Essay:Jesus' Crucifixion
The ancient world had several founders of great religions, but only one performed miracles: Jesus of Nazareth. His resurrection is the single greatest event in the history of the world. Do we know when it occurred?
It is easy to calculate the date of His crucifixion because we know it was during the reign of Pontius Pilate, who served from A.D. 26 to 36, thereby encompassing the entire period of ministry of John the Baptist and Jesus himself. A Jewish historian named Philo described Pilate as inflexible, obstinate and merciless, and Pilate was hated by the Jewish people under his rule. The Gospels describe the savage retaliation by Pilate against Galileans as follows: "Now on the same occasion there were some present who reported to Him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices." Luke 13:1 (NAS). Eventually the Romans removed Pilate from power for being too cruel.
A detailed analysis of the Gospel and historical sources places the date of the Crucifixion at Friday, April 3, A.D. 33, although some historians think it occurred in A.D. 29. You can review the evidence yourself at: http://www.themoorings.org/apologetics/69weeks/weeks4.html
Contents
Calculating the Exact Date (work in progress)
Introduction
The question of the date of the Crucifixion is not a simple one. It is complicated not only by the passage of time, but the interaction of multiple date systems and multiple religious agendas all seeking to promote their own position. This discourse seeks to be as primary source focused as possible and just focus on the raw data and textual clues therein.
To this end we will examine the conception of John the Baptist, the conception of Jesus Christ, Luke's list of rulers at the baptism of Jesus, the Feast of Trumpets, Day of Atonement and how to calculate the duration of Jesus ministry and death as the Passover Lamb. Only then can a true date be set upon.
The conclusion of the below data is that Jesus was crucified on Friday the 3rd of April AD 31.
Conception of John the Baptist
Luke 1:5 states: "There was in the days of Herod, the king of Judaea, a certain priest named Zacharias, of the course of Abia: and his wife was of the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elisabeth." KJV
Possible Date Of Baptism Window
In the process of isolating the date of Jesus Crucifixion, we are need to first ask "What year was he baptised? Luke's Gospel gives us some excellent data that allows us to narrow the window.
| Current Rulers List - Luke 3:1-2 | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| NB: All dates use Gregorian Calander, not Julian | |||
| Tiberius Caesar | Emperor of Rome | 22 August AD 14 | AD 37 |
| Pontius Pilate | Govenor of Judea | AD 26 | AD 36 |
| Herod Antipas | Tetrarch of Galilee | 4 BC | AD 39 |
| Philip the Tetrarch | Tetrarch of Ituraea & Trachonitis | 4 BC | AD 34 |
| Lysanias | Tetrarch of Abilene | AD 14 | AD 29 |
| Annas & Caiaphus | High Priest | AD 18 | AD 36 |
| Max. Possible Baptism Window | AD 26 | AD 29 | |
The next most notable point is that Luke tells us "Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Jesus Christ was baptised by John the Baptist. It is accademically understood that Luke, like Josephus, used Syrian Regional Regnal Time in which no matter where you ascend in that year, it counts as '1' and is measured from Tishri 1 to Tishri 1. It must be noted that Tishri 1 is the first day of the Jewish civil year, determined by the new moon nearest the automn equinox. Therefore correlating astronomical data and imposing the Gregorian calander system, by our time Tiberius Caesar's 15th regnal year began at sunset on 20th of September AD 27 and extended until sunset on the 9th of September AD 28.
Therefore the maximum possible window for Jesus Baptism is the year extending from the 20th of September AD 27.
Feasts and Jesus Baptism
The Jewish civic calander kicked off with The Feast of Trumpets. It wasn't a 'feast' in the traditional sense, but that riders we sent throughout the land blowing horns to call people to the attention that the Day of Atonement was near at hand and to repent and prepar themselves. This lasted for 10 days. Those that could would make their way to the temple in Jerusalem. Here the street preaching would focus on the message of repentance as mirrored by John the Baptist's preaching that called men to repentance. The Feast of Trumpets in AD 27 began on 20th of September AD 27 which correlates with Luke's statement of "in the 15th year". The Day of Atonement of that year fell on the 1st of October AD 27. The true significance will reveal itself in the next section. We are also told that "[Jesus] began then to be about 30 years of age" which is noted as the Levitical age priests began their ministry.
Duration of Jesus Ministry
A synoptic examination of the four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John reveal four seperate passover events as a reliable method to count the passage of time. This is best seen through the Gospel of John:
- Passover 1 - John 2:13
- Passover 2 - John 5:1
- Passover 3 - John 6:4
- Passover 4 - John 12-19
If Jesus was baptised during the Feast of Trumpets prior to the Day of Atonement which is exactly six months before the Feast of the Passover, then it can reasonably be said that Jesus ministry lasted 3.5 years from the Day of Atonement on the 1st of October AD 27 as being the 15th year of Tiberius Caesar to the 3rd of April AD 31 using the Gregorian calander.
Baptism of Jesus
Luke 3:1-3 states: "Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judaea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of Ituraea and of the region of Trachonitis, and Lysanias the tetrarch of Abilene, Annas and Caiaphas being the high priests, the word of God came unto John the son of Zacharias in the wilderness. And he came into all the country about Jordan, preaching the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins;" KJV Tiberius Caesar reighned as Emperor 22 August AD 14 - AD 37 (Gregorian) Pontius Pilate was in office as Govenor AD 26 - AD 36 Herod Antipas reigned as Tetrarch of Galilee 4 BC - AD 39 Philip the Tetrarch reigned over Ituraea & Trachonitis 4 BC - 34 AD Lysanias reigned as Tetrach of Abilene AD 14 - AD 29 Annas using his son-in-law Caiaphas as a puppet high priest - AD 15 - 36 AD Jointly these create a timestamp window of AD 26 through to AD 29.
But the real clincher is if we use Syrian Provincial Regnal Reconing (used by Luke and Josephus) to calculate the 15th year of Tiberius Caesar. This is Tishri AD 27 (20 September, AD 27) → Tishri AD 28 (9 September, AD 28). The dates supplied are using the Gregorian calander.
Given that virtually all of the four gospel stories happen during a feast as these were the times of public gathering, John the Baptist's call for repentance is the textually consistent message of the Feast of Trumpets as the people prepared for the Day of Atonement.
John the Baptist declared that "the time is at hand" necessitating the question of "Which specific time?" The logical answer is the 70 weeks of Daniel 9. Saint Jerome's Commentary on Daniel proves that Christianity before 400 AD understood this prophecy to specify the exact time of Jesus ministry. Setunius and Tacitus both directly reference this prophecy as influencing their regional foreign policy as they took all utterances of the gods very seriously, especially one that already proven so true and affected the actions of Alexander the Great and the Ptolemians.
