Archive 1 Archive 2

Drmies' protection of Chronology of Jesus

Collapsing off-topic diversionary rants by edit-warring IP-hopper. This talk page is for discussions on improving the article, not fingerpointing. Softlavender (talk) 07:17, 1 April 2016 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Hi Drmies. You have protected the article Chronology of Jesus and the reason you give is "Persistent disruptive editing: IP editing against apparent consensus following ANI thread". I am not sure what this means (I am relatively new to Wikipedia). You seem to have been prompted by user GBRV who says "The discussion was at Talk:Census of Quirinius. An anonymous user can't just undo this agreement."

However I have just checked the Census of Quirinius Talk page, and there is no discussion suggesting large-scale scale deletions in the Chronology of Jesus article, and indeed no mention of the article "Chronology of Jesus" at all (I have searched in the Talk archives as well).

I am concerned someone is trying to vandalise the Chronology of Jesus article by repeatedly undertaking large-scale deletions without discussion and is pretending there was an agreement on this. I may be wrong though, so am keen on your advice. So far I have received only an evasive statement by User Talk:Softlavender. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.154.102.54 (talk) 08:49, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

I am the editor who summarized the Date of Birth section. This was not vandalism, and the material was not deleted – it is all available at Date of birth of Jesus of Nazareth, with a clear linkage – easy to find and access for anybody who wants to. I have retained here a summary of the important facts (i.e the date of birth), and for people who might want the extra info on the process by which this date has been estimated by scholars, it is all detailed at the other article.
There are several reasons for doing this. One reason is that this topic is both notable in its own right, as well as quite complex. Any discussion about the date of birth of Jesus in one of the many Jesus-related articles will therefore tend to repeat this material yet again, and different editors add different material to the discussion in different articles, so in some cases a reader visiting different articles would get inconsistent info on the same topic. This is obviously sub-optimal. Second, the complexity of the discussion sometimes causes a substantial diversion away from the main topic of the host article, which is inappropriate, but the material is still important to some users. This is what was happening until recently at the Census of Quirinius article, until we agreed to centralize the detailed discussion of this topic in a separate article. Third, the Date of birth of Jesus of Nazareth article was created as a spin-out of the Nativity of Jesus article, which was already exceeding the ideal total size for an article. This approach was approved recently at the AfD forum – see here [2]
However since an article now exists which is dedicated to this topic, it is easy and useful to centralize all discussions on this topic at that one place, and to build up the discussion centrally over there, while simply linking all other articles to that discussion. It is more efficient, as well as improving consistency of content.
The material has thus NOT been deleted, it is still readily available to readers, in a user-friendly way which gives the readers their answers in a clear and simple paragraph but which requires only one extra click to access the supporting detail. Wdford (talk) 13:52, 31 March 2016 (UTC)
Hi Wdford. As I feared, there is no discussion for permission of your large-scale deletions from the Chronology of Jesus article. Instead the discussion you point to is about "the proposed deletion of the article below.", i.e. deletion of your own new article! I am not actually against your new article, but what I request now is that you put back some of the key dates and references into the Chronology article. The reader must at least be informed that the two main approaches to dating the birth of Jesus are (1) Matthew's reference to the reign of Herod and (2) the 30-year reference by Luke, along with a couple of good references, the dating results (2BC, 4 BC whatever), and a pretty picture. Agreed? If you do that fairly, there will be no further hassle from me. Also, please instruct Drmies to turn off the protection - that was clearly a misunderstanding of what is going on.
Slightly off-topic: Why does nobody cite literature for the under-50-year-old Jesus? John 8:57. Sounds to me like Jesus was closer to 40 than 30 years old. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.154.102.54 (talk) 16:05, 31 March 2016 (UTC)
To 86.154.102.54 : you seem to be claiming that no discussion occurred on the Census of Quirinius talk page just because we didn't specifically mention the "Chronology of Jesus" article, but that's because there were many different articles which all contained duplicated material, not just the "Chronology of Jesus" article. We didn't need to mention all of them by name. There was nevertheless a discussion and general agreement to consolidate the duplicated material in a single article and then link to it from the articles which the material had been removed from. The discussion occurred under the following subsection of the talk page, although it's mixed in with a lot of other issues: [3]
In any event, we don't need your permission to do this, especially since you haven't even taken the time to register, so why do the rest of us need to take the time to gain your approval? You don't have veto power over this article. GBRV (talk) 00:32, 1 April 2016 (UTC)
What ever the discussuion was at, it should have been clarified in related articles or concerning articles. — JudeccaXIII (talk) 00:37, 1 April 2016 (UTC)
Not necessarily. It was apparently a wise move that cleaned up a lot of excess verbiage and organized this article better. If you disagree with the new organization, then start a thread or an WP:RFC (or use some other form of WP:DR) about it. Softlavender (talk) 01:07, 1 April 2016 (UTC)
Good morning GBRV, thanks for answering, but the discussion you point to is mainly a debate about the census of Quirinius and does not mention setting up a new article or deleting large chunks out of other articles. To dispel any suspicions that you might be lying to us, I would be grateful if you could give me a text string to search for the relevant section in the discussion.
And to answer your second question: the reason why you should try to gain other people's approval is to achieve consensus. That is, ideally, how Wikipedia works.

