Lu. xxii. 15. And he said unto them, With desire I have desired to Jerusalem. eat this passover with you before I suffer: alone, is not always used exclusively for the paschal lamb, but The passover was commanded to be celebrated in the first It will be admitted, that if our Lord had determined upon observing the passover, and if there is in truth any difference between the Jews and our Saviour on the day on which it was to be eaten, the error would be not on the part of Jesus himself, but of the Jews who differed with him. Neither his character, conduct, nor sentiments, will for a moment permit us to believe that he disobeyed, in the slightest degree, the ordinances of the Mosaic law, in deference to any traditions which existed among the Scribes and Pharisees. If he refused to follow, upon this occasion, the practice of the High Priests, and others among the Jews, his refusal must be referred to some deviation in their practice from that which had been formerly prescribed to their forefathers. Our Lord was right, and they were wrong. Whatever rules might have guided them, He at least would have eaten the Passover on the day, "when the Passover ought to be killed” ἐν ᾗ ΕΔΕΙ Θύεσθαι τὸ πάσχα, (Luke xxii. 7.) It is well known that the months of the Jews were lunar months, but in what manner they were measured and dated, whether from the phasis or appearance of an illuminated portion of the moon's disk, or from tables in which her mean motion was calculated, and adapted to the purpose; or by some faulty and inaccurate cycle of their own, or by some other method altogether different from these, is a point upon which the most learned have disputed in every age; and which, I apprehend, can never be settled with any degree of satisfaction, from the remaining scanty and inadequate hints, which form the only materials for our judgment. Mr. Mann, De Ann. Christ. cap. xx. 23. argues very strongly for the antiquity of the astronomical method of computation at present in use amongst the Jews, and contends that it was the method adopted so early as the times of our Saviour. Epiphanius, Hær. 51. cum anim adv. Petavii, on the other hand, broadly asserts that the Jews, in our Saviour's time, followed the calculations of a faulty and inaccurate lunar cycle, by means of which they anticipated, in the year of his crucifixion, the proper period for the celebration of the passover by two days. Petavius defends this opinion; and he and Kepler have both, with much labour, endeavoured to draw out a set of Lu.xxii. 16. For I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof until Jerusalem. it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God. tables upon the principles which Epiphanius has laid down; The rabbinical doctors (and Maimonides in particular) have After the central committee had thus fixed the day of the new moon, messengers were sent to the several cities within the distance of a ten day's journey from the metropolis, to announce the fact. The council at Jerusalem, however, did not settle for themselves, and their own practice, whether the intercalary month should consist of twenty-nine or thirty days, until the conclusion of that month and the appearance of the new moon of the succeeding month Nisan, had pointed out which number of days it ought to consist of. Hence it is evident that there might, and would sometimes be, a difference between the members of the Jerusalem council and the rest of the Jews, in their mode of reckoning the first day of the month Nisan. If the council announced to the nation at large an intercalary month of twenty-nine days only, and afterwards found out that they were wrong in their calculations, and that it ought to have consisted of thirty days, it is evident that in that year the persons composing and adhering to the practice of the council, would differ from the rest of the Jews in counting the first, and therefore the fifteenth day of Nisan. What was the fifteenth of Nisan to the one, would be the sixteenth to the other; and perhaps some circumstance of this nature, at present unknown to us, may have occasioned the difference, if there really was any difference, amongst the Jews, as to the day of the celebration of the passover in the year of our Lord's crucifixion. Perhaps from this very cause we may explain why, as is supposed by Lu.xxii. 17. And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and said, Take Jerusalem. this, and divide it among yourselves : many, our Saviour and his disciples, and the generality of the The learned Cudworth, in his admirable treatise on the Jewish In the great, or outer court, there was a house called Beth Yazek, where the senate sat all the 30th day of every month, to receive the witnesses of the moon's appearance, and