Date of the Resurrection

From what I could come up with the following is a sequence of the events:

Monday; Nissan 12: Preparation of room for the Passover
Tuesday; Nissan 13
Wednesday; Nissan 14: Crucifixion; Jesus died about the 9th hour (3:00pm) and had to be buried before the beginning of Passover at sunset
Thursday; Nissan 15: High Holy Sabbath Day; Passover
Friday; Nissan 16,
Saturday; Nissan 17: Christ rose
Sunday; Nissan 18: Women at the grave early in the morning; Christ was already risen. It was the weekly Sabbath.

The month of Nissan is the first month of the Jewish calendar and is 30 days in length. It corresponds with our months of March-April. So we are not that far off! The only thing different would be that churches celebrate Good Friday through Sunday and that is not a full 72 hours but following the Jewish calendar from sunset of Nissan 14 to sunset of Nissan 17 - we get a full 72 hours.

The date that Jesus rose was on the feast of firstfruits. He was the firstfruits of the resurrection from the dead.

1Co 15:20 But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.

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People speak about Christ being the passover lamb and rightfully so. But the truth is we remember his death through communion. Jesus himself set that up. Really it is communion that corresponds to Passover.

Concerning his resurrection , He was risen on another of the feast days which was the feast of first fruits. if we want to connect Resurrection Sunday with one of the biblical holidays , it is feast of firstfruits , not passover.

The Holy Spirit descended on Pentecost which was known as Shavuot in Hebrew . Another feast day. this time the one where the law was given at Sinai. The law was now written upon our hearts by the Holy Spirit


Christmas , celebrated as Christ's birth , if done accurately would be set in the fall, The High Holidays on the Jewish calendar. There were three holiday seasons on the biblical holiday calendar. The spring harvest with the feast of unleavened bread , passover and the feast of first fruits. Clearly these all pertain to the crucifixtion and the resurrection. The first harvest was Jesus risen.


The second harvest , Pentecost pertains to the giving of the law and the Holy Spirit and the second harvest of souls. this time spiritual.

The third harvest season is in the fall. The feast of trumpets , followed by ten days of repentance and then the day of atonement. That is followed by the festival of booths, Sukkot.

Books have literally been written about each of these. The thing that is clear is that shadows and types are present and God saw to it that these events occured at the right time.

If we do concern ourselves with dates . It is the feast of firstfruits that was fulfilled by the resurrection , not passover. Passover is about death. Passover is not the only type that Jesus fulfilled.

patience7 said:

From what I could come up with the following is a sequence of the events:

Monday; Nissan 12: Preparation of room for the Passover
Tuesday; Nissan 13
Wednesday; Nissan 14: Crucifixion; Jesus died about the 9th hour (3:00pm) and had to be buried before the beginning of Passover at sunset
Thursday; Nissan 15: High Holy Sabbath Day; Passover
Friday; Nissan 16,
Saturday; Nissan 17: Christ rose
Sunday; Nissan 18: Women at the grave early in the morning; Christ was already risen. It was the weekly Sabbath.
The month of Nissan is the first month of the Jewish calendar and is 30 days in length. It corresponds with our months of March-April. So we are not that far off! The only thing different would be that churches celebrate Good Friday through Sunday and that is not a full 72 hours but following the Jewish calendar from sunset of Nissan 14 to sunset of Nissan 17 - we get a full 72 hours.

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This is important, and very accurate info folks!

SpiritPsalmist said:

The actual date of the resurrection of Jesus was the Hebrew calender date, Nissan 18 (Passover begins at sundown on Nissan 15). Why do we not celebrate His resurrection on that date?

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The reason we don't is because the calendar date is not the important part of it. Some of the feasts were specified by calendar date, and others were specified by day of the week.

For example, as you point out Passover is Nissan 15. That can be any day of the week but its always on Nissan 15. Following Passover, there is the feast of unleavened bread (passover usually gets kind of rolled into it and counted as part of it). The feast of unleavened bread lasts 7 days which means that there is always one weekly sabbath during the feast of unleavened bread.

The day following that weekly sabbath (ie sunday) is the feast of first fruits. Thus the feast of first fruits is not fixed to a calendar date, but rather the day of the week (sunday).

Then the feast of weeks, or shavout, what most know as pentecost, is 7 weeks from first fruits, and thus it is also not fixed to a calendar date, but instead is always fixed on a sunday.

Both First Fruits and Shavout are technically 'first fruits' feasts, they both mark the beginning of a harvest. First Fruits was the barley harvest and Shavout was the wheat harvest.

