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Many
believe that Christ our savior died at 3:00 PM on Friday, and that He was buried
shortly thereafter -- around 6:00 PM on Friday evening. If that were our case, in order to have 3 days and 3 nights as He prophesied (see Sign
of the Messiah), Christ would have
resurrected at 6:00 PM Monday evening. However, that is certainly not our case; Christ
rose from the grave on Sunday morning before sunrise.
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John 20:1 Early on Sunday morning, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance
Matthew 28:1 Now after the Sabbaths, as it began to light up into the first of sabbaths (Sunday), Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to look at the grave.
The Greek word that has been translated as "began to light up" is "ἐ π ι φ ω σ κ ο ύ σ ῃ". Notice that "phos" is the Greek root for light. From the root "phos" or "phot" come words such as phosphorus, phosphorescence, photo, photograph, photon, etc.
Another place where a similar word " ἐ π έ φ ω σ κ ε ν " appears is in the book of Luke, in reference to Christ's burial.
Luke 23:54
"it
was
day of preparation, and Sabbath was lighting upon"
The Greek word for "lighting upon" is " ἐ π έ φ ω σ κ ε ν" "epephosken", therefore when Luke states "Sabbath was lighting upon," he means that it was becoming daylight, or dawn.
It was becoming MORNING when Christ was finally buried, not evening as most people believe. Yeshua/Jesus had to be buried before morning because our Messiah is the Passover lamb, and the requirement was that any part left of the Passover lamb had to be buried or burned before daybreak.
Exodus 34:25
You shall not offer the blood of my sacrifice with
leavened bread; neither shall the sacrifice of the feast of the Passover be
left to the morning.
From reading in Luke 23:54
"Sabbath was lighting upon," many
people have assumed that this means that it was now Saturday. However
in the Bible there are weekly Sabbaths, and there are also annual Sabbaths which
refer to the Holy
Days.
This Sabbath was not a weekly Sabbath; this was a yearly Sabbath that falls on Nisan 15 of the Jewish Calendar, the first day of Feast of Unleavened Bread. It happens that in the year Jesus died, Nisan 15 fell on a Thursday. Counting 72 hours (3 days and 3 nights) from that Thursday morning when Yeshua / Jesus' burial was finally COMPLETED, we arrive at Sunday morning, the day that we find that He was already resurrected, fulfilling the prophecy.
Notice that he was buried before sunrise and resurrected before sunrise.
See our file Did Christ Die on a Friday?
The crucifixion occurred at 3:00 PM Mark 15:25 It was now the third hour, and they crucified Him. Jesus died during the night, late on Wednesday (Roman time). His burial took place during the night of Wednesday and past midnight until the early hours of Thursday, the burial finishing with the stone being rolled over the entrance of the grave in the predawn hours of Thursday.
Mark 15:46 So Joseph purchased a [fine] linen cloth [for wrapping the body], and after taking Jesus down [from the cross], he wrapped Him in the linen cloth and placed Him in a tomb which had been cut out of rock. Then he rolled a [large, wheel-shaped] stone against the entrance of the tomb.
To answer the question "Was he buried at 6:00 pm on Friday?" we have to understand that the problem arises from trying to "fit a foot too big for the shoe." Throughout the ages people have tried to fit the events of Christ's death and prove that He was the Messiah. From the lack of knowledge of what Pesach/Passover, feast of unleavened bread, and the annual holidays mean, people have assumed that the Sabbath in reference was a weekly Sabbath, and therefore in order to fit the 3 days and 3 nights, they needed to "bury" Christ as early as possible in order to be able to count Friday as one of the 3 days. We do not need to fit a square peg into a round hole. We want to find the truth; we are going to look into the bible and find out what it says.
| More evidence that Christ
died LATE IN THE EVENING is found in Mark
15.
Mark 15:42-43 The original Greek
transliteration states "and already of
evening having come to be" The word translated as "evening"
is the Greek word "o y
i a V"
"opsias" which means late evening.
It was already late evening when
Joseph from Arimathea came to the cross.
After Jesus was already dead,
Joseph went to Pilate to claim the body of Jesus. |
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Notice that Mark talks about the preparation for Passover. It was an annual Sabbath, not a weekly Sabbath. Pilate had to make sure that Jesus was dead, so he first sends the centurion to find out if it is true. After Pilate confirms that Jesus is dead, about 10:30 PM, he allows Joseph of Arimathea to take the body for burial. |
From the time Joseph of Arimathea came to Jesus' cross we can list the following events:
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Roman Centurion |
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Joseph was the owner of the cave site were they buried Jesus, but it was just a cave, not a burial site. Since there were no power tools at that time, they had to prepare the tomb by chiseling out the rock with hand tools. The tomb included a flat bed carved out of the rock in which they put the body of Christ. This took several hours.
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It was becoming daylight when they
finally finished rolling the stone to the door of the tomb. Remember,
the original Greek word
for
"lighting upon"
is
" ἐ π έ φ ω σ κ
ε ν" epephosken.
How long did all of these
events take? Several hours as a minimum. That is why we can be sure
that if Jesus died at 9:00 PM that Wednesday night, then Christ's burial was finally completed around
5:30
AM that Thursday morning, because during the spring equinox -- time of
the year when Christ died -- the sun rises at 6:00 AM. By finishing His burial before daybreak of Nisan 15,
it was fulfilled the requirement of the law that no part of the Passover lamb
was to remain till the morning.
Exodus 34:25 |
