Was Jesus Entombed 72 Hours? - Part II

Is the phrase "three days and three nights" in Matthew 12 to be taken literally and understood as 72-hours? We look at sources inside and outside the Bible to get some clues.

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In the previous post, we looked at the phrase "three days" and other similar phrases. We learned that the Bible counts days differently than the modern Western mind, using inclusive reckoning. "Three days" means three consecutive days, whether they are complete or fractions of a day. The phrase "third day" could mean "day after tomorrow" or "day before yesterday". We saw how that fits into five different descriptions of the entombment of Jesus.

We needed that so we would be ready to look at description number six: “three days and three nights”. 

We have important questions to answer. Must this phrase be interpreted literally as 72-hours? Does adding "and nights" force a difference? Does the Bible offer help on how we should understand it? Is there any evidence outside of the Bible that might shed some light? Is "three days and three nights" the one phrase out of six that we must use to interpret the length of Jesus' entombment?

We are going to let the Bible interpret the Bible.

SAMUEL

Let's spend some time on Samuel 30, because this is going to be arguably the most important selection of all. There are only three places in the entire Bible where “three days and three nights” appears. One is in Jonah 1: 17. Another is in Matthew 12: 40. The last is in Samuel 30: 12.

Here, David's men were tracking some Amalekites when they happened upon a young Egyptian man in a field somewhere in the Levant. He fell ill while raiding for slaves with the Amalekites and was left behind to starve to death.

(I SAM. 30: 11-13) 11 Then they found an Egyptian in the field, and brought him to David; and they gave him bread and he ate, and they let him drink water. 12 And they gave him a piece of a cake of figs and two clusters of raisins. So when he had eaten, his strength came back to him; for he had eaten no bread nor drunk water for three days and three nights. 13 Then David said to him, “To whom do you belong, and where are you from?” And he said, “I am a young man from Egypt, servant of an Amalekite; and my master left me behind, because three days ago I fell sick.

There is that phrase - three days and three nights. Notice it's not the Egyptian who says this, but the narrator of the story. This selection is quite special. It is the only instance of "three days and three nights" in the Bible that has another time reference nearby to give us a clue about how to understand it. The Egyptian had not eaten for “three days and three nights”, yet he had only fallen sick “three days ago”. There is the clue.

Using what we learned in the last post about how counting days works in the Bible, we know "three days ago" means day before yesterday.

We now have but three options:

1) The Egyptian had not eaten for upwards of a day before he fell ill. 

2) The Egyptian misspoke and fell ill four days ago.

3) “Three days and three nights” is a figure of speech not meant to be understood as 72 literal, exact hours, and means the same thing as "three days".

#2 is the least reasonable. If we try to press for #1 and its literal interpretation, we must ask how anyone knew it was exactly 72 hours (not 71.5 or 73) since the last time the Egyptian ate? In that time period, how did a slave on a raid in the Levant, so unimportant that he was left for dead, have the means to know exactly what hour it was?
What luck! They interrogated him exactly 72 hours to the minute after he last put food in his mouth.

Also, notice the time of day in this scene. David found the Egyptian while pursuing the Amalekites, and then continued his pursuit. This scene was clearly not at the beginning or ending of a day. If we insist on three complete days and three complete nights, how does that work in a scene that takes place in the middle of the day? This must also be explained.

I prefer #3. It simply makes more sense.

The text gives us nothing to support an exact 72-hour chronology. It does give us reasons to discount this, however, by also using "three days." The most reasonable explanation is that it was never meant to be taken literally.

JONAH

We have two more instances of this phrase to review. Matthew refers to Jonah. Many claim that Matthew 12 is definitely 72-hours because Jonah is definitely 72-hours. But is it?

I am not going to explore Jonah deeply because I want you to do that yourself. Go ahead. Should you go to verify that claim, you will come away from Jonah unable to prove anything about the exact timing. (I know because I tried for days.) All you will see is the phrase "three days and three nights" with no other time markers to help demonstrate whether it is literal or figurative. Isn't that odd now?

If Jonah does not give any way to prove 72-hours, then Matthew cannot rely on Jonah as proof of 72-hours. Matthew refers to Jonah, no doubt, but not for an exact timing.

MATTHEW AND LUKE

Matthew is one of the synoptic Gospels. It has a parallel in Luke.

(LUK. 11: 29-30) 29 And while the crowds were thickly gathered together, He began to say, “This is an evil generation. It seeks a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah the prophet. 30 For as Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites, so also the Son of Man will be to this generation."

What is missing here? Timing. There is no mention of timing at all. How can it be that the entire point about the sign of Jonah is its chronological precision when Luke doesn't mention time?

Answer: it isn't. A literal 72-hours is not taken from the Gospels, it's read into the Gospels.

Add in that example from Samuel and we see none of the three mentions are meant to be taken literally.

One might say, "But Jesus referred to the example of Jonah, not David." So, what then, this reference of the exact same phrase from Samuel doesn't count? Are we to understand that this one phrase means two completely different things depending on where it is? Should we not expect it to always mean the same thing, if indeed it is so exact a phrase? If it doesn't mean the same thing in each place then the phrase is nigh useless. Who can say what it means?

With Matthew relying on Jonah, and Jonah saying nothing about timing, we must rely on Samuel, and Samuel is clearly not literal. Therefore there is no legitimacy to the claim that the phrase "three days and three nights" must be taken literally.

ESTHER

Esther does not say "three days and three nights" but it does say something quite similar.

(EST. 4: 15-16) 15 Then Esther told them to reply to Mordecai: 16 “Go, gather all the Jews who are present in Shushan, and fast for me; neither eat nor drink for three days, night or day. My maids and I will fast likewise. And so I will go to the king, which is against the law; and if I perish, I perish!”

(EST. 5: 1) Now it happened on the third day that Esther put on her royal robes and stood in the inner court of the king’s palace, across from the king’s house, while the king sat on his royal throne in the royal house, facing the entrance of the house.

Here is another three days and three nights, only it’s worded “three days, night or day”. Esther told Mordecai to fast for three days and nights before she went in to see King Xerxes, but "on the third day" she went in. This means the conversation happened on day 1, therefore the first day was partial, and she went in on the third day, so the third day was also partial. There was no third night.

Once again, not to be understood as 72-hours.

How can the ancient Israelites get away with this? Because that's simply how they counted time. That's inclusive reckoning. Onah! They are using idiomatic expressions. They don't have to be literal. You might just as well obsess over how there can be an apple in your eye, skin on your teeth, or a heart in the earth.

A DISSENT

Now, let's consider those who disagree with my conclusions. Many sources inside and outside of Armstrongism assert, “Adding ‘nights’ makes the phrase strictly literal.”

Oh? Based on what evidence?

Outside the Bible, this phrase is surprisingly more difficult to find than I anticipated. I used AI to locate everything it could find:

• Inanna/Ishtar’s Descent to the Netherworld (Sumerian): After Inanna is killed and hung as a corpse in the underworld, "after three days and three nights had passed," her minister Ninshubur carries out the instructions Inanna had given her before descending into the netherworld.
• The Contendings of Horus and Set (Egyptian): Horus and Set fight, transform into two bears (or hippopotamuses in variants), and “pass three days and three nights” in that form.
• Setna Khamwas and Naneferkaptah (Demotic Egyptian): Setna and the priests of Isis “spend three days and three nights searching in all the tombs on the desert of Coptos,” turning over stelae in search of a hidden tomb.
• Setna Khamwas and Si-Osire (Demotic Egyptian): A Nubian magician threatens to cast sorcery so the people of Egypt “spend three days and three nights seeing no light, only darkness.”
• Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor (Middle Kingdom Egyptian): A sailor is stranded on an island and lies helplessly for three days (some renderings add “and nights”) before encountering a divine serpent.
• Rare mentions in magical papyri: Rituals or preparations that take “three days and three nights.”

That's all it found. That is a very short list. None of these are meant to be chronologically precise.
In each case, “three days and three nights” is a figure of speech indicating a significant but inexact period of time. This means that in every instance outside the Bible, the phrase is not meant to be taken as a literal 72 hours.

Inside the Bible, the phrase “three days and three nights” appears in three verses. Only Samuel includes any additional clue nearby. Esther's phrase, although not exactly the same, has an additional time clue. Neither Samuel nor Esther are 72-hours. That leaves two verses, but they have no additional time indicator close by. They are ambiguous.

But if you think about it, Matthew does have supporting evidence, we just have to hunt for it.

As we saw in the last post, there are twenty one verses which describe the length of Jesus' entombment. Six different phrases are used. All describe one event that happened in one way. The parallel in Luke does not mention time at all. Now, add the evidence of Cleopas' words on the road to Emmaus, where he said Sunday was three days since the trial and crucifixion. Counting inclusively as the Bible does - Friday was three days before Sunday. There is not enough time between Friday and Sunday for "three days and three nights" to be literal. And if an exact 72-hours was the sign Jesus gave, why was there nobody to witness it? What kind of critical sign has no witnesses? By using these other clues, we can be confident "three days and three nights" in Matthew is not a literally 72 hours.

Matthew and Samuel and Esther are not literal. That leaves us with Jonah, which has no additional time indicator close by. 

But if you think about it, Matthew ties to Jonah, which means Jonah ties to Matthew. What we see in Matthew should also apply to Jonah. Either it does, and the time is not meant to be taken literally, or it doesn't, and Jonah is completely ambiguous. Take your pick. In neither case does it support a literal interpretation.

This means every instance in the Bible comes with contextual clues, and in every case the phrase is not meant to be taken as a literal 72 hours.

Someone will say, "But it's the natural reading of the phrase." To our modern minds, perhaps it is. But that is entirely irrelevant. What matters is what it meant to the ancient mind. Proper Bible study is not getting the Bible to think like us, but getting us to think like it.
Someone else may say, "But being idiomatic doesn't mean it cannot be literal in some cases." True! I agree. But possibility is not proof. We must rely on the evidence. We can't just say it might be literal, we have to prove it is literal. And that, the evidence will not allow.

Not a single biblical example gives us a reason to treat the phrase as exactly 72 hours.

Not a single extra-biblical example gives us a reason to treat the phrase as exactly 72 hours.

