The hours of the trial and crucifixion of the Lord Jesus and the methods of keeping time are very interesting. In John's Gospel Roman time is used, which is the same as we employ now, but in all the other gospels, and in Acts, time is reckoned after the Jewish mode. It calculates from sunup to sundown, and from sundown to sunup.
1. Pilate sentenced the Lord Jesus at "the sixth hour" (John 19:1414And it was the preparation of the passover, and about the sixth hour: and he saith unto the Jews, Behold your King! (John 19:14)), or six o'clock in the morning according to Roman time. The Lord and His disciples had eaten the Passover the previous evening, after which they went to the Garden of Gethsemane. There He was betrayed by Judas, seized by the mob, and forsaken by His own. He was then taken before the high priest, and later before the whole council where He was condemned to death. From here He was taken to Pilate, from Pilate to Herod, and back to Pilate. Then in His final appearance before Pilate He was condemned to death by 6 o'clock in the morning. They had been busy all night to accomplish their evil designs.
2. Mark 15:2525And it was the third hour, and they crucified him. (Mark 15:25) says, "And it was the third hour, and they crucified Him." This is in perfect accord with John's Gospel where He was still on trial at 6 a.m. Here, according to Jewish time, He was crucified at the third hour, or 9 a.m. After His sentencing by Pilate, He was led away to be mocked by the soldiers, and then in the procession out of the city to Golgotha. Thus there was an elapsed time of three hours from His sentencing to the actual crucifixion.
3. Matthew, Mark and Luke tell of the darkness that settled over the land from "the sixth hour... until the ninth hour," or from 12 noon until 3 p.m. He was on the cross from 9 a.m. till noon suffering as a martyr; from then on the scene changed and He was made "an offering for sin." During the second three hours, He was there as the holy victim and darkness shrouded the scene, for man was shut out when it became a matter of God's dealing with sin in the Person of the sinless Substitute. All three gospels which speak of these hours speak of them after the Jewish method of reckoning time. The reason that John uses Roman time is that he wrote much later, perhaps about A.D. 90, or twenty years after Jerusalem and Jewish polity had been destroyed; by then Roman time was in vogue.
4. As soon as the Lord Jesus delivered up His Spirit, at the ninth hour, the veil in the temple was rent from the top to the bottom. No human hand had done it, for the rent started at the top. It was God's doing, thus opening up the holy of holies, showing that He could come out in grace, and the sinner could now approach through the finished work of Him who died.
5. Acts 3:11Now Peter and John went up together into the temple at the hour of prayer, being the ninth hour. (Acts 3:1) tells us that the ninth hour was "the hour of prayer"; that is, 3 p.m. We are also told by some that at that time, the hour of prayer, the priest was in the holy place of the temple, just outside of the veil. If this is true, the priest was there in the holy place to witness the rending of the veil. What a sight it must have been to him to see that secluded spot-the holy of holies known only to the high priest once a year-open to his full view. What a testimony as to the efficacy of the work of Him who had just died!
P. Wilson