Something to consider...
We
say Jesus was crucified on Friday because the text says He died the day before
the Sabbath.
And
we say that if all of these things happened the day before the Sabbath, or on
the "day of preparation," then it must have been on a Friday.
And
we say that Jesus came out of the tomb on a Sunday, because it was the day
after the Sabbath.
So
when our kids read things like
Matthew12:40 For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of
the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the
heart of the earth.
or
John2:19 “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.”
are
we teaching them to mistrust the scriptures?
That
is, for the sake of our "Good Friday, Resurrection Sunday"
traditions, are we teaching them to doubt the Holy Scriptures?
Because,
you see, those ideas don't line up. You cannot... Cannot... get three
days and three nights between Friday and Sunday, no matter how you slice it.
If you count partial days as whole, and ignore certain parts of the text,
you can get three days (Friday, Saturday, Sunday) but you cannot get three
nights.
Are
we teaching our kids that Scripture doesn't mean what it says?
Are
we setting them up for failure?
As
with most things, the solution is simply to set aside our prejudices and
actually READ the scriptures (I know, radical idea, right?)
But we must understand the context, and we must understand the time.
If I said "Well, I vote in every Presidential election, and the last time I voted for President of the United States I was 37 years old," you can make some inferences from that statement. If you are an American, you know that we only vote for President once every four years, on the years that are evenly divisible by 4. So we voted for President in 2000, 2004, 2008, and 2012. You can say "The last Presidential election was 2012, and A.J. was 37 years old then, so since this is 2015, he must be about 40 years old now."
Notice, I didn't tell you when the last election was, and I didn't tell you how old I am now. You can gather that information from my sentence by putting it with other information you already know.
It is the same with the Scripture text.
the Gospel authors don't bother to tell us "The Sabbath was on the 7th day of the week," because that's common knowledge, even for some Americans today (the Hebrew word for Saturday is "Shabbat," which is where we get the term "Sabbath").
But what was equally common knowledge in the days of Christ was that, during certain Holy feasts, there could be more than one Sabbath.
Let’s compare two American holidays to see this: Thanksgiving and Christmas. Thanksgiving always falls on the fourth Thursday in November. So the calendar date on which it falls is fluid, but it falls on a fixed day of the week… it is always on Thursday. In 2015, it will be on November 26th. But in 2016, it will be on November 24th. Christmas, on the other hand, comes on December 25th, every year. So in 2015, Christmas will be on a Friday, but in 2016, it will be on a Sunday.
But we must understand the context, and we must understand the time.
If I said "Well, I vote in every Presidential election, and the last time I voted for President of the United States I was 37 years old," you can make some inferences from that statement. If you are an American, you know that we only vote for President once every four years, on the years that are evenly divisible by 4. So we voted for President in 2000, 2004, 2008, and 2012. You can say "The last Presidential election was 2012, and A.J. was 37 years old then, so since this is 2015, he must be about 40 years old now."
Notice, I didn't tell you when the last election was, and I didn't tell you how old I am now. You can gather that information from my sentence by putting it with other information you already know.
It is the same with the Scripture text.
the Gospel authors don't bother to tell us "The Sabbath was on the 7th day of the week," because that's common knowledge, even for some Americans today (the Hebrew word for Saturday is "Shabbat," which is where we get the term "Sabbath").
But what was equally common knowledge in the days of Christ was that, during certain Holy feasts, there could be more than one Sabbath.
Let’s compare two American holidays to see this: Thanksgiving and Christmas. Thanksgiving always falls on the fourth Thursday in November. So the calendar date on which it falls is fluid, but it falls on a fixed day of the week… it is always on Thursday. In 2015, it will be on November 26th. But in 2016, it will be on November 24th. Christmas, on the other hand, comes on December 25th, every year. So in 2015, Christmas will be on a Friday, but in 2016, it will be on a Sunday.
According to Exodus chapter 12, the Passover day falls on the 14th day of the 1st month. It’s a fixed day on the calendar, rather than a fixed day of the week. But the weekly Sabbath always falls on Saturday (Shabbat), which is a fixed day of the week, like Thanksgiving.
What we’re coming to understand is that during a High Holy Week, such as Passover, you can have multiple Sabbaths in a single week.
Now lets suppose that the Passover Sabbath came on Thursday of that week. That makes Wednesday the day of preparation, and it would mean that Jesus died on a Wednesday. This breaks our Good Friday tradition to pieces, but let’s just try it on.
So Thursday is the Sabbath of the Passover. Then there’s Friday, which is the normal, weekly day of preparation for the normal, weekly Sabbath. Then there’s Saturday, the weekly Sabbath. Then there’s Sunday, which is the first day of the week. Here we have an interesting marker in scripture: John 20:1 says “Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb.” Note that this is not making reference to Sabbaths or days of preparation, but rather to a fixed day of the week (the Hebrews did not have names of the days, like we do. Their week was Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5, Day 6, and Shabbat. So “the first day of the week” that John mentions is the day we would call Sunday. So at least we get that part right in our traditions.
No, in our thought experiment with the Passover Sabbath on Thursday and the Weekly Sabbath on Saturday, how does this play out?
Jesus dies on Wednesday, at twilight. Very late in the day. So we won’t count Wednesday. But we will count
Wednesday NIGHT and ThursDAY and
Thursday NIGHT and FriDAY and
Friday NIGHT and SaturDAY.
Now John tells us (20:1) that Mary went to the tomb while it was still dark… before sunrise… and finds the stone rolled away. So the resurrection happened sometime during the dark hours… during the night… after sundown on Saturday. Since it wasn’t a full night, we cannot count it.
But do you see what happens then? The scripture lines up! When Jesus says “Three days and three nights,” (Matt 12:40, John 2:19) He means it!
Now John tells us (20:1) that Mary went to the tomb while it was still dark… before sunrise… and finds the stone rolled away. So the resurrection happened sometime during the dark hours… during the night… after sundown on Saturday. Since it wasn’t a full night, we cannot count it.
But do you see what happens then? The scripture lines up! When Jesus says “Three days and three nights,” (Matt 12:40, John 2:19) He means it!
So with a better cultural context, we can show the
scriptures to be reliable. Do yourselves and your children a favor. Stop clinging to your traditions which nullify the Holy Scriptures. Set aside your preconceived ideas and see what the Bible says. Because it IS trustworthy.
If we teach our children that it is wrong at this point, and wrong at that point, eventually they will begin to judge it on their own, and decide that the pieces they don’t like are also wrong.
And their eternal soul hangs in the balance. The cost is just too great.
Crucifixion hurts. Setting aside your traditions hurts. But be crucified with Christ, and live your life for the Son, who loved you and gave Himself for you.
