's spiritual, though not apostolic, successor in Asia Minor. Polycarp believed that Nisan 14 was the correct time for the spring festival, but Anicetus, bishop of Rome, favored Sunday.

But what were some Christians doing on Nisan 14 and others doing on "Easter"? Were some observing the Passover as the only time for the Lord's Supper, while others were observing a pagan holiday? If so, how did each view the other?

A careful reading of the evidence shows that an annual Lord's Supper was not the issue, neither was Easter, or at least what we think of as Easter. No one was arguing that the Lord's Supper should only be kept once a year. And no one was arguing over Easter bunnies and colored eggs.

Furthermore, none of the Quartodecimans claimed that it was wrong to celebrate Jesus' resurrection. To the contrary, the evidence indicates that both Polycarp and Anicetus celebrated Jesus' resurrection. Polycarp's claim seems to have been that the best day to do so was on Nisan 14. Anicetus argued for Sunday.

What is more intriguing for us is that Polycarp claimed his practice came to him from the apostle John. In other words, Polycarp essentially argued that the practice of celebrating Jesus' resurrection on Nisan 14 was an apostolic practice, at least for the apostle John. His argument was not so much scriptural as it was traditional.

Eusebius, in his Ecclesiastical History, chapters 23 to 25, makes it plain that the Quartodeciman controversy involved in part when to celebrate Jesus' resurrection. He tells us that the churches in Asia Minor, focusing on the crucifixion as of primary importance, argued for Nisan 14 as the day to commemorate the entire story of Jesus' death, burial and resurrection. The church at Rome, focusing on the resurrection, argued that there was no need to depend on the Jewish calendar and that Sunday was the most appropriate day of all.

http://www.gci.org/church/holidays/passover


To celebrate the day of the week of the death burial resurrection of our precious Lord.

To celebrate the anniversary date of the death, burial, resurrection of our precious Lord.

To celebrate the FACT of the death, burial, resurrection of our precious Lord.


One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.

Greater than us have been debating this for centuries, almost two millenium, and will continue to do so until our Lord speaks directly to us in person.

I would say lay it aside and let each be pursuaded in their own mind.

--------------------
A Servant of Christ,
Drew

1 Tim. 3:
16: And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh..

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Carol Swenson
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Hi Betty

He won't answer the questions because he can't. And because he can't answer them he runs away and posts a ton of repetitions, or makes copies of other people's posts, or starts another topic. At any rate, he skips past the questions and won't answer.

And we're supposed to trust him and listen to him?

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Betty Louise
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Carol,

Barry will not answer your question. He never answered mine. He prefers to tell me I am ignorant for not believing what he believes. I told my Pastor about Barry and his beliefs tonight and he said that Barry is like the people Paul talked about who went back to the law for salvation instead of salvation by grace.
betty

--------------------
Luk 21:28 And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.

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oneinchrist
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Brother Barry,
Your last few posts on this subject definitely got me thinkin. I am amazed at how detailed the whole crucifixion week seems to be laid out in your post. I have never realized that there was
so much study on the subject. The whole Friday to Sunday scenario no longer really makes sense to me anyways because Sunday is only two days after Friday.
If Jesus said "Destroy this temple and in three days I will rebuild it" , and on a Monday they destroyed the temple, it only makes sense to me that Jesus would have it rebuilt no sooner than Thursday (3 days later)

I believe that we should question our traditions before we question the word of God. It would be(I believe) quite a stretch to say that 3 days means 2 days. Then we may as well say that anytime the scriptures make a reference to a specific length of time that we have to subtract one day to get the true length of time......then today would actually be tomarrow already because 1-1=0....thats crazy!

With love in Christ, Daniel

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Carol Swenson
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quote:
Originally posted by Carol Swenson:
quote:
Originally posted by Carol Swenson:
You still haven't answered the questions. When you get done copying other people's posts, maybe you'll do that? I'll wait... [zzzzzz]

Still waiting.

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Carol Swenson
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quote:
Originally posted by barrykind:
Matthew 12:39
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

Is that what you want to be? An evil and adulterous generation (person) seeking after a sign?
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barrykind
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Matthew 12:39
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


--------------------
The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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barrykind
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quote:
Thunderz7

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posted April 30, 2006 07:48 AM
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sticking to the main topic of a thread gets harder and harder around here.

I agree that there were two sabbath's the week Jesus was crucified;
the High Day Sabbath and the weekly Sabbath;
I agree that Jesus was put in the tomb at sundown Wednesday and rose sundown Saturday;
three days and three nights, just as HE said.

John 11:9 Jesus answered, Are there not twelve hours in the day? If any man walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world.

The WORD, who is GOD, knows there are 12 hours in a day and 12 hours in a night;
HE said 3 days and 3 nights;
HE created the evening and the morning a day.
The written Word contains the terms;
"in 3 days" = a time period of 0 to 72 hours
"on the 3rd day" = a time of 48 to 72 hours
"after 3 days"= 72 hours or more
"3 days & 3 nights"= 72 hours
72 hours satisfies all these scriptures.


I agree it is all about Jesus Christ (Yashua Messiah) in the Passover, Unleavened Bread, and the Firstfruit Wave offering.

I agree that easter is pagan;
I agree that the term Easter is not in the original wrightings;
that the KJV writers made and error in using Easter instead of Passover.

T7
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posts: 1062 | From: Northeast Alabama | Registered: Jun 2002 |



--------------------
The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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Carol Swenson
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quote:
Originally posted by Carol Swenson:
You still haven't answered the questions. When you get done copying other people's posts, maybe you'll do that? I'll wait... [zzzzzz]

Still waiting.
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barrykind
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quote:
becauseHElives

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Member # 87

posted March 11, 2006 11:36 AM
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hey WhiteEagle, I do not hate any individual, But I do hate false teaching in any form!

As we approach this subject of “Good Friday”… consider

"For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many" ( Matt. 24:5).

Here we have many (plural) coming and saying I (singular) am Christ and deceiving many. This is a perfect description of a dynasty (The Roman Catholic Church). Those who say Antichrist is one man are dreaming.

Since the time of Pope Constantine there have been about 300 Popes, all coming one at a time and sending multiplied millions to hell one generation at a time.
(Every Pope is declared to be the Vicar of Christ, Christ incarnate)

One of the unmistakable identifying signs of Antichrist would be his changing the TIMES:

"And he shall speak great words against the Most High, and shall wear out the saints of the Most High and think to change TIMES and laws: and they shall be given into his hands until a time and times and the dividing of times" (Daniel 7:25).

Time changed by the Papacy.

Constantine presided over a famous Church Council named the Council of Nicaea in 325. At this Council, Constantine dictated that the date of the Lord's Resurrection should be celebrated only on the Sunday following the new moon. Those who refused to comply were called Quatrodecimans or 14th Day Christians and were ostracized by the ruling hierarchies.

At the first great church Council held in Jerusalem about 45 A.D., the apostle James presided. 300 years later we find a Roman soldier presiding.


The day of the Resurrection had to be changed so the Roman Catholic Church and its worship of Mother and Son from ancient Babylon could replace the True Worship of Yeshua the Messiah.

Satan saw He could not destroy the Church by persecution, persecution only made it grow. So one by one the True Church father’s were murdered at the hands of the RCC and replaced with men of greed for power and wealth.

And tradition replaced Truth, till as Yeshua predicted “by your Traditions you have made the Word of God of none effect.


I hope the following will peek enough interest that the readers will go to the web site provided……

Luke specifically tells us that Paul and his colleagues arrived in Troas in time to spend the first of the seven weekly Sabbaths between Passover and Pentecost with the brethren there. Once again, there is no significance to be found for Sunday in this passage.
Now let's examine the final instance where the "first day of the week" is mentioned in most English Bibles. It is found in the 16th chapter of Paul's first letter to the Corinthians:

I CORINTHIANS 16:1 Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I have given orders to the churches of Galatia, so you must do also: 2 On the first day of the week let each one of you lay something aside, storing up as he may prosper, that there be no collections when I come. (NKJV)

Is Paul speaking of a weekly collection to be set aside by the Corinthians every Sunday so a sufficient amount would be available when he arrived? Or is it possible that Paul had something else in mind?

The key to understanding this whole passage is the Greek word which begins verse 2. Thayer says is: "a preposition denoting motion or diffusion or direction from the higher to the lower . . ."

This word is frequently rendered "after" by Greek translators ("down from" = "after"). Let's look at the difference it would make to translate this word as "after" instead of "on" in this verse:

On the first day of the week >>>- becomes ->>> After the First of the Sabbaths
Here is a literal rendering of the first two verses of I Corinthians 16:

I CORINTHIANS 16:1 Now concerning the collection that is for the saints, as I directed to the churches of Galatia, so also you do. 2 After the First of the Sabbaths, let each one of you beside himself put something aside, storing up whatever he may have prospered, in order that when I come then collections may not be made; (literal translation)

We know that Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread were important to the context of Paul's instructions to the Corinthians (I Cor. 5:7-8). It is likely that Paul wrote this epistle just before the arrival of the spring Holy Days. If that was indeed the time frame of the letter, then Paul's encouragement to begin gathering a collection "after the First of the Sabbaths" would have been intended to clearly tell the Corinthians WHEN to begin their offering so they would have it completed by the time Paul arrived. Once again, the most logical view of this Scripture does not include a recognition of Sunday.

CONCLUSION
Almost the entire Christian world celebrates Sunday as their day of worship in place of the seventh-day Sabbath God instituted at creation (Gen. 2:2-3). They justify doing this because they believe that Jesus Christ was raised from the dead on this day. However, as our study of the burial and resurrection has shown, the Greek text overwhelmingly supports another set of facts.
Yeshua was buried late on a Wednesday afternoon just before the Passover high Sabbath and he was resurrected very early on the morning of the weekly Sabbath. This particular weekly Sabbath was known to the Jews as the "First of the Sabbaths," because it was the first weekly Sabbath between Passover and Pentecost. Furthermore, it's likely that the "first day of the week," Sunday, is NEVER even mentioned in the Greek New Testament. May God help us to put away the traditions of men and obey His Torah!

http://users.aristotle.net/~bhuie/sabbath_res.htm

The web sit will answer many questions about “The Burial, the Crucifixion and the
Resurrection.

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Strive to enter in at the strait gate:for many, I say unto you will seek to enter in, and shall not be able. ( Luke 13:24 )

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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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SIX DAYS BEFORE THE PASSOVER" (John 12:1).
We are furnished by Scripture with certain facts and fixed points which, taken together, enable us (1) to determine the events which filled up the days of "the last week" of our Lord's life on earth; (2) to fix the day of His crucifixion; and (3) to ascertain the duration of the time He remained in the tomb.

The difficulties connected with these three have arisen (1) from not having noted these fixed points; (2) from the fact of Gentiles' not having been conversant with the law concerning the three great feasts of the LORD; and (3) from not having reckoned the days as commencing (some six hours before our own) and running from sunset to sunset, instead of from midnight to midnight.

To remove these difficulties, we must note :--

I. That the first day of each of the three feasts, Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles, was "a holy convocation", a "sabbath" on which no servile work was to be done. See Lev. 23:7, 24, 35. Cp. Ex. 12:16.

"That Sabbath" and the "high day" of John 19:31, was the "holy convocation", the first day of the feast, which quite overshadowed the ordinary weekly sabbath.

It was called by the Jews Yom tov ( = Good day), and this is the greeting on that day throughout Jewry down to the present time.

This great sabbath, having been mistaken from the earliest times for the weekly sabbath, has led to all the confusion.


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II. This has naturally caused the further difficulty as to the Lord's statement that "even as Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights, so shall the Son of man be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights" (Matt. 12:40). Now, while it is quite correct to speak according to Hebrew idiom of "three days" or "three years", while they are only parts of three days or three years, yet that idiom does not apply in a case like this, where "three nights" are mentioned in addition to "three days". It will be noted that the Lord not only definitely states this, but repeats the full phraseology, so that we may not mistake it. See the subject fully discussed in Ap. 144.

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III. We have therefore the following facts furnished for our sure guidance :
1. The "high day" of John 19:31 was the first day of the feast.

2. The "first day of the feast" was on the 15th day of Nisan.

3. The 15th day of Nisan, commenced at sunset on what we should call the 14th.

4. "Six days before the passover" (John 12:1) takes us back to the 9th day of Nisan.

5. "After two days is the passover" (Matt. 26:2. Mark 14:1) takes us to the 13th day of Nisan.

6. "The first day of the week", the day of the resurrection (Matt. 28:1, &c.), was from our Saturday sunset to our Sunday sunset. This fixes the days of the week, just as the above fix the days of the month, for:

7. Reckoning back from this, "three days and three nights" (Matt. 12:40), we arrive at the day of the burial, which must have been before sunset, on the 14th of Nisan; i.e. before our Wednesday sunset.

8. This makes the sixth day before the passover (the 9th day of Nisan) to be our Thursday sunset to Friday sunset.

Therefore Wednesday, Nisan 14th (commencing on the Tuesday at sunset), was "the preparation day", on which the crucifixion took place : for all four Gospels definitely say that this was the day on which the Lord was buried (before our Wednesday sunset), "because it was the preparation [day]" the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, "for that sabbath day was a high day", and, therefore, not the ordinary seventh day, or weekly sabbath. See John 19:31


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IV. It follows, therefore, that the Lord being crucified on "the preparation day" could not have eaten of the Passover lamb, which was not slain until the evening of the 14th of Nisan (i.e. afternoon). On that day the daily sacrifice was killed at the 6th hour (noon) and offered about the 7th hour (1 p.m.). The killing of the Passover lambs began directly afterwards. Thus it is clear, that if the killing of the Passover lambs did not commence until about four hours after our Lord had been hanging upon the Cross, and would not have been concluded at the ninth hour (3 p.m.) when "He gave up the ghost;" -- no "Passover lamb" could have been eaten at the "last supper" on the previous evening.

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V. With these facts before us, we are now in a position to fill in the several days of the Lord's last week with the events recorded in the Gospels. By noting that the Lord returned to Bethany (or to the Mount of Olives) each night of that week, we are able to determine both the several days and the events that took place in them.

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THE SIXTH DAY BEFORE THE PASSOVER, THE 9TH DAY OF NISAN.
(Our Thursday sunset to Friday sunset)

MATTHEW. MARK. LUKE. JOHN.
The Lord approaches Jerusalem from Jericho ............. 19:1-10
He passes our Thursday night at the house of Zacchaeus 19:5
And delivers the Parable of the Pounds 19:11-27
He proceeds toward Jerusalem 19:28
He sends two disciples (apenanti) for an "*** " and a "colt" (two animals) 21:1-7
And makes His first entry from Bethphage (not Bethany) (Ap. 153) 21:8, 9
He is unexpected, and they ask "Who is this?" 21:10, 11
He cleanses the Temple 21:12-16
He returns to Bethany 21:17 12:1

THE FIFTH DAY BEFORE THE PASSOVER, THE 10TH DAY OF NISAN.
(Our Friday sunset to Saturday sunset.)
The Lord passes the Sabbath at Bethany; and after sunset (on our Saturday), the first of three suppers was made, probably at the house of Lazarus, in Bethany (Ap. 157) ............. .............. ................. 12:2
At this supper the first of two anointings took place (Ap. 158) 12:3-11


THE FOURTH DAY BEFORE THE PASSOVER, THE 11TH DAY OF NISAN.
(Our Saturday sunset to Sunday sunset), the Gentile "Palm Sunday".

The second, or triumphal entry into Jerusalem. He sends two disciples (katenanti) for a colt (one animal). See Ap. 153 ............... 11:1-7 19:29-35 12:12-
The Lord starts from Bethany (not Bethphage) and is met by multitudes from Jerusalem (Ap. 153). 1:8-10 19:36-40 12:12-19
He weeps over the city. 19:41-44
He enters the Temple, looks around. 11:11-
And Returns to Bethany. 11:11

THE THIRD DAY BEFORE THE PASSOVER, THE 12TH DAY OF NISAN
(Our Sunday sunset to Monday sunset).

In the morning (our Monday a.m.) the Lord returns to Jerusalem. 21:18 11:12
The Fig-tree cursed. 21:19-22 11:13, 14
The Temple. Further cleansing. 11:15-17 19:45, 46
In the Temple. Further teaching. "Certain Greeks". 19:47- 12:20-50
Opposition of Rulers. 11:18 19:-47, 48
He goes out of the city (probably to Bethany; see Luke 21:37, 38, below). 11:19

THE SECOND DAY BEFORE THE PASSOVER, THE 13TH DAY OF NISAN.
(Our Monday sunset to Tuesday sunset).

