Why the Memorial Is Held on the Wrong Day

by Leolaia 58 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  Phizzy

  I just revisited this problem, and have come to the conclusion that it is possible to read the synoptics as though it was not the actual night of the Passover that Jesus ate the Last Supper, but it is a stretch to do so.

  The writer of the Gospel of John is plain though, and his having Jesus eat the last supper on the 14th and dead by 3pm on the 14th of Nisan allows for all the events to take place, trials etc, and Jesus be removed fom the cross before passover started after sundown on the 15th.

  I think, if I have this right, that by mistake the JW's are doing it about the right time this year, except they think this night April 5th should be Passover night.

  Our default position should always be that JW's have got it wrong, at least in the important aspects. I have found that position always works.
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  cantleave

  Our default position should always be that JW's have got it wrong, at least in the important aspects. I have found that position always works.

  Yep!!! That works for me.....
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  ziddina

  AArrgh...

  This calculation always made my head hurt...

  I always thought that the Passover/Last Supper was celebrated on the first full moon after the spring equinox.
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  Leolaia

  ziddina....The Society really doesn't compute it that way. The date of the Memorial is computed from the date of the new moon, not the full moon, and not the astronomical date of the new moon but from the moment when the first sliver of the moon is expected to be visible from Jerusalem. That means that the date of the Memorial will not always fall on the day of the full moon. Also they calculate the date from the nearest new moon to the vernal equinox, not the first new moon. So on occasion Nisan 1 could precede the spring equinox (as reckoned by the Society in the 2005 date for the Memorial) and if the usual new moon that would start Nisan 1 is not as close to the equinox as the new moon the following month, the Society reckons the Memorial from the second new moon and considers the one prior as occurring on V e adar 1.

  Head hurting yet?
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  diamondiiz

  bttt
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  finallysomepride

  my head hurts
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  mind blown

  Lolala....I kinda sorta get it....but not really......LOL...

  But which would be the correct date or day??? From what I get from your post it woudn't be a constant....but would flucuate according to the new moons ebbs and flows???
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  Phizzy

  There can be no definitive answer to "What would be the correct day " there are too many unknowns, did Jesus celebrate the Passover that year, or was he dead before it ? If he did celebrate Passover, did he follow the Temple date for Passover or that of other groups like the Essenes ( very doubtful),

  or the Sadducees ?

  How did the Temple jews fix the date ? and so on.

  My gut feeling is that Jesus was having a communal meal with his disciples (not the Seder) on Nisan14 , just after that day had started at sundown, and some of the things happened as in the Gospels, the washing of feet perhaps. I do not think he instituted the Eucharist then, I think that is a slightly later invention.

  The events of the night passed, trials etc, and he was dead by 3pm the following afternoon,the same time as the pascal lambs, still Nisan 14. After sundown a few hours later, 3 or so, Nisan15 began and the Temple jews celebrated Passover.

  So, do JW's want to celebrate their strange ritual exactly at the time Jesus was supping with his friends ? or do they want to do it at the time Passover was celebrated ? I think they believe they are doing the latter and the former, that the two coincide.

  There are lots of difficulties with that position.
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  Diest

  Would it make sense for the sake of JW arguements that the jesus aka the lamb would be slaughtered on nisan 14 for passover on the 15th? I know they dont argue this, but it would seem to make sense based off of Leo's post from last year.
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  wannabefree