Phony claim about Jesus crucified on a Friday

There are many reliable sources making this point: there is no consensus that Jesus was crucified on a Friday. See as a starting point http://www.gotquestions.org/three-days.html Tgeorgescu (talk) 17:12, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

A book from Zondervan: [4]. Tgeorgescu (talk) 17:17, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. According to your Zondervan source, Wed has only one major adherent (Scroggie), and the Thursday theory is dismissed by Zondervan as a reliable source. I am therefore concerned that your Zondervan reference is an insufficient source for Wed at least. And Thu looks little better (fringe theory?). Do you have better references for Wed and Thu?
Meanwhile I have self-reverted an added properly referenced content. Tgeorgescu (talk) 20:19, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Y'shua bar Yosef was lashed 39 times and crucified on the first day of Passover Friday April 7, 30 AD / 7.4.783 AUC / 14 Nisan 3790 HC. The Jewish Messiah was 34-years old having been born on Saturday (Sabbath) April 17, 6 BC / 17.4.748 AUC / 29 Nisan 3755 HC; see astronomer http://MichaelMolnar.com 2601:589:4705:C7C0:99D1:6EC8:266C:262D (talk) 22:10, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Jesus was crucified on the first day of Passover Friday April 7, 30 AD / 7.4.783 AUC / 14 Nisan 3790 HC

EDIT REQUEST - Y'shua bar Yosef was lashed 39 times and crucified on the first day of Passover Friday April 7, 30 AD / 7.4.783 AUC / 14 Nisan 3790 HC. God-incarnate was 34-years-old on that fateful day. The Jewish Messiah then spent 40 days hanging out in Jerusalem and Galilee. He then darted for his safety and the safety of his wife Mariamne (Mary Magdalen) to maybe Egypt according to The Jewish Papers by Michael Baigent. Legends also have the Christ and Magdalen going to the south of France or Glastonbury, England. Some claim he was buried in a tomb in Kashmir, but that doesn't jive with the archaeological evidence. Y'shua died sometime between 30-70 AD, after a year, his bones were placed in an ossuary which was put in the Jesus Family Tomb. 2601:589:4705:C7C0:99D1:6EC8:266C:262D (talk) 22:49, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

  Not done Please cite proper reliable sources instead of a fringe work by Baigent and half remembered ideas from TV specials. Ian.thomson (talk) 01:14, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

Ancient timekeeping: Romans, Jews and Palestinians

I have just added a section explaining ancient timekeeping, see below. I anticipate some discussion, perhaps edit-warring, because historians, religious researchers etc all have their various agenda, but are often not well-versed in astronomy. I hope the section survives the ravages of Wikipedia. On the last point (astronomical ignorance), I have a further suggestion: it is my impression that most historians etc do not realise that before the invention of coaxial sundials, and the mechanical clock, daylight hours were of unequal lengths, varying both with season and with time of day (so an ancient "hour" around noon was a different length than an hour in the morning or evening). This is because the ancient sundials projected on a horizontal surface and used a perpendicular gnomon rather than a gnomon aligned to the celestial North Pole (the latter alignment became common I think in the 15th century, so only quite recently, and that led to hours of equal length). Is it worth elaborating this point here? I do not see how the modern layman, no longer familiar with sundials, can begin to understand timekeeping in the Bible, or in any other ancient source, without the astronomical basics.94.198.142.113 (talk) 13:46, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

