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THEREFORE

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Sep 10, 1901

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 78, No. 37.

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THEREFORE

By Uriah Smith

“THEREFORE the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day.” Deut. 5:15. These are among the words spoken by Moses to the children of Israel at the end of their forty years’ wandering in the wilderness; and the opponents of the seventh-day Sabbath fly to this text as proof that the Sabbath was given to the Jews alone, and is not binding, in any other country, or in any other age, upon any other class of people. Hence they say it is not binding upon so-called Christians, and not binding upon us, which is the point they wish to prove.
But this text does not prove it.
Does not the word “therefore” denote that that which is said gives the reason for what is stated?—Very true; and what is stated?—“The Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day.” But this is not giving the reason for the Sabbath; that is, it is not the reason for the law of the Sabbath itself. Here is a distinction that men generally lose sight of: the text does not tell why men should keep the Sabbath, but only why God gave to Israel a reason why they should keep the Sabbath. Read the whole passage: “And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore [for this reason, on account of this interposition in thy behalf, which ought to arouse thy highest gratitude] the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day.”
The Sabbath commandment existed apart from, and independent of, this. But this is why God gave them the commandment to keep the Sabbath; He appealed to the gratitude they should cherish toward God, in view of what He had done for them, as a motive which should lead them to keep His commandments.
But if we give this as a reason for the commandment itself, we must consider what conclusions must follow. It would make the Sabbath verily a most limited and short-lived institution. It would be confined not to the Jews, or to the Jewish nation only, but to that particular and specific generation of that people which had just come out of Egypt; for the Jews who were born and raised in Canaan could not be included in the specifications, any more than those who were born in America in the nineteenth century. Mark the language: “And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day.” Applying this, as our friends do, we say it must be confined to those who were actually delivered from Egypt. But nearly fifteen hundred years of Sabbath-keeping by the Jews in the land of Palestine, and over nineteen hundred years more of the same practice by the same people in all the world, give the lie to such a groundless conception. Therefore that application is not correct.
But even if correct, it proves too much. This is seen by such texts as Deut. 24:17, 18, which forbids perversion of judgment, and oppression of the widow. “But thou shalt remember that thou wast a bondman in Egypt, and the Lord thy God redeemed thee thence: therefore I command thee to do this thing.”
Again: Deut. 10:19; 11:7, 8: “But your eyes have seen all the great acts of the Lord which He did. Therefore shall ye keep all the commandments which I command you this day, that ye may be strong, and go in and possess the land, whither ye go to possess it.” This language could apply only to that generation to which Moses spoke; for it was not true of those who were afterward born in the land of Canaan that their eyes had seen the great works of the Lord, as had those of the people in the days of Moses. But shall we, therefore, conclude that they only were under obligation to obey the duties referred to, as our friends reason?—Not by any means.
This argument proves too much. The obligation does not rest upon the facts referred to. They only state the reason why the duties were enjoined upon them. And the emotion of gratitude which was aroused in their breasts should also be aroused in the hearts of their posterity as well, just as every one to-day should be prompted to love and obey God because He has shown such love to us as to provide a way of salvation, as He did in the days of Adam, of Noah, of Abraham, of Lot, and of Israel in Egypt, in the case referred to, and as He has provided, in a larger sense, salvation for all men by the gift of His dear Son. He might say to us, “Therefore I command thee to love and serve me,” and the gratitude of our hearts in view of His goodness should prompt us to do it.
But now to take God’s dealings with Israel and urge them as an excuse for turning away from God and breaking His commandments, borders hard upon the domain of crime. U. S.