I certainly respect your efforts in searching for the truth. The very first words in Mark 16:1 say ""And when the sabbath was past" This seems to support the idea that Friday was a day between two sabbaths. They bought spices AFTER the sabbath on Thursday for the beginning of the unleavened bread holy day. They prepared the spices the same day they bought them ( Friday ). Then they rested on the Saturday sabbath and went to the tomb Sunday morning.I hope you will continue to search for the truth with anopen mind. And I hope we can both be better people because of this discussion. I just can't accept that Friday evening to Sunday is three days and three nights. And remember that Jesus said that this would be the ONLY proof that He was the Son of God. I really do not want to call him a liar. Best wishes.
Hi. I agree that we must take the Jonah prophecy as a literal 'three days and nights'. But I wonder whether the days and nights have to be whole 12 hour segments of time, or whether, as some commentators suggest, it's OK to take part days and nights to count as a whole. If we go by the purist view and only accept whole days and nights, and also accept that the women arrived at the empty tomb early on the first day of the week (Sunday), then we must go back to Wednesday for the crucifixion. I'm in full agreement with this understanding of the evidence. It also fits with the Jewish mathematical calculation that excludes Monday, Wednesday and Friday as the first day of Passover (the 15th Nisan).
The Jewish and Gentile day clocks don't match, but the rough equivalent would look something like this:
Tuesday - 13 Nisan (Last Supper)
Wednesday - 14 Nisan (Crucifixion and, in evening, Jewish Seder) [Jonah - 1 night]
Thursday - 15 Nisan (Holy Convocation or sabbath) [Jonah - 2 nights, 1 day]
Friday - 16 Nisan [Jonah - 3 nights, 2 days]
Saturday - 17 Nisan (weekly sabbath) [Jonah 3 nights, 3 days] [resurrection at night]
Sunday - 18 Nisan (tomb empty)
If we are to take all possibilities into account, then there is a chance that the preparation of spices took place on Wednesday, immediately after the entombment of the body of Jesus. Other spices could then have been purchased on either Friday, or after 6pm on Saturday. Either way, the text seems to indicate that some spices were prepared, before others were purchased. And, most importantly, there is no contradiction in the text!
Scriptures that do add some confusion are Matthew 26:17, and parallel passages in the synoptic gospels, where it says, 'Now the first
day of the
feast of unleavened bread the disciples came to Jesus, saying unto him, Where wilt thou that we prepare for thee to eat the passover?'
The wording here, taken from the KJV, seems to indicate that the Last Supper was held on the first day of the feast of Unleavened Bread, which would then have been a sabbath day.
I do have an idea how this difficulty might be addressed, but what do you think?