In the morning (our Tuesday a.m.) on the way to Jerusalem, the question of the disciples about the Fig Tree. 11:20-26 .............
In Jerusalem again; and in the Temple. 21:23-27 11:27-33 20:1-8
In Jerusalem teaching in Parables; and questions. 21:28-23:39 12:1-44 20:9-21:4
The first great prophecy, in the Temple (Ap. 155). 21:5-36
(Parenthetical statement as to the Lord's custom during this week). 21:37, 38
The second great prophecy, on the Mount of Olives. 24:1-51 13:1-37
The second great prophecy, continued (Ap. 155). 25:1-46
"After two days is the Passover". 26:1-5 14:1, 2
He returns to Bethany, and is present at the second supper in the house of Simon the leper. The second Anointing. See Ap. 157 and 158. 26:6-13 14:3-9

THE DAY BEFORE THE PASSOVER -- THE 14TH DAY OF NISAN --
"THE PREPARATION DAY" -- THE DAY OF THE CRUCIFIXION.
(Our Tuesday sunset to Wednesday sunset).


The plot of Judas Iscariot to betray the Lord. 26:14-16 14:10, 11 22:1-6
The "preparation" for the last supper (*1). 26:17-19 14:12-16 22:7-13
"The even was come" (our Tuesday after sunset) when the plot for the betrayal was ripe for execution. 26:20 14:17
The last supper, commencing with the washing of the feet. 13:1-20
The announcement of the betrayal, &c. 26:21-25 14:18-21 13:21-30
The supper eaten, the "New Covenant" made (Jer. 31:31). The lamb abolished, bread and wine substituted. 26:26-29 14:22-25 22:14-23
The first prophecy of Peter's denials (Ap. 160). 13:31-38
The strife; who should be the greatest, &c. 22:24-30
The second prophecy of Peter's denials (Ap. 160). 22:31-34
The final appeal to His first commission (Luke 9:3). 22:35-38
The last discourse to the eleven, followed by His prayer. 14:1-17:26
They go to Gethsemane. 26:30-35 14:26-29 22:39 18:1
The third prophecy of Peter's denials (Ap. 160). 14:30, 31
The agony in the garden. 26:36-46 14:32-42 22:40-46
The apprehension of the Lord (Ap. 165). 26:47-56 14:43-50 22:47-54 18:2-11
The escape of Lazarus (see notes on Mark 14:51, 52). 14:51, 52
The trials: continued throughout our Tuesday night. 26:57-27:31 14:53-15:19 22:54-23:25 18:12-19:13
About the sixth hour (our Tuesday midnight) Pilate said "Behold your King". 19:14, 15
Led away to be crucified. 27:31-34 15:20-23 23:26-31 19:16, 17
And "led with Him" two "malefactors" (kakourgoi) (Ap. 164). 23:32, 33 19:18
Discussion with Pilate about the Inscriptions (Ap. 168). 19:19-22
The dividing of the garments. 27:35-37 15:24 23:34 19:23, 24
"It was the third hour, and they crucified Him" (our 9 a.m. Wednesday). 15:25, 26
"Then were there two robbers" (lestai) crucified with Him" (Ap. 164). 27:38 15:27, 28
The revilings of the rulers, both "robbers", and one "malefactor". 27:39-44 15:29-32 23:35-43
The Lord's mother and John. 19:25, 27
"The sixth hour" (our Wednesday noon) and the darkness (Ap. 165). 27:45-49 15:33 23:44, 45
"The ninth hour" (our Wednesday 3 p.m.) and the expiring cry (Ap. 165). 27:50 15:34-37 23:46 19:28-30
Subsequent events 27:51-56 15:38-41 23:47-49 19:31-37
Buried in haste before sunset (our Wednesday about 6 p.m.), before the "high day" (the first day of the Feast began), our Wednesday sunset. 27:57-66 15:42-47 23:50-56 19:38-42

"THE FIRST DAY OF THE FEAST" - "THE HIGH DAY" (Yom tov) - THE 15TH DAY OF NISAN.
(Our Wednesday sunset to Thursday sunset.)
THE FIRST NIGHT AND FIRST DAY IN THE TOMB.

THE SECOND DAY OF THE FEAST - THE 16TH DAY OF NISAN.
(Our Thursday sunset to Friday sunset.)
THE SECOND NIGHT AND SECOND DAY IN THE TOMB.

THE THIRD DAY OF THE FEAST - "THE (WEEKLY) SABBATH" - THE 17TH DAY OF NISAN
(Our Friday sunset to Saturday sunset.)
THE THIRD NIGHT AND THIRD DAY IN THE TOMB.

"THE FIRST DAY OF THE WEEK" - THE 18TH DAY OF NISAN
(Our Saturday sunset : "the third day" of Matt. 16:21, &c.; not the third day of the Feast.)

Thus the Resurrection of the Lord took place at our Saturday sunset or thereabouts on "the third day"; cp. "after three days" (Matt. 27:63. Mark 8:31.).

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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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Carol Swenson
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You still haven't answered the questions. When you get done copying other people's posts, maybe you'll do that? I'll wait... [zzzzzz]
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quote:
WildB

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Member # 2917

posted April 09, 2010 12:29 PM
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quote:
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Originally posted by Carol Swenson:
If Jonah died, repented in Hades, and was brought back to life, then that would violate Scripture:

And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment ( Hebrews 9:27).

Scripture does teach us of others who were brought back to life, but not because they repented in Hades.

I think that Jonah, like David, was that miserable, but he wasn't physically dead.

Psalm 88
4I am reckoned among those who go down to the pit;
I have become like a man without strength,
5 Forsaken among the dead,
Like the slain who lie in the grave,
Whom You remember no more,
And they are cut off from Your hand.
6 You have put me in the lowest pit,
In dark places, in the depths.

Scripture says that God will chastise those He loves. It does not say that He will kill them and then bring them back to life when they repent.
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We must remember that before Christ led captivity captive. That the righteous souls went to Abraham's bosom separated from Hell by a great gulf.

If you say that Jonah did not die then you make Christ a liar and his Jonah sign to Israel of no effect.

How can one not see the death, burial, and reselection?

Do you really believe that a Jew 2000 years ago had any other thought than that the man Jonah came back from the dead after sloping around in the digestive fluids of a great fish for 3 days and nights? I'm shur after this mans resurrection he had a skin tone and after smell that set him apart as most strange. Something that not only opened the eye, nose gate, but most importantly the ear gate of the people of Nineveh.

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That is all.....

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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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quote:
WildB

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Member # 2917

posted April 08, 2010 10:33 AM
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Jonah died in the belly of the great fish

Jonah 2:2And 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. KJV

“Out of the belly of hell and the grave cried I.’’ The fish might well be called a grave, and, as it was a prison to which Jonah was condemned for his disobedience and in which he lay under the wrath of God, it might well be called the belly of hell. Thither this good man was cast, and yet thence he cried to God, and it was not in vain; God heard him, heard the voice of his affliction, the voice of his supplication. There is a hell in the other world, out of which there is no crying to God with any hope of being heard; but, whatever hell we may be in the belly of in this world, we may thence cry to God. When Christ lay, as Jonah, three days and three nights in the grave, though he prayed not, as Jonah did, yet his very lying there cried to God for poor sinners, and the cry was heard – Matthew Henry

Other Commentary does matter and does have weight…….

In addition there are many known documented events of men and animals being retrieved from whales after days inside their air compartments. That is not a miracle, only explained events. A miracle is something that man can not explain, it is an act of God, like Jonah and his resurrection

3 Other Scolars, not minimalists, that believe Jonah died: are listed below

Dr. Henry M. Morris also leans toward this view. He said, The Lord Jesus confirmed the historicity of both Jonah and his experience in the “fish” by citing it as a type of his own coming death, burial and resurrection (Matthew 12:39, 40). In fact, these words of Christ probably indicate that Jonah, like Jesus, actually died and was then restored to life (Dr. Henry M. Morris, The Defender’s Study Bible, World Publishing, 1995, note on Jonah 1:17)……

Dr. M. R. DeHaan said,
The Lord Jesus Christ Himself vouches for the historicity and literalness of Jonah by seizing upon it as a type of His own literal Death and Resurrection. In Matthew 12:40, Jesus, in answer to His critics, who questioned His authority, says: “For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the fish’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.” Jonah most probably died and was resurrected……..
(M. R. DeHaan, M.D., Jonah – Fact or Fiction?, Zondervan Publishing House, 1957, Introduction)

J. Vernon McGee, holds the view that Jonah actually died while in the belly of the great fish. The Hebrew word “sheol” is translated “hell” by the translators of the KJV Bible. McGee says this concerning the use of this word in the phrase, “out of the belly of hell”:

The longer I study the Book of Jonah, and Christ’s words in Matthew 12:39-41, the more I tend to agree with Dr. DeHaan that Jonah actually died while he was in the stomach of that fish. Christ literally died on the Cross, and rose again from the dead. And Christ used the experience of Jonah as the great Old Testament picture of His own death and resurrection. This was also the view of Dr. J. Vernon McGee, who went into great detail on this subject in his Thru the Bible Commentary (Dr. J. Vernon McGee, Thru the Bible, Thomas Nelson, 1982, volume III, pp. 749-755).

The phrase, “earth with her bars,” is Elizabethan English and this was a way death was spoken of in day the King James Bible was translated. There is no other way to interpret the phrase except to mean, “bars of death”.

Further, the phrase “brought up my life from corruption”, is referring to the decay of the body. “Corruption” is death. In Acts 2:25-31, Peter states the Lord Jesus did not see corruption. It does not mean He did not die, but that His body did not decay.

The greatest argument for Jonah actually dying and being raised form the dead is in Matthew 12:40. Jesus told the Pharisees that wanted a sign that none would be given but the sign of the prophet Jonah. Jesus said the sign was that as Jonah was three days and three nights in the heart of the earth, so should He would be. Jesus actually died on the cross and was physically
dead for three days and nights in the grave and on the three day rose. Jesus’s using Jonah as a illustration of His resurrection which was to be a sign the Jews would see can not be ignored. For the sign to be used they must have been paralleled. This is the strongest argument to evidence
that as Christ died, so did Jonah.

I believe the evidence weighs heavy in favor of Jonah dying in the fish and being raised again. The miracle of Jonah’s deliverance was greater in that God raised him from death.

Blessings……..

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That is all.....

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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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quote:
becauseHElives

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Member # 87

posted May 12, 2009 08:30 AM
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the only way to know the truth of the Resurrection is to understand The Feast of Yahweh as Shadows of things to come!

to except Friday Crucifixion is to except the Roman Catholic Wh!ore's authority to change what Yahweh's word says will be perpetual to all generations throughout eternity!

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Strive to enter in at the strait gate:for many, I say unto you will seek to enter in, and shall not be able. ( Luke 13:24 )

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Posts: 4221 | From: Southeast Texas | Registered: Jun 2002



--------------------
The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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quote:
becauseHElives

Advanced Member
Member # 87

posted May 09, 2009 11:51 AM
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quote:
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T7 - Yes, early on Sunday morning they went to the tomb and found it empty,
it had been empty since Saturday sundown,
the end of the Sabbath.

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Amen T7.....

the truth will set you free from the Roman Catholic Wh!ore traditions

--------------------
Strive to enter in at the strait gate:for many, I say unto you will seek to enter in, and shall not be able. ( Luke 13:24 )

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Posts: 4221 | From: Southeast Texas | Registered: Jun 2002



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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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quote:
Thunderz7

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Member # 31

posted May 09, 2009 11:35 AM
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1- Willmington = Statement of the view—Jesus predicted that he would die and be raised on the third day (Matt. 16:21; Mark 8:31; Luke 9:22).

T7 - Matthew 27:63 Saying, Sir, we remember that that deceiver said, while he was yet alive, After three days I will rise again.
Mark 8:31 And he began to teach them, that the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and of the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.

T7 - Willmington accepts the scriptures about "on the third day" that support his traditions of man,
while ignoring the scriptures about "after three days" and "three days and three nights".

2- Willmington = When one reads these events in the Gospels, one clearly receives the impression that Jesus rose on the third day.

T7 - Yes, Yeshua/Jesus arose on the third day,
HE arose in three day,
HE arose after three days,
HE arose after three days and three nights;
we must receive all scriptue not just the verses that fit our traditions.
Willmington may receive the impression that Friday sundown to Sunday morning is truth, but I certainly don't.

3- Willmington = Jesus’ body was laid in the tomb on the evening of the day of preparation (Friday), the day before the Sabbath (Matt. 27:62; 28:1; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54, 56; John 19:31, 42).

T7- Yes, the evening of the the day of preparatiion.
NO, not Friday;
Yes, the day before the Sabbath, the high day, not the weekly Sabbath, this is the preparation for Passover.
John 19:31 presented by Willmington, makes this high day abundantly clear.

4- Willmington = The women returned home and rested on the Sabbath (Saturday, Luke 23:56).

T7- Willnmington is still ignoring the high day of John 19:31.
On Wednesday the day of preparation for the high day/Passover/Sabbath these women saw where Jesus was laid.
They rested on Thursday,
the high day/Passove/Sabbath.
Friday, preparation day for the weekly Sabbath they prepared spices and ointments.
Saturday/Sabbath they rested.


5- Willmington = Early on the first day of the week (Sunday), they went to the tomb (Matt. 28:1; Mark 16:1-2; Luke 24:1; John 20:1) which was empty.

T7 - Yes, early on Sunday morning they went to the tomb and found it empty,
it had been empty since Saturday sundown,
the end of the Sabbath.


6- Willmington = Furthermore, on the same day he arose from the grave, Jesus walked with two disciples on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:21). This, then, points to his crucifixion as having occurred on Friday.

T7 - Luke 24:21, is the only place in this I can find any WORD backing up Willmington's opinions.
Using only this verse, one could come up with a Friday crucifixion;
but you could get Thursday just as easily, and that is this verse only;
ignoring the tie-in of all other scripture.

T7- Deuteronomy 19:15 One witness shall not rise up against a man for any iniquity, or for any sin, in any sin that he sinneth: at the mouth of two witnesses, or at the mouth of three witnesses, shall the matter be established.
Matthew 18:16 But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.
2 Corinthians 13:1 This is the third time I am coming to you. In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established.

John 19:31 The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.
Matthew 12:40 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.
Mark 8:31 And he began to teach them, that the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and of the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.

These 3 witnesses show me 72 hours.


7- Willmington = With all this evidence, the only plausible conclusion is that Jesus was crucified on Friday and rose on Sunday.

T7 - Willmington and I obviously disagree on what is evidence, what is plausible, and what is truth.
Yeshua/Jesus was crusified on Wednesday, placed in the tomb and the stone rolled over it at exactly sundown.
Three days and three nights later,
72 hours,
Saturday sundown, the end of the weekly Sabbath, HE arose.

8- Willmington = “This view also fits well with Old Testament typology. On Monday, Nisan 10, Jesus presented himself as the Paschal lamb at the triumphal entry. On Nisan 14 he was sacrificed as the Paschal lamb (1 Cor. 5:7), and on Nisan 16 his resurrection was a type of the offering of First Fruits (1 Cor. 15:23). In conclusion, then, with the most natural reading of the New Testament, one would conclude that Jesus was crucified on Friday and was resurrected on Sunday.

T7 - Nisan 14 occurs on a different day every year just like July 4th does.
Willmington is right in that the sacrifice was on Nisan 14, he is wrong on the day of the week.
the first fruit/wave offering takes place on the first day following the weekly Sabbath after Passover;
it may occur on Nisan 16 in some years but not every year.


9- Willmington = This is also the common consensus of the Church Fathers and scholars throughout church history, and it is the view generally accepted today.”

T7 - These "Church Fathers";
are these the same ones who decided that Yeshua/Jesus wasn't born on the Feast of Tabernacles and placed HIS birth on December 25th?
Are these the same ones who named Resurrection Day after a pagon goddess?
These scholars/scribes?
This view generally accepted today?
10 of 12 sent to scout the Promised Land failed to see the truth;
the rest of that generation accepted the lies of the 10;
only the 2 entered the Promised Land.
Generally accepted???
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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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quote:
Thunderz7

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Member # 31

posted May 09, 2009 05:40 AM
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I'm in total disagreement with the biblelight.net article.

John 11:9 Jesus answered, Are there not twelve hours in the day? If any man walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world.
10 But if a man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because there is no light in him.

It is quite obvious that the Creator knows there are 12 hours in a day and 12 in a night.

John 19:31 The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.

