The story of the last week of Jesus’ earthly life (‘Holy Week’, or ‘Passion Week’) is told in great detail in the four Gospels.

But there are some apparent discrepancies which sceptics seize on in order to undermine the historical accuracy of the narrative.

For example, Judith Redman supposes that she is speaking for many when she states that

‘scholars who have looked at what we can know about the historical Jesus from the Gospels have generally decided that the answer is “not much”.’

The apparent chronological discrepancy between the account of John and the Synoptic writers is summed up in Harper’s Bible Commentary:

‘In John’s account, Jesus was condemned at about noon (Jn 19:14; cf. Mk 15:25, 33–34 and parallels) on a Friday, the Day of Preparation, just before Passover, so that the Jews refuse to enter the praetorium (John 18:28). According to the unanimous testimony of the Synoptics, however, the Friday of Jesus’ crucifixion followed the Passover meal, eaten the preceding evening.’

Carson sums up the problem:

‘If this [“the day of Preparation”] refers to the day before the Passover, i.e. the day in which one prepares for the Passover, then John is presenting Jesus as being sent to execution about the same time the Passover lambs are being slaughtered. That would mean that the meal Jesus and his disciples enjoyed the night before was not the Passover supper; and that in turn brings us into sharp contradiction with the Synoptic witness, which makes it clear that Jesus and his disciples ate the Passover. The attractiveness of this theory, despite the clash with the Synoptists, rests in the assumption that John introduces this time factor here as a symbolic way of saying that the true Passover lamb was none other than Jesus himself: he was sentenced to be slaughtered just as the slaughter of the lambs began.’

Most critical scholars think that there is a real discrepancy between the chronology of the Synoptists and that of John, with most favouring the Synoptic chronology (J.A.T. Robinson being an exception, in favouring John’s chronology).  John’s alteration would, then, be for the purpose of being able to say that the crucifixion took place at precisely the time that the Passover lambs were being slaughtered.

Klink appears to accept without question that John has Jesus being crucified at the time the Passover lambs were being slaughtered:

‘The narrator notes that “it was the day of the preparation for the Passover” (ἦν δὲ παρασκευὴ τοῦ πάσχα)…Thus, Jesus was about to be crucified at the very time the great feast was beginning to be prepared all across Jerusalem, with thousands of lambs being slaughtered and hearts being prepared for the climactic moment of the Passover.

‘The allusion to the slaughtering of the lambs is intended to declare that Jesus is the true Passover Lamb first announced by the Baptist (Jn 1:29, cf. 1:36). The motif of Jesus as “the Lamb of God” is one of the primary theological statements the Gospel is making, through which all of Jesus’s authority as Judge (Jn 5:22–27) and King (vv. 2–5; cf. Jn 12:1–19) must be understood. Jesus has continually been depicted by the Gospel of John as the fulfillment of the Jewish feasts (see comments on Jn 10:22; 15:1) and here is depicted as the fulfillment the Passover. The image created by this pericope’s connection between Jesus the King (vv. 2–5) and Jesus the Lamb is nicely displayed by the portrait provided in the Revelation of John: “I saw a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain, standing at the center of the throne” (5:6), about whom it is said, “Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain” (Rev 5:12).’

Beasley-Murray adopts a similar view:

‘The place, the day, and the hour are all mentioned, for the Evangelist is conscious of the momentous nature of the event now taking place. The governor is on his judgment seat in the “Stone Pavement” area; it is the seat rather than the pavement that is important; the representative of the Roman empire is about to deliver his official judgment on Jesus. It is the sixth hour (noon) of the Preparation Day; at this hour three things take place: Jews cease their work, leaven is gathered out of the houses and burned, and the slaughtering of the Passover lambs commences. The Passover festival, for all practical purposes, now begins. The Evangelist’s thought is plain: Passover is the great celebration of Israel’s deliverance from slavery by God’s almighty power; then it was that he showed himself as King, and they became his people. In this celebration the Jews gathered before Pilate are about to play a decisive part in the fulfillment of the Passover, a second Exodus, wherein God would achieve an emancipation for all nations, not for Israel alone, giving them life in the promised land of his eternal kingdom. The crucial hour of destiny for Jew and Gentile has arrived.’