So, the claim that adding “nights” makes the phrase strictly literal is based on what, exactly? Opinions and guesses. My disagreement is based on what, exactly? All the evidence I could find.

ONE TRUE PHRASE

As I've said multiple times, there are five other phrases used to describe the length of Jesus' entombment. Why is it that we must choose "three days and three nights" over the others?
I'll tell you why: personal preference. 

The entire Wednesday crucifixion scenario hinges on literality of "three days and three nights." It needs it. All the beautiful charts like the one below absolutely require it.

But if that phrase is not literal, then what we have left is "third day" and inclusive reckoning. And as we've seen, that only works in a Friday scenario. Wednesday is cleanly eliminated.

Is the phrase literal? As we saw, no. It is not. This insistence is based on a misunderstanding of Hebrew.
Ergo, we have no reason in or out of the Bible to demand "three days and three nights" is the one true phrase that a proper understanding of Jesus' entombment hinges upon. We have no reason to insist inclusive reckoning is a creation of the Pharisees. We have no reason to believe the Catholics swapped the proper timeline with another. We have no reason to dismiss five other phrases from twenty other verses, because they all mean the same thing. And we have no support for the Wednesday crucifixion timeline.

I cannot agree that, "It has to be literal against all odds because I really want it to be," is a convincing argument.

Whether you hear it from a Minister, a publication, a video, social media, a meme, or otherwise - whether you hear it one time or a thousand times - if you have 700 people on social media all saying "Yeah yeah, that chart makes sense to me," - the claim has no independent support, therefore it must be rejected.

CONCLUSION

Today, we had important questions to answer.

• Is a plain reading the best way to understand this phrase? If plain means literal, then no.
• Does any source treat "three days and three nights" literally? No.
• Does adding "nights" force it to be literal? No.
• Do we, then, have compelling reason to continue insisting the phrase is literal? No.
• Can we find evidence in the Bible for how best to understand "three days and three nights"? Yes.

All four passages that we explored today point in the same direction: none of them were meant to be taken as a literal 72 hours. Extra-biblical references only confirm it.

"Three days and three nights" is an idiomatic expression, not a precise chronological statement. It is paired with "three days", which we learned in the last post has clear meaning. These phrases describe one thing, so they must be speaking the same thing. Six phrases to describe Jesus' entombment and they all tell the same story. What story? Not a Wednesday crucifixion.

Trying to force "three days and three nights" to be a literal 72 hours just to support a Wednesday crucifixion scenario only ignores what the overwhelming weight of evidence is telling us.

The Wednesday crucifixion timeline does not work.

For more, read our post "Three Days and Three Nights" and "Two Sabbaths of Matthew 28".

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It is important that you understand; Everything on this blog is based on the current understanding of each author. Never take anyone's word for it, always prove it for yourself, it is your responsibility. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. ; )

Acts 17:11

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Was Jesus Entombed 72 Hours? - Part I

Is the phrase "three days" meant to be understood as a literal 72 hours? We look at several verses to get some clues.

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We are going to take this in two parts. In this first one, the phrase "three days" and similar phrases. In the second, the phrase "three days and three nights".

We have important questions to answer. How did ancient Israel count days? Were partial days really counted as whole days? Can Sunday morning be three days from Friday evening? By the end, we will see that a 72-hour literalism is not necessary and a Friday crucifixion scenario is entirely possible.

We are going to let the Bible interpret the Bible.

GENESIS

Let's start at the start, where we will see a pattern emerge.

(GEN. 40: 12-13) 12 And Joseph said to him, “This is the interpretation of it: The three branches are three days. 13 Now within three days Pharaoh will lift up your head and restore you to your place, and you will put Pharaoh’s cup in his hand according to the former manner, when you were his butler.

Joseph interprets a dream for a fellow prisoner, the Chief Butler for Pharaoh. The Chief Butler dreamed of three grape vine branches that budded and fruited. Joseph explained the three branches represented three days of imprisonment. Notice very carefully the timing here. Even though the three branches represent three days, his release would come before the third day was complete.

If we force the Bible to be chronologically literal, one would expect two partial branches and one full. But the full three branches are there, each budding and providing grapes, even though a full three days are not there.

This same thing is repeated in verses 18 and 19, without the happy outcome.

Now, let's see something similar in another place.

(GEN. 42: 17-19) 17 So he put them all together in prison three days. 18 Then Joseph said to them the third day, “Do this and live, for I fear God: 19 If you are honest men, let one of your brothers be confined to your prison house; but you, go and carry grain for the famine of your houses.

Joseph, now the Vizier of Egypt, has imprisoned his brothers in retaliation for selling him into slavery those years ago. Notice very carefully the timing here once again. Joseph's brothers were only in the prison for part of one day, then a full day, and then part of another day, same as the Chief Butler we saw before. Sounds pretty much exactly like Jesus’ death. Yet there the Bible says "three days."

Do you see the pattern emerging already?
     A part of a day counts as the whole.

That is how days are counted throughout the Bible. Our term for this method of counting is "inclusive reckoning". The ancient Jews called this the "onah". The story of Joseph demonstrates inclusive reckoning was used even from early in the Bible.

With inclusive reckoning, all items in a count are included in the count, regardless if they are partial or full. The first day, the last day, and all days in between.

When modern Western minds count days, we might say, "Friday to Saturday, Saturday to Sunday; that's two days." Everyone I have ever seen counts that way when they are trying to demonstrate that the Friday crucifixion timeline doesn't work. But that is not how ancient Jewish minds counted days. They would say, "Friday, Saturday, Sunday; that's three days."
We count objects this same way. 1-2-3-4, etc. We wouldn't count eggs in a carton 1-2, 2-3, 3-4. This changes when we count consecutive days. Not so for ancient minds.
All ancient cultures around the Mediterranean counted time inclusively. For example, in Rome, March 25 would be 8 days before April 1. Both the first and last days in the count are included. We would count 7 days. We usually skip the last day in counts like this because that is the destination so why count it. They did not skip the last day, because they counted inclusively.

Do you see how we count differently today? It would not be proper to force our counting style onto the ancient Jews who wrote the Bible.

If we are not using the Biblical method of counting days, we are guaranteed to misunderstand the timing of the crucifixion.

EXODUS

Here is an even more blatantly plain example from Exodus.

(EXO. 19: 10-11) 10 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow, and let them wash their clothes. 11 And let them be ready for the third day. For on the third day the Lord will come down upon Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people."

We could not ask for a more plain example than when God says today, tomorrow, and the third day. What can we conclude? "Third day" means the exact same thing as "day-after-tomorrow."

Understand this happened well into day 1. Moses and the Elders had already gone up and come back down the mountain. Day 1 was well spent. Day 2 would be a full day. On day 3, God would visit the people. This is just like the selections with Joseph.

Do we not see that the Jews were counting time inclusively even from the beginning? It's the same in the New Testament as well.

ACTS AND LUKE

We find another example of inclusive reckoning in Acts 10: 1-30. This is the story of when Peter met Cornelius, the first Gentile to receive the Holy Spirit.

On day 1, after 3 PM Cornelius sends men 36 miles south to Joppa to find Peter.
On day 2, Peter has a vision around noon as Cornelius' men approach Joppa. They stay the night and leave the next day.
On day 3, they travel all day.
On day 4, before 3 PM they arrive at Cornelius' house. In verse 30, Cornelius relates that "four days ago" he sent men.

Cornelius includes his current day in the count. That's inclusive reckoning. Onah!
If we count in the modern, Western way, we would say, "three days ago I sent men," not four. Because we are not using inclusive reckoning.

And yet again, Cornelius ignores the fact that both day 1 and day 4 are only partial days. Day 1 began after 3 PM, and day 4 ends sometime before 3 PM, yet both were included in the count as if they were full days.

Didn't Jesus die at around 3 PM? Yes. According to multiple Gospel accounts, He died around the 9th hour, which equates to 3 PM. The day was practically over. It ended around 6 PM. In Jewish thinking, even at that late hour the day is still included in the count. We can be assured of this by paying attention to Cornelius.

We find another example in Luke 24.

Cleopas and another person (possibly his wife, Mary) were walking to the town of Emmaus on Sunday. Jesus joins them, hiding His identity. Cleopas talks about the events of the past few days. Jesus asks, "What things?" Cleopas responds about the trial and crucifixion, then in verse 21 he says, "Today is the third day since these things happened."

There's that "third day" phrase again. Since we know this is Sunday, we must assign that day 1. Day 2 would be Saturday. Day 3 would be Friday. Friday is the third day before the road to Emmaus discussion. Third day here means "day before yesterday".
A Friday crucifixion scenario works naturally with inclusive reckoning.

Herbert Armstrong was a staunch proponent of the Wednesday crucifixion scenario. He said Jesus died on a Wednesday, on Thursday they set the Roman guards to watch the tomb, on Friday the women of Galilee bought spices, on Saturday Jesus rose from the dead, then on Sunday they found Him alive. He tried to prove this out by counting the wrong way. Let's count the biblical way and see how inclusive reckoning works in this scenario.
Day 1 = Wednesday, day 2 = Thursday, day 3 = Friday. So Friday is the third day from Wednesday. A Wednesday scenario cannot work if we count days as the Bible counts. Saturday is the fourth day from Wednesday. Armstrong also said Cleopas was referring to the setting of the guard. Cleopas never said that. Even so, according to Armstrong, the setting of the guard happened on Thursday. Thursday is the fourth day before Sunday.

None of this works!

For yet another fine example of inclusive reckoning, please see our post "Wednesday Crucifixion? Not Likely".

I was unable to find an example where counting days was clearly done without using inclusive reckoning.

A DISSENT

Now, let's look at an example of someone who disagrees with my conclusions, provided by Herman Hoeh, chief historian of Armstrongism; a man Herbert Armstrong called, "the most accurately informed man in the world."

In his booklet titled "The Crucifixion Was Not On Friday", Hoeh goes to II Chronicles 10, with its parallel in 1 Kings 12. Hoeh then gives us this:

"The people left 'for three days' and did not return until 'after three days' - 'as the king had appointed.' Let us suppose they had first met the king sometime on Friday. As they were ordered to return at the end of three days, they could not have returned before the same time of day the following Monday. Now was Monday “the third day” from the day they had originally met with the King? The first day from that Friday was Saturday; the second day from that Friday was Sunday; and the third day was Monday - exactly the time the king expected them to return."