So, in the year that Jesus was crucified (33 AD in my opinion) Passover was on Friday, Unleavened bread began on Saturday (the High sabbath, or great sabbath because it was a sabbath in a feast) and first fruits was on sunday.

Thus Jesus was crucified on passover, was in the tomb for unleavened bread, and rose on first fruits.

This symbolicly fortold the sacrifice of the lamb (passover) the fact that he did not see corruption in the grace (unleavend bread) and that he is the first fruits of the resurrection (first fruits).

The feast of weeks/Shavout, also is a good demonstration of another thing that trips people up. To most Shavout is better known as pentecost. It was called pentecost (even at the time of Christ) because pentecost means "50 days".
But shavout is called the feast of weeks because it was celebrated 7 weeks after First fruits. 7 weeks is how many days? to our reckoning 7 weeks is 49 days, because we count exclusively. In other words, we would say for example that 7 days from today is saturday, but we don't include that saturday itself in the count. The Jewish OT calendar counted days inclusively so in that reckoning from today (saturday) to next saturday would be 8 days because the whole day of saturday is included, not just counting up to the beginning of saturday.

Thus in the Jewish reckoning 7 weeks from sunday to sunday was not 49 days, it was 50 days because the last sunday was included.

This same difference of counting sometimes messes up modern people when they count the days of Jesus in the tomb. Jesus went into the tomb on friday and came out on sunday, which means that all three days are counted, He was in the tomb, friday, saturday and sunday.

If you say 3 days to the our way of thinking we would think of it stretching out to monday. Which is why some people try to argue that Jesus wasn't crucified on Friday etc.

So anyway.. the reason we don't fix the resurrection to a calendar date is because its the day of the week that is important not the day of the month. This was true of the feast on which the resurrection occured and which forshadowed it, First Fruits.

Technically, originally, Passover was on Nisan 14 and unleavened bread began on Nisan 15, but as I mentioned earlier, passover and unleavened bread have essentially been amalgamated into one feast and it begins on Nisan 15

This actually also is a source of confusion regarding the gospel accounts, because Jesus appears to eat the passover with his disciples (the last supper) on the day before the passover. What is actually going on is that the passover celebration was held on two days due to the number of lambs that had to be sacrificed in the temple.

Because the passover lamb was a sacrifice, it had to be slain in the temple by the priests by law. Sacrifices are not permitted to be offered outside the temple. This meant that every Jewish family that was going to celebrate the passover had to bring their lamb to the temple to have it sacrificially slain. Of course not every family had a lamb, somtimes poorer familes etc, would get together and have one lamb between them.

Even so, conservative estimates are that well over 100,000 lambs were offered in the temple during passover's at the time of Christ. It simple was not possible to sacrifice all of the lambs in one day. As a result the feast was celebrated on two days with the people from the north (or other countries) bringing their lambs on the day before and celebrating passover on the day before, and the people from Judea bringing their lambs on the day of the passover and eating the meal that day.

So Jesus and his disciples ate the last supper on thursday, he was crucified on friday and rose on sunday.

As an interesting note, traditional observant Jews do not eat lamb at passover to this day because the lamb is a sacrifice and it can not be offered without the temple. To do so would be a violation of the law. That is why most passover seder's have a lamb bone which represents or brings the lamb to rememberance.

Yitzchak said:

The date that Jesus rose was on the feast of firstfruits. He was the firstfruits of the resurrection from the dead.





People speak about Christ being the passover lamb and rightfully so. But the truth is we remember his death through communion. Jesus himself set that up. Really it is communion that corresponds to Passover.
...

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SpiritPsalmist said:

The atonement for sin is not the "only" sacrifice. There were sacrifices for sin (of which Jesus fulfilled) and there were sacrifices of praise, just to name a couple. All of them may be found in the first five books of the Bible.

As I said in several posts here, I'm not really interested in the date that it actually happened, although, I think it would be cool to celebrate on the actual anniversary. I disagree with your conclusions about how Easter and Christmas evolved but have found that many believers don't really seem to care where our traditions came from they just like the tradition. Even if it may be offensive to God Himself.

Bottom line though: Jesus is risen!

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After having done a lot of research on Easter and Christmas, I can tell you with relative certainty that the majority of the stuff floating around out there on these topics is simply people's guess work.

The dating of easter is pretty well established because it was observed right from the beginning. Though I should note that pretty much only the English speaking world refers to it as Easter (thats a name deriving from old English) The rest of the Christian world refers to it as Pascha or some variation on that.

