Did Christ rise in 3 of OUR days or 3 Semitic days?

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moonfire

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I was just reading some of the Quick Questions in the latest This Rock about the story of Jonah. In supplying an answer to that quesiton, the response gave the example of “If Johah’s 3 days in the whale were counted like Christ’s 3 days in the tomb, after the Semitic fashion - that is, parts of 3 distinct days, but perhaps only slightly more than twenty-four hours total - then it is possible that Johah could have been coughed up…”

The question that arose for me in this response is what is it that we as Catholics really believe? That it was literally on the 3rd day as we count it (ie: Fri, Sat, Sun) that Jesus rose, or is there a different time(frame) that is actually the case? Are we using a Semitic version of “days?” And if so, what the heck is that ? 🙂

j
 
I think the common understanding is that it was parts of three days (friday afternoon - sunday morning) but not necessarily 72 hours. That seems to be where the “semetic” understanding comes from - occuring over three days but not necessarily three full 24-hour days.

That is the point that they were making in the Jonah article - that since a period such as late friday night to early sunday morning would be not much more than 24 hours but actually be a part of three days - that it could be possible to believe the Jonah story if you wanted to.

We believe that Good Friday was the first day and Easter Sunday is the third. How many actual hours that might have been doesn’t seem to be a big deal. The Catholic and Semitic views don’t seem to cause much conflict in that regard.
 
I believe it says on the third day - not after the third day - a large difference.
 
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