-Herman Hoeh, "The Crucifixion Was Not On Friday", 1968, pp. 9-10.

Pay very close attention to what Hoeh just did. He makes two unfortunate errors.

1) Hoeh said, "The people left 'for three days' and did not return until 'after three days'." That order is backwards! What Rehoboam told the people to return 'after three days' (v. 5) and they returned on 'the third day' (v.12). You should also know verse 12 is actually a quote of verse 5. Verse 5 doesn't say "after" at all. All this fuss over the word "after" is really making a big deal out of nothing.

2) Hoeh counts incorrectly, using modern counting styles rather than the appropriate inclusive reckoning. We learn elsewhere that Hoeh was fully aware of the onah and inclusive reckoning, he just dismissed it as Pharisaical. But it is not an invention of the Pharisees. The Pharisees coined the phrase "onah" to describe what we call inclusive reckoning, yes, but as we clearly saw in today's post, the counting style is entirely biblical and must not be simply dismissed.

So, not only does Hoeh misquote the selection, he misunderstands the passage entirely. In the end, the best thing we get from Herman Hoeh is a lesson on why paying attention to the details is valuable.

Hoeh's entire point is the people returned precisely when Rehoboam expected them to. With that I agree! If the king asks you to return after the third day but you return on the third day, and everyone is fine with that, then that is a good indicator that everyone understood it the same way and all happened as expected.

I am taking so much time on this for a good reason. It displays something very important. That being, we should accept the phrases "third day", "after three days", and "within three days" all mean exactly the same thing to these people. They were not as chronologically exact as we are. Why is this so important? Because these are the same phrases used to describe Jesus' entombment:

• "The third day" 11 times.
• "In three days" 5 times.
• "After three days" 2 times.
• "On the third day" 1 time.
• "Within three days" 1 time.

Twenty different verses describing one event that happened in one way. They all mean the same thing!

CONCLUSION

Today, we had important questions to answer.

• Does the phrase "three days" mean exactly 72 hours? No.
• Were partial days counted as whole days? Yes.
• How did ancient Israel count days? Inclusively.
• Can Sunday morning be three days from Friday evening? By counting days as the people in the Bible did, yes, it can.

"Three days" means three consecutive days, whether they are full or partial. "Third day" means either "day after tomorrow" or "day before yesterday". The third day from Friday is Sunday. The third day from Wednesday is Friday. The Wednesday crucifixion timeline does not work because it relies on counting the wrong way.

A literalist will insist on 72-hours, but they base that on what, exactly? I find no evidence in the text to support this. My disagreement is based on what, exactly? Multiple verses and cultural context.

We cannot simply take everything literally. If we must take everything Jesus said literally, then we must believe that for 72 hours Jesus was literally in the beating heart, the cardio-vascular system, of the planet. He did say "heart of the earth" after all. No one has a problem with that part of His statement being idiomatic. Yes, dear reader, God sometimes uses colloquialisms and slang terms to communicate with us.

For more, read our post "Three Days and Three Nights".

In the next post, we will see the twenty-first verse where the Bible describes Jesus' entombment.

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It is important that you understand; Everything on this blog is based on the current understanding of each author. Never take anyone's word for it, always prove it for yourself, it is your responsibility. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. ; )

Acts 17:11

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Does John 11 Define A Biblical Day?

(JON. 11: 8-9) 8 The disciples said to Him, “Rabbi, lately the Jews sought to stone You, and are You going there again?” 9 Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours in the day? If anyone walks in the day, he does not stumble, because he sees the light of this world."

Many are the times when I have heard someone point to John 11: 9 in an attempt to support a 72-hour length of time for the phrase "three days and three nights" in Matthew 12: 40. "Jesus comes right out and tells us precisely how long a day is," they say, "so we know He had to be 72-hours in the tomb." Are they right about that? Is it truly appropriate to take "are there not twelve hours in the day" and apply that to the phrase "three days and three nights"? Or, are there other mitigating factors we should be aware of before we go this route?

Let's just start off by putting this out there - it is an undeniable fact that the ancient Hebrews (and most of the surrounding cultures besides) did recognize twelve hours in a day and twelve hours in a night, making twenty-four hours altogether. Hebrews apparently got this from the Babylonians, who got it from the Egyptians. Nothing at all that I say here should be understood as disputing or taking away from that fact. It is true.

Does that mean the game is over? Set and match? Let's investigate this further.

IDIOMATIC EXPRESSIONS

Their day had twenty-four hours just as much as ours does. But is it true we always mean a twelve or a twenty-four hour period every single time we say the word day? No. We can use words in colloquial ways. When we use a word in a non-literal sense, it is called an idiom.

Webster's first definition of idiom is:

"1. An expression in the usage of a language that is peculiar to itself either in having a meaning that cannot be derived from the conjoined meanings of its elements (such as up in the air for "undecided") or in its grammatically atypical use of words (such as give way)"
-Mirriam-Webster, "Idiom", https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/idiom

The meaning of an idiom cannot be derived from its elements. In other words, you say one thing but mean something else entirely. Do you know what the phrase "tickling the ivories" means? It means playing the piano. Every culture has idioms, and the Bible is full of them.
Perhaps the most well known is this:

(PRO. 7: 2) Keep my commands and live, And my law as the apple of your eye.

Is there an apple in your eye? No. Not literally. There is not a Macintosh inside your eye fluid or a Red Delicious in the reflection. Here's a fun fact for you - "apple of your eye" is an English idiom, not a Hebrew one. The literal translation is "little man of the eye". It just means your pupil.
Here is another:

(JOB. 19: 20) My bone clings to my skin and to my flesh, and I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.

Are your teeth covered in flesh? No. Not literally. A completely other understanding is hiding in that phrase.
Here is an example we all know:

(GEN. 4: 1a) Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain...

You know exactly what is really meant when the Bible says "knew". They say it, but they don't say it. Idioms are very handy for that sort of application.
Here is an example from the very verse we focus on most:

(MAT. 12: 40) 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.

Jesus was placed inside the literal beating heart within the cardio-vascular system of the earth? No. An idiom is right here in exact same verse which people demand is the most literal of all.
Let's do just one more:

(ISA. 2: 12) For the day of the Lord of hosts shall come upon everything proud and lofty, upon everything lifted up - and it shall be brought low -

I chose this example specifically because it uses the word day in a way that is neither twelve nor twenty-four hours. Taken all together, the many examples of the phrase "day of the Lord" will paint a very clear picture that this is a period of time far beyond a single day. The word day is not always literal, dear reader. It just isn't.

These are all examples of non-literal uses of words and phrases. They are idiomatic expressions. 

Today, we can use the word day every bit as literally or idiomatically as anyone else. Take for example the phrase "in my day." It doesn't mean, "In my literal twelve or twenty-four hour period of time." It means, roughly, "Back when I was in my prime." Jesus used the phrase "my day" (JON. 8: 56). He didn't mean Abraham saw his literal 24-hours. For another example, "Have a nice day!" Do we intend people only to have twelve nice hours, or for their period of niceness to end at sunset? No. Not at all. It was never intended to be chronologically specific. Sometimes language can just be unspecific. It's one of the hardest parts of literal translations of the Bible, and why we sometimes need thought-for-thought translations.

A person went to a job interview at 3 o'clock PM. They did well and got the job. The hiring manager said, "You're hired. You start in two days." Two days later, the employee arrived precisely at 3 o'clock PM. The manager saw the person walking in, and angrily said, "What is the meaning of coming here at this hour? Turn right back around and go home. You're fired!"
Why? The employee arrived exactly forty-eight hours later, didn't they? But starting time was 8 o'clock AM, not 3 o'clock PM. When the manager said, "in two days," their intent was at the appropriate hour on the second day. It is still the case, even in our mathematically and chronologically meticulous day and age, that day is not always meant to be literally twelve or twenty-four hours.

A minute has sixty seconds, does it not? Must it follow that every time we use the word minute it only refers to a literal sixty-second period of time? No. For example, we say "a hot minute." When things get hot, they expand. A hot minute is a completely inexact period of time that is longer than a minute. It has no specific meaning at all. It's the same when we exclaim, "Give me a minute!" We don't mean to say, "Give me precisely sixty seconds because that's the definition of a minute." No. We just need more time. It doesn't matter how much time, precisely, just however much more it takes to finish the task at hand.

Why waste so many words on this simple concept? Two reasons. First, to show that words with specific meanings like day can be idiomatic under the right circumstances. Second, because I intend to demonstrate an inconsistency. It is the tendency of some people to apply a literal meaning to day when they want to force the length of Jesus' interment to be precisely 72-hours. They will go right back to defining a day loosely elsewhere. Let's see that.

CONSISTENTLY INCONSISTENT

As I pointed out in my article "Three Days and Three Nights", the only verse in the New Testament that uses the phrase “three days and three nights” is Matthew 12 verse 40. There are twenty other places where the length of Jesus interment was described. In all of these twenty other instances, none of them repeat Matthew 12: 40. Here is how they play out in the NKJV:

• "The third day" 11 times.
• "In three days" 5 times.
• "After three days" 2 times.
• "On the third day" 1 time.
• "Within three days" 1 time.

There is no possible way all of these can be taken literally. All twenty-one instances (these 20 plus Matthew 12: 40) speak of one and the same event. One event that played out one way described with six different phrases. They cannot all be literal. Every single person who just set John 11: 9 as their standard to define day as exactly a twelve or twenty-four hour period of time in order to make Matthew 12: 40 into 72-hours, will now abandon that standard for most if not all of these other phrases.

If someone, unwisely, decides not to abandon their literal standard, they cause a terrible issue. Let's see that. Let's replace the word day with twelve-hour period.

• The third twelve-hour period.
• In three twelve-hour periods.
• After three twelve hour periods.
• On the third twelve hour period.
• Within three twelve hour periods.

Do you see the problem caused? The, in, after, on, within... creates several different resurrection times. If we insist on a strict literal interpretation, we turn the Bible into an inconsistent mess. No one involved agreed on the length. Not even Jesus Himself!

