That Jesus Was In Fact Crucified On a Friday, According to the Scriptures

Introduction

There are some who madly fight against the Tradition which the Church has received throughout the whole world, that our Lord was crucified on a Friday, and attempt to overthrow this taking as their key the sign given to that wicked and adulterous generation, that the Son of Man shall be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth, which is found in Matthew 12:40. It is our purpose with what follows to show that they thus introduce an irreconcilable contradiction with ALL of the other Scriptures.

Preparation

To aid us in this task, we begin with the God-inspired Scriptures, which, as the beloved Paul says, are profitable for such reproof and correction and instruction. Here follows an exhaustive list of those sayings on this matter recorded in the Gospels, the Acts, and the Epistles — that is, the New Testament. (NB: All Scriptures quoted from the King James.)

Matthew

For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

12:40

From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day.

16:21

The Son of man shall be betrayed into the hands of men: and they shall kill him, and the third day he shall be raised again.

17:22, 23

Behold, we go up to Jerusalem; and the Son of man shall be betrayed unto the chief priests and unto the scribes, and they shall condemn him to death, and shall deliver him to the Gentiles to mock, and to scourge, and to crucify him: and the third day he shall rise again.

20:18, 19

And said, This fellow said, I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three days.

26:61

And they that passed by reviled him, wagging their heads, and saying, Thou that destroyest the temple, and buildest it in three days, save thyself.

27:40

Now the next day, that followed the day of the preparation, the chief priests and Pharisees came together unto Pilate, Sir, we remember that that deceiver said, while he was yet alive, After three days I will rise again. Command therefore that the sepulchre be made sure until the third day, lest his disciples come by night, and steal him away, and say unto the people, He is risen from the dead: so the last error shall be worse than the first.

27:62-64

Mark

And he began to teach them, that the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and of the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.

8:31

The Son of man is delivered into the hands of men, and they shall kill him; and after that he is killed, he shall rise the third day.

9:31

Behold, we go up to Jerusalem; and the Son of man shall be delivered unto the chief priests, and unto the scribes; and they shall condemn him to death, and shall deliver him to the Gentiles: and they shall mock him, and shall scourge him, and shall spit upon him, and shall kill him: and the third day he shall rise again.

10:33, 34

We heard him say, I will destroy this temple that is made with hands, and within three days I will build another made without hands.

14:58

Luke

The Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be slain, and be raised the third day.

9:22

Behold, I cast out devils, and I do cures to day and to morrow, and the third day I shall be perfected.

13:32

Behold, we go up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of man shall be accomplished. For he shall be delivered unto the Gentiles, and shall be mocked, and spitefully entreated, and spitted on: and they shall scourge him, and put him to death: and the third day he shall rise again.

18:31-33

The Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again.

24:7

Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day...

24:46

John

Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. … But he spake of the temple of his body.

2:19, 21

Acts

…whom they slew and hanged on a tree: Him God raised up the third day, and shewed him openly…

10:39, 40

1 Corinthians

…and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures…

15:4

Summary of Scriptures

In short, we find the following formulas, regarding when He would rise:

Phrase	# Occurrences
the third day	13
(with)in three days	4
after three days	2
three days and three nights in the heart of the earth	1

Examination

Generally, and especially among Sola Scriptura types, it is considered a good principle to interpret the obscure by the plain, the single by the plenty, and to let Scripture interpret itself.

After three days

First, let's examine the formulation, after three days to see if it has the import of the three days having fully passed (which would accord with the meaning they assign to three days and three nights in the heart of the earth), or if it means something else.

The Witness of the Old Testament

In the Old Testament we find this interesting passage in the second book of the Chronicles, the tenth chapter, beginning in verse five:

And he [that is, Rehoboam] said unto them, Come again unto me after three days. And the people departed. … [v12] So Jeroboam and all the people came to Rehoboam on the third day, as the king bade, saying, Come again to me on the third day.

Here we find that the two phrases, after three days, and on the third day are understood to be completely synonymous.

The Witness of the New Testament

This synonymity is attested also by the Greek of the Gospels that is translated after three days, wherein the word for after is meta, and has within its semantic range (as defined in Strong's, which these types also love to rely upon): amid or on.

And that this is not just Strong's understanding, but also that of the speakers themselves (the chief priests and Pharisees), we need only but examine their own words, Command therefore that the sepulchre be made sure until the third day.

Did they not wish the tomb to continue secured through the entire period of expectation? Why then did they only ask that it be secured until the third day — that is, through the time period of the third day — if they understood the time of expectation to extend beyond this same third day? But if after is taken to mean once the three days have already passed, it could not have been understood otherwise. Therefore, they must have understood after three days to be synonymous with on the third day.

Conclusion: Synonymous with the third day

Thus in the mouth of two witnesses — the Old Testament and the New — we have established every word with respect to this phrase, and may count it firmly among the others.

Three Days & Nights: Norm or Exception?

We have seen that the formulas, the third day, within three days, and after three days all agree in their import. These collectively comprise 18 of the 19 Scriptures listed above, being the unified witness of two of the three pillars (namely, Peter the Apostle to the Jews, and John the Beloved) as well as Paul the Apostle to the Gentiles, and (although not worthy of mention) the unbelieving Jews and the chief priests and Pharisees.

In the mouth of two or three witnesses, indeed.

Therefore, the formula three days and three nights is found to be the exception, rather than the rule.

The Third Day

Now let us examine the interpretation of this unified formula, again allowing two or three witnesses from within the Scripture itself to do the interpretation.

