Have you ever sat and read through the gospel accounts of Passion Week, and tried to work out chronologically what is happening? And have you done that with the four gospels? (It is easiest to do that latter using a synopsis, either in print or using this one online.) Why not do it as part of your Holy Week devotions this year? If you do, you might notice several things.
- Though there are variations in wording and in some details, there is a striking agreement between all four gospels in the order of the main events during the week.
- The events at the beginning of the week around Palm Sunday, and at the end of the week around the crucifixion seem very busy, yet the middle seems very quiet—the issue of the ‘silent Wednesday’.
- The main issue on which the gospel accounts disagree on the order of events is in relation to the denials of Peter by Jesus, which come earlier in Luke’s gospel, and are spread out in John’s gospel.
- Jesus’ trial is more detailed, with more people involved in different phases in John than in the Matthew and Mark, the latter two treating it in quite a compressed way as more or less a single event.
- The synoptics claim explicitly that the last supper was some form of Passover meal (which must happen after the lambs are sacrificed), whilst John makes no mention of this, and appears to have Jesus crucified at the moment that the Passover lambs are sacrificed.
These anomalies have made the question of the Passion Week chronology ‘the most intractable problem in the New Testament’, and it causes many readers to wonder whether the accounts are reliable at all. For some, they are happy to inhabit the narratives in each gospel as they are, and not worry about reconciling each account with the others, or any of the accounts with what might have actually happened.
But I am not sure it is quite so easy to leave it there. After all, the word ‘gospel’ means ‘announcement of good news about something that has happened’; a central part of the Christian claim is that, in the death and resurrection of Jesus, God has done something, and so we cannot evade question of what exactly happened and when. Sceptics (both popular and academic) make much of these apparent inconsistencies, so there is an apologetic task to engage in. And understanding how these issues might be resolved could potentially shed new light on the meaning of the texts themselves.
A couple of years ago, I caught up with Sir Colin Humphreys’ book The Mystery of the Last Supper, in which he attempts to solve this problem. Humphreys is an academic, and a distinguished one at that, though in materials science. He has written on biblical questions before, though is not a biblical studies professional, but he does engage thoroughly with some key parts of the literature. He identifies the main elements of the puzzle under four headings:
- The lost day of Jesus, noticing the lull in activity in the middle of the week.
- The problem of the last supper; what kind of meal was it, when did it happen, and can we harmonise John’s account with the synoptics?
- No time for the trials of Jesus. If we include all the different elements, they cannot fit within the half night from Thursday to Friday morning.
- The legality of the trials. Here, Humphreys notes that later Jewish sources prohibit the conduct of a capital trial during the night, and require that any decision is ratified on the morning following the first trial.
The book is set out very clearly and logically (as you might expect) and includes a good number of tables. Early on Humphreys helpfully tabulates the events in the gospels, showing their relationship.
What is striking here—and the challenge to sceptics—is that, despite the various omissions, there is no actual contradiction in the order of events. (Something similar happens when you look at the events of Jesus’ birth; there are no real contradictions when you put the accounts side by side.)
Having started by looking at the biblical texts, in the middle of the book Humphreys goes on a long scientific exploration, delving into the astronomical issues behind the construction of Jewish calendars, and using this to argue for a particular date for the crucifixion. The key issue here is identifying the dates of the calendar from what we know of the moon phases, and then finding the years when the Passover falls on a Friday, which it will do on average only one year in seven.
Humphreys then uses other well-established data to eliminate outlying dates, and argues for Jesus’ death at 3 pm on Friday, April 3rd, AD 33. He is not alone in this, though the style of his argumentation will have lost many mainstream New Testament specialists (there is quite a nice, clear argument working through the data at this Catholic site). He assumes that the gospels are historically accurate, and takes them as his basic data, when most scholars would want him to be much more provisional. If the case was expressed more in terms of ‘were the gospels accurate, it would lead to this conclusion’ might have been more persuasive for the guild—but then Humphreys is primarily writing for a popular and not a professional audience. There is no particular problem in asking the question Humphreys does in fact ask: are the narratives we have capable of coherent reading, and if we taken them seriously, what do we find?
I was much more interested, though, in the later chapters, where Humphreys explores the gospel texts in detail in the light of the calendrical background. Although his proposals about the different calendars in use at the time of Jesus are speculative (even if plausible), there can be no doubt that different calendars were in use, and that it is quite likely that different gospel writers are making reference to different calendar schedules which could give rise to apparent anomalies in the gospel chronologies. In particular, some calendars worked sunset to sunset (as Jewish calculation works today), others counted from sunrise to sunrise, and the Roman calendar counted from midnight to midnight, as we do now. It is not hard to see how the phrase ‘on the next day’ can now have three different possible meanings.
It is also clear that the gospel writers vary in the emphasis that they give to chronological issues. So, whilst Luke offers some very specific markers in his narrative to locate the gospel story to wider world events (which has been typical of his overall approach), and John includes frequent temporal markers in relation both to Jewish feasts and successive days of Jesus’ ministry, Matthew is happy to group Jesus’ teaching and ministry into non-chronological blocks, and Mark has long been recognised as linking events in Jesus’ ministry thematically rather than chronologically. Humphreys uses an everyday example to illustrate this: if I cut the lawn and do some weeding, and someone asks my wife what I have been doing, and she says ‘He has been doing some weeding and cut the lawn’ then we would not describe our two accounts as ‘contradictory’. Chronology just hasn’t been an important issue here.
Humphreys’ solution rests on proposing that, in celebrating the Passover with his disciples, Jesus used the pre-Exile calendar which ran sunrise to sunrise and was at least a day ahead of the official Jerusalem calendar, so that there could be up to two days’ difference in calculation. (It is worth noting here in passing that first century Judaism was far from monolithic, and serious differences in belief, including about dates and calendars, was part of the diversity.) This means that, if the Jerusalem Passover took place on the Friday, following the sacrifice of the lambs on Friday afternoon, it would be possible for Jesus to celebrate his own Passover (and not merely a ‘Passover-like meal’ as some scholars have suggested) as early as the Wednesday. Humphreys believes that the man carrying the water jar (in Luke 22.10 and parallels) is a signal that the Upper Room was in the Essene quarter of Jerusalem, where there would not have been any women to undertake such roles. And the calendar differences account for Mark’s statement that the lambs were sacrificed on the ‘first day of the feast of Unleavened Bread’, (Mark 14.12) which is a contradiction that scholars have in the past attributed either to Mark’s error or his careless writing.
