What night was Jesus captured in the?

Answer 1

Christian tradition holds that Jesus was arrested in the garden on Thursday night.

Answer 2

A:It seems strange that Jesus was captured at night, most especially the night of the Passover when the priests and everyone else should be celebrating their most important night of the Jewish year. John's Gospel moves the day of the Passover to the Friday, resolving the paradox of the arrest on the night of the Passover, but still has Jesus arrested at midnight, of all times.

The answer should lie in Mark's Gospel, as this was the first gospel to be written and it has been demonstrated that the other New Testament gospels were essentially copied from it.

The last twenty four hours in the life of Jesus are described in a sophisticated chiastic structure, a circular sequence in which an opening set of events is contrasted with another set of events that mirrors the first. The last 24 hours are broken up into eight segments, each of exactly three hours, with the opening set beginning on the evening of the Last Supper and ending with the trial before the high priest and other senior priests and elders. The second set begins with the trial before Pontius Pilate and ends on the evening of the crucifixion.

• Mark begins the story "when it was evening" (14:17). In this ancient world without electricity, that would mean when the sun went down, or approximately 6 pm.
• Mark knew that the duration of the Passover meal was three hours and that it concluded with the singing of a hymn. So at the end of his segment he noted, "And when they had sung a hymn they went out to the Mount of Olives". It was obviously about 9 p.m.
• Mark then has Jesus and the disciples go to the Garden of Gethsemane, where his closest disciples, Peter, James and John, were not able to remain awake. "Could you not watch one hour?" Jesus asked. The process was repeated two more times. The disciples could not watch one, two or three hours. It was now midnight.
• The act of betrayal, the darkest deed in human history, came next, occurring at the stroke of midnight.
• Jesus was led away for a trial before the high priest and other senior priests and elders. This governing body then judged him, on the basis of his messianic claim, to be worthy of death. It was 3:00 am.
• The watch of the night between 3 am and 6 am was called cockcrow. Mark now inserted his account of Peter's threefold denial of Jesus, once each hour until the cock crowed, marking the end of that phase of the night. That makes it 6 am.
• "As soon as it was morning", which would be 6 am, Jesus was led by the chief priests, scribes and elders to Pontius Pilate for judgement.
• Mark told his readers once again that this drama has been shaped liturgically, saying, " It was the third hour," or 9 am "when they crucified him".
• When "the sixth hour had come" (12 noon), darkness covered the whole earth, reflecting the betrayal at 12 midnight.
• After three hours of darkness, Jesus said "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" At 3 pm, Jesus gave up the ghost.
• Jesus was buried in the final period from 3 to 6 pm, before the sun went down. That brings us to 6 pm on Friday evening, reflecting the beginning of the passion on 6 pm on Thursday evening.

From this we can see that the arrest took place at midnight because this is traditionally the darkest hour, when evil is most likely to occur. It is mirrored by the darkness that fell exactly twelve hours later, at midday. And the arrest at exactly this time creates a marvellous literary structure. The author of Mark's Gospel was a brilliant writer.