Jesus gave his disciples a specific ‘SIGN’ that would prove he was ‘The Messiah,’ which now, like many other aspects of Bible truth, has been clouded by the insertion of man’s ‘Corrupt Religious Traditions.’

In Matt. 12:38 we find some of the scribes and Pharisees asking Jesus for a ‘sign’ to prove He was the Messiah. But Jesus told them that the only sign He would give was that of the prophet Jonah:

“For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man [Jesus] be THREE DAYS and THREE NIGHTS in the heart of the earth [in the grave of His tomb]” (Matt. 12:40).

Many people try justify their belief in the religious idea of the Friday crucifixion and Sunday resurrection by arguing that this segment of time does not require a span of 72 hours. They unbiblically reason that a part of a day can be counted as a whole day. Hence, since Jesus died around 3 p.m. (Matthew 27:46), they incorrectly believe the remainder of Friday constituted the first day, Saturday, the second, and only a part of Sunday the third. What they fail to take into consideration is that only two nights—not three are accounted for in this erroneous explanation. Also, Jesus had already risen BEFORE the daylight portion of Sunday (Jn. 20:1). Something is obviously incorrect about this commonly accepted assumption!

Jonah 1:17, to which Jesus referred, states specifically that “Jonah was in the belly of the fish THREE DAYS and THREE NIGHTS,” as He would also be in the grave “THREE DAYS and THREE NIGHTS,”  There is no reason to think that these days and nights were fractional. Nor is there any basis for thinking that Jesus meant only two nights and one day, plus parts of two days, when He described the length of time He would be in the grave. Such human rationalization undermines the integrity of Jesus’ own words and of the written word of God.

Was Jesus’ Prophesied Sign fulfilled?

IF Jesus were in the grave only from late Friday afternoon to sometime very early Sunday morning, then the only sign that Jesus gave proving that He was the prophesied Messiah … was NOT fulfilled.

The claim of His Messiahship rests on the fulfillment of His words, and words matter. This is that serious a matter! Either He meant what He said, or He didn’t!

Let’s now carefully examine the details of the text regarding those fateful days. Each of the Gospel writers gives an account of the events, but each presents different aspects that need to be correctly synchronized and harmonized to produce a clear sequence and understanding of what happened that week (see accompanying detailed day-by-day account in Part 4). The Bible does not contradict itself (Psalm 119:160), and we will see that not one of the Gospel accounts contradicts what the other Gospels teach.

Consider, John 19:31 preserves a crucial point that provides insight into the other narratives.

“The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day [the sabbath day referred to here is the an ‘annual ‘high day’], besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.” (John 19:31 (KJV)  

The annual “preparation” day on which Jesus was crucified is described as the day before the annual Sabbath. But John clarifies it by stating that this approaching Sabbath “was a high day.” This term does not refer to the Biblical weekly Sabbath of Friday sunset to Saturday sunset, but to the first day of “the Feast of Unleavened Bread,” which is one of God’s annual “high”—or holy—days (Exo. 12:16; Lev. 23:6-7), which annually could fall annually on any day of the week.

Some try to get around this by arguing that this high day fell that year on the seventh day of the week, making it a double Sabbath, with the preparation day being on Friday. But Luke’s account shows that this was not the case. Notice the sequence of events outlined in Luke chapter 23. Jesus’ moment of death, as well as His hasty burial because of the oncoming Sabbath, is narrated in verses 46-53. Verse 54 then states, “That day was the Preparation, and the Sabbath drew near.” In Bible Study Facts matter!

TWO DIFFERENT Kinds of ‘Sabbath Days’ are described:

There are many Sabbaths in the Bible. Apart from the weekly sabbath and the ‘land sabbath’ there are other days described as sabbaths! Many wrongly assume it is only the ‘weekly Sabbath’ mentioned here. But this is not the case. Instead, it was a Sabbath that occurred on Thursday, since Luke 23:56 shows that the women [Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome], after seeing Christ’s body having been laid in the tomb, “returned and prepared spices and fragrant oils” for the final preparation of the body.

In this sequence, such work of preparing could have been done only in the daytime of Friday, since it would have been considered a violation of the regular weekly Sabbath if that work was done on that Sabbath, and that would not have been allowed. This is further verified by Mark’s account, which states, “Now when the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices [which could not have been purchased on a Sabbath] that they might come and anoint Him” (Mark 16:1, emphasis added).

This conclusively proves that the Sabbath mentioned here and in the other narratives was the first Holy Day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which in that particular year fell on a THURSDAY. The women had to wait until this first Sabbath Holy Day was OVER before they could buy and prepare the spices on FRIDAY, to be used for anointing Jesus’ body. Then, after these activities, “they rested on the [weekly] Sabbath’ according to the commandment,” which would have been the regular weekly seventh day Sabbath (Luke 23:56).

The ‘Sign’ of the ‘Messiahship of Jesus’ Was Fulfilled!

After this rest, the women then went to Jesus’ tomb early on the first day of the week (Sunday), while it was still dark (cf. John 20:1), and found that Jesus had already resurrected (Matt. 28:1-6; Mk. 16:2-6; Luke 24:1-3; John 20:1). Therefore, if we allow the Scriptures to interpret themselves, an accurate harmonization of all four Gospel accounts confirms the validity of Jesus’ statements.

Further proof of the accuracy of this sequence and explanation is found in Matthew 28:1. Many translations render it “Now after the Sabbath” as if the word Sabbath were singular. But this is not correct. “Sabbath” here is “sabaton” in the Greek text, which is genitive plural.

“In the end of [or after] the sabbath [Grk. sabaton, sabbaths], as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulchre.” (Matthew 28:1 (KJV)

Some Bible versions, including Alfred Marshall’s Parallel New Testament in Greek and English and Ferrar Fenton’s translation, translate it properly as “after the Sabbaths,” which again demonstrates that there was more than one kind of Sabbath that week. There were both annual Sabbath day and weekly Sabbath day in the Jewish calendar, of which the Passover is one.

The wording of Mark 16:1-2 is also confusing to some because it seems to suggest that the spices were purchased after the weekly Sabbath rather than it was before it, on Friday. However, this is explained by Luke 23:56, which clearly shows that the women bought the spices before, and not after, the weekly Sabbath, since “they rested on the Sabbath (i.e., Friday sunset to Saturday sunset) according to the commandment.” Mark did not mention this weekly Sabbath rest in his account, but Luke, who wrote later, did.

Some also stumble over Mark 16:9, not taking into account that there is no punctuation indicated in the Greek text. Therefore, to be in harmony with the material presented in the other Gospels, a better translation would be: “Now having [already] risen, early the first day of the week He [Jesus] appeared first to Mary Magdalene...” These verses are not saying that Jesus rose early on Sunday morning, but that He APPEARED to them Sunday morning, having risen some time earlier.

“Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast seven devils.” (Mark 16:9 (KJV)