The Discussion in Portland, Me.
QUESTION. The Seventh-day Sabbath observed by God's people prior to the crucifixion of Christ, is still binding upon mankind. Affirmative, M. E. Cornell. Negative, T. M. Preble. Cornell. We have some interesting things now before us. The Lord's day, the Elder tells us, is Christ's day, and that is the first day of the week; for Christ is Lord of the Sabbath-day. Is the first day of the week the Sabbath-day? If Eld. P. will find in the New Testament where the first day is ever called the Sabbath, any reference to the day, saying that it is the Sabbath-day, then he will have proved something. But what day was it? I shall claim that it was the seventh day, unless he can show that some other day is somewhere called Lord's day in the New Testament. But when Christ said he was Lord of the Sabbath-day, Eld. P. knows it was not the first day of the week. It was the old seventh day. If he can find that the first day has been sanctified, then he may claim that Lord's day is the first day. The fourth commandment, and also Isa. lviii, tell us what day the Lord's day is. The first day of the week is never called Lord's day in the Bible. It is admitted, or if denied, I will bring the proof, that John wrote his gospel after his return from the isle of Patmos, where he wrote the Revelation. And in that gospel he has occasion to refer to the first day of the week. Now if by the term Lord's day, in the Revelation, he had meant the first day of the week, and that was the term then given to that day, he would certainly have called it so when speaking of it afterward. But in his gospel he calls it simply first day of the week. Refers to Preble's assertion that God sanctified the day beforehand, and reads the record that he sanctified the day after, and because, he had rested upon it. Re-argues some points in relation to the penalty, showing that Preble admitted that the real penalty was the second death, so that the real penalty never has been changed, and no change of the law can be argued on that ground. He did not wish to be understood as repudiating the Emphatic Diaglott as a whole, but only some of its renderings, and among them the rendering of 2 Cor. iii, 7. The word there translated dispensation, has never that meaning. Everybody will say that that is false. As a whole, I like King James' translation the best of any. Eld. P. says that every day is alike in this dispensation; that we are to have holy work six days, and holy rest on the seventh day. Was it not just so in the former dispensation? I believe in keeping every day right, and the commandment shows how that is, by directing us to work six and rest on the seventh. Refers to what Preble calls Paul's accommodation meetings. But Paul preached to the Gentiles as well as to the Jews. Only one meeting can be found on the first day of the week. Acts xx. And I can show that that was an accommodation meeting. It was held because Paul was to depart on the morrow, and they were to see his face no more. Every Bible institution has a name. On this point Bro. C. made a strong argument, giving illustrations all through the Bible, and showing the names and titles of sacredness that have all along been applied to the seventh day, ending with Rev. i, 10, and showing also that no title of sacredness is ever given in the Bible to the first day of the week. Fifty-nine times the seventh day is called the Sabbath. The first day, never. The only title ever given to that day is a "working day." Eze. xlvi, 1. And God has set the example of working upon it. God never changes an institution of his. The seventh day is never called Jewish like the passover, the feasts of the Jews, &c. Preble. Eld. C. says that stoning to death was not the real penalty. But was it not all the penalty there was to that law given? I am glad he admitted so much in regard to the Emphatic Diaglott. He also admits that all days are alike. I thank him for that. The children of Israel were journeying the seventh day before the Sabbath in the wilderness. The word Sabbath occurs in the New Testament, and refers to the first day, too. In every instance where the first day of the week occurs it is sabbaton. Thus we have the first sabbaton, the second sabbaton, &c. He says it is the seventh of the sabbaton; but the Bible says it is the first of the sabbaton. Which will you believe? As soon as you pass the resurrection of Christ, you find first day sabbaton. The reason the disciples could not bear some things which Christ had to say to them, was because the Jews would persecute and put them to death for them. Pray that your flight be not on the Sabbath-day. You see we have to come down to the time when the New Testament was written to find the change. Cornell. My friend will keep the first day without any command; but will not keep the seventh day without its being commanded over again. Reads from Preble's tract of 1845, that those who keep the first day are "Pope's Sunday-keepers and God's Sabbath-breakers." He says the Gentile converts all went for the first day of the week; and I can tell you why; it was because the first day of the week was dedicated by the Gentiles or heathen, to the sun from ancient times, and called Sunday. Bro. C. here gave a thorough exposure of the fallacy of the seventh-part-of-time theory. We have no record of Christ's appearing to his disciples on the first day of the week, except on the day of his resurrection. Met