Notsri

Matthew's "three days and three nights" is a semitism which has the same meaning as his "on the third day." "Three days and three nights," "after three days," and "on the third day" are all used in the NT to mean the same thing (as in rabbinic literature also).

Regards,
Notsri

Chili

The sign of Jonah is to end the evil age in the mind of the believer who, like Jonah, will feel guilty for the turmoil around him that exists only in his own mind. This would be where the salvation comes like a thief in the night and sets the sinner free again on the other side of life.

yummyfur

There is only one mention of "three days and three nights" in the New Testament, and it is the line we are discussing in Matthew. While it is certainly true that partial days can be related as a fullday, when a generic "three days" or "third day" is used, when each portion of the day is spelled out as in "three days and three nights" it is meant to say, well three days and three nights, unless you want to render language completely meaningless. Even if you want to say a partial day and a partial night would count as one of the three, it still doesn't fit the resurrection story, which goes as follows:

partial daytime, full nightime, full daytime, full nighttime, partial daytime

That leaves us with Three days and two nights, unequivically.

the bare minimum requirement for "three day and three nights" would be

partial daytime, full nighttime, full daytime, full nighttime, full daytime, partial nighttime

this is at least 50 hours

There are only two times this phrase is used in the OT, the line in Jonah that Matthew is borrowing, and 1Samuel 30:12

"They gave him a piece of fig cake and two clusters of raisins, and he ate; then his spirit revived. For he had not eaten bread or drunk water for three days and three nights. "

Please don't use Esther, as that line is quite different

Esther 4:16-17

"Go, gather together all the Jews who are in Susa, and fast for me. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my maids will fast as you do. When this is done, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. And if I perish, I perish."

Notice it doesn't spell out three days and three nights, but merely three days, it makes the day or night reference so as to not let there be any error, and think that the person would only need to fast during the daytime.

PhilosopherJay

Hi Yummyfur,

Sorry for misunderstanding your interpretation of the sign.

While you are correct and it doesn't make much difference here if Jesus or John said it, for me, and the hypotheses in my book, it does make a significant amount of difference for collateral investigations of other important issues.

In my book (The Evolution of Christs and Christianities, go to Evocc.com) chapter 6, Deconstructing the Gospel of Mark, I demonstrate that Mark has used a document which I call MQ which consists of doublets or similar answers to the same question given by two groups, the John the Prophet group and the John the Christ group. This is a source document for Mark, but not a source document for Matthew. I give 30 examples of doublets in the Gospel of Mark.

Yet, although MQ is not a Matthew source, we have this douplet from MQ found only in Matthew:

12.38 Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to him, "Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you."

12.39 But he answered them, "An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign; but no sign shall be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah... 12.41 The men of Nin'eveh will arise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here.

16.1 And the Pharisees and Sad'ducees came, and to test him they asked him to show them a sign from heaven

16.2 He answered them, "When it is evening, you say, 'It will be fair weather; for the sky is red.' 16.3 And in the morning, 'It will be stormy today, for the sky is red and threatening.' You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times. 16.4 An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign shall be given to it except the sign of Jonah."

The first answer to the first question is from the John the Prophet group. It means simply that the people from Ninevah trusted Jonah without a sign, I, John, am greater than Jonah. You should trust me.

The second answer is from the John the Christ group. It means simply that the scribes and pharisees can tell trivial things like the weather from the signs , but you can't see the signs about the time (aeons, ages, present age). Luke (12:54-12:56) backs this up.

The first answer is basically "You got to trust me." The second answer is "You're too dumb to see the signs."

Now for me the question is how did a doublet from the MQ source get into Matthew. The John the Prophet Group answer about not receiving a sign was already in Matthew from the UrMatthew source, which is a source document for MQ.

The answer of how the John the Christ's group answer got into Matthew becomes apparent when we look at Mark:

8.11The Pharisees came and began to argue with him, seeking from him a sign from heaven, to test him. 8.12And he sighed deeply in his spirit, and said, "Why does this generation seek a sign? Truly, I say to you, no sign shall be given to this generation." 8.13And he left them, and getting into the boat again he departed to the other side.

Note that the question is from the John the Christ group (the reference to heaven is the giveaway), but the answer is from the John the Prophet group.

Now, I have only figured out recently that the UrMatthew Document which I call The Teachings of John the Nazarene preceeds the UrMark Document MQ.

What has happened apparently is this. The passage 12:38, 39 and 41 was originally in the Gospel of Mark and not in Matthew. We may reconstruct it this way:

12.38 Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to him, "Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you."
8.12And he sighed deeply in his spirit, and said, "Why does this generation seek a sign? An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign; but no sign shall be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah
12.41 The men of Nin'eveh will arise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here. Truly, I say to you, no sign shall be given to this generation."

And soon after, probably after another miracle we had this in Mark,

(Mark 8.11)The Pharisees came and began to argue with him, seeking from him a sign from heaven, to test him.

(Matthew 16.2) He answered them, "When it is evening, you say, 'It will be fair weather; for the sky is red.' 16.3 And in the morning, 'It will be stormy today, for the sky is red and threatening.' You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times.


Now, my best guess is that Luke (17:22-24) contains more or less the rest of the John the Christ Group's answer:

"The days are coming when you will desire to see one of the days of the Son of man, and you will not see it. 17.23 And they will say to you, 'Lo, there!' or 'Lo, here!' Do not go, do not follow them. 17.24 For as the lightning flashes and lights up the sky from one side to the other, so will the Son of man be in his day.

The word "days' was probably "signs" in the original gospel of Mark and MQ text. In other words the sign is going to be the Son of Man flashing like lightening here and there in the sky.

Why did the editor break up this doublet which was originally in MQ (and thus in Mark) and place part of it into Matthew and part into Luke? I do not know.
My guess is that it was too gnostic or Marcion sounding for his taste

I do strongly suspect this editor is the same fellow who put in the nonsense about the sign of Jonah being Jonah's three day visit to the whale's belly. I now suspect that nearly every reference to three days in the synoptics comes directly from the hand of the editor.

I guess we should now look for other MQ doublets that the editor has treated in this fashion. Maybe this will be my next research project.

I realize this doesn't make much sense for people who have not read the book, but for me it is very exciting.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

Hallandale

Dear Yummy,
I meant the praise.
You look at things in a deeper way.
I was looking at things in a much simpler way.
I just wanted to show the Christians that the New Testament resurrection story is not reliable and that the post resurrection appearances and empty tomb senario are very poor evidence for Jesus' supposed resurrection.
I was attempting to debunk the Christian's resurrection story by using the Bible as a source that they accept as the word of God.
1Corinthians 15:17 NAS
""if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless""

Nick Hallandale
enterprisestrategy@earthlink.net

Hallandale

The Christians often use Isaiah 53 as a supposed source of prophecy about Jesus.
Look at Isaiah 53:9 from the KJV and from the NAS. Supposedly this verse is about the crucifixion and burial of Jesus.

""And he made his grave with the wicked,
and with the rich in his death;""

""His grave was assigned with wicked men,
Yet He was with a rich man in His death,""

Do you notice something odd about this verse?
The verse is saying that Jesus' grave was with the wicked....
and his death was with the rich.
Everyone Knows the story....Jesus' death was with the wicked (the two thieves).........but he was buried with the rich (the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea)

The gospel writers seem to have gotten things backwards from the supposed prophecy of Isaiah 53:9.

How can someone believe the resurrection story when key facts are confused?

Nick Hallandale
enterprisestrategy@earthlink.net

Notsri

The gospel uses the expression in the same way it's used in rabbinic literature, as I mentioned before. Esther Rabbah 9:2 provides a perfect example:

"'Now it came to pass on the third day' (Esth. 5:1).

Israel are never left in dire distress more than three days. For so of Abraham it is written: 'On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes, and saw the place afar off' (Gen. 22:4). Of Jacob's sons we read: 'And he put them all together in prison for three days' (Gen. 42:17). Of Jonah it says: 'And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights' (Jonah 2:1).

The dead will also come to life only after three days, as it says: 'On the third day He will raise us up, that we may live in His presence' (Hos. 6:2). This miracle also [of Mordecai and Esther] was performed after three days of their fasting, as it is written: 'Now it came to pass on the third day, that Esther put on her royal apparel...'"

Regards,
Notsri

yummyfur

Thanks for not actually answering any of my points, I'm concerned only with "three nights and three days", who cares that a post talmudic midrashic text(probably written in Aramiac, not Hebrew) put together a bunch of bible qoutes that have "three days" in them, it's hardly meaningfull or original writing. Also since it's basic premise, that Isrealites are never left in dire distress longer than three days, is seriously flawed, why should we care what the writer says? By the way you did notice the author did not use the expression "three days and three nights" himself, he merely is qouting Jonah which is all Matthew is doing, how does this show us anything about rabbinic writing? What we would need, at the very least, is someone writing this took "three days and three nights", and then describing events that only have two nights in it, though this would still not prove that this was a general practice.

We actually have a fairly exact timetable and daytable for the resurrection story right from the gospels themsleves, so we can actually compare it to "three days and three nights". Are all these phrases considerd in a general sense "three days", yes, but the resurrection story is in a general sense "three days" but not in a specific sense "three days and three nights". It's kind of like something is a rectangle but not a square. "three days and three nights" is a more specific term than "three days" or "on the third day". Much like a square is a more specific polygon than a rectangle, though it is still part of the rectangle group.

By the way, this isn't a semiticism as the same kind of thing can be done in English, if I say something took three days, in English, it doesn't have to make it a full three days. But I bet when someone books a cruise, they know there can be a difference between a cruise merely advertised as "three days" and one advertised as "three days and three nights", so they would probably want to check the itinerary, and not just hope that they are similar in length. You could sue for false description, if the three day and three night cruise has only two nights on it's total itinerary, like the resurrection story does, but if it was listed only as three days, your out of luck.

John Kesler

Read the next verse. Taken together, the two verses seem to indicate that "three days and three nights" wasn't always interpreted as rigidly as we do now:

Also consider the Flood narrative. Even allowing that different sources have been combined, look at how the "J" source refers to the flood's duration:

yummyfur

If today is Wednesday, and I say I left for New York "three days ago", it would be Sunday that I left, which would also be "three days and three nights", I fail to see the problem, adding the "ago" does actually change what is meant.

If today is Wednesday, and I said I have been on the road for "three days", this could mean that I could have actually left as late as Monday or as early as Sunday. It's possible that this is still "three days and three nights", but not a given.

Of course the first qoute you gave is also about two totally different events, one being without food and water, the second being when he fell sick, or when his master left him(the text is unclear as to which), there is no requirement that they be the exact same time period and it is unlikely that they would be.

Again, the more general phrase "40 days" can always be used to describe the more specific phrase "40 days and 40 nights". But if you actually say from April 1 at 12:00 pm through May 10 at 12:00 pm, while this can be desribed as 40 days it can't be described as 40 days and 40 nights. If you say from April 1 at 12:00 pm through May 11 at 12:00 am, then both terms "40 days" and "40 days and 40 nights" are applicable.

Again we have extremely specific time information on the resurrection, which we do not have in any of these example, so far I have seen nothing that shows that "three days and three nights" doesn't mean what it says it means.