Of those, if we only look at what Jesus said, we see: "the third day" 8 times, "in three days" 1 time, and "after three days" 1 time. One man speaking of His own resurrection in four different ways (these three plus "three days and three nights"). When we force a literal definition onto the word day, we see only inconsistency in the words that came from Jesus' own mouth.

There is but one way to solve this issue: they all mean the exact same thing and day is not meant to be taken as a literal twelve or twenty-four hours in any of them. Not even in "three days and three nights".

EMPTY ASSERTIONS AND PREDETERMINED CONCLUSIONS

It seems we have an option. I have shown you why I think day should not be literal. Now we need to ask, what evidence is there to support applying a literal definition to "three days and three nights"?

Please supply a reason why we should. We need some kind of legitimate, biblical reason, not just, "Because it suits our desired outcome of Jesus not dying on a Friday." Demanding a certain definition without plotting out support for it makes it just that - a baseless assertion. If this were some petty point, nobody would really care. But it's not. This is a premier claim for some people, and they use it to accuse billions of other Christians of being pagans. Evidence for something this important is required. So, where is this evidence?

Having spent decades in a church that taught me to believe it should be literal, and having read thousands of articles and booklets over the years, and having reviewed many here at ABD, we have yet to see any particularly convincing evidence. No sermon from any minister I have ever heard, nor article from any author I have ever read or reviewed, nor any response from any person I have ever debated on this topic, has given any convincing reason why we should take that phrase literally. It is just assumed we should. So, I went to look for my own evidence. I went over in my article "Three Days and Three Nights" how there is no other biblical reason. In fact, there are several legitimate biblical reasons why it should not be defined literally. "Three days and three nights" is a known and quite ancient idiom.

Why is "three days and three nights" held as the gold standard, but those twenty other utterances are shoved aside? I will tell you why. Because the claim of 72-hours in the tomb absolutely relies on it. It is necessary in order to get the result they went looking for in the first place.
But, as we hope you have seen, there is no good Biblical reason to take the phrase literally. There is no good reason to showcase it to the exclusion of the others. Therefore, "three days and three nights" is simply a convenient means to an predetermined end. It is a conclusion looking for support.

Predetermined conclusions are not a very good thing. You know how scientific research is suspect when it has been funded by a special interest? It's practically the same thing here. Does that mean it is wrong? No, not necessarily. But it makes peer review more important. What happens when we peer review the 72-hour assertion in the patented As Bereans Did gauntlet? As I said, it comes up completely unsupported. We have a desired outcome looking for evidence and suppressing anything that disagrees.

One strict definition for day is used in one place, and another loose definition is used in twenty other places. One verse is emphasized, twenty others are shoved aside. The modern way to count time exclusively is used, and the way Hebrews count time inclusively is ignored. The demonstrably false claims of Alexander Hislop are promoted, and the historically documented ideas of the Pharisees and the early church are dismissed. The 12-hour definition of day is insisted upon in one verse, and the words sabbaton and prosabbaton used by Matthew and Mark are redefined out of existence.

Did I lose you there? I am referring to topics covered in other articles. See our articles "Three Days and Three Nights", "The Two Sabbaths of Matthew 28", and "Easter FAQ" for more.

There really is nothing whatsoever to support the conclusion. What some people are doing with John 11: 9 is neither intellectually honest nor consistent.

THREE DAYS IS FOUR DAYS?

I assure you, dear reader, that even after 14 years, we are still searching the topic, trying to be as even-handed in everything as we can. Perhaps we have missed something. Perhaps someone noticed some new detail everyone else overlooked. We have not come across anything that persuades us to change our minds.
That isn't to say we haven't seen new ideas. There are some. For example, there are people out there saying "the third day" is actually four days.

To explain, let's turn to the first chapter of the Gospel of John.
Some of John the Baptist's disciples are meeting Jesus for the first time and being called to follow Him, then they head together to Cana for the wedding where Jesus turns water into wine. There is a time progression described here that we need to see.

John 1: 29 says, "on the next day," then v.35 says, "again, the next day," then v.43 says, "the following day," and finally we come to John 2: 1 which says, "on the third day". Did you catch that? Day, day, day, third day.  ??
Some people look at that and conclude, "John says 'on the third day' when it was actually the fourth day, so 'third day' is a phrase that refers to the fourth day."

You might be saying, "Huh. I never noticed that before. That's really interesting." If so, that's fine. But please follow that up with, "I am going to go see if there is any other example anywhere within the Bible or without where 'the third day' indicates a fourth day, and if not, this conclusion is merely a simple misunderstanding which needs to be clarified."

There are several examples showing this is not how the Bible uses the phrase "third day". The Hebrews counted inclusively. The phrase "third day" is easily recognizable as being equivalent to saying 'day after tomorrow' (e.g., EXO. 19: 10-11; HOS. 5: 2). You can even find an example of "fourth day", where the timeline is meticulously laid out and there is no doubt that four days are involved (ACT. 10 all). In all of the Bible commentaries I dug through, none agreed that "third day" can be understood as "fourth day". In all the oldest and most reliable extra-biblical sources I read, I found no hint of support. So, we have no examples within the Bible or outside of it to support the claim that third day means fourth day.

It doesn't even make sense chronologically.

The distance between where John was baptizing in the Jordan in Judea, somewhere due west of Jericho, and Cana of Galilee where the wedding was, is roughly 60 miles in a perfectly straight line (verified on Google Maps). If you walk at a steady 4 miles per hour, it would take 15 hours. The terrain is rough, and Samaria lay in between the two. Jews would never go into Samaria unless they absolutely had to. The Bible makes no mention of it. Some time later, when Jesus did go through Samaria, the Apostles protested strongly. Clearly, this was not something they were accustomed to doing. We can reasonably assume they went around at this point. This means they would have to first go east into the Decapolis to go north and then west into Galilee. Your 60-mile trek just got much longer. The only way that journey could have been made in one day is by purchasing transportation, which Jesus was not accustomed to doing.

One cannot simply walk from the Jordan River on day three to Cana on day four. That interpretation is prohibitively difficult. So, I feel justified in rejecting it.

There are four explanations for John's choice of words:

1. John is referring to Tuesday, which was called 'the third day'.
2. John starts the count at John 1: 35 where Jesus first gains a following.
3. John means it had been three days since John 1: 43 where Jesus decides to go to Galilee.
4. John means it is the third day since Jesus entered the area of Cana.

Options #1 and #2 are weak, and the hardest to accept since they are so arbitrary. Options #3 and #4 are strong. I feel the more reasonable of those is option #3. They left John the Baptists on day one, on foot, and arrived in the region of Cana on day three.

There is no clear way to settle which is the correct option, but it is abundantly clear 'the third day' cannot be defined as 'the fourth day'. This is not only unsupported but contraindicated from the rest of the biblical and extra-biblical evidence. It is simply not a possible option.
Yet, someone is out there right this minute relying on it as part of their Biblical interpretation (in this case, the person making this argument wanted to support a Thursday crucifixion).

These are the wild things we get when people start with a conclusion -- making the cherry-picked evidence go in the direction of the pre-determined conclusion, rather than allowing the total evidence to lead us to the reasonable conclusion. What we should be doing is letting the Bible interpret the Bible.

CONCLUSION

Is a day defined as 12-hours in the New Testament? Yes, that is a possible option. We granted that at the start. But must that definition always apply to the word day? No. We demonstrated that. In fact, forcing a literal definition in every instance of day causes terrible issues for resurrection timing.
More importantly, does John 11: 9 define the meaning of Matthew 12: 40? Does it apply for "three days and three nights"? From what we have seen in this article and others, I say no.

If there is an option, we need a good reason why we should choose one or the other.

Those who argue Jesus was entombed for 72-hours make assertions without a compelling explanation why. We investigate the claims, and they keep coming up making the same mistakes over and over again. Their conclusion depends on proof-texting and too many other things I categorize as nothing shy of intellectual dishonesty.

As for the evidence we provide for our conclusion, aside what I have shown you here today, As Bereans Did has several articles where we lay our case out in detail. Some of them I have already mentioned. We invite you to our Categories page where our articles are listed under the topic Easter.

All of the best evidence leads us to conclude the phrase "three days and three nights" is a very ancient and known idiom that was never meant to be understood as literally 72-hours. Choose exegeses over eisegesis!

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It is important that you understand; Everything on this blog is based on the current understanding of each author. Never take anyone's word for it, always prove it for yourself, it is your responsibility. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. ; )

Acts 17:11

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Firstfruits and the Beauty of God's Timing

Herbert Armstrong was absolutely right when he said,

"Few professing Christians have ever thought to question or to prove this "Good-Friday-Easter" tradition. Yet the Bible tells us to prove (test) all things."
-Herbert W Armstrong, "The Resurrection Was Not On Sunday", 1972, p3

He lived in a time when average people generally did not have access to information. They didn't know anyone who questioned or proved, and didn't think to question or prove. When I tried to question Easter, I got garbage answers from people who were completely unprepared. I took their lack of ability to explain as evidence there was no good answer. For that mistake, I served a 26-year stint in Armstrongism.

These people had answers. I asked, and they PROVED! (Armstrong would always capitalize for emphasis.) But did they? Armstrongism was feeding me completely one-sided answers; the same few points over and over, which I was not allowed to question. I went from not knowing I should question, to knowing I should not question. I thought we were supposed to question and prove! No. Only enough to get you in the door. After that, it just gets you back out the door again.

Is confirmation bias and beating up on straw men really the same thing as proving? Was it really any different than when I questioned Easter at the outset? There are two sides to every story, but after all those years it dawned on me I had still only heard the testimony from one side. But if that was so, then I had never really PROVED either side of this. All this time I had been hearing only what I wanted to hear. This made me no different than the Easter-keepers who only heard what they wanted to hear. I didn't need to be coddled, I needed proof! But I didn't know Easter from Adam. Who was going to give me the answers I still needed? No one. I was going to have to get the answers myself. Thus began a 16-year journey here at As Bereans Did.

I made life-altering choices based on the information I had at the time. Now, dear reader, we have access to better information. Now we can finally PROVE as we should. As Bereans Did has several articles on Easter. Those articles do the heavy lifting on topics like "three days and three nights", the two Sabbaths of Matthew 28, the Quartodeciman Controversy, Constantine the Great, Eostra, Old Covenant vs New Covenant, and all the rest. See our Categories page for a list.

