I just want to comment on this part. The scripture of the Gospels uses two different words for "rise" when Jesus tells his disciples that he would "rise" from the dead. They are egeiro and anistemi. It is when the word anistemi is used [cf. Mark 9:9-10; Mark 9:31-32; and Luke 18:33-34] that the scriptures confer that the disciples did not understand this word anistemi. The scriptures use but words to say that Jesus would rise(egeiro) on the third day and that Jesus would [also] rise(anistemi) on the third day. When we look at the specific accounts of Jesus's resurrection day, we find that the two angels who met the women early that morning, that they (the 2 angels) said that Jesus was already risen (egeiro) from the dead. But this was before Mary Magdalene met and talked with Jesus a short time later. It was here that Jesus told her that he had not yet ascended to the Father. Now, in Mark 16:9ff we find this:
Mar 16:9-12 KJV 9 Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast seven devils. 10 And she went and told them that had been with him, as they mourned and wept. 11 And they, when they had heard that he was alive, and had been seen of her, believed not. 12 After that he appeared in another form unto two of them, as they walked, and went into the country.
He appears FIRST to Mary Magdalene and afterward he appears in another form to the two Emmaus disciples. This was after he had thus "ascended" to the Father. Luke gives completion to this idea of opening their understanding:
Luk 24:44-46 KJV 44 And he said unto them, These
are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and
in the prophets, and
in the psalms, concerning me. 45 Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the scriptures, 46 And said unto them, Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and TO RISE from the dead THE THIRD DAY:
Of course, this is when they understood the anistemi. Heb 5 (et al) confirms that Christ received the authority of being our high priest on the day of his ascension. Christ was both resurrected and ascended to the Father at different times on the third day. His ascension (the anistemi) occurred after daybreak, but still on the third day!
Luk 24:21 KJV But we [the 2 Emmaus disciples] trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel: and beside all this, to day is the third day since these things were done.
What the disciples did not understand was the seemingly indiscreet use of the word anistemi, translated as the word rise(n). When the word egeiro is used (Jesus telling them that he would "rise" from the dead), there are no statements saying the disciples did not understand. The gospel writers thus qualified that two events were in view... the resurrection and the ascension, both taking place on the same day but at different times during that day.
The PuP