WHY IS IT? by R. F. Cottrell

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Mar 16, 1876

WHY IS IT?

By R. F. Cottrell

Why is it that late in the nineteenth century the Christian world are unsettled on the subject of the Sabbath of the moral law? Why is it that, while so many are agreed in observing the first day of the week instead of the seventh, so many and conflicting reasons are given for so doing? Why is it that, with the Bible in hand, and with all the accumulated and increasing light of centuries of investigation, the subject is so far from being settled that the number is increasing of those who doubt the divine authority for the change of the day, and many intelligent students of the Bible and history are convinced of their obligation to return to the

original day, though it has so long been degraded as merely a Jewish rite, while the first day has been honored as the Christian Sabbath? Why is it that, in a land of Bibles, convictions of the want of the divine sanction in favor of this time-honored change, should force themselves upon so many inquiring minds, and the agitation on the subject increase, rather than diminish? With the mighty array of learning and talent in favor of the first-day Sabbath, combined with all the force of tradition and custom, what can be the reason for so much distrust and dissatisfaction, but the want of Bible testimony in its support? Is it not most probable that this is the thing, and the only thing, that is wanting to settle the question and put the public mind at rest?

If the keeping of the seventh day as the Sabbath is really Judaism, and therefore a virtual denial of Christ and the gospel, as it is frequently claimed, why is it that other rites of the same class, such as circumcision and bloody sacrifices, are not also being revived in the Christian world? All the types, or shadows, of the former dispensation have an equal claim to observance in this; if one has any claim to be perpetuated, so have all the others; and consequently no argument can be adduced in favor of one which is not equally good for all the rest. Then why is it that Christians in this enlightened age of the world should be convicted of their duty to keep the ancient Sabbath, and, contrary to their own convenience, worldly interests, and the popular custom of the times, be conscientiously compelled to turn and keep it, while they have not the slightest conviction of duty to “be circumcised and keep the law of Moses”? Is it not probable that the proofs on which the claims of the Sabbath rest are very different from any that could be adduced in favor of circumcision and sacrifices? And are not these things presumptive proof that the original Sabbath is still binding? The whole Christian world are settled in the faith that the ordinances of the Jewish church have been utterly abolished; but there has never been a time since Christ was on the earth in which there were no Christians who kept the Sabbath on the seventh day, according to the commandment.

Such considerations go to show that the arguments on which the Sabbath rests, and those which might be brought to sustain Jewish rites, are of an entirely different nature; and is not this strong presumptive proof that, while Jewish rites have been utterly abolished, the Sabbath remains precisely as it was? The present agitation of the Sabbath question, and the turning to the original day all over the Christian world, could not exist, could make no headway against the popular wind and tide, were it not a real reformation, having the truth of God for its foundation. The reason why this work is advancing, in spite of gray tradition, is because it has truth for its foundation, God for its author, and the Holy Spirit for its motive power.

R. F. COTTRELL.