On Which Days Did Jesus Die and Rise?

empty-tomb

The Biblical Case for Wednesday Crucifixion and Saturday Resurrection

Introduction

The death, burial, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ stand at the very heart of the Christian faith. To deny the historical reality of His bodily death and resurrection is to deny Christianity itself. In another article, Christ's Resurrection: The Trustworthiness of the Testimony, we defended the bodily resurrection as a historical fact. Yet within this central confession lies a question often overlooked: On which day did Jesus die, and on which day did He rise?

The traditional view, embraced by the vast majority of Christians, maintains that Jesus was crucified on Friday and rose on Sunday. But dissenting voices have long challenged this chronology, insisting that it cannot be reconciled with the Gospel accounts. Among these dissenters, some argue for a Thursday crucifixion, others for a Wednesday one. While Thursday crucifixion remains a minority position, Wednesday crucifixion has gained broader acceptance.

Though we respect the weight of tradition, we believe it is mistaken here, for its chronology rests not on apostolic testimony but on later tradition. Our final authority is Scripture. Where tradition and Scripture diverge, we must follow Scripture in the spirit of Sola Scriptura.

We hold that Jesus was crucified and buried on Wednesday, and that He rose from the dead on Saturday. Why does this matter? Is not salvation secured by believing simply in Christ's death and resurrection, regardless of the chronology (Romans 10:9)? Yes, it is; yet the implications of getting the chronology right are profound. The traditional Friday–Sunday chronology has been used for centuries to justify Sunday observance as the Lord's Day. If the Friday–Sunday chronology is mistaken, then the foundation of Sunday's replacement of the seventh-day Sabbath is shaken.¹

In this article, we examine the biblical testimony. Four key passages will guide us. The first two are Matthew 12:40, with its "three days and three nights", and Luke 24:21, with its "third day since these things". The other two are Mark 16:1 and Luke 23:54–56, which describe three women — Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome — who prepared spices and fragrant oils to anoint Jesus' body after His burial. These two Gospel reports of the women are significant because they show that the women's preparation of spices could not have taken place right after Christ's crucifixion. This seemingly small detail has a consequential bearing on the chronology of Christ's bodily death and resurrection, and as we shall see, it conflicts with the traditional chronology of Friday crucifixion and Sunday resurrection.

We will show that each of these witnesses contributes a distinct piece to the same consistent picture. When their testimonies are allowed to speak in their own terms, they converge on a single timeline that satisfies both Scripture's wording and its internal harmony. Matthew 12:40 cannot be dismissed as a careless Jewish idiom, nor does it require a literal seventy-two hours. Luke 24:21 rules out the Friday crucifixion and does not compel the Thursday view. Mark 16:1 and Luke 23:54–56, when read together, clarify the time frame of the women's activity and confirm the Wednesday–Saturday framework as the only coherent solution.

Many assume that the Wednesday view rests on a woodenly literal reading of "three days and three nights". Yet the real issue is not arithmetic but integrity: the language of the text, the categories of Scripture, and the harmony of the Gospel narratives. When each witness is allowed to speak plainly, the Friday–Sunday scheme collapses, and the Wednesday–Saturday chronology emerges as the only account that preserves both accuracy and consistency.

All Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version (NKJV), unless otherwise noted.

The Two Key Witnesses to Christ's Chronology

Two passages stand as key witnesses to Christ's chronology: Matthew 12:40 and Luke 24:21.

Matthew 12:40

For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

The crucial question is this: from what point should the count of the "three days and three nights" begin? We must test whether the Friday, Thursday, or Wednesday crucifixion view can satisfy our Lord's saying.

Luke 24:21

Indeed, besides all this, today is the third day since these things happened.

This statement was made on Sunday (cf. Luke 24:1, 13, 21). By the disciples' own reckoning, Sunday marked the third day since "these things" took place. From this we can infer the remaining days:²

Sunday counted as the third day since "these things" happened (the disciples' statement)
Saturday counted as the second day since "these things" happened (our inference)
Friday counted as the first day since "these things" happened (our inference)
Thursday counted as the very day on which "these things" happened (our inference)

As we shall see, the phrase "these things" refers not merely to the crucifixion itself, but to the whole sequence of events: the betrayal, condemnation, crucifixion, burial, and the setting of the guard with the sealing of the tomb.

The word rendered "since" is the Greek prepositional phrase ἀφ᾽ οὗ (aph ou), a compound form of ἀπό (apo). Leading lexicons such as BDAG³ and EDNT⁴ note that it carries the same temporal sense as the English word "since", that is, "from the time (when)", marking the beginning point of time. In other words, the disciples' expression corresponds exactly to the English expression: "today is the third day since these things happened." In such usage, the day of the events themselves is not included in the count, but serves as the starting point from which the days are reckoned.⁵ Thus, in both Greek and English, this expression excludes the starting point itself; the count begins only after the event, not with it.

Thus, from these two texts, the question comes sharply into focus: how should the timing of Christ's death be understood? Throughout the history of interpretation, three main dates have traditionally been proposed for Christ's crucifixion: Friday, Thursday, and Wednesday. These are the options we must now weigh. A further witness, the account of the women in Luke 23:54–56 together with Mark 16:1, will be examined later. Taken together, these testimonies form the cornerstone of our case, and as the argument unfolds, we will see that all other evidence converges upon them.

The First Witness: "Three Days and Three Nights" (Matthew 12:40)

We now turn to Jesus' words as recorded by Matthew.

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. (Matthew 12:40)

Matthew's account concerns Christ's death and resurrection, declaring that He would be "in the heart of the earth" for three days and three nights. Two questions require careful attention: (1) what does "three days and three nights" mean, and (2) what does "in the heart of the earth" mean?

1) The meaning of "three days and three nights"

Does it necessarily mean that Jesus would have risen from the dead after three days and three nights had passed, that is to say, He would have risen on the fourth day? No, on the contrary. It would contradict the clear and unambiguous apostolic testimony that Christ rose from the dead on the third day.

For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures. (1 Corinthians 15:3–4)⁶

In biblical usage, the counting of days is inclusive. This means that the first and last days of the count are included even though they need not be whole: if the triggering event occurred late in the day, that day would still count as the first day. The same principle applies to the last day of the count. With this understanding, "being dead three days and three nights" is consistent with the apostolic testimony "that He rose again the third day" (1 Corinthians 15:4). The pertinent question is whether we count days and nights separately or treat them as full days, with day and night combined.

The traditional view treats day and night as a single unit. That's why it can maintain Friday crucifixion and Sunday resurrection: Christ died about 3 p.m. on Friday,⁷ was buried just before Friday evening,⁸ and rose on Sunday morning.

From Friday afternoon to Saturday morning was the first day
From Saturday morning to Sunday morning was the second day
From Sunday morning onward was the third day

Yet this sequence contains only two nights, Friday night and Saturday night, not the three days and three nights Christ explicitly mentioned. This view, therefore, faces two related difficulties: it must explain the missing night and, moreover, why Jesus spoke of both days and nights instead of merely "three days" if that was His intention. Many Christian writers attempt to resolve this difficulty by appealing to a supposed Jewish maxim:

A day and a night make an onah, and a part of an onah is as the whole.