In my last post I promised another article. I did this because I have stumbled across something that I want to share with you. I was reading through the article "History of Easter - part I" when I was sidetracked reading about the Feast of Firstfruits. That led me to a little detail I thought was interesting enough to warrant its own article.

Today's post is going to be about the beauty and intricacy of God's timing. Specifically, the timing of Good Friday and Easter Sunday (the timing everybody loves to hate) and how it fits with the Feast of Firstfruits. But to get to that point, we need to learn about the Feast of Firstfruits.

FEAST OF FIRSTFRUITS

Firstfruits (Yom HaBikkurim = Day of Firsfruits) was an important ceremony within the timing of the Days of Unleavened Bread. We can read about it in Leviticus 23.

(LEV. 23: 9-11) 9 And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 10 “Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: ‘When you come into the land which I give to you, and reap its harvest, then you shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest to the priest. 11 He shall wave the sheaf before the Lord, to be accepted on your behalf; on the day after the Sabbath the priest shall wave it. 12 And you shall offer on that day, when you wave the sheaf, a male lamb of the first year, without blemish, as a burnt offering to the Lord. 13 Its grain offering shall be two-tenths of an ephah of fine flour mixed with oil, an offering made by fire to the Lord, for a sweet aroma; and its drink offering shall be of wine, one-fourth of a hin. 14 You shall eat neither bread nor parched grain nor fresh grain until the same day that you have brought an offering to your God; it shall be a statute forever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.

The Day of Firstfruits was the very day when the Wave Sheaf Offering was performed.
The Days of Unleavened Bread, which the Jews call Passover, was a harvest festival. Actually, Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles were all harvest festivals. Passover was the festival of the first harvest of the year - the barley harvest. Since the first and best of everything is dedicated to God, the barley harvest couldn't begin in earnest until after the Wave Sheaf Offering. And the Wave Sheaf Offering couldn't happen until the barley was ready to harvest. The ripening of the barley and the Spring Equinox keep Passover tied to its particular time of the year. The Day of Firstfruits also helped to tie Passover to Pentecost. The 50-day count to Pentecost starts on Firstfruits.
The Day of Firstfruits was actually pretty important.

Firstfruits wasn't emphasized by Herbert Armstrong, therefore it is mostly overlooked by the Church of God splinter groups. Oh, you'll get mention of it here and there from detail-oriented ministers, but most people glossed right over it. Here is where I would usually give my catch phrase "The law! The law! Just not THAT law!" and where Armstrongists would object that this was ceremonial so it was done away, then I would respond that if you keep Pentecost then it isn't ceremonial and keeping 2% of the law is not keeping the law. Yada yada. Round and round it goes. Today's article isn't meant to be so polemic as that.

There is a fairly interesting detail hidden in here which you probably glossed right over. I'll put it here again for you -
     "On the day after the Sabbath the priest shall wave it." (v.11)

Why is that important, you ask? Because, as fate would have it, that little word right there - Sabbath - caused issues that I think display the beauty and intricacy of God's timing.

WHICH SABBATH?

That's the big money question right there. Which Sabbath is verse 11 referring to? In my last article, I shared this quote from the UCG, "Two kinds of 'Sabbaths' leads to confusion." Not in Matthew 28, no, but in Leviticus 23 it really does. 

If you're here reading this blog, you already know there are two kinds of Sabbaths: weekly Sabbaths (Saturday) and annual holy days. In a multi-day festival like the Days of Unleavened Bread, you will always have at least one weekly Sabbath. By the nature of the DOUB, you will also have two annual Sabbaths - the first day and the last day. One feast, two kinds of Sabbaths.

When you have a thousand years to think on things, details like the word Sabbath can cause big disputes. By the time Jesus was born, that Sabbath in v.11 was interpreted in two very different ways. The Sadducees decided the regular weekly Sabbath was the one being spoken of. For them, the date didn't matter, only the day of the week - Sunday. The Pharisees, on the other hand, tied it to the annual Sabbath. Why tie the Wave Sheaf to a regular weekly Sabbath when you're reading a section of Torah detailing annual Sabbaths? For them, the day of the week didn't matter, only the date - the 16th. In any given year, there were two completely incompatible interpretations of the timing of the Day of Firstfruits.

You can read about this topic on any number of Jewish sources (e.g., Chabad).

Harder to find is information on when other Jewish sects observed the Wave Sheaf. From what I can find, Kenneth Strand (at the time of Andrews University) claims the Essenes sided with the Sadducees and observed after the weekly Sabbath.

We have mentioned in other articles the Church of God splinter groups disagree on when to keep Pentecost in years where the first day of Unleavened Bread falls on a Saturday. The nature of this debate is is why.

Which side was in the right? The Bible doesn't clarify elsewhere. If it were clear, there wouldn't be a debate. I am not going to attempt an answer. That is not the point of this article. I wish to show something quite different. I for one am amazed at something good that comes from these debates. I see God glorifying Himself in them.

I'll explain how in a bit! Don't rush me!

JESUS - FIRST OF THE FIRSTFRUITS

I said earlier that the Wave Sheaf is mentioned by the more detail-oriented ministers in Armstrongism. Some use it to dispute over the timing of Pentecost. The better sermons would explain how Jesus fulfills the symbolism of the Wave Sheaf offering. I like to give credit where credit is due - and these ministers deserve credit for being correct.
See? We at ABD always admit where people are right.

Christ is called Firstfruits in I Corinthians 15: 20 & 23. Christ is also indirectly called the Firstfruits in Romans 11: 16. The idea of associating Jesus with the firstfruits is an old one. Granted, Jesus isn't the only one associated with it. All Christians will eventually be associated. But that's for another article. Suffice it to say it is possible to demonstrate a tie between Jesus and Firstfruits.

Know that when Christ is called Firstfruits in I Corinthians, this is in reference to resurrection from the dead. The entire chapter is, overall, about resurrection.

(I COR. 20: 20-23) 20 But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. 21 For since by man came death, by Man also came the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive. 23 But each one in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, afterward those who are Christ’s at His coming.

God isn't interested in harvesting barley. Ultimately, we are the harvest God has planted. Jesus is the very first of the harvest. "The firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep." Firstfruits and resurrection are linked so closely that, at least in Corinthians, Jesus' resurrection is the fulfillment of the Day of Firstfruits.

Taking what we've seen about Firstfruits, let's put that together with Passover.

Passover is fulfilled by Jesus' crucifixion, as He is our Passover lamb. The first day of Unleavened Bread is fulfilled by Jesus' death taking away our sin, as the leaven in the bread is representative of sin. And the Firstfruits is fulfilled by Jesus' resurrection, as He is the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. Three days that point directly to Christ.

Now that we've talked about imagery, let's talk about the beauty of how that played out.

GOD FULFILLS EVERYTHING

Remember how the Sadducees always put Firstfruits on a Sunday while the Pharisees always put it after the holy day? Imagine what a mess that must have been. The powerful and wealthy yet less numerous Sadducees, in control of the Temple, performing rituals according to their own views, versus the numerous and fastidious Pharisees, tithing to the last seed, wanting everything done according to their views. It had to have been a frustrating dynamic even on normal days. Yet, as providence would have it, in a Friday-Sunday scenario, both systems snap into alignment. But only in a Friday-Sunday crucifixion scenario.

I want to put a chart up for you so you can visualize what I just said:

	Nissan 13 Thursday	Nissan 13/14 Thu/Fri	Nissan 14 Friday	Nissan 14/15 Fri/Sat	Nissan 15 Saturday	Nissan 15/16 Sat/Sun	Nissan 16 Sunday
	Day	Night	Day	Night	Day	Night	Day
Traditional		Passover	Passover	First Day UB	First Day UB	Firstfruits	Wave Sheaf
Pharisees		Passover	Passover	First Day UB	First Day UB	Firstfruits	Wave Sheaf
Sadducees		Passover	Passover	First Day UB	First Day UB	Firstfruits	Wave Sheaf

The "Traditional" row shows how the traditional Good Friday-Easter Sunday scenario fits. For the Pharisees (and modern Jews), Firstfruits could be on any day of the week but it was always on the 16th. For the Sadducees, it was always on the same day of the week, Sunday, but it could be on any date.

See how that lines up? Only in a Friday-Sunday scenario is everything aligned. I find this to be an absolutely wonderful testament to the intricacy and beaty of God's timing. When our God says "fullness of time" He really means it!

What would this look like in the Thursday-Sunday and Wednesday-Saturday timelines?

Thursday-Sunday

	Nissan 14 Thursday	Nissan 14/15 Thu/Fri	Nissan 15 Friday	Nissan 15/16 Fri/Sat	Nissan 16 Saturday	Nissan 16/17 Sat/Sun	Nissan 17 Sunday
	Day	Night	Day	Night	Day	Night	Day
Thu-Sun	Passover	First Day UB	First Day UB	Sabbath / Firstfruits?	Sabbath / Wave Sheaf?	Firstfruits?	Wave Sheaf?
Pharisees	Passover	First Day UB	First Day UB	Sabbath / Firstfruits	Sabbath / Firstfruits		Wave Sheaf?
Sadducees	Passover	First Day UB	First Day UB	Sabbath	Sabbath	Firstfruits	Wave Sheaf

For the Thursday-Sunday scenario, you now have a choice for Firstfruits. Which will it be, the Saturday or the Sunday? That all depends on who is writing the article you read. For the Pharisees, Firstfruits moves to Saturday because it is the 16th and comes after the annual holy day on Friday. But now there is a problem. Usually, an homer of barley was cut immediately after sundown at the start of the Firstfruits, then the Wave Sheaf happened the next morning. With Firstfruits on a double-Sabbath, neither of those can happen. The Wave Sheaf would have to be postponed. Except, Exodus says not to delay this kind of ceremony.

(EXO. 22: 29a) You shall not delay to offer the first of your ripe produce and your juices.

Whether they delayed or not is beside the point. The point here is, the perfect alignment is ruined. Look at the chaos in that chart.