The preperation day for the Passove, a high day/Sabaath not the weekly Sabbath.
The WORD teaches us of Sabbaths that are not the weekly 7th day Sabbaths.

biblellight.net has dismissed the obvious truth in the sign of Jonah, to perpetuate the traditions of man that make the WORD of GOD of none effect.

Terminology used in most English Bibles
in three days = between now and 72 hours
on the third day = 48 to 72 hours
after three days = 72 hours or more
three days and three nights = exactly 72 hours

What time will meet all these quotes = 72 hours

Jonah 1:17 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.
Matthew 12:40 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.

In the twinkling of an eye,
GOD's eye,
at exactly the end of the weekly Sabbath,
before the fourth day began,
three days and three nights (72 hours) after the stone was rolled in front of the tomb,
Yesua/Jesus rose.

T7



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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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quote:
yahsway
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posted May 06, 2009 10:59 PM
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Amen WildB! Thats it! And you dont get 3 days and 3 nights if you were crucified on Friday.
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quote:
WildB

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posted May 06, 2009 10:52 PM
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Go back to Jonas. Even Christ makes mention of him.

Matt.12

[40] 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.

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That is all.....

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Thunderz7

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posted May 06, 2009 04:04 AM
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Yeshua rose at sundown at the end of the Sabbath,
72 hours,
exactly 3 days and 3 nights after he was buried,
on the first day of the week.

Recored in all 4 gospels without relying of Mk. 16:9

Matthew 28:1 In the end of the sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulchre.
Mark 16:2 And very early in the morning the first day of the week, they came unto the sepulchre at the rising of the sun.
Luke 24:1 Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared, and certain others with them.
John 20:1 The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre, and seeth the stone taken away from the sepulchre.

T7
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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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Carol Swenson
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You are stubborn, aren't you? You can't accept the fact that you can't base doctrine on ONE SINGLE VERSE and ignore all the rest of scripture.
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quote:
Caretaker

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Member # 36

posted September 04, 2010 10:01 PM
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From my notes:


quote:
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Millions of Christians believe that Jesus was crucified on a Friday and rose on a Sunday. Sadly, that misconception denies the one and only proof that Jesus ever gave of His Messiahship!

Mat 12:38-40 Then certain of the scribes and of the Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we would see a sign from thee. 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 Jonah: For as Jonah 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.

Definitions

Lets begin with a few definitions in order to fully understand the text.

Day A day is defined in Genesis 1:4-5 as having two portions, the darkness and then the light. A biblical day runs from around 6pm to 6pm. We come out of the darkness (6pm to 6am) into the light (6am to 6pm). Additionally, the 6am to noon time of the day is considered the morning of the day and from noon to 6pm the evening of the day. To this day, Jews observe a day as beginning in the evening and ending in the evening 24 hours later.

Sabbath is from Friday around 6pm (varies depending on the time of year) and ends the same time on Saturday. The Orthodox observe a 25 hour Sabbath by adding an extra hour to the end as a means of safeguarding themselves from ending the Sabbath rest too early as the timing is based upon the sighting of the moon from Israel.

Sabbath "Sabbath" does not refer to Saturday as many people assume. If you refer to the book of Leviticus, chapter 23, you can see that Sabbath means "Day of Holy Convocation" where no work is to be preformed. The day prior to a Sabbath is referred to as a Day of Preparation. Annual Sabbaths (High Sabbaths) are designated by the date, not the day of the week. In weeks when a Day of Holy Convocation occurs on a Sunday through Friday, there are 2 'Sabbaths', the day of the holiday and the last day of the week.
Here are the 7 Sabbaths of the Lord (one weekly and 6 High):

* The 7th day of the week
* The Feast of Unleavened Bread (day after Passover)
* Shavout (Pentecost)
* Rosh Hashana
* Yom Kippur
* First day of Tabernacles (Sukkot)
* 8th (last) day of Tabernacles

Passover This holiday is observed on the 14th of Nisan. It is the Day of Preparation for the Feast of Unleavened bread, which is 15 Nisan. The Feast of Unleavened bread is a Holy Convocation or Sabbath day (Leviticus 23: 5-7). Exodus 12 tells the story of the Passover and deliverance from Egypt. Seders (dinners) are eaten on both nights and the 14th is the preparation day for the 15th.

The Gospels Account

Now that we have some definitions laid out, lets look at the accounting from the Gospels. If Jesus was truly crucified on a Friday and arose the following Sunday, that would only give us 2 nights and 1 day as opposed to the 3 nights and 3 days that He Himself said that he would be in the earth. For His words to ring true, He would have to arisen sometime Monday evening if this were the case.

On top of this, to truly be three days and three nights, He would have to have arisen at the same time of day that he was laid in the grave.

Matthew 16:21 is very clear that He would be raised the third day. Not after it, but on it.
We know from the gospels that Jesus partook of the Passover seder the night of the first half of the preparation day. (Matthew 26:17, Mark 14:12, Luke 22:18, John 13:29)

Additionally, we are told that Jesus was crucified on the second (daylight) half of the preparation day (Mathew 27:62, Mark 15:42, Luke 23:54 John 19:31, 42).

We know that the Passover is the preparation day for the Feast of Unleavened Bread.
How do we know that this Sabbath reference is to the Feast of Unleavened Bread and not the regular Saturday Sabbath?

Jhn 19:31 The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and [that] they might be taken away.

We know that that tomb was found empty just after the Sabbath (Matthew 28:6, Mark 16:6, Luke 24:6, John 20:2)

Now lets take a look at the timing of the events of that fateful day.
Matthew 27:1 Jesus is brought to trial in the morning
Matthew 27:45 There is darkness from noon (the 6th hour) until 3pm (the ninth hour)
Matthew 27:46-50 Jesus died at 3pm (the ninth hour)
Matthew 27:57 Joseph of Arimathea comes for the body of Jesus in order to bury him prior to the Sabbath.
Matthew 27:64 The next day (night of the crucifixion) the leaders sealed the tomb for three days.
From there we can count forward.
Wednesday Night - Thursday Night: darkness then light #1
Thursday Night - Friday Night: darkness then light #2
Friday Night - Saturday Night: darkness then light #3

For Jesus to have spent exactly 3 days and three nights in the earth, He had to be resurrected at the same time that he was entombed - in this case, just before sunset on Saturday as He was laid in the tomb just prior to the beginning of the Holy Day. If He didn't then His words don't hold true!

Objections addressed

Now - the two most common questions that arise out of this is the issue of Mary and Mary Magdaline finding the tomb empty after the Sabbath and the men walking to Emmaus on the first day of the week.

Keeping in mind the biblical timing of a 'day', the first day of the week would begin at sundown on Saturday and run until sundown on Sunday.

Mary and Mary Magdaline came to the tomb to anoint the body with oils - what they found was an empty tomb. An angel announced to them that Christ had risen. What is important to note here is the tense of the Greek word used for rise - egeiro indicating third party passive, perfect (aorist) tense. (Matt 28:7, Mark 16:6, Luke 24:6). The women arrived after the fact, not during the event itself.

In Luke 24:21, we see an accounting of two men walking to Emmaus lamenting on the events that had transpired.
Luk 24:21 But we trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel: and beside all this, to day is the third day since these things were done.

Now, this event is written to have taken place on the first day of the week. No dispute there. What we DO need to question however; is what they are referring to as the things that were done.
A cursory review of Matthew 27:61-66 shows us the completion of these "things" to be completed. "These things" included all the events pertaining to the resurrection — the seizing of Christ, delivering Him to be tried, the actual crucifixion, and, finally the setting of the seal and the watch over the tomb the following day, or Thursday. Sunday being the 3rd day from Thursday further supports the fact that Christ was not crucified on a Friday.

The Origins of "Easter"

Many people are surprised to learn the pagan origins of Easter. Yes, it is referenced in the Bible - Acts 12:4 (KJV). Easter has been observed as a pagan holiday for hundreds of years before the birth, death and resurrection of Christ.
This holiday is marked as the first Sunday after the first full moon occurs on or after March 21st. The reasoning for the timing is the vernal equinox - when the day and night are exactly the same amount of time.

This holiday commemorates Astarte and her son, Tammuz. On this date, the ancient pagans would dye and hide eggs as a symbol of Astarte's fertility. Other names for this fertility goddess include Ashterah, Esther, Aurora and Eostre. The symbol of the latter was the hare - 'Estore's hare' which evolved in name to become the 'Easter bunny'.

The Church's Adoption of Easter

After the death of the apostles, the church spread and grew at an amazing rate. The problem was that the written word was not only expensive to copy for people but many were illiterate and could not read it if they had access to a copy. Scriptural interpretation was left to the elders of the church.

People were following different traditions during this time. The early Jewish believers were following the traditions of the feasts and Sabbath worship, while the newly converted gentile believers were following their pagan traditions and holidays, including Sunday worship.

The Early Church Fathers (ECF) wanted clarity and continuity in Christianity. They took the issue of the differing observances to their political leader of the day, Constantine. Constantine agreed that they should chose to distance themselves from the Jewish believers and their traditions in lieu of the pagans and their traditions. This became known as Constantine's Sunday Edict. He declared Sunday as the official day of worship and enacted it on March 7th, 321ad.

People had been observing the crucifixion up until this point on the day of Passover, this date varying annually due to the differences between the Biblical calendar and the Roman one. For clarity and continuity, Constantine then declared at the Council of Nicene in 325ad that Easter will now be celebrated on the holiday of Estarte, the first Sunday following the vernal equinox, always to be between March 22 and April 25th. This was known as his Easter Edict.

Now here is the irony....

The Lord is very clear on worshipping gods other than Him. He is very clear about worshipping a "queen" of Heaven (Jeremiah 44).
So why did the early Roman Church declare Easter Sunday one of the holiest days of the year, yet name it after a pagan fertility goddess?

Bottom Line

I am not saying that Sunday worship or Easter observance is wrong, all I have attempted to do here is give the scriptural accounting of the events up to and after the death of Jesus to His resurrection and the history of the Church traditions.

Romans 14:5 One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day [alike]. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.


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A Servant of Christ,
Drew

1 Tim. 3:
16: And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh..

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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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quote:
Caretaker

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Member # 36

posted September 01, 2010 08:34 PM
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This was posted several years back by Brother Art:


quote:
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Crucifixion and Resurrection
of Jesus Christ(Messiah Yeshua) -the "Lamb" and the "wavesheaf"

In the early days of the Anti-Nicene fathers(those who had actually had contact with and learned under the original apostles of Jesus(Yeshua the Messiah) a controversy raged between them and the church at Rome. This controversy centered around the dispute of the day of crucifixion. The church at Rome(later to become the Catholic church) desired to establish Friday as the date of crucifixion and Sunday as the day of resurrection. The Anti-Nicene(against the Nicene creed of c.325AD) fathers insisted the crucifixion happened on Nissan 14, the very day of the sacrifice of the Passover lamb(Jesus being the Lamb of God). Thus the Anti--Nicene fathers were called the "Quartradecimans"(meaning "fourteen").
They were eventually killed off, so Rome had her way for the time. And as we know the traditional Friday crucifixion-Sunday resurrection has been accepted widely by mainstream Christianity. Hence the Good Friday-Easter Sunday.
Why did the early church fathers contend over this? Is it important? Let us examine the matter with Scripture.
Jesus said he would provide the sign of Jonah and"so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth(Matt 12:40)."
Jonah, we see was indeed in the belly of the fish three days and three nights(Jon 1:17). See also Matt 16:21, 17:23, 20:19, Mark 8:31, 9:31, 10:34, Luke 9:22, 11:30, 18:33 and John 2:19.

This is speaking of a full three days and three nights in the grave, and a Friday-Sunday scenario simply will not fit.
The apostle Paul said "-He rose again the third day according to Scriptures(1 Cor 15:3-4).

In order for His word to be perfectly fulfilled there must be a full three days and three nights(72 hours).
The time of death can be established at 3:00 PM(ninth hour-Hebrew reckoning) by Matt 27:45-50. Our 6 am to noon would be counted in the Hebrew time period as the first six hours of the "Day" period, so three hours past noon(6+3=9) would be about the ninth hour(depending on the exact time of sunrise).
According to the Hebrew calendar in the year Jesus was crucified (A.D.31), the 14th day of Nissan(Passover day)was Wednesday, April 25.
The annual Sabbath(first High Holy day) of unleavened bread was Thursday. For this reason Joseph of Arimathia hurried to place the body of Jesus in the tomb before dark on Wednesday(Nissan 14-Passover sacrifice day-midweek). This would mean He would rise at 3PM Saturday Apr 28, exactly 72 hours(three full days and three full nights).
There is mention in Mark 15:25 that He was crucified "in the third hour"(9am), when He was taken to be crucified, and the "ninth hour"(3PM) when He gave up His spirit(died-verses 34-37). Is the time significant? Yes, because about three PM would be the very time the priests of the temple were sacrificing the Passover Lamb, to prepare it for the evening meal.
We find plainly in John 19:14 that this "was the preparation day for the Passover". You can see in verse 31 that this was not a normal weekly Sabbath but a special "high" holy day(annually celebrated). This "High Sabbath" was the first day of unleavened bread, the first of seven annual special holy days of Leviticus and Exodus. Any who have kept this day or keep it today are quite familiar with the "high" Sabbath as an annual holy day and not the weekly Sabbath(seventh) day. These seven annual "high" Sabbath holy days days might begin on any day of the week from year to year.
The "preparation day" is the day which precedes(comes before) the Holy day, in this instance putting all leavened(symbolic of sin) products out of the household of believers. This was a physical act to remind one to put sin out of their life.
The only significance to a Friday would be that it is the eve of Sabbath(Saturday-seventh day). Nothing involving unusual preparation.
Now, we must reason carefully as a Hebrew of that day would have, using a Hebrew mindset.
The Hebrew day begins at SUNDOWN.
The first part of the Hebrew day is the 12 hour NIGHT period(approx 6PM to 6AM).
The last part of the Hebrew day is the 12 hour DAY period(approx 6AM to 6PM).
Please keep this firmly in mind.

The first High Sabbath being Thursday would make the "wavesheaf offering" occur on SUNDAY, midweek of the feast of unleavened bread, which would week would be concluded on the following Wednesday(second annual High holy day). All of this is connected and important to fulfill prophecy and magnify God's plans.
The fourteenth day of the first month is always the Passover and in the fifteenth day of this month is the first "High" holy day, the first day of the feast of unleavened bread(Leviticus & Numbers 28:16-17).
Now, VERY IMPORTANT, remembering the Hebrew day ends at SUNDOWN, let us examine the clear evidence of the first verse of Matt 28:
(NKJ) "Now after the Sabbath, as the first day of the week began to dawn(approaching SUNDOWN SATURDAY), Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to see the tomb". We see in verse 6 He had already risen.
Therefore, at 6Pm Saturday Jesus had ALREADY RISEN.
Keep firmly in mind the Hebrew Sunday(first day of the week) begins at sundown Saturday.
Jesus said also in John 2:19 " Destroy this temple(His body) and in three days I will raise it up." Three days is 72 hours, so a resurrection of about 3 Pm Saturday would be indicated.
One can count back from Saturday three full day and three full night periods and you arrive at a Wednesday crucifixion. If one even disputes the year, by counting backwards three days and three nights and coming to a Wednesday crucifixion, you would determine it had to fall on Nissan 14 therefore even confirming the year of His death and resurrection.
Deut 21:23 mandated the removal of His body off the tree before sundown Wednesday, and they had to place His body in the tomb before sundown as well, because such work was prohibited on the High Sabbath beginning at sundown(Lev 23:7).
This claiming of the body and placing it in the tomb would have likely put the actual burial time at about 5 or 6 PM Wednesday, a MIDWEEK crucifixion. We find in Luke 16:1 that "when the Sabbath was past" they found the tomb empty, meaning the tomb was found to be empty after sundown Saturday. Other verses which use the Greek word "opse" are incorrectly rendered to read "after the Sabbath was over", because "opse" means late in the day, toward the end of the day. It does not mean after the day is completed.
To find the tomb empty early Sunday(that is after sundown Saturday) would indicate He came out around 5 or 6 PM Saturday.
Let us examine the sequence of events and some fulfillments of prophecy concerning Messiah:
Nissan 9(Friday). Six days before Passover(crucifixion) Jesus came to Bethany(John 12:1).
Nissan 10(Saturday-weekly Sabbath)Jesus made the triumphal entryfrom Bethany/Mt. Olivet into Jerusalem mounted on a donkey(John 12:12-15) fulfilling Zech 9:9. This being the Sabbath is confirmed as it was a "sabbath's day journey(Act 1:12).Questioned and returned to Bethany.