The maxim is often treated as established fact, yet its origins and meaning require closer attention.

The Onah Maxim in Tradition and Interpretation

The Hebrew word onah (עונה) in the commonly cited maxim ("A day and a night make an onah, and a part of an onah is as the whole") means a "period" or "time span". This saying appears, for example, in Believer's Bible Commentary (on Matthew 12:40),⁹ and similar formulations are echoed in other modern works. Even where the maxim is not quoted directly, the same idea is assumed. Thus R. T. France, in the Tyndale Commentary on Matthew, states that "three days and three nights was a Jewish idiom appropriate to a period covering only two nights".¹⁰ The traditional answer, then, is that "three days and three nights" was simply an idiom, not meant to distinguish day from night but to count any part of either as a whole.

Yet this familiar maxim, often cited by Christian commentators, does not exist as a fixed Talmudic idiom. The Jerusalem Talmud (Shabbat 9:3)¹¹ does not present a settled idiom but records a live debate among rabbis. Rabbinic opinion was far from unanimous:

Rabbi Ishmael and Rabbi Akiba both reckoned a day and a night as separate onah units, but disagreed over whether part of an onah could count as the whole. Rabbi Ishmael allowed it; Rabbi Akiba denied it.
Rabbi Eleazar ben Azariah went further, teaching explicitly that "a day and a night are an onah, and part of an onah counts as the whole".

What does this tell us? Rabbinic reckoning rests on a late interpretive tradition, not on the biblical text itself. On the one hand, rabbinic and biblical reckoning are not wholly opposed: both acknowledge that a partial day or night can be counted as a whole in the reckoning. On the other hand, they are not identical: Christ's words specify a definite sequence of day-night periods, which matches Rabbi Ishmael's distinction but not Rabbi Eleazar's collapsing rule.

And here is the decisive point: Even if later rabbis did standardize inclusive reckoning, this tradition was not infallible. It arose after Christ as a pragmatic way of counting, not as a divine rule of interpretation. By contrast, Christ deliberately anchored His prophecy in Jonah: "three days and three nights" (Jonah 1:17). His words carry greater weight than a rabbinic convention. Nevertheless, for the sake of clarity, we may note how rabbinic tradition itself framed the issue. On the basis of rabbinic tradition, the "part-for-whole" principle can be understood in two ways:

Simple inclusive reckoning — any part of a 24-hour day counts as a whole. This became the tradition that later dominated Christianity.
Refined inclusive reckoning — day and night are distinct 12-hour halves, and any part of each can be counted as a whole. This is the view we uphold.

Strikingly, the very reckoning we uphold was already voiced by Rabbi Ishmael himself. He taught that days and nights are to be counted separately, but that even a part of each could stand for the whole. This is exactly what Christ's words demand. "Three days and three nights" means distinct spans — night, day, night, day, night, day — with the beginning and ending partial, and the middle complete. In contrast, the traditional Friday–Sunday scheme follows Eleazar ben Azariah's collapsing rule, in which day and night are merged, thereby erasing the very precision of Christ's words. Our view, then, is not a modern invention but a return to the sharper reckoning already recognized in Jewish debate.

Two interpretations, then, stand before us. The simpler view collapses the idioms and blurs the distinction between day and night. The refined view, by contrast, rests on the plain sense of Scripture's language, where "days and nights" are reckoned as distinct spans, with the beginning and ending partial, and the middle complete. As we will see below, this refined reckoning alone preserves the Lord's wording and reflects the biblical pattern of time.

Summary of Rabbinic Positions

To make the debate clear, here is a simple summary of the positions recorded in the Jerusalem Talmud (Shabbat 9:3):

Rabbi	View of day/night	Does a part count as the whole?	Category of reckoning
Rabbi Ishmael	Day and night = separate units (onah)	Yes, part = whole	Refined inclusive reckoning
Rabbi Akiba	Day and night = separate units (onah)	No, part ≠ whole	Distinct but strict reckoning
Rabbi Eleazar ben Azariah	Day and night merged into one unit	Yes, part = whole	Simple inclusive reckoning

The comparison makes the issue plain: Rabbi Ishmael's refined reckoning preserves the distinct day-night pattern found in Christ's saying, while Rabbi Eleazar's collapsing rule dissolves it.

Protestant Misuse of Rabbinic Tradition

Early Protestant scholarship noticed this rabbinic debate as well. John Lightfoot summarized it in his Hebraica, but his paraphrase blurs the sharper difference between Ishmael and Eleazar ben Azariah. Still, his reference shows that Christian readers long ago recognized the rabbinic debate over whether "part of the day" could count as a whole.¹²

Independently of this rabbinic discussion, modern apologists often appeal to a supposed Jewish way of speaking — allegedly teaching simple inclusive counting — by pointing to narrative examples in Scripture. For instance, Eric Lyons (Apologetics Press) gathers passages where "after three days" and "on the third day" appear interchangeable, or where characters speak loosely about time spans:¹³

Genesis 42:17–18 — Joseph confined his brothers "for three days", yet released them "on the third day".
1 Samuel 30:12–13 — The Egyptian servant had not eaten "three days and three nights", but described his illness as beginning "three days ago".
Esther 4:16–5:1 — Esther asked the Jews to fast "three days, night or day", yet went before the king "on the third day".
2 Chronicles 10:5, 12 — Rehoboam ordered the people to return "after three days", but they came "on the third day".
Acts 10:3–30 — Cornelius spoke of an angelic vision that had occurred "four days ago to this hour". As Lyons observes, the expression reflects inclusive counting: a span covering parts of four days, roughly seventy-two hours in total.

We do not dispute that biblical writers sometimes used inclusive reckoning, where a part of a time span was treated as the whole. To repeat: the simple inclusive reckoning treats any part of a 24-hour day as a whole, while the refined reckoning (still inclusive) distinguishes day and night as separate halves, each of which could be counted as a whole. The question is not whether inclusive reckoning existed, but what kind of inclusive reckoning Jesus' words require.

Esther 4 — Different wording, different meaning. Esther's "three days, night or day" is a deliberately loose expression. It does not say "three days and three nights". To apply her phrase to Jesus' prophecy is to collapse precision into vagueness. Christ's words were solemn, measured, and exact: "three days and three nights". Esther's words were urgent, approximate, and rhetorical: "night or day". The two cannot be equated.
1 Samuel 30 — Not a counterexample. The narrator carefully states that the servant had eaten nothing for "three days and three nights". The servant himself later says, "three days ago I fell sick". But this is not contradictory. In everyday speech, "three days ago" normally means that three full days and nights have passed. For example, if on Monday at 3 p.m. I say, "One day ago", then I mean Sunday at 3 p.m., i.e., one day and one night have passed. The servant's colloquial phrase does not redefine the narrator's precision; it illustrates the same reality in looser terms.
Genesis 42 and 2 Chronicles 10 — Inclusive but inconclusive. These cases show that "after three days" could be fulfilled by "on the third day". That proves inclusive reckoning, yes, but inclusive reckoning itself is not in dispute. As we noted earlier, "three days and three nights" stands in full harmony with "the third day". The question here is whether the reckoning was simple or refined. These texts can be read under either model, and so they do not weigh against counting days and nights as separate units.
Acts 10 — Cornelius' "Four Days Ago". Lyons is correct to observe that Cornelius' expression "four days ago to this hour" reflects inclusive reckoning, covering roughly seventy-two hours. This is also our position.