to examine them. If there came approved witnesses on the 30th day, who could state they had seen the new moon, the chief man of the senate stood up, and cried wp, mekuddash, it is sanctified; and the people standing by, caught the word from him, and cried mekuddash! mekuddash! But, if, when the consistory had sat all the day, and there came no approved witnesses of the phasis, or appearance of the new moon, then they made an intercalation of one day in the former month, and decreed the following one and thirtieth day to be the calends. But, if after the fourth or fifth day, or even before the end of the month, respectable witnesses came from far, and testified they had seen the new moon, in its due time: the senate were bound to alter the beginning of the month, and reckon it a day sooner, viz. from the thirtieth day. As the senate were very unwilling to be at the trouble of a second consecration, when they had even fixed on a wrong day, and therefore received very reluctantly the testimony of such witnesses as those last mentioned, they afterwards made a statute to this effect-That whatsoever time the senate should conclude on for the calends of the month, though it were certain they were in the wrong, yet all were bound to order their feasts according to it. This, Dr. Cudworth supposes, actually took place in the time of our Lord, and "as it is not likely that Lu, xxii. 18. For I say unto you, I will not drink of the fruit of the Jerusalem. vine until the kingdom of God shall come. our Lord would submit to this perversion of the original cus- In corroboration of this opinion Bishop Pearce supposes, that Mr. Benson's profound and sagacious reasoning on the time of our Lord's crucifixion, can only be appreciated by those who are acquainted with the difficulties of this subject, and have followed his argument through all its ramifications. It is to be regretted, that the learned men who have endeavoured to decide this point, have not sufficiently examined the data, which enabled Mr. Benson to come to his very satisfactory conclusions. That the reader may perceive the discrepancies to which I allude, I here subjoin from Bowyer, the various decisions of former chronologers. It has been computed, he observes, that from the twentieth to the fortieth year of Christ, the only passover full moon, which fell on a Friday, was April 3, A.D. 33, in the year of the Julian Period 4746. And yet Mr. Mann, in support of his hypothesis, computes it to have been so likewise March 22, A.D. 26, Julian Period 4739. Differences there will be, while some calculate by astronomical full moons, others by cycles; and while we know not whether the Jews kept the true or the mean full moons; or what cycle they followed. That which prevailed in the time of Epiphanius, Dodwell observes, De Cyclis, p. 429, was different from the Calippic, the Hippolytan, and from what the Jews now MATT. XXVI. part of ver. 20. Jerusalem. 20 Now-he sat down with the twelve. follow; Sir Isaac Newton, in his Observations on Prophecies, p. 163, mentions another Jewish rule for calculating the time of the passover. To avoid the inconveniences of two Sabbaths together, which prevented burying their dead, and making ready fresh meat, &c. they postponed their month a day, as often as the third of the month Nisan was Sunday, Wednesday, or Friday; and this rule they called 18 Adu, by the letters x, 7, 1, signifying the 1st, 4th, and 6th days of the week, which days we call Sunday, Wednesday, and Friday. Postponing therefore (a day in) the passover months above, the 14th day of the month Nisan, which A.D. 31, fell on Tuesday, March 27, will fall on Wednesday, March 28. In A.D. 32, which fell on Sunday, April 13, will fall on Monday, April 14. In A.D. 33, which fell on Friday, April 3, will fall on Friday, April 3, likewise. In A.D. 34, which fell on Wednesday, March 24, or rather, for the avoiding the equinox, which fell on the same day, and for having a fitter time for the harvest, on Thursday, April 22, will fall on Friday, April 23. In A.D. 36, which fell on Tuesday, April 12, will fall on Wednesday, April 13. In A.D. 36, which fell on Saturday, March 31, will fall likewise on the same day. Here the 33rd and 34th are both years on which the passover fell on a Friday; and Sir Isaac Newton determines for the 34th, two years after 32, when the passover fell very late. I shall subjoin the several computations of the paschal full moons, by Roger Bacon, in his Opus Magnum, p. 131. Jos Scaliger and Nic. Mann, De veris annis N. D. Jesu Christi, &c. p. 239. R. Dodwell, De Cyclis, p. 84S. Mr. Ferguson in his Astronomy, Sir Isaac Newton on Prophecies, and Lamy in his Harmony, by which the reader will judge with what variety they have all been certain. |