Nissan 11(Sunday)Came from Bethany again, spoke to the fig tree(symbolic of Judah) and purged the temple(Mark 11:12-16). Return to Bethany(verse 19).
Nissan 12(Monday) return to Jerusalem(Mark 11:20-27). Parables. Conspiracy with Judas(Luke 22:1-6, resulting in the fulfillment of Zech 11:12 of "thirty pieces of silver"(Matt 26:14-15). TWO DAYS

before Passover(Matt 26:1-5).
Nissan 13(Tuesday) Passover meal prepared(Matt 26:19). Notice in verses 17-20 there appears to be a statement that the first day of the feast of unleavened bread had started. This almost certainly should be rendered "first day at the feast" because it is impossible to begin the actual first (High Sabbath holy day) day of the feast UNTIL the Passover lamb meal is eaten on Nissan 14.
Nissan 14(Wednesday-Passover & Preparation day for first day of unleavened bread):After 6 Pm(which began Passover day) ate the Lord's supper with His disciples(Matt 26:20). Sundown of Tuesday evening began the day of Passover as counted in the Hebrew day(Mark 14:12-17) Went to pray in garden of Gethsemane, very late(mark 14:37) when disciples were asleep.
There Judas and the great multitude laid hands on Him and took him away(Mark 14:37-46). The interrogations went through the balance of the night until morning until probably about sunrise Wednesday morning(Mark 15:1). This was the preparation day for the High Sabbath(John 19:31).
This Wednesday crucifixion happened midweek, symbolic of the week of Dan 9:27(midweek cut off), with the week divided in half, symbolic of the two part ministry of Messiah(two 3 ½ year periods-one past and one to come).
The resurrection was recognized and proclaimed on SUNDAY as Sunday began(after sundown Saturday). This corresponds to the "wavesheaf offering" happening on the very same day(middle of the seven days of unleavened bread).
This seven days of unleavened bread(with Messiah the "wavesheaf offering) are also symbolic of the "week" of Daniel 9:27 consisting of seven years ministry, again divided in half by the "wavesheaf offering"(two separate 3 ½ years ministry, one past one ahead called the coming of the Lord and other terms). The unleavened bread represents instruction to sinners(You and I). These two ministries are also represented in the feeding of the two multitudes. The leftover baskets of twelve in the first feeding represents the 12 apostles. The leftover baskets of five in the second feeding represents the seven churches of Rev 2 & 3(seven candlesticks of Zech 4).
The two spiritual covenants Messiah made with mankind are represented counting 49 days(seven weeks of seven) from this "wavesheaf Sunday"(Lev 23:15) to the next High holy day(Shavuot/Pentecost/firstfruits/feast of weeks). Sound familiar? These days represent the "seven weeks" remaining of Dan 9. These represent 49 years which started counting in 1948 when Judea was reestablished. The two leavened wave (firstfruits of the Lord) represent the two separate groups(Old and New) of Covenant keepers, who shall stand in the firstfruits/saints/inheritors resurrection at the last of the seven trumpets of Rev.

A more detailed account of the activities may be found in the book "Sabbath Rest" by Michael Detwiler. The chapter "The Last Week" is an excellent detailed study in a Hebrew perspective and his book also contains much of the above account and agrees with the Wednesday crucifixion and Saturday(Sabbath) resurrection.


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--------------------
A Servant of Christ,
Drew

1 Tim. 3:
16: And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh..

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Posts: 3352 | From: Council Grove, KS USA | Registered: Jun 2002



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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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quote:
Thunderz7

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Member # 31

posted March 11, 2006 03:49 PM
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The Word did/does not rely on man-made doctrine.
The Word did/does not rely on denominational tradition.
The Word did/does not even rely on Hebrew tradition!!!

John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

The Word was/is God.

Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
Genesis 1:5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
Genesis 1:8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.
Genesis 1:13 And the evening and the morning were the third day.
Genesis 1:19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.
Genesis 1:23 And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.
Genesis 1:31 And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

The Word knows that He/Himself created evening to evening as a day. Twelve hours of night/dark, Twelve hours of day/light = 1 day.

John 11:9 Jesus answered, Are there not twelve hours in the day? If any man walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world.

The Word/Yeshua/Jesus, who created time, days and nights, KNOWS there are twelve hours in a day.
That leaves twelve for the night.
He does not depend on modern man, or ancient Hebrews, to tell Him what a day is, He made it, even before He made man.

Matthew 12:40 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 Word said He would be in the earth three days and three nights.
N1+D1+N2+D2+N3+D3=72
12+12+12+12+12+12=72

Other terminology from scripture.
[using KJV as to not offend the "only's"]

1- (on the third day) - used many times in the old testament, but not in the new.
Still, a time period from 48 to 72 hours.

2- (in three days) - used five times in the new testament.
Three ways to look at this phrase.
(a)-a time period from 1 to 72 hours.
(b)-from 48 to 72 hours.
(c)- begining at 72 hours.

3-(after three days) - appears six times in the new testament.
a time period of 72 hours or more.

If I have left any out please point it out, but I beleive any I missed will still fall into this same framework of timing.

The only time that fits all the scriptures is 72 hours, just as the WORD said.
The 72nd hour, a 60 minute period of time created by the Word.

Jonh 19:42 There laid they Jesus therefore because of the Jews’ preparation day; for the sepulchre was nigh at hand.
John 20:1 ¶ The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre, and seeth the stone taken away from the sepulchre.

The Word was laid in the earth at sundown the day of the crucifixion and was already gone at sunrise of the first day of the week (Sunday).
He rose at sundown as the sabbath gave way to the first day of the week,a 60 minute time frame, 72 hours after He was laid there, which was Wednesday sundown.
Wed. evening - Thu. morning, the first day.
Thu. evening - Fri. morning, the second day.
Fri. evening - Sat. morning, the third day.
12 hours of dark, 12 hours of light = 1 day.
12 hours of dark, 12 hours of light = 2 days.
12 hours of dark, 12 hours of light = 3 days.
Denominatiions, tradition of man and Pharisee tradition of the Hebrews, can't change this.


John 19:31 ¶ The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.

John says, in 19:31, that the day of the crucifixion was the preparation day for the High Day Sabbath.

Tuesday sundown to Wednesday sundown = (Wed. to modern western man).
Jesus was laid in the earth at the end of the day of preparation for the High Day Sabbath.

Wednesday sundown to Thursday sundown, The High Day Sabbath = (Thu. to mwm). [First night and first day of Jonah].

Thursday sundown to Friday sundown is the day after the High Day Sabbath = (Fri. to mwn)[second night and second day of Jonah]. Preparation day for the weekly sabbath.
This is the day the shops are open, between the two sabbaths.

Friday sundown to Saturday sundown the weekly sabbath.

So I'm for a "sundown service" instead of a "sunrise service".

T7
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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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barrykind
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hfhs

quote:
posted March 09, 2006 10:02 AM
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This article is verylong, but it is one of the best that I have ever read on this subject: It is worth reading with careful attention to detail even if you had to print it and read it over 3 days to take it all in. Perhaps it will help.

I think that part of our difficulty in seeing this is the difference in how the day is rekoned. But there is great blessing in seeing some of the things pointed out in this article. I hope it blesses someone.

CHRONOLOGY OF THE CRUCIFIXION WEEK
Radio Sermons
by Wayne Carver
The Christian Jew Foundation
Foreword

The Lord Jesus Christ clearly said in Matthew 12:38-40 that He would spend "three days and three nights in the heart of the earth," just as Jonah had spent "three days and three nights" in the belly of the great fish. Isn't it strange, however, that almost universally throughout Christendom we find that the remembrance of Christ's crucifixion is held on "Good Friday" and that His resurrection is acknowledged as occurring on Sunday morning, at dawn? By no stretch of the imagination or masterful manipulation of Scripture is it possible to stretch the period from Friday evening to Sunday morning into "three days and three nights"! Many have attempted to do so and millions of Christians have accepted this viewpoint; but in all honesty, it just can't be done.
There are two vital issues at stake: the trustworthiness of the Bible and the Deity of Jesus Christ. If the Lord only spent 36 hours in the grave--from Friday at 6 PM until Sunday at 6 AM--then the Bible is not correct and the Lord Jesus is a false prophet. And if this is true, then we are foolish to believe the Bible and to follow Christ. We would be just as well off becoming Buddhists, Muslims or atheists.
So you see, this is no small matter. As a Bible-believing Christian who openly and unashamedly professes the Deity of Jesus Christ, I make no apology for standing on the Word of God and against the teaching of men--even sincere, godly men--who have explained away the prophecy of our Lord and the clear statement of Scripture. For in so doing they have committed a terrible act against the integrity of the Christian faith. I believe that diligent study of the Word of God will yield the truth, and this is what we seek.
Perhaps you're wondering why the vast majority of Christians accept the Friday-to-Sunday burial of Christ if it is wrong? The only honest answer that can be given is tradition. I firmly believe--and hope that you will to after you have finished this book--that tradition is wrong in this instance and that the Bible is clear and we have to make no apologies or excuses for Christ's words.

The key to properly understanding the "three days and three nights in the heart of the earth" is knowing the chronology, or time-event sequence, of the crucifixion week. As creatures of time, we always want to know when something happened, and what happened before and after. The Bible has recorded the significant events of the last week of our Lord's life on this earth. We'll have to do a little "digging" to find them, but then the Word of God commands us to "study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth." II Tim. 2:15.
In this study, Scripture will be our basis, and the upholding of the honor of our Lord and His infallible Word will be our motive.
Contents
1. The Sign of the Prophet Jonah
2. The Passover Pilgrimage
3. First Century Jewish Traditions
4. The Time of the Resurrection
5. Two Key Days
6. Chronology: Friday Through Sunday
7. Chronology: Monday and Tuesday
8. Chronology: Wednesday and Thursday
9. Chronology: Friday Through Sunday
10. Chronology of Crucifixion Week Illustrated


1. The Sign of the Prophet Jonah
There are several preliminary details that we need to consider before we actually begin to set forth the chronology of the crucifixion week. Although they may seem unrelated on the surface of things, as the study progresses, we will see their importance and relevance.

The Prophecy of Jonah
"Then certain of the scribes and of the Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we would see a sign from thee. 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." Matt. 12:38-40.

Repeatedly the scribes and the Pharisees refused to accept the Messianic claims of the Lord Jesus. His words were not good enough for them. They wanted something more. They demanded an unmistakable sign. The Jews walked by sight, not by faith.

The Lord Jesus Christ responded to their demand by quoting Jonah 1:17, which says that the prophet Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish. Then He clearly applied this passage to His own coming experience, saying that He would be "three days and three nights in the heart of the earth." Our Lord said that three full days would pass between the time of His entombment and the hour He arose from the dead. The Jews did not question the literalness of Jonah's three days and three nights in the great fish, and there is no reason to believe that our Lord did not mean that His own entombment would not be literally fulfilled.

The Typology of Jonah
Jonah's captivity in the great fish and his subsequent deliverance is a type of the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. The death and bodily resurrection of Christ after three days in the tomb is the sign that God is now using to authenticate the Gospel message. That's why the Apostle Paul wrote, "For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures." I Cor. 15:3-4.

Jonah was the only Old Testament prophet who was ever sent away from Israel as a missionary to the Gentiles. He was sent to that great and wicked city of Nineveh. After passing through a death-illustrating experience and being restored to his commission, God used him to bring repentance to the Ninevites.

At the time our Lord gave the sign of Jonah to the Jews, He was about to depart from Israel. The religious leaders had rejected His Messianic claims and had persuaded most of the people to do the same. But before the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ would be carried to the Gentiles, it was necessary for Him to be crucified, buried for three days and three nights as Jonah was and resurrected to newness of life and commission.
The importance of the sign of Jonah is that if Jesus Christ did not spend exactly three days and three nights in the tomb, then the Gospel message is not being authenticated, the Lord Jesus Christ's words are in error and the Bible is not true. No wonder Satan is so eager to perpetuate the "Good Friday" crucifixion and the Sunday morning resurrection. For in so doing he is attacking the Lord, the Bible and the Gospel at the same time.

2. The Passover Pilgrimage
The appropriate point to begin our detailed consideration of the crucifixion week is with an incident that occurred at Jericho. The healing of blind Bartimaeus stands at the beginning of the end of our Lord's life on this earth.

The Jericho Road
"And they came to Jericho: and as he went out of Jericho with his disciples and a great number of people, blind Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, sat by the highway side begging. And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out, and say, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me. And many charged him that he should hold his peace: but he cried the more a great deal, Thou son of David, have mercy on me." Mark 10:46-48.

There is a significant point in Mark's record that we should not overlook. Bartimaeus called the Lord Jesus Christ the "Son of David." This is the only place in Mark's Gospel that this title appears. Elsewhere the Lord is referred to as the "Son of man." But Bartimaeus called Him the "Son of David," and he was healed of his blindness.

The spiritual blindness of the nation Israel, God's chosen people, is pictured by Bartimaeus' physical blindness. The Son of David, the Anointed One of God, had come to give sight to that spiritually blind nation. And in Jericho the Son of David once more showed His gracious power as Bartimaeus, who is a type of the remnant that will someday recognize Jesus of Nazareth as David's greater Son, had his vision restored.
The Passover Feast was, by far, the greatest crowd gatherer of all Israel's annual feasts.

The pilgrims were young and old. The aged who were unable to walk the entire distance rode upon the backs of donkeys. The crowded road and the plodding asses made for slow progress along the road.

It is approximately 17 miles from Jericho to Bethany. Seventeen miles seems quite a short distance to us today because of our modern roads and means of transportation. But to the pilgrims of Jesus' day the distance was not short and the journey was not a minor undertaking. The road was wild, rough and a continuous upgrade.

The Outskirts of Jerusalem
When the pilgrim crowds reached the vicinity of Jerusalem, it was necessary that a camp be made before the sun went down and darkness settled over the land. Historical records indicate that on the eve of the Passover there were vast numbers of pilgrims in and around Jerusalem. Some estimates run as high as a million.

The city of Jerusalem certainly did not have accommodations to handle so many people; therefore, it was necessary for the people to camp wherever they could find room. The campsites had to be prepared and the booths erected, which served as temporary shelters, after the destination was reached. It would frequently require several hours for a family to find a suitable campsite and to get properly settled down for the night.

The purpose in considering the details of the journey from Jericho to Jerusalem is to help us understand today that it would have been next to impossible for a group of traveling pilgrims to leave Jericho in the morning and arrive in Jerusalem on the same day.

It took a minimum of two days to make the trip. And this fact has an important bearing on establishing the day of the week as well as the day of the month on which our Lord's last journey to Jerusalem was made.


Messianic Expectations
When our Lord began His journey to Jerusalem to keep the Feast of the Passover as the true Paschal Lamb, a relatively small company followed Him. By the time He reached Jericho, the band of disciples had been joined by other religious pilgrims who also were headed for Jerusalem to keep the Passover. Having seen and heard of the miracles performed by Jesus, many in this assorted company expected Jesus to openly declare Himself as the Messiah when He reached Jerusalem.

They anticipated the Roman yoke being thrown off by a force of arms, aided by a display of supernatural miracles from the Messiah Himself. Thus by the time the group reached Jerusalem, Messianic hopes were running high, and the stage was set for a triumphal march into the city.
Entry into Jerusalem "On the Next Day"


The Apostle John tells us of our Lord's arrival at Bethany after His long journey along the Jericho road. Leaving most of the traveling party at the outskirts of Jerusalem, Jesus and His disciples went to nearby Bethany.

"Then Jesus six days before the passover came to Bethany, where Lazarus was which had been dead, whom he raised from the dead. There they made him a supper; and Martha served: but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with him." John 12:1-2.

The last eight miles on the Jericho road were the steepest part of the uphill grade; so we can be sure that our Lord and His party were quite weary when they arrived at the home of Mary, Martha and Lazarus. They certainly must have appreciated the supper that was prepared as a token of their great love.

Notice, however, John 12:12-15, which reads:
"On the next day much people that were come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, Took branches of palm trees, and went forth to meet him, and cried, Hosanna: Blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord. And Jesus, when he had found a young *** , sat thereon; as it is written, Fear not, daughter of Sion: behold, thy King cometh, sitting on an *** 's colt."

The basis for what is known as Palm Sunday is found in this passage. It is generally taught that the triumphal entry occurred on the first day of the week, and that by observing Palm Sunday, Christians are properly commemorating the first significant event in the crucifixion week.
Let me point out that verse 12 definitely states that the so-called triumphal entry took place "on the next day" after our Lord's arrival in Bethany.

If this occurred on the first day of the week, then the preceding day was the seventh day of the week. In other words, the Lord Jesus completed His journey from Jericho on the Sabbath.