When it comes to Christmas, 99% of what people say about it is pure guess work. Worse than that, most of it is also motivated by a specific agenda. In other words, people are making stuff to fit with what they want to believe regardless of if there is good reason or not.

What we know for sure from the Historical record is this.
The earliest Christians don't appear to have celebrated Christmas (ie a birth feast for Jesus) It began to be observed popularly in the 2nd century AD, but there was no clear consensus on when it should be celebrated.

In the early third century (around 202 - 210 AD if memory serves) a couple of Christian writers wrote about the probable dates for Christ's birth and they predominantly based their speculation of the fact that the Christian commemorated the feast of the annunciation (the Angel visiting Mary and the conception of Jesus) on March 25. Nine months from March 25th is December 25th so that was put forward as a likely date for Jesus birth (along with some other dates, pretty much all on the 25th or 24th of given months).

It is alleged by many people that Christmas was fixed on Dec. 25th because this was the pagan feast day celebrating the birth of Mithra/Sol Invictus. However, there is actually no historical evidence that shows that the feast of Sol Invictus on Dec. 25th even existed before the Christian celebration of Christmas on Dec. 25th.

In fact, the cult of Sol Invictus was estalbished in Rome in around 274 AD by emperor Aurelian. This was around 70 years AFTER Christians had already begun using Dec 25th for Christmas. Further, according to what we know, most of Sol Invictus' original feasts were in August, with one on Dec 11th.
There is no mention of Sol Invictus birth on Dec 25th until at the earliest 354 AD and possibly not until Emperor Julian the Apostate even later.

The reference in 354 AD is on a calendar that just says "Dec 25th,festival of the birth of the unconquered."

Sol Invictus means "unconquered sun" so some people assume that "birth of the unconquered" refers to Sol Invictus. However, it is possible that it could actually refer to Jesus.

Julian the Apostate was an emperor who tried to return Rome to paganism after it had become mostly Christian. It is not only possible, but the best evidence available suggests it is probably likely that Julian actually put the feast of Sol Invictus on Dec. 25th to try and combat and co-opt the celebration of Christmas, and not the other way around.


Now, moving on to what you said about sacrifices.

Communion is actually a sacrifice. In the Old Testament one of the sacrifices offered in the temple was the Todah offering, or the "thank offering" it was a sacrifice of bread in thanksgiving.

It was fortold in the Rabbinical tradition that when the messiah came all the sacrifices would cease except the Todah sacrifice of bread. That is exactly what happened. We continue to offer the todah sacrifice every time we celebrate communion. We offer up the bread of heaven in thanks.

Communion is also forshadowed in the Showbread of the temple. Though it is often called "showbread" what the original language actually means is "bread of the presense". This is particularly meaningful when understood in light of communion given the understanding of the 'real presense' of Christ in the communion elements which the early Church universally believed.
Also the bread of the presense was to be laid out weekly as a memorial, exactly as Jesus instituted communion as a memorial.

Yitzchak said:

Christmas , celebrated as Christ's birth , if done accurately would be set in the fall, The High Holidays on the Jewish calendar.

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I think if these events were held at the date given in the bible it would be a mighty witness to Jewish people.

Simon_Templar said:

The reason we don't is because the calendar date is not the important part of it. Some of the feasts were specified by calendar date, and others were specified by day of the week.

For example, as you point out Passover is Nissan 15. That can be any day of the week but its always on Nissan 15. Following Passover, there is the feast of unleavened bread (passover usually gets kind of rolled into it and counted as part of it). The feast of unleavened bread lasts 7 days which means that there is always one weekly sabbath during the feast of unleavened bread.

The day following that weekly sabbath (ie sunday) is the feast of first fruits. Thus the feast of first fruits is not fixed to a calendar date, but rather the day of the week (sunday).

Then the feast of weeks, or shavout, what most know as pentecost, is 7 weeks from first fruits, and thus it is also not fixed to a calendar date, but instead is always fixed on a sunday.

Both First Fruits and Shavout are technically 'first fruits' feasts, they both mark the beginning of a harvest. First Fruits was the barley harvest and Shavout was the wheat harvest.

So, in the year that Jesus was crucified (33 AD in my opinion) Passover was on Friday, Unleavened bread began on Saturday (the High sabbath, or great sabbath because it was a sabbath in a feast) and first fruits was on sunday.

Thus Jesus was crucified on passover, was in the tomb for unleavened bread, and rose on first fruits.

This symbolicly fortold the sacrifice of the lamb (passover) the fact that he did not see corruption in the grace (unleavend bread) and that he is the first fruits of the resurrection (first fruits).

