p. 168 | The Abiding Sabbath by Alonzo T. Jones

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Mar 18, 1886

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 12, No. 11.

“The Abiding Sabbath.”

By Alonzo T. Jones

Acts 20 : 7; 1 Cor. 16 : 2.

IN continuing his search for the origin of the first day of the week as the Lord's day, the author of the “Abiding Sabbath” comes to Acts 20 : 7. As this text mentions a meeting of disciples on the first day of the week, at which an apostle preached, it is really made the foundation upon which to lay the claim of the custom of the primitive church, and the example of the apostles in sanctioning the observance of Sunday as the Sabbath. But although there was a meeting held on the first day of the week, and although an apostle was at the meeting, as a matter of fact, there is in it neither custom nor example in favor of keeping Sunday as the Sabbath. Here is what Mr. Elliott makes of the passage:—

“The most distinct reference to the Christian use of the first day of the week is found in Acts 20 : 7: ‘And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them.’ . . . The language clearly implies that the apostle availed himself of the occasion brought about by the custom of assemblage on the first day of the week to preach to the people. . . . Here, then, is a plain record of the custom of assemblage on the first day of the week, less than thirty years after the resurrection. The language is just what would be used in such a case.”—Pp. 194, 195.

It is hard to see how he can find “a plain record of the custom of assemblage on the first day of the week,” when the record says nothing at all about any such custom. In all the narrative of which this verse forms a part there is no mention whatever of anything that was there done being done according to custom, nor to introduce what should become a custom, nor that it was to be an example to be followed by Christians throughout all time. So the fact is that Mr. Elliott's “plain record” of a custom, is not a record of any such thing.

Nor is his statement that “the language is just what would be used in such a case,” any more in accordance with the fact; for when Luke, who wrote this record, had occasion to speak of that which was a custom, he did so plainly. For example: “And he [Jesus] came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up; and, as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up for to read.” Luke 4 : 16. Again: “And Paul, as his manner [custom] was, went in unto them, and three Sabbath days reasoned with them out of the Scriptures.” Acts 17 : 2. In these two passages, the words, “as his custom was,” and “as his manner was,” as Luke wrote them, are identical—Kata to eiōthos—and in both instances mean precisely as his custom was; and that “language is just what” Inspiration has used in such cases as a plain record of a custom. Therefore we submit that the total absence of any such language from the passage under consideration, is valid argument that it is not a record of any such thing as the custom of the assemblage of Christians on the first day of the week.

If the record really said that it was then a custom to assemble on the first day of the week; if it said: Upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together, as their custom was, as the same writer says that it was the custom of Christ and of Paul to go to the Sabbath assemblies; if it said: Upon the first day of the week Paul preached to the disciples as his custom was; then no man could deny that such was indeed the custom: but as in the word of God there is neither statement nor hint to that effect, no man can rightly affirm that such was a custom, without going beyond the word of God; and that is prohibited by the word itself— “Thou shalt not add thereto, nor diminish from it.” Deut. 12 : 32. More than this, reading into that passage the “custom” of assemblage on the first day of the week, is not only to go beyond that which is written; it is to do violence to the very language in which it is written. The meaning of the word “custom” is, “A frequent repetition of the same act.” A single act is not custom. An act repeated once or twice is not custom. The frequent repetition of an act, that is custom. It is so, likewise, in the case of example. Webster says: “The word ‘example’ should never be used to describe what stands singly and alone.” Now as Acts 20 : 7 is the only case on record that a religious meeting was ever held, either by the disciples or the apostles, on the first day of the week, as there is no record of a single repetition of that act, much less of a “frequent repetition” of it, it follows inevitably that there is no shadow of justice nor of right in the claim that the custom or the example of the apostles and of the primitive church sanctions the observance of that day as the day of rest and worship—the Sabbath.

Instead, therefore, of the Sunday deriving any sacredness from the word of God, or resting for its observance upon the authority of that word, or upon that which is just and right, or upon the example of the apostles or the custom of the primitive church, it is contrary to all these. It is essentially an interloper, and rests for its so-called sacredness and for its authority upon nothing but sheer willfulness.

The next reference noticed by Mr. Elliott is 1 Cor. 16 : 1, 2, of which he writes:—

“Another incidental allusion to the religious use of the day—an allusion none the less valuable because incidental—is the direction of Paul in 1 Cor. 16 : 1, 2: ‘Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I have given order to the churches of Galatia, even so do ye. Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come.’ . . . The Corinthians were on that day to deposit their alms in a common treasury.”—Pp. 195, 196.

Paul's direction is, “Let every one of you lay by him in store;” Mr. Elliott says they were “to deposit their alms in a common treasury.” Now can a man lay by him in store, and deposit in a common treasury, the same money at the same time? If there are any, especially of those who keep Sunday, who think that it can be done, let them try it. Next Sunday, before you go to meeting, find out how God has prospered you, and set apart accordingly that sum of money which you will lay by you in store by depositing it in the common treasury of the church. Then as you go to church, take the money along, and when the collection box is passed, put in it that which you are going to lay by you in store; and the work is done! According to Mr. Elliott's idea, you have obeyed this scripture. That is, you have obeyed it by putting away from you the money which the scripture directs you to lay by you. You have put into the hands of others that which is to be laid by you. You have carried away and placed entirely beyond your control, and where you will never see it again, that which is to be laid by you in store. In other words, you have obeyed the scripture by directly disobeying it!