One thing that was deeply ingrained in the consciences of the Jews of that day was the Sabbath.

The Rabbinical laws of the Sabbath had been worked out to the minutest detail, one of which pertained to the "Sabbath day's journey."


The Sabbath day's journey is mentioned only in Acts 1:12, where we read, "Then returned they unto Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is from Jerusalem a sabbath day's journey." Davis'

Dictionary of the Bible states that the distance between Mount Olivet and Jerusalem, measured as the crow flies, is about 2,250 feet.

The regulation of the Sabbath day's journey had its origin in God's injunction found in Exodus 16:29, which states that the Israelites on the wilderness journey were not to leave the boundaries of the camp on the Sabbath day. These were reckoned to be about 2,000 cubits, or just under 3/4 of a mile.


We know from secular records that some flexibility was allowed in the length of the Sabbath day's journey to permit Passover pilgrims encamped on the outskirts to come into Jerusalem. The walls of Jerusalem were considered as extended to encircle the encamped pilgrims during this season.

The man-made regulation always permitted travel to any point within the city wall, since the Sabbath day's journey was considered to end at the city gate.


Bethany is fifteen furlongs (about 1 7/8 miles) from the actual walls of Jerusalem. John 11:18. Though this would have been slightly longer than a Sabbath day's journey, travel from Bethany to Jerusalem was permissible on the Sabbath, due to the "extended walls" of the Passover season.
But, a long eight-mile journey toward Jerusalem along the Jericho road by the Lord Jesus and all who were with Him would have been a clear violation of the Sabbath laws as most Jews understood them.

Furthermore, the supper that Martha and Mary had prepared for Jesus on the day of His journey (if that day was a Sabbath day) would have placed them in violation of the Sabbath. The penalty for Sabbath violation was stoning to death by command of the religious authorities.


These facts lead to only one valid conclusion: the journey from Jericho was not made on a Sabbath day. Therefore, the triumphal entry could not have been made on a Sunday!


3. First Century Jewish Traditions
The observance of the Passover recalls Israel's deliverance from Egypt and the beginning of her national life. But in a much deeper sense, the Passover foreshadowed the sacrifice of that true, spotless Lamb of God, slain on Calvary's tree for the sins of the world.


The Law of the Passover
God's law of the Passover is considered in three books of the Pentateuch: Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers. Three specific days are mentioned in conjunction with the observance of the Passover Feast.

The first date of importance is the tenth of Nisan, the first month of the Jewish year, which in Moses' day was known as Abib.


This is the date on which the Israelites were to select their Paschal lamb. "In the tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb." Exodus 12:3.


The next important date is the fourteenth of Nisan. Exodus 12:6 has these instructions: "And ye shall keep it (that is, the Paschal Lamb) up until the fourteenth day of the same month: and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening."


The Passover lamb was to be slain on the fourteenth. However, God's instructions permitted some tolerance as to the exact time of the slaying of the sacrifice, and this is extremely significant.


The literal translation of the last clause of verse 6 is "between the evenings," not "in the evening."


According to Hebrew reckoning, a day begins at sunset.

So the fourteenth of Nisan begins at 6 PM on the day we would call the thirteenth.

And the fourteenth ends and the fifteenth begins at 6 PM on the following day, the day we would consider as the fourteenth.


Therefore, the Passover extends from sunset on the thirteenth to sunset on the fourteenth.
In the observance of the first Passover, God specifically instructed Moses that the lamb was to be slain in the evening of the fourteenth, which was the evening that ushered in the day of the fourteenth.


The Jewish custom down through the centuries, therefore, was to slay the lamb early in the evening of the fourteenth of Nisan (which actually was done late in the afternoon of the thirteenth) and partake of it at the Paschal supper, which was on the evening preceding the day of Nisan fourteenth.


The highly significant point, however, is that the law permitted the sacrifice to be slain any time "between the evenings."


Thus God made provision for His Son, the true Paschal Lamb, to partake of the symbolic Paschal lamb on the evening of the fourteenth and still offer Himself as an acceptable sacrifice before the setting of the sun on the day of Nisan fourteenth.

God's way is perfect just as His Word is perfect.


Immediately upon the setting of the sun upon the day of the fourteenth of Nisan, the fifteenth of Nisan began. And according to Leviticus 23:6-7 and Numbers 28:18, this was the day that initiated the Feast of Unleavened Bread.


In it, the assembly of Israel was to "have an holy convocation" and to "do no servile work therein." Don't miss this point, the day of Nisan fifteenth was always a Sabbath day! It made absolutely no difference on which day of the week it fell.


The nation of Israel was given a number of Sabbath days, among which the seventh-day Sabbath was only one type.

The other Sabbaths, such as the fifteenth of Nisan, were considered to be "high" days; that is, they had even more significance than the regular seventh-day Sabbath.


One of the main reasons the Christian church holds to a Friday crucifixion is because the crucifixion day was followed by a Sabbath.

Early church leaders jumped to the conclusion that this was a seventh-day Sabbath without carefully consulting the Scriptures.


The Old Testament clearly teaches that every Nisan fifteenth was a Sabbath--and a high Sabbath at that.


But John 19:31 tells us "that sabbath day was an high day." Therefore, the day of our Lord's crucifixion did not necessarily occur on Friday.


It could have occurred on any day of the week.
Modifications to the Passover
When Israel was finally settled in Palestine, there was a modification in the manner the Passover Feast was observed.

For instance, in our Lord's day the Passover was no longer eaten in a standing position. Instead, it was eaten in a reclining position just as the regular meals.


In the days of our Lord, it had become customary to kill the Passover lambs on the afternoon of the thirteenth of Nisan rather than on the evening of the fourteenth.

Josephus, the Jewish historian, tells us that there were sometimes as many as 250,000 lambs slain on the occasion of the Passover.

It was necessary that the lambs be slain by the priests in the temple. We can imagine the momentous traffic jam that resulted from this and we can well appreciate that several hours of time would be required to sacrifice all these lambs.


So the killing of the Passover lambs began about two or three o'clock in the afternoon of Nisan thirteenth.

Then by five to five-thirty in the afternoon, all the lambs were slain.

Josephus confirms that in the years just before the time of Titus's destruction of Jerusalem, in 70 A.D., it was customary to slay the lambs between the ninth and eleventh hour (that is, between 3:00 PM and 5:00 PM).


At sundown on the thirteenth of Nisan, the fourteenth began. The lamb had been prepared, and when the roasting was complete, the participants gathered around the table and ate the Passover supper.


God's law of the Passover and Feast of Unleavened Bread calls the fourteenth of the month Nisan "the Passover." However, by the time of our Lord, the Jews had come to call this day the "Preparation day."


To them the major feast day, the "high" day, was the fifteenth of Nisan, the day the Scriptures designate as the first day of Unleavened Bread.


So at the time of our Lord's crucifixion, the fourteenth of Nisan, the day on which the Passover lamb was eaten, was called the day of "Preparation." The following day (the high Sabbath day, the fifteenth of Nisan) was called the "Passover day," although this was actually the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread.


This modification is confirmed by Matthew 26:17-19. Notice particularly verse 17: "Now the first day of the feast of unleavened bread the disciples came to Jesus, saying unto him, Where wilt thou that we prepare for thee to eat the passover?" If this passage were to be interpreted in strict accordance with the law of Moses, it would not make any sense. "The Passover" was the fourteenth of Nisan and the Paschal lamb was to be eaten on that day. "The first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread" was Nisan the fifteenth.


So we can conclude that the terms associated with the observance of the Passover Feast which appear in the New Testament are used in accordance with popular usage in that day and not strictly according to the definition of the law of Moses.


4. The Time of the Resurrection
In developing the chronology of the crucifixion week, there is one event that we can definitely associate with a particular day of the week. That event is the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.


He is Risen
"And when the sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome, had bought sweet spices, that they might come and anoint him. And very early in the morning the first day of the week, they came unto the sepulchre at the rising of the sun. And they said among themselves, Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the sepulchre?

And when they looked, they saw that the stone was rolled away: for it was very great. And entering into the sepulchre, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, clothed in a long white garment; and they were affrighted. And he said unto them, Be not affrighted: Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified: he is risen; he is not here: behold the place where they laid him." Mark 16:1-6.


This passage records the discovery of our Lord's resurrection and tells us the time of this discovery. More literally translated, this passage reads as follows: "And the Sabbath being past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the (mother) of James, and Salome brought aromatics, that having come, they might anoint him.


And very early on the first (day) of the week, they come upon the tomb, the sun having risen." This account shows that this visit came very early on a Sunday morning.


The same incident is recorded in Luke 24:1-3. "Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared, and certain others with them.


And they found the stone rolled away from the sepulchre. And they entered in, and found not the body of the Lord Jesus." So Luke also recorded that the discovery of the empty tomb came very early on a Sunday morning.


"The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre, and seeth the stone taken away from the sepulchre. Then she runneth, and cometh to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple, whom Jesus loved, and saith unto them, They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre, and we know not where they have laid him." John 20:1-2.


Note carefully that none of these Gospel reports describe our Lord's resurrection. These passages tell of the discovery of the empty tomb when the women came to anoint the Lord's body very early on a Sunday morning. T


he resurrection had already taken place sometime prior to this event. The idea that the resurrection took place at sunrise on a Sunday morning is not Scriptural. All three Gospels positively state that as early as the time was--even while it was "yet dark"--the Lord had already risen.


The Sabbath is Ended


We could know for certain when the resurrection of our Lord happened if we had just one definite witness to the exact hour of its occurrence. Well, God has seen fit to give us this witness in the Gospel of Matthew.


"In the end of the sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulchre. And, behold, there was a great earthquake: for the angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon it." Matt. 28:1-2.


Matthew described an event that seems to have occurred very closely in conjunction with the actual resurrection. This is the earthquake that took place when the angel descended from heaven to roll back the stone from the door of the tomb.
Matthew's emphasis here is upon the descent of the angel and the accompanying earthquake. The time of this event is set by the opening phrase "in the end of the sabbath." This designates a specific time of the day.


The word translated "began to dawn" in Matthew 28:1 is the Greek "epiphoskousa," which literally means "the coming of the light." Dr. H. A. Griesemer, a Greek scholar, has made the following remarks concerning this word.

"The word 'dawn' is very misleading.


We speak of the dawn as the opening of the day, the light that comes with the rising of the sun.

We always associate the dawn with the sunlight, but the Greek word here is 'epiphoskousa,' which means the shining of the sun or the moon.


You will observe that the passover feast always occurred at the time of the full moon. Just as the sun was setting, the moon would be rising."
Dr. George R. Berry in his Interlinear Greek-English New Testament translates the opening part of Matthew 28:1 as follows. "Now late on the sabbath, as it was getting dusk toward the first day of the week..." We can establish the time referred to by Matthew as the time of the setting of the sun on the seventh-day Sabbath.


So, just as the sun had set at the beginning of the Jewish first day of the week (remember, the Jewish day always began with the evening at the setting of the sun); there was an earthquake, the angel of the Lord descended, and he rolled away the stone and sat on it.


The resurrection occurred at the "end of the sabbath," just as the first day of the week was beginning, which according to Hebrew reckoning would have been sunset on Saturday, or around 6 PM.


Certainly the stone would not have been rolled away from the tomb before our Lord arose from the dead.

Furthermore, Matthew 27:51 tells us that there was an earthquake at the time of our Lord's death. So it seems reasonable that the second earthquake would have occurred at the moment of our Lord's resurrection.


Therefore, Matthew supplies the definite witness to our Lord's resurrection at sunset on Saturday afternoon, 72 hours after His burial.


Prophetic Requirements

The requirements of prophecy also help us to pinpoint some of the key events of the crucifixion week.

The Lord Himself prophesied that He would be resurrected on the third day. Matthew 16:21 says, "From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day."


According to Jewish reckoning, the setting of the sun marked the end of the day, but that point in time was also a part of that day.

However, sunset also marked the beginning of the next day. So Christ also was resurrected on the first day of the week.


There is another prophecy that required the Lord Jesus Christ to be resurrected on the first day of the week.

The Apostle Paul wrote in I Corinthians 15:20, "But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept." Jesus Christ in His resurrection fulfilled the law of the firstfruits. Leviticus 23:9-11 contains God's instructions concerning this law: "And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come into the land which I give unto you, and shall reap the harvest thereof, then ye shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest unto the priest: And he shall wave the sheaf before the LORD, to be accepted for you: on the morrow after the sabbath this priest shall wave it." The offering of the firstfruits, which typified the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, was to be waved before the LORD "on the morrow after the sabbath"--on the first day of the week!


The evidence that our Lord was resurrected at sunset on Saturday is overwhelming.

Only this exact point in time permits our Lord's resurrection to literally fulfill the prophecy for three seemingly incompatible situations: (1) resurrection after "three days and three nights in the heart of the earth," (2) resurrection "on the third day," and (3) resurrection on the first day of the week--"the morrow after the sabbath."


5. Two Key Days
The most important day in conjunction with the crucifixion week is obviously the day of resurrection, which we have seen is Saturday-Sunday (Nisan 18). However, there are two other key days that we need to investigate from a Scriptural position before we can unfold the chronology of the crucifixion week.

"Good Wednesday"


"Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared, and certain others with them. And they found the stone rolled away from the sepulchre. And they entered in, and found not the body of the Lord Jesus." Luke 24:1-3.


Since it has been shown from the Word of God that the resurrection took place at sundown on the day that we would call Saturday, the traditional "Good Friday" myth can be dispelled once and for all.

All arguments supporting a Friday crucifixion evaporate when we come to this realization.


Furthermore, we can unreservedly apply the prophetic typology of Jonah, who was (according to our Lord's words) in the belly of the great fish for "three days and three nights." And this definitely fixes Wednesday as the day our Lord was crucified and buried.


The Lord died about three o'clock in the afternoon. Matthew 27:46-50. He was placed in the sepulchre at sunset.

The Lord was crucified "between the evenings" on Nisan fourteenth in order to literally fulfill the Levitical law of the Passover.

Therefore, Nisan the fourteenth began at sunset Tuesday, and that day extended to sunset on Wednesday.

The Lord Jesus Christ partook of the Paschal supper on the evening of Nisan fourteenth, and He died as the true Paschal Lamb on the day of Nisan fourteenth.

So both the type and antitype were fulfilled. Both were slain "between the evenings" as required by God's law.


Thursday was Nisan fifteenth, the "high Sabbath" of the Passover. Levitical law called this day "the first day of Unleavened Bread." Friday was Nisan sixteenth, Saturday was Nisan seventeenth, and Sunday (the first day of the week and the day on which the offering of the firstfruits was to be brought) was the eighteenth of Nisan.


"Palm Saturday"

Now, let's count backward from Wednesday, Nisan fourteenth, and see where other significant events of the crucifixion week fit into the chronology.

First, we need to recall God's detailed instructions for the selection of the Paschal lamb.

These are given in Exodus 12:1-3.
"And the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying, This month shall be unto you the beginning of months: it shall be the first month of the year to you. Speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying, In the tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to the house of their fathers, a lamb for an house."


The Paschal lamb was to be selected and set apart from the other members of the flock on the tenth day of Nisan.


Now, if Wednesday was Nisan fourteenth, then Tuesday would have been Nisan thirteenth; Monday, Nisan twelfth; Sunday, Nisan eleventh; and Saturday, therefore, would have been Nisan tenth.


The tenth day of Nisan occurred on a regular seventh-day Sabbath.

Many prophecies and types were fulfilled during the crucifixion week; so it only seems natural to wonder what event of the crucifixion week fulfilled the selection of the Paschal lamb on Nisan tenth.


Certainly if Jesus is the true Paschal Lamb, there must be some event that pointed to His selection and acceptance during the week. The answer seems obvious.


Let's notice the words of Mark 11:7-9.

"And they brought the colt to Jesus, and cast their garments on him; and he sat upon him. And many spread their garments in the way: and others cut down branches off the trees, and strawed them in the way. And they that went before, and they that followed cried, saying, Hosanna; Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord."


Hosanna means "Save now!"

The triumphal entry was the fulfillment of the prophetic type represented in the law of the selection of the Paschal lamb.


It was on this day that the multitude turned out to greet our Lord Jesus Christ and to recognize Him both as the King of Israel and as the One who had come to bring physical salvation from Roman oppression.


The nationalistic fervor that had arisen on the Jericho road pilgrimage reached its peak with the entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem.


The triumphal entry into Jerusalem by our Lord not only fulfilled the type of the selection of the Paschal lamb, it also fulfilled several Old Testament prophecies.


