Alan Dale Gross
Well-Known Member
"The One Intermediate Day between the Two Sabbaths."
"The 4th scientific proof that Jesus Rose from the dead on a Sabbath morning: There is a clear biblical fact that the conventional opinion that Jesus was crucified on Good Friday and rose from the dead on Easter Sunday cannot be true at all."Between the burial of Jesus on the Preparation Day and His Resurrection there is not only talk of One Sabbath, but of TWO.
"The mention of these Two Sabbaths is a further valuable proof that Jesus could not have died on a Preparation Day for a double Sabbath, that is, not on a Friday.
"The biblical facts:
"The Women Prepare the Spices and Ointments BEFORE and AFTER the SABBATH."
"An alleged contradiction arises when comparing the statements of Mk 16:1 and Lk 23:56. The evangelist Mark writes:Mk 16:1: “When the Sabbath was past, [the women] ... bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him [Jesus].“
"But Luke says that this event was not after the Sabbath, but before:
Luke 23:55-56: “Then they returned and prepared spices and ointments.
56b On the Sabbath they rested according to the commandment.“
"According to Mark, the women clearly went shopping AFTER the Sabbath in order to prepare the ointments on the working day; but according to Luke, they prepared the ointments on the working day BEFORE the Sabbath in order to rest on the following Sabbath.
"This great alleged contradiction between Mark and Luke has caused many Bible readers headaches. For some, it has even been one of the greatest proofs of doubting the Authority of the Bible and making fun of the Word of God. In almost all Bible-critical books this comparison is mentioned. It has even been claimed that the Bible contains clear errors and is therefore implausible. Here the solution is very simple, as long as Christians are familiar with the calendar...
"After the Sabbath is before the Sabbath, as there are not only one or two, but even three Sabbaths in the 7-day Passover week. And this even happens every year, although in some years a yearly Sabbath may fall on a weekly Sabbath.
The Evangelists clearly speak of TWO different Sabbaths that are close in time, with at least one Intermediate Weekday in between. They describe the Preparation of ointments AFTER the Yearly High Sabbath and BEFORE the Weekly Sabbath:
"It is obvious: the Preparation Day of the 14th Nisan in that week must correspond to our Wednesday today, which was followed by the High Sabbath (Thursday). Then followed a Workday (Friday) and then the Weekly Sabbath (Saturday). It is true that this Working Day before the weekly Sabbath in the New Testament is not expressly referred to as the "Preparation Day", but this is not necessary at all, because nothing is written about this day except that the women have prepared the ointments. It is also a quite normal Preparation Day, which appears every week in the year before a Weekly Sabbath.
"The preparation day (14th Nisan) for Passover (15th Nisan, annual or high festival Sabbath) was much more important.
"The possibility that the 14th Nisan (the day of Jesus' crucifixion) falls on a Wednesday is something absolutely normal according to the biblical calendar and has come and will come in about 30% of all years. This same constellation has already very often existed not only at the time of Jesus and the first Christian congregation, but throughout the history of humanity, and every person who is reading this text right now has experienced in his life several times exactly the same holiday sequence at the time of the Passover, as in the year in which Jesus was crucified. In the following years, according to the Jewish calendar, the 14th Nisan fell on a Wednesday: 1972, 1975, 1979, 1982, 1986, 1989, 1996, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2006, and 2009. In the future, too, the same Passover order will exist as at the time of Jesus, in 2020, 2023, 2026, 2027 and 2030 (see table below).
"The Women Prepare the Ointments AFTER the SABBATH'
and Come to Jesus' Grave 'ON the SABBATH'."
"Another alleged contradiction can be found in the Gospel of Mark. Mark mentions that at the end of the Preparation Day (clearly before the Sabbath) the women "saw where He [Jesus] was laid" (Mark 15:47) and immediately afterwards he writes:"When the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint Him" (Mark 16:1). And then immediately in the next verse (Mk 16:2) he emphasizes: "And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb."
"Martin Luther writes that the women clearly bought the ingredients for the ointments AFTER (not before!) the Sabbath and then that they came to the tomb "ON a Sabbath". Luther's words also correspond to the literal translation from the basic Greek text, which many Bible experts around the world have also translated as correct (for examples see Old Bibles). Many English Bibles have also been correctly translated and speak of the coming of women to the tomb "on a Sabbath" or "on one of the Sabbaths."
"When the Sabbath was past" and "on a Sabbath". How is this possible? Is this not a contradiction? If the women went shopping AFTER the Sabbath, then they could not possibly have come to the tomb ON the Sabbath, as there would be a whole week in between. But Mark did not make a mistake. The explanation is very simple, because also here we are talking about two different Sabbaths: Jesus was buried on the Preparation Day (14th Nisan) for the Feast Sabbath (15th Nisan) and the day after this High Sabbath the women went shopping to come to the grave on the following Weekly Sabbath (17th Nisan). There are no contradictions.
"The explanation is so simple. Any child can understand it. Here again we are clearly talking about two Sabbaths, because at the time of Passover there are always three Sabbaths within a week. After the burial of Jesus at the end of the Preparation Day (14th Nisan), the women would never have been able to prepare the ointments, because there was not enough time for shopping and preparing the ointments.
"The women went home at the end of the Preparation Day and immediately the Great High Sabbath began. The women could not go shopping on the High Sabbath, since all trade, whether in the night or day phase, was strictly forbidden and thus not possible at all. Consequently, they prepared the ointments "after the Sabbath" and came "on a Sabbath" to the tomb.
"The two Sabbaths in a row, back-to-back, during the week, (which some Seventh-day Adventists accept (see church opinions), are also not possible, since the women prepared the ointments "when the Sabbath was past" and Jesus could not otherwise have been in the tomb "three days and three nights", since at least one night would be missing.
"There must therefore have been a working day between the Sabbaths:
From: 4. The one day between the two Sabbaths