Comment Thread for The Resurrection of Jesus - Apologiaphoenix vs Gary

[tabibito]

Tabby,

There are TWO Days of Preparation in Judaism:

The Day of Preparation for the Passover and the Day of Preparation for the Sabbath.

And the one referred to in the crucifixion story is the day of preparation for the Passover - Passover itself being a Sabbath.

[Gary]

You ignored the reasoning given why. If the gospels were anonymous in the way you suggest then we would have different names attributed to them. The gospel of Mark for instance would have several different names against it instead i.e. Mark Matthew, Peter, Thomas, etc, etc. Other historical documents that were anonymous in the sense that you say show this.

We have ZERO evidence that the four gospels had name tags. Zero. During the early second century, Church Fathers such as Polycarp and Justin Martyr quote passages from the books which we now refer to as the Gospels, but NO ONE identifies them by name. No one quotes from these texts and identifies them by author until Irenaeus in the late second century.

Christians have no proof whatsoever of the traditional authorship of the Gospels. They base this entire belief upon vague comments made by Papias circa 120 AD that someone had told him that someone had told them that John Mark had written down some of Peter's sermons and that Matthew had written a gospel in Hebrew or Aramaic. The overwhelming majority of scholars do NOT believe that the Gospel of Matthew is a translation from Hebrew or Greek. Papias was either wrong or Matthew wrote another gospel which no longer exists.

[Gary]

And the one referred to in the crucifixion story is the day of preparation for the Passover - Passover itself being a Sabbath.

Then why in John, on the night of the betrayal, does Judas Iscariot leave the table to go and purchase the food for the Passover meal? If they had just eaten the Passover meal why would Judas being going to buy food for another Passover meal? And if you are correct, why then in the synoptics do they refer to the day of Jesus death as the Day of Preparation?

It is clear from the text that the Synoptics have Jesus die on Friday and the Gospel of John has him dying on Thursday. The Synoptics use the Day of Preparation in reference to the day prior to the Sabbath, whereas John uses that term in reference to Thursday, the day prior to the Passover Sabbath, which in that year was on Friday.

[tabibito]

The synoptics do NOT have a different day to that recorded by John.

Just goes to show you the dangers of perfunctory examination - it can mislead people into making inane pronouncements that serve no better purpose than to destroy their own credibility.


Each of the gospels identifies the day of the crucifixion as the day of preparation - Passover Seder is taken with the commencement of the SABBATH day of Passover week. The day commences with sunset. Under the Hebrew system during the first century, "evening" extended from roughly 3pm til 6pm.

Jhn 19:14-18a

₁₄ Now it was the Preparation Day of the Passover, and about the sixth hour. And he said to the Jews, “Behold your King!” ₁₅ But they cried out, “Away with Him, away with Him! Crucify Him!” Pilate said to them, “Shall I crucify your King?” The chief priests answered, “We have no king but Caesar!” ₁₆ Then he delivered Him to them to be crucified. So they took Jesus and led Him away ₁₇ And He, bearing His cross, went out to a place called the Place of a Skull, which is called in Hebrew, Golgotha ₁₈ where they crucified Him ...

Luke 23:46,54

And when Jesus had cried out with a loud voice, He said, “Father, ‘into Your hands I commit My spirit.’ ” Having said this, He breathed His last. .... ₅₄ That day was the Preparation, and the Sabbath drew near.

Mark 15:37

_37,42 And Jesus cried out with a loud voice, and breathed His last. ₄₂ Now when evening had come, because it was the Preparation Day, that is, the day before the Sabbath,

Matthew 27:35, 62

₃₅ Then they crucified Him, and divided His garments, casting lots, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet: ₆₂ On the next day, which followed the Day of Preparation, the chief priests and Pharisees gathered together to Pilate,

Careful reading of the texts the day of preparation before the weekly Sabbath began at the evening following that day Christ was crucified. And each morning that passover week there was preparation for that daily sacrifice (see Ezekiel 45:21-23; Numbers 28:16-24).

The day of Passover is a High Sabbath (that is: not the weekly Sabbath - though it may fall on the same day). In the ordinary course, it was referred to as the Sabbath or Pesach.

But there is no need to make guesses about the particular Sabbath being referred to:

John 19:14

And it was the preparation of the passover, and about the sixth hour: and he (Pilate) saith unto the Jews, Behold your King!

Luke 22:7

Then came the day of unleavened bread, when the passover must be killed.

[Darth Ovious]

We have ZERO evidence that the four gospels had name tags. Zero. During the early second century, Church Fathers such as Polycarp and Justin Martyr quote passages from the books which we now refer to as the Gospels, but NO ONE identifies them by name. No one quotes from these texts and identifies them by author until Irenaeus in the late second century.