Wednesday-Saturday

	Nissan 15 Thursday	Nissan 15/16 Thu/Fri	Nissan 16 Friday	Nissan 16/17 Fri/Sat	Nissan 17 Saturday	Nissan 17/18 Sat/Sun	Nissan 18 Sunday
	Day	Night	Day	Night	Day	Night	Day
Wed-Sat	First Day UB	Firstfruits?	Wave Sheaf?	Sabbath	Sabbath	Firstfruits?	Wave Sheaf?
Pharisees	First Day UB	Firstfruits	Wave Sheaf	Sabbath	Sabbath
Sadducees	First Day UB			Sabbath	Sabbath	Firstfruits	Wave Sheaf

For the Wednesday-Saturday scenario, you again have a choice for Firstfruits. With whom will you side, the Pharisees or the Sadducees? Again, that depends on the opinion of who is writing what you are reading. For the Pharisees, Firstfruits moves to Friday, while nothing at all happens on Friday for the Sadducees. (Why didn't the women go to the tomb on Friday?) As you can see, this scenario completely ruins the beauty of the alignment.

A Friday Firstfruits complicates the symbolism of Jesus' resurrection fulfilling Firstfruits. Pharisees would never agree that He did. He was resurrected two days afterward. Alignment obliterated!

If you know what Armstrongism teaches about the Last Supper, then you know they claim Jesus was correcting the timing of the Jews. That means the slaughter of the lambs should be moved to Tuesday and Jesus was crucified a day later than He should have been. That wreaks havoc on the imagery of Jesus as our Passover Lamb. 
This time scenario ruins the imagery of Passover and Firstfruits. How does that fix the timing exactly?

Read our article "History of Easter - part I". In it we talk about whether Jesus was correcting the timing of Passover when He ate the Lord's Supper a day early.

Notice how the alignment gets uglier and more chaotic the farther away you go from the Traditional timing. Contrast that with the beauty of the traditional timing and the intricacy of the planning that must have gone into it on God's part. The alignment only happens in the traditional Friday-Sunday scenario. What a little detail, and easy to miss. Yet God did not miss it.

You will never see a chart like this in any Church of God splinter group's material. It would never occur to them to make one in the first place. The information is just as much in front of them as it is you, yet they cherry pick right past it. They don't concern themselves with things that don't support their desired outcomes. And they most definitely do not make charts that show there could be issues with their predetermined conclusions. Too much money is at stake.

It's about time we took Herbert Armstrong's advice to "prove (test) all things".

CONCLUSION

At the start of this article, I said, "I for one am utterly amazed at something good that comes from these debates. I see God glorifying Himself in them." I hope now you understand what I meant.

Is this some slam dunk of a point I'm making today? Standing on its own, no. But it is interesting! Good thing this point doesn't stand by itself. Taken with the evidence in our other articles we have written for you, it builds a decent case.

When we genuinely prove something, we look at all of the evidence, both for and against. Not like our friends in the Church of God splinter groups who only look at evidence for their claims, and hide everything else. If we refuse to accept any contrary evidence even exists, how are we proving? We here at As Bereans Did spent most of our lives in Armstrongism. We know what is said and what evidence is given. We don't deny it. What we realized we hadn't done was exactly what Herbert Armstrong said to do in the first place - really prove out the Friday-Sunday scenario. Well, against all expectations, turns out there is quite a bit to it when we let the Bible interpret the Bible, use the right definitions of words, count like a Hebrew, take into account extra-Biblical evidence, and genuinely try to poke holes in our own understanding in order to let the truth just be what it is.

God is a God of order, not chaos. He defeats chaos. Because of some points in the law that were not clarified, such as which Sabbath should mark the start of the Day of Firstfruits, the Jews fell into disagreement. The Jews debated timing and ended up with two incompatible timing scenarios. God, being wiser and more capable than all our greatest faults, found a way to satisfy everything. He patiently waited, and when the fullness of time had come, He acted. Truly, He was up to the challenge of whatever our confusion threw at Him. He practically wraps it all up in a pretty bow. Praise the Lord! Glory and laud and honor to the One who sits on the throne, surrounded by beauty and power, and who humbled Himself for us so we could be with Him.

And this alignment only happens in the traditional Friday-Sunday scenario.

God bless you, dear reader! You are why ABD exists. Thanks for reading.

If you have more questions about Easter and timing, please read our "Easter FAQ". I update it from time to time.

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It is important that you understand; Everything on this blog is based on the current understanding of each author. Never take anyone's word for it, always prove it for yourself, it is your responsibility. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. ; )

Acts 17:11

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Refusing To Understand

Hello readers! It’s me again. I had retired from blogging. I came out of retirement, briefly, to write this post. And the most succinct thing I can say about it is - I don’t know why I do this to myself. 

Lately, I have been working on updating the Easter FAQ (if you’ve never read it, or haven’t read it in a while, please do check it out, we answer almost everything there). After finishing, an idea popped into my head. I haven’t been to a Church of God website in a couple years. I was curious to see if they’ve improved their research skills. Maybe all of this information on the Interwebs has gotten through. Maybe things have changed for the better. I figured the most recent article on Easter from the United Church of God should be a fairly good representative. So, I pulled up the showpiece from 2023, “Good Friday + Easter Sunday It Doesn’t Add Up!” by Scott Ashley and Mario Seiglie.

Why, oh why do I do this to myself!?

Have research skills improved? No. Has intellectual honesty increased? No. Have they stopped posting the same old nonsense from 75 years ago? No. Have they stopped posting blatantly false information? Sadly, no.

Let’s see if the patented As Bereans Did gauntlet still works. It might need a little oil.

WHAT SIGN DID JESUS GIVE?

Mr. Ashley and Mr. Seiglie start with the classics, and quote Matthew 12: 40.

“This was the only specific sign Jesus gave that He was the promised Messiah: ‘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.’”

It's the good old “72 hours is the only sign Jesus gave” claim. We address this in depth in our 2013 article “Three Days and Three Nights”. Where did they get this claim? From Herbert Armstrong.

"He expressly declared that the only sign He would give to prove He was the Messiah was that He should be just three days and three nights in the rock-hewn sepulcher in 'the heart of the earth.' "
-Herbert Armstrong, "The Resurrection Was Not On Sunday", 1972, p.4

But let’s ask - is that the only specific sign Jesus gave? No.

Jesus gave one sign, stated in two ways.
In Matthew 12: 39-40 & 16: 4, and Luke 11: 29-30, He gave the sign of Jonah the prophet. Only Matthew 12 mentions time. The others do not. So, are the specifics of the timing really the point when only one selection out of three mentions it? Jonah is mentioned in all three. Some people can't see past the time aspect as if that's all there is to it. There is another thing to consider.
When we go to John 2: 18-19, we see an entirely different sign, the sign of the temple being destroyed and rebuilt in three days. Notice, three days, not three days and three nights. Seems pretty specific to me.
So, straight off the starting line, the UCG is wrong. That temple sign means the sign of Jonah is not the only one.

Yet, Jesus said only one sign would be given. A clear Bible contradiction? No. If we understand what Jesus was really referring to. Both the sign of Jonah and the sign of the Temple are the same sign, spoken in two ways. That sign is: His death and resurrection.
That is the one and only sign.

Ashley and Seigli will disagree, of course, because the founder of their church said this:

"That evidence was not the fact of the resurrection itself. It was the length of time He would repose in His grave, before being resurrected."
-Herbert Armstrong, "The Resurrection Was Not On Sunday", 1972, p.4

But as you can see with your own eyes, it really was the fact of His resurrection after all. There was a time component in the resurrection, but the time component itself is not the sign.

There was one sign stated in two ways. Just as Jonah and the Temple are one sign spoken of in two ways; the phrases "three days and three nights" and "three days" are one time period spoken of in two ways. It's the same.

We have quite a bit more for you on this topic in our article "Three Days and Three Nights".

Now that we know what the only sign actually is - the fact of a death and a resurrection - we can put to bed any talk about, "The only sign is a literal 72-hour three days and three nights." That was never the sign. If the time were the sign, don't you suppose someone would have been there to witness it? The only people there were Roman guards who were passed out in fear. Exact time isn't much of a sign if nobody witnessed it. But that He was dead and came back on the third day .. no lack of witnesses for that sign.
The whole claim about 72-hours is nothing but a gross oversimplification of the intricacies and beauty of the Biblical narrative. (That's for another article.)

These UCG authors aren’t exactly hitting a bullseye on Jesus’ signs. I imagine this is going to devolve into arguing over what the definition of “specific” is.

MATH DOESN’T WORK IF YOU DO IT WRONG

Next stop is the well-worn argument about Friday to Sunday not being 72 hours. 

Did you know you can use the truth to misdirect and deceive? I’ve read countless times in my day how, “Satan quotes the Bible, too.” It is actually true that Friday evening to Sunday morning is not 72-hours. But could there be a very important detail we are not being shown? After that last section about signs, can we be confident Ashley and Seiglie have looked at all of the evidence? I don’t think so.

If we let the Bible interpret the Bible (people still do that, right?), we might be able to go in search for the Bible’s own definition of “three days and three nights”. Let’s do that now.

Jesus refers to Jonah. Is there any marker of time in Jonah that will prove this is a literal 72-hours? None at all. It just says three days and three nights, then moves on. A definition of 72-hours is not something we got from Jonah. It has to be read into Jonah.

If we turn to I Samuel 30: 12, we will see the same phrase. The young Egyptian hadn’t eaten for three days and three nights. Then, in the very next verse he says, "I fell sick three days ago". That doesn’t seem to be 72-hours. In fact, it gives the sense of less than 72-hours. It seems like “three days and three nights” and “three days” are two different ways to say the same thing. It's as if "three days and three nights" is an ancient idiomatic expression not intended to be understood as a specific time down to the hour. A definition of 72-hours is not something we got from Samuel.

If we go to Esther 4: 16, we see the phrase "three days, night or day". Not exactly the same, but practically identical. Esther tells the Jews, "Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day ... then I will go to the king." Chapter 5: 1 says, "On the third day Esther put on her royal robes and stood in the inner court of the king's palace." Did you catch that? The time marker in Esther shows this "three days, night or day" period ended "on the third day". There is no way “on the third day” is 72-hours here. Esther puts a nail in that definition.

A definition of 72-hours is not something we get from the Bible. It has to be put into the Bible. When we let the Bible interpret the Bible, its own definition of "three days and three nights" is clearly less than 72-hours.