with them once on a fishing day. Pray that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the Sabbath-day. Bro. C. gave the true exposition of this passage, which the reader will find in full in History of the Sabbath, pp. 132-138. Discussed the frequent references to the Sabbath in the book of Acts, and contrasted these with the one instance of preaching on the first day. Makes a strong argument on the fact that the Sabbath commandment is in the very bosom of the decalogue, and the whole law is perfect and holy, and hence cannot be abolished. Preble. Eld. C. quotes Webster to show that Sunday was anciently dedicated to the sun. We could give him a rich treat from Noah Webster. [Eld. P. here read from Webster concerning Sunday as the Christian Sabbath, claiming it as a triumphant argument; to which Eld. C. subsequently replied by referring him to Webster's definition of the word soul, and asking him if he would endorse that!] Refers to his Sab. tracts, and says, I told you in my first speech that I got bewildered and observed the seventh day three years. I am twenty years older now, and have had a chance to learn something. I ask my heavenly Father to forgive me this error, if he has not already done it. I have seen distraction in families from this seventh-day Sabbath-keeping. It makes confusion and quarreling, women refusing to cook, &c. The whole number of Seventh-day Adventists have not been converted from sin to holiness, but are proselytes from other churches. They have broken up churches. This State is witness to it. He says that according to my view, any seventh day is the Sabbath, notwithstanding I have given evidence that the first day of the week should be observed by Christians in commemoration of redemption. In Acts xviii, where Paul preached to the Gentiles, some argue that it was the Sabbath between. Now what kind of a Sabbath could come between two Jewish Sabbaths? It would be the first day of the week would it not? And the great crowd assembled because it was the first day of the week, was what caused the Jews to be so enraged. When he refers to the ten commands, he wants to know if the nine commandments are abolished. I guess he thought he was arguing with Miles Grant, in New Hampshire. But I am not Miles Grant. I believe they are all brought over. In order to commemorate the redemption of our world, we must commemorate it on the first day of the week. We can commemorate both creation and redemption by the first day of the week. One of the reformers believed in the seventh-day Sabbath, Carlstadt, a fiery, crazy sort of a fanatical person, who went on till war was declared, and so perished. Cornell. He asks me to give him notes in writing. I cannot speak and take notes for the negative too. I have referred to some things several times, and he has not tried to notice them. The first point I have to notice now, is his effort to get up sympathy, and create prejudice against the Sabbath, by asserting that it has a bad influence, creates confusion, breaks up churches, &c. I repudiate such a course. It is unworthy any cause. Others have made the same complaint against Adventists. The same things have been said about the immortality doctrine; and every new truth is open to the same objections. Christ said that he came not to send peace on earth but a sword. The truth will always make division where all do not embrace it. As a specimen of the contradictions my friend indulges in, you will recollect that he has taken the position that the commandments were dead, done away; but now he says that they are all brought over and written on the heart. Miles Grant had the commandments brought over and the fourth left out. Preble has them abolished, then all brought over and written on the heart, then the fourth changed. If the Sabbath was abolished at the cross, how could it be changed at the resurrection of Christ? Those who have kept the seventh day, he says, have been miserable fanatics ever since the days of Christ. I could mention several miserable fanatics who have kept the first day. See the Catholic church for example. My arguments on the Sabbath being placed in the midst of the moral law, and the immutability of the law, have not yet been touched. Preble. In regard to a discussion of the History of the Sabbath, I should like to have it go through the World's Crisis, but I have no control over it. I am ready to meet Andrews or anybody else. And if the Crisis cannot be opened to it, will they shut it out of their paper? The divisions Christ refers to, are divisions between saints and sinners. That is bad fruit because it divides saints, and is contrary to the gospel. He says that I say that those who keep the seventh day crucify Christ afresh. I deny that I said so. I have not said that the ten commandments were dead; I said law. I never said that all who kept the seventh day were fanatics. I said the principal movements were made by such. They were by heretics and visionary men and women. Refers to testimony of Justin Martyr, and reads from Reeve's translation, Vol. i, p. 163. Refers to 1 Cor. xvi, 1. On the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, &c., and reads from Eusebius in relation to this custom, p. 159. [Here Eld. P. fell into the singular mistake of making Dionysius of Soter's time, A. D. 170, mentioned by Eusebius, the same as the Dionysius of Paul's time mentioned in Acts xvii, 34.] Reads again from his articles.