Good Thursday, not Good Friday

[snopes]

Comment: The ceremony of "Good Friday", signifying the death of Jesus on
the cross, Is apparently not true. He was crucified on Thursday.
Rationale: The Jewish Sanhedrin did not want him hanging on the cross
during their Sabbath.
The Bible, John 19/31, records that the Jews had a special Passover
celebratipn scheduled on Friday," a day of Preparation:. Therefore the
Christ spent three nights and three days in the "tomb" . Thursday, Friday
and Saturday nights and Friday, Saturday and rising on "The Third day",
Sunday. Comment??

[lord_feldon]

I thought it was generally accepted by most people that the days and dates of Christian holidays are just dates of convenience... I guess someone needs the memo.

[Admiraldinty]

Originally Posted by lord_feldon

I thought it was generally accepted by most people that the days and dates of Christian holidays are just dates of convenience... I guess someone needs the memo.

While that argument can be made about other holidays, I don't think this is the case with Easter. However, I don't know enough about the Jewish calendar to be able to make a good argument. Jason (formerly Jason Threadslayer) is good at that stuff.

[bluestocking]

Well, obviously there's some element of "convenience" in choosing the date for Easter, since annual celebrations don't naturally fall on the same day of the week year after year (e.g. if you were married on a Saturday, your first anniversary will probably fall on a Sunday, your second on a Monday, etc.)

If I have time I may post again with more detailed information--gotta get ready to go to work to earn the money to pay for my internet connection!

[Loyhargil]

Bugger, I don't have time to look it up this morning, but since Easter is based on a "movable feast" calculation, they calculate the date based on something aside from a specific date (obviously, since the date changes from year too year).

Ah, from Wikipedia:

The ecclesiastical rules are:

Easter falls on the first Sunday following the first ecclesiastical full moon that occurs on or after March 21 (the day of the ecclesiastical vernal equinox).
This particular ecclesiastical full moon is the 14th day of a tabular lunation (new moon).

Now, as far as the third day, my understanding was Friday was considered the "first" day, then Saturday, then Sunday was the "third" day. I heard this on a radio program so I don't have a site available, but I recall a Biblical scholar discussing the importance of the crucifixion being on a Friday, because that's when Jewish sacrifices were made at that time, and that depending on how you calculated the hour that Jesus actually died, the death occurred at something like 3 pm, which is the time of day the sacrifices were actually done, since Jesus was the ultimate sacrifice. I wish I remembered what scholar I was listening to so I could provide a site, and I'm getting ready for work so I don't have time to look it up right now. Sorry.

I'm sure someone out there who doesn't have to rely on memory like me at the moment will fill in the gaps before I get off work tonight. If not, I'll get to lookin'.

[UEL]

When I was in Israel, the Sabbath started at sunset on Friday and lasted until sunset on Saturday.

Thus, when Jesus was crucified, the order came to break the criminals' legs to hasten death so that they were dead by sundown. This would happen on a Friday.

[hambubba]

According to what I know of Jewish timekeeping, historically, any part of a day was considered "a day". Thus, there were "three days" involved in the crucifixion.

Keep in mind, that they did not have clocks back then to look at and determine exact 24-hour or fractional parts of days. Of course, hours were known as a unit of measure. The sunset being a marker for day-change is significantly different than our current usage of midnight.

This, I think, is where this argument keeps coming from - the difference in ways of marking "what is a day?"

I doubt the roman were very much concerned with the jewish holidays. I do wonder why the date of easter being accurate is so much more important than christmas being accurate.

What, no appeals or anything

that stinks too. I distictly recall that you could be retried if exonerating evidence came up.