Gage, W. A. (2011). Milestones to Emmaus: The Third Day Resurrection in the Old Testament (p. 24). Warren A. Gage.

What Is The Jewish Response?

This is how they play the game. They give you a phrase or a verse, and it reads exactly as they said it would. The problem is that it has nothing to do with the subject. What is that, you might ask?

Do The Three Days Speak of Jesus Death and Resurrection?

“Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day, according to the Scriptures” (1 Cor 15:3–4)

(Esther 4:15–16; 5:1–2 – Esther calls for a three-day, three-night fast for herself and the Jews of Susa. Then she approaches the king “on the third day” and receives mercy via the golden scepter.)

Warren Gage presents this as a striking gospel preview: Esther, raised up “for such a time as this,” risks death by approaching the king uninvited (a capital offense under Persian law). She calls for communal fasting “three days, night or day” as preparation. On the third day, she stands in the inner court and faces potential execution. However, she finds favor—the king extends the scepter, sparing her life.

This act initiates the reversal: Haman (who plotted the Jews’ genocide) is hanged on the gallows he built for Mordecai. Mordecai is exalted to Haman’s position. Letters of liberty go out to all provinces, and many Gentiles “become Jews” (Est 8:17).

Gage draws direct parallels to Christ: Esther intercedes at risk of death → Jesus intercedes and actually dies; Esther is spared after three days → Jesus rises after three days; Haman hanged on a tree → Jesus cursed on a tree; Mordecai exalted → Jesus at God’s right hand; ecumenical letters and Gentile inclusion → Gospel to the nations.

From The Tanach’s Original Hebrew Text, Historical-Literary Context

From the Tanach’s original Hebrew text, historical-literary context, and Jewish interpretive tradition, this milestone does not function as a prophetic type or foreshadowing of Jesus’ literal death, burial, and resurrection on the third day. The three-day fast is preparatory, not a period of death-like state. In fact, the narrative contains no death, burial, or resurrection.

1. The “Three Days” Refers to Fasting and Waiting, Not a Death-Burial-Resurrection Sequence

• Esther 4:16 specifies a fast of “three days, night or day” (שְׁלֹשֶׁת יָמִים לַיְלָה וָיוֹם)—a complete, intensive fast (no food or drink) as an act of repentance, supplication, and solidarity in crisis.
• Esther 5:1 states: “Now it happened on the third day” (וַיְהִי בַּיּוֹם הַשְּׁלִישִׁי) that Esther put on royal robes and stood in the court.
• This is a three-day preparation period leading to her bold approach. She is alive, fasting, and actively planning throughout—no one dies during these days. The fast ends with her receiving life and favor, not emerging from death.
• Contrast with Jesus: actual death by crucifixion, entombment for three days (inclusive Jewish counting), bodily resurrection. Here, there is no death or entombment—only voluntary self-denial and risk of future death if the scepter is not extended.

2. Esther Never Dies or Experiences a Death-Like State—She Risks Death but Is Immediately Spared

• The threat is real: approaching uninvited means instant death unless the king shows mercy (Est 4:11).
• But the king immediately extends the scepter (Est 5:2). Esther is not executed, buried, or revived—she is granted audience and life right then.
• The deliverance is instantaneous mercy, not resurrection after a period of death. The three days precede the encounter, not follow a death event.

3. Jewish Interpretation Focuses on Courage, Providence, Repentance, and Reversal of Fortune—Not Resurrection Typology

• Rabbinic tradition (Talmud Megillah, midrashim, Rashi, Ibn Ezra) emphasizes:
  • Esther’s heroism and willingness to die (“if I perish, I perish”).
  • The power of communal fasting and prayer.
  • Purim as celebration of hidden divine providence (God’s name is absent from the book, yet sovereign).
  • Reversal (vengeance on enemies, exaltation of the righteous, Gentile admiration).
• The three-day fast is seen as a model of earnest supplication (similar to Jonah’s call in Nineveh or other fasts), not a symbolic death-and-resurrection period. No classical Jewish sources treat Esther’s approach “on the third day” as foreshadowing a messianic resurrection.

4. Typological Parallels Are Selective and Require Retroactive Imposition

• Esther risks death but is spared → Jesus actually dies.
• Haman hanged on a “tree” (gallows) → Jesus on the cross (tree of cursing, Deut 21:23).
• Mordecai exalted → Jesus exalted.
• Letters to all nations → Gospel spread. These are compelling thematic echoes in a Christian reading, but they do not hinge on a “third day resurrection” pattern. The three days are preparatory fasting, not a liminal death state. The book of Esther is a festival etiology (explaining Purim) and a story of Jewish survival in exile, not a messianic prophecy cycle.

Conclusion on Milestone 7

Esther 4–5 is a masterpiece of dramatic tension, courage, and divine reversal: a hidden providence turns genocide into deliverance, enemy into victim, and mourning into joy. The three-day fast underscores urgency, communal solidarity, and dependence on God. However, it does not depict or prefigure a Messiah who dies for sins, is buried, and rises bodily on the third day. Esther faces potential death but receives immediate mercy. The three days are a time of fasting and waiting, not death, burial, and resurrection.

Gage’s summary of the “Third Day Doctrine Thus Far” (unalterable decrees, piercing threats, substitutions, ecumenical proclamations, tree of death vs. life) is a creative synthesis of motifs across disparate narratives. However, it relies on allegorical connections rather than explicit textual signals in the Tanach itself. The patterns emerge more clearly when reading backward from the New Testament, not forward from the Hebrew Bible’s plain sense.

Hazan Gavriel ben David