November 13

The chronology of the “Final Week.”

Sorry to become technical for a day but we have a controversy before us. I am not much of a traditionalist but on the chronology of the final week I am, and here is my reasoning:

1. I have no problem with a day of inactivity. Knowing his upcoming trial and death was imminent, Jesus used Wednesday to strengthen and prepare himself.

2. The most critical issue for those who see a Wednesday Passover and Thursday crucifixion is the phrase “three days and three nights.” LaGard Smith suggests that this must be a “full” 24 hours and therefore is required to have a Thursday afternoon death of Jesus. A traditional Friday crucifixion would not leave 72 hours. You could probably come out with 36-38 hours but that certainly does not equal three “full” days and three “full” nights of 72 hours. But this word “full” has both a western and eastern connotation. In eastern thought this expression could be used to allow the full day and night to be counted when just a part of that time was included.

For example, in 1 Samuel 30:12 we see the same formula "three days and three nights" used by the Egyptian, whom David found as he was pursuing the Amalekites. The Egyptian turned out to be a slave who was abandoned when he became ill "three days ago" (1 Sam 30:13).
The words translated by the NIV as "three days ago," literally translated from the Hebrew read: "Today is the third [day]" (Hebrew: hayyom sheloshah). Thus, he too used the "three days and three nights" stereotype formula, but clearly he did not mean three “full” days and three “full” nights, for on that very day, it was only day three!
Therefore, in accordance with this example and several others in Scripture, a part of a day, night, or year could be counted as a full day or night or year. Likewise, Solomon's navy was gone for three years (1 Kings 10:22), but it becomes clear that any part of a year counted as one year; thus his ships left about the fall of the year, were gone all the next year and returned in the third year about Passover time.
Therefore, it is not necessary to move the crucifixion back to "Good Wednesday" or "Good Thursday" in order to account for the 72 hours.

I want to credit my fantastic Hebrew teacher Dr. Walter Kaiser for opening my eyes to this truth many years ago.

Here are some other reasons to keep Good Friday as the day of the crucifixion.

3. John 9:42 states that it was the "Day of Preparation" which would have been Friday.

4. John 8:28 states that it was during the early morning hours on Friday that Jesus was led into the Governor's official residence. He says that the Jews would not enter the house so that they would not be defiled for the Passover Supper, which they had not eaten yet.

5. John 9:3 further states that because it was the Day of Preparation, the Jews wanted to break their victim's legs; hastening their deaths so that they would not defile the Sabbath (the Jewish Sabbath goes from Friday sun-down to Saturday sun-down). This again shows that they were crucified on a Friday.

6. John also says, in this same verse, that that Sabbath was also a "High Day." This may mean that this Sabbath Supper was also the Passover Supper. If so, Jesus could not have eaten Passover because the Passover Lamb could only be killed in the Temple, and the Priests didn't start the ritual killing of the Lambs until Friday, well after Jesus had been taken into custody.

In the end it does not matter if it was Wednesday, Thursday or Friday. The work of salvation was accomplished by Jesus on one of those days. The real issue is, "Do you believe Jesus died for your sins on that cross?"