This view is also supported by Keener (IVPBBC).

‘Day of Preparation’ for the Sabbath, not for the Passover meal?

Michaels thinks that the day in question was both the day of preparation for the Passover and of the Sabbath (for a parallel, compare Jn 5:1 with Jn 5:9):

‘The “preparation” normally meant Friday, the day before Sabbath (see Mk 15:42), but in connection with “the Passover” it refers to the day before Passover, when lambs were slaughtered in “preparation” for the Passover meal. Although the Gospel writer does not labor the point, Jesus, “the Lamb of God” (1:29), will die on that very day. That it was indeed the “preparation” in that sense was clear from the moment Jesus was brought to Pilate, when those who brought him “did not go into the praetorium, so that they might not be defiled but might eat the Passover” (18:28). Later, however, we will learn that it was the “preparation” in both senses, for it seems to have been a year in which the Passover also fell on a Sabbath.’

Carson, however, comments that paraskeuē (‘Preparation’) is only ever used for a Friday.  (Indeed, we might add that it is the very word that is used in modern Greek for ‘Friday’).

NIV offers an interpretative translation: ‘The day of Preparation of Passover Week’.  As Carson remarks, this is perfectly acceptable, since ‘Passover’ can refer to the Passover meal, the Passover Day, or the Passover Week.  Hence, the present expression refers to ‘the Friday of Passover Week’, bringing John into concordance with the Synoptics.

Carson suggests that the reason John introduces this chronological note is to anticipate vv31-37,

‘where the piercing of Jesus’ side by a spear, and the ‘sudden flow of blood and water’, turns on the need to ensure that Jesus and those crucified with him be taken down from the cross promptly, since it was already paraskeuē (v. 31) and the next day, the Sabbath, was a special Sabbath (since it fell within the Passover week).’

(This pattern has already occurred earlier, when the note that a healing took place on the Sabbath (Jn 5:9) prepares us for the Sabbath-controversy in Jn 5:16ff).

Kruse comments that:

‘Preparation day was not the day of preparation for Passover but for the sabbath, which followed Passover (cf. Matt. 27:62; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54). It was a special sabbath because it fell in Passover week.’

This solution is also favoured by Hendriksen, and by Kostenberger (in Holman Apologetics Commentary and elsewhere).

Blomberg (Historical Reliability of John’s Gospel) adopts the same view:

‘The Greek of the first part of this verse reads merely, ōn de paraskeuē tou pascha (‘now it was the preparation of the Passover’). Out of context, this clause could be understood to mean that it was the day before Passover; hence, the claim of John’s contradictory chronology. Ridderbos (1997:456), however, observes that this sense of the expression is not elsewhere attested. Moreover, because ‘the Passover’ could just as easily mean the week-long festival and because ‘the day of Preparation’ could mean Friday (the day of preparation for the Sabbath; cf. Did. 8.1 and Mart. Polyc. 7.1), in a context in which we have reason to believe that the initial Passover meal has already been eaten, it is completely appropriate to understand John to mean that ‘it was Friday of Passover week’ (Story 1989:318; Ridderbos 1997:606; Burge 2000:508; cf. further Blomberg 1987:177-178). This assessment is bolstered by the fact that, in every other occurrence of paraskeuē in the New Testament including its other two uses in John, the term unambiguously means the day before the Sabbath (Matt. 27:62; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54; John 19:31, 42).’

Archer (Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties) thinks that John and the Synoptists agree that Jesus was crucified on the Friday.  He adds the following interesting comment:

‘Note that in 1 Corinthians 5:7 Jesus is referred to as the Passover Lamb for believers: “Purge out the old leaven, so that you may be a new lump, just as you were unleavened.  For Christ our Lamb was sacrificed for us.” The statement of E. C. Hoskyns on John 19:14 is very appropriate here: “The hour of double sacrifice is drawing near. It is midday. The Passover lambs are being prepared for sacrifice, and the Lamb of God is likewise sentenced to death” (The Fourth Gospel [London: Farber and Farber [sic.], 1940], ad loc.). It simply needs to be pointed out that the lambs referred to here are not those that were slaughtered and eaten in private homes–a rite Jesus had already observed with His disciples the night before (“Maundy Thursday”)–but the lambs to be offered on the altar of the Lord on behalf of the whole nation of Israel. (For the household observance on the evening of the fourteenth of Abib, cf. Ex 12:6; for the public sacrifice on the altar, cf. Ex 12:16-17; Lev 23:4-8; 2 Chron 30:15-19; 35:11-16. These were all known as Passover sacrifices, since they were presented during Passover week.)’

