This book takes the Wednesday position openly. This chart sets it next to the Friday position fairly so the reader can weigh the same Gospel data both ways and decide for themselves.
Where the two views agree
Both views read the same Gospel events in the same sequence: an arrival in Bethany, a triumphal entry, a temple cleansing, days of teaching, a Last Supper, six trials, a crucifixion, a burial before sundown, and an empty tomb at first light Sunday. The disagreement is not over what happened — it is over which day of the week each event landed on, and that disagreement turns almost entirely on one phrase.
The phrase that divides them: “three days and three nights”
“For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.” — Matthew 12:40
How long is that, exactly? The two views answer differently — and the reader’s answer to this one question is what tips the rest.
| Friday view | Wednesday view | |
|---|---|---|
| “Three days and three nights” | A Hebraism — any part of three calendar days. Like Esther’s three-day fast (Esther 4:16) that ended “on the third day” (5:1). | Literal — three nights and three days, counted in Hebrew civil days (sundown to sundown). |
| Tomb interval | Friday ~3 PM → Sunday dawn = ~36 hours. Two nights (Friday night, Saturday night) and parts of three days. | Wednesday just before sundown → end of Saturday = ~72 hours. Three full nights (Wed→Thu, Thu→Fri, Fri→Sat) and three full days (Thu, Fri, Sat). |
| Reconciling “on the third day” (1 Cor 15:4) | The phrase carries the inclusive idiom — any part of three calendar days satisfies it. | At the close of Hebrew Day 3 (sundown Saturday). The women find the tomb already empty Sunday at dawn. |
The Friday view reads “three days and three nights” figuratively. The Wednesday view reads it literally. Everything else flows from that.
Side-by-side timeline
| Gospel event | Wednesday view | Friday view |
|---|---|---|
| Arrival in Bethany; supper at Lazarus’s | Nisan 9 — Friday | Nisan 8 — Saturday ⚠ |
| Triumphal entry into Jerusalem | Nisan 10 — Saturday (= Lamb Selection Day, Ex 12:3) | Nisan 9 — Sunday ⚠ |
| Temple cleansed; fig tree cursed | Nisan 11 — Sunday | Nisan 10 — Monday |
| Day of teaching; every authority tests Him | Nisan 12 — Monday | Nisan 11 — Tuesday |
| Betrayal arranged; Last Supper (after sundown) | Nisan 13 Tuesday eve → Nisan 14 begins | Nisan 13 Thursday eve → Nisan 14 begins |
| Arrest, trials, crucifixion, burial before sundown | Nisan 14 — Wednesday | Nisan 14 — Friday |
| High-day Sabbath (Unleavened Bread Day 1) | Nisan 15 — Thursday (annual, separate from weekly) | Nisan 15 — Saturday ⚠ (annual + weekly merged) |
| Day between — women buy & prepare spices | Nisan 16 — Friday | (no equivalent day) ⚠ |
| Weekly Sabbath — women rest | Nisan 17 — Saturday | (same as Nisan 15 above) |
| Tomb found empty at dawn | First day — Sunday | First day — Sunday |
| Time in tomb | 3 nights, 3 days (~72 hours) ✓ | 2 nights, parts of 3 days (~36 hours) |
⚠ = Friday-view tension point — explained in the next section.
Where Friday strains the text
1. John 12:1 — “six days before the Passover” lands on a Sabbath. If the Passover is Friday, “six days before” is the Saturday before. A supper at Lazarus’s house with Mary’s anointing of Jesus’s feet on the Sabbath is at odds with normal Sabbath conventions. The Wednesday view places this supper on Friday Nisan 9 — an ordinary Sabbath-preparation evening.
2. The Triumphal Entry as Lamb-Selection Day (Exodus 12:3) — only Wednesday fits. Exodus 12:3 commands that the Passover lamb be selected on Nisan 10. In the Wednesday view, the triumphal entry lands precisely on Nisan 10 — the entry is Israel’s selection of the Lamb, fulfilled to the day. In the Friday view, the entry falls on Nisan 9, and Nisan 10 passes the next day with no event attached.
3. Three days and three nights vs. ~36 hours. Friday gives two nights and parts of three days. Wednesday gives three of each. This is the load-bearing point.