By citing examples such as Acts 10:30, Lyons proves what no one disputes. Everyone agrees that Scripture sometimes uses inclusive reckoning, where the first day is counted as part of the span. The real issue, however, is whether Jesus' prophecy in Matthew 12:40, where the deliberate phrase "three days and three nights" is used, should be read with this simple reckoning that collapses day and night into one, or with refined reckoning that counts them distinctly.

Shall we follow the tradition?

In sum, these examples cannot serve as counterexamples to separating days from nights in an inclusive count. Given all this inconclusive biblical data, which interpretation should we follow? Is the traditional simple reckoning of days in harmony with the rest of Scripture? No, it is not. It contradicts Luke 24:21. As we established earlier in our analysis of Luke 24:21, the phrase "since these things happened" marks the sequence by exclusive counting, where the day of the events is not included in the count. According to tradition, with Friday as day one, counting forward we arrive at Sunday as the third day from the crucifixion. But Luke 24:21 insists that Sunday was the third day since "these things". Counting backward, Friday becomes "the first day since," which means Thursday — not Friday — was day one. (Notice the contradiction: under the traditional inclusive scheme, Friday must be day one; but under Luke's exclusive "since", Friday becomes "the first day since," which means the events must have occurred on Thursday.) The two cannot both be true. Thus the simple reckoning clashes with Luke's testimony and must be rejected.

Luke's testimony exposes the contradiction in the Friday scheme, and Matthew's fuller wording drives the point home. Scripture sometimes says simply "three days" (e.g., Matthew 15:32), and other times "three days and three nights" (Matthew 12:40). Why does it preserve both expressions? The distinction must be meaningful: day and night must be counted as distinct spans. Otherwise, "three days and three nights" collapses into the shorter idiom and loses its force.

This raises a natural question: why adopt the simpler traditional reckoning in the first place, which makes no distinction between day and night, when Scripture itself points us toward a richer pattern? From the very beginning, the creation account establishes the formula "evening and morning", marking night and day as distinct spans (Genesis 1:5, 8, 13, 19, 23, 31). When Scripture describes the full cycle of twenty-four hours, it uses "evenings and mornings". Thus, when it speaks of "days and nights", it treats the halves as separate entities. Our Lord, in Matthew 12:40, deliberately chose the latter expression. He spoke of "days and nights", choosing the wording that compels us to count them distinctly. This is no flourish of language but an act of deliberate precision.

Thus the testimony of the First Witness is clear. The words of Christ are honored in their plain sense: "three days and three nights in the heart of the earth". And this plain sense is not arbitrary. It rests upon the very structure laid down in the creation account itself: "the evening and the morning"; night and day as distinct spans, paired but never blurred. To follow that biblical pattern is to follow Christ's own words; to ignore it is to let tradition blur the very boundaries God set in creation.

2) The meaning of "in the heart of the earth"

Having clarified the reckoning of days and nights, we must now ask: what did Jesus mean by "the heart of the earth"? Some interpreters understand that "the heart of the earth probably refers to Sheol, the place of the dead."¹⁴ This is possible because "earth" can sometimes stand for the grave or the underworld. On the other hand, Jesus' comparison with Jonah points to a literal entombment: Jonah was shut in the belly of the fish, enclosed and buried away from life. The parallel suggests the tomb, not merely death.

The apostolic witness confirms this: "that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day" (1 Corinthians 15:4, emphasis added). Burial is the hinge between death and resurrection. It marks the entry into "the heart of the earth". By apostolic definition, the clock begins at the tomb.

If burial is not the triggering event for the count, it is difficult to reconcile this with the apostolic testimony that He rose again the third day (1 Corinthians 15:4). On that assumption, the first day would be counted from the moment of Jesus' death (about 3 p.m.) until evening on the same day. We would then have the following reckoning:

In the list below, the counted days appear in bold, and the evening transitions are marked in italics. This reflects the biblical pattern in which the full day-cycle begins at evening (cf. Genesis 1:5).

From about 3 p.m. on the day Jesus died until the first evening would count as the first day
From the first evening to the first morning would count as the first night
From the first morning to the second evening would count as the second day
From the second evening to the second morning would count as the second night
From the second morning to the third evening would count as the third day
From the third evening to the third morning would count as the third night

On this reckoning, Jesus would have risen on the third night, not on the third day. However, the problem disappears if the clock begins at the tomb on the first evening:

From the first evening to the first morning would count as the first night
From the first morning to the second evening would count as the first day
From the second evening to the second morning would count as the second night
From the second morning to the third evening would count as the second day
From the third evening to the third morning would count as the third night
From the third morning to the fourth evening would count as the third day

Thus, Jesus would have risen on the third day. Notice that we have not yet identified which days of the week were the first day and the third day; that question will be taken up in the next section.

The Women With Their Spices

The next crucial clue lies not in one verse alone, but in the interplay of the Gospel accounts. Luke 23:54–56 and Mark 16:1 describe three women — Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome — who prepared spices and fragrant oils to anoint Jesus' body after His burial.

That day was the Preparation, and the Sabbath drew near. And the women who had come with Him from Galilee followed after, and they observed the tomb and how His body was laid. Then they returned and prepared spices and fragrant oils. And they rested on the Sabbath according to the commandment. (Luke 23:54–56)
Now when the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, that they might come and anoint Him. (Mark 16:1)

Mark and Luke agree that the women obtained and prepared spices, though Luke also adds fragrant oils. In ancient Israel, as across the Near East, such substances were used to honor the dead in burial practices.¹⁵ Because they were costly,¹⁶ their use signified reverence for the deceased. The women's desire to anoint Jesus, therefore, reflected not mere practicality but deep honor and devotion.

The puzzle and three possible solutions

When did the women buy and prepare the spices? They could not have done so during the Sabbath, when both trade and work were forbidden by the Law.¹⁷ Yet Luke reports that they prepared the spices before the Sabbath, while Mark says they bought them after the Sabbath. At first glance, these details appear puzzling, difficult to reconcile if there was only one Sabbath in view. And this is precisely how the traditional Friday–Sunday chronology reads it: as if the references are to the same Sabbath, namely the regular weekly one. However, as we shall see, there is no real contradiction even if we assume the traditional view of a single Sabbath, though that view faces a different challenge.