Christians have no proof whatsoever of the traditional authorship of the Gospels. They base this entire belief upon vague comments made by Papias circa 120 AD that someone had told him that someone had told them that John Mark had written down some of Peter's sermons and that Matthew had written a gospel in Hebrew or Aramaic. The overwhelming majority of scholars do NOT believe that the Gospel of Matthew is a translation from Hebrew or Greek. Papias was either wrong or Matthew wrote another gospel which no longer exists.

So basically another post from you detailing that you don't know how history works. Scholars of history have been able to identify other authors of works under the same circumstances of the gospels, actually with even lesser evidence than the gospels. Your insistence otherwise says a lot about you. The zero evidence claim you cite is based upon the fact that again ignored what I told you already. It's not my fault if you keep ignoring what people say to you and refuse to acknowledge evidence while shouting "you dumb Christians don't have any evidence". There really is no point in you being here. You're not interested in a conversation at all.

[Gary]

The synoptics do NOT have a different day to that recorded by John.

Ask Nick and Stein if they agree with you.

The differing day of the crucifixion between the Synoptics and John is pretty well settled.

[Gary]

So basically another post from you detailing that you don't know how history works. Scholars of history have been able to identify other authors of works under the same circumstances of the gospels, actually with even lesser evidence than the gospels. Your insistence otherwise says a lot about you. The zero evidence claim you cite is based upon the fact that again ignored what I told you already. It's not my fault if you keep ignoring what people say to you and refuse to acknowledge evidence while shouting "you dumb Christians don't have any evidence". There really is no point in you being here. You're not interested in a conversation at all.

The fact that even Nick and Stein disagree with you says a lot about the shaky evidence for your fundamentalist position.

[Apologiaphoenix]

That fact that even Nick and Stein disagree with you says a lot about the shaky evidence for your fundamentalist position.

No. He's right on that claim. Other "anonymous" works are established on less evidence.

[tabibito]

Ask Nick and Stein if they agree with you.

The differing day of the crucifixion between the Synoptics and John is pretty well settled.

The facts are laid out clearly enough. It would be interesting to see their views.

[Darth Ovious]

The fact that even Nick and Stein disagree with you says a lot about the shaky evidence for your fundamentalist position.

The disagreement we had was based upon my use of the term authorship. If I'm correct then I think Nick believes that the origins of the accounts are not in question.

[Gary]

No. He's right on that claim. Other "anonymous" works are established on less evidence.

That is not my point. My point is that the majority of NT scholars do not believe that the traditional authors wrote the Gospels. I would bet that a considerable percentage, if not a majority, of scholars would even go so far as to say that the Gospels were not written by eye-witnesses. Do you agree with these two statements? If not, please provide a source for your position.

[Gary]

The disagreement we had was based upon my use of the term authorship. If I'm correct then I think Nick believes that the origins of the accounts are not in question.

If Nick believes that the majority of NT scholars believes that Matthew the tax collector, John Mark the companion of Peter, Luke the physician and companion of Paul, and John son of Zebedee wrote the four Gospels of the New Testament, I would love to see his source for this claim. Or is Nick breaking his own rule and going against the majority scholarly opinion on this issue? If so, I would like to hear his explanation why we should tolerate his picking and choosing when it comes to accepting the majority scholarly opinion on issues related to the Bible.

[tabibito]

One extra piece of information is relevant to the discussion about the day of preparation which resolves the apparent conflict between John's account and Mark 14:17 -
opsios.jpg

[Gary]

One extra piece of information is relevant to the discussion about the day of preparation which resolves the apparent conflict between John's account and Mark 14:17 -
[ATTACH=CONFIG]9615[/ATTACH]

Tabby,

You guys are always filleting me for not used scholarship for my positions (which I have shown is a false accusation), but yet you are taking a position against the majority scholarly opinion on this discrepancy. Why?

[tabibito]

Tabby,

You guys are always filleting me for not used scholarship for my positions (which I have shown is a false accusation), but yet you are taking a position against the majority scholarly opinion on this discrepancy. Why?

I criticise your lack of scholarship, not your ignoring scholarly opinions. And in matters scriptural there are few scholars that approach the subject dispassionately.

ETA - There is no scholarly consensus on the issue of the apparent discrepancies in the timing of the crucifixion - there are competing reconciliations of the conflict. And the conflict arises for the most part from a failure to conduct simple reading comprehension tests. A small amount can be attributed to perfectly understandable, natural thought processes that occur for everyone.