Important Dates in the Lives of Jesus and Mary 

Forty Days in the Wilderness 

     The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. And he was in the wilderness forty days, 

tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered to him.  (Mk 1:12 13). 

    The Gospel of Mark describes the Baptism of Jesus (Mk 1:9 11), then the 40 days in the wilderness, then the 

arrest of John the Baptist. The Gospel of Matthew likewise gives the same order of events. Mark's Gospel uses 

the word `immediately,' which might be interpreted to mean that the Baptism of Jesus was followed by the 40 

days in the wilderness with little time or other events intervening. On the other hand, the Gospel of Luke 

places a statement that the Ministry of Jesus began when He was about 30, and an account of His ancestry 

(through the Virgin Mary), between the Baptism and the 40 days. The placement of a significant amount of 

text between the Baptism and the 40 days might be interpreted to mean that a length of time and a number of 

events occurred between the Baptism of Jesus and His 40 days in the wilderness. 

    The word `immediately' generally means `without delay', so that if one event occurs immediately after the 

other, there are no intervening events of any significance and little or no time between the occurrence of the 

two events. When Jesus healed the leper, Sacred Scripture says:  And immediately the leprosy left him, and he 

was made clean.  (Mk 1:42). There was no delay or other events between Jesus saying  be clean  and the 

leper being healed. In the case of this healing, the entire time frame being described is quite brief, occurring 

over the course of probably only a few minutes, from the exchange of words to the completion of the healing 

(Mk 1:40 42). But in the case of a much longer series of events, (e.g. Baptism, 40 days in the wilderness, and 

the arrest of John), the much larger time frame imparts a somewhat different meaning to the word 

`immediately'. In the context of a larger time frame, the word `immediately' still means that one event 

occurred after the other, and without any significant delay, but there may have been a greater space of time 

between the two events, a time larger than a few minutes or hours. 

    Blessed Anne Catherine describes a series of events between the Baptism of Jesus and the 40 days in the 

wilderness. In particular, she states that, after His Baptism, Jesus celebrated two Sabbaths and then the Feast 

of Tabernacles, before going into the wilderness for 40 days. She does not mention the Day of Atonement 

(Yom Kippur) by name. However, she does say that, on the Sabbath before the Feast of Tabernacles began, 

Jesus taught several different groups of people, at great length, on the topics of penance, modesty, chastity, and 

humility before God.

426

 These topics are fitting instruction for the Day of Atonement. Furthermore, the Day of 

Atonement in that year (

A.D.

 15) coincided with a Saturday (the Sabbath), in harmony with her description of 

events.

427

    When did the 40 days in the wilderness occur? No particular date is given in Sacred Scripture, except the 

indication that the 40 days occurred soon after the Baptism of Jesus by John. In the writings of Blessed Anne 

Catherine, she describes the 40 days soon after describing the celebration of the Feast of Tabernacles. She does 

not specifically state how many days occurred between the end of the Feast of Tabernacles and the 40 days in 

the wilderness. However, in the year 

A.D.

 15, the Feast of Tabernacles began on Oct. 17 and ended on Oct. 24. 

She further states that Jesus left for the wilderness, to begin His 40 days fast, on the hour before the Sabbath 

began.

428

 Since the Jewish Sabbath begins on Friday at sunset, the 40 days began on a Friday evening 

(Saturday, by the Jewish calendar), after the Feast of Tabernacles had ended. 

    After describing the 40 days that Jesus spent in the wilderness, Blessed Anne Catherine describes three 

Sabbaths celebrated by Jesus, and then the Feast of Dedication (Hanukkah).

429

 In 

A.D.

 15, the Feast of 

Dedication fell on Tuesday, Dec. 24 (and so actually began at sunset on Dec. 23).

430

 The three previous 

Sabbaths would then be the Saturdays of Dec. 21, 14, and 7. So, Jesus was in the wilderness for 40 days 

sometime between Thursday, Oct. 24, and Saturday, Dec. 7, of 

A.D.

 15. There are only 43 days between those 

two dates. And since Jesus began His 40 day fast on a Sabbath (beginning on Friday evening) after the Feast of 

Tabernacles, that Sabbath must have been the one from sunset on Friday, Oct. 25, to sunset on Saturday, Oct. 

26, immediately following the close of the Feast of Tabernacles on Oct. 24. The 40 days in the wilderness 

would then be the 40 days from Saturday, Tishri 24 and Oct. 26, to Wednesday, Kislev 5 and Dec. 4, counting 

inclusively. 

    Jesus was in the wilderness for forty days from the end of Tishri, throughout the month of Heshvan, until 

the beginning of the month of Kislev. In choosing this time of the year to spend in the wilderness, Jesus was 

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