Although the one-Sabbath view need not involve a contradiction, the evidence points more plausibly to a crucifixion week that contained two Sabbaths rather than one. The crucifixion took place during the Passover. During Passover week, in addition to the regular weekly Sabbath, there was also a special Sabbath. John makes this explicit:

Now it was the day of Preparation, and the next day was to be a special Sabbath. (John 19:31, NIV)
Therefore, because it was the Preparation Day (…) for that Sabbath was a high day. (John 19:31, NKJV)

Scripture (Leviticus 23) lists such Feast Sabbaths alongside the weekly Sabbath. Unlike the weekly Sabbath, which always fell on the seventh day, an Annual Sabbath could fall on any day of the week. Our task, then, is to identify which day was the Annual Sabbath in the crucifixion week. The timeframe is limited by the Gospels themselves: Jesus was to be in the tomb "three days and three nights"¹⁸ and rise "on the third day".¹⁹ Since His first post-resurrection appearance was on a Sunday morning,²⁰ only three candidates remain: Saturday, Friday, or Thursday.

1. Saturday as Annual Passover: Friday crucifixion

This traditional assumption treats the weekly Sabbath and the Annual Passover Sabbath as coinciding. In this scheme, Luke and Mark would both refer to the same Sabbath: Luke says the women prepared before it, while Mark reports that they bought after it. At first glance this appears to be a contradiction. Yet even if only one Sabbath were in view, the accounts could be reconciled. Perhaps the women already had some spices on hand (Luke does not say they bought them before the Sabbath), prepared those in advance, and then, after the Sabbath ended, purchased more and continued their preparation.

Yet the decisive problem is one of timing. Could they really have prepared the spices before the Sabbath began? Jesus died around 3 p.m. on Friday. Joseph of Arimathea still had to obtain permission from Pilate, take down the body, and entomb it before sundown.²¹ That left the women, at most, perhaps 30–60 minutes. The preparation of spices was no simple task:

Grinding and mixing raw myrrh or aloes into usable form could take hours.
Carrying even modest quantities required time and effort.²²
Luke adds that the women first watched the burial and then prepared (23:55–56).

Given these huge logistical problems, it stretches credulity to suggest that the women could have completed their preparation of spices and fragrant oils before the Sabbath, which would have begun about 6 p.m.

But why suppose that they had to complete their preparation before the Sabbath? Could they not have resumed it after the Sabbath, since Mark says the women bought spices afterward? Perhaps they completed their preparation after the Sabbath? Yet Luke's account, taken as a whole, makes this unlikely. To see this more clearly, let us look at the context.

Luke records no further activity connected with the women's preparation. His statement in 23:56 is immediately followed by 24:1, and the two should be read as a continuous narrative. In 24:1, he says that the women came to the tomb bringing the spices they had prepared. The spices function as the narrative through-line that carries the reader naturally from 23:56 into 24:1. There is no sense of a fresh or resumed preparation. Both the subject ("the women") and the object ("the spices") remain the same. Therefore, Luke's phrase "the spices" in 24:1 naturally points back to the same spices of 23:56. They would not have approached the tomb with unfinished materials, and yet there is no clear indication that the women resumed their work. Without any such indication, the only reasonable conclusion is that the preparation of spices was fully completed before the Sabbath.

Now that we have established that a resumed preparation is improbable, let us see why this becomes even clearer when we look at the structure of Luke's account. We see a simple narrative structure:

They prepared the spices.
They rested on the Sabbath.
They came to the tomb with the spices already prepared.

Nothing in this flow implies or even leaves room for a return to unfinished work. If the women had resumed their preparation after the Sabbath, Luke's sequence would require an additional step between rest and arrival. But Luke includes no such step, no hint of it, and no structural pause that would make room for it. The Friday model must therefore insert a fourth, unstated step in the middle, making it structurally disharmonious. The result is a reconstruction that is historically improbable, exegetically forced, and dependent on silence rather than the text. When a narrative requires an unstated action to make its timeline work, the interpretation is exegetically suspect. Or, in other words, if the traditional chronology depends on Luke forgetting to mention something essential, then it is wrong.

Before we go further, we must distinguish possibility from plausibility. Almost anything is possible if we are willing to imagine unstated events. But exegesis is not built on possibility; otherwise, we could "explain" any passage by inventing missing scenes — in which case even elephants could fly. What matters is plausibility: what the author actually gives us, what the narrative makes room for, and what the flow of events naturally supports. And on that level, Luke offers no clear space for any resumed preparation after the Sabbath.

Summary and conclusion: Let us briefly recap our findings if the traditional view is assumed, where Christ died on Friday (about 3 p.m.). Luke reports that the women completed their preparation of the spices before the Sabbath. Yet we have seen that this is highly improbable — indeed, logistically impossible — for them to begin this work right after the crucifixion (about 3 p.m. on Friday) and still finish before the Sabbath began (about 6 p.m. on Friday). We also examined the suggestion that they resumed their work after the Sabbath, and showed that this too is highly unlikely. Thus, the traditional view cannot be reconciled with Luke's account, which tells us plainly that the women completed their preparation before the Sabbath. Consequently, the traditional Friday view collapses under Luke's testimony.

2. Friday as Annual Passover: Thursday crucifixion

This view assumes two consecutive Sabbaths: Friday (Annual Passover) followed immediately by Saturday (weekly). Jesus would have been crucified on Thursday. In practical terms, the two Sabbaths occurring back-to-back effectively functioned as one continuous period of rest lasting about forty-eight hours during which neither work nor trade was permitted. Yet the same difficulty reappears here as in the previous view. If the Annual Sabbath began on Thursday evening, the women still faced the same impossibly short time to prepare before the two consecutive Sabbaths. Moreover, as we saw in the first case, Luke's narrative also makes it highly unlikely that the women resumed the preparation of spices after these two Sabbaths. Therefore, the women could not have completed their preparation before the two consecutive Sabbaths, nor did they resume it afterward.

Thus, the Thursday-crucifixion view collapses under Luke's testimony as well.

3. Thursday as Annual Passover: Wednesday crucifixion

With the two earlier crucifixion views excluded, only one possibility remains: Thursday was the Annual Passover Sabbath, and Friday fell between two Sabbaths.

Wednesday was the day of the crucifixion
Thursday was the Passover Sabbath
Friday was an ordinary working day
Saturday was a weekly Sabbath

In this framework the accounts align seamlessly. Luke describes preparation before the weekly Sabbath (Saturday), which places the activity on Friday. Mark describes purchase after the Passover Sabbath (Thursday), which likewise places the activity on Friday. The Gospel accounts therefore converge on Friday. Friday was the only full day on which the women completed their preparation of the spices. This resolves the logistical difficulty and shows how the Gospel accounts harmonize without strain.

Recall that we have established that the count of days and nights should start from the moment Jesus was buried in the tomb. (See our discussion in the section "The meaning of 'in the heart of the earth'".) This means that the first night begins with Jesus' burial on Wednesday evening, and thus Saturday daytime would be the third day:

Wednesday evening to Thursday morning counted as the first night
Thursday morning to Thursday evening counted as the first day
Thursday evening to Friday morning counted as the second night
Friday morning to Friday evening counted as the second day
Friday evening to Saturday morning counted as the third night
Saturday morning to Saturday evening counted as the third day

And thus, Jesus would have risen on Saturday, during the daytime, which would be the third day.

