When the history of this world is finally written up with an eternal perspective, many events will vie as being worthy to be included. However, because of their significance to every person who has ever lived on this earth or who will ever live on it, the events of the last week of the Savior’s life—from the Sunday morning of his triumphal entry into the city of Jerusalem to the Sunday morning of the resurrection—will undoubtedly be acclaimed as the greatest week in history. Without the events of that week, particularly those which took place in the Garden of Gethsemane and at the time of the resurrection, everything else is virtually meaningless.
Obviously an article such as this could barely list, let alone discuss, all the week’s events that are recorded in the scriptures. Thus, the article will discuss in some detail only one or two events from each day, and it will mention only briefly some of the others.
Later, however, Peter mentioned some of the happenings of that seventh day:
“For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit:
“By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; …
“For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.” (1 Pet. 3:18–19; 1 Pet. 4:6.)
While the Savior was still on the cross, he had hinted concerning some of his actions in the immediate future, for he had promised the repentant thief, “To day shalt thou be with me in paradise.” (Luke 23:43.) Earlier in his ministry the Savior had prophesied concerning his activities in the post-earthly spirit world:
“Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live.
“For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself;
“And hath given him authority to execute judgment also, because he is the Son of man.” (John 5:25–28.)
The Lord has revealed to Joseph F. Smith, the sixth president of the Church in this dispensation, what actually occurred on that momentous day, which in eternity promises to be one of the most important days of all time. (See Ensign, November 1971, pp. 66–70.)
The Book of Mormon also tells us of some of the activities of Jesus on this seventh day when his body lay in the tomb in Jerusalem. It was on this day that the Savior spoke out of the darkness to the Nephite survivors on the American continent. He did not appear to them on that occasion, but he spoke to them and, among other things, said:
“Behold, I am Jesus Christ the Son of God. I created the heavens and the earth, and all things that in them are. I was with the Father from the beginning. I am in the Father, and the Father in me; and in me hath the Father glorified his name.
“I came unto my own, and my own received me not. And the scriptures concerning my coming are fulfilled.
“And as many as have received me, to them have I given to become the sons of God; and even so will I to as many as shall believe on my name, for behold, by me redemption cometh. …” (3 Ne. 9:13–17.)
Among many peoples on the earth the seventh day was a day of physical darkness, but it was only the brief darkness of the night that was to precede the most glorious dawn in history.
Daniel H. Ludlow, “The Greatest Week in History,” Ensign, Apr 1972, 34
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