At some points, I think Humphreys’ case is actually slightly stronger than he claims. For example, John’s phrase ‘the Passover of the Jews’ in John 11.55 could arguably be translated as ‘the Passover of the Judeans’, thus emphasising communal and calendrical differences, and Matthew highlights the differences between the crowds of pilgrims and the local Jerusalemites in their response to Jesus. Richard Bauckham has argued that John is writing on the assumption that his readers know Mark, so there is no need for him to recount the details of the Passover meal in John 13 and following. And in the latest edition of Bauckham’s Jesus and the Eyewitnesses, he argues (in an additional chapter) that the ‘Beloved Disciple’ is the author of the gospel but is not John son of Zebedee, and so not one of the Twelve, but a Jerusalemite. This explains some of the distinctive perspectives of John’s gospel with its Judean and Jerusalem focus in contrast to Mark’s focus on Galilee—but would also account for calendrical differences.
There are some points of strain in Humphreys’ argument—for me, the most testing one was Humphreys’ account of the cock crowing three times, the first of which was (he argues) the Roman horn blown to signal the approach of dawn, the gallicinium which is Latin for ‘cock crow’. (I always struggle to be convinced by an argument that claims a repeated phrase actually means different things at different times when the phrase is identical.) But there are also some interesting ways in which his reading makes better sense of some details of the text, such as the dream of Pilate’s wife—which she could not have had time to have under the traditional chronology. Moreover, one of our earliest testimonies to the last supper, in 1 Cor 11.23, does not say (as much Anglican liturgy) ‘on the night before he died’ but ‘on the night that he was betrayed’. I will be sticking with the latter phrase in my future use of Eucharistic Prayers! And when Paul says that Christ our Passover has been sacrificed for us (1 Cor 5.7), and that he is the first fruits of those who sleep (1 Cor 15.20), Paul is reflecting his death on Passover (as per John, even though in other respects Paul’s account matches Luke, and it is largely Paul and Luke’s language we use in liturgy) and his resurrection on the celebration of First Fruits two days later.
Humphreys is certainly bold in taking on key scholars, including Dick France (with whom I would always hesitate to disagree), but in every case he gives citations and explains where the disagreement lies. When the book was first published, Mark Goodacre wrote a brief blog on why he disagrees, and the debate in comments—including from Humphreys himself—are worth reading. Goodacre’s main concern is Humphreys’ anxiety about demonstrating the reliability of the gospel accounts, and the need to eliminate contradictions.
One of Humphreys’s primary concerns is to avoid the idea that the Gospels “contradict themselves”. The concern is one that characterizes apologetic works and it is not a concern that I share.
But I wonder whether concern about this aim has led many scholars to dismiss the detail too quickly; much of academic scholarship is ideologically committed to the notion that the gospels are irredeemably contradictory. (If I were being mischievous, I would point to the irony of Mark’s resisting Humphrey’s challenging of a scholarly consensus, when that is precisely what Mark is doing himself in relation to the existence of ‘Q’, the supposed ‘sayings source’ that accounts for the shared material of Luke and Matthew…!) And we need to take seriously that fact that Humphrey’s approach resolves several key issues (including the silence of Wednesday, the lack of time for the trial, the reference in Mark 14.12, and Pilate’s wife’s dream) that are otherwise inexplicable or are put down (slightly arbitrarily) to writer error.
Another serious challenge (which Mark highlighted to me) is the consistent tradition of the early church of celebrating the last supper on Thursday. But the early church established other early traditions, particularly in relation to ministry, which I think are discontinuous with the New Testament—so this cannot be decisive.
I think there are some further things to explore, but it seems to me that Humphreys’ case is worth taking seriously.
(Posted previously.)
I know Colin slightly and even after (cordial) correspondence I remained unconvinced that he had accounted for “three days and three nights” in the tomb. Great book nevertheles, and it convincingly explains the apparent discrepancy between the synoptics and John over whether the Last Supper was a Passover.
I don’t know that 3 days and 3 nights is ever in the picture unless through the prior lens of Jonah, whose story is used to make a parallel.
Agreed. I have usually taken that as a figure of speech and not a literal time reference. The Armstrongites (who used to publish ‘The Plain Truth’) used that verse as a linchpin in their argument that the Crucifixion was actually on Wednesday.
French scholarship in the late 1950s (IIRC) argued that Jesus and his disciples followed the Qumran calendar. I think Stephane Saulnier supported this idea in his doctoral dissertation.
It’s Matthew 12:40, “For 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”. I cannot accept this as a figure of speech.
Luke’s account of what seems the same incident makes much more sense to me. In that the “sign of Jonah” to the Ninevites was his declaration of the destruction. That led to their repentance. They were a long way away from the sea where Jonah was in the ‘great fish’, so did not witness it: it was not a sign to them.
Look, Matthew says in so many words “the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth”. If that is figurative, you can play as fast and loose with all scripture as the liberals are.
Quite. And what is motivating all the wriggling? A desire to defend ecclesiastical tradition, on a par with the birth of Jesus in AD 1. One would never conclude that Jesus died on a Friday if one examined the question afresh today.
And it’s not only Matt 12:40 that makes Friday impossible. Matt 27:63 is to the same effect, while Mark repeatedly says ‘after three days’ (Mark 8:31, 9:31, 10:34).
Even with a Thursday crucifixion one is having to interpret ‘three days and three nights’ with a certain latitude, taking three days as the last hour of Thursday (Mark 15:42), all Friday and all Saturday.
If you disallow figurative language, you will get into all kinds of issues with many things in the Bible. How do you read Luke 14:26?
One very important issue is that of idiom. Language is full of it. I think it was Eddie Arthur who gave one illustration of this. You get on a crowded train, and spot two seats, one occupied. You ask that person, “is anyone sitting there?”
Or consider a text translated word for word from French. In an argument, one person says “guard your onions” when onions don’t seem to part of the discussion. What is that about?
David,
I take the general point, but in regard to the example at issue, can you give an example of “three days and nights” in ancient Jewish writing which provably cannot take the literal meaning?
I’d add that it would be odd if
one day and one night means what it says
two days and two nights means what it says
four days and four nights means what it says
but
three days and three nights is an idiom.
Anton
It’s not a question of playing fast and loose, but a question of whether you treat scripture as obeying a modern understanding of historical accuracy or as coming from a ancient cultures which didnt rely on the same level of detail as we expect from modern written accounts.
Peter,
Then the same question to you: can you give an example of “three days and nights” in ancient Jewish writing which provably cannot take the literal meaning?
