A CORRECTION by W. M. Jones

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 29, 1876

A CORRECTION.

By W. M. Jones

A STATEMENT from the rounds of the papers appears in the REVIEW of the 18th of May that every day of the week is observed as follows:—

“Christian nations generally, Sunday. Greeks, Monday. Persians, Tuesday. Assyrians, Wednesday. Egyptians, Thursday. Turks, Arabs and Mohammedan nations, Friday. Jews and S. D. Baptists, Saturday.”

From the reading of this tabular statement one is led to think that the Greeks do not belong to the Christian nations, that Persians are not Mohammedans, that Egyptians are neither Arabs nor Mohammedans, and that there is such a nation now as the Assyrian! Many a schoolboy of twelve can see that this is a rattle-brained statement, and whoever first penned it was probably laughing in his sleeve at the gullibility of people in the rural districts.

Please to observe that the old Assyrians devoted every day of the month of 30 days to some deity, and four days of the month were Sabatu or Sabbaths. There is no nation now existing by the name of Assyrian.

The ancient Egyptians knew the week, but they did not keep Thursday any more than they did Wednesday. The fact that the nations of antiquity regarded Saturn as the god of rest and sloth is presumptive evidence of the seventh day being regarded as an idle or non-working day. With the Egyptians all the days of the week were dedicated to the gods. (A list of them is published in the 5th number of the Sabbath Memorial.) They were the most horrid of idolaters, but have long since disappeared from the face of the earth, unless some of the modern Gipsies are a remnant of that noted people. The Egyptians of to-day are Arabs. The Persians, Arabs and Turks are Mohammedans. Friday is usually called by Christian nations the Mohammedan Sabbath; but Sabbath-keepers should note that only an hour or two hours of Friday mid-day is used for public prayer. In all other respects, except by the Ulemas (the clergy), the people are found at their work on that day. It is simply a day for assembling at mid-day for prayer; hence its name Junah, i. e., Assembly day.

The Greeks are Christians, and keep the Sunday which they call resurrection day. In Russian and Polish it is also called “non-working day” and “do-nothing day.” It was under the Greek Empire that the Sunday was brought into prominence as a Christian festival and the rival of the Sabbath. The Greeks have not changed from the Sunday to the Monday, nor do the Persians keep the Tuesday. The facts are that Christians generally make some sort of a keeping of Sunday; Jews, Abyssinians, S. D. Baptists, and S. D. Adventists keep the Saturday; and Mohammedans of all nations keep, where it is convenient, an hour of mid-day on Friday, as a season of prayer. We know of no other day of the week required to be kept as a weekly day, by Jew, Christian, Mohammedan, or Pagan. Excepting S. D. Baptists and S. D. Adventists, each of the foregoing has yearly festivals as all know; but Red-Letter-Days, Candlemas and Christmas, the Mohammedan fast of Ramadan (30 days), and Pagan days are quite beyond the ken of the article in question.

We are pained to know that Protestant Christian communities are so generally demoralized on the real merits of the Sabbath question. All sorts of quibbles, burlesques, throwing dust in the eyes of those who desire to see, a reckless perversion of foreign customs, and a ridiculous jumble of the true and the false—all this is the ill-gotten gain from the attempted overthrow of the fourth commandment. Our Sabbath-keeping friends are fast being taught that the subterfuges of the Sunday party are many and devious, subtle and obstinate; but the realm of invention is becoming exhausted, and sooner or later must fall like Dagon before the ark. The Sunday is in an agony of peril, and is determined to die hard. Its friends are getting out of heart, and more are the thousands than we number all told, who in their hearts believe that we are right in keeping the Lord’s own Sabbath day. W. M. JONES. 15 Mill Yard, Goodman’s Fields, London.