The Boston Herald—The Sabbath.
By Uriah Smith
The Boston Herald has a department entitled, “Letters from the People,” in which the conductors of that journal, without any reference to their own views, propose to let the people express their opinions on any subject of general interest, the only conditions imposed being that all opinions shall be expressed with courtesy, and with as much brevity as is consistent with the subject in hand. While in Boston, last August, my attention was called to a paragraph by J. Loring, published in this department of that paper, entitled “Sunday Weeding.” To this I wrote a brief reply, which called out a response from D. V. O’Leary, to which I have also replied. The Herald is an influential paper, circulating daily about 80,000 copies; and all who are interested in the Sabbath question will be pleased to learn what statements on this subject have been laid before its readers. The following are the articles in question, the first appearing in the daily Herald of Aug. 4, 1871: “Editor of the Herald: I have recently come to New England to reside. I have been in the habit of hoeing up the weeds in my garden on Sunday. Last Sunday one of my neighbors spoke to me, as I was passing his house, and inquired if I did not know it was illegal and wicked to do so. As I said I did not, he went on to inform me that it not only subjected me to arrest, fine, and imprisonment, under the statute laws of Massachusetts, but by the divine law I deserved to be stoned to death and roasted in hell forever. He said he saw me, and seriously thought of coming over and stoning me, but concluded not to, on the consideration that it might be a sin of ignorance rather than wilfulness. I thanked him for the forbearance, and promised to inform myself on the subject, and, if I found he was right, to abstain from such risky business in the future. Please inform me and others who may be in equal need of the information, if my neighbor is right. I wish to be a good citizen, and have no desire to be stoned to death or suffer everlasting torture on account of a few weeds.
“J. LORING.” The following in response to the foregoing was published in the Herald of Aug. 17, 1871: “Editor of the Herald: I was much interested in the paragraph with this heading, from J. Loring, in your issue of Aug. 4th. Having made this subject a matter of considerable study, allow me to state, for his benefit, but more especially for that of his friend who was inclined to stone him to death for hoeing his garden on that day, that Sunday is not the Christian Sabbath, because (1.) Christ never spoke of the day in any manner; (2.) no divine being ever rested upon that day; (3.) no blessing was ever placed upon it; (4.) it was never sanctified, or set apart, for man; (5.) no divine law was ever given for its observance, and hence no law is violated by working upon it; and (6.) as sin is the transgression of the law, no sin is committed by doing any lawful business, either weeding garden, or anything else, upon that day; (7.) the apostles did not keep the day; according to Acts 20: 7–14, 1 Cor. 16: 1, 2, they used it as a secular day; (9.) the first law for its observance was the edict of Constantine, A. D. 321, which was put forth in its behalf as a heathen holiday; (10.) Constantine being converted two years after, this law was used to enforce it as a Christian festival; (11.) Pope Sylvester was chiefly instrumental in transforming it into a Christian Sabbath, authoritatively giving it the title of Lord’s day; (12.) the Sabbath which is now binding upon mankind is the original Sabbath, that of the fourth commandment, the seventh day of the week, which has come down, with the rest of the moral law, unrepealed and unchanged; all of which propositions are sustained by the Bible and history. If J. Loring is a conscientious observer of the seventh day, I understand the statutes of Massachusetts allow him to pursue his ordinary business on the first day.
U. SMITH.” This called out the following response published in the Herald of Aug. 23. “SUNDAY THE CHRISTIAN SABBATH.”
“Editor of the Herald: In answer to your correspondent, U. Smith, I would suggest that he ought to make himself better acquainted with ecclesiastical history before he maintains that Sunday is not the Christian Sabbath. We find that the apostles always held their assemblies for divine service on that day, as we read in Acts 20: 7, and 1 Cor. 16: 2, and St. John expressly calls it the Lord’s day, Rev. 1: 10; and we find in every age and in every country where the gospel was preached, that Sunday was the Christian Sabbath, because it was so taught by the practice of the apostles, as before stated.
“Now as to the power of the apostles to change the Sabbath, Christ said to them, ‘All power is given to me in Heaven and on earth.’ Matt. 28: 18. ‘As the Father hath sent me, I also send you.’ John 20: 21. ‘Whatever you shall bind on earth shall be bound also in Heaven; and whatever you shall loose on earth, shall be loosed in Heaven.’ Matt. 16: 19.” “I will now give an example of how the early Christians regarded the Sunday long before the reign of Constantine or Pope Sylvester, in the year 304, in the persecution of Diocletian, in the city of Abitina, in the proconsular province of Africa, Saturninus, a priest of the city, celebrated the Divine Mysteries on Sunday, he and the principal persons of his congregation were seized and carried to Carthage before the proconsul Anulinus. When the proconsul asked them how dare they hold their assemblies on Sunday against the imperial edict, they answered: ‘The obligation of the Sunday is indispensable; it is not lawful for us to omit the duties of that day; we never pass a Sunday without meeting at our assembly.’ Baluzius t. 2; also Bollandus and Ruinart.” “I have shown that the apostles had full power to change the day of the Sabbath, or to raise the dead even to life. I have also shown that by their practice they did change it, and that all Christian nations followed their example. I will now show the reasons which induced them to change it to Sunday. 1. Christ our Lord was born on that day. 2. Christ our Lord rose from the dead on that day. 3. The Holy Ghost descended on the apostles on that day to give them miraculous powers to enable them to preach the gospel to all nations. Those wonders which God performed on the first day of the week for the salvation of all mankind, are more stupendous than the creation, and are more than sufficient to justify the change of the Sabbath to that day.” “Whoever, therefore, does any servile work on that day, violates a prime law of God’s church, and he is no more than the heathen and the publican, for Christ says, ‘He that will not hear the Church, let him be to thee as the heathen and the publican.’ Luke 10: 16; Matt. 18: 17.
