Midnight Weddings?

[Ged]

“Then the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom.
... As the bridegroom was delayed, they all became drowsy and slept. But at midnight there was a cry, ‘Here is the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.’
... the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut."
(Matt.25:1-10)

On the third day there was a wedding at Cana in Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. Jesus also was invited to the wedding with his disciples.
(John 2:1-2)

Several observations and several questions concerning Jewish wedding customs:

1. They needed lamps, so weddings were held at night. My first question is, Were bible era weddings sometimes held in the day?
2. The marriage feast on this occasion was after midnight. Was it more common to have the feast early evening?
3. In the case of the Cana wedding, Jesus and his mother gathered at the wedding on the third day. Were they likely to have had the feast Monday evening? Tuesday daytime? or Tuesday evening?

Thanks for any thoughts.
Ged

[Ged]

Well, this is probably not as exciting as other topics so I guess Ill have to answer myself.

Were bible era weddings sometimes held in the day?
Probably not. My wife and I got married at midday, but Bible weddings were after dark.

Was it more common to have the feast early evening?
Yep; Jesus' parable about the 'late bridegroom' was exactly that - late!

Was the wedding at Cana on the third day Monday evening? Tuesday daytime? or Tuesday evening?
Umm. Monday evening cos that's the start of the 3rd day.

How am I going folks?

[semiopen]

Since you are dying for feedback. I think this is ridiculous. You give two dubious examples from the NT.

The point that there are really no clear customs brought down from the bible is interesting. I suspect that once the financial issues were in order there wasn't much else to say.

[Ged]

Perhaps I should have put it in the Christian Forum, but, since it was about Jewish culture, I figured posters on this forum might have a few more clues. And yes, I wouldn't mind a bit of feedback. Do old Jewish writings, apart from the Torah, indicate the customary time for weddings?

[semiopen]

I briefly searched and found nothing about it.

The Talmud seems mostly on the business side - like the famous question if a girl slides down a tree and a branch takes her virginity, does her guardian still get the full bride price. Hence my guess that weddings weren't all that romantic.

I was considering starting the tradition that the bride would throw her panties to the unmarried girls instead of the bouquet (because flowers were hard to get or something) but this group seems a little too sophisticated for that.