From: REXLEX@linac.fnal.gov
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: biblical inerrancy / sign of Jonah
Date: 29 Sep 92 06:52:50 GMT
Organization: FNAL

I'm not going to type everything about this "difficulty" out, but maybe some of
what I'm about say will help.  It will be noted that some info came just last
month in a Jewish news paper that I get.....

OK, Matt 12:40 " for just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly
of the sea monster, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in
the heart of the earth."  Most of us commonly hold to the tradition that Jesus
was crucified on Friday (aka Good Friday)  and rose on Sunday.  If He died on
Friday afternoon, then how on earth do you get 3 days and 3 nights out of it. 
Most of us simply do not come up with a satisfactory solution to this
difficulty.  
     Well, the first problem we have is the presupposition that it was on
Friday that He was crucified.  (Oh no, I feel a heresy coming on....)  Look at
Mk 15:42.  It merely states that it was on "the day before the Sabbath." Of
course we suppose that the sabbath was, well of course Saturday.  The problem
is that it was a week of Sabbaths.   I can hear it now -Hu!  Read Ex 12:16;
Lev. 23:7; Num. 28: 16-18.  What we learn is that the first day of the Passover
week, no matter which day of the week it fell on, was considered a sabbath. 
Now what I have just recently learnt is that "To this day, two of the peoples
who retain the lunar calendar are Jews and Moslems....This may come as a
surprise to those who see Jews solely in their lunar glory, an impression
created by the special Sabbaths before each new month when we announce the
exact time, to the second, of the moon's birth, or when we step outside the
synagogue after evening service, and we stand clustered together blessing the
moon, one of the unique sights of urban Jewish life."  The article goes on
about the secret of Jewish survival and the calendar.  
     So, what does this have to do with anything?  Everything.  The commonly
accepted year of the crucifixion by astronomers and Xians alike was 30AD. (33AD
does not meet all the criteria)  The Passover sabbath of that year fell on the
15th of Nisan which was a *Thursday*  that year.  (Go back and look up your
full moons! June 6th was a full moon -a Thursday!)  John 19:14 clarifies that
on the day on which He was tried and crucified, was the day of preparation for
the Passover! Get it?  It wasn't the day before the weekly Sabbath but the
Passover Sabbath.  
     Here's the heresy then:  Christ was crucified on Wednesday, not Friday. 
(We could discuss how the idea of Friday came about, but I think I'll leave
that one alone.  Lets just say it could be tied in with something having to do
with a form of Babylonian mystery religion.)  Because John was written later
than the Synoptics, I think he writes to clear some things up.  One of these
misunderstanding could have been the idea that Christ ate the Passover with His
disciples at the regular time.  He states rather that Christ ate the evening
before the Passover lambs were to be slain.  Therefore, Christ was being slain
at the same time the Passover lambs were slain!  What poetry.  "Between the 2
evenings" on the 14th of Nisan (cf. Ex 12:6 and Heb.)  There is much that could
be said about Christ's fulfillment of the Passover but I simply havent the
time.  (Did you think the Passover was merely instated for no other reason than
to memorialize the passover recorded having taken place in Egypt?)
    Just a quick for instance (lunch is almost over...)  The buying of lambs
had to be on or before the 10th of Nisan.  There was a "fair market price" set
for lambs.  No bones were to be broken when it was killed, and it was to be
killed between the evenings, just before the beginning of the 15th of Nisan at
sundown. (I know some of you cringe at types, but this one is simply poetry in
motion)  
    Anyway, with this explanation (favored, by the way, with ALL the Messianic
Jews that I have contact with, who, by the way, are all dispensationalist!) it
harmonizes the various accounts.  The 3 day thing is so firmly established that
we can't dismiss it.  It had to be 3 days and three nights if we are not to
perform a disservice to the truth of the Scriptures.

Rex