It depends on your definition of “provably”. I’m not a biologist but I expect biological science can prove that Jonahs time in the whale was impossible, which doesn’t mean it didn’t happen if you believe in miracles, but for many that would be sufficient to suggest that the Book of Jonah is not literal in the modern sense, but again you’re trying to demand modern understanding of accuracy from ancient texts that weren’t primarily written to our culture or time.
Oh right, ancient standards of accuracy are so low that when the gospels say Jesus died and came back to life it’s actually not true?
I assume youre not Jewish so perhaps that is why you cannot accept it as non-literal.
As an example – Matthew 4:2—“And after He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He then became hungry” ; the parallel verses in Mark 1:13 and Luke 4:1–2 simply say ‘Forty days’. Are you saying there is a contradiction here?
It has been well established that Jews counted partial days as a day. Therefore per above 40 days and 40 nights = 40 days. Therefore 3 days and 3 nights = 3 days, which fits perfectly with Friday, Saturday & Sunday.
Even the Scriptural equivalence of ‘after 3 days’ and ‘on the 3rd day’ does not make sense to our modern precision minds as ‘after’ means the 3rd day must have ended whilst ‘on’ means it happened during the 3rd day, but both expressions mean exactly the same thing.
Logic. Or Scripture contradicts itself.
40 days and 40 nights = 40 days and 40 nights
3 days and 3 nights = 3 days and 3 nights
As a matter of logic, if someone goes to the trouble of emphasising that the period in question is so many days and nights, you cannot then boil it down a smaller number of days and nights.
Jesus did not enter the belly of the earth until he was buried in a tomb, just before the start of the first sabbath. He rose from the tomb before dawn on the day after the sabbath. With a Friday crucifixion, that’s 2 nights and, counting the Friday as one day, 2 days.
Logically, ‘after’ means after. Thus, if Jesus was crucified on Friday, ‘after 1 day’ would mean he rose on the Saturday (not Friday), ‘after 2 days’ would mean he rose on Sunday, and ‘after 3 days’ would mean he rose on Monday.
Your point of view contradicts Scripture, and really you should be open to other interpretations. Or just not say anything.
Steven,
Plwease see the April 10th thread; I heard from the Bible Society about those figures.
“Three Days and Three Nights” is identified by Prof Uriel Simon in his commentary on Jonah as a common Jewish idiom “to denote a period which is long but not too long” (p19). As such there is no necessity for a strict chronological interpretation. Ditto when Jesus’ parents returned “after three days” to the temple (Luke 2:46), the same idiom, not a chronological expression. So also Acts 25:1, 28:7; 28:12; 28:17; Acts 9:9; all these should be understood as Jewish idiom not strict chronology. (cf my brief note in Olive Press Research Paper no 42 published by CMJ)
I Cor 15.4, ‘he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures’ looks like a more exact time reference.
Certainly. Agreed.
But Friday pm to Sunday am fits “on the third day” quite happily, whereas “three days & three nights” does not.
Indeed. And I understand that part days were often included in Jewish thought. Plus there is at least one reference in the OT which indicates such counting of days is not to be understood literalistically.
Frank,
Does Prof Simon find in ancient Jewish writings definite uses of this phrase that in context cannot refer to the literal meaning, please?
I am willing to believe it if the answer is Yes in several cases. (One or two cold siply be errors.) But I see no reason why the examples you give in Acts should not be temporally accurate.
Anton
Thanks for the question; fair points.
In his commentary on Jonah 2:1 Prof Simon says “three days – this is a common idiom to denote a period that is long but not too long; for example ‘we arrived in Jerusalem and stayed there three days’ (Ezra 8:32; see also Neh 2:11)”. He then refers to 1 Sam 30:12 and Esther 4:16, and comments that “the addition of ‘and three nights’ highlights the slow passage of time in Jonah’s consciousness”.
Since he is himself Jewish and is writing as a renowned Professor at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, I think we have to give him some credit for knowing what is a Jewish idiom when he sees one. He comments in his Introduction that he has taken pains to “bring out certain idiomatic qualities of the Hebrew original” in his treatment of the text, which he thinks are missing in other translations (page vi).
The commentary in question is “The JPS Bible Commentary – Jonah” – (The Jewish Publication Society; Philadelphia, 1999)
Having come across this I then included a section on it in my Paper entitled “Idiom and Irony – Reading Between the Lines in Biblical Narrative” [Olive Press Research Paper no 42; published by CMJ in 2020] ; which also looked at certain other idioms / colloquialisms and examined the question in general of how irony works in Hebrew texts.
As far as Acts is concerned, once you are aware that something is a common idiom, you are then at liberty to examine the context and see what you think makes sense. To me, once I was aware that it is known idiom, then it makes much more sense in context if Luke is using the phrase in that way. Especially as there is a constant repetition of “three days”, never two, four or five days. However, if you choose to think otherwise, fair enough. We have that choice.
I understand why it is often difficult for us to come to terms with Hebrew cultural expressions in Biblical writings, since we are brought up with a certain degree of expectation of literal-ness in Scripture, a respect that we are dealing with Holy Writ. I accept that. However over time I have come to appreciate a new found richness and depth in scripture – intended by God – who did not simply choose the Hebrew culture to express Himself to the World, but in fact created it for that purpose.
I would grant any Hebrew speaker priority in understanding the idioms of modern Hebrew. But about Hebrew idioms of 2000 years ago and longer, I question whether he has greater expertise. There are plenty of idioms in the English of Shakespeare and Chaucer that we need explaining to us today.
I ask, in ancient Jewish writings, for uses of this phrase involving three days (and perhaps nights) that context *proves* cannot refer to the literal meaning. That – and only that – would make me accept it as an idiom.
John Wenham’s book “The Easter Enigma” has provided me with a reasonable reconciliation of many of the apparent anomalies in the Gospel accounts. He does not hold to a dogmatic view but shows that many of these anomalies can be explained away without too much “hoop jumping”. I always liked his view of matching Luke’s sinner in chapter 7 with both Mary of Bethany and Mary Magdalene. Interesting, but not an issue over which I will fall out with anyone!
David
I too like the idea of matching Mary of Bethany with Mary Magdalene; although it is not popular in academic circles, it certainly holds some interesting possibilities for me.
I have often wondered whether our post-enlightenment view of how historical truth should be expressed (essentially chronologically and factually accurate) may be at odds with the way truth statements were compiled in a previous era with different cultural norms to our own. Not wrong, just different perhaps?
Yes. Tell young-earthers!
YEC works out perfectly fine, provided you allow for a different speed of light 10,000 years ago and change geology. And carbon 14. And all the other laws of physics.
Otherwise, no problem.
lol. That just about sums it up.