Some 450 years prior to this event, the prophet Zechariah had written, "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem: behold, thy King cometh unto thee: he is just, and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an *** , and upon a colt the foal of an *** ." Zech. 9:9. Zechariah's prophecy is quoted in Matthew 21:5 and John 12:15.


But this is not the only prophecy that was fulfilled on that day. About a century earlier than Zechariah's prophecy, the prophet Daniel was chosen of the Lord to give us the great time prophecy found in Daniel 9:25-26. "Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times. And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself."


Daniel prophesied that Messiah the Prince would be cut off after 69 "weeks of years," which is 483 years (in 360-day prophetic years exactly 173,880 days), after "the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem."


Sir Robert Anderson, in his book The Coming Prince, has done a remarkable job of showing that this prophecy terminated on the very day of the triumphal entry.


There is one further piece of evidence that shows that the triumphal entry took place on a Saturday rather than a Sunday. This comes from noticing what our Lord did after He arrived in Jerusalem on that day.

Mark 11:11 says, "And Jesus entered into Jerusalem, and into the temple: and when he had looked round about upon all things, and now the eventide was come, he went out unto Bethany with the twelve." So ended the events of that day.


The focal point of the activity of the next day comes in Mark 11:15-16, where we read, "And they come to Jerusalem: and Jesus went into the temple, and began to cast out them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the money-changers, and the seats of them that sold doves; And would not suffer that any man should carry any vessel through the temple."


On the day of the triumphal entry, Jesus entered into the temple, He looked around, and He left. On the following day, He entered into the temple and drove out the money-changers. Why did He not do this on the first day? The answer is obvious. The Lord did not cleanse the temple on the first day because it was the quiet Jewish Sabbath.


There was no merchandising on that day! The Lord would not have hesitated to cleanse the temple on the first day if the business activities were in progress. And He did not need 24 hours to decide what to do about the disgraceful situation there. This passage is powerful circumstantial evidence that the triumphal entry did indeed occur on the seventh-day Jewish Sabbath.


6. Chronology: Friday Through Sunday

"Then Jesus six days before the passover came to Bethany, where Lazarus was which had been dead, whom he raised from the dead. There they made him a supper; and Martha served: but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with him.

Then took Mary a pound of ointment of spikenard, very costly, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped his feet with her hair: and the house was filled with odour of the ointment." John 12:1-3.
We are now ready to consider the details of the chronology of the crucifixion week.

We have developed a number of time-points, and the basic structure of the events during this week has emerged.

But now it's time for us to begin at the day that our Lord Jesus Christ made the final part of His journey to Bethany from Jericho and step-by-step carefully go through the details of the Scriptural record that will take us event-by-event to that early Sunday morning when the empty tomb was discovered.


Friday, the Ninth of Nisan

Our starting point is John 12:1-3. You'll recall that there had been several changes in the observance of the Passover since God had given this feast through Moses at the time of the Exodus.


Originally, Scripture referred to the fourteenth of Nisan as the "Passover" and the seven days of Nisan fifteenth through the twenty-first as the "Feast of Unleavened Bread." However, in the days of our Lord, the Jews referred to the entire eight-day celebration as both the "Passover" and the "Feast of Unleavened Bread" interchangeably.


The high point in the celebration was the Passover Sabbath, which was observed on Nisan fifteenth.

To the Jews of our Lord's day, this was the focal point of the entire celebration, and it was referred to as the "Passover." The day previous, Nisan fourteenth, God's Passover, was referred to as the Preparation day.


Therefore, when John wrote that "Jesus six days before the passover came to Bethany," he was using the term "Passover" as it was used at that time.

He had in view the high Sabbath of the Passover celebration, which was Nisan fifteenth.

So we can identify the day on which our Lord arrived in Bethany.

That was Friday, Nisan the ninth. It was on this day that our Lord arrived at the home of Martha, Mary and Lazarus, in the little village of Bethany, which was fifteen furlongs (1 7/8 miles) from Jerusalem.


The Lord Jesus Christ arrived in Bethany sufficiently early on Friday afternoon to permit Martha and Mary to prepare a supper for Him. We can be sure that the preparation of the food was finished before sunset.

However, the supper was not eaten until after the sun had set and a new day had dawned.

When Mary took the pound of ointment of spikenard and poured it on Jesus' feet and then wiped them with her hair, the evening of the tenth of Nisan, a seventh-day Sabbath, had already begun.


This act of Mary's was the first phase of the selection of the Paschal Lamb, which God's law said must be done on the tenth day of the month.
Scripture does not tell us whether or not our Lord spent that entire evening in the home of Martha and Mary. The inference is that He did.

It is significant that after our Lord's arrival in the vicinity of Jerusalem to keep His appointment with the cross, He never spent a night in the city of Jerusalem. In Scripture Jerusalem represents the fold of Judaism, the housing place of the sheep of that nation.


After our Lord's selection as the true Paschal Lamb who was to die, not only for the lost sheep of the house of Israel, but for all peoples, it was necessary for Him to remain separate. The law required that the selected Paschal lamb be set apart from the rest of the sheep. Bethany represents the position of separation "outside the camp."


Saturday, the Tenth of Nisan

"On the next day much people that were come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, Took branches of palm trees and went forth to meet him, and cried, Hosanna: Blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord." John 12:12-13.

This was the next day, the day following that evening on which our Lord Jesus Christ was anointed by Mary for His burial.

It was Saturday, Nisan tenth, a seventh-day Sabbath, and the day on which God's law said that the acceptable "lamb without blemish" must be selected and set apart.

Christ began the day by presenting Himself to Israel as her King. He was recognized as such. But then He was rejected, and the people of Israel selected Him as a Lamb for slaughter instead.


And what did the Lord of the Sabbath do when He reached the temple? Mark tells us that "Jesus entered into Jerusalem and into the temple: and when he had looked round about upon all things, and now the eventide was come, he went out unto Bethany with the twelve." Mark 11:11.


It was the Sabbath. All was quiet. There were no money-changers or merchants at work in the temple.

The Lord Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, simply inspected His house. "He looked round about on all things."

Herod's temple was a beautiful structure. But despite the beauty of this magnificent edifice, our Lord saw a great deal of ugliness, too.

The evidence of a sinful and disobedient people was all around. But on this particular day, Nisan the tenth, the temple area was quiet, for it was a Sabbath.

Thus our Lord simply inspected His Father's house and then withdrew Himself to Bethany as the sun began to sink in the west, closing the day on which the true Passover Lamb had been selected.
Sunday, the Eleventh of Nisan
"And on the morrow, when they were come from Bethany, he was hungry: And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came, if haply he might find any thing thereon: and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for the time of figs was not yet.

And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And his disciples heard it." Mark 11:12-14.


This day was Sunday, Nisan the eleventh, the first day of the week. It was just one week prior to that time when our Lord would come forth from the tomb in resurrection life, "the firstfruits of them that slept." It is most appropriate that the incident of the cursing of the fig tree took place on this day.

This incident is a living parable which predicts the setting aside of the nation Israel during the present inter-advent age. The fig tree is a figure used in Judges 9 in Jothan's "parable of the four trees," but it has continued throughout the Old Testament record.


On the first day of the week, Sunday, the temple area was a beehive of activity once again. Only two days remained until the fourteenth of Nisan which ushered in the eight-day celebration that the Jews referred to interchangeably as the "Feast of Passover" and the "Feast of Unleavened Bread."


To the temple merchants, Nisan fourteenth was a time of business--big business. There were many thousands of pilgrims present in Jerusalem.

They had come from all over the Roman Empire.


Many of then had only Roman money or money from their homeland, and this money had to be exchanged for the "shekels" of the temple in order to be useful for the buying of sacrifices and for giving in offerings.

Those who had traveled far were unable to bring animals for sacrifice; so these had to be purchased.


This was like "Christmas" for the temple merchants. The business that they did during the Passover season often determined whether their fiscal years were successes or failures. In the same way, many businesses of our day have to depend on their volume of Christmas business for financial "success."


So on this first day of the week, the money-changers and merchants were in their booths early. No doubt they were calling out to the pilgrims who passed into the temple courts, hawking their merchandise and services.

It is no wonder that the Lord Jesus Christ, in righteous anger, said to them, "Is it not written, My house shall be called of all nations the house of prayer? but ye have made it a den of thieves." Mark 11:17. And in this we see the fulfillment of the prophecy of Malachi 3:1. "And the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the LORD of hosts." And as we have seen, this occurred on Sunday, Nisan the eleventh.


7. Chronology: Monday and Tuesday


Monday, the Twelfth of Nisan
When the disciples saw the withered fig tree, Peter, who remembered the incident of the previous morning, called the Lord's attention to it.

"And in the morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. And Peter calling to remembrance saith unto him, Master, behold, the fig tree which thou cursedst is withered away. And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith in God." Mark 11:20-22.
Our Lord used this object lesson of the withered fig tree to deliver a great dissertation on faith and prayer.


This occurred on the second day of the week, Monday, Nisan twelfth.

We have no way of knowing whether the dawning of this Monday was the proverbial cloudless one or not.

But we can know that it was a fateful day. It was the last day that Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God, would offer Himself to God's chosen people, Israel, as their King and Messiah.

This was a day full of dramatic incidents. It was a tiring day and from the viewpoint of those unable to see God's divine plan, it was a day that ended in failure.


The Lord and His disciples entered again into Jerusalem, and went into the temple court. Here there were a long series of encounters with those who sought to discredit our Lord's testimony.

The chief priests and the scribes attacked Him in an effort to entrap Him in His own words. They first asked Him the source of His authority to do "these things." And by this, they doubtlessly referred to His cleansing of the temple the day before.

Immediately the Lord brought out clearly His source of authority when He asked, "The baptism of John, was it from heaven, or of men? answer me." Mark 11:30.


That ended that line of questioning, but it did not end the encounter. The Lord then related the parable of the hedged vineyard and the wicked husbandmen, in which the chief priests and scribes clearly saw themselves portrayed in the roles of the wicked husbandmen.

They were humiliated in front of the people, and they were put into confusion. "And they sought to lay hold on him, but feared the people: for they knew that he had spoken the parable against them: and they left him, and went their way." Mark 12:12.


Next it was the Pharisees' turn, and they joined forces with their old enemies, the Herodians--which was a strange combination indeed. They concocted a brilliant scheme to place the Lord Jesus Christ at odds with the Roman authorities and thus remove Him from the scene.

But the little coin with Caesar's image on it sent them crashing down in defeat. Then the Sadducees came and tried their hand. The result was the same.

The day finally drew on toward sunset after all had their turn to try to entrap Christ. All comers had been silenced. But their hatred had now crystallized. The Lord's hour was approaching.


Things were moving rapidly toward that rendezvous with the cross.

Evening, the closing of that fateful Monday and the dawning of Tuesday, was rapidly drawing near. It was probably with reluctance that the Lord, with the twelve, left the temple courts and passed beyond the walls of the city to the slopes of the Mount of Olives.


The evening sun was sinking low over toward the west side of the city, and it would soon be lost to view behind the hills. "And as he went out of the temple, one of his disciples saith unto him, Master, see what manner of stones and what buildings are here!" Mark 13:1.

This enthusiastic remark, probably made with the intent of cheering up the Lord after that trying day, set the stage for that great prophetic revelation that Bible scholars call the "Olivet Discourse." This discourse came at the close of the day on Monday, the twelfth of Nisan.


Now, let's turn our attention to a passage of Scripture that allows us to check our chronology.

The passage is found in the opening verse of Mark 14.

Here Mark wrote, "After two days was the feast of the passover, and of unleavened bread: and the chief priests and the scribes sought how they might take him by craft, and put him to death."


This verse not only gives us a time mark to check our chronology, but it also verifies the records that have come down through secular channels concerning the terminology used by the Jews in our Lord's time.

Although God's Word designates the fourteenth of Nisan as the Passover and the fifteenth of Nisan as the first day of Unleavened Bread, the Jews used these terms interchangeably.


The fifteenth of Nisan, the high Sabbath of Passover, had become the focal point of the entire celebration; and it was the day commonly called "the Passover." Mark identified the day of Nisan fifteenth when he used the combination expression "the passover, and of unleavened bread" to refer to a single day.


Tuesday, the Thirteenth of Nisan

The Lord Jesus Christ and the twelve had climbed the slopes of the Mount of Olives at the close of Monday, Nisan twelfth. While they were there, the Master had delivered His discourse, which included the prophecy of the coming destruction of the temple and the city. The sun had set on

Nisan twelfth, and the evening of the thirteenth day of Nisan had just dawned. And apparently, after the discourse, they went back to Bethany for the night. At this point Mark wrote, "After two days was the passover, and of unleavened bread." Mark 14:1.

The evening was Nisan thirteenth, and the next day was to be Tuesday, Nisan thirteenth.

Two days later would be Thursday, Nisan fifteenth, the day that Mark designated as "the feast of the passover, and of unleavened bread."
"And the chief priests and the scribes sought how they might take him by craft, and put him to death. But they said, Not on the feast day, lest there be an uproar of the people." Mark 14:1-2. Notice that the word "feast" is not used in Mark 14:1. The verse literally says, "After two days was the passover, and of unleavened bread."


The King James Version inserts the words "the feast of" in italics, but there is nothing in the Greek text corresponding to these words.


The expression in Mark 14:1 refers to Nisan fifteenth. And the expression "on the feast day" in Mark 14:2 apparently refers to the same day, that is, the high day of the Passover celebration, Nisan fifteenth.

So the plot began to take form. The Lord Jesus Christ was to be apprehended and slain before Nisan fifteenth. God used the modifications of the Jews to take the Lord Jesus Christ to the cross on Nisan fourteenth, God's Passover.
It was on the evening of the thirteenth of Nisan, a Tuesday, after our Lord had delivered the Olivet Discourse, that the Lord and His disciples came down off the mountain and once again headed toward Bethany. This time they went to the house of Simon the leper.


Many Bible teachers have tried to establish that the evening meal in the house of Simon the leper was the same meal as that with Martha, Mary and Lazarus, reported by John in the opening verses of chapter 12.

The reason for this is that the incident of the anointing of the Lord by the woman, described both in Mark 14:3-9 and in Matthew 26:6-13, does have many similarities to the incident of the anointing by Mary described in John 12:3-8. But careful reading also shows a great many differences.

Mary anointed the Lord's feet (John 12:3), but the woman in the house of Simon the leper anointed His head. Mark 14:3; Matthew 26:7. The Scripture seems clear that the incident mentioned by Matthew and Mark occurred on a different day and in a different house and that the anointing was performed by a different woman from that in the incident mentioned by John.

This second anointing of our Lord occurred on Tuesday evening, after the setting of the sun and the closing of Nisan twelfth.


"And the first day of unleavened bread, when they killed the passover, his disciples said unto him, Where wilt thou that we go and prepare that thou mayest eat the passover?" Mark 14:12.

This brings us to the day of Tuesday, Nisan thirteenth. This was our Lord's last day of freedom before His arrest and crucifixion.

It is confusing because Mark prefixed this record with "And the first day of unleavened bread." But we should keep in mind that the Gospel writers used terms according to the contemporary usage in their day, not strictly according to the definition of Mosaic law.

Josephus recorded that in those days the Jews celebrated "eight days of Unleavened Bread."

They included the fourteenth of Nisan, the day that Moses designated as the "Passover," in the feast of Unleavened Bread (which was only seven days long).

Josephus also said that it was customary to kill the lambs between three o'clock and five o'clock in the afternoon before the Passover Supper, which then were roasted and eaten in the evening.


The Jews of Mark's day still ate the Passover on the evening of Nisan fourteenth, but they often referred to this meal as the "first Chagigah." Alfred Edersheim in his book, The Temple--Its Ministry and Services, tells us that "the Chagigah which was strictly a peace offering might be twofold. The first Chagigah was offered on the fourteenth of Nisan, the day of the Paschal sacrifice, and formed afterwards part of the Paschal Supper.

The second Chagigah was offered on the fifteenth of Nisan, or the first day of the feast of Unleavened Bread." It is this second Chagigah which the Jews were afraid they might be unable to eat, if they contracted defilement in the judgment hall of Pilate. John 18:28.


The Lord ate the "first Chagigah," which was the true Passover Supper, with His disciples. Since the Jews included the fourteenth of Nisan in their designation "the Feast of Unleavened Bread," and since they allowed the hours after three o'clock in the afternoon on Nisan thirteenth to be considered as a part of Nisan fourteenth for the purpose of the slaying of the lamb, then it seems that Mark was designating the late afternoon of Nisan thirteenth in his prefix to this exchange between our Lord and His disciples.


