Misconceptions Concerning the Sabbath
By L. A. S.
ONE of the most commonly perverted texts of Scripture, says the New York Observer in speaking of “The Lord’s Day,” “is the declaration of the Master, ‘The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.’ By an easy and popular method of modern interpretation,” says the Observer, “this is commonly understood to mean that man is practically above the law of the Sabbath, and that the Sabbath was made simply to serve man’s wayward whim or selfish ease. The average man, if forced to formulate his half-formed views on the meaning of this text, would probably say, ‘It means that I can do what I please on the Sabbath.’ If this contention be admitted, the whole fabric of Sabbath institutions and of legal enactments and social usages safeguarding the Sabbath, falls to the ground.” In combating this perverted idea of the purpose of the Sabbath, the Observer proceeds to say:— No man is at liberty in any sphere to do as he pleases. Human and divine laws encompass and limit him on every side. There is no such thing as absolute freedom for any individual. One of these constraints of law comes in with respect to the Sabbath. A man has a right to do on the Sabbath that which pleases God—nothing more, nothing less. The Sabbath is primarily not man’s day, but the Lord’s day. “The Son of man is Lord of the Sabbath day.” The Sabbath becomes secondarily man’s day in so far as it is utilized by man for the important purposes—such as physical5and mental resting and spiritual upbuilding—which the Lord of man approves. We certainly agree with the Observer that the Sabbath was not given to man for him to use as he pleases. The Sabbath was made for man, but it remains the property of the Creator. “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.” “The earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof,” yet it was made for man. The Sabbath is the Lord’s, but it was made for man’s welfare. And it is for man’s welfare because it is the Lord’s,—because it was prepared by the Omniscient and by him adapted to man’s needs. That which God himself made must be of value, so long as it remains what he made it; and the Sabbath, being made especially for man by him who has infinite wisdom and power, is of inestimable value to man so long as no change is made in it. Finite, fallen man must not tamper with it; it must remain the Sabbath of the Lord.
To say, however, that a man “has a right” to do on the Sabbath only “that which pleases God,” is to express a misapprehension of man’s relation to this beneficent institution. It is very true that it is not right to do aught else on the Sabbath than that which pleases God; but to define human rights in the matter of Sabbath observance, and to have “legal enactments and social usages safeguarding the Sabbath,” is to show a misunderstanding of the nature of the Sabbath altogether. No legal enactments or social usages can safeguard the Sabbath; and when people come to trust in such things as a safeguard for this divine institution, it is high time that they should fall to the ground. What is right for a man to do on the Sabbath day, as regards its proper observance, is a question between him and God alone. As regards rights, which it is the purpose of human laws to define and maintain, a man is at liberty to observe the day in any way that he chooses, and no legal enactments touching its observance can ever be necessary or proper. Remembering that the Sabbath belongs to God, and that he himself has enacted a law for all mankind covering its observance, the impropriety of human legislation to define the proper observance of the day is plainly apparent. Human legislators have no business upon such ground. To God alone is every man accountable in the matter, and to legislate concerning it is the prerogative only of the Deity. It is a false sabbath, having no divine authority, but depending wholly upon human laws and customs for its support, that has given to men the idea of the necessity of legal enactments to safeguard the day. The Sunday institution began its career as a professedly Christian institution under the sanction of human law, and remains to-day dependent upon the same support. The Observer, however, comes again further to the truth in the following statements, which present the great fact that the experiment of the Messiah was not to destroy or to change the Sabbath, but to present it more clearly to mankind by removing the rubbish of human traditions and enactments with which the Pharisees had covered it:— Jesus sought to strip off the superfluities of Jewish will worship and of pharisaic formalism, which in the course of the centuries had so encrusted the Sabbath that its original spiritual intent disappeared from view. He never intended to abrogate the Sabbath, or to lessen any of its essential claims to human regard. Rather, Jesus Christ sought to give men more, not less, of the Sabbath, and imprinted upon its observance a holier and a happier sanction. That Jesus meant the Sabbath to be still observed, and how he intended it to be observed, may be gathered from his own personal course while on earth with reference to the seventh day. His use of that day was always for purposes that assisted the development of the higher nature of men, and that contributed to their healing or physical well-being. He was scrupulously careful to attend the synagogue services on the Sabbath, and the day was for him one of happy because holy activity, full of heavenly inspiration and of good deeds performed in behalf of a sin-weary humanity. The truths here set forth are truths which all men, especially those professing to be followers of Christ, should know and remember. Jesus Christ came not to abrogate any of the claims of the holy day, least of all to institute a change from the day on which God rested after creation, to another day of the week. Had he done this, he would have given occasion for new laws and new customs and features of Sabbath observance on the part of mankind, which were the very things he sought to have removed. The voice and example of Jesus were for a return to the Sabbath observance which God ordained—to that which was of God alone and not of man. And this is the rule to be followed in presenting the subject of Sabbath observance to the world to-day.
L. A. S.