James Patrick explores difficult questions around the nature of Holy Week
In Part 3, we considered the significance of the ‘Passover’ meal that Jesus ate with His disciples, one evening too early and therefore without the lamb. This observation would hold true even if one were to maintain a belief in ‘Good Friday’, because in that case, the 14th of Nisan would be the Thursday evening / Friday, followed by the (extra special) normal Sabbath, and then the resurrection on the Sunday. As it is, I am proposing that there were two Sabbaths in a row, a ’special’ Sabbath (15th of Nisan) on the sixth day of the week that kicked off the Feast of Unleavened Bread, followed by a normal Sabbath on the seventh day.
That means Jesus celebrated the Passover meal early and was then arrested and crucified all on the evening and morning of the fifth day of the week, the Day of Preparation (14th of Nisan = Wednesday evening / Thursday). If this is so, how does it affect our understanding of the days prior to the Last Supper?
The ‘four days’ of Lazarus
The progression of events recorded by John in his Gospel seems to lay particular weight on the story of Lazarus as a ’sign’ of Jesus’ own death and resurrection, which makes it worth considering carefully. From chapter ten of John’s Gospel onwards there is a clear focus on
Jesus’ power over death. In John 10:18 Jesus says, “I have authority to lay [my life] down, and I have authority to take it up again.”
Then in 10:38, He says, “…though you do not believe me, believe the works [I do], that you may know and understand that the Father is in me…” Chapter eleven is all about the death and resurrection of Lazarus, and Jesus tells His disciples in 11:4, “This sickness is …for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified by it.” This is part of a theme of glory found throughout John’s Gospel, and in particular, the glorification of Jesus that came through His death (see 12:23-33).
In 11:25, Jesus tells Martha, “I am the resurrection and the life.” When Martha then pointed out at the tomb that Lazarus had been dead for four days, and would be rotting behind the stone, Jesus replied to her, “Did I not say to you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?” (11:40). At the beginning of the next chapter is the story of when Mary anointed Jesus’ feet with pure nard, which Jesus justified by referring to “the day of my burial” (12:7).
This story begins the Passion narrative in John’s Gospel, culminating in Jesus’ death and resurrection. Perhaps the clearest contrast between the resurrection of Lazarus and that of Jesus a few weeks or months later is the fact that when the weeping women went to Jesus’ tomb on the fourth day, the stone was already moved, the graveclothes folded neatly rather than wrapped around the body, and the body itself had no hint of rottenness about it. God had not allowed His “Holy One to see decay” (Acts 2:27); Jesus had risen before the start of the fourth ‘day’. This ‘evidence’ for a ‘3 days and 3 nights’ burial is perhaps less than conclusive, but taken together with John’s interest in clarifying details of Jesus’ death and resurrection seen elsewhere, it may gain more weight.
Traveling to Bethany on the Sabbath?
John starts the Passion week in 12:1-2 earlier than any of the other Gospels, by noting that “six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany where Lazarus was… So they made Him a supper there,” and Lazarus’ sister Mary anointed Jesus’ feet with nard. The following day Jesus approached Jerusalem over the Mount of Olives on a donkey, and the crowds came out with palm branches to meet Him (12:12-14). Those who hold to Good Friday calculate backwards six days, and therefore have Jesus arriving in Bethany on the previous Saturday, which means that Jesus would have entered Jerusalem on what has therefore become known as ‘Palm Sunday’.
The problem with this is that Jesus would have therefore travelled from the city called Ephraim, “near the wilderness” (John 11:54), to Bethany on the Sabbath. Scholars suggest Ephraim may have been a certain town about twelve miles north-east of Jerusalem. Acts 1:12 tells us that the Mount of Olives where Bethany was located was “a Sabbath day’s journey” from Jerusalem (2000 cubits = 3/5 mile). The Sabbath would have been the wrong day to choose to journey to Bethany from a town any distance away.
