the day of preparation...of the Passover...of Shabbat...or BOTH in this case...yes Friday the 14th. I don't know why you keep pushing the chagigah. How does the prophecy of no bone to be broken and fulfillment in the NT narrative relate? It was a festival offering...Chag. IF He died on the 15th, why did they make an issue of His bones not being broken? Paul and John relate this too. “For these things were done that the scripture should be fulfilled, ‘Not one of His bones shall be broken’” ( John 19:36 ). You still have not answered any of my questions. How does your theory fulfill ANY prophetic scripture of the 14th, 15th or the 16th? Pesakh was the passing over of death to life.
You pointed it out yourself. “For these things were done that the scripture should be fulfilled, ‘Not one of His bones shall be broken’” ( John 19:36 ) I've often mused about the fact that given a conspicuous opportunity to point out a parallel between Jesus and the passover, John ignored the similarity altogether and pointed instead to a scripture of prophecy.
Psalm 34:20 — He keepeth all his bones: not one of them is broken.
Prophecy fulfilled.
I "keep pushing the chagigah" because if a person is objective about the scriptures, there is an obvious contradiction that needs to be resolved. The Synoptic gospels say that Jesus ate the passover at the last supper, which necessarily means that the last supper was on the 14th. But John relates how the priests were trying to avoid defilement, because they wanted to eat the passover, which also indicates that the day of the crucifixion was the 14th. Both can't be true.
That leaves only four explanations. Either the Synoptics are correct and John is wrong, John is correct and the Synoptics are wrong, either of which leaves us with a contradiction (which I reject), else the Synoptics somehow harmonize with John, or John somehow harmonizes with the Synoptics.
As for the Synoptics harmonizing with John, it is simply impossible. The afternoon preceding the last supper was the first day of unleavened bread, when the passover was slain. There is no way to interpret that differently than that it was the 14th. I've thought of every scenario I can, had these arguments with people like you to see what sort of things they would come with ... it's just not possible. There is no way to conclude anything other than a 14th last supper in the Synoptics. It can't be done.
So if the first two options result in a contradiction, which I do not accept, and the third option is impossible, that only leaves the option of harmonizing John with the Synoptics. And this is very easily done. John makes only three suspect statements, and all three have viable answers that cause his gospel to harmonize with the other three rather than contradict them.
Ergo, in the interest of gospel harmony, the priests were desiring to eat the chagigah, also called the passover.
All other solutions leave us with a contradiction.
As a matter of hermeneutics, we know from all three of the other gospels that Jesus was crucified on the day of preparation. From all four gospels, we know that he was crucified during the passover holiday. And from the Synoptics, we know that he ate the passover at the last supper.
Therefore, the "preparation of the passover" is not a term synonymous with the
eve of the passover. Nor does it say that it was the preparation
for the passover. It was simply the day of preparation during passover, or Friday of passover week.
Any reasonable person can see the correlation. There are, in fact, a number of study Bibles available on the market that give this very same interpretation.
Concerning your questions of fulfilled prophecy ... you seem to be under the impression that everything had to happen in a specific way, that Jesus had to somehow mimic the rituals to the letter. And I have only this to say about it: They didn't put a piece of Jesus in a sheaf and wave him around on Sunday. They didn't roast him on Friday. His blood wasn't drained into a bowl and poured on the altar. He wasn't killed in the temple.
That he died so death would pass us over is fulfillment enough. If you insist that the ritualistic processes had to be carried out to the letter, then I declare to you that Jesus didn't fulfill his passover duty at all. There are simply too many aspects of the passover ritual that Jesus didn't fulfill according to the ritualistic specifics.
Nevertheless, I've said this before, and I'll say it again ... theology does not dictate chronology. Relative to chronology, it doesn't matter what spiritual purposes Jesus was meant to serve. The gospels still say that he died on the 15th. And
that is the part
you are refusing to see.