Getting your questions ready
Getting your questions ready
Beat the crowd
10 questions No timer
50 free Good Friday trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Good Friday is the quietest day in the Christian year and one of the most widely observed, and this quiz covers both the story and the customs that grew up around it. It starts with the name itself, why 'good' means holy, why the Anglo-Saxons called it Long Friday and the Germans call it the Friday of Sorrow, then walks through the Passion: Pilate and Herod, Barabbas, Simon of Cyrene, the place of the skull, the seven last words, the spear, and Joseph of Arimathea's tomb, along with what Tacitus and Josephus had to say and which years scholars think it happened. The second half is about how the day is kept: the Three Hours' Agony, the fourteen Stations, the Pope at the Colosseum, Tenebrae's snuffed candles, silent bells, black vestments and the epitaphios of the Orthodox world, plus the things people actually do, from hot cross buns and Bermuda kites to Ireland's old pub ban, the crucifixions of Pampanga, Iztapalapa's two-million-strong Passion Play and the plague vow of Oberammergau. The Good Friday Agreement of 1998 gets its due at the end. The easy questions suit anyone who has been to a service; the expert tier asks about Pius XII's reforms, Hong Kong's 1875 ordinance and Poor Robin's Almanac. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on the day, the Passion and the traditions, and the supporting sentence is attached to each question.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Good Friday commemorates which event in the life of Jesus?
His death on the cross
It falls two days before Easter Sunday, at the heart of Holy Week.
Q 02Where does the 'Good' in Good Friday come from?
An obsolete sense meaning 'holy'
The same obsolete sense survives in 'the good book' for the Bible and 'good tide' for Christmas.
Q 03In Old English the day was called 'Long Friday'; what did the name refer to?
The lengthy fasting and services
Equivalents of the name are still used in Scandinavian languages, such as Danish Langfredag.
Q 04The German name for the day, Karfreitag, uses an Old High German word 'kara' meaning what?
Sorrow
Germany treats it as a 'silent holiday', with laws in many states banning public dancing and even loud lawnmowers.
Q 05The 'Maundy' of Maundy Thursday comes from the Latin 'mandatum', meaning what?
Commandment
It refers to Jesus's 'new commandment' at the Last Supper, re-enacted in the washing of feet.
Q 06The Good Friday Service of the Great Three Hours' Agony runs between which hours?
Noon and 3 p.m.
They are the hours the Gospels record darkness covering the land until Jesus's death.
Q 07According to the Gospel of Mark, at roughly what time of day was Jesus crucified?
About 9 a.m.
Mark has him die at the ninth hour, around 3 p.m., which is why many Good Friday services centre on that time.
Q 08Which Roman governor of Judaea sentenced Jesus to be crucified?
Pontius Pilate
He served under Tiberius from about AD 26 to 36, and the Pilate Stone found at Caesarea is the only inscription naming him.
Q 09Learning that Jesus was a Galilean, Pilate sent him to which ruler, who was in Jerusalem for Passover?
King Herod
Herod Antipas questioned him, mocked him and sent him back to Pilate.
Q 10Which prisoner did the crowd choose to have released instead of Jesus?
Barabbas
Mark and Luke describe him as an insurrectionist who had committed murder; the Passover pardon custom is not recorded outside the Gospels.
Q 11Who was compelled by the Romans to carry Jesus's cross?
Simon of Cyrene
Mark names him as the father of Alexander and Rufus, suggesting his sons were known to early Christians.
Q 12Golgotha, the site of the crucifixion, has a name meaning what?
Place of a skull
Its Latin equivalent, Calvaria, gives us the name Calvary.
Q 13The traditional site of Calvary is enclosed within which Jerusalem building?
The Church of the Holy Sepulchre
A rival Protestant site, the Garden Tomb on 'Skull Hill', was proposed in the 19th century.
Q 21On Good Friday the Pope traditionally leads the Stations of the Cross at which Roman landmark?
The Colosseum
Since John Paul II the Temple of Venus and Roma opposite the entrance has served as the platform.
Q 22What is the Holy Week service where candles are extinguished until the church is dark called?
Tenebrae
The Latin word means 'darkness', and the service ends with a loud noise, the strepitus.
Q 23Which sacrament is never celebrated in Catholic churches on Good Friday?
Mass
Communion is given from hosts consecrated the day before; until 1955 only the priest received it, in the 'Mass of the Presanctified'.
Q 14How many 'last words' or sayings of Jesus on the cross are traditionally counted?
Seven
No single Gospel contains all of them; Luke and John each have a trio found nowhere else.
Q 15Jesus's cry from the cross, 'Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani', is in which language?
Aramaic
It echoes the opening of Psalm 22, but uses a verb for 'forsake' that exists only in Aramaic.
Q 16In John's Gospel, why did the soldiers not break Jesus's legs as they did the two men beside him?
He was already dead
Instead a soldier, named Longinus in later tradition, pierced his side with a spear.
Q 17Which member of the Sanhedrin asked Pilate for Jesus's body and laid it in his own new rock-cut tomb?
Joseph of Arimathea
All four Gospels agree on the burial, which had to be done before the Sabbath began at sunset.
Q 18Which two later Roman writers independently mention the execution of Jesus under Pilate?
Tacitus and Josephus
Tacitus's Annals and Josephus's Testimonium Flavianum are the main non-Christian references.
Q 19Most scholars date the crucifixion to which two candidate years?
AD 30 or 33
Many favour Friday 7 April AD 30, the 14th of Nisan.
Q 20How many Stations of the Cross are there in the traditional devotion?
Fourteen
They imitate the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem, and the Franciscans got the right to erect them in their churches in 1686.
Q 24Traditionally, what is not done in Catholic churches from Good Friday until the Easter Vigil?
Ringing the bells
Holy water fonts are also emptied in preparation for the blessing of new water at the Vigil.
Q 25Which pope's 1955 reform of Holy Week reshaped the Good Friday liturgy, including its Latin name?
Pius XII
Before the reform the day was called Feria sexta in Parasceve, 'Friday of Preparation'.
Q 26Byzantine-rite Christians call it 'Great and Holy Friday'; what colour vestments do clergy wear?
Black
Many also keep an absolute fast, taking no food or drink at all that day.
Q 27In Greek Orthodox tradition, what is the epitaphios carried in procession on Good Friday evening?
An embroidered cloth icon of Christ
It is laid on a flower-decked table representing the tomb, and worshippers bow beneath it as they re-enter the church.
Q 28Which Christian denomination has a Good Friday tradition of cleaning the gravestones in its cemeteries?
The Moravian Church
Moravians also hold a Lovefeast on the day, having taken Communion on Maundy Thursday.
Q 29Which spiced bun is traditionally eaten on Good Friday in Britain?
Hot cross bun
The cross stands for the crucifixion and the spices for those used to embalm Jesus.
Q 30In 1592 London restricted the sale of spiced buns to Christmas, Good Friday and which other occasion?
Burials
Anyone breaking the rule forfeited the whole batch to the poor, so buns were mostly baked at home.