The Definite Seventh Day.
FROM BRO. Waggoner's Review of Baird, pp. 39-43, we give the following respecting the definiteness of the seventh day:— But the statements already noticed are scarcely equal, to the following:— “From a perusal of the 12th chapter you will see that in connection with the institution of the feast of unleavened bread both the first and the seventh days were to be days of holy convocation, but regarding the seventh day it is said: ‘For in this self-same day I brought your armies out of the land of Egypt, therefore ye shall observe this day in your generations, as an ordinance, forever.’ Both of these passages occur in connection with events that transpired before the giving of the law, and in neither of them is the slightest reference made to the creation rest, as that upon which their Sabbath was grounded, or their observance of it enjoined.” If any excuse can be offered for the above, we would like to know on what ground it rests. Every reader of the Bible must know that the passover feast was one of seven days, always falling on the fifteenth and twenty-first days, inclusive, of the first month. But as the fifteenth day of the month cannot fall regularly on any day of the week, of course this record concerns, not the first and seventh days of the week, but the first and seventh days of the feast. And it came only once a year. Hence it has no possible connection with the weekly Sabbath. Mark the words of Mr. Baird: “Regarding the seventh day it is said, ‘For in this self-same day I brought your armies out of Egypt.’” This is not true. It was not said of the seventh day—not even of the seventh day of the feast. The words of the Lord are these: “Ye shall observe the feast of unleavened bread; for in this self-same day I brought your armies out of the land of Egypt.” Ex. 12:17. Now mark the order of events. The lamb was slain on the fourteenth day of the month; that evening the blood was sprinkled on the doorposts; that night the angel slew the first-born of Egypt; the next morning, the fifteenth day of the month, Pharaoh thrust them out of the land. And this fifteenth day of the month was counted for the first day of the feast. If Mr. Baird honestly and with good intent made this statement, it was only because his ignorance was beyond all parallel. If he has a friend who can show that our judgment is unjustly severe, we will withdraw our decision and make honorable amends to him. And what is true of his remarks on this feast is true of those on the feast of tabernacles. And Mr. Baird seems to be as deficient in knowledge of natural truth as of the Bible. Remarking on the “utter destitution of argument” of Seventh-day Adventists, he says:— “The same might be said of all their attempts to explain away obvious facts by reference to an imaginary day line somewhere on the Pacific Ocean, on crossing which some erroneously suppose that there is a sudden transition of twenty-four hours’ time.” It is true that a Seventh-day Adventist, Eld. J. N. Andrews, has examined this subject more closely, and written upon it more largely, than any other person within our knowledge. But justice will not permit us to say that it is original with him, nor with any other one of this generation. It is a fact well known to scientific men and to navigators that each day of the week commences in the Pacific Ocean. If the reader will take the trouble to examine past volumes of the Scientific American, he will find the subject treated on by different writers at different times. The conclusion of all is the same, because it is not a mere theory—“an imaginary day line,” as Mr. Baird says—but a settled fact. It is well known that in traveling either east or west we find our time-pieces continually varying from the time of the different localities through which we pass. To keep our watches with sun time, that is, true or correct time, we must often set them by local time. The whole amount of such changes in traveling around the world will be 24 hours. For if we travel eastward, we must correct our time-pieces by setting them forward four minutes to each degree, one hour for every fifteen degrees, and of course twenty-four hours for the complete circle. Having changed our time twenty-four hours in going round the world, it is evident that, on returning to the locality whence we started, we find there the same time with which we started, and to conform to that time we must drop out of our count all the variations we have made in traveling. The effect is the same in traveling westward, but the order is reversed.93 It is always a fact that a person starting in China and traveling westward will find that his enumeration of the days of the week will agree with that of every place through which he passes until he again reaches the Pacific, in California. And reversing the order, starting at San Francisco, he may travel eastward, and he will find that his days of the week agree with those of every place through which he passes, until he reaches the other shore of the Pacific. Through Asia, through Europe, across the Atlantic, and through America, no change is found. But let him start from the coast of China and cross the Pacific Ocean and the case is different. On landing at San Francisco he will find his week one day in advance of those living there, unless he corrected his count, by one day, on the ocean. And in like manner, if he crosses from California to China, he will find himself one day behind the inhabitants of China unless he corrected his time, by one whole day, on the passage. This is not “imaginary.” The providence of God has preserved the certain knowledge of the order of the days of the week by indicating where each day begins, and where the correction must be made. We might quote from the Scientific American to verify this fact, but for brevity’s sake will content ourselves with an extract from the remarks of a correspondent of the Buffalo Express, who crossed the Pacific in July 1874. He thus gives his experience in crossing the day line:— “No one thing on shipboard creates so much excitement, or gives rise to so much discussion, as the dropping of a day on the 180th parallel of longitude; and particularly to those who have been several times over the route are these arguments laughable. The more people argue upon it the less they seem to know, though the whole of it is just this: Buffalo is in about 79 degrees longitude west of Greenwich. As we travel west we gain four minutes for every degree; hence in traveling 300 miles per day we lengthen it twenty minutes, and, by the time we have reached the 180th parallel, we are six hours and forty-four minutes behind Buffalo time. In other words, we are five o’clock and sixteen minutes in the morning when you at Buffalo are noon of the same day. It is evident that a uniform place must be established for days to begin, and mariners—or astronomers, I don’t know which—long ago agreed upon the 180th degree as that place; and they decided that ships going east should there pick up a day, and those going west should drop one. This point we reached about eleven o’clock, P. M., Saturday, 25th, and over we skipped into Monday, July 27th. We had gone to sleep on Saturday night, and waked up on Monday morning, much to the disgust of the Rev. Mr.——, a missionary from Siam, who had prepared a sermon for the lost Sunday. On Saturday we were six hours and forty-four minutes behind our Buffalo friends; on Monday, seventeen hours and sixteen minutes ahead of them.” The true line is somewhat east of the 180th degree west from Greenwich; but as longitude is generally reckoned from Greenwich, navigators, for convenience’ sake, have adopted the even 180th degree as the place where the change shall be made. But Mr. Baird says this is all “imaginary,” and attributes it all to the ignorance of Seventh-day Adventists! And yet he contradicts himself, and again admits that the change is made, and because of this fact he says that we ought to keep Sunday instead of Saturday, as that would more nearly conform to the true reckoning! That is nothing less than silly. Every one is aware that the variation is in opposite directions according as we travel east or west, and that this correction preserves the true enumeration of the days of the week.