So it was on Tuesday, Nisan thirteenth, that the disciples asked the Lord where He wished to eat the Passover.

Evidently Judas was present when this question was put to the Lord; and since the Lord knew of Judas' plot to betray Him, He replied in a guarded way. Instead of naming the place, the Lord Jesus Christ sent Peter and John to find and follow the man bearing a pitcher of water. (By the way, this instruction was not so ambiguous as it might seem to us because men normally did not carry water in those days.) This was evidently a clever method of delaying the betrayal by Judas until after the Paschal Supper. Judas would not know until the time of the supper itself where it was to take place. This arrangement assured an uninterrupted evening following Tuesday, Nisan thirteenth.

This brings us to the evening of Nisan fourteenth, the Wednesday on which our Lord would die.

8. Chronology: Wednesday and Thursday

Wednesday, the Fourteenth of Nisan
Immediately after sundown on Tuesday afternoon, the fourteenth of Nisan began. The lamb had been slain and roasted and was now ready in the upper room.

The Lord Jesus Christ and His disciples arrived early after sunset and partook together of the Passover Feast. "And when the hour was come, he sat down, and the twelve apostles with him. And he said unto them, With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer: For I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God." Luke 22:14-16.

It was on the occasion of this evening that the disciples' feet were washed, the Lord's Supper was instituted, and that wonderful discourse of our Lord was given beginning with the words "Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me." John 14:1.

The Lord Jesus Christ knew that Judas was anxious to bring the soldiers to arrest Him. So when the supper had progressed to a certain point, the Lord said to him, "That thou doest, do quickly." John 13:27.

This gave the betrayer an opportunity to get away and carry out his unholy purpose.

It is not the intent of this study to go into the details of those events of the crucifixion day.

The point that is important to our study of the chronology of the crucifixion week is that the crucifixion took place on Wednesday, Nisan fourteenth.

The Lord's body was placed in the tomb just as the sun was setting on that sad day. And with the placing of His body in the tomb, the fulfillment of the Lord's own prophecy that He would be "three days and three nights in the heart of the earth" was begun.

Three days later, again at sunset, He would come forth in resurrection life.


"The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away." John 19:31.

This verse establishes that the day following our Lord's crucifixion was a "high day." That in turn established that it was Nisan fifteenth, the great Passover Sabbath, the day that God had designated as "the first day of unleavened bread." The Passover Sabbath was the greatest Jewish Sabbath of the year.

It was not only a day of rest and worship like Saturday, the seventh-day Sabbath; but, unlike that day, this Thursday Passover Sabbath was a "high day."

The fifteenth of Nisan fell on a different day each year, and that particular year it fell on Thursday as the Scriptural "time-points" clearly affirm.


Thursday, the Fifteenth of Nisan

What happened on this particular day? Scripture provides us with a record of only one specific event. And this record is found in Matthew 27:62-66. "Now the next day, that followed the day of the preparation, the chief priests and Pharisees came together unto Pilate, Saying, Sir, we remember that that deceiver said, while he was yet alive, After three days I will rise again.

Command therefore that the sepulchre be made sure until the third day, lest his disciples come by night, and steal him away, and say unto the people, He is risen from the dead: so the last error shall be worse than the first.

Pilate said unto them, Ye have a watch: go your way, make it as sure as ye can. So they went, and made the sepulchre sure, sealing the stone, and setting a watch."

One thing of significance should be noted here.

The chief priests and Pharisees said, "After three days." They were perhaps the very ones who were present when the Lord had spoken of the sign of the Prophet Jonah. And they remembered well what He had said.

It is quite likely that these events (which transpired on the day of Thursday, Nisan fifteenth) were in the minds of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus when they said, "And beside all this, today is the third day since these things were done." Luke 24:21.

To those looking on, the sealing of the tomb and the placing of the Roman guard were very much events that were to be included in the burial of the Lord Jesus Christ. Since these words were spoken on Sunday, and since the final steps of the putting away of the Lord took place on Thursday, the two disciples were absolutely correct in their statement of time.


9. Chronology: Friday Through Sunday

To conclude this study of the chronology of the crucifixion week, let's direct our attention to a passage from the Gospel of Mark. In his description of these events, Mark provides final verification of the chronology that we have established:

"And he bought fine linen, and took him down, and wrapped him in the linen, and laid him in a sepulchre which was hewn out of a rock, and rolled a stone unto the door of the sepulchre. And Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses beheld where he was laid. And when the sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome, had bought sweet spices, that they might come and anoint him. And very early in the morning the first day of the week, they came unto the sepulchre at the rising of the sun. And they said among themselves, Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the sepulchre?

And when they looked, they saw that the stone was rolled away: for it was very great." Mark 15:46-16:4.


Our Lord Jesus Christ was placed in the sepulchre, but it was necessary that those looking on hasten home because the High Passover Sabbath had arrived. Mark 15:47 tells us; "And Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses beheld where he was laid." This verse refers to the events that took place late in the afternoon of Wednesday, Nisan fourteenth.

The wording of this verse seems to infer that the women observed the Lord's body being placed on the shelf in Joseph's new tomb, but that they did not remain on the scene as the heavy stone was rolled in place.

Now the very next verse in Mark's Gospel, Mark 16:1, says, "And when the sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome, had bought sweet spices, that they might come and anoint him." The word "Sabbath" as used in this verse is singular. The reference is to the High Passover Sabbath, which occurred on Thursday, Nisan fifteenth.

The bringing of the sweet spices, described in Mark 16:1, was a separate visit from the coming of the women to the tomb--that visit which took place early on the first day of the week, as described in Mark 16:2. Mark 16:1 describes an event that took place on Friday, Nisan sixteenth.
Friday, the Sixteenth of Nisan
"And Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses beheld where he was laid." Mark 15:47.

Again, the inference of this statement is that the women saw the Lord's body placed in the sepulchre but that they left before the stone was rolled in place to seal the door. Therefore, it is possible that they did not realize the impossibility of gaining access to the Lord's body without outside help.

The Roman seal and the Roman guard were established on Thursday morning. The seal and the guard were to insure that the tomb was not opened until the three days were definitely past. It is entirely possible that the women were not aware of the Thursday development.


After the High Sabbath, the women (on Friday, Nisan sixteenth) "bought sweet spices, that they might come and anoint him." But on arriving at the tomb they found the heavy stone in place, the official Roman seal on it, and the Roman guard posted to make sure that no one touched that seal until after the third day had passed. So the women found it necessary to return to their homes to await the passing of three full days (which included the seventh-day Sabbath) before they could again attempt to anoint the Lord's body.


The Gospel of Luke also confirms that there were two visits to the tomb by those faithful women.

The two visits are seen in the passage contained in Luke 23:55-56. "And the women also, which came with him from Galilee, followed after, and beheld the sepulchre, and how his body was laid. And they returned, and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the sabbath day according to the commandment."


The statement of verse 55 indicates that the women did observe the body of our Lord Jesus Christ placed in the tomb at sundown on the day of His crucifixion. Then verse 56 says, "And they returned and prepared spices and ointments..." This speaks of that first visit to the tomb on Friday, Nisan sixteenth.


The women were unable to anoint the Lord's body because of the stone with its affixed seal and the Roman guard that had been set by Pilate. Unable to complete the task that they had attempted on that Friday, Luke says that they "rested the sabbath day according to the commandment."


Saturday, the Seventeenth of Nisan


Notice that the statement of Luke 23:56, that they "prepared spices and ointments," comes before the statement of the same verse that they "rested the sabbath day according to the commandment."

The spices and ointments were prepared on Friday, Nisan sixteenth, but they were not used that day. The statement about the Sabbath day refers to the seventh-day Sabbath, which occurred on Saturday, Nisan seventeenth.

The second visit, as recorded in Luke 23:1, occurred on Sunday, Nisan eighteenth, the first day of the week.


Recall that Matthew 28:1-2 tells us that "in the end of the sabbaths, as it was dawning toward the first day of the week," came the angel and the earthquake.

The word "sabbaths" here is plural, and by using this plural form Matthew indicated that both the High Sabbath of Nisan fifteenth and the seventh-day Sabbath of Nisan seventeenth had passed.

The Lord broke the bonds of death and came forth from the tomb. All prophecy concerning His death, burial and resurrection was literally and precisely fulfilled!


Sunday, the Eighteenth of Nisan

Mark 16:2-3 tells us of that second visit of the women to the tomb, which Mark asserted was early in the morning on the first day of the week. "And very early in the morning the first day of the week, they came unto the sepulchre at the rising of the sun. And they said among themselves, Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the sepulchre?"

This passage definitely indicates that the women had knowledge of the presence of the stone before they arrived at the tomb early on Sunday morning. And it also infers that the time limit set by Pilate as to how long the tomb must be sealed and guarded by Roman soldiers (three full days) had passed. The women felt sure of access to the tomb if only they could find someone with adequate physical strength to roll away the stone.


The record of the second visit to the tomb by the women is confirmed by the opening verses of Luke 24. The evangelist wrote, "Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared, and certain others with them. And they found the stone rolled away from the sepulchre, And they entered in, and found not the body of the Lord Jesus."

But the absence of His body was not loss.

The answer of the angelic beings has been the victorious cry of Christians ever since:
"He is not here, but is risen!"

10. Chronology of Crucifixion Week Illustrated

FRIDAY - Nisan 9th
John 12:1--"Then Jesus six days before the passover came to Bethany..."
Jericho to Bethany
Last Half of Journey

SATURDAY -Nisan 10th
John 12:12,13--"On the next day much people that were come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, Took branches of palm trees, and went forth to meet him, and cried, Hosanna..."
Mark 11:11--"And Jesus entered into Jerusalem, and into the temple: and when he had looked round about upon all things, and now the eventide was come, he went out unto Bethany with the twelve."
The Triumphal Entry
Jewish Seventh-Day Sabbath
"Palm Saturday"

SUNDAY - Nisan 11th
Mark 11:12,13--"And on the morrow, when they were come from Bethany, he was hungry: And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came..."
Mark 11:15--"And they come to Jerusalem: and Jesus went into the temple, and began to cast out them that sold and bought in the temple..."
Mark 11:19--"And when even was come, he went out of the city."
Cursing of the Fig Tree
Cleansing of the Temple

MONDAY -Nisan 12th
Mark 11:20--"And in the morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots."
Mark 11:27--"And they come again to Jerusalem..."
--Late in Day--
Matt. 24:1--"And Jesus went out..."
Matt. 24:3--"...He sat upon the mount of Olives..."
Matt. 26:2--"Ye know that after two days is the feast of the passover..."
Battles with His Enemies
Announces that After Two Days the Passover

TUESDAY -Nisan 13th
Matt. 26:6,7--"Now when Jesus was in Bethany, in the house of Simon the leper, There came unto him a woman having an alabaster box of very precious ointment..."
--Afternoon--
Matt. 26:17--"Now the first day of the feast of unleavened bread the disciples came to Jesus, saying unto him, Where wilt thou that we prepare for thee to eat the passover?
Matt. 26:19--"And the disciples did as Jesus had appointed them; and they made ready the passover."
Olivet Discourse Concluded
Supper at Simon's House
On Next Afternoon Peter and John Prepare Passover

WEDNESDAY -Nisan 14th
--Just After Sunset--
Matt. 26:20--"Now when the even was come, he sat down with the twelve."
--Then came Gethsemane and the arrest, the religious trial before day, the trial before Pilate in the morning, the crucifixion by noon--
Mark 15:42,43--"And now when the even was come, because it was the preparation, that is, the day before the sabbath..."
--Joseph of Arimathea went unto Pilate and requested the body of Jesus which he buried in his own tomb.
Mark 15:47--"And Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses beheld where he was laid."
God's Passover
Jews' "Preparation Day"
Passover Eaten
Jesus Crucified "Between the Evenings"
"Good Wednesday"

THURSDAY -Nisan 15th
Matt. 27:62--"Now the next day, that followed the day of the preparation the chief priests and Pharisees came together unto Pilate." And secured a watch for the tomb.
John 19:31--"...For that sabbath day was an high day..."
Lev. 23:6--"And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast of unleavened bread unto the LORD..."
Lev. 23:7--"...Ye shall do no servile work therein."
Passover Sabbath
(The Day of "Passover and Unleavened Bread")
Jesus in Tomb

FRIDAY -Nisan 16th
Mark 16:1--"And when the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome, had bought sweet spices, that they might come and anoint him."
Luke 23:56--"And they returned, and prepared spices and ointments..."
Preparation Day of Seventh-Day Sabbath
First Visit of the Women
Jesus in Tomb

SATURDAY -Nisan 17th
Luke 23:56--"And rested the sabbath day according to the commandment."
Matt. 28:2--"And, behold, there was a great earthquake: for the angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon it."
Seventh-Day Sabbath
Jesus in Tomb
Resurrection at Sundown

SUNDAY -Nisan 18th
Luke 24:1--"Now upon the first day of the week, very early on the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared, and certain others with them."
Luke 24:2--"And they found the stone rolled away from the sepulchre."
Luke 24:3--"And they entered in, and found not the body of the Lord Jesus."
Lev. 23:10,11--"...Then ye shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest unto the priest...On the morrow after the sabbath the priest shall wave it."
Discovery of the Resurrection
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Posts: 4679 | From: Southern Black Hills of South Dakota | Registered: Jun 2002 |



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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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Carol Swenson
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quote:
Only a sovergn act of YHWH, i think would you see, your set, you believe the "Traditions you have been taught" and i dont think you or Betty will EVER change what you have been taught!

Sigh. Well, that's okay barrykind. I know it's easier to say we believe "traditions" than to actually read what we post. You haven't answered, or even acknowledged, the tough questions.

quote:
Thats just not true Carol, scripture does not say that!

Yes, it says that.

Mark 16:9 KJV
Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast seven devils.

quote:
Originally posted by Carol Swenson:
Those who teach a Wednesday or Thursday crucifixion and a Saturday afternoon/evening resurrection do so for two primary reasons:

First, they think they are correctly interpreting Jesus' statement in Matthew 12:40 that He would be in the grave a literal "three days and three nights." However, as we have demonstrated in Matthew 12:40 their theory flatly contradicts twenty-one other Bible texts. This is simply a case of standing the Bible on it's head.

Second, they hope to take the wind out of the sails of those who worship on Sunday by proving Jesus did not rise on Sunday. However, their assertion that Jesus rose on Saturday afternoon/evening flatly contradicts the grammar of the Greek language as well as the Bible's specific statement in Mark 16:9 that Jesus rose on Sunday morning.

Greek Grammar

The Greeks had four words to express "early morning," just as we have in English: “dawn,” “daybreak,” “sunrise,” and “morning.” When the Greek words are defined by the dictionary, and studied in their context, there is no doubt that they mean "in the morning as the sun is rising." Let's consider how these four Greek words are used and defined in each of the texts which record Christ's resurrection on Sunday morning and the subsequent visits by the women:

Matthew 28:1 - "epiphosko" (Strongs #G2020)

"After the Sabbath, at dawn ("epiphosko") on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb."

AT DAWN = The Greek "epiphosko" literally means "to dawn in the morning, to begin to be light." The root word is "phosko" meaning "to shine." We get our English word "phosphorescence" from "phosko." This word is used in Scripture twice: once in it's literal sense (Matthew 28:1) to mean "sunrise, dawn, as it begins to be light," and once in a metaphorical sense to mean "beginning of the day from a Jewish perspective, sunset" (Luke 23:54). This is the one text the "three days and three nights" advocates use to build their theory that Jesus rose at sunset on Friday. However, when taken in the context of the following texts, the grammar establishes beyond a doubt that the two Mary's came to the tomb at dawn on Sunday morning.

Mark 16:2 - "proi" (Strongs #G4404)

"Very early ("proi") on the first day of the week, just after sunrise ("anateilantos tou heliou"), they were on their way to the tomb"

VERY EARLY = The Greek "proi" means "early in the morning, the early morning watch which ushers in the dawn." This is the opposite of the Greek word "opse" which means "late in the day, evening." When Luke wrote Acts 28:23 informing us that Paul preached "from morning ("proi") until evening ("hespera") he used "proi" to indicate "morning/dawn/when the sun rises."

JUST AFTER SUNRISE = The Greek literally reads "anateilantos tou heliou" meaning "at the rising of the sun." Notice carefully that Mark clearly states when he uses the word "proi" he intends us to understand it the way the dictionary defines it: the time of day "just after sunrise." Thus, without question, when the two Mary's arrived "very early" ("proi"), they arrived at sunrise on the first day of the week (Sunday morning).

Mark 16:9 - "proi" (Strongs #G4404)

"When Jesus rose early ("proi") on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had driven seven demons."