Here is where Herbert Armstrong and all who read his material will remind us Jesus said there are 12 hours in a day (JON. 11: 9). No one on either side denies there are 12 hours in a day. But this isn't about there being 12 hours in a day. This is about whether "three days and three nights" is meant to be understood literally. From its other uses, clearly is not. If you are going to hold "three days and three nights" to this literal standard, then all the rest of the descriptions must be literal as well. That simply is not possible.

Ashley and Seigli speak only about Matthew 12, as had everyone since Herbert Armstrong. But did you know that isn’t the only verse where the length of Jesus' interment is described? The length of Jesus' entombment was described in much more than one way:

• "The third day" 11 times.
• "In three days" 5 times.
• "After three days" 2 times.
• "On the third day" 1 time.
• "Within three days" 1 time.

    (These come from the KJV.)

Several different phrases that all describe the exact same event, yet some say “within” and some say “after”. Some of those are the same phrases used in Esther and Samuel. Of course they are! They are very Hebrew ways of talking about time. Do you get the sense the Israelites didn’t talk about time in the same way we do today? Do you think there might be even a small chance that forcing a modern American view of time into an ancient Israelite discussion while completely ignoring idiomatic figures of speech is why the timeline doesn’t make sense to Ashley and Seiglie? Maybe if they stop trying to make the Bible say what they want it to say, and just let it say what it does say, there won't be so much confusion?

They go on,

“Most theologians and religious scholars try to work around it by arguing that any part of a day or night counts as a day or night.”

Yes, most theologians do argue that. And for good reason. Because that is how the Jews understood time. The concept is called the onah. 

Rabbi Eleazar ben Azariah (circa 90-155 AD), was President of the Sanhedrin after Gamaliel II (grandson of the Gamaliel that taught Paul) and is considered one of the great Rabbis whose views are recorded in the Mishnah. In the Jerusalem Talmud, in the Sabbath tractate chapter 9 part 3j, it says this:

“It has been taught: R. Eleazar b. Azariah says, ‘A day and a night constitute a span [onah], and part of a span [onah] is equivalent to the whole of it.’"

Rabbi Hiyya bar Abba (circa 180-230), who was also considered a great sage of his day, is recorded in the Mishnah as well. In the Talmud, Pesachim 4a v6, Rabbi Hiyya says this:

"...and part of the day is as the whole of it".

This cannot simply be ignored as something the theologians made up. It cannot be dismissed as if this is some perversion of the Pharisees. This is how they understood things. If you want to understand how people of that time and place thought about time, then heed this. It might not be what we think. But our opinions do not matter. The Bible wasn't written by modern minds in King James English. It was written in Hebrew by people who genuinely consider a part of a day to count as the whole of it. They even had a word for it! Put yourself in their shoes. If they read about how we count time, they would say we are the ones who don't make sense.

The word onah is ancient Jewish word that describes what we call inclusive reckoning. Inclusive reckoning is where the first item and last item in a series are included in the count. This isn’t some novel concoction. All the Mediterranean counted inclusively. It can be demonstrated in the Bible itself, from start to end. You want to talk about “God-given time reckoning”, this is it!
Would you like an example? Here:

(EXO. 19: 10-11) 10 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow, and let them wash their clothes. 11 And let them be ready for the third day. For on the third day the Lord will come down upon Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people."

Do you see how God says today (day 1), tomorrow (day 2), and the third day? That's inclusive reckoning. To put this another way, today (Friday), tomorrow (Saturday), and the third day (Sunday). Neither the first nor the third days are full days, but they are still counted. Do you suppose the Israelites arrived at the foot of Mt. Sinai directly exactly 72-hours later? No. So, even God included part of a day as the whole of day 1 and and part of a day as the whole of day 3. Onah!

It's completely Biblical, folks!

Do you suppose that maybe, just maybe, the math actually does add up and makes sense IF you are willing to think like the people who wrote the Bible?
Yet, Ashley and Seiglie say:

“Clearly something doesn’t add up. Either Jesus misspoke about the length of time He would be in the tomb, or the “Good Friday–Easter Sunday” timing is not biblical or accurate.”

Or! They were counting like ancient Jews.

The length of time Jesus was in the grave was spoken about in six different ways in over twenty verses. The only thing that doesn’t add up is why these two gentlemen had every opportunity to read their Bibles and see for themselves what I'm telling you - but they refused. What they are really saying in that quote is, "If the Bible doesn't say what we want it to, then it's wrong." We here disagree. We feel if we don't conform to what the Bible is really saying, then we are wrong.

Jesus was talking to the Pharisees in a way they would understand. Did the Pharisees think Jesus meant "exactly 72-hours"?

(MAT. 27: 63) “Sir, we remember, while He was still alive, how that deceiver said, ‘After three days I will rise.’

The priests and Pharisees say "after three days". That isn't at all 72-hours. Oh, they got the point. They understood exactly what Jesus was claiming. Yet, not a single one of these people who spent years of their lives memorizing and analyzing the scriptures took Jesus or Jonah to mean 72-hours.

Doesn't that say something?

Read our article “Three Days and Three Nights” for more.

PROPER DEFINITIONS LEAD TO CLARITY

Now we go on to the two sabbaths of Matthew 28. Typical fare. Predictable. So typical that we have an article on that, too. Written in in 2013. It's called "The Two Sabbaths of Matthew 28". The name's not very creative, but it's super practical. Nothing has stopped the authors from reading it, or any of the myriad other articles online like it.

We are told, “Two kinds of ‘Sabbaths’ lead to confusion.” Well, I can’t argue against that. It sure does!
…but not in Matthew 28.

The authors review how Old Covenant annual holy days operated, and how work was prohibited, and how that made them Sabbaths. So far so good. Then they say,

“Because traditional Christianity long ago abandoned these biblical annual Sabbath days (as well as the weekly Sabbath), for many centuries people have failed to recognize what the Gospels plainly tell us…”

Is that what it is? People don’t keep a Sabbath, therefore they aren’t aware of them? Well whadda ya know! All this time I thought it was because the Greek word sabbaton doesn’t actually support being defined as a combination of an annual Sabbath and a weekly Sabbath.

Let’s see the Strong's Concordance definition of that word. 

4521 Sabbaton: the Sabbath (that is, Shabbath), or day of weekly repose from secular avocations (also the observance or institution itself); by extension a se'nnight, that is, the interval between two Sabbaths; likewise the plural in all the above applications: - sabbath (day), week.

Do you see anything in there that says "sabbaton means a combination of an annual Sabbath and a separate weekly Sabbath two days later"? No. You don’t see it because that isn’t one of the possible definitions. It cannot mean what they say it means.

"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

The word sabbaton only refers to the weekly Sabbath; never an annual Sabbath. Greek has an entirely different word for annual Sabbaths: hoerte. In Colossians 2: 16, Paul separates "Sabbath day" (sabbaton) from "holyday" (heorte) in the same sentence. They are separate.

Even if for sake of argument we accept a Friday-Sunday timeline, and see John 19: 31 as saying the weekly Sabbath was also a high day, sabbaton still does not refer to a holy day. John says the sabbaton (weekly Sabbath) was high - using the Greek word "megas". Two days overlapped but separate. The words are still distinct in their use and their meaning.

Do you know why not a single Bible translation renders Matthew 28: 1 as Ashley and Seigli do? (Except maybe Fred Coulter's.) It’s not because Bible translators don’t keep the Sabbath and therefore don't know what a Sabbath is. It’s because they do know Greek.

What Ashley and Seiglie do here is utterly intellectually dishonest! It's one thing to redefine "three days and three nights" but it's another thing entirely to redefine Greek words. To be fair, it wasn't them. This is a very old claim. It was really Herbert Armstrong who committed the crime. These two just repeat it. But that makes me wonder who is worse? Herbert Armstrong's booklet "The Resurrection Was Not On Sunday" first came out in 1951. Ashley and Seiglie have had decades to correct this error. They just refuse to. It's not like they didn't have a Strong's Concordance! Or Bible dictionaries, or commentaries, or the internet, or experts in Greek, or...

Read our article “The Two Sabbaths of Matthew 28” for more. 

Pointing you at this article allows me to skip rebutting the rest of their misinformation and go straight on to … well, more ridiculous misinformation about another topic. Why do I do this to myself?

ANCIENT EVIDENCE?

In the final section, Ashley and Seiglie promise us evidence of a Wednesday crucifixion and a Saturday resurrection hidden in arcane documents you’ve never heard of (unless you've read Herbert Armstrong's booklet "Plain Truth About Easter" which is apparently where they got both of these sources). They then proceed to deliver a nothing burger.

First, they mention the Didascalia Apostolorum.

The document is real, it claims to be from the Apostles but it really isn't, and it does show a Tuesday evening Last Supper. They are only interested in a Tuesday Last Supper because they are looking for support for a Wednesday crucifixion. Alas, it is quite clear about the Friday crucifixion.
Just because Armstrongism and the Didascalia both have a Tuesday evening Lord's Supper doesn't mean anything. They are very different otherwise. The authors get no support here.

What's more, the Didascalia was written in the 200s. Ashley and Seiglie just quoted from a document that exonerates Constantine. He is innocent of the charges of inventing the Friday-Sunday timeline.
Maybe it wasn't such a good idea for Ashley and Seiglie to refer to the Didascalia after all!

Next, they quote from Epiphanius of Salamis.

Epiphanius is known to have read the Didascalia Apostolorum. I would venture a guess that Ashley and Seiglie happened across Epiphanius while reading about the Didascalia. Epiphanius believed the Didascalia to be genuine. That's why he was quoting it. Since he's quoting the Didascalia, Epiphanus isn't really a second source apart from the Didascalia, is he? No, he isn't.

Ashley and Seiglie wouldn’t mention either the Didascalia or Epiphanus if they didn’t think there was some way of spinning it to their benefit. And so they do. They say:

“Nonetheless, the document demonstrates that Passover was then understood by some to have been on Tuesday evening, which would place the crucifixion on the next day, Wednesday.”

No. It doesn’t place the crucifixion on Wednesday at all. It ends the paragraph with these words, “…they crucified Him on the same Friday.”

