How do you know that Jesus, the Messiah, entered Jerusalem on a Sunday and not on some other day of the week?

Email Received:

You said in your Good Thursday commentary that "Jesus entered Jerusalem riding on a donkey (on Palm Sunday, Aviv 10)" Relative to this statement: How does one ascertain that the Messiah came into Jerusalem on Sunday? Incidentally, Sunday, as I know it, is the modern-day heathen name for the first scriptural week day.

Ted's Response:

This is how I would work "backwards" to confirm that Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem was on the first day of the week (which generally is referred to as "Palm Sunday"). Firstly, I am convinced that Jesus rose from the dead sometime following sunset after Saturday had ended (that is, at some point during the darkness of the first day of the week, which we commonly call Sunday), probably a few hours before Mary Magdalene went to the tomb (John 20:1).

Secondly, three nights and days prior to that would bring us back to sometime during the day on Thursday, since traditionally, for Jews, any part of a day could be considered a "day" and any part of a night could be considered a "night." That is, there would have been

I have selected mid-afternoon on Thursday for Jesus to have died, since it was the ninth hour (of daylight) that this happened (Matthew 27:46-50). Also, "twlight," at which time the Passover lamb was to die, implies that it was midway between the major and minor evening oblations, which would have been mid-afternoon. From then until sunset (when Friday began) would have been the "day hours of Thursday" shown above, as any part of daylight hours was considered to be a "day."

Thirdly, look at John 12:1, where it indicates that it was six days prior to the Passover that Jesus arrived at Bethany. I believe that the first "day" prior to the Passover (which began mid-afternoon on Thursday) encompassed the previous hours of Thursday, as any part of a day could be considered a "day." So the six days before the Passover were determined this way:

  1. the hours of Thursday prior to the beginning of Passover (at mid-afternoon),
  2. Wednesday,
  3. Tuesday,
  4. Monday,
  5. Sunday, and
  6. Saturday.
So Jesus arrived at Bethany sometime on Saturday. At sunset, Sunday began. That night, a dinner was given in Jesus' honor (John 12:2). The next day (during the daylight hours of Sunday), Jesus entered Jerusalem (12:12-15).

By the way, I agree that our modern-day names of the days of the week are heathen names. However, if I were to use "first day," "second day," "seventh day," etc., in my Good Thursday commentary, it would have been confusing to the majority of people reading it. It certainly would have made many people scratch their heads if I had named the commentary "Good Fifth Day."

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