The first part of this answer to the problem of a "Wednesday Crucifixion" has stressed the inconsistency of substituting the name of the United States Naval Observatory for the authority of the Pentateuch and the gospel narrative. It has also demonstrated the futility of employing a calendar, to reckon the ancient Jewish dates, that is based upon the wrong paschal season, and employing a paschal date other than that prescribed by Moses. In this concluding section, the outline of passion week incidents shows that the Jewish Sabbath coincided only with the first day of the passion week, and that there is no intimation in the gospel account of any other synchronism.
3. A Full Week of Passion Incidents
The events of the Passion Week form a framework into which the time assertions of all the Gospel writers are securely locked. These time phrases are of two particular kinds. One may be called the connective time phrase, as "on the next day," or "on the morrow," or "in the morning," etc. There are altogether seven of these short time expressions in the gospel narrative—a sufficient number to unite the events of Passion Week into a consecutive series, leaving no doubt in regard to the order of occurrence, and no room for an unaccounted interval. Every day is definitely marked in place by the Scripture narrative.
Then there is a second featured time assertion in the crucifixion account, which John and the Synoptists both employ to point directly at the Passover day itself—a sunset-to-sunset day. As an example the following may be cited: "After two days was the Passover and unleavened bread." Matt. 26:2. There are at least eight of these important time statements, and they show (a) that the Johannine and Synoptic narratives agree, and look to the same point of time; (b) that the crucifixion Passover was the same as the ancient Mosaic; namely, a one-day feast on the fourteenth day of Nisan. Consequently, the events of Passion Week, according to several eyewitnesses, comprise a defined scene to which the crucifixion day has to conform in time and place.
Jesus came to Bethany "six days before the Passover" John 12:1. From that point of time to the Lord's death a period embracing a whole week was included. If, in the crucifixion year, the fourteenth of Nisan had been Wednesday, or even Thursday, as some insist, then the incidents on either 9 or 10 Nisan, according to the accompanying outline, would have occurred on the Sabbath day. But such an arrangement of time and circumstances would have been impossible because of the very nature of the incidents. It would have been very unlikely that Jesus could have overthrown the money tables on the Sabbath without a counter remonstrance of some kind from the Jewish leaders; and neither is it consistent to see these same leaders submitting in silence to such a scene as the public entry of Christ into Jerusalem on the Sabbath day.
It can readily be seen that if the Bible text is given credence, the series of Passion incidents cannot be condensed into a less number of days than is allowed in the accompanying outline. Consequently, if the 10th of Nisan had actually been the Jewish Sabbath in harmony with the "Wednesday" argument, the Pharisees would certainly have openly objected to the blind and the lame's being healed on that day, even if they kept silence when the money tables were overthrown!
With reference to the supposition that three twenty-four-hour days had to intervene between the death and the resurrection of Christ, the Wednesday-crucifixion advocates discover a March full moon in the year 31 A.D.—Tuesday, March 27—and come to the conclusion that this was the time of the crucifixion Passover, because it seemed to agree with the hypothesis taken, although wholly unproved, and contrary to a consistent interpretation of the Bible text. And in addition, unjustifiable use is then made of the name of the United States Naval Observatory as a supporting authority for fallacious reasoning. For before a March full-moon date can be accepted as "proof positive" of the crucifixion day, there must be demonstrated (1) the month and year of the crucifixion, and (2) the actual relation of the paschal 14th of Nisan to its associate full-moon date. These chronological details must be known facts before they can be logically employed in an argument to prove an unknown crucifixion day by the moon's phase! Hence, as the Wednesday argument now stands, the reasoning itself is faulty, because three unknown terms (the year, month, and day) are introduced into the problem to solve a fourth unknown—the actual day of the week upon which Christ died.
On the contrary, the true crucifixion argument accepts from the Bible that Friday was the day of the week that marked the Passover death of Christ, and shows from the Bible, calendar, and archeological record that the crucifixion full moon was in April. The problem then becomes one of finding the unknown year and date of the death of Christ from the known month and day of the week, in connection with a known Jewish feast date. In summation, the outstanding reasons why the Wednesday argument cannot hold are as follows:
1. It is contrary to the studied principles of the American Government to exploit one of its official departments as an authority for the crucifixion date or for any other religious argument. The needed authority for the crucifixion problem is vested in the Bible and in the standard moon tables such as Schram and Ginzel provide.
2. The Bible text and the archeological record both show that March was not the crucifixion month. For, during the very week of the crucifixion, both the fig trees and "all the trees" were in leaf, and summer was "now nigh" (Luke 21:29, 30). In other words, the crucifixion moon was a late-season moon, and not the earliest that even the Nisan limits could offer. Much less, therefore, could it have been a March moon, when snow, wind, and rain prevail in Palestine.
3. The Bible outline of the events of Passion Week opposes the claim that the 10th day of the paschal month Nisan could have been the Sabbath day, as would have been the case if the 14th of Nisan had been on Wednesday.
The two main errors in the Wednesday argument over the crucifixion day are therefore vital—the wrong Passover month and the wrong authority. As an additional conclusion to this inconsistent reasoning, it can also be stressed that both Gentile and Jewish chronologers alike agree with reference to the important bearing that the Judaean barley harvest had upon the ancient position of the paschal moon; yet none employ this fact in their various attempts to reconstruct Jewish time in the first century. Consequently, crucifixion arguments in general are based upon a wrong method of early calendation and upon the wrong position of the paschal moon. As a result, the true crucifixion date is entirely overlooked.