A clarification is needed. Jesus was buried just before sundown on Wednesday, immediately before the Annual Sabbath began.²³ Should those last scraps of daylight be counted as the first day? Certainly not, for in Jewish reckoning the day closed at sunset, and only what followed was counted as night. Those slivers of fading light cannot reasonably be exaggerated into a full "day".²⁴ Thus the count begins with Wednesday evening as night one.

The picture is coherent: Christ was crucified Wednesday afternoon around the ninth hour (~3 p.m.) and laid in the tomb before evening. Thursday was the Passover Sabbath, on which all work ceased. Friday was the day of preparation, on which the women prepared their spices. Saturday was the weekly Sabbath, on which the women rested. On Saturday, during the daytime, Jesus rose from the dead. On Sunday morning, the women came to the empty tomb and later that day they met the risen Christ.

The Second Witness: "The Third Day Since These Things" (Luke 24:21)

The picture so far is coherent: the women's preparations fit perfectly into the Friday between two Sabbaths. Yet one difficulty remains. On the road to Emmaus, two disciples said, "today is the third day since these things happened" (Luke 24:21). At first glance, some interpreters have taken this phrase to support a Thursday crucifixion. Could this overturn the conclusion we have just reached? No, it could not. When we take a closer look, Luke's own presentation tells a fuller story.

This statement was made on Sunday (Luke 24:1, 13, 21). As already shown in "The Two Key Witnesses to Christ's Chronology", the count would unfold as follows:

Sunday counted as the third day since "these things" happened
Saturday counted as the second day since "these things" happened
Friday counted as the first day since "these things" happened
Thursday counted as the very day on which "these things" happened

Would this necessarily imply that Jesus was crucified on Thursday? The key question is what the phrase "these things" actually refers to. Does it mean only the crucifixion itself, or does it encompass a wider chain of events? Some would narrow "these things" only to the crucifixion because of Luke 24:19–21. Let us take a closer look at the whole passage.

(v. 19a) And He said to them, "What things?"

(v. 19b) So they said to Him, "The things concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a Prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people,

(v. 20) and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered Him to be condemned to death, and crucified Him.

(v. 21) But we were hoping that it was He who was going to redeem Israel. Indeed, besides all this, today is the third day since these things happened". (Luke 24:19–21, emphasis added)

On a surface reading, the disciples' words might seem to point only to the crucifixion if the expression "these things" (v. 21) is assumed to be tightly linked with the earlier phrases "what things?" (Greek poia, ποῖα; v. 19a) and "the things concerning" (Greek ta peri, τὰ περὶ; v. 19b). Under that assumption, "these things" (Greek tauta, ταῦτα) would narrowly refer to the crucifixion mentioned in verse 20. But this apparent link is an illusion created by English; in Greek these expressions are entirely different words and do not function as a unified set. The English phrasing makes them look related, but the Greek reveals their distinct roles. Ta peri introduces a topic in a general manner ("the things concerning Jesus …"); it is not meant to provide a complete account of the events. The disciples' statement in verses 19–20 is therefore a summary rather than a full account. By comparison, tauta is a demonstrative that typically gathers up the entire situation under discussion, not only the last event mentioned.²⁵

This distinction between a general introduction (ta peri) and gathering up everything that has happened (tauta) fits Luke's narrative usage perfectly. In Luke–Acts, tauta regularly points to the entire situation under discussion, not merely the last mentioned event, and so it can easily encompass the condemnation, the crucifixion, the burial, the sealing of the tomb, and the setting of the guard — events completed by Thursday. Thus, "these things" does not need to refer narrowly to the crucifixion alone but to the wider cluster of deeds surrounding Christ's death.

Two lines of evidence support this broader reference of tauta:

The ongoing conspiracy of the rulers.²⁶
The discovery of the empty tomb

Let us consider both points in turn.

1. The ongoing conspiracy of the rulers

The Gospels speak with one voice: the chief priests and rulers were not merely passive bystanders but active conspirators in Christ's death.²⁷ In the words of the Emmaus disciples, Luke recounts part of this very conspiracy: "how the chief priests and our rulers delivered Him [Christ] up to be condemned to death, and crucified Him" (24:20). These deeds lie at the heart of the conspiracy and belong to the events referred to by the expression "these things", though the scope of "these things" is wider than these deeds alone. The conspiracy was driven by the leaders' hostility toward Christ, and that hostility did not end on Golgotha. Matthew records that their plot continued beyond the crucifixion into the next day.

On the next day, which followed the Day of Preparation, the chief priests and Pharisees gathered together to Pilate, saying, "Sir, we remember, while He was still alive, how that deceiver said, 'After three days I will rise.' Therefore command that the tomb be made secure until the third day, lest His disciples come by night and steal Him away, and say to the people, 'He has risen from the dead.' So the last deception will be worse than the first." Pilate said to them, "You have a guard; go your way, make it as secure as you know how." So they went and made the tomb secure, sealing the stone and setting the guard. (Matthew 27:62–66)

In Matthew's account we see the same leaders whom Luke calls "chief priests and rulers" (Luke 24:20), now sealing the stone and setting the guard. These acts were no separate episode but the very continuation of their conspiracy. The plot that began in their council chamber reached its climax at the cross, yet continued into the sealing of the tomb and the setting of the guard. All of it belongs to the same cluster of hostile deeds — the full scope of "these things".

2. The discovery of the empty tomb

The words of the Emmaus disciples cannot be separated from the shock that had just electrified Jerusalem: the tomb was empty! The women had gone early on Sunday to perform their final act of devotion, carrying the spices they had prepared. Instead of a sealed grave, they found an open one and angels declaring that Christ was alive.

They ran to tell the apostles, and the report sent ripples of astonishment through the whole company. Later that same day, as two of the disciples walked to Emmaus, it was in the heat of this very excitement that they spoke: "Today is the third day since these things happened." Their words about "the third day since" were spoken in response to the discovery of the empty tomb.

Luke makes the link unmistakable:

(…) today is the third day since these things happened. Yes, and certain women of our company, who arrived at the tomb early, astonished us. When they did not find His body, they came saying that they had also seen a vision of angels who said He was alive. (Luke 24:21–23)

Notice how Luke presents the scene. The disciples say, "today is the third day since these things happened", and immediately begin speaking about the women and the empty tomb. It was the discovery of the empty tomb earlier that morning which gave the context for the disciples' saying, "today is the third day since these things happened." In other words, that discovery brought back to mind the entire chain of deeds that had already taken place: the condemnation, the crucifixion, the burial, the sealing of the tomb, and the setting of the guard, which was the final act that brought the rulers' conspiracy to its end. Thus, the phrase does not point narrowly to the crucifixion alone, but to the wider chain of events culminating in the sealing of the tomb and the setting of the guard. It is the third day since all these things unfolded.

