the 72-hour-view

The recent series of blogs about the days on which Christ died and arose delivered quite a few responses. Oddly enough, the vast majority of responses came not from those who (traditionally) take Friday to be the day of the crucifixion, but from of those who believe that this was on a Wednesday. Their idea comes down to this: because Christ, according to His own words, would be dead for “three days and three nights”, they count it as 72 hours (=6×12), i.e., from the beginning of the Wednesday evening to the beginning of the Saturday night. Thursday was the annual Sabbath of the 15th of Nisan, Friday was an ordinary day in the Passover week and Saturday was the weekly Sabbath. Christ was resurrected on Saturday night, after the Sabbath and Sunday morning, the stone was rolled away from the tomb. Hence, this perception or view. Some of them also rely on Daniel 9:27, where it speaks about “the midst of the week”. They bring this into connection with the slaying of the Messiah in Dan.9 26. They conclude: Jesus was slain in the midst of the week, so, on Wednesday… A few notes: Let me begin with the last argument of Daniel 9: the half of the week that is spoken of in this chapter, has nothing to do with the Wednesday under consideration. Daniel 9 does not speak of weeks of days, but of years. The 70 weeks are 490 years. The half of the week mentioned in Dan.9:27, is elsewhere called “42 months” (Revelation 13:5) and “1260 days” (Revelation 12:6). In other words, half of year-week, equals 3.5 years. Secondly, I don’t see why “three days and three nights” should be converted to 72 hours. Jesus counted days and nights, not hours; where a part of a day is counted as a complete day. When a Jewish boy was circumcised on the eighth day, then this was counted from the day of his birth, even if that day would only be a few minutes; it was counted as one day. Thirdly, it is a forced construction that Christ was resurrected on Saturday night, while the stone was only rolled away from the grave on Sunday morning (Mat.28:2; Jn 20:1). Why twelve hours later? Do the earthquake and the rolling-away of the stone not precisely pinpoint the time of Christ’s resurrection and Him leaving the grave?! Fourthly, in this consideration, it is meaningless for the women not to attend to the need of the body of Jesus on Friday. After all, that was, in this perspective, an ordinary day, between two Sabbaths. Why should the women, in this case, wait until Sunday morning? Yet, in my opinion, the most decisive argument against the 72 hour-view is what the Emmaus-travelers said on Sunday afternoon:

20 …that both our chief priests and chiefs give Him up to the judgment of death, and they crucify Him. 21 Yet we expected that He is the One about to be redeeming Israel. But surely, together with all these things also, it is leading in this third day since these things occurred. -Luke 24- (CLV)

Please note: when the condemnation and crucifixion occurred on Thursday, then Friday was the first day since then, and Saturday the second day, and Sunday the third day. However you count (inclusively or exclusively), with the above communication of the Emmaus-travelers, you never come to a Wednesday. Impossible. Christ was indeed three nights in the heart of the earth. Dead. But this counting does not lead us to the Wednesday, but to the Thursday, as the day of the crucifixion.

Delen: