Sheshbazzar

What is "irritating" about the fact that "Tuesday" is the third day in each week?

Are you suggesting that the phrase, "the third day" (or "in three days") indicates that "the third day" under consideration is actually a "Tuesday" in each instance where that phrase occurs in Scripture?

Chili

Perhaps so in OT thinking where Sabbath begins in the dark but in the NT the seventh day has arrived on which evening did not follow the day and therefore is Sunday as the seventh day. My bible says for the first day "thus evening came and morning followed" and likewise "evening came and morning followed" for each of the next five days until heaven and earth and their array were completed and that is where Genesis 1 ends. Period.

Genesis 2 is where the created essence of Gen.1 finds existence in being for whom ligth was life and perdition not known wherefore evening did not follow on the Seventh day and it is called Holy in being because darkness is absent and therefore is eternal in existence as being. Period.

So then we come to Gen.3 where individual-ity is added to existence wherein only we have being and it is upon this existence that the city of God is built wherein darkness is not, which for the Jews was Jerusalem [on high] in Israel and for NT people it is Rome [sweet home] in the seventh day of existence wherein darkness is not in Christendom. Period.

The simple conclusion here is that night is an illusion to make stars known from which follows that stargazers should not be our informers but rather the dean of the city of God wherein light is life everlasting.

ETA, to wit: Sunday is Holy and therefore real whereore it belongs in Gen. 2 but must emerge out of the confrontation between light and dark, which then is how the essence of salvation is created to come about in the journey of life [along the road dust of the sun] that finds form in Gen.2 between 10-14. It is here that the river of life divides with the fall of man so that we can perceive pleasure and pain and finally become one once again in brilliance that there is called Eu-phrates to confirm this as fact.

Lucis

the sign of jonah is also the astrological sign of pisces (fish) which is the age that started when jesus 'died'.

the_cave

I do think it's an interesting idea in its own right, however. But I have a hard time getting completely on board with it, as the idea that gMk originally ended with chapter 13, and that the remainder of the PN is tacked on, seems too incongruous--Jesus has already arrived in Jerusalem, has already predicted the fall of the temple, etc., and so the termination of the gospel with chapter 13 is anticlimactic. I don't dispute that there is a change in style and narrative technique. But if chapter 13 and the PN are not originally by the same hand, there must be a more complicated solution than simply saying the PN was an addition to an already-existing gospel.

Instead, I think that the Little Apocalypse (LA) and the PN are both evidence that gMk is a composite document, originally based off of at least one (or more) prior works, whether literary or oral. IMO the sense the reader gets of arriving at a narrative climax with the LA is evidence that gMk is a re-working of an older narrative, one which did not precisely mirror the order of gMk.

Notice that the narrative element which just precedes the LA is the entry into Jerusalem--and that this happens to be the most notable example of gJn deviating from the narrative order in gMk, suggesting that either aMark or aJohn has been doing some rearranging (and let me suggest that it was aMark who did the rearranging, not aJohn as has been traditionally suggested). Next note that gJn has no LA--instead, it features a public discourse in Jerusalem, and a longer private one during aJohn's version of the Last Supper. This suggests that Mark and John were both adding material to a smaller narrative core. And note also that the narrative element which just follows the LA is the Last Supper (LS)--again presenting one of the notable deviations of gJn from gMk's narrative (in gJn, there is no institution of the eucharist, and the footwashing is entirely absent from the other gospels).

Finally, notice that gMk and gJn also deviate on a key element in the LS narrative--in gMk, Judas is bribed to betray Jesus, whereas in gJn he is simply possessed by Satan to betray him. Once again I feel compelled to refer to the account in the Slavonic Josephus, where it is Pilate, not Judas, who is bribed in order to crucify Jesus.

As for spin's observation about the "three days", I think this is accurate--there was a tradition earlier than gMk where Jesus was said to have been raised "after three days", and which featured some sort of LA tradition--but which did not feature a PN. My guess is it looked something like a proto-Q, or an alternate Q. I'm not even sure it was a literary source. But it did have an ending, and the ending was the LA--which has been spliced into a narrative gospel, containing a PN, that served as a source for both gMk and gJn. aMark used the LA, but aJohn did not. This particular Markan source knew that the Son of Man had died and been raised--but did not have the story of how it happened.

And briefly getting back to something I mentioned at the beginning--why do I suggest that it was aMark who rearranged the narrative order, rather than aJohn? Because in the Slavonic Josephus, Jesus is arrested by Pilate--but then released, only to be arrested a second time. I suggest that aMark has telescoped this narrative into a single arrest, whereas aJohn preserves some of the original order.

Jeffrey Gibson

It's what??:huh: Who says so? And on what grounds?

Jeffrey

Lugubert

Tuesday as resurrection day makes the NT chronology at least problematic. The creation story probably doesn't mean that it started on Sunday.

How the notion of when a "day" starts affects counting might deserve a thread of its own.

Casper

Would this have been a result of an original tradition based on a lunar calender, or at least seeing the beginning of each day as sunset?

spin

I don't see how a lunar calendar would have any effect. Perhaps, if you have a working idea, you might explain.

I think if one counted from sunset, then Jesus was plainly in the ground a day and a half (rather than a full day and bits of two others), so it should be clear that a change for clarity from "after three days" to "on the third day" would not have convinced anyone under the Pharisaic evening to evening day.


spin

badger3k

The fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh...?

Actually, that is a bit of a linguistic question, one I am unfamiliar with. In English, we have used "on" as in "On Sunday" to indicate a definite time, but "after" to indicate either definite or indefinite "After Saturday" could indicate either "on Sunday", or "any day from Sunday and later". When translating them into these terms, are these concepts followed, or is the language more fluid than that? Another question is whether the terms for "day" referred to a 24-hour period or the time of daylight? That could change the meaning of "on the third day/after the third day" as well (this ties into the start of the day idea).

Of course, the discovery of this pre-Christian idea of a resurrecting savior after three days may explain this element as well. Another idea to consider would be the influence of other religious ideas of the time. Does anyone know of any pagan beliefs that included the three-day motif?

Chili

I would not worry so much about the exact three days if it is just a passing stage in metamorphosis. Don't forget here that it was a common occurance in those days when doubters were beaten into submission. But for sure, it is the time needed for eagles to grow wings.

I hope Johnny reads this.