Comparison of ancient calendars

At the time of Jesus, three calendars were in operation in Palestine: the Jewish-Babylonian calendar (the day begins at sunset), the Samaritan-Egyptian calendar (the day begins at sunrise), and the Roman-Julian calendar (the day begins at midnight, as is the modern custom).[1] In addition, among the two Jewish calenders, the beginning of each month is shifted, usually by 1-2 days, dependent on the moon's celestial position. The crucifixion occurred, according to all four gospels, on a Friday before sunset, whereby the corresponding date of the month (14/15/16 Nisan) differs according to whichever ancient calender was used, shown here by way of example for the year AD 33 (based on the table in Humphreys 2011, p163):

JUD--------12 NISAN---------|m--------13 NISAN---------|---------14 NISAN-----+---|M--------15 NISAN---------|
DAY--------WE---------------|m--------TH---------------|---------FR-----------+---|M--------SA---------------|
SAM------------|---------14 NISAN---------|---------15 NISAN---------|--------+16 NISAN---------|---------17 NISAN---------|
DAY------------|---------WE--m------------|---------TH---------------|--------+FR--M------------|---------SA---------------|
ROM-----|---------01 APRIL---m-----|---------02 APRIL---------|---------03 APRIL---M-----|
DAY-----|---------WE---------m-----|---------TH---------------|---------FR----+----M-----|
24h 6h 12h 18h 24h 6h 12h 18h 24h 6h 12h 18h 24h

The slaughtering of the Passover lamb is prescribed for the afternoon of 14 Nisan according to Exodus 12:6, and the beginning of the subsequent Passover meal for the time point immediately after sunset. Depending on which calendar a Palestinian community was adhering to, there were in the year AD 33 two Passover meals, one meal on 1 April and another on 3 April. The hypothesised crucifixion time for the year 33 is marked here by "+" (at the 15 hours timepoint), the official Jewish Passover meal is marked as "M" and the Samaritan (and also Essene and Zealot) Passover meal as "m". The timing of the Galilean Passover has not been historically recorded. Even today in Israel, the Passover meal is celebrated on two different dates per year, depending on whether the community is Jewish or Samaritan (Humphreys 2011, p143).— Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.198.142.113 (talkcontribs)

Humphreys is not a Bible scholar, why would his opinion matter? Tgeorgescu (talk) 15:03, 2 March 2017 (UTC)
I opened a topic about it at WP:RSN. Tgeorgescu (talk) 15:15, 2 March 2017 (UTC)
If you wish to criticise Newton's, Humphreys', whomever's astronomical calculations, you should provide a reference. If you wish to criticise their scholarly treatment of the Bible, you should likewise provide a serious reference. Telford does not cut the mustard, as I have explained on your new topics page. Note that I am not deleting Telford, because I am tolerant. Do as I do, and go to the literature. More seriously, if you do not understand the graph, please discuss what the problem is and I can help. It is not rocket science, you have exactly the same situation with say, Orthodox and Western Easter dates.94.198.142.113 (talk) 15:49, 2 March 2017 (UTC)
It's not his ability to perform computations which is disputed, but his historical knowledge of the Ancient world. Tgeorgescu (talk) 17:59, 2 March 2017 (UTC)
You really have not read/understood the literature. It is not Humphreys who conducts the calculations but Waddington. All you have done so far is to point to the invalid Telford criticism. With a heavy heart I give up on you and hope someone else can teach you to be more welcoming of scientific research trying to help address historical issues. Scientists and historians should work together and not eye each other enviously as potential threats to one's own authority. The same problem happened with radiocarbon-dating in 1950: most historians refused to accept it until their deathbeds (because it upset their Egyptian chronologies). Hope you are not like that. Goodbye and good luck.94.198.142.113 (talk) 10:03, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

Some scholars have argued that we have this difference between the Gospels because different Jews celebrated Passover on different days of the week. This is one of those explanations that sounds plausible until you dig a bit and think a bit more. It is true that some sectarian groups not connected with the Temple in Jerusalem thought that the Temple authorities followed an incorrect calendar. But in both Mark and John, Jesus is not outside Jerusalem with some sectarian group of Jews: he is in Jerusalem, where the lambs are being slaughtered. And in Jerusalem, there was only one day of Passover a year. The Jerusalem priests did not accommodate the calendrical oddities of a few sectarian fringe groups.

— Bart D. Ehrman, Jesus, Interrupted, HarperCollins ebooks, p. 36
Quoted by Tgeorgescu (talk) 14:33, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Note that although the Roman date changed at midnight, Roman timekeeping counted 12 hours from sunrise (I, II, III, ... XII, e.g prima diei hora) and 12 hours from sunset (e.g. prima noctis hora).
And I have writen on your topic page.

Y'shua bar Yosef was born on Saturday April 17, 6 BC / 17.4.748 AUC / 29 Nisan 3755 HC

EDIT REQUEST - Y'shua bar Yosef was born on Saturday (Sabbath) April 17, 6 BC / 17.4.748 AUC / 29 Nisan 3755 HC; see astronomer http://MichaelMolnar.com . I've seen this date referred to on the BBC, Discovery Channel, History Channel, CNN, FOX, and the CBS Christmas Special. 2601:589:4705:C7C0:99D1:6EC8:266C:262D (talk) 22:20, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

  Not done Please cite proper reliable sources instead of a personal website and vague and contradictory memories of an unspecified TV special. Ian.thomson (talk) 01:13, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

Yes. This is supposed to be an objective article. Endorsement by one book and a few TV specials does not make this objectively the "most likely" date.Csrc1189 (talk) 21:50, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

Chronology of what?

I wonder, how can a person have a chronology? Wouldn't it be more precise to name the article something like "Chronology of the life of Jesus"? --ChoG (talk) 15:34, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

Why are dates provided in the Hebrew and ancient Roman calendars?

In the lead, some dates are given in Hebrew and Roman notations. This is not what the cited references use. And it is not usual elsewhere on Wikipedia. Can someone please explain? 31.4.149.65 (talk) 20:09, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Lunar eclipse of 3 April AD 33: visibility from Jerusalem?

I have added the NASA website for the lunar eclipse of 3 April AD 33 (the favoured candidate date for Jesus' crucifixion), and this NASA map shows that the lunar eclipse was visible a few miles to the west of Jerusalem, but not in Jerusalem itself. The NASA eclipse calculations were performed in 2009. However, it strikes me that the NASA map seems to contradict Schaefer's paper of 1990, who states that the lunar eclipse had finished by the time the moon rose in ancient Jerusalem on that evening (3 Apr 33). This implies to me that the lunar eclipse according to Schaefer's calculations was visible only to the east of ancient Jerusalem. So there is a contradiction between NASA and Schaefer. And to confuse the matter further, the third party cited in this article, Humphreys and Waddington, calculate that the lunar eclipse was just visible in Jerusalem at moonrise in the evening of 3 April 33.

These contradictions tell me that astronomers are not yet capable of calculating consistent precise zones of visibility for ancient eclipses. (This is different from calculating the time of an eclipse. I imagine it is easy to calculate the time when the Earth's shadow touches the moon, but when you try to calculate the terrestrial zone of visibility, obviously you also have to estimate historic variations in the Earth's rotational speed, which may be affected by tidal forces and irregular post-glacial rebound effects of the Earth's crust.) I am not an expert though. Can an expert therefore please find out the factor(s) why the three calculations are contradicting each other, and cite appropriate literature for this article? Thank you. 81.131.171.221 (talk) 13:51, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

"Illicit," non-scholarly, non-encyclopaedic use of the legal term, Murder

Section 2.1 gives but one example of the unconsidered and largely erroneous use of the term, murder, in lieu of all instances of events which are "killings" but have not assumed any legitimacy as a crime in their own times: known or later to be ascribed as "Murder." To wit (from this section, 2.1...

"... when Herod reportedly ordered the Massacre of the Innocents, that is, the murder (or, speaking realistically, the killing) of all boys in Bethlehem ..."

Albeit that people nowadays use the word unthinkingly and indiscriminately (note the "crime" root in that word) in the common, English speaking culture, it is out of place when used in a non-legalistic context in a work purporting to be encyclopedic.

This is made clearer if on considers, for example, that Herod, in this section and elsewhere the primary and legitimized purveyor and enforcer of Roman Law, is herein purported to have ordered his officers to commence the broad-scale commitment of criminal killings ... and not of killings which by his legitimate authority are even hardly conceivable as unlawful, such as is the crime, once adjudicated, of Murder.

It is recommended that this passage be changed to exclude "Murder" and include a non-legal term such as killing ... for one in order to eliminate emotional overtones inconsistent with a scholarly work; and for another to "de-legitimize" the illegitimate use of such a legal terminology for instances in which a more basic terminology is warranted. Such an improvement will also serve, by specific example, to improve editing in other such places in this and other articles.

Your patience is appreciated. 172.58.38.177 (talk) 05:32, 24 February 2019 (UTC)

Suggestion for New Section: pre-zero numeral system

Someone is trying to insert his/her interpretation of the meaning of "on the third day/after three days" without referring to academic sources. Doug Weller has rightly reverted his/her changes. I request adding the following section at the end of the article to resolve the matter, or at least to channel future editing into a productive direction.86.178.192.179 (talk) 10:59, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

Resurrection "on the third day". After the crucifixion, the Gospels report the discovery of Jesus' empty tomb, and subsequently the Gospels and Paul provide accounts of Jesus' resurrection. A potential chronological contradiction arises in the fact that the resurrection is referred to as happening "on the third day" (e.g. Matt 16:21) whereas elsewhere Matthew (Matt 12:40) states that Jesus would be buried "three days and three nights".[1] The modern concept of zero as a number was introduced by Indian scholars only in the fifth century AD,[2] so that for example the global calendar in use today never had a year "AD 0" and instead begins with the year AD 1. Applied to reckoning of days, in the absence of a day "zero", that is, using inclusive counting, many modern languages (e.g. Greek, Italian, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Welsh) continue referring to two weeks as "fifteen days",[3] whereas in English, which does observe zero and thus uses exclusive counting, this space of time is referred to as a fortnight.[4] Following general practice at the time, the Gospels employ inclusive counting, highlighted in Mt 27.62-64:

the chief priests and the Pharisees went to Pilate. ‘Sir,’ they said, ‘we remember that while he was still alive that deceiver said, “After three days [Gr. meta treis hemeras] I will rise again.” So give the order for the tomb to be made secure until the third day [Gr. tes trites hemeras]’”

where Matthew uses "after three days" and "until the third day" interchangeably.[5]

References

  1. ^ Norman Geisler and Thomas Howe, When Critics Ask: A Popular Handbook on Bible Difficulties Wheaton, Illinois, USA: Victor Books, 1992
  2. ^ Ifrah, Georges (2000). The Universal History of Numbers: From Prehistory to the Invention of the Computer. Wiley. ISBN 978-0-471-39340-5.
  3. ^ James Evans, The History and Practice of Ancient Astronomy. Oxford University Press, 1998. ISBN 019987445X. Chapter 4, page 164.
  4. ^ "Fortnight". The Concise Oxford Dictionary (5th ed.). 1964. p. 480.
  5. ^ Zarley, Kermit (2006). The Third Day Bible Code. Synergy Books.[1]

Why does this article claim Jesus' ministry began before John the Baptist's ministry in the 15th year of Tiberius (28 or 29)?

Luke 3:1 "Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar ..." Luke 3:3 "And he came into all the country about Jordan, preaching the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins;" Luke 3:21-23 "Now when all the people were baptized, it came to pass, that Jesus also being baptized, and praying, the heaven was opened, And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased. And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, ..." Luke 4:1-2 "And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, Being forty days tempted of the devil. And in those days he did eat nothing: and when they were ended, he afterward hungered."

It is puzzling why you think the Wikipedia article claims that "Jesus' ministry began before John the Baptist's ministry". In fact the Wikipedia article repeatedly states the opposite, for example saying "The New Testament presents John the Baptist as the precursor to Jesus and the Baptism of Jesus as marking the beginning of Jesus' ministry".31.53.150.209 (talk) 10:40, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Year 0

0 AD did not exist. Tgeorgescu (talk) 20:32, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

Eusebius' date for Jesus

In his Historia Ecclesiastica, Eusebius offers a date for when Jesus was born -- but does not offer any dates for when he began to preach or his crucifixion. At I.5.2 he writes:

It was the forty-second year of Augustus' reign, and the twenty-eighth after the subjugation of Egypt and the deaths of Antony & Cleopatra, the last of the Ptolemaic rulers of Egypt, when our Savior & Lord, Jesus Christ, at the time of the first registration, while Quirinius was governor of Syria, in accordance with the prophecies about Him, was born in Bethlehem in Judea.

