Did Jesus Die On Good Friday?

Published by DonDavidson on

Tradition says that Jesus was crucified on a Friday and resurrected on a Sunday. But is that true? What does the Bible say?

First, the Bible tells us that the women came to the tomb where Jesus’ body had been laid sometime before or near dawn on “the first day of the week” (Sunday) and found the tomb empty. (See, for example, Matthew 28:1, Mark 16:1-2, Luke 24:1, and John 20:1.)[1] The “first day of the week” began at sunset on Saturday, because for the Jewish people each new day begins at sunset.[2] Thus, the Jewish Sabbath begins at sunset on Friday and ends at sunset on Saturday. Jesus’ resurrection must have occurred sometime before dawn on Sunday, but it is important to remember that the Bible does not tell us exactly when he rose from the dead.

Now when was he crucified? Tradition says he was crucified on a Friday—“Good Friday.” This is based on scriptures like Mark 15:42-43, which says that on the day Joseph of Arimathea asked Pilate for Jesus’ body—which was the day Jesus was crucified—“it was the preparation day, that is, the day before the Sabbath.” Luke 23:54 is similar. (See also Luke 23:56 and John 19:31.) Since no work could be done on the Sabbath, the day before the Sabbath was the “preparation day”—the day on which necessary work was done in preparation for the day of complete rest to follow.

The rapidly approaching Sabbath, at sunset, was the reason why the Jews wanted to hasten the death and burial of the crucified prisoners, per John 19:31, and it was why Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus hastily placed Jesus’ body in Joseph’s “nearby” tomb, per John 19:42, rather than a more permanent location.

If the approaching Sabbath was Saturday, then the “day before the Sabbath” would be Friday. Thus, the church concluded that Jesus was crucified on a Friday.

But this simple approach seems to run afoul of Matthew 12:39-40, where Jesus said this in response to the scribes and Pharisees demanding to see a sign to prove his divine authority: “An evil and adulterous generation craves a sign; and so no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah the prophet; for just as Jonah was in the stomach of the sea monster for three days and three nights, so will the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights.”[3]

From Friday afternoon or evening to Sunday morning is obviously not “three days and three nights.” Proponents of a Friday crucifixion try to get around this problem by counting each fraction of a day as a full day. In this way, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday (which begins at sunset on Saturday) constitute three “days” (but not three “nights”). And they contend that Jewish custom did not require precision in time measurements like we often do today. They also point out that Matthew 16:21 and Luke 9:22 say that Jesus would be raised “on the third day,” which could easily fit a Friday crucifixion. However, this translation is not universally accepted, and Mark 8:31 says he would be raised “after three days.”

Many find this creative math unconvincing. They argue that Jesus must have been crucified on either a Wednesday or a Thursday. My next two blog entries will discuss the merits of each of these two alternatives.


[1]. Sunday as the day of the resurrection also finds support from the fact that it quickly became the day of worship for the Christians.

[2]. The Israelites based this on Genesis 1:5, where God created the light and it says: “And there was evening and there was morning, one day.” Thus, the “day” began with evening, which they interpreted as beginning at sunset.

[3]. See also John 2:19-21, where Jesus speaks of raising “this temple”—meaning his body—in three days.


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