"Forty-six years" building the Temple
GradeProbable
At Jesus' first Passover in John's Gospel, his opponents say, "Forty and six years was this temple in building" (). Josephus, writing independently, dates the start of Herod's rebuilding of the Temple to "the eighteenth year of his reign" (Antiquities 15.380), about 20/19 BCE. Forty-six years on gives the Passover of 27 or 28 CE, early in Jesus' ministry and within Pilate's term. A passing remark in the Gospel lines up with a Jewish historian's chronology.
Probable. The figure points to a Passover in 27/28 CE. The Greek may instead mean that the sanctuary had stood for 46 years rather than that it had taken 46 years to build, but that reading gives a similar date.
Explore the counterarguments
The result depends on when the 46 years are counted from. Josephus' other account, in the Jewish War, is reported to give Herod's fifteenth year rather than his eighteenth, which would shift the date. And because John has several Passovers, a first Passover in 27/28 points to 30 or 33 only together with an assumption about how long the ministry lasted, which is itself disputed.