The feast of weeks/Shavout, also is a good demonstration of another thing that trips people up. To most Shavout is better known as pentecost. It was called pentecost (even at the time of Christ) because pentecost means "50 days".
But shavout is called the feast of weeks because it was celebrated 7 weeks after First fruits. 7 weeks is how many days? to our reckoning 7 weeks is 49 days, because we count exclusively. In other words, we would say for example that 7 days from today is saturday, but we don't include that saturday itself in the count. The Jewish OT calendar counted days inclusively so in that reckoning from today (saturday) to next saturday would be 8 days because the whole day of saturday is included, not just counting up to the beginning of saturday.

Thus in the Jewish reckoning 7 weeks from sunday to sunday was not 49 days, it was 50 days because the last sunday was included.

This same difference of counting sometimes messes up modern people when they count the days of Jesus in the tomb. Jesus went into the tomb on friday and came out on sunday, which means that all three days are counted, He was in the tomb, friday, saturday and sunday.

If you say 3 days to the our way of thinking we would think of it stretching out to monday. Which is why some people try to argue that Jesus wasn't crucified on Friday etc.

So anyway.. the reason we don't fix the resurrection to a calendar date is because its the day of the week that is important not the day of the month. This was true of the feast on which the resurrection occured and which forshadowed it, First Fruits.

Technically, originally, Passover was on Nisan 14 and unleavened bread began on Nisan 15, but as I mentioned earlier, passover and unleavened bread have essentially been amalgamated into one feast and it begins on Nisan 15

This actually also is a source of confusion regarding the gospel accounts, because Jesus appears to eat the passover with his disciples (the last supper) on the day before the passover. What is actually going on is that the passover celebration was held on two days due to the number of lambs that had to be sacrificed in the temple.

Because the passover lamb was a sacrifice, it had to be slain in the temple by the priests by law. Sacrifices are not permitted to be offered outside the temple. This meant that every Jewish family that was going to celebrate the passover had to bring their lamb to the temple to have it sacrificially slain. Of course not every family had a lamb, somtimes poorer familes etc, would get together and have one lamb between them.

Even so, conservative estimates are that well over 100,000 lambs were offered in the temple during passover's at the time of Christ. It simple was not possible to sacrifice all of the lambs in one day. As a result the feast was celebrated on two days with the people from the north (or other countries) bringing their lambs on the day before and celebrating passover on the day before, and the people from Judea bringing their lambs on the day of the passover and eating the meal that day.

So Jesus and his disciples ate the last supper on thursday, he was crucified on friday and rose on sunday.

As an interesting note, traditional observant Jews do not eat lamb at passover to this day because the lamb is a sacrifice and it can not be offered without the temple. To do so would be a violation of the law. That is why most passover seder's have a lamb bone which represents or brings the lamb to rememberance.

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Meaning to offence to anyone - I just have to say: Friday to Sunday is not three days and three nights. I think this "bugs" me more than the date that is celebrated. (lol)

The math is not there! As Jonah was in the belly of the fish 3 days and 3 nights (Jonah 1:17) so was Jesus to be in the heart of the earth for 3 days and 3 nights (Matt. 12:40)

patience7 said:

Meaning to offence to anyone - I just have to say: Friday to Sunday is not three days and three nights. I think this "bugs" me more than the date that is celebrated. (lol)

The math is not there! As Jonah was in the belly of the fish 3 days and 3 nights (Jonah 1:17) so was Jesus to be in the heart of the earth for 3 days and 3 nights (Matt. 12:40)

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But Tuesday Night around 6:00PM to Friday night around 6:00PM = Sabbath evening does. I can count 72 hours in that time frame .

Pilgrimer said:

I have long since wrestled with God over these things and am at peace. I am asking you to defend your comments.

God also said that the atonement sacrifices of bulls and goats would also be "for ever." Leviticus 16:29-30. Are you suggesting that God intends for bulls and goats to again be slain and their blood sprinkled on an altar by a Levitical High Priest to atone for the sins of His people as though the blood of Christ and his ministry as our High Priest is not sufficient?

In Christ,
Pilgrimer

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God said it I didnt, if you have your answer from God why ask me?

patience7 said:

Meaning to offence to anyone - I just have to say: Friday to Sunday is not three days and three nights. I think this "bugs" me more than the date that is celebrated. (lol)

The math is not there! As Jonah was in the belly of the fish 3 days and 3 nights (Jonah 1:17) so was Jesus to be in the heart of the earth for 3 days and 3 nights (Matt. 12:40)

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As I said, the Jewish method of counting time was different. As you point out, many people think that the three days should mean 72 hours, but if you count it inclusively as the Jewish way of reckoning did, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday is three days.

