Three Days and Three Nights

The organized church of the fourth century decreed that the celebration of our Master Yahshua's resurrection should be held on the pagan holiday of Ishtar. Why?

Religious form and tradition trick us into accepting things that do not make sense sometimes. Certain very clear religious compromises had to be made to change the authentic foundation[1] and primitive pattern of the first Messianic community to make it fit into the mold of the organized religion you see today. It did not happen all at once, but by the fourth century what remained bore no resemblance to the glory of its beginnings in Jerusalem.[2] What remained was a religion full of half-truths we all accept just because that's the way it's always been.

One odd change may look insignificant, but it exposes a much deeper motive. This is the creation of Good Friday as the day of the crucifixion when the Savior of the world clearly had to have died on a Wednesday. So what difference does it make whether it is Wednesday or Friday? What made them want to change it anyway? Let's look at how history exposes this strange cover-up.

Because an ugly anti-Semitism was surfacing among them, the Christian leaders of the fourth century tried to disassociate themselves from their Jewish roots. What formerly had been considered a Messianic/Jewish sect now tried to cut the ties to make a new religion. This religion would free itself from the restrictions of the laws of its founding fathers, including its wealth of festivals. They tried to hide their own Jewishness to make this new religion more appealing, in order to 'take the world for Christ.'

The most important festival they celebrated each year was Passover (Pesach in Hebrew). To the world this appeared to be a Jewish holiday. Despite its vital significance to the whole message of the Messiah, Yahshua (whom they also now began to call by the Greek name Jesus to make his own Hebrew heritage less obvious), the Christian leaders made some big changes in their calendar in order to remove Passover altogether.

They chose rather to merge their celebration of the death and resurrection of Yahshua the Messiah into the festival of a more fashionable religion of the day. Joining with the secular leaders of the government, they made a new holiday called Easter (named after a springtime fertility goddess, Ishtar).[3] In order to do it they had to squeeze the crucifixion, death, and resurrection of the Lamb of God into the Friday-through-Sunday holiday of Ishtar. Two full days were cut off their own celebration by the leaders with no apology or explanation.

But this dark plot is exposed when you look at the calendar with just a little common sense. The Bible makes it very clear that the Messiah was to be killed at the time of Passover. The Son of God Himself said that He would die and stay in death for "three days and three nights."[4] It was no coincidence that His death perfectly coincided with the time of the killing of the Jewish Passover lamb as a sacrifice. It happened at this very time to validate His claim to be the sacrificial lamb that would save men from death (the death angel of the Passover). From sundown when He died, a full three days and three nights had to pass. Then, if He was true to His word, the Savior promised to rise from this state of death. In this perfect progression of time many other types in our Jewish heritage were fulfilled to verify that He truly is the Messiah.

The organized church of the fourth century (which had already departed from the original revelation from the Father to the 'flesh-and-blood' decrees and doctrines[5]) altered the order of events, losing the deep significance of Passover altogether.[6] Thus, they were able to cut themselves off totally from the holy root of their faith, substituting the pagan Spring festival for the Jewish Passover. Finally they could stand on their own as Christians, no longer under the shadow of their Hebrew ancestors,[7] since they no longer belonged to Messiah and could not claim to be the seed of Abraham.

Messiah was put into the tomb after His crucifixion on a Wednesday, just before dark. The lambs were being sacrificed at that time in the temple to save the people from the Death Angel. He rose from the dead 72 hours later — exactly three days and three nights — just at sundown, as the first day of the Jewish week began. There is no such thing as Good Friday.[8] Scholars even within Christianity[9] agree that the events of that extraordinary week follow this time line. By examining other historic writings (Didascalia Apostolorum, Epiphanius, Victorinus of Petau) from before 300 AD, these changes are confirmed.

Something vital was lost when the Christian leaders attempted to mask their Jewish origins by disassociating themselves from the Jewish festivals and by compromising a foundational aspect of the message of their Jewish Savior. It all points to a clear sign of the darkness that had already overtaken that institution once the illuminating lampstand of His presence with them had been blown out by their disobedience. [10]

So, what is the importance of whether Good Friday should actually be Good Wednesday? Good Friday is just another indication of the confused state of Christianity, another blatant contradiction of a church gone haywire to the point that one third of the world's population claim to be on the "narrow way, which only a few can find..."[11] History tells the whole story for those who care enough to investigate.