JESUS ROSE EARLY = Here Mark once again uses the Greek word "proi." In verse 2 Mark already has defined what he means by "proi": "just after sunrise." Now Mark tells us Jesus rose "early in the morning, during the early morning watch which ushers in the dawn, at sunrise." Not only is this the dictionary definition of "proi," but it is precisely how Mark himself defined it in Mark 16:2. "Proi" is the opposite of the Greek word "opse" which means "late in the day, evening," thus "proi" cannot mean Jesus rose Saturday evening after sundown as darkness fell. When Luke wrote Acts 28:23 telling us that Paul preached "from morning ("proi") until evening ("hespera") he used this same word to indicate "morning/dawn/when the sun rises." There is simply no way to deny the grammar: Jesus rose at dawn as the sun was rising on Sunday morning, just a few moments before the women arrived at the tomb. To claim otherwise is simply to display an outright ignorance of Greek grammar, the Biblical context, and history.

Luke 24:1 - "orthros" (Strongs #G3722)

"On the first day of the week, very early in the morning ("orthros"), the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb."

VERY EARLY IN THE MORNING = The Greek "orthros" means "at daybreak, dawn, early morning." It is the opposite of the Greek words "hespera" meaning "evening;" "opse" meaning "evening, close of the day;" "nux" meaning "night;" "skotos" meaning "darkness." By using this third Greek word meaning "dawn, early morning," Luke affirms beyond question that the events of Christ's resurrection occurred on Sunday morning at sunrise.

Luke 24:22 - "orthrinos" (Strongs #G3721)

"In addition, some of our women amazed us. They went to the tomb early this morning ("orthrinos")"

EARLY THIS MORNING = The actual date was Sunday, April 9, 30 AD. The Greek word "orthrinos" means "early in the morning." It is regularly used as a substitute for the word "morning." This word cannot be used in Jewish reckoning for the beginning of a day at sundown. It requires the light to be breaking (early morning), not the light to be waning (evening). Thus Luke has used two additional words, "orthros" and "orthrinos" to inform his readers the events of resurrection Sunday occurred very early in the daylight.

John 20:1 - "proi" (Strongs #G4404)

"Early ("proi") on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance."

EARLY = The Greek word "proi" means "early in the morning, the early morning watch which ushers in the dawn." As explained previously, "proi" cannot be used to refer to sunset, for it is the opposite of the Greek word "opse" which means "late in the day, evening." When Luke wrote Acts 28:23 telling us that Paul preached "from morning ("proi") until evening ("hespera") he used this same word ("proi") to indicate "morning/dawn/when the sun rises." This is the same word Mark used to state Jesus rose early on Sunday morning (Mark 16:9).

Summary

The Gospel writers are in full agreement that Jesus rose on Sunday morning at dawn. They went so far as to use every one of the four Greek words which mean "dawn, sunrise, daybreak": "epiphosko," "proi," "orthros," "orthrinos." One of them, Mark, even specified that he was speaking of that time of day which is "at the rising of the sun" (Mark 16:2). All of this was done so that modern readers would not have so much as a shadow of a doubt that Jesus' resurrection and the women's visit to the tomb occurred on Sunday at sunrise.

Conclusion

The "Three Days and Three Nights" proponents require exactly 72 hours to pass between the moment Christ died and the moment He was raised from the dead. This leaves them with only three options:

1. Advocate a Saturday evening resurrection. However, to teach Jesus rose Saturday evening after sundown contradicts Mark 16:9 which specifically states Jesus rose at dawn on Sunday morning. Furthermore, claiming Jesus rose after sunset on Saturday evening nullifies their argument that Jesus did not rise on Sunday, for (by Jewish time) Sunday had already arrived at sunset on Saturday.

2. Advocate a Saturday afternoon resurrection. To teach that Jesus lay in the grave 72-hours requires Jesus to rise on Saturday afternoon before sunset at the exact moment He was buried three days earlier. The Bible evidence is clear that Jesus was buried just before sunset. Thus proposing an afternoon resurrection, no matter what day, contradicts Matthew 28:1; Mark 16:2; Mark 16:9; Luke 24:1; Luke 24:22; and John 20:1 which state Jesus rose Sunday at dawn.

3. Advocate that it is not necessary to require exactly 72-hours (a literal three days and three nights) to pass between the moment of Christ's death and the moment of His resurrection. This admission defeats the entire purpose of advocating "three days and three nights" and thus nullifies any Wednesday/Thursday crucifixion theory. If "three days and three nights" does not mean literally 72 hours, then there is no justification for proponents to object to the Friday crucifixion/Sunday resurrection scenario.

From both context and grammar no legitimate case can be made for Jesus rising on Saturday afternoon or Saturday evening. The only possibility is that Jesus rose at dawn on Sunday, just as the Bible states. The Bible record is clear: Jesus was crucified at 3 PM on Friday afternoon (the "Preparation Day"). His burial was completed around 6 PM Friday afternoon before sunset. He rested in the grave through Saturday (the "Sabbath"), and He rose from the dead at dawn on Sunday morning ("the first day of the week"). By the time the women arrived a short time later at daybreak Jesus had already risen.

This is the Biblical, historic, and consistent position Christians have held for 2,000 years.

http://www.christiancommunitychurch.us/3dayWhen.html


 - G4404. πρωΐ prōi; adv. of time, from pro (G4253), before. Early in the morning.

(I) Particularly and in an absolute sense (Matt. 16:3; Mark 1:35; 11:20; 16:2, 9; John 20:1; Sept.: 1 Kings 3:21; Isa. 5:11). With the prep. hama prōi (hama (G260), with, together with), very early, at dawn (Matt. 20:1); apo prōi (apo (G575), from), from morning (Acts 28:23); epi to prōi (epi (G1909), upon), in the morning (Mark 15:1).

(II) Metonymically the morning watch which ushers in the dawn (Mark 13:35).

Deriv.: prōia (G4405), morning; prōimos (G4406), pertaining to the morning; prōinos (G4407), early, at early morning.

Ant.: opse (G3796), late in the day, evening.


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barrykind
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for you sister Carol i gave ample proof of the year of 30ad which would make the weds eve work out for the 72 hours.

i dont know if you read the post or not.

Do you want me to post from Helpfromhomeschool's post?

what would make you see, what would make you turn from the "traditions of Men"..?

Only a sovergn act of YHWH, i think would you see, your set, you believe the "Traditions you have been taught" and i dont think you or Betty will EVER change what you have been taught!

Sorry for you have eyes to see; but do not see; and ears to hear but do not hear!

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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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barrykind
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Betty says:


quote:
Barrry YOU DO JUDGE others by the day they worship. NONE of us JUDGE YOU. You make it clear that if I do not agree with you that I am ignorant.
I don't care what you think, the Gospels spell it out Jesus rose on Sunday. You and your mini cult can believe what you will. You place so much emphases on Saturday being the day Jesus rose again, that you forget the important JESUS DID RISE AGAIN.
betty

Yes i will judge you betty, by the scripture:

You will know them by thier fruit!

Yes it is ok to judge , not to hell, nor the lake of fire, that is YHWH's judgement, not mine; but to judge things is rightfully mine to do:

You make false statements, i will not let them pass, i will challange them on every side..
i w ill defend the truth as best i can.

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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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barrykind
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Carol says:

quote:
Scripture says He rose early in the morning on the first day of the week. Monday is the second day of the week.
Thats just not true Carol, scripture does not say that!

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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27

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Betty Louise
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Barrry YOU DO JUDGE others by the day they worship. NONE of us JUDGE YOU. You make it clear that if I do not agree with you that I am ignorant.
I don't care what you think, the Gospels spell it out Jesus rose on Sunday. You and your mini cult can believe what you will. You place so much emphases on Saturday being the day Jesus rose again, that you forget the important JESUS DID RISE AGAIN.
betty

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Luk 21:28 And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.

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Caretaker
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God bless each of you so very much.

There is scriptural validation and arguments for both sides.

What is the critical is the absolute fact of the death, burial, and resurrection of our Lord and Savior.

Phil. 2:
5 Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:
6 Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:
7 But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men:
8 And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
9 Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name:
10 That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth;
11 And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

--------------------
A Servant of Christ,
Drew

1 Tim. 3:
16: And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh..

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WildB
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quote:
Originally posted by barrykind:
Origianally posted by wildb


quote:
WildB

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posted April 03, 2006 08:28 PM
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Was Jesus Christ Crucified on Good Friday?
...Does It Make Any Difference?

N.W. Hutchings

Nisan 14, The Lord's Passover (Israel's Passover Preparation Day)

Tuesday, 6:00 P.M. (First Watch): Jesus observed Passover in the Upper Room with His apostles (no lamb, because Jesus Himself was to be the Lamb).

Tuesday, 9:00 P.M. (Second Watch): Jesus arrested and taken to Caiaphas to be judged.

Tuesday, 12:00 midnight (Third Watch): Jesus judged and found guilty of blasphemy by the Sanhedrin.

Wednesday, 6.00 A.M. (first hour): Jesus taken to Pilate at Anthony's Tower to be judged and sentenced.

Wednesday, 9:00 A.M. (third hour): Jesus nailed to the cross.

Wednesday, 12:00 noon: darkness over the earth to the ninth hour.

Wednesday, 3:00 P.M. (ninth hour): Jesus died and gave up the ghost.

Nisan 15, Israel Passover Day (First Day of Unleavened Bread)

Wednesday, 6:00 P.M.: Jesus' body placed in the tomb.

Wednesday, 6:00 P.M to 6:00 P.M. Thursday: Jesus' body was in the tomb - one night and one day (24 hours).

Nisan 16, Second Day of Unleavened Bread

Thursday, 6:00 P.M to 6:00 P.M. Friday: Jesus' body lay in the tomb for second night and second day (total now 48 hours).

Nisan 17, Third Day of Unleavened Bread (Jewish Sabbath)

Friday, 6:00 P.M. to 6:00 P.M. Saturday: Jesus' body lay in the tomb for third night and third day (total now 72 hours). "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" (Matt. 12:40).

Jesus arrived in Jerusalem on the eve of Nisan 9 because He came to fulfill the Father's will that He be the Lamb of God who would take away the sins of the world; lambs chosen for Passover must be separated from parents for seven days before the Day of Preparation. Jesus was anointed by Mary on Nisan 10 for His death, because a sacrificial lamb must be chosen (anointed) on this day, four days before the Passover. Nisan 10 the year Christ was crucified was indicated to be a Saturday Sabbath. Four days later, on Wednesday, Jesus was crucified. Jesus not only must have fulfilled every specific prophecy, but also every example and type, else He could not have been the Messiah.

Christendom, with few exceptions, observes "Good Friday" as the day Jesus Christ was crucified. A few believe that Jesus was crucified on Thursday, and a few more hold to the opinion that He was crucified on Wednesday. The term itself, "Good Friday," is a mispronunciation of Gott Friday, German for "God's Friday."

That Jesus Christ was crucified on the Day of Preparation is without controversy (Matt. 27:62; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54; John 19:14,31,42).

The Day of Preparation, according to the Scriptures, and as verified by Josephus, always fell on the fourteenth day of Nisan. This was the day in which the lamb was killed for Passover. The sins of those who were to eat the Passover were placed on the lamb, and then the lamb died, symbolically, for their sins. John the Baptist pointed to Jesus and declared, "Behold the Lamb of God!" (John 1:36). Therefore, the Lamb who was to take away the sins of the world must be sacrificed on the Day of Preparation, else He would not have fulfilled all the prophecies identifying Him as the Messiah. Jesus must fulfill every prophecy relating to His first coming: to be born of a virgin, to be born in Bethlehem, to open the eyes of the blind, to make the deaf to hear, to make the lame leap as a deer, to be betrayed for 30 pieces of silver, to be beaten, to be cut off from the land of the living for others sins, and dozens of other things foretold about Him by the prophets. Inasmuch as He came in "the fulness of the time" (Gal. 4:4), even the day and the hour He would be nailed to the cross and then raised from the grave was important.

The primary reason that the vast majority of Christendom accepts Friday as the day of crucifixion is that Jesus was crucified not only on the Day of Preparation, but also on the "day before the Sabbath." A Jewish Sabbath referred not only to the last day of the week (Saturday), but also to certain holy days, or feast days. He was laid in the tomb minutes before the High Sabbath, not the regular Saturday Sabbath.

We read in John 19:31-33: "The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was a high day) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away. Then came the soldiers, and brake the legs of the first, and of the other which was cruficied with him. But when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they brake not his legs."

Jesus was laid in the tomb minutes before the beginning of the High Sabbath, 6:00 P.M., the twelfth Hebrew hour, and Thursday began a few minutes later (see Companion Bible and Dake's Reference Bible).

If, as the majority of Christendom believes, Jesus was crucified on Friday, then His body would have lain in the tomb only 24 to 26 hours - one night and one day, even though the time frame may be stretched to one whole day and a few minutes of the other two days. Jesus said of the time His body would be in the tomb: "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" (Matt. 12:40).

It is evident from the Book of Esther, the Book of Jonah, and other scriptures, when the time period is given as one day and one night, 24 hours is meant. Two Days and two nights means 48 hours; three days and three nights means 72 hours.

When Jesus was informed that Lazarus was sick unto death, He delayed going to Bethany until after Lazazrus had been in the tomb three days, and part of the fourth day (John 11:17). Martha protested it was much too late to help because her brother's body was already stinking. It was an accepted Jewish tradition that a person not be legally declared dead until three days had passed. Jesus proved to the Jews that He did indeed raise to life a person legally dead.

"It was the Jewish belief at that time that when a person died his spirit remained within his body for three days ... Jesus had to be in the tomb for three days, not only to fulfill His own prophecy concerning Himself, but to keep Jews ... from claiming that He had not really been dead" (Robert Faid, A Scientific Approach to Biblical Mysteries, p. 70).

The chief priests and Pharisees understood that Jesus meant He would be in the tomb for three full days, 72 hours, or else their conversation with Pilate in Matthew 27:62-66 makes no sense at all. It seems conclusive to this writer that Jesus Christ was crucified on Wednesday, Nisan 14. His body placed in the tomb just before the twelfth Hebrew hour (6:00 P.M.), and He arose from the rgave just after the twelfth hour on Saturday, or the first Hebrew hour on Sunday, the first day of the week.

The Lord's Passover was foretold to be Nisan 14, from sunset on Tuesday to sunset on Wednesday (according to our calendar). The sheaf of first fruits, according to Leviticus 23:10-11, was to be waved before the Lord on the day after the regular Sabbath following Passover. Jesus Christ did indeed rise from the grave on the first day of the week following the regular Sabbath (Matt. 28:1-8), the first fruits of the resurrection (1 Cor. 15:23).

While we believe it is important that Jesus' body did lie in the grave three days and three nights, infinitely more important is that we believe that He did need to die for our sins and that He did indeed rise from the grave for our justification. Because unless the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ occurred as Scripture declares, then "we are of all men most miserable" (1 Cor. 15:19).

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That is all.....

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Posts: 3434 | From: USA, MICHIGAN | Registered: Mar 2004

Is this what you believe wildb?
With my life. Next!

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That is all.....

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Carol Swenson
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Scripture says He rose early in the morning on the first day of the week. Monday is the second day of the week.
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oneinchrist
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Hi Barry,
I doubt that the Friday-Sunday thing what done in an effort to remain true to the actual death and resurrection of Jesus. Could you see the government giving us two paid Holidays(or two off days) for Easter?

Barry, I am convinced by your posts that the time frame between the death of resurrection of Jesus spanned over 2 days (which the Friday-Sunday thing does not do)
IF Jesus' death and burial was on Friday......I believe that His resurrection would actually have been Monday sometime in the morning.......that would span the 3 nights then...Friday,Saturday, and Sunday. About whether or not it was an exact 72 hours.......not completely convinced of that yet.

With love in Christ, Daniel

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Carol Swenson
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quote:
Originally posted by barrykind:


SATURDAY
Nisan 10th

John 12:12,13--"On the next day much people that were come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, Took branches of palm trees, and went forth to meet him, and cried, Hosanna..."


According to you, "much people" broke the Sabbath by cutting palm branches. And the Lord broke the Sabbath by riding an animal.
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Carol Swenson
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quote:
Originally posted by Carol Swenson:
Three days and nights does not mean 72 hours. If He was entombed BEFORE SUNDOWN, then 72 hours later He would have risen BEFORE SUNDOWN.

But the Greek term used in Mark 16:9 specifically states Jesus rose at dawn.

He was NOT entombed at dawn, so the 72 hour theory simply does not work.

This hasn't been answered yet either.
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