Really, people make all sorts of theories about this, but the details included in the gospels make it pretty much incontravertible that Jesus died on Friday and rose on Sunday morning.

If Jesus had actually been in the tomb for 72 hours, in the ancient Jewish reckoning that would have been 4 days.

The clearest example of this in scripture is the reckoning of weeks. Both the Ancient Jews, and us consider a week to be seven days. However, we think of that seven days as being from sunday to sunday. Thus a week from sunday is the next sunday. In point of fact and in Jewish reckoning that is actually 8 days. Seven days from sunday is saturday. The next sunday is an 8th day. In our way of looking at it, we don't include that sunday in the count however. Its just the way we have come to think of it. But, in they way they viewed it back then, the sunday would have been included so from sunday to sunday is 8 days, not 7 days.

This is why, as I pointed out in my previous post, the feast of weeks, Shavout, which is 7 weeks after First fruits, was reckoned by the Jews to be 50 days from First Fruits, not 49 days, as we would think of it.

lismore said:

I think if these events were held at the date given in the bible it would be a mighty witness to Jewish people.

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I think it would be nice if those who insist upon Resurrection celebrations would emphasize the biblical and spiritual aspects of it.

A lot of what people call worship and fellowship is just people getting together with family and friends to eat food and have fun. One clue that these celebrations are often not God centered is that many church people feel very comfortable to go and celebrate Christmas or Easter with their unsaved family. These unsaved anti God relatives "fellowship" together with these Christians and they seem to have a really good time together in mutual celebration of the holiday.

The reason that store owners get excited about these holidays is it generates sales. I would have more respect for these holiday celebrations if they were done in a spiritual manner. Of course , to people who just want an excuse to party , it makes no difference about the details.

Simon_Templar said:

As I said, the Jewish method of counting time was different. To us 7 weeks is 49 days, but in Jewish reckoning it was 50. As you point out, many people think that the three days should mean 72 hours, but if you count it inclusively as the Jewish way of reckoning did, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday is three days.

Really, people make all sorts of theories about this, but the details included in the gospels make it pretty much incontravertible that Jesus died on Friday and rose on Sunday morning.

If Jesus had actually been in the tomb for 72 hours, in the ancient Jewish reckoning that would have been 4 days.

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I love your posts so much that I hate to say anything contrary. but in this case , I beg to differ. It was three days and three nights.

Mat 12:39 But Jesus replied: You want a sign because you are evil and won't believe! But the only sign you will get is the sign of the prophet Jonah.
Mat 12:40 He was in the stomach of a big fish for three days and nights, just as the Son of Man will be deep in the earth for three days and nights.

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Simon_Templar said:

As I said, the Jewish method of counting time was different. To us 7 weeks is 49 days, but in Jewish reckoning it was 50. As you point out, many people think that the three days should mean 72 hours, but if you count it inclusively as the Jewish way of reckoning did, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday is three days.

Really, people make all sorts of theories about this, but the details included in the gospels make it pretty much incontravertible that Jesus died on Friday and rose on Sunday morning.

If Jesus had actually been in the tomb for 72 hours, in the ancient Jewish reckoning that would have been 4 days.

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Yes - Friday, Saturday, and Sunday is three days but you are forgetting that it included "three nights" and He was already risen before dawn on Sunday.

Jesus rose exactly three days and three nights after His burial (just before sunset; see Matt. 27:46 and Mark 15:34), His resurrection would have been the very end of the weekly Sabbath at sunset. On Friday, the preparation day for the weekly Sabbath, the women prepared spices for His embalming (Luke 23:56) then kept the weekly Sabbath. When they came to the tomb early Sunday morning, He was already risen "as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week"; "very early in the morning the first day of the week. . . at the rising of the sun"; "Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning,". He rose exactly three days and three nights from His interment ( a full 72 hours) at sunset as the weekly Sabbath ended.

I believe the three full days and three nights and you prefer the Friday to Sunday - whatever! - He rose - and that is the "weightier matter"!

patience7 said:

Yes - Friday, Saturday, and Sunday is three days but you are forgetting that it included "three nights" and He was already risen before dawn on Sunday.