Not quite… you’ve omitted the Devil planting fossils to deceive us.
Excellent James.
Einstein derived his theory of gravitation (the general theory of relativity) under the assumption that the speed of light is constant, so you can’t just take its equations and suppose that the symbol denoting the speed of light is now a variable. It’s more complicated than that, one of many errors I’ve seen creationists make. A scientist called João Magueijo has got a working theory with a variable lightspeed. But is it necessary? Creationists point to very slight reductions in the values of the middle of the error bars for experiments determining the speed of light from the 19th century to the present. But (1) the Victorian error bars were huge compared to modern, and no significant trend is disclosed when this is taken into account; (2) even if you take the centre-of-the-error-bars argument seriously, the extrapolation needed to get an enormously different lightspeed a few thousand years ago is utterly unwarranted.
Instead of welcoming the Big Bang as the first scientific theory to propose a beginning, as Genesis stated long before (and Buddhism denies), fundamentalists attack it! These ‘creation scientists’ don’t do proper science in the sense of framing and testing hypotheses, and their writing is agenda-driven rather than curiosity-driven – which they ironically accuse mainstream scientists of being. Science involves seeking a particular category of truth without prior commitment to the outcome. ‘Creation scientists’ often claim that anomalies which await scientific explanation cannot be explained, even as they ignore multiple facts that they are unable to give order to. They are unhappy that ‘random’ events might have been involved in the history of life, although they are happy to see God at work in apparently chance events such as meetings that lead to evangelism or marriage. They might say that the second law of thermodynamics (or ‘information’) disproves evolution, although few can state either principle accurately. They typically avoid science but still want to argue with scientists, and they revert to religious argument as soon as a discussion of the science starts to go against them. They agitate against school science, although secular humanist influence is more insidious in the humanities, and the image-of-God argument itself suffices to lift man above the animals. Some of them practically regard rejection of Darwin as equally important as belief in Christ, deterring potential converts who take an interest in science.
But I do understand what is at stake for them, and am wholly in sympathy. If the Bible cannot be trusted in its opening sections, why trust any other part of it? I agree with them that Genesis 1-3 is not ‘myth’. (Quite apart from philosophical arguments, how can a mythological figure beget a flesh-and-blood one, as would have to happen in the genealogies at some point?) I just resolve the problem in a different way from them. And no, I’m not going to state it here.
‘if the Bible cannot be trusted in its opening sections, why trust any part of it?’ But (a) it was only later that the different writings were put together to form a whole called ‘the Bible’ at all.(b) Even at that late stage it is well known that the different writings have different sources and origins. (c) So why are they being treated as one size fits all?
Because, Christopher, they are all directly inspired by God. But it needs to be added that they were written for differnt audiences, often with different cultural assumptions.
Talk about circular argument. Inspired because found to be infallible, and required to be infallible because inspired. That is at a lower level than scholarly discourse, and unless a lower level of rigour is preferred to a higher, which it cannot be, then that level must be rejected. Secondly, to compound that, circular ‘argument’ is not even honest.
It may be that I have mistaken what your actual argument is, and further it may be that that actual argument can be stated in robust form.
My usual summary is: Don’t be amazed at the accuracy of ‘the Bible’ (seen as a single unit) if you would not have allowed or countenanced any other conclusion in the first place. There would (as detailed above) be a lack of both coherence and integrity there.
There is no cause to attack my integrity and you owe me an apology for moving a reasoned discussion about matters of faith to the personal.
I find your words confusing, so please clarify them. You claim I make a circular argument. Please set out specific binary propositions that you believe I have made, and state exactly where in which posts of mine on this thread you believe I have (1) argued that one follows from the other, and then (2) where the other follows from the one.
That’s why I asked whether I had understood you aright. One of your foundational hypotheses (‘because the Bible was inspired by God’) was so vast that it needed demonstrating. It seemed to me that it was more in the nature of a desired conclusion than of something that was so obvious that it could act as a foundational hypothesis.
In order for it to be in play within the argument at all, (a) the bounds of what counts as being included in ‘the Bible’ and what doesn’t would need to be argued for, which is immensely complex and also not susceptible of anything approaching proof; (b) treating 66 books as a single book would also need to be argued for, which is the more challenging given the length of time between first and last; (c) one would need to make sure that the claim to overall inspiration was not circular, based on claims in its own pages – though of course 2 Tim may not have seen itself as scriptural at the time of writing anyway, since it seems to be referring to writings other than itself; (d) inspiration would need to be defined; (e) its relation to infallibility and inerrancy would also need to be defined; (f) it would need to be shown why most writers do not so much as mention the supreme experience (as it would have been) of knowing that they were writing under inspiration at the time of writing.
What I am treating here is standard presuppositions, which are indeed below the normal scholarly ones both in coherence and (therefore) also in integrity – from which standard presuppositions yours may well be different. It was just your enormous unfootnoted claim being treated as a pillar of the theory that made me put your argument in that category – perhaps I was not inerrant in so doing.
So rather than there being specific binary propositions in play, there was, or may have been, one single proposition being treated as both a leading presupposition and a conclusion – and that is how one gets circularity from one ingredient not two.
One of your foundational hypotheses (‘because the Bible was inspired by God’) was so vast that it needed demonstrating.
This is a matter of faith, of course! But whenever I have tested it, either by reading archaeologists (Joel Kramer is a wonder), or in prayer, I have found it reliable, and so I extrapolate that the rest of it is.
First, archaeologists find which things are accurate, not that a text is inspired.
second, a high proportion of texts are accurate, partly because they are written about their own time and therefore accuracy is not hard to achieve. Does that make them inspired? Not remotely – though of course the word is vague anyway.
Third, how does finding that the Bible is inspired happen in the specific arena of prayer that you mentioned?
Fourth, ‘faith’ in common parlance is not the same as the way pistis is used in the biblical writings.
Fifth, getting such positive findings for a given detail in one biblical book says nothing about any of the other details nor any of the other books.
Sixth, using what you call ‘faith’ could be regarded as a cheat or illegitimate short cut in debate context.
I still don’t understand where you think you are disagreeing with me. Would you state a binary proposition that you believe is true and that you think I believe is false, please?
As mentioned, the disagreement lies not there but in your use of something unargued and unarguable as a cheif foundation of your position. Things can (to repeat) be circular if a presupposition is identical to a conclusion, and that particular circularity involves only one proposition, not two. The fact that both presupposition and conclusion are unevidenced (i.e. they are dogma) means that evidence is nowhere.
typo ‘chief’
You have made general statements about logic without applying them to our exchange. It should still be possible for you to state a proposition that you believe is true that you reckon I believe is untrue. Unless you do, may I suggest we desist?