That the third day is Sunday

First, regarding the narrative of the events themselves, we are told that the day upon which He did in fact rise was specifically the first day of the week — that is, what we call Sunday. Luke relates to us that upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they [that is, the women], came unto the sepulcher …

Second, we are told by the two on the Road to Emmaus that the third day is in fact the Day of the Resurrection. That is, He did not rise on some day after that day, thus allowing for some longer timeline. Luke relates that Cleopas, later that same day as above, said, Concerning Jesus … the chief priests and our rulers delivered him to be condemned to death, and have crucified him. … to day is the third day since these things were done. Now, these things could not correctly said to be done until that was done which completed their number: namely, the crucifixion.

Together, then, we conclude that this first day of the week was also the third day since they crucified Him, and was a Sunday.

The impossibility of three days and three nights taken literally

Now if the day He rose was, as we just found, the third day since His crucifixion, it is manifest that three entire days and nights counted completely and without diminution could not have already passed, although the Friday-deniers would have it so.

If three full days (let alone and three nights) had already passed, then the day whereon it is noted that they have passed cannot in any sense be called the third day, for the third day is counted among those that have already passed, being precisely the third of the three.

That same third day having then already passed with the three, the earliest day that one could possibly say the three have passed would be the fourth day, and not before, else said third would be yet passing, and not already passed.

But those who would take the phrase three days and three nights as the governing time frame regarding the day of the Resurrection, and thus work backward to some other day than Friday for the crucifixion — these would have the third day be simultaneously passed already and yet still passing (that is, not yet passed) when Cleopas spoke!

This is a contradiction that cannot be avoided nor overcome in that scheme, and thus their interpretation is shown to be nonsense.

The Lord's own witness

For a second witness to this fact, let us examine the words of our Lord Himself, Who explained to Herod, Behold, I cast out devils and I do cures to day and to morrow and the third day I shall be perfected.

What can this mean? By today and tomorrow and the third day, did He refer to that same day on which He spoke, the day following, and the day after that? Or did He have some other meaning?

He wasn't speaking immediately

He tells them (and thus us) straightaway that He had not just referred to that very day, etc., when He spoke these things. Rather, of those days He says, Nevertheless I must walk today and tomorrow, and the following, for it cannot be that a prophet perish out of Jerusalem. And He then, over the next several chapters, He proceeds to do exactly that: to walk toward Jerusalem, culminating in His triumphant entry with palms, on the donkey, in the beginning of the week of His passion.

Therefore it is manifest that He was referring to two different sets of three days: the one immediately following His declaration, wherein He walked to and entered Jerusalem, and the other some other time, when He would cast out devils, do cures, and be perfected.

Rather, He spoke of the exact three days in question

To what, then, did He refer in His message to Herod? We need only examine the content of the message, and compare it to the days of the crucifixion, burial, and resurrection.

Of the first two days

Regarding the first two days, He says, I cast out devils and I do cures to day and to morrow.

Note that He does not say, I cast out devils to day, and I do cures to morrow. Rather, He here obscures the order by reversing it and grouping both under a collective today and tomorrow.

Nevertheless in the Cross the true order is revealed, for in the same day that He stood before Herod He was also scourged and crucified, fulfilling the Scripture, by His stripes we are healed. Thus it is on the first day of the three — today, when talking to Herod — that He did cures.

Next, on to morrow (that is, the second day) He cast out devils, for on that day, while His flesh rested in hope (it being the Sabbath, that seventh day of the week upon which God rested) in the tomb, yet in His soul He invaded Hades and bound the strong man — namely Satan, the prince of devils — and cast him into the bottomless pit, and divided his spoils, leading his captivity forth captive to Himself, even as He foretold by the mouth of the prophet Jeremiah:

And I will punish Bel in Babylon, and I will bring forth out of his mouth that which he hath swallowed up: and the nations shall not flow together any more unto him: yea, the wall of Babylon shall fall.

51:44

Of the third day

And on the third day, He said, I shall be perfected.

What can this mean but the Resurrection? For in what other way can the Perfect One have been perfected, except that His soul was not left in Hades nor His Holy One (that is, His body) suffered to see corruption? Indeed, the two were on that third day made complete (i.e. perfected) — joined together whole again — and He was raised up!

Conclusion

So then after a long excursus, we have once again proven in mouth of two or three witnesses that the Resurrection was on the third day, the time in the grave on the second, and the Crucifixion on the first.

The third day since these things were done (that is, the things culminating in the crucifixion) is also the first day of the week, which we know as Sunday, in which He was perfected.

Now when counting, the day before the third is the second, and regarding the week the day before the first is the seventh, known to us as Saturday but known to the Jews as the Sabbath, on which God rested in the tomb while He cast out devils in Hades.

Finally, the day prior to the second is the first, being of the week the sixth before the seventh, in which our Passover was sacrificed for us outside the gates in accord with the Law on the preparation day, the sixth day of the week, in which He did cures, healing us by His stripes and submitting to crucifixion that He might cure the disease of sin by putting it to death in His body on the Cross. The sixth day is known to us as Friday.

And thus we arrive at that which was to be proven: that our Lord was crucified on a Friday.

Post-Script

NB: We have not here addressed what the Lord actually meant by three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. However, we have shown that it could not possibly mean that He was crucified on a day other than Friday, since the overwhelming weight of the rest of Scriptures by many and varied witnesses including His own thoroughly indicates that He was indeed crucified on a Friday.

What He did actually mean is a subject for another post.