Jesus rose exactly three days and three nights after His burial (just before sunset; see Matt. 27:46 and Mark 15:34), His resurrection would have been the very end of the weekly Sabbath at sunset. On Friday, the preparation day for the weekly Sabbath, the women prepared spices for His embalming (Luke 23:56) then kept the weekly Sabbath. When they came to the tomb early Sunday morning, He was already risen "as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week"; "very early in the morning the first day of the week. . . at the rising of the sun"; "Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning,". He rose exactly three days and three nights from His interment ( a full 72 hours) at sunset as the weekly Sabbath ended.

I believe the three full days and three nights and you prefer the Friday to Sunday - whatever! - He rose - and that is the "weightier matter"!

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I'm not intending to beat a dead horse as it were, but I personally find this stuff interesting and I think it helps to clarify things. There doesn't need to be confusion on issues like this because the biblical accounts give enough detail to pretty clearly show what happened and when.

Lets look at what the gospels say. First keep in mind that the Jews had a different system of counting time than the rest of the Roman world. The Jews counted days from evening to evening where as the gentiles counted days from morning to morning. As a result when the gospels speak of hours of the day, some confusion may arise because depending on the audience they were writing to, or their own way of thinking, they may have used either the Jewish reckoning or the Roman reckoning.

In Matthews account of the crucifixion he tells us that as Jesus was on the cross, darkness came over the land at the "6th hour" until the 9th hour, and Jesus died at the "9th hour"

This was a supernatural darkness that covered the land for three hours while Jesus was on the cross.

Matthew further tells us that in the evening Joseph of Arimathea retrieved Jesus body and put it in the tomb (27:57)

Matthew then reports that the next day, which he identifies as the day after "the day of preperation". The chief priests went to Pilate to ask him to put a guard on the tomb. This poses a question because there are actually two days of preperation that this could be referring to. We know that this is occuring at the time of the feast of unleavened bread and there was a day of preperation for the feast of unleavend bread during which the house had to be cleaned and all leaven removed.
But there was also a day of preperation for the weekly sabbath (ie friday) so which one is matthew referring to?

Matthew 28 begins the account of the resurrection and he states that the women came to the tomb after the sabbath at dawn on the first day of the week. Further he tells us that there was an earthquake and the tomb was opened at that time (dawn on the first day of the week).


In Marks gospel...

in 15:6 we are told that Pilate had the custom of releasing a prisoner to the people "on the feast" (the feast being passover). Usually the people would ask for a political prisoner.. someone who had been imprisoned for opposing the Romans etc. Not an actual Criminal.
So Pilate used that custom to try and release Jesus. He offered up Jesus and Barabbas who was a criminal. It is a very interesting note that the name Barabbas literally means "son of the father". This scene is reminiscent of the sacrifice on the day of atonement when two sheep are brought into the temple, the sacrifical lamb, and the scape goat. The scape goat was let go outside the camp and the sacrifical lamb was of course offered up to God. Here we see two 'sons of the father' Jesus and Barabbas, one of them sinless who was offered up, and the other a sinner who was let go.

This also implies, however, that Jesus' trial is taking place on the Passover because pilate invoked his custom of releasing a prisoner on the feast.

Mark then tells us that Jesus was put on the cross at the 3rd hour, and he agrees with Matthew that darkness came over the land at the 6th hour until the 9th hour and Jesus died at the 9th hour. The exact same time description that Matthew used.

Then Mark tells us that Joseph of Arimathea collected the body at evening (just as Matthew said) but he adds the statement "since it was the day of Preparation, that is, the day before the Sabbath".

Remember in Matthew we saw that he mentioned the priests coming to Pilate to ask for a guard on the tomb on the day after the day of preperation, but we weren't sure which day of preperation he was talking about. Mark tells us unequivocally that they day of preperation was the day of preperation for the weekly sabbath. In other words, it was Friday.

Mark's account of the resurrection, again agrees with Matthew's, however it does add a bit of detail. Matthew just said that the women came and the tomb was opened around dawn.

Mark specifically states that the women went to the tomb "when the sun had risen".
Matthew's description mentions the women coming, but it also mentions that there was an earthquake, an angel came and rolled away the stone, and the Roman guards were either rendered unconscious or struck with terror so that they 'became like dead men'.

Mark fleshes out some of the detail showing that the women arrived after sunrise, but they found the stone already rolled away.

Thus it seems that the earthquake and the angel rolling away the stone happened at sunrise, and the women arrived shortly there after.

Luke's account and his time descriptions agree with Mark and Matthews. He mentions the same darkness at the 6th and 9th hours. He mentions Joseph of Arimathea coming to bury the body and that it was the day of preperation. He, however, adds the detail that "the sabbath was beginning" so they hurried to get him in the tomb and didn't fully prepare the body. Then he says...
"On the Sabbath they rested according to the commandment"

This provides further confirmation that this was the weekly sabbath, so the day of preperation was friday and the sabbath was saturday.

Luke agrees with Mark and Matthew saying that the women came to the tomb on the first day of the week 'at early dawn'.

Lastly we have the gospel of John.

John's gospel account agrees with the others, but there is one apparently contradiction. John says that Jesus was still before Pilate at the 6th hour. All the others say Jesus was on the cross and that the darkness began at the 6th hour.

The confusion here is because of the variable ways that time was reckoned. Jews usually reckoned 12 hours of day and 12 hours of night. The 6th hour of the day was around noon.

The romans had a couple different ways of doing it. They did sometimes use hours of the day and hours of the night as the Jews did and in this way 6th hour would be noon just as among the Jews, but they also reckoned the day beginning at midnight, the system we use to this day. This was the official reckoning, thus the sixth hour of the day in this view was around 6 AM or sunrise.

John mentions several times that Jesus was on the cross during the day of preperation and he also tells us that the sabbath was a high sabbath. This meant that it was a sabbath that occured on a feast day, in this case the feast of unleavened bread.

John's account of the resurrection says that the women came to the tomb early on the first day "while it was still dark". Some people have tried to argue from this that it happened actually on saturday night (since Jewish days begin at sundown).
However, this does not contradict what the other gospels all say, that it happened at sunrise, at dawn. If you've ever been outside at dawn when the sun rises, it is still dark. Its twilight.

So.. if we piece all this together, we find out that Jesus' trial before Pilate was coming to an end at about 6 AM on the day before the sabbath (Friday), he was put on the cross at about 9 AM on Friday. At noon on Friday the supernatural darkness covered the land and at about 3 PM on Friday, Jesus died. His body was collected and put in the tomb just before sundown on Friday, probably around 6 PM.

On saturday the priests when to Pilate to get the guards assigned to the tomb.

Early in the morning on Sunday, at dawn, the tomb was opened and an earthquake occured, very shortly after dawn, the women arrived at the tomb and met the angel and Jesus.

Looking at the question of three days and three nights, consider this. It was fortold that Jesus would be in the tomb three days and three nights, BUT it was also fortold that he would arise on the third day.

How is that possible? If he arises on the third day, he can't be in the tomb on the third night.
Thus if you take the literal understanding of three days and three nights, then the prophecies themselves and Jesus own words conflict with each other.

If you are going to be in the tomb three days and three nights, then by definition you have to rise on the fourth day, not the third day. Unless you count any portion of a day as a full day. Which is what the Jews did.

This actually occurs several places in scripture where it says something went on for three days and nights, and then on the third day it ended.

Talmud Pesach 4a states that any part of a day is considered as a whole day. This is specifically written in regard to periods of mourning the dead. Thus it was Jewish practice to count even only a small part of a day as a whole day (including the night).

The key to understanding it is given in John

Joh 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.

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What was a high day ? One of the seven annual Sabbaths commanded In Leviticus. These are distinct from the weekly Sabbath. The account in john makes it plain. This was not the normal weekly sabbath. This was the holiday sabbath. The extra sabbath day that occured during passover week.

Also if you look at the literal translations , the plural in the Greek is reflected. The word Sabbath is actually Sabbaths. Matthew 28:1 is one example of this. There were two sabbaths.


Another clue is given here. This is a contradiction. They rested and obeyed sabbath and yet prepared spices. Unless there were two Sabbaths. and the day in between the two is when they did the work.

Luk 23:56 And they returned, and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the sabbath day according to the commandment.

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Yitzchak said:

The key to understanding it is given in John




What was a high day ? One of the seven annual Sabbaths commanded In Leviticus. These are distinct from the weekly Sabbath. The account in john makes it plain. This was not the normal weekly sabbath. This was the holiday sabbath. The extra sabbath day that occured during passover week.

Also if you look at the literal translations , the plural in the Greek is reflected. The word Sabbath is actually Sabbaths. Matthew 28:1 is one example of this. There were two sabbaths.


Another clue is given here. This is a contradiction. They rested and obeyed sabbath and yet prepared spices. Unless there were two Sabbaths. and the day in between the two is when they did the work.

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Actually, the idea that the feast days were referred to as High Sabbaths is a later invention, ironicaly from Christian sources. The term high sabbath is never used in the Torah and it is not recognized by Jews even down to this day as referring to the 7 feast days.

