The Jewish Sabbath

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Apr 15, 1913

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 40, No. 15.

The Jewish Sabbath

It would seem, in view of the plainness of the Sacred Record, that men professing godliness would not try to localize the Sabbath; but they do. It is ridiculed as of no account, or called “Jewish” Sabbath, by many who can not plead ignorance of the facts of Scripture. The term is used to cast contempt on the holy day. But what are the facts? The Sabbath was made 2,500 years before the Jews became a nation, and 3,200 years before we have the term “Jew” at all. It is never once called “Jewish” in the word of God; but it is called, “the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.”

The Sabbath belongs to no one race, kindred, tribe, or nation. And certainly when Inspiration states so positively that the Sabbath was made at creation and enjoined upon man, no Christian who is honest and well informed, would ever strive to belittle it by attaching to it a title prejudicial to so many. To call the Sabbath of the Lord “Jewish,” is contrary to the plainest declarations of God’s word, casts dishonor upon a sacred institution, and contempt on one of His greatest blessings to man, and at the same time shows that he who uses the term “Jewish,” as applied to the Sabbath, is either grossly ignorant or else he wishes to prejudice some one whom he can not convince by either reason or scripture. Says the apostle: “God that made the world and all things therein, . . . hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation.” Acts 17:24-26. The Sabbath is one of God’s appointed seasons, and is binding upon all nations of men.