I believe it is true that appeals to what you call faith, as opposed to evindece, have no part in a debate. Whereas you look to believe that they do have a part. It is obvious where that will lead. One might have faith (in that sense of the word) in anything at all, and so that is the death of debate, of rigorous debate that is worth anything.
In an exchange on a Christian blog, one might reasonably take ‘faith’ to mean faith in Jesus Christ crucified died and risen, and faith that the Bible is accurate.
If you want some logic, every piece of reasoning proceeds from premisses to conclusion. You might be able to derive your premisses from something more primitive. But eventually that regress is going to have to terminate at some statement that you cannot prove from anything farther back. In other words, it is a statement of faith.
But what all of that has to do with the fact that you disagree with me, make it personal, and then decline to clarify, I don’t know.
Nothing personal whatever, ever. There are always persons involved in debate, but sometimes those are the arguments (effectively principalities) about which Paul speaks in 2 Cor 10.5. When I encounter incoherent arguments which were initially planted to deceive people for personal gain, I recognise them, I know them of old, and I give them what-for. But how is that personal? It is by definition to do with ideas not people – and moreover, maturer discourse always focuses more on the former (whereas children and the gossipy focus on the latter). All of us can be deceived by arguments, particularly those in common currency. In cases where those arguments have been seen through, then they start being treated rightly as enemies. After all they are large-scale things, so (compared to small scale things) will quite likely deceive many precious people down the line – nipping them firmly in the bud is the best way to prevent this. But for each of us there will be arguments that we are still taken in by which are actually wrong but we have not identified them as wrong yet.
So you see what you thought you saw is not only not what you saw but is very distant from what you thought you saw.
It is also true that we all rest on presuppositions, but these can be logical or tautological or scientific or supported by statistical science. All of these bases are far firmer than the one you were using, which I mentioned about 5 things wrong with.
A wrong presupposition is just like any other flaw in an argument – just, it comes at so early a stage that it goes unnoticed. The unscrupulous (in which category you do not fall) exploit this, and almost the most regular form of argument they use is to *assume*, and expect others to assume, some outrageously wrong presupposition, because that (placing it at that earliest stage in the argument) is the only way that they will avoid having to argue for it, which they would not be able to do. I recognise this, and name it for what it is.
“When I encounter incoherent arguments which were initially planted to deceive people for personal gain, I recognise them, I know them of old, and I give them what-for. But how is that personal?”
Because you know what I wrote but you don’t know my motivation; you are guessing it, guessing it ungenerously, and guessing it wrong. Poor show, if I may say so.
But how many times do I need to say that I do not include you among the unscrupulous?
Moreover, I said twice that I include myself among those who are capable of being taken in.
I am speaking on a larger scale – about the way that wrong/incoherent arguments are like principalities, and need to be exposed when recognised. But both you and I will not always immediately recognise them. In each of our cases, there will be those we have not yet recognised.
Which also goes along with my saying it is not personal.
And with my saying that it is only lower order discourse, and that of the young and the more gossipy, that tends to be person based rather than idea based.
From all these dimensions, you can see what my position is, but I have repeated its main elements now and repeated some of them more than once.
In an extended interaction with me and nobody else, you make comments about motivation such as those I have quoted but say they are not aimed at me. I am glad to hear it but why say them?
Because they are my main point.
Secondly, because it is very normal for that type of conversation to involve precisely two people.
Thirdly, because this may be one of the instances where I have seen the flaw[s] and you have not, just as there will be instances where we both have, or neither has, or you have and I have not. And if so, that would advance the discussion.
And fourthly, because it is normal and positive for academic discussions to be about ideas and not be personal. Hence the guying of academics as angry people when in fact it is just that they care passionately about truth – and the ones who have something to explain are the ones who do not care passionately about truth.
Ian would be within his rights to remove Anton’s post here and its replies as deviation from the post’s subject; otherwise, it’s enough to point out that Hebrew writers had ways of describing large numbers and long periods of time, and didn’t use them in that context.
As this doesn’t seem to be the right place to do it, I refrain from a point-by-point reply to the ignorance on display elsewhere; only to note that claiming carbon 14 “against” YEC is like someone referring to the Dead Sea Scrolls as evidence of major corruption in the transmission of the Hebrew OT, i.e. it immediately inhibits confidence that the claimer knows what they’re talking about….
Ian exercises a very light hand of censorship on his blog, unlike other sites. This can lead to some unhelpful exchanges, but on balance most people behave themselves.
It’s true that often I don’t know what I’m talking about. But carbon-14 is used to date living things up to 50,000 years ago, which is well outside a YEC framework.
Let me add that while I believe life has been on earth for millions of years, I am increasingly doubtful about macroevolution because of the sheer number and weight of problems attaching to the theory. I incline to the idea of repeated acts of creation over many millions of years.
I can see how the evidence seems to point that way, but what on earth would it look like on video?
Exactly, Christopher. I am tired of philosophy encroaching on the science/Genesis discussion. I hold that the only discussions worth having derive from attempts to answer the following questions: Did God create time; Why is science beautiful; Do miracles occur; How old is the earth; Was Noah’s flood global; Who did Adam’s children marry; Do you believe that some people lived for centuries as Genesis states; What would you see if you had snapshots of your father, and his father, and so on, backwards in time indefinitely?
At least they are concrete. Mostly.
Ian is within his rights to remove any post, because this is his blog. I presume you are hinting (without being prepared to say so) that he ought to remove my longer post above, presumably because you disagree with it rather than because (as you state) it is not about the timing of Holy Week.
Ray
it is not so much “historical truth” as literary genre. Were the Gospel writers setting out to write “historical truth” or were they doing something different? They were not historians per se, writing for posterity. They would have been shocked to think we would be reading their stuff 2 millenia later in something called The Bible. They were not doing history for our sake. Mark and Matthew were travelling evangelists, telling their and others testimonies over and over again, and their eventual written documents were a coalescence of itinerant preaching, part testimony, part theology, within a loose historical context. Many of their first readers had heard them preach many times and could fill in some of the gaps, or could personally access some of their named (and other) witnesses. They wrote for their contemporaries, not us, they were primarily doing testimony/theology, not forensic historical analysis.
Would they have been shocked? They knew that Jesus said that his words would never pass away.
Dan
I am happy to tone down the word “shocked” if you like. Perhaps you would permit the odd raised eyebrow?
From the general tenor of their writings I would imagine the Synoptic writers hardly expected Jesus’ Return to be two millenia away, more like one or two generations. John, writing a little later, finds it necessary to start to revise expectations, and think more in terms of playing the long game.
