WHO DID IT? by C. W. Stone

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · May 8, 1879

WHO DID IT?

By C. W. Stone

Who made the first law for the observance of the first day of the week?—A Roman emperor. His name was Constantine. He did it in A. D. 321. He did not at that time profess to believe in Christ; hence, as might be expected, his decree did not require the observance of that day in commemoration of the resurrection of Christ. He was a pagan; consequently in his decree he commands the “judges, and town people, and the occupation of all trades” to “rest on the venerable day of the sun.” Soon after this, Constantine professed to become a Christian, when the same heathen law was continued as the only statute then existing as a support to that day.

The council of Laodicea, A. D. 364, took steps to strengthen the Sunday festival, and prohibited the keeping of the seventh day under a curse.

In the fifth century a law was made by Pope Leo that “holy orders” “should be conferred” on the first day of the week only. According to Justin Edwards, Leo also decreed that all should rest on that day.

Soon after this, in A. D. 469, the Roman emperor Leo made a decree forbidding “citations, executions, pleadings, and the like avocations,” ordering the circus and theater closed, and husbandmen to rest on Sunday.

Under Clodovæus, king of France, the bishops met in the first council of Orleans, A. D. 507, where they obliged themselves and their successors always to be at church on Sundays, except in case of sickness. At that time it appears that courts of law were sometimes held on Sunday by some of the bishops who acted as lawyers or judges; for about the year A. D. 518, in the reign of Theodoric, king of the Goths, it was decreed that, “no bishop or other person in holy orders should examine or pass judgment in any civil controversy on Sunday.”

In A. D. 538 the third council of Orleans was held. In its twenty-ninth canon it says that “agricultural labor ought to be laid aside [on Sunday], in order that the people may not be prevented from attending church.” Notice the reason. It is not in order that people should not break the sanctity of the day, but in order that they might not be prevented from attending church.

From this time onward we find very frequent acts of councils, imperial laws, and edicts from the pope himself, who had then become “corrector of heretics and head of all the churches,” all tending to restrict Sunday labor and make it a day of religious service.

Now whose institution is this so-called Christian Sabbath, the Sunday? The Bible contains no precept for its observance. All history attests that the first law relating to the institution sprang from Rome. For many centuries none other than Romish ecclesiastical and civil laws for its support were in existence. It matters not that a part of a backsliding church had come to pay some regard to this as a festival day before any law for it existed—it was Rome that first gave that practice the support of law, and it was the Romish Church that made the fundamental decrees on which the Sunday Sabbath rests. All history testifies to the truthfulness of these charges.

In doing this, the Roman Church has thought to change the fourth commandment, and so amend it as to require the observance of the first day of the week. The spirit of prophecy pointed to this by the prophet Daniel: “He shall think to change times and laws.” Dan. 7:25. In thus tampering with God’s law, removing God’s Sabbath, and erecting an institution to please himself, the papacy has “exalted himself above all that is called God.” See 2 Thess. 2:3, 4.

The case stands like this: 1. The finger of prophecy points to the papacy as the power that should presume to change God’s law; 2. The voice of history is heard boldly accusing the papacy of having thought to change God’s law in relation to the Sabbath day; 3. Like a certain boy, who, when his father raised the question, “Who cut down my cherry tree?” replied, “I cannot tell a lie; I did it with my little hatchet,” so the papacy, when asked the question, “Who changed the Sabbath?” replies, “Sundays and holy days [such as Christmas, New Year’s, St. Patrick’s day, etc.] all stand upon the same foundation, viz., the ordinance of the church.”—Cath. Chris. Instructed, pp. 209-211.

Prophecy said the papacy would do it.

History says the papacy has done it.

The papacy takes the stand, and says, I did it.

C. W. STONE.