CHRONOLOGY, (Vi) The Day of the Jewish Month Nisan.—The Passover was kept at the full moon of the lunar month Nisan, the first of the Jewish year; the Paschal lambs were slain on the afternoon of the 14th, and the Passover was eaten after sunset the same day—which, however, as the Jewish day began at sunset, was by their reckoning the 15th ; the first fruits (of the barley harvest) were solemnly offered on the 16th. The synoptic Gospels appear to place the Crucifixion on the 15th, since they speak of the Last Supper as a Passover; St John’s Gospel, on the other hand (xiii. 1, 29, xviii. 28), distinctly implies that the feast had not yet taken place, and thus makes the Crucifixion fall on the 14th. Early Christian tradition is unanimous on this side ; either the 14th is mentioned, or the Crucifixion is made the antitype of the slaughter of the Paschal Lamb (and the resurrection of the first fruits), in the following authorities anterior to a.d. 235 : St Paul, 1 Cor. v. 7, xv. 20; Quartodecimans of Asia Minor, who observed the Crucifixion on the “ 14th,” no matter on what day of the week it fell; Claudius Apollinaris, Clement of Alexandria, Hippolytus, all three quoted in the Paschal Chronicle; Irenaeus (apparently) IY. x. 1 [xx. 1]; [Tertullian] adv. Judceos, 8 ; Africanus, in Kouth, Pell. Sacr. ii. 297. The Crucifixion, then, should be placed rather on the 14th than on the 15th of Nisan. These four lines of inquiry have shown that the Crucifixion fell on Friday, Nisan 14 (less probably 15), in one of the six years 28-33 a.d. ; and therefore, if it is possible to discover (i.) exactly which moon or month was reckoned each year as the moon or month of Nisan, and (ii.) exactly on what day that particular moon or month was reckoned as beginning, it will, of course, be possible to tell in which of these years Nisan 14 (or 15) fell on a Friday. To neither question can an answer be given in terms so precise as to exclude some latitude, but to both with sufficient exactness to rule out at once three of the six years, (i.) The difficulty with regard to the month is to know how the commencement of the Jewish year was fixed —in what years an extra month was intercalated before Nisan. If the Paschal full moon was, as in later Christian times, the first after the spring equinox, the difficulty would be reduced to the question on what day the equinox was reckoned. If, on the other hand, it was, as in ancient Jewish times, the first after the earliest ears of the barley harvest would be ripe, it would have varied with the forwardness or backwardness of the season from year to year, (ii.) The difficulty with regard to the day is, quite similarly, to know what precise relation the first day of the Jewish month bore to the astronomical new moon. In later Christian times the Paschal month was calculated from the astronomical new moon; in earlier Jewish times all months were reckoned to begin at the first sunset when the new moon was visible, which in the most favourable circumstances would be some thirty-six hours later than the astronomical new moon. Direct material for answering the question when and how far astronomical calculations replaced simple observations as the basis of the Jewish kalendar is not forthcoming. Jewish traditions represented the Sanhedrim as retaining to the end its plenary power over the kalendar, and as still fixing the first day of every month and the first month of every year. But as it is quite inconceivable that the Jews of the Dispersion should not have knowm beforehand at what full moon they were to present themselves at Jerusalem for the Passover, it must be assumed as true in fact, whether or no it was true in theory, that the old empirical methods must have been qualified by permanent, that is in effect by astronomical, rules for the commencement of years and months. The first of each month was within a certain limit from the astronomical
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new moon. Nisan was fixed with reference to the equinox,, though with regard to the day of the equinox it must be remembered (i.) that even of Christian calculations, while the Alexandrine reckoning in the 4th century adopted 21 st March, Anatolius in a.d. 277 had employed 19th March, and Hippolytus in a.d. 221 18th March; (ii.) that Christian controversialists from Anatolius onwards accused the Jews of disregarding the (Christian) equinoctial limit,, and of sometimes placing the Paschal full moon before it; the Jewish equinox may therefore have gone back even as far as 17th March. In the following table the first column gives the terminus paschalis, or 14th of the Paschal moon, according to the present Christian kalendar; the second gives the 14th, reckoned from the time of the astronomical new moon of Nisan; the third the 14th, reckoned from the first appearance of the new moon at sunset. Alternative moons are given for a.d. 29, according as the full moon falling about 18th March is or is not reckoned after the equinox. Mar. 28 Mar. (29-) 30 a.d. 28 Sat. Mar. 27 Mar. 17 Mar. (18-) 19 „ 29 Th. Mar. 17 Ap. 16 Ap. (17-) 18 F. Ap. 15 Ap. 5 Ap. (6-) 7 „ 30 Tu. Ap. 4 Mar. 25 Mar. (26-) 27 ,, 31 Sat. Mar. 24 Ap. 12 Ap. (13-) 14 ,, 32 Sat. Ap. 12 Ap. 1-2 Ap. (2-) 3 ,, 33 W. Ap. 1 or (3-) 4 The first and third columns may safely be taken torepresent the possible extremes for Nisan 14, so that it will be seen at once that Friday cannot have fallen on Nisan 14th or 15th in any of the three years a.d. 28, 31, and 32. The choice is narrowed down to a.d. 29, Friday 18th March (Friday 15th April would probably be too early even for Nisan 14); a.d. 30, Friday 7th April; and a.d. 33, Friday 3rd April. (e) The Civil Year (consuls, or regnal years of Tiberius) in early Christian tradition. It is not a priori improbable that the year of the central event from which the Christian Church dated her own existence should have been noted in the apostolic age and handed down to the memory of succeeding generations; and the evidence does go some way to suggest that we have in favour of a.d. 29, the consulate of the two Gemini (15th or 16th year of Tiberius), a body of tradition independent of the Gospels and ancient, if not primitive, in origin. The earliest witness, indeed, who supplies material for a definite date for the Crucifixion gave not 29, but 33 a.d. The pagan chronicler, Phlegon, writing in the reign of Hadrian, noted under Olympiad 202‘4 ( = a.d. 32-33), besides a great earthquake in Bithynia, an eclipse so phenomenal that it became night “ at the sixth hour of the day.” The eclipse meant is, of course, that of the Crucifixion (so Origen, contra Celsum, ii. 33 [but see in Matt. 134, Delarne iii. 922], Eusebius’s Chronicle Tib. 19 [ = a.d. 33], Anon, in Cramer’s Catena in Matt. p. 237), but as the notice of it was clearly derived by Phlegon, pagan as he was, directly or indirectly from the Gospel narrative, there is no reason at all to ascribe any independent value to the date. Phlegon may have had grounds for dating the Bithynian earthquake in that year, and have brought the dateless portent into connexion with the dated one. Eusebius adopted and popularized this date, which fell in with his own system of Gospel chronology, but of the year 33 as the date of the Passion there is no vestige in Christian tradition before the 4th century. The only date, in fact, which has any real claim to represent Christian tradition independent of the Gospels, is the year 29. Tiberius 15 is given by. Clem. Alex. Strom, i. 147; Origen, Horn, in Jerem. xiv. 13 ; cf. c. Cels. iv. 22. Tiberius 16 by Julius Africanus (Routh, Pell. Sacr. ii. 301-304), and pseudo-Cyprian de pascha