Conclusion

Far from forcing a Thursday crucifixion, Luke 24:21 actually strengthens the Wednesday chronology. The phrase "the third day since these things" refers to the entire sequence of passion events — the condemnation, the crucifixion, the burial, the sealing of the tomb, and the setting of the guard — with the latter taking place on the day after the crucifixion, that is, on Thursday. Combined with the insurmountable problems of the Thursday view, the Emmaus disciples' words confirm rather than undermine the Wednesday chronology. And they do so on two independent grounds: first, the rulers' ongoing conspiracy; and second, the discovery of the empty tomb that prompted their words. Each strand reinforces the other. Taken together with the rest of the evidence, they strengthen the overall cumulative case for the Wednesday chronology.

Mark 16:9 — A Misunderstood Text

Of all passages used to defend the Friday–Sunday chronology, none is cited more often than Mark 16:9.

Now when He rose early on the first day of the week, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom He had cast seven demons. (Mark 16:9)

At first glance, the verse appears to declare a Sunday resurrection. Yet the entire case rests on how one renders a single Greek construction, and once the grammar is seen clearly, the supposed proof collapses.

The key lies in the Greek structure itself. Mark's wording consists of two clauses, and the question is where to attach the temporal phrase, "early on the first day of the week".

The verse presents:
(1) ἀναστὰς δὲ (anastas de, "having risen") — a participle describing what had already taken place before the main action.
(2) ἐφάνη (ephanē, "He appeared") — the main clause that carries the narrative action.

The temporal phrase prōi prōtē sabbatou ("early on the first day of the week") stands between the two clauses in the Greek sentence and may be attached to either one,²⁸ creating two equally legitimate readings,²⁹ each permitted by the syntax but differing in meaning.

All major translations connect the phrase to the first clause ("having risen"), producing the familiar rendering:

Now when He rose early on the first day of the week, He appeared …
Yet the grammar fully supports reading the phrase with the second clause, marking the timing of the appearance:

Now, having already risen, He appeared early on the first day of the week …

This second reading shows that Mark is timing the appearance rather than the resurrection. Sunday morning thus marks the women's encounter with the risen Christ, not the resurrection itself, and thereby avoids the contradictions created by the traditional rendering. If the phrase were tied to the resurrection itself, Mark would stand in conflict with Matthew 12:40 and Luke 24:21, both of which fix the timeline otherwise. It would also conflict with Luke 23:56, whose timing of the women's actions rules out a Sunday-morning resurrection view. But if it marks the timing of the appearance, the harmony is restored: Sunday morning is when the risen Christ was seen, not when He rose.

Yet if the grammar permits harmony, why has the other reading dominated almost every translation? The answer lies not in the Greek text itself, but in the weight of later church tradition.

Why the traditional reading prevailed — The reason nearly all translations favor the first reading is not grammatical necessity but historical tradition. From the fourth century onward, the church increasingly exalted Sunday as the Lord's Day. Interpreting the verse as anchoring the resurrection to Sunday morning naturally reinforced this growing emphasis. Thus, what began as one legitimate option gradually hardened into the only accepted translation.

Verdict — The text itself does not require the Sunday reading. On the verse alone, the grammar allows two equally valid renderings. Yet the traditional translation, when combined with the Friday–Sunday scheme, collides head-on with the wider Gospel record, given the difficulties revealed in Luke 23:56 and the witness of Matthew 12:40 and Luke 24:21. To insist on the Sunday rendering is not only unnecessary but creates a serious and irreconcilable conflict with the Gospel record itself. Far from overturning the case, Mark 16:9 in fact fits smoothly within the Wednesday–Saturday chronology. The Sunday-resurrection claim, therefore, rests on tradition rather than Scripture, while the Saturday chronology remains unshaken.

The question now becomes historical rather than grammatical: how did this tradition take root so deeply that it came to dominate both worship and translation alike?

Why the Sunday Tradition Prevailed

The triumph of the Sunday tradition did not arise from the Gospel text itself, but from the gradual evolution of Christian practice and ecclesiastical policy. The following overview shows how devotion, custom, and later conciliar decisions transformed the day on which the empty tomb was discovered into the assumed day of resurrection.

What the Gospels actually say

The evangelists never clearly state that Jesus rose on Sunday morning. (See our discussion on Mark 16:9.)
Instead, they show that by dawn on the first day, He had long since risen: "He is risen! He is not here" (cf. Mark 16:6).
What happened on Sunday was the discovery of the empty tomb and the first appearances of the risen Christ.

How Sunday became associated with the resurrection

In the earliest centuries, Christians gathered both on the seventh-day Sabbath and on the first day of the week,³⁰ the latter in view of the discovery of the empty tomb and Christ's first post-resurrection appearances that happened on Sunday.
Over time, remembrance of the appearances was gradually conflated (or merged) with the resurrection event itself.
Thus Sunday came to be celebrated not merely as the day the risen Christ was seen, but as the day He was believed to have risen.

Why Nicaea fixed Easter on Sunday

At the First Council of Nicaea (A.D. 325), the computation of Easter was separated from the Jewish Passover calendar and fixed on a Sunday. Three main reasons for this are as follows:

To distance the church from Jewish observance: celebrating on the 14th of Nisan coincided with the Jewish Passover, which many bishops wished to avoid.
To unify the churches: the early church had been divided between Quartodecimans, i.e., those who observed the 14th of Nisan, and others who favored Sunday. Nicaea sought a uniform practice.
To exalt Sunday as the day of encounter with the risen Christ: Sunday had already been honored as the day of the empty-tomb discovery and Christ's first post-resurrection appearances. Aligning Easter with Sunday reinforced that symbolism.

In this way, Sunday became firmly entrenched not only as the weekly day of worship but also as the annual celebration of the resurrection. This decision shaped both liturgy and translation: the rendering of Mark 16:9 that linked the resurrection to Sunday morning soon became dominant.

Conclusion

We have listened to the witnesses. Each has testified clearly and consistently. When their words are weighed together, the verdict is unavoidable. It points unmistakably to the Wednesday–Saturday chronology, which is not the product of rigid day-counting, as is sometimes alleged. It arises from Scripture itself: the idiom of "days and nights" (Matthew 12:40), the precise force of "since" in Luke 24:21, Luke's record of the women's preparation before the Sabbath, the double Sabbaths of Passion Week, and the syntax of Mark 16:9. This is not a mere mathematical puzzle but a matter of faithfulness to the biblical record.