When John says "that sabbath was a high day" it is unclear what exactly that means. Although the original source is not known, the idea of "high sabbath" referring to one of the seven feast days is unique to Christian groups and it probably originated from English translations of the bible.

In actualy Jewish tradition, the closes thing to "high sabbath" are the "great sabbaths" which precede the seven feasts (note not the feasts themselves) Specifically Sabbath Hagadol which is the weekly sabbath preceeding Passover.

However, it is unlikely that John is referring to a great sabbath or Sabbath Hagadol because it doesn't fit with the rest of the time line described.

When thinking about this keep in mind that John was writing his gospel to a Greek audience. It was written probably in Ephasus and it was the last of the gospels to be written. Many of John's intended readers would not have been familiar with Jewish custom and tradition. This is why through out John's gospel you will find brief translations and explanations whenever he refers to something that is uniquely Jewish custom or tradition. This is also why John alone of the gospels uses Roman time in his description rather than Jewish time.

I believe that this statement "that sabbath was a high day" is the same kind of thing. John is explaining to his Greek audience that the day was the weekly sabbath, but it was also a feast day. So it was both the sabbath, and also a high day.

There is no 100% clear explanation of what exactly John meant because, despite claims to the contrary, the phrase he uses is not a traditional Jewish description of any feast day, it is not a known Jewish idiom etc.

Given that fact, I think it is best understood in the context of John giving a brief note to his Greek readers indicating that the sabbath in question was also a 'high day', which they would have understood to mean a holy feast day.

"so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth." Matthew 12:40 No matter how you look at it Friday to Sunday is not a 72 hr period. Friday - Friday night = 24 hrs; Saturday -
Saturday night = 24 hrs; not there Sunday. That is only 48 hrs and that is stretching it.

John 11:19a "Are there not twelve hours in the day?"
Genesis 1:5, 8, 13 "God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day. . . So the evening and the morning were the second day. . . .So the evening and the morning were the third day, etc."

What about Jonah? Was he in the great fish's belly for a complete 72 hrs? Bullinger's Companion Bible for Jonah 1:17 reads: "Three days and three nights. The Hebrew idiom 'three days' can be used for parts of three days (and even years): but not when the word 'nights' is added. By the addition of "nights," the expression becomes more specific, precluding the idea of "parts" of days.

Jesus said He would rise "the third day"; "in three days"; "after three days". (Mark 9:31; 10:33-34; Matt. 17:22-23; 20:18-19; Luke 9:22; John 2:19-21; Mark 8:31; Matt. 27:63)

Matthew, Mark and Luke are very specific about when Jesus died. John records only the time of the crucifixion (John 19:14-16). Luke gives us the clearer picture of the time frame.
Luke 23:44-46 And it was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour.
This indicates that Jesus was crucified around noon and died about 3pm.
Since evening was beginning - Joseph had only about three hours before sunset, when the Sabbath would begin and the task required for burial work was expressly forbidden on the Sabbath. (Exodus 20:8-10) Also, Deuteronomy 21:22-23 demands that an executed criminal be buried before nightfall, and the Jewish law of the time required all dead bodies to be buried before a Sabbath or a feast day. Joseph Aramathea then had to get permission to take the body down, wrap it in linen and place it in the tomb. Joseph and Nicodemus must have had very little daylight left when they finally rolled the stone over the entrance to the tomb - "sunset was very near (Matt. 27:57; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54; John 19:31). Jesus was laid "in the heart of the earth" at sunset - He was buried for exactly 72 hours, He was also resurrected at sunset.

Jesus was tried, convicted, crucified and buried on a preparation day before the annual High Holy Sabbath (Passover and the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread). (John 19:31)

Mark 16:1 "Now when the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Salome bought spices, that they might come and anoint him." Since Joseph and Nicodemus barely had time to bury Jesus before sundown, how much less time would the women have had to do all that they needed to do. So the harmonized accounts show that when Joseph took Jesus down from the cross, the women followed him to see where he would place the body. They then returned to their houses and observed (day of rest) the annual high holy day Sabbath, the first day of Unleavened Bread. The day after the holy day, they had to gather together the spices and oil, gone back to their houses to prepare them for use on the body and they rested on the weekly Sabbath according to the commandment. They rested twice: once on "a high day" and once on the weekly Sabbath two days later. There were two Sabbaths within that 72 hour period.

Jesus was crucified and buried on a Wednesday, the annual high holy day fell on Thursday, the women prepared spices on Friday and our Saviour was resurrected at sunset on the Sabbath as the day ended.

I agree, Simon, it is very interesting!