The ascension of Augustus is commonly dated to the year of the death of Julius Caesar (44 BC), & Antony & Cleopatra died in 30 BC. If we follow Roman practice with "inclusive reckoning" in determining which year he may have meant, we conclude that Eusebius dated the birth of Jesus to 3 BC. -- llywrch (talk) 09:29, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

Thank you. Now implemented. 31.4.158.36 (talk) 09:44, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Correcting reference errors in Scholarly debate section

The Scholarly Debate section (Chronology of Jesus#Scholarly debate on the hour, day, and year of death) contains several referencing errors, in that some scholarly statements (for example that Jesus was crucified on Nisan 14, or that John's chronology is problematic) are referenced by Gospel verses. The Gospels themselves of course make no such statements. I have therefore fixed the referencing errors with some minor tweaks to the text. But Sundayclose has immediately reverted my corrections. I believe SundayClose has not understood the problem and has simply acted hastily. Could SundayClose please discuss here how he/she proposes to fix the errors? If not, my corrections have to be re-instated. 31.49.112.189 (talk) 14:25, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia policy at WP:BRD requires you to wait for consensus on the talk page before restoring your edit. Repeatedly reverting without consensus is edit warring, which is very inappropriate.
Are you claiming that the cited sources are wrong? If so, you need to provide additional sources to back up your claim. The content of an article like this is determined by reliable sources, not the Bible. Although Bible verses can supplement reliable sources, Bible verses alone are not sufficient. Don't restore your edit without citation to reliable sources.
SundayClose, as I suspected, you have simply misunderstood the citation problem, and you are still misunderstanding the problem. Please read this carefully again:
The Scholarly Debate section (Chronology of Jesus#Scholarly debate on the hour, day, and year of death) contains several referencing errors, in that some scholarly statements (for example that Jesus was crucified on Nisan 14, or that John's chronology is problematic) are referenced by Gospel verses. The Gospels themselves of course make no such statements. I have therefore fixed the referencing errors with some minor tweaks to the text.
Meanwhile I am changing my edit, swapping around two references to make it less confusing, perhaps that is the problem. Check it out. 31.49.112.189 (talk) 16:24, 27 May 2020 (UTC)
So what I have done is to separate the bland Bible statements (with referenced verses) from the scholarly interpretations (with scholarly references). What we cannot allow, as you rightly say, is to use the Bible as a Wikipedia-reliable source for scholarly interpretations. Therefore my minor swapping around of text is necessary. Got it? 31.49.112.189 (talk) 16:36, 27 May 2020 (UTC)
Help me understand something about your original edit. In this edit you state that you "Removed mismatch between Wikipedia text and Gospel sources". How does that edit remove a mismatch? Sundayclose (talk) 16:49, 27 May 2020 (UTC)
Glad to help, as follows: The original version said John's account places the crucifixion on 14 Nisan. John's account of course does not mention Nisan 14 at all, so the original text was factually wrong/mis-referenced. It is a (plausible) scholarly interpretation that John is referring to Nisan 14, and I have indicated this interpretation by using a grammatical form (would place) which indicates indirect speech (by the scholar responsible for the Nisan 14 interpretation). 31.49.112.189 (talk) 17:16, 27 May 2020 (UTC)
I don't see how changing "places" to "would place" clarifies that it is the scholar's interpretation. Why not just state directly that "Philo's interpretation places ..." or something similar. I'm not a Biblical scholar, but I am reasonably intelligent, and I didn't get that you were referencing the scholar. It needs to be crystal clear what the scholar is saying. Sundayclose (talk) 17:29, 27 May 2020 (UTC)
The problem is worse than you think. So far, by using would place I have corrected the first mistake, and my correction signals to the reader that "Nisan 14" is not a quote from John. The unsolved second problem is to find an author who does say that John implies Nisan 14. Certainly Philo, Josephus and the Mishnah (all three cited at the end of the sentence) are not interpreters of John - they are all Jewish! Those three references were inserted by some Wikipedia editor presumably to argue that John's crucifixion narrative implies Nisan 14. I cannot solve all problems in this section in one editing session, so someone else needs to pick up where I leave off. I have had enough for today. 31.49.112.189 (talk) 19:48, 27 May 2020 (UTC)
I'm getting more confused. A scholar of Christianity can be Jewish. Have you actually looked at any of the sourced cited in the section in question? And if we "have to find an author who does say John implies Nisan 14", then does it make any difference whether the wording is "places" or "would place"? I may seek feedback at WP:WikiProject Christianity. Sundayclose (talk) 22:23, 27 May 2020 (UTC)