Fw: Three days and Three nights Part 11
David Lee errancy@infidels.org
Thu, 03 Jun 1999 20:41:25 -0400 (00928474885, 00ed01beae22$fb5008c0$d65c74cc@ronies)
----- Original Message -----
From: David Lee <ronie@infoave.net>
To: <David Lee>
Sent: Saturday, May 29, 1999 11:02 PM
Subject: Three days and Three nights Part 11
> DAVID (responding to a website Student referred him to):
> I went to the web site you suggested and came up with this. This site
> belongs to Glenn Miller and I did not see any copyright so I print it
below
> with my responses. The question below asked about the "three days and
three
> nights" expression found in Matthew 12:40. Miller attempts to respond and
I
> give my responses below his.
>
> MILLER's web:
> QUESTION: This comes from a list of reasons why humanists don't believe
the
> Bible. I picked up their document from America On-Line. It is also a
> question I've had, but have never had answered. Jesus said he was going to
> be in the earth (buried) for three days and three nights. If he died on
> Friday and rose on Sunday morning, how is this three days and three
nights.
> ANSWER: This is one of the easier ones...the Jews counted PART of a day or
> night as a WHOLE day or nite, so part of Friday, all of Sat, part of Sun
> would be 'three days and three nights'--it was a Hebrew idiom of the
day...
>
> DAVE
> This is simply not true. Whether Miller is ignorant or deliberately
> spreading an untruth I do not know. But there is no such idiom in the
Hebrew
> language. A part of a day was reckoned as a day and a part of a night was
> reckoned as a night but nowhere in Hebrew literature is any part of a day
> (as opposed to night) reckoned as a day _and_ a night.
>
> Miller:
> It is important to recognize first off, that the issue of "Don't you think
> so?" needs to be answered definitively 'no'...Idiomatic expressions in
other
> cultures don't have to make ANY sense to us at all.
>
> DAVE
> Unfortunately for Miller there is no evidence that "three days and three
> nights" is an idiom. Just saying it doesn't make it so. There is no reason
> to believe that "three days and three nights" means anything other than
> "three days and three nights". An idiom is an expression whose meaning
> _cannot_ be derived from its constituent elements. The above expression
> shows no evidence of an idiomatic expression.
>
> Miller:
> Our job as readers of the literature from another culture is to try to
> understand THEIR idioms,rather than judge them.
>
> DAVE
> Again, Miller needs to show (without begging the question of biblical
> inerrancy) that the expression "three days and three nights" is an idiom.
> Just saying it is doesn't make it so.
>
> Miller:
> So, with that in mind, let me answer the request above for the data that
> supports my original statement ("What is the source of this information
> about the referred Jewish tradition?")
> Although I cannot list it all, let me give the main references
> available.Let me cite data from three sources: the OT, the Rabbinix,
> and one NT passage.
>
> Miller continues:
> 1. The OT data (to show that 'on the third day' = 'after three days')
>
> Gen 42.16: "And he put them all in custody for three days. 18 On the third
> day, Joseph said to them, "Do this and you will live, for I fear God" and
> they are released ON that day (from the context of verses 25-26). In this
> case the 'for three days' meant only 'into the third day'
>
> DAVE
> Where does it say here that "on the third day" is equal to "after three
> days"? It doesn't. If Joseph put them all in custody on Sunday night then
> the third day would begin Tuesday night and extend to Wednesday. He put
> them in custody for three days (Mon, Tue, Wed) and on the "third day"
> (Wednesday) he released them. Any part of a day (Mon or Wed) was counted
as
> a whole day and any part of a night was counted as a whole night.
Therefore,
> Wednesday (daytime) would be the third day. If Joseph put them into
custody
> Sunday night (the beginning of the second day of the week) and released
them
> daytime Wednesday (the fourth day of the week) we see at once that we have
> three days, not four (certainly not *after* three days in the sense of
after
> three days are past).
>
> Miller:
> 1 Kings 20.29: "For seven days they camped opposite each other, and on the
> seventh day the battle was joined. " In this case we have 'for seven days'
> meant only 'into the seventh day'.
>
> DAVE
> I see no problem with this. It doesn't say "seven days and seven nights"
> though so it isn't much help one way or the other. All it shows is that
> seven days and "on the seventh day" are equal in this case. Three days
> (Fri-Sat-Sun) and on the third day (Sun) would be a good example of this.
I
> do not dispute this. I have argued from the beginning that Sunday would be
> the third day from Friday.
