Here is another interesting, well-argued view from Dr. Boise (though I should mention that most of my commentaries align themselves with a Dr. Carson's traditional view). It's also interesting to note how much controversy there is surrounding v40, including the differences of opinion about what the "sign" of Jonah actually was, to the fact the v40 may have not been part of Matthew's Autograph.
In the traditional handling of the events of Passion Week, Jesus was crucified on a Friday and was raised from the dead on Sunday morning. All four Gospel writers placed the crucifixion on the day immediately preceding a normal Saturday Sabbath (see Matt. 27:62; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54; and John 19:31). Yet if that is a correct understanding of these events, how can it be said that Jesus spent “three days and three nights” in the earth?
According to Jewish idiom, the phrase “three days” does not necessarily mean a period of seventy-two hours. It can mean merely one whole day plus parts of two others. But while this observation helps us deal with texts that say “three days,” it does not help us deal with Matthew’s version of the prophecy, for here the phrase is not “three days” but rather “three days and three nights.”
It is possible that parts of one day and one night are involved, rather than three full days and three full nights; nevertheless, three periods of light and three periods of darkness must be accounted for. This requirement, regardless of anything else, is fatal to a Friday crucifixion theory. As one writer says, “Add to the indictment of Friday the statement of the two disciples on the way to Emmaus, spoken on the afternoon of Sunday (Luke 24:21), ‘Today is the third day since these things were done,’ and the case looks black indeed against Friday. Sunday is not the third day since Friday.”
There is another difficulty too, a difficulty apparent to anyone who has tried to sort out the events of the final Passover Week and assign them days. On an average, about one-third of the Gospels is taken up with the events of the last week of Christ’s life. This means that the events of this week are given to us in fairly complete detail. Indeed, from the arrival of Jesus in Bethany, six days before the Passover, until the resurrection, every moment seems to be accounted for. Yet when the events of these days are pieced together into one connected whole, one entire day, and possibly two, is lacking. One of the missing days can be explained as the preceding Sabbath, a day in which Jesus rested in Bethany and received those who came to see him and Lazarus. But what of the other day? Can it really be that in a week as full as this one was, one entire day is unaccounted for? How can we explain this omission?
The difficulty of accounting for this day led no less careful a scholar than Frederick Godet to move the events of Palm Sunday to Monday, thereby compressing six days of activity into five. This is interesting, but the same effect can be achieved by moving the crucifixion back to Thursday rather than by moving the events of Palm Sunday forward.
A third difficulty is of a more recent development. The dating of historical events has been a complicated matter, involving the days and times of solar and lunar eclipses and new moons. But in recent years, thanks to the use of computers, much that was formerly uncertain is now known. Thus, to give an example, as recently as 1973 a work entitled New and Full Moons by Herman H. Goldstine was published, from which it is possible to calculate the days of the week on which the Jewish Passover fell in any given year during Christ’s lifetime or thereafter. If such a calculation established a Saturday Passover and therefore a Friday crucifixion for any year near the time at which Jesus must have been crucified, it would provide excellent support for the traditional theory. But, in fact, it does not. Instead, the day before Passover falls on a Friday only in the year A.D. 26, which is too early, and in the year A.D. 33, which most scholars agree is too late.
What are we to do with these problems? Is there a solution? I believe there is and that it is obviously the solution, once we get over the idea that the crucifixion must have been on a Friday, as tradition says. The solution is simply that two Sabbaths were involved in this last week of Christ’s earthly ministry. One was the regular weekly Sabbath, which always fell on Saturday. The second was an extra Passover Sabbath, which, in this particular week, must have come on a Friday.
It needs to be said, in case it is not entirely self-evident, that the Passover Sabbath always came on the fifteenth of the month of Nisan and would therefore naturally fall on different days of the week in different years, as Christmas does in our day. However, it was always observed as a Sabbath. In my reconstruction Jesus would have been crucified on Thursday and would have been raised from the dead sometime before dawn on Sunday morning. --Boice, J. M. (2001). The Gospel of Matthew (pp. 220–222). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books.
~Deut