True, that is a novel kind of obedience; but no one need be surprised at it in this connection; for that is the only kind of obedience to the Scripture that can ever be shown by keeping Sunday as the Sabbath. The commandment of God says: “Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. . . . The seventh day is the Sabbath.” And people propose to obey that commandment by remembering the first day instead of the seventh. The word of God says: “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God, in it thou shalt not do any work;” and people who keep Sunday propose to obey that word by working all day on the day in which God says they shall do no work. And so it is in perfect accord with the principles of the Sunday-sabbath that Mr. Elliott should convey the idea that 1 Cor. 16 : 2 was obeyed by doing directly the opposite of what the text says.

But he seeks to justify his theory by the following remark:—

“That this laying in store did not mean a simple hoarding of gifts by each one in his own house, is emphatically shown by the reason alleged for the injunction, ‘that there be no gatherings [i. e. “collections,” the same word used in the first verse] when I come.’ . . . If the gifts had had to be collected from house to house, the very object of the apostle's direction would have failed to be secured.”

This reasoning might all be well enough if it were true. But there is no truth in it. This we know because Paul himself has told us just what he meant, and has shown us just what the Corinthians understood him to mean; and Mr. Elliott's theory is the reverse of Paul's record of facts. A year after writing the first letter to the Corinthians, Paul wrote the second letter; and in the second letter he makes explicit mention of this very “collection for the saints,” about which he had given these directions in the first letter. In the second letter (chap. 9 : 1-5), Paul writes:—

“For as touching the ministering to the saints, it is superfluous for me to write to you; for I know the forwardness of your mind, for which I boast of you to them of Macedonia, that Achaia was ready a year ago; and your zeal hath provoked very many. Yet have I sent the brethren, lest our boasting of you should be in vain on this behalf; that, as I said, ye may be ready; lest haply if they of Macedonia come with me, and find you unprepared, we (that we say not, ye) should be ashamed in this same confident boasting. Therefore I thought it necessary to exhort the brethren, that they would go before unto you, and make up beforehand your bounty, whereof ye had notice before, that the same might be ready as a matter of bounty and not as of covetousness.”

Now if Mr. Elliott's theory be correct, that the Corinthians were to deposit their alms in a common treasury each first day of the week, and if that was what Paul meant that they should do, then why should Paul think it “necessary” to send brethren before himself “to make up” this bounty, so “that it might be ready” when he came? If Mr. Elliott's theory be correct, what possible danger could there have been of these brethren finding the Corinthians “unprepared”? and why should Paul be afraid that they were unprepared? No; Mr. Elliott's theory and argument are absolutely false. In the first letter to the Corinthians (16 : 2), Paul meant just what he said, that on the first day of the week every one should “lay by him in store;” and the Corinthian Christians so understood it; and so likewise would every one else understand it, were it not that its perversion is so sorely essential in bolstering up the baseless fabric of the Sunday Lord's day. But the Corinthians, having no such thing to cripple or pervert their ability to understand plain language, understood it as it was written, and as Paul meant that they should understand it. Each one laid by him as directed; then when the time came for Paul to go by them and take their alms to Jerusalem, he sent brethren before to make up the bounty which had been laid by in store, so that it might be ready when he came. Therefore, 1 Cor. 16 : 2 gives no sanction whatever to the idea of meetings on the first day of the week.

And now after all his peregrinations in search of the origin of the first day of the week as the Lord's day, Mr. Elliott arrives at the following intensely logical deduction:—

“The selection of the Lord's day by the apostles as the one festival day of the new society seems so obviously natural, and even necessary, that when we join to these considerations the fact that it was so employed, we can no longer deny to the religious use of Sunday the high sanction of apostolic authority.”—P. 198.

All that we shall say to that is, that it is the best illustration that we have ever seen of the following rule, by Rev. Philetus Dobbs, D. D., for proving something when there is nothing with which to prove it. In fact, we hardly expected ever to find in “real life” an illustration of the rule; but Mr. Elliott's five-hundred-dollar-prize logic has furnished a perfect illustration of it. The rule is:—

“Prove the premise by the conclusion, and then prove the conclusion by the premise; proving A by B, and then proving B by A. And if the people believe the conclusion already (or think they do, which amounts to the same thing), and if you bring in now and then the favorite words and phrases that the people all want to hear, and that they have associated with orthodoxy, ‘tis wonderful what a reputation you will get as a logician.”

If Dr. Dobbs had offered a five-hundred-dollar prize for the best real example that should be worked out under that rule, we should give a unanimous, rising, rousing vote in favor of Rev. George Elliott and his “Abiding Sabbath” as the most deserving of the prize.

Yet with all this he finds “complete silence of the New Testament so far as any explicit command for the [Sunday] Sabbath or definite rules for its observance are concerned.” A New Testament institution, and in the New Testament neither command nor rules for its observance! Next week we shall notice how he accounts for such an anomaly.

A. T. J.