On the other hand, if we calculate six days earlier from the Day of Preparation (i.e. the Feast of Passover – 14th Nisan), which was Wednesday night / Thursday, we arrive at Thursday night / Friday of the previous week. This would have Jesus arriving in Bethany on the Thursday night, and then riding into Jerusalem on a donkey on Friday. We know it was against the Law of Moses to let even donkeys work on the Sabbath (Deuteronomy 5:14), so
Jesus would not have ridden into Jerusalem on a Saturday. But a Friday would have been perfectly acceptable.
Those who hold to Good Friday cannot calculate six days back from the Feast of Passover as John says, on the 14th of Nisan (Thursday night / Friday). Rather, to avoid Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a donkey on the Sabbath, they must adjust the timing John gives and push it a day later to the Feast of Unleavened Bread on the 15th of Nisan (Friday night / Saturday), therefore arriving at Palm Sunday. As we saw above, this means that Jesus’ arrival into Bethany would have been on a Sabbath, which would have been equally unacceptable. On the other hand, if one accepts Good Thursday, the entrance into Jerusalem naturally falls on Palm Friday.
Cleansing the temple a day late?
At this point we must observe that whereas Matthew (21:9-13) and Luke (19:37-46) both give the impression that Jesus cleansed the temple immediately on arrival into Jerusalem after His triumphal entry, Mark corrects this with a very valuable historical note in 11:11. “Jesus entered Jerusalem into the temple; and after looking around at everything, He left for Bethany with the twelve, since it was already late.”
It was only on the following day that He returned and cleansed the temple. One can hardly help wondering, if Jesus was so upset at what was going on in the temple courts, why would He merely look around and then leave? Was He just a bit too tired to make a fuss? Did it take Him a while to get zealous enough to go back and sort things out? Had too many traders already closed up shop to make it worth His while to cause a scene so late in the day?
If one holds to Good Friday and Palm Sunday, cleansing the temple on the Monday makes practically no sense. However with Good Thursday and Palm Friday, an explanation is immediately apparent. Jesus saw everything in the temple late on Friday afternoon, but the Sabbath was drawing in (”it was already late”), and He wanted to be back in Bethany for the Sabbath meal with Mary, Martha and Lazarus. The following day He walked into Jerusalem rather than riding, which was acceptable since it was “a Sabbath day’s journey” away (Acts 1:12), but the difference was that this time He was entering the temple on a Sabbath day. What a difference!
Two details of Mark’s account of the cleansing of the temple support our interpretation. The first is the note in 11:16, peculiar to Mark, that “He would not permit anyone to carry a vessel through the temple”. Carrying was particularly forbidden on the Sabbath, and Jesus’ actions are reminiscent of Nehemiah’s in Nehemiah 13, when he rebuked those carrying “all kinds of loads” into Jerusalem on the Sabbath, and instead forbad traders from entering Jerusalem on the Sabbath.
Furthermore, when we consider the context of Jesus’ quotation of Isaiah 56:7, “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations”, we find in Isaiah 56:2-8 that both eunuchs and foreigners are encouraged specifically to observe the Sabbath as their way of becoming acceptable to God, receiving a memorial “in my house and within my walls”. In Jesus’ day, trading happened in what was known as the “Court of the Gentiles”, and when this took place on a Sabbath, foreigners who wanted to draw near to God were prevented from doing the very thing the Scriptures required of them. How appropriate that Jesus cleared space for Gentiles to draw near, and prevented people carrying vessels through the temple.
One more post to follow, matching up the other events of Jesus’ passion week with regulations concerning the Feast of Passover, and then a summary of our argument.
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Dr James E. Patrick is a Bible scholar, theologian, and author, with a particular interest in Jewish-gentile relations in biblical times and throughout history. For example, see https://grovebooks.co.uk/products/e-187-british-christian-history-and-the-jewish-people-recovering-an-ancient-spiritual-legacy.
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