>
> Miller:
> 2 Chr 10.5: "And he said to them, 'Return to me again in three days" (NAS)
> with verse 12: "So Jeroboam and all the people came to Rehoboam on the
third
> day as the king had directed, saying, 'Return to me on the third day." In
> this case 'in three days' is equivalent to 'on the third day'.
>
> DAVE
> If Rehoboam said this on A Friday then Sunday would be the third day. He
> told them to return in three days and they came back on the third day (two
> days later). There are references that I have shown in a previous post
where
> the phrase "on the third day" was used in the sense of "the day after
> tomorrow" (Ex 19:10,11,15; Lev 7:16-18; 19:6,7; 1 Sam 20:12; Luke 13:32).
So
> the "third day" could also refer to "two days later".
>
> Miller:
> Esther 4.16: "Go, gather together all the Jews who are in Susa, and fast
for
> me. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my maids will
> fast as you do. When this is done, I will go to the king, even though it
is
> against the law. And if I perish, I perish.'" And then in 5.1: "On the
third
> day Esther put on her royal robes and stood in the inner court of the
> palace, in front of the king's hall. " In this case, "on the third day" is
> equivalent to "for three days, night or day".
>
> DAVE
> I have dealt with this in a previous post. The third day already
included
> the third night before it. If the fast began Friday night then the third
day
> (Monday daytime) would include three days and three nights. That is
because
> the night was counted first. However, in the NT we see Jesus died three
> hours before sunset Nisan 14. This means the first day would precede the
> first night. This is what causes the conflict. Had Jesus died after sunset
> then we would begin counting with the night first and three days and three
> nights later would still be the third day (as in Esther). But the problem
> remains that Jesus died in the afternoon of the first day. The first night
> followed, then a whole day (Sat) and a night. That makes only 2 days and 2
> nights.
>
> Miller:
> 1 Samuel 30.12: "He ate and was revived, for he had not eaten any food or
> drunk any water for three days and three nights. 13 David asked him, "To
> whom do you belong, and where do you come from?" He said, "I am an
Egyptian,
> the slave of an Amalekite. My master abandoned me when I became ill three
> days ago. " In this case "for three days and three nights' somehow was
> fulfilled when his master left him 'three days ago'.
>
> DAVE
> I have covered this in a previous post. If this happened on a Sunday
> afternoon (this is for convenience only) then three days ago (KJV) would
> be Thursday afternoon. That was when (according to the KJV) that his
> master abandoned him. Yet we see he had not eaten in three days and three
> nights. Counting back three days and three nights from Sunday afternoon we
> come to the beginning of Thursday night. So we conclude that although his
> master abandoned him on Thursday afternoon (KJV) the slave still had
> something to eat after his master abandoned him because the text says his
> fast did not begin until about Thursday sunset
> (assuming for convenience the slave was discovered on Sunday afternoon
{you
> can pick your own day and count backwards} ). The important thing to
> remember is this: There are two separate events being counted here: 1) the
> time of abandonment and 2) the beginning of the fast. There is no evidence
> they began at the same time. One could logically come before the other.
>
> Miller:
> "Thus, the Old Testament gives the picture that the expressions 'three
> days,' 'the third day,' and 'three days and three nights' are used to
> signify the same period of time." [NT:CALC:73]
>
> DAVE
> No, there is no evidence that "three days and three nights" can equal
the
> "third day" _unless_ the event being counted begins at nighttime. Then,
> logically, the third day would have the third night come before it and in
> that sense "three days and three nights" does equal "the third day".
>
> Miller:
> 2. The Rabbinical literature also manifests this idiomatic range:
>
> Rabbi Eleazar ben Azariah, tenth in the descent from Ezra was very
specific:
> "A day and a night are an Onah ['a portion of time'] and the portion of an
> Onah is as the whole of it" [J.Talmud, Shabbath 9.3 and b.Talmud, Pesahim
> 4a]
>
> DAVE
> Keep in mind that this is from the Talmud which post dates Jesus by at
> least 70 years and Jonah by more than 800 years. There is _no_ evidence
that
> the rabbis had such a teaching at the time of Jonah. And Jesus said it was
> *as* Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster
> that he would be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. So
> unless Miller can provide evidence that this rabbinic teaching (of at
least
> the 2nd century AD) was used in the time of Jonah he doesn't have a case.
> But there are some weaknesses to the Talmudic citation mentioned above.
