Bible Synapse
Did Jesus say he would raise the temple in three days, or was that the false witnesses’ invention?
Hard question · The death and resurrection of Jesus · raised by 1 of the lists sceptics circulate
See the passages joined in the interactive mapThe passages
Jesus said, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up”; John explains, “he spake of the temple of his body”.
Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. Then said the Jews, Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou rear it up in three days? But he spake of the temple of his body.
Two false witnesses said, “This fellow said, I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three days”.
Now the chief priests, and elders, and all the council, sought false witness against Jesus, to put him to death; But found none: yea, though many false witnesses came, yet found they none. At the last came two false witnesses, And said, This fellow said, I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three days.
False witnesses said, “We heard him say, I will destroy this temple that is made with hands”, but even so their witness did not agree.
And there arose certain, and bare false witness against him, saying, We heard him say, I will destroy this temple that is made with hands, and within three days I will build another made without hands. But neither so did their witness agree together.
The objection
John reports that Jesus said “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up”. Matthew and Mark put almost the same words in the mouths of witnesses whom they call false. Critics ask how testimony can be called false if Jesus really said it.
The answer
The witnesses were false because they twisted what Jesus had said, not because he had said nothing like it. Compare the words. Jesus spoke to his questioners and told them to do the destroying: “Destroy this temple” (Greek lusate, a command to them), “and in three days I will raise it up” (John 2:19). The witnesses turned this into a threat by Jesus himself: “I am able to destroy the temple of God” (Matthew 26:61), “I will destroy this temple that is made with hands” (Mark 14:58). They also applied it to the stone temple, whereas John tells us “he spake of the temple of his body” (John 2:21). Gill sets out these changes one by one: in the witnesses’ version the destroying is his, the temple is the sanctuary, and the raising has become rebuilding.
A threat against the temple was a serious charge, and Stephen was later accused in much the same way by witnesses whom Luke also calls false (Acts 6:13–14). Mark adds that even so the witnesses could not agree (Mark 14:59), so the charge failed and the high priest had to question Jesus himself. That the saying was really about his death and rising shows in what happened next. Mockers at the cross threw it back at him (Matthew 27:40; Mark 15:29), the chief priests knew that he had spoken of rising again after three days (Matthew 27:63), and John says that after the resurrection the disciples remembered this very saying and believed (John 2:22).
Other answers Christians give
Several sayings run together
Jesus also foretold the destruction of the temple buildings (Mark 13:2). Some suggest that the witnesses ran this prophecy together with the saying in John 2:19, which would help to explain why their accounts did not agree.
From the classic commentators
he did not say, "I am able to destroy the temple", but only said, "destroy this temple"; signifying neither his power, nor his will and inclination to it; but put it upon the Jews, and left it to them to do itJohn Gill, Exposition of the Bible, on Matthew 26:61 (1746–1763)