The great things are:
(1) Humphreys knows what makes a good tight argument and what does not;
(2) He has progressively tightened his over the years.
(3) The fact that it fits the data a few lengths ahead of any rival is itself significant. This could not be the case if it were not the correct theory.
This is good, because within less than a decade we will be celebrating the 2000th anniversary of the crucifixion and resurrection. In order to do that, we need to have the correct date[s]. For the fact that we seem to do so, we have CH to thank.
Reminisce with a friend about the details of an event you both experienced 30 years ago. You both agree on the important points but it will be unlikely you’ll remember the details identically. The differences in the Gospels involve inconsequential points (e.g. Peter denied Christ three times, who cares about the exact timing?) and thus are more indicative of authenticity than they would be if they agreed precisely on every detail like criminals getting their stories straight before interrogation.
Oh, Ian, are you not content with wrecking Christmas and upsetting the child who was playing the kindly innkeeper in the school nativity play?
Do you have to wreck Easter as well? 🙂
The Jewish scholar/polemicist Hyam Maccoby argued from the purported nighttime trial by the Sanhedrin that the Gospel accounts were fictional and anti-Jewish propaganda.
That depends on the traditional chronology and the later attested prohibition of night time trials.
On the face of it, a daytime trial does seem more likely, as well as the movements and events traditionally ascribed to early Friday morning.
I have a reputation to maintain!
That is interesting about Hyam Maccoby, whom I once met.
That is probably the least controversial of Maccoby’s theories. I am not familiar with his writings, but I see that among the many ideas he promoted, Jesus was really a Pharisee (good-hearted but misguided) who expected on the night of his arrest a great divine miracle which would throw out the Romans and put him on the throne of David – this sounds rather like H. S. Reimarus – and Paul wasn’t a Pharisee or even a Jew but a Gentile charlatan – which is what I think Graetz taught in the 19th century).
Dipping into reviews of Maccoby’s works reminds me a bit of Barbara Thiering (the thinking person’s Dan Brown): what you get when you put a good brain, good linguistic skills and a lively imagination into a crackpot conspiracy theorist.
I read his book on Paul, The Mythmaker, as an atheist when it came out, but I didn’t have enough knowledge of the New Testament to understand what it was all about.
Ian
Many thanks for an excellent and very clear summary. I heard Colin Humphries speak on this recently, and while I was mightily impressed, not quite sure of every facet. He postulated 2 dates for the Crucifixion before plumping on AD33. Personally, because of various factors he did not touch on, I would prefer his alternative possibility of April AD30. In his talk he did not deal at all convincingly with the 46 year marker (46 years of temple construction), which would give a date around AD 26/7 for John 2:2. That and other factors left me unconvinced about AD 33; I think AD 30 is still a fair bet. But many thanks for a careful and fair analysis.
I prefer the AD 30 date as well, chiefly because of the John reference, and the approximate age of Jesus given in Luke 3.23 (although I haven’t examined in detail the arguments for AD 33, which I think Paul Barnett supports).
Agree on Luke 3:23.
From page 107 of When the Towers Fall: A Prophecy of What Must Happen Soon
This accords with ‘three days and three nights’ – Jesus’s own prophecy and obviously not a ‘figure of speech’ or a ‘Jewish idiom’. Jesus was crucified on the Thursday, Nisan AD 30. There were two sabbaths that week, the weekly Sabbath and the sabbath of Nisan 15 (John 19:31, Lev 23:6f). Whether concerning the chronology of creation or the chronology of the crucifixion, Scripture cannot be broken.
Regarding the latter, Prof. Roger Rusk (‘The day he died’, Christianity Today March 1974), came to much the same conclusion. His article is on the web.
Did I not read a hypothesis of a double sabbath (Friday and Saturday) that deals with silent Wednesday amongst other issues?
The Easter events have been questioned by doubters and disputers from the beginning. {e.g “a conjuring trick with bones”.}
Paul and the apostles recognized that there were wolves, dogs and lions opposing the saints.
Their response seemed to counter these not by arguing with them but teaching, admonishing and edifying {building up} the saints to understand the power and wisdom of God.
It occurs to me that the Church spends a month in contemplating the death of Christ for our Sin and a morning telling each other “He is Risen!”
Perhaps we need to spend the next month studying and reflecting on the full orbed riches and wonder of the Resurrection and its ramifications for the saints in living in the joy and gladness of that resurrection life as detailed in the Apostles Doctrine.
As Paul earnestly prayed: -{a modal of positive thinking”!}
I pray that your hearts will be flooded with light so that you can understand the confident hope he has given to those he called—his holy people who are his rich and glorious inheritance.
19 I also pray that you will understand the incredible greatness of God’s power for us who believe him. This is the same mighty power
20 that raised Christ from the dead and seated him in the place of honor at God’s right hand in the heavenly realms.
21 Now he is far above any ruler or authority or power or leader or anything else—not only in this world but also in the world to come.
22 God has put all things under the authority of Christ and has made him head over all things for the benefit of the church. 23And the church is his body; it is made full and complete by Christ, who fills all things everywhere with himself.
May God flood us with Light and Resurrection Life. Shalom.
The Orthodox Christians emphasise the Resurrection more than the Crucifixion at this time of year. I am not inclined to say whether either is right or wrong.
Mark Goodacre is obviously right that there is no presumption of harmony. The idea of a presumption of harmony would not only have no sound basis (it is rarely given a stated, clear, logical basis) but also would privilege, of all people, the more dogmatic who had done little or no actual thinking.
However, Mark’s case would benefit from being fleshed out in regard to the specifics. Just because there is no presumption of harmony means nothing: the point is ‘don’t assume things’, and if you don’t assume things you will not be assuming either harmony or disharmony.
In some cases there will be harmony and in others not. But that will be determined by the detailed analysis, not by stating theory, and least of all by stating theory that is accompanied by no analysis.
Mark has written very well on the Markan passion, and also is a go-to for analysis of any synoptic pericope or interrelationship whatever.
Could the “three days” be inclusive of the whole event, from sweating drops of blood to the resurrection?
The Great Lights were placed in the firmament to act as ‘signs’; the greatest of which is the crucifixion. There was a slow dimming of the light, then totality. How closely does the events of the Passion mirror the ‘signs’ set up to prophecy it? Does the Revelation of Jesus describe this when it says, “the sun went dark, the moon to blood and the stars fell…” Is this symbolic of the Trinity? The Sun, Moon and Stars = the Trinity.