Matthew 12:40 — Christ Himself declared that He would be "three days and three nights in the heart of the earth", a statement that plainly contradicts the traditional view. We have shown that the traditional appeal to treat Christ's expression as a Jewish idiom in which day and night are counted together as one unit, rather than as distinct spans, is unfounded. It is often presented as though it were firmly established in rabbinical writings. Quite on the contrary, the rabbinical understanding of "three days and three nights" is not unanimous, and biblical examples usually cited for supporting the traditional view prove nothing of the kind. We have also presented biblical evidence showing why Christ's words should be honored in their plain sense where days and nights should be distinguished.
Luke 23:54–56 and Mark 16:1 — We have demonstrated that these two Gospel records of the women with their spices are significant in the chronology of Christ's death and resurrection. First, they show that the women could not have begun preparing their spices after the crucifixion and still finished before the Sabbath began. Second, they show that the women did not resume their preparation at any point after the Sabbath began. Third, these passages make best sense once we recognize that the crucifixion week contained two Sabbaths: the Annual Passover Sabbath (a "high day", John 19:31) on Thursday and the regular weekly Sabbath on Saturday. This leaves Friday as the one day for the women to buy and prepare spices, which is the only possible harmonization within the three-day framework.
Luke 24:21 — Luke identifies Sunday as the third day since "these things" happened (24:1, 13, 21). In context, "these things" include the rulers' actions such as sealing the tomb and setting the guard. These actions are inseparably tied to Christ's death and burial and therefore form part of "these things". The verse is in direct conflict with the traditional view of Friday crucifixion. Moreover, we have shown that it does not require a Thursday crucifixion but fits perfectly with the Wednesday–Saturday chronology.
Mark 16:9 — At first glance it seems to place the resurrection on Sunday morning. But the Greek allows and reasonably supports the reading that Sunday morning marked Christ's appearance to Mary, not the moment of His rising. By the dawn of Sunday, He had long since risen.

When all is brought together, the result is consistent and compelling:

Jesus was crucified and buried on Wednesday.
The Annual Passover Sabbath fell on Thursday.
The women bought and prepared spices on Friday.
They rested on the regular weekly Sabbath (Saturday).
Jesus rose from the dead on the Sabbath.

The testimony is complete. The Friday–Sunday view collapses under the weight of Scripture. The Thursday crucifixion view cannot stand. The Wednesday–Saturday chronology alone accords with the plain words of Christ, the testimony of the disciples, the harmony of the Gospels, and the pattern of the creation week, in its divinely ordered rhythm of evening and morning.