4. Mark 16:1 vs. Luke 23:56 — preparation, rest, and purchase. Luke 23:56 says the women “prepared spices and perfumes; and on the Sabbath they rested.” Mark 16:1 says “when the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene… bought spices.” Friday view, one Sabbath: women must prepare and rest and later purchase across a narrow window — tight. Wednesday view, two Sabbaths: Thursday’s high-day Sabbath, women rest. Friday between, women buy and prepare. Saturday’s weekly Sabbath, women rest again. Both verbs in both Gospels land in their natural order.
5. “That Sabbath was a high day” (John 19:31). The Friday view reads this as the weekly Sabbath happening to coincide with Passover. The Wednesday view reads “high day” as the annual Sabbath of Unleavened Bread (Nisan 15), distinct from the weekly Sabbath that follows. John’s phrasing — that Sabbath, a high day — reads more naturally as one Sabbath among more than one.
6. “ὀψὲ δὲ σαββάτων” — late on the Sabbaths, plural (Matthew 28:1). The Greek phrase Matthew uses for the women’s pre-dawn approach to the tomb is in the plural form of “Sabbath.” Friday view: a Greek idiom for the weekly day. Wednesday view: two Sabbaths had just passed.
7. The Hebrew day frame holds Scripture-wide. “And there was evening and there was morning, the first day” (Gen 1:5). Hebrew civil days begin at sundown all through the Bible. Reading the burial-resurrection window the same way is the natural choice.
Where Friday has the stronger case
Honest comparison requires giving the Friday position its due:
1. Tradition. The Friday view has held the majority position in Christendom since at least the third century. Tertullian, Origen, Augustine, and most of the Latin and Greek fathers from AD 200 forward read it as Friday. An 1,800-year stream of Christian readers is not nothing.
2. Simpler narrative. Friday + Saturday + Sunday is the easier story to teach a child, preach in a single Holy Week sermon, or encode in a liturgical calendar. Wednesday requires the reader to follow Hebrew sundown-counting and recognize two distinct Sabbaths in the same week — more accounting, more attention demanded.
3. The “third day” phrasing reads more naturally under Friday. “On the third day He rose” is the dominant Gospel and epistolary formulation (1 Cor 15:4; Luke 24:7, 21, 46; Acts 10:40; Matt 16:21, 17:23, 20:19). Friday inclusive — Day 1, 2, 3 = Fri, Sat, Sun — drops the phrase in without strain. The Wednesday view also reconciles “on the third day” (at the close of Hebrew Day 3, sundown Saturday) but it asks the reader to count Hebrew civil days rather than ordinary inclusive days.
4. The Synoptic flow. The Synoptic Gospels move from the Last Supper to the trial to the crucifixion in a single rapid sequence that reads like one continuous night-and-day. The Friday view honors that flow as a single 24-hour rush. The Wednesday view places an extra two days between the Wednesday crucifixion and the Sunday morning that the women come to the tomb — which can feel like an interruption in the Gospel narrative pace.
5. Creeds and the liturgical year. The Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds both phrase the resurrection as “on the third day” without qualification. The Church’s Holy Week (Maundy Thursday → Good Friday → Holy Saturday → Easter) is built around Friday. Departing from it means rebuilding ~1,800 years of devotional rhythm.
Closing note
The choice is not between literal and figurative reading — both views read the Bible carefully. The choice is between which phrase carries the literal weight, and which carries the idiom.
If “three days and three nights” is literal and “on the third day” is the inclusive Hebrew idiom (counted from sundown), you arrive at Wednesday.
If “on the third day” is literal and “three days and three nights” is the Hebraic idiom for parts of three calendar days, you arrive at Friday.
This book argues for Wednesday because it reads “three days and three nights” at face value, sees the Lamb-Selection Day (Exodus 12:3) fall precisely on the Triumphal Entry, finds the two-Sabbath reading reconciles Mark 16:1 with Luke 23:56 cleanly, and watches the typology of the Passover Lamb (slain “at twilight” on Nisan 14) match the Gospel hour of death.
You may weigh it differently. The chart and the Scriptures are now in front of you; the call is yours.
All Scripture references from the NASB. The Last Week of the Lamb — Paul & Pam Hainline — NobleMind.Study.