How are we to understand the Easter events as the Supreme Court, today has engaged in Biblical interpretation defining a woman as woman understood to be in Gospel times.
It is term not defined from time to time, age to age, by cultural mores and edicts.
Immutable.
Of course it has varied. Aristotle Περὶ ζῴων γενέσεως 2.3: “for woman is but a defective male.”
There was a recognised real biological difference, yet his qualitative philosophical, assessment was scripturally amiss, erroneous.
Immutable.
Back off, man, he was a scientist!
– Ghostbusted.
From the veracity of the Easter events, we have moved to discussions of the veracity of the Creation narrative.
There is alas, widespread ignorance of the Scriptures and attempts to understand the Science.
God created the heavens and the Earth Gen 1 v 1
The earth was dark and without form and empty 1 v 2
Ergo, how the earth came into being in the first place is not known
It does not here appear that there was a big bang
because the sun and moon were not yet created 1 v 14 – 18
How long had the world been without form and void?
What then is the age of the earth?
Had there been a previous creation?
Adam is created at the culmination of creation.
How long was Adam on the earth prior to his fall and judgement?
He understood what death was in respect of the commandments
Perhaps from observations of animal deaths?
Adam lived some hundreds of years before actual physical death
and his years are recorded 5:5
Time as relevant to man only has significands when the judgement was enacted.
Prior to that, Time was irrelevant, apart from the length of day and night and seasons.
Earth may well be old but it would appear that mankind is quite young.
Does that make sense? Shalom.
The ‘previous creation’ stuff is little other than an attempt to Christianise Erich von Daniken. Genesis uses the great word ‘bara’ three times: for the creation of matter, life and humans. I think we can safely take it that each is the first time.
Hi Alan,
I agree with you. I think our perception of time is a result of guilt. Time started when Adam realised he was naked.
Thought experiment/whimsey: Imagine the act of creation like a pebble dropped in a pond. God is over the middle. We ride the wave of the present up and down in the centre. The distant ripples are the past. Perhaps that moment of creation unravelled time from the centre. From infinite complexity creation unwound backwards, the ripples getting lower and lower until all is simple, flat and static. The story of creation describes it the way we see it after the ‘Fall’. We see the ripples as past events. If we had stayed in union with Him we would ride a continuous present but because of sin we only see the past, spreading out in all directions.
Time existed long before mankind thought anything. And our perception of it largely comes from the sun, moon and seasons.
The Big Bang corresponds to ‘In the beginning, God created…’ Astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle said, “The reason why scientists like the ‘big bang’ is because they are overshadowed by the Book of Genesis.” Hoyle rejected the theory in favour of the Steady State view, which essentially said the universe has always existed and had no beginning. He didnt like the Big Bang idea precisely because of its correlation with Genesis.
Having said that, Genesis should not be read as a scientific textbook.
Unfotunately for Hoyle his steady state theory proved incompatible with further astrophysical and cossmological observations.
It was a theory which begged the question in the first place. Theories are supposed to be explanatory, not to say that no explanation can be found. That is an anti-theory.
No, thje steadyd state theory did have predictive consequences, or it could not have been tested against Big Bang cosmology in the light of further observations and found wanting – as was the case.
Anton: was it the discovery of CMBR that put paid to steady state?
Did Hoyle think the universe was eternally old?
Yes, in that matter (a) it was scientific, and in the matter (b) of not giving any ultimate explanation it was not scientific, given that things in the real world have explanations, and giving none (like B Russell) is a cop-out on such a high level it amounts to having no explanation for anything at all.
James,
That was one nail in its coffin, to be sure.
Christopher: science deals all the time with entities it can neither define nor explain: space, matter, time. Science doesn’t give ‘ultimate explanations’, it only explains how (not why) matter behaves now and postulates how it behaved in the past (historical science).
Science is thus not the final or only truth.
Scientists are often impatient with and uncomprehending toward philosophy. They need to look outside the laboratory-box.
Mathematics isn’t empirical or scientific but empirical science depends on it. Gavin Ortlund is very good on the theological significance of maths.
I remember in school hearing about the famous Russell-Copleston debate on BBC radio, and decades later discovered in on youtube.
Scientists are often impatient with and uncomprehending toward philosophy. They need to look outside the laboratory-box.</I
Not when they do science they don't. So-called philosophy of science is parasitic on science itself. When I was a young physicist the general attitude was "If you want to get into that stuff, Karl Popper is the man." It turned out that Popper was dead wrong. (read the late great David Stove). And science carried on.
Of course I agree that scientists who dogmatically assert materialism/scientism are straying into the realm of philosophy, and bad philosophy at that. I like to point out to them that the laws of physics are themselves real things yet not material.
I also think that much of philosophy contains many implicit assumptions, and is not as watertight as its proponents reckon. I also argue it is no coincidence that modern science evolved in a culture that was a combination of Athens and Jerusalem (althogh this isn't the place for detail).
I know very well what scientists – even Hawking – are often like in their complete neglect of fundamental questions or even their willingness to include them at all or realise about them. It is like they have learnt the grammar of their discipline and neglected common sense.
I know they do not face ultimate questions often enough. But my point was that it was against the scientific spirit to act this way. The scientific spirit should always be looking for origins and explanations, however far back. This was a point I made when invited to High Table at Selwyn 1994-5.
Hawking worked in one of the few fields of science to have immediate overlap with scripture. The foolish and vain comment with which he closed his best-seller used the ‘mind of God’ as a metaphor for the laws of physics – a turn-off for both Christians (who know an altogether different God) and atheists (who wonder why mention God at all).
If you want to play at 2 Corinthians 11, I dined most nights on the High Table of another Cambridge college when I was a Fellow for some years a long time ago.
If you use the word play, that is a serious misunderstanding, to add to several you have shown in recent comments.
I am sure that was the only time I was at a High Table, to my memory. (A welcome chance to chat to a professional science don. The great thing was that they said he normally never spoke to anyone.) I don’t think it was at all a major occasion. It was probably a weekday lunch with 5-6 people. No, there was another time in 1990 after theology schools, which was certainly illuminating as it seemed there were as many post-dinner additional courses served as there were floors in the dons’ quarters (through which they progressively ascended), i.e. many. How the other half live.
Genesis is indeed not meant to be a science textbook, but the word of God ought to be consistent with correct science.
Is that not a philosophical ought? And an inversion which appears to take little to no account of the underpinning philoshophy of science.
My ‘ought’ comes from the fact that God ordained the “fixed laws of the earth and the heavens” (Jeremiah 33:25-26) and other scientific laws, and God directly inspired scripture.
why? That is not its purpose.