“DENIS V. O’LEARY.” To this the following reply was prepared and sent to the Herald, Sept. 4, 1871. “SUNDAY NOT THE CHRISTIAN SABBATH.”
“Editor of the Herald: In view of the proportions which the Sabbath question is beginning to assume as one of the great questions of the day, I trust you will feel justified in granting a little more space to its consideration. The answer of your correspondent, Denis V. O’Leary, to my note on “Sunday Weeding,” in your issue of Aug. 17, has just come to my notice. He, in common with all Papists, rests the Sunday Sabbath on the authority of the church. I, in common with all Protestants, deny the authority of the church to change a law of God. An examination of the Sabbath question from his standpoint would involve the prior examination of this question of church authority, into which it is not my purpose at present to enter. I take issue with Protestants, and claim, that in their defense of Sunday observance, they stand upon Roman Catholic ground. In the “Catholic Catechism of Christian Religion,” it is claimed that the church has made the change of the Sabbath from the seventh to first day of the week. In another Catholic work, entitled, “Abridgment of Christian Doctrine,” pp. 57–59, is found an exposition of the third commandment, in which occur the following question and answer: ‘Ques. How prove you that the church hath power to command feasts and holy days? Ans. By the very act of changing the Sabbath into Sunday, which Protestants allow of; and therefore they fondly contradict themselves by keeping Sunday strictly, and breaking most other feasts commanded by the same church.’ To the same end see “Catholic Christian Instructed,” pp. 207–211, “Treatise of Thirty Controversies,” “Doctrinal [Cath] Catechism,” pp. 101, 174, 351, 355, &c. Protestants should acquaint themselves with what Romanists claim in this matter, and know that the great Reformation will not be complete till this festival, like all others of that church, is set aside.” According to the fundamental principles of Protestantism, that the Bible and the Bible only is the rule of faith and practice, I feel very confident in affirming that Sunday is not the Christian Sabbath. Suppose Christ was born upon a Sunday, which may be questioned, and rose from the dead on Sunday, and the Spirit was poured out upon a Sunday, how can this prove, without a syllable of inspired instruction upon the point, that Sunday thereby acquired authority to array itself in the habiliments of the fourth commandment, and spurn from the divine temple the original Sabbath, which was as old as creation, and had been up to that time enjoined with all the authority of God’s immutable law? There is no record in the New Testament of any meeting held by the disciples in the day-time of the first day of the week. The meeting of Acts 20: 7 was held in the evening of that day, corresponding, as days were then reckoned, to our Saturday night. See Conybeare and Howson’s Life and Epistles of St. Paul, in loc. And when Sunday morning dawned, Paul, so far from keeping that day as a Sabbath, resumed his journey toward Jerusalem. See verses 8, 11, 13, 14. The direction given by Paul in 1 Cor. 16: 2, did not enjoin the putting of gifts into the contribution box in the public congregation, but the setting of them aside privately at home. See the original Greek, and the Vulgate, Douay, French, German, Swedish, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and other translations of this passage. This looking over one’s business, and setting apart for religious purposes such an amount as would correspond to the financial prosperity of the preceding week, would be very appropriate work for a secular day, but not for a holy one. The Lord’s day of Rev. 1: 10, must be that day of which he expressly claims to be Lord; and that day is the Sabbath. Mark 2: 28. The term Lord’s day was not applied to the first day of the week till so used by Tertullian, A. D. 200; with whom also we find the first traces of resting from labor on that day. See Kitto, Cyc. Bib. Lit., art., Lord’s Day. The change was accomplished by a long and gradual process, the Sabbath being very generally observed several hundred years after our Saviour’s crucifixion. But Sunday enlarged its claims and increased its influence, just in proportion as the power of superstition strengthened in the church, and the darkness of the dark ages came down upon the world. See History of the Sabbath by J. N. Andrews, in the Public Library of this City.
U. SMITH.” Whether or not this last reply has appeared in the Herald, I have not learned. If it has not, many will be disposed to raise the question, why it has not. It certainly complies with the most rigid construction that can be put upon the conditions upon which contributions are admitted to that paper. Its statements are courteous; and to every Sabbath-keeper who knows how much wanted to be said, it will appear a marvel of brevity; and good authorities are referred to for all the statements made. We shall be happy to learn that it has been inserted according to request.
U. S.