Mounce (Why I Trust The Bible) thinks that all four gospels agree that Jesus died on the Friday afternoon.  The Jewish leaders wanted his body taken down from the cross before the beginning of the Sabbath.  John’s ‘day of Preparation’ must refer to Friday, and refers not to the preparation of the Passover meal (which took place on the Thursday) but to the preparation for the week of festivities to follow.

According to Mounce, it is clear that John and the Synoptists are referring to the same meal, since both refer to Judas’s betrayal and Peter’s denial.  When, as recorded in Jn 18:28, the Jewish leaders refused to enter the Roman governor’s palace because ‘they wanted to be able to eat the Passover’, this would probably refer to the next day’s midday meal, the hagigah, which was the second most important meal of the Passover.

For Burge, the solution is clear enough:

‘The best way to interpret “preparation” (paraskeue) in 19:14 is preparation for the Sabbath, or Friday, as 19:31 implies. Note that Mark 15:42 uses paraskeue in just this way as well: “It was Preparation Day (that is, the day before the Sabbath).” No evidence has shown the words “day of Preparation” as relating to any other day but a Sabbath. Paraskeue means “Friday” and John is telling us that this happened on Passover-Friday, that is, the Friday of Passover week.’

Different calendars?

Whitacre thinks that there is no straightforward solution to the chronological problem.  He appears to be open to the possibility that John and the Synoptics use different calendars.  This is also the solution offered by Morris.

Colin Humphreys (The Mystery of the Last Supper) opens his 2011 study by identifying the four main elements of the puzzle:

1. What happened on the Wednesday of Holy Week?  According to the usual chronology, the answer is, ‘Almost nothing’.
2. What sort of meal was the Last Supper?  According to the Synoptics, it was a Passover meal.  But according to John, it was eaten on the day before the Passover.
3. How can all the comings and goings involved in the trials of Jesus be fitted into the narrow time slot between finishing the Last Supper and the crucifixion (if the former took place on the Thursday evening, as is usually supposed)?
4. How could the trials of Jesus have been legal, given the evidence that suggests that Jewish trials could not be held at night?  (Although the Gospels say that there were false witnesses, they do not imply that the trials themselves were illegal).

Turning now the summary at the end of the book, Humphreys offers the following reconstruction:

1. The Last Supper took place on the Wednesday evening, the 1st April AD 33.
2. As stated by the Synoptics, it was a Passover meal (according to the pre-exilic calendar).
3. John refers, however, to the official calendar, according to which the Passover was held on the Friday, with the first Passover lambs being slain at the time of Jesus’ death (about 3pm on 3rd April AD 33).  This official calendar had been adopted by the Judean Jews when they were in exile in Babylon in the 6th Century BC.
4. The pre-exilic calendar continued in use through to the 1st century AD by groups such as the Samaritans, Zealots, and some Essenes.  It would not have been particularly odd for Jesus to choose to use this calendar to celebrate his Last Supper as a Passover meal.  Indeed it would have been natural for him to do so, given that he saw himself as the new Moses, and therefore had good reason to hold his last Passover meal on the anniversary of the very first Passover meal as described in the book of Exodus.
5. A Wednesday Last Supper solves the puzzles outlined above.  It accounts for the ‘lost day’ in the middle of the Passion week.  It resolves the apparent discrepancy between the accounts of the Synoptics and John.  It allows sufficient time for all the events that happened between the Last Supper and the crucifixion.  It means that the trials of Jesus were legal: the main trial being held during the day on Thursday, with a further meeting the following day to confirm the verdict.

Of course, I’m omitting the detailed argumentation which takes up the bulk of the book.  But I’ll leave it at that for the moment, as a more than plausible working hypothesis (Ian Paul: ‘worth taking seriously’) when trying to piece together the Passion narrative.