The earth is portrayed as resting on pillars, hence when the earth shakes, so do the pillars. We know that is not scientifically correct. Yet there is nothing in the texts themselves to indicate it is not to be understood literally (without having sight of them, why could it not be true from an ancient pov?). But most people today do not read it literally descriptive given our modern scientific understanding.
Even employing it’s own basic tenents, science, can not prove the how of material existence, nor why there is something rather than nothing, in the beginning. Only it’s own explanation.
Neither can it prove the resurrection, nor the ascension.
Indeed, Geoff. Miracles are the (one) place where science and scripture contradict eatch other.
I think you have misunderstood the relevant texts, which unfortunately you do not quote. Ps 75:3 is one, and note that it is God speaking, so it is his view that you are doing down.
‘Pillar’ is a metaphor, and to that extent your point verges on a rehash of the Galileo debate. But the general picture is that the earth (= lithosphere; you seem to be understanding the word as = whole planet) was ‘founded’ on pillars. Inbetween were bodies of water, the ‘deeps’, collectively the subterranean deep. The lithosphere was destroyed by the mabbul (Gen 6:13, 9:11) and is thus beyond scientific investigation. The fact of its destruction can be investigated – inasmuch as the earliest part of Earth’s geological record (the Hadean ‘aeon’) is missing, immediately followed by a planet completely covered in water.
Language, ancient and modern, scientific and non-scientific, uses metaphors all the time. ‘Founded’ is an architectural term. ‘Bodies’ above is a metaphor. If I were to describe the deeps as pockets of water, that would be another metaphor. The fallacy is to suppose that the thing so described is therefore fictitious.
Job 26:11 speaks of the ‘pillars of heaven’. This is a reference to the mountains. Another metaphor, but mountains really do exist.
However, all this is a very long way from the subject of the posted article, which is the chronology of Holy Week. ‘Three days and three nights’ is a factual statement, not a metaphor.
But is there any sign it would have been capable of being a scientific textbook?
Steven Robinson – I showed you that from the Gospels themselves ‘days and nights’ just equals days, and that from ancient Jewish writings we know that partial days also equal days. Therefore Fri, Sat and Sun = 3 days in Jewish understanding. Sunday is then ‘on the 3rd day’.
If you dont accept logic, so be it. And I dont know why you keep publicising your book here. You claimed a few months ago that something very important was going to happen on a certain day (presumably based on your understanding of Scripture). That day came and went. Nothing. When asked about it here by myself and others, there was complete silence from you. Wonder why.
You did not show what you claimed to show, and your argument was illogical. ‘Day’ can mean a 24-hour period (as in Gen 1:5) or ‘day’ distinct from night (also as in Gen 1:5). You are confusing the two meanings.
I referred to the book because the part quoted from it addressed the topic of this blog post, substantively. There was not complete silence on the point you bring up quite irrelevantly (in respect of a sentence I wrote more than a year and a half ago) and the book itself remains true and important from beginning to end.
“There was not complete silence on the point you bring up quite irrelevantly “
It was quite relevant. You made a claim that you could not justify and still can’t. The only break in your silence was to tell us that the Lord had spoken to you directly about and that you couldn’t/wouldn’t say any more. Such claims are meaningless and many make them – all contradictory.
Just a passing comment on different calendars in the Easter story. A Muslim colleague of mine was organising Eid events for the end of Ramadan a few weeks back. There was great uncertainty just a few days beforehand whether Eid would fall on the Sunday or the Monday.
I spoke to her afterwards asking how it had gone and what day had Eid fallen upon. She said that they’d had a nice time, her family had celebrated Eid on the Sunday because her mosque had reported the new moon being sighted in Saudi Arabia but her cousin who only lived ten miles away celebrated on the Monday as his mosque was following the sighting of the moon in Morocco!
The fasts in Ramadan were designed for latitudes not too far from the equator, where Islam originated. It’s a lot harder nearer the Arctic wher day can last 20 hours. Not to mention *in* the Arctic.
Many are old but few are frozen.
*cold
Today is Thursday, the day when our Lord suffered and died for our sins. Alleluia.
The year was AD 30 and the day was Nisan 14, the day of preparation for the sabbath, with which the Feast of Unleavened Bread began on Nisan 15. In that year Nisan 14 fell on a Thursday. Nisan 14 was the day of the first Passover, in 1447 BC, when the lambs were slaughtered in place of Israel, God’s firstborn son (Ex 4:22). Israel passed through the waters of the Red Sea in the early hours of Nisan 17.
In accordance with the scriptures he rose again on the third day (I Cor 15:4). Those scriptures were the Exodus narrative, Jonah 1:17 and Hosea 6:2. The Word of God is true from first to last, from Gen 1:1 to Rev 22:20, and cannot be broken. Praise him! Worship him all the earth! Worship him who made the heaven and the earth, and sea and springs of water.
Perhaps a stupid question, but why does it end with the crucifixion and not the resurrection?
I know one of the big inconsistencies is who was first to witness the resurrected Jesus.
Matthew – Mary Magdalene and the “other” Mary meet with a solitary angel and then Jesus
Mark (OG) – Mary, Mary and Salome meet a man (angel/Jesus?) in the empty tomb and they leave and say nothing
Mark (added bit) – Mary Magdalene is the first to see Jesus (plausibly consistent ish with Mark (OG) and Matthew)
Luke – Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, Joana and “others” meet two angels at the tomb, but no Jesus. Jesus first appears to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus.
John – Mary Magdalene on her own meets two angels and Jesus.
Out of the 5 accounts 3 or 4 say Mary Magdalene was the first or one of the first, and 2 of these include other women.
Im sure this is the kind of inconsistency that police have to wade through when dealing with witness statements and they would go for the most commonly repeated features, which would mean Mary Magdalene met Jesus first with two angels (and possibly there were other women with her)
One of the reasons I believe the resurrection happened is that the idea that a man, particularly a Jewish writer, would have made up that it was a woman who was the first witness to the biggest event in world history, is laughable.
It is described as such because it actually happened.
I think God raised Jesus to life in the tomb but It was the angels who unwrapped Him, dressed Him and got Him up and perched on a rock in the garden. Mary interrupted the resurrection and tried to hug Him. He recoiled from this because it would have been/ was painful. He disguised himself because His beard had been torn out and He still looked a mess. He was alive but needed the next 40 days to grow a beard and for the wounds to heal properly. He was transforming from glory to glory, even so the resurrection was only the start. Therefore Sunday can be included within the 3 days/nights. Another example of days being ‘cut short’ for our sakes.