# ******Jesus' Resurrection

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Posted by Bibleman [Bibleman] on November 13, 1999 at 10:27:32 {OA5YBxH8IAf9UnUPxURUslyACFuF8c}:

In Reply to: *****Jesus' Resurrection posted by LuckyX on November 13, 1999 at 06:54:56:

It does take work, and sometimes it is more than just the internal problems in the text. There is the competition with what is considered "secular" facts.

A huge example of just a mistake repeated over and over and is considered fact is the date of Herod's death in 4BCE. That is such a "fact" that no one questions, based upon Josephus' mention of an eclipse, but that is all that is considered, just the mention of that eclipse and they think they have a good date. But the eclipse of March 13/14 4BC doesn't even match remotely the eclipse requirements described by Josephus. But for some reason, it just doesn't matter.

What's amazing is once you do the actual background research and do some astro-testing you find out the eclipse confirms Herod's death exactly where the Bible dates it and that is in 1BC-1AD when Jesus would have been between 1 and 2 years old.

So I'm not too impressed with scholarly distractions from the gospels, but remain very impressed with what continuity and background information the Bible contains if you look for it and research it. There are certainly gems to be found.

The other thing that has to be considered, since so many want to claim the Bible has been changed and all that but don't have the original writings to prove it, is that among those who survived from the time of the 1st century until hour day were to major NT contributorys, both the Apostles John and Paul. So I would think one of the reasons Jesus selected a handful of selected ones to survive down through the ages would be to at least protect the holy writings, establish enough copies that would have the Bible come together as it has.

So it remains a wonderful book of historical accuracy, truth and prophecy. But you can't take it superficially. You have to minimize the cultural and language gaps that happen in translating as well as consider the cultural considerations.

Case in point is the term "passover" in the 1st century. At John 19:14 the term "preparation for passover" is thought to refer to the day before the Passover seder meal eaten on the 15th by all translators. Thus they think there is a conflict between John 19:14 and the synoptic gospels which clearly show Jesus eating the traditional "passover" on the 15th. So how can he die on "preparation for passover" when the other gospels show he ate the actual passover? All they do is presume the gospel writers lost the details, dismiss the synoptic gospels and go with John 19:14 with a Friday afternoon death the day before "passover."

But it is easily established both in the NT as well as related writings such as Josephus that by the 1st century "passover" was a term used for anything connected with the entire week of Passover. Thus that specific term was equally applicable to any of the "passover" sabbath days, those days being either Nisan 15th or Nisan 21st.
Thus the two "preparation for pasover" days were either Nisan 14th OR Nisan 20th. Since you can't harmonize Nisan 14th with the synoptic gospels, though, which show Nisan 14th had already passed, there is no choice but to harmonize the reference to Nisan 20th. And when you do, the "three days and three nights" work out perfectly for a Thursday afternoon death vs. a Friday afternoon death which only has two nights until Jesus' resurrection on a Sunday.

So it is just incompetent, and perhaps some doctrinal bias that overrides really accepting what the scriptures are saying. And then when othe "scholars" see these contradictions that aren't there, they immediately presume the accuracy got lost over the years and the Bible is full of errors, when it is not.

It's just scholarly incompetence, and the two rather obvious "contradictions" discussed here that have completely disappeared proves the scholars are not quite up to the task of a professional treatment of this wonderful ancient work.

Thanks for the references and comments. But, I think I'll pass.

Cheers,
Bibleman

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