Endnotes

In Scripture the days of the week are numbered rather than named: the "first day of the week" corresponds to Sunday and the "seventh day" to Saturday. This article follows the biblical numbering throughout. Thus, the expression "seventh-day Sabbath" simply refers to keeping the seventh day (Saturday) as the holy day of rest.↩︎
The four-step counting pattern presented here follows the formulation given by Donald Culp. It is here adapted and expanded in its application. Source: Donald Culp, The Three Days and Three Nights (self-published, 2017), pp. 25–26.↩︎
Walter Bauer, revised and edited by Frederick William Danker, A Greek–English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature. 3rd ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), s.v. "ἀπό" section 2bγ. (Comment on Luke 24:21.)↩︎
Eerdmans Exegetical Dictionary of the New Testament. 3 vols. (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1990; accessed via Olive Tree Bible Software), s.v. "ἀπό" section 3b. (Comment on Luke 24:21.)↩︎
The Greek prepositional phrase ἀφ᾽ οὗ (aph ou) in this context corresponds exactly to the English preposition "since". As a preposition, since has a single temporal meaning, and that meaning is exclusive: it marks the period after a specified event. Merriam-Webster defines this prepositional sense as "in the period after a specified time in the past", with examples: "I haven't seen him since yesterday" and "I haven't eaten since breakfast". In these examples, the reference points ("yesterday", "breakfast") are not included; only the time after is included. See Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, s.v. "since," accessed November 20, 2025; https://unabridged.merriam-webster.com/collegiate/since.↩︎
cf. Matthew 16:21; 17:23; 20:19; Mark 9:31; 10:34; Luke 9:22; 18:33; 24:7, 46↩︎
Matthew 27:46; Mark 15:34; Luke 23:44–46 place Jesus' death at the ninth hour (around 3 p.m.).↩︎
According to the Jewish custom, the sunset marked the end of a day and the beginning of a new one, in contrast to our modern custom where midnight serves this purpose. The regular Sabbath began on Friday evening. The burial had to be completed before the Sabbath began, since Jewish law forbade work once the Sabbath was underway. John 19:42 notes this explicitly: "So there they laid Jesus, because of the Jews' Preparation Day, for the tomb was nearby." According to the traditional view, this Preparation Day was Friday, and therefore Christ had to be buried before Friday evening.↩︎
Believer's Bible Commentary cites the saying in the form: "A day and a night make an onah, and a part of an onah is as the whole". Source: William MacDonald, Believer's Bible Commentary, ed. Art Farstad (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1995), on Matthew 12:40.↩︎
R. T. France, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries: Matthew (Nottingham: Inter-Varsity Press; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1985; reprint 2008; accessed via Olive Tree Bible Software), on Matthew 12:40. (Comment on the Jewish idiom about onah.)↩︎
Jerusalem Talmud (Shabbat 9:3), available at Sefaria.org: https://www.sefaria.org/Jerusalem_Talmud_Shabbat?tab=contents (direct link: https://www.sefaria.org/Jerusalem_Talmud_Shabbat.9.3.3?lang=bi&with=all&lang2=en). The Hebrew word onah (עונה) literally means a "period" or "time span". The online translation renders it as "term", but "unit" or "segment" would also capture the sense here of a day or night counted separately. (Accessed: 27 September 2025).↩︎
John Lightfoot, From the Talmud and Hebraica (Grand Rapids, MI: Christian Classics Ethereal Library, n.d.), 152; also available online at CCEL: https://www.ccel.org/ccel/lightfoot/talmud. (Accessed: 27 September 2025).↩︎
Eric Lyons, "Did Jesus Rise 'On' or 'After' the Third Day?" Apologetics Press. https://apologeticspress.org/did-jesus-rise-on-or-after-the-third-day-756/ (Accessed: 27 September 2025).↩︎
R. T. France, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries: Matthew (Nottingham: Inter-Varsity Press; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1985; reprint 2008; accessed via Olive Tree Bible Software), on Matthew 12:40. (Comment on Sheol)↩︎
J. B. Payne writes: "The quantity employed at the burial of Jesus, both by Nicodemus and by the women (Jn. 19:39; Mk. 16:1), indicates honor rather than a desire to embalm (cf. ICC on John 19:39)." Source: Payne, "Burial" in Geoffrey W. Bromiley (ed.), International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1979–1998; accessed via Olive Tree Bible Software).↩︎
Spices and fragrant oils were costly commodities in the ancient world, used sparingly and often reserved for honorific purposes. Victor H. Matthews notes that such materials were prized possessions of kings and the wealthy, often used in royal treasuries or funerary rituals (cf. 2 Kgs 20:13; Ps 45:7–8; Jer 34:5). D. A. Carson and Colin G. Kruse note the high value of perfumed oils such as nard, illustrating the costliness of the fragrant materials used in burial preparation. Sources: Matthews, "Perfumes and Spices" in The Anchor Bible Dictionary, ed. David Noel Freedman et al. (New York: Doubleday, 1992; accessed via Olive Tree Bible Software); Carson, The Gospel According to John (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1991; accessed via Olive Tree Bible Software), on John 12:5; Kruse, John (London: Inter-Varsity Press; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2017; accessed via Olive Tree Bible Software), on John 12:3–5.↩︎
Texts teaching that any work on the regular weekly Sabbath of the seventh day is forbidden: Exodus 20:8–11; 31:12–17; Leviticus 23:3; Deuteronomy 5:12–15; Jeremiah 17:19–27. Separately, Nehemiah 10:31; 13:15–22 imply that any trade on the Sabbath is forbidden. Work was also forbidden during Jewish festivals which were considered as annual Sabbaths (cf. Leviticus 23:4–44).↩︎
Matthew 12:40.↩︎
cf. Matthew 17:23; Mark 9:31; Luke 9:22; 18:33; Acts 10:40; 1 Corinthians 15:4.↩︎
cf. Matthew 28; Mark 16; Luke 24; John 20.↩︎
The burial had to be completed before sunset, since Jewish law forbade work once the Sabbath began. John 19:42 notes this explicitly: "So there they laid Jesus, because of the Jews' Preparation Day, for the tomb was nearby." (Emphasis on urgency before sundown.)↩︎
John 19:39–40 records that Nicodemus used about a hundred pounds of spices for Jesus' burial. While the women may not have intended the same quantity, even a modest amount would have required significant time to purchase, carry, and prepare. It is implausible to imagine this being done in the brief span between mid-afternoon and sunset.↩︎
The burial had to be completed before sunset, since Jewish law forbade work once the Sabbath began. John 19:42 notes this explicitly: "So there they laid Jesus, because of the Jews' Preparation Day, for the tomb was nearby." (Confirming the burial was completed before the Sabbath began.)↩︎
In Jewish timekeeping, sunset closed the day, and what followed was counted as night. This boundary was visible and practical rather than mathematical, and it was based on the sun's disappearance to the naked eye. How, then, can a few minutes of fading light outweigh the long night that follows? In fact, the exact moment of sunset is not absolute. Even with modern instruments, astronomers disagree on how to define it, e.g., whether by the upper rim of the sun, the center of the sun, or by allowing for atmospheric refraction. And beyond "sunset proper", they further distinguish between civil, nautical, and astronomical dusk, each marking a different fading of light. If there is such uncertainty today with precise tools, how much more in biblical times, when people reckoned sunset by sight and approximation alone? To build a whole day upon a sliver of uncertain daylight is not only strained but untenable.↩︎
The expressions ta peri (τὰ περὶ, "the things concerning", v. 19) and tauta (ταῦτα, "these things", v. 21) may look similar in English translation, but in Greek they are distinct terms with different functions and should not be treated as identical. According to BDAG, ta peri refers to "what concerns someone or something" — the general circumstances or matters relating to a person or topic. In narrative usage, ta peri ordinarily introduces a subject in broad, non-exhaustive terms; it does not attempt to present a complete list of events. The disciples' description in verses 19–20 is therefore a general summary, not a full inventory, and the few items mentioned there are introduced only in passing. For that reason, the scope of tauta in verse 21 cannot be limited to those few items. In general, tauta is a demonstrative that in Luke–Acts regularly refers to the entire situation or sequence of events under discussion, not merely the most recent detail (cf. Luke 1:20; 2:19; 7:9; 24:14; Acts 5:11; 11:4). Thus in Luke 24:21, tauta naturally encompasses the whole Passion sequence — the condemnation, the crucifixion, the burial, the sealing of the tomb, and the setting of the guard — rather than the crucifixion alone. Source: Walter Bauer, revised and edited by Frederick William Danker, A Greek–English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), s.v. "περί" section 1i.↩︎
Donald Culp likewise argues on this point that the rulers' conspiracy continued beyond the crucifixion. Source: Donald Culp, The Three Days and Three Nights (self-published, 2017), pp. 49–52.↩︎
Numerous Gospel passages report the rulers' conspiracy against Jesus. The most explicit include Matthew 12:14; 22:15; 26:3–5; 27:1–2, 62–66; Mark 3:6; John 11:53; 12:10.↩︎
The Greek structure, Ἀναστὰς δὲ πρωῒ πρώτῃ σαββάτου ἐφάνη πρῶτον Μαρίᾳ (Anastas de prōi prōtē sabbatou ephanē prōton Maria), contains a participial clause (anastas de, "having risen") and a main clause (ephanē, "He appeared"), with the temporal phrase prōi prōtē sabbatou ("early on the first day of the week") standing between them. Three points follow concerning the Greek structure of the verse. First, the time-phrase may attach to either clause if the following conditions are met: (1) both clauses must make sense with the time-phrase; (2) the Greek verb-forms in each clause must be of the kind that can take a time-phrase; and (3) nothing in the Greek sentence compels the time-phrase toward one clause rather than the other. Mark 16:9 satisfies all three conditions. Second, this means the verse must be understood as allowing two fully legitimate readings of equal grammatical support: the traditional rendering, where the time-phrase is attached to the participial clause; and the alternative rendering, where it is attached to the main clause. In the alternative rendering, the word "already" is supplied, not written in the text but accurately reflecting the temporal force of the aorist participle anastas. Finally, a similar issue of temporal attachment appears in Luke 23:43 ("Today you will be with Me in Paradise"), where the placement of the temporal adverb affects interpretation.↩︎
A third reading of Mark 16:9 has been suggested, based on a literal rendering: "And having risen early on the first of the Sabbaths, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene…" (cf. Young's Literal Translation). Some Wednesday-proponents, such as Daniel Gregg, advocate this translation. They argue that because the words for "day" (ἡμέρα hemera) and "week" (ἑβδομάς hebdomas) do not appear in the Greek, the text should not be translated "the first day of the week". Instead, they connect "the first of the Sabbaths" with the Levitical command to count seven Sabbaths from Passover to Pentecost (Leviticus 23:15–16). See Daniel Gregg, The Resurrection Day of Messiah Yeshua (Self-published, 2012), www.torahtimes.org. The problem with the third reading is twofold: (1) πρώτῃ σαββάτου (prōtē sabbatou) is best explained as a Hebraism: in Hebrew, שַׁבָּת (shabbat) could designate not only the Sabbath day but also the whole week-cycle (cf. Luke 18:12, "I fast twice in the week"). (2) If one counts literal Sabbaths (Saturdays) toward Pentecost, only forty-two days elapse, not the forty-nine required by Leviticus. Here is the math: at the count of the first Sabbath (Saturday), no days have passed because it is the very first day of the count; by the second Sabbath, 7 days (1 week) have passed; by the seventh Sabbath, 42 days (6 weeks) have passed. But Leviticus requires 7 full weeks = 49 days, plus one more day = 50 (Leviticus 23:15–16). Only by counting weeks (not Saturdays) does one reach the commanded fifty days. For this reason, sabbaton here should be understood as "week", not as literal Sabbath days.↩︎
For a documented overview of early Christian practice of gathering both on the Sabbath and on the first day, see The Sabbath in Church History. This survey gathers primary and secondary sources from the 1st to the 12th century, including the testimonies of Socrates Scholasticus, Sozomen, the Apostolic Constitutions, and several medieval and early-modern writers who describe the continued observance of the seventh day alongside Sunday.↩︎