> First, it overlooks the fact that Jesus used three nights as well as three
> days in his prophecy. That defined the Onah for his audience. According to
> the popular interpretation of the above passage, an hour could be an Onah,
a
> half day could be an Onah, an hour of night could be an Onah, a half of a
> night could be an Onah, a part of a day and a part of a night could be an
> Onah etc, etc, etc. The problem is this: Jesus defined how big his Onah
was
> going to be. His three Onahs were going to be composed of three days and
> three nights. The same principal applied to the definition of a day. Jesus
> said there were 12 hours in a day, yet we know the Jews taught that any
part
> of a day would be reckoned as the whole (for computational purposes). That
> means that although a day consisted of 12 hours and one hour could be
> considered a day, there was no way that an hour could also be considered
12
> hours.
> It would be proper to say (if you worked one hour) that you had worked
one
> day (because it is used in its generic sense) but it would be improper to
> say you had worked 12 hours. The specific term defined the length of the
> day, not the other way around. If someone promised someone else 12 hours
of
> work for 60 dollars then quit after one hour and demanded his full wages
> because after all "any part of the day was counted
> as a day so therefore one hour is the same as 12 hours" we would at once
> think he was nuts. The generic term "day" could be used for counting
> purposes even if a part of a day was counted but the specific terms 6
hours,
> 9 hours, etc meant exactly that, no more, no less. Likewise (allowing the
> interpretation of Onah above) the generic expression "Onah" was used for
> counting periods of time consisting of a day and a night and someone could
> claim he had traveled for "five Onahs" even if he had traveled for a part
of
> five Onahs. But if he used the specific term he traveled for "five days
and
> five nights" then he was understood to have literally meant "five days and
> five nights". The specific term always defined the boundaries. That is
> important to remember. That meant that the "three Onahs" of Jesus were
> clearly defined as Onahs that consisted of three days and three nights.
> But there is another problem with that passage from the Talmud. It has
> been pointed out to me by a Jew that an "Onah" was thought of as a unit.
By
> definition, an Onah was a "day and a night". Minus one of those elements
it
> ceased being an Onah. Any part of a day was counted as a day and any part
of
> a night was counted as a night but any part of a day AND a night was
> reckoned as one Onah. That means if someone served parts of six days and
> parts of six nights he was said to have served "six Onahs". If he served
> only parts of six days and *five* nights then it was said he served "five
> Onahs and a day" or more commonly "six days and five nights". In any case,
> the Talmud quote doesn't really hold up well to scrutiny.
>
> Miller:
> This understanding was used in the numerous correlations between Jonah
1.17
> ('in the belly of the fish for three days and three nights') and the OT
> passages cited above [e.g. Mid.Rabbath on Genesis 56 (on 22.4); Genesis
91.7
> (on 42.17-18)].
>
> DAVE
> Some rabbis taught that the events mentioned in the verses given above
> began during the nighttime portion of the day. So if Joseph jailed his
> brothers on Sunday night and released them Wednesday daytime it was not
only
> the third day but also the third night had come before it. Likewise with
> Abrams trip with Issac, he arose before sunrise the first day (according
to
> some rabbis) and when he arrived the third day (daytime) he had traveled
> three days and three nights (because the portion of the night was counted
> first).
>
> Miller:
> 3. There is one NT passage that indicates this Jewish idiom.
>
> Matt 27.63: ""Sir," they said, "we remember that while he was still alive
> that deceiver said, `After three days I will rise again.' 64 So give the
> order for the tomb to be made secure until the third day. " Note that
'after
> three days' was somehow equivalent to 'until the third day' (not 'until
the
> fourth day').
>
> DAVE
> I pointed out in an earlier post that "after three days" can mean on
the
> "third day" as well so there is no problem here. This is the way the
> Pharisees understood it. This doesn't solve the problem of the missing
> night though. Jesus need not spend the whole three days in the grave for
the
> third day to be counted. So in this usage, if Jesus rose a few hours into
> the third day, it could be said to be "after three days". I do not make a
> big deal out of this passage (and those in Mark) as some skeptics do. Some
> skeptics use these "after three day" passages alongside the "three days
and
> three nights" passage and claim contradiction with the "on the third day"
> passages. It has been shown to me that it was possible for "after three
> days" to be compatible with "the third day" so that presents no problem
> here.
>
> Miller:
> This data should demonstrate the rough equivalence of the NT phrases.
> Hope this helps,
> Glenn M. Miller
>
> DAVE
> I am sure Miller means well but he is mistaken on his "proofs" that
"three
> days and three nights" is merely a Jewish idiom. This has never been shown
> to be the case although there is no shortage of scholars past and present
> who *assert* this is so.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>