Does it support the idea that some people believed the Last Supper was on Tuesday? Yes. Does that fact provide any support for a Wednesday crucifixion? No.
If you’re going to reference a source, you can’t just yank out the parts you like and change the rest. The Didascalia, in chapter XXI, goes into a good amount of detail about the timeline between the Tuesday Last Supper and the Friday crucifixion. It doesn’t support Ashley and Seiglie at all. The authors don’t seem to care what the Didascalia says. What they do here is presumptuous.

This is exactly what they did with the Bible commentaries they mentioned in their article. The commentaries agree with them in one point, that sabbaton can be plural, but completely disagree with their conclusion, yet they cite the commentaries anyway as if everyone is in harmony.
But it gets worse.

Feeling they've demonstrated the crucifixion was on a Wednesday - which they have not done - Ashley and Seiglie add two more references. These last two are intended to demonstrate that there were some people who believed Jesus rose on Saturday. They mention Socrates of Constantinople and Gregory of Tours. When I checked, I honestly don’t know where they got this idea that these sources support them.

I cannot find the provided quote from Gregory of Tours. They didn't give the name of the writing. In his “History of the Franks” Book I chapter 18, Gregory only says, “The day of the Lord's resurrection is the first, not the seventh.” (Meaning the Lord was resurrected on Sunday not Saturday.) He doesn’t mention anyone believing it was on the seventh. Might be possible some did. People believe crazy things (like sabbaton can mean an annual holy day and a weekly sabbath two days apart). But I can't find where he say so.

As for Socrates of Constantinople, Ashley and Seiglie straight up butcher what he says.
In his book "Ecclesiastical History" chapter XXII, Socrates is referring to the account of the Quartodeciman Controversy recoded by Eusebius. Socrates is paraphrasing Eusebius.

Ashley and Seiglie look at the quote, they see the word “sabbath”, and they conclude it means the weekly Sabbath. But that isn’t what Socrates means when he uses that word.
To understand why not, you must understand that Socrates is talking about the differences over Pascha, and summarizing Eusebius’ account.
The issue being discussed wasn’t about when Jesus was resurrected. It was about when people were honoring the Last Supper. The word sabbath here does not refer to Saturday or to a resurrection on Saturday. It refers to a remembrance of the Lord's Supper.

Read it for yourself:

“In Asia Minor most people kept the fourteenth day of the moon, disregarding the sabbath: yet they never separated from those who did otherwise, until Victor, bishop of Rome, influenced by too ardent a zeal, fulminated a sentence of excommunication against the Quartodecimans in Asia. Wherefore also Irenæus, bishop of Lyons in France, severely censured Victor by letter for his immoderate heat; telling him that although the ancients differed in their celebration of Easter, they did not desist from intercommunion. Also that Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, who afterwards suffered martyrdom under Gordian, continued to communicate with Anicetus bishop of Rome, although he himself, according to the usage of his native Smyrna, kept Easter on the fourteenth day of the moon, as Eusebius attests in the fifth book of his Ecclesiastical History. While therefore some in Asia Minor observed the day above-mentioned, others in the East kept that feast on the sabbath indeed, but differed as regards the month.”
-Socrates of Constantinople, "Ecclesiastical History", book V, chapter XXII

Do you see there how it says "fourteenth day of the moon"? The fourteenth of Nissan is Passover. That is not the day on which Jesus was resurrected. Ashley and Seiglie know this. So, how can they use this to conclude He was resurrected on the Sabbath? They cannot.

From the context, nothing I've read in this book or any other leads me to believe Socrates was referring to the weekly Sabbath. When the weekly Sabbath is mentioned in relation to Pascha, it is in reference to strict fasting and a vigil in remembrance of the entombment, not the Pascha itself. No one regularly observed the Lord's Supper on Saturday.

Wait just a minute. This is the same mistake Herbert Armstrong made in his booklet "Plain Truth About Easter" (see 1973 version, pages 20-21). Funny, Socrates and the Didascalia were his two cited sources as well. Isn't that a strange coincidence?
They are just copying off of Armstrong this whole time. I thought Armstrong was irrelevant these days? I do recommend allowing him to be.

I can't tell you how many articles and booklets have been written to condemn Sunday observance which reference this very same Quartodeciman Controversy. Armstrongist material since the start have condemned mainstream Christianity as pagans for not being like the Quartodecimani. Socrates says the Quartodeciman side disregarded the sabbath. If Socrates uses sabbath to mean Saturday (which he does not), then guess what - Socrates undermines everything Armstrongist literature said in favor of the wonderful law-keeping Quartodecimani.
Maybe it wasn't such a good idea for Ashley and Seiglie to refer to Socrates after all!

Ashley and Seiglie never read through their source until they understood it. They just trusted Armstrong. They were so ideologically committed to a conclusion decided in advance, they couldn't see the source material literally says the opposite of what they were claiming.

For all the promise of Wednesday crucifixions and Saturday resurrections, they managed to come up with naught. All we got was more false history, more cherry picking, and more misquoting, and more redefining words, just like we used to get from Herman Hoeh.

HOW NOT TO DO RESEARCH

Have you noticed what these authors have been doing this entire time?
They have a pre-existing ideological commitment. Maybe it's to 'three days and three nights' being 72-hours exactly. Maybe it's to a Wednesday crucifixion. They start with the conclusion, then they go looking for evidence. Is it any wonder they only accept evidence they think supports their conclusion?

Mind you, they didn't start with a hypothesis then set off to see if the evidence supports it. No. They started with a conclusion and went to see if they can cherry pick something to support it. They were so committed that they went out in search of people who understood the Lord's Supper was on a Tuesday, then didn't care when the source utterly contradicted everything else they had to say. Because, to them, a Tuesday Passover demands a Wednesday crucifixion, even if what they are reading specifically says otherwise. They were so ideologically committed that they saw the word sabbath in Socrates of Constantinople and concluded it had to mean weekly Sabbath, even though the source wasn't even talking about Saturday, or the resurrection for that matter, and literally contradicts their point. As if there is no way that word could mean anything else. They were so ideologically committed that they redefined the word sabbaton. If you know the larger story that I don't even didn't get into here, then you know they in fact redefined sabbaton twice! And not just sabbaton, but prosabbaton as well (MAR. 15: 42). The word prosabbaton was the  name for Friday.

If they read the Didascalia and Socrates and the Greek dictionary this way, you can be certain they read the Bible this way.

They are ministers in the system, though. They get paid to have this conclusion. If they don't tow the line they are out of a job. But for you and I, is that how we should research? No.

If we genuinely search for truth, what we should do is be intellectually neutral and unbiased arbiters in that search for truth. Let the material say what it says. Let the truth be what it is. Truth can take care of itself. It doesn't need us to protect it.
I have always liked the definition of truth as "reality as it actually is." Truth is reality as it actually is. If we try to force reality to be one thing or the other, what is that called? Error, delusion, or worse, deception. If we do that, are we really looking for truth in the first place? This is why you see me using the phrase intellectual honesty. Being honest with the evidence.
When evidence is flat out ignored, when definitions of words are changed, when a source is used to come to a conclusion specifically denied by that very source - they pointed out that it disagreed with them for crying out loud - is that being intellectually honest?
Is that reality as it actually is?
Is that God's truth?
No. It isn't.

The best advice I can offer is to do the opposite of what your gut tells you and try to prove yourself wrong. Yes, be your own critic. Before I write a single word, I read and reread the source until I believe I understand what the author was saying. I try my best to understand the source as the author intended. Just like when I read Matthew 28 I try to understand it as the ancient Hebrews would have, not the way I want things to be. Then I mull the possible meanings over in my head until I think I understand. Then I try to poke holes in my conclusions and prove myself wrong. I do that until I can't poke any more holes. That way, I get as close to the truth as I can.
Sometimes you get what you want. Sometimes you don't. And sometimes the best conclusion you can come to is - I don't know. The answer can be uncertain. So, let it!

If you do these things, at least you will end up far closer to the truth than otherwise.

These authors could be fine people, with families and folks who love them. I don't know. I've never met them. My article is not about who they are as people. This article is about what they've written and the methods they've used. (Or is it about Herbert Armstrong's ideas and methods? They are the same, after all. I thought he wasn't relevant anymore.)
They've written a propaganda piece. They have access to all this history, sure enough. Rather than quote it accurately, learning what was meant to be understood, they twisted it beyond recognition because they had an agenda to satisfy.

If they do this to history books, do you think maybe they do the same thing to the Bible? Do you think they only treat this one subject in this way?

CONCLUSION

Why! Why do I do this to myself??

I could have left well enough alone, but no. I just had to go and look into that Palantir. I had hope! But now none. I am sorely disappointed to see that not only have things not improved in the Armstrongist splinter churches, but they've somehow managed to degrade just that much farther.

The Church of God splinter group articles on the last days of Jesus' life are, well, not so good. They don't understand what sign Jesus gave. They don't understand how Hebrews counted time. They don't understand the proper definition of Greek words like sabbaton or prosabbaton or paraskeue. They don't understand ancient documents when they read them.
Is it really honest to purposefully make a mess of things then complain how everything is a mess? "I redefined, and obfuscated, and misrepresented, and cherry picked, now things don't make sense. Why!?"
It's not that things can't add up, it's that when we try to force an answer from bad math it won't add up. It's not that they can't understand, it's that they refuse to understand.

I started out looking for hope. I couldn't find a single ray of hope in any of this, except possibly that the piece seemed to lack any heart. How is that a ray of hope? Because it means they don't really love what they're dishing out anymore. Maybe there's an end to this tunnel after all.

I want to share with you the reason this blog has so many articles on the holidays. It's not because we are stuck on holiday topics. It's because these fields are always so ripe with examples like the ones in today's article. Few other topics make it so easy to demonstrate the rank ideological bias in Armstrongism. Every time they write an article on holidays it has this same kind of thing like we saw today. We just grab that low-hanging fruit.

Dear reader, beloved by God, I plead with you to read our articles on this topic. We have a Categories page with articles on every topic you need. If you only read one thing on this topic, at least read our Easter FAQ. It could have saved you, and Scott Ashley and Mario Seiglie - and me - quite a bit of headache.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have one more article on the topic to write. Better get to it.

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It is important that you understand; Everything on this blog is based on the current understanding of each author. Never take anyone's word for it, always prove it for yourself, it is your responsibility. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. ; )

Acts 17:11

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