SATURDAY OR SUNDAY by Editor

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Mar 17, 1887

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 13, No. 11.

"SATURDAY OR SUNDAY."

By Editor

THIS is the title of a four-page leaflet having a subtitle, "A Letter to Seventh-day Believers." It was written by Mrs. J. C. Bateham, "Supt. Sabbath Observance Department, N. W. C. T. U." We give it a place in the SIGNS in compliance with the request which accompanied it, to "Please publish." The letter is as follows:—

DEAR CHRISTIAN FRIENDS: Many of you I know and love as conscientious Christian workers in our Woman's Christian Temperance Union and elsewhere, and greatly respect for your self-sacrificing devotion to principle. I desire your earnest co-operation in efforts to save a weekly Sabbath for our beloved country, that without it must sink to heathenism and ruin. One of your own writers, N. V. Hull, says: "By common consent, the weekly Sabbath is a necessary institution. It is in the interest of both civilization and religion, and the world without it would be in darkness and confusion. The loss of the Sabbath would be irreparable." Yet to-day, so strong is the tide of Sabbath desecration, so determined, cunning, and successful the opposition from the liquor traffic and other Sabbath foes, that apparently only the united and earnest efforts of Christians can preserve it.

Surely no Christian should be found on the side of its enemies. Would that we might see eye to eye on the question that divides us, for it is a simple one: Does the Sabbath-day of the Bible necessarily fall on Saturday? We think not.

In Eden, God set apart and blessed a day, not the seventh of time, but the seventh day, as the Holy Sabbath, but we claim that no man can possibly tell on what day of the week that first Sabbath fell, since their names are not revealed. God's days were doubtless long ages—æons, during six of which the creation was finished, so that all earthly time is a part of God's Sabbath in which he rests from creative work. The Sabbath was instituted after Eve was created. Time is reckoned from Adam's first day, but how much of that sixth æon Adam had lived before Eve's creation, there is no record. His creation was apparently toward the close, yet he lived single long enough to make the acquaintance of every living thing and give to each a name expressive of its peculiarities, and to find that not one was a suitable companion. Then he slept and Eve was created.

The next day was the Sabbath. It was Eve's first day, not seventh. Who shall tell how many days or weeks Adam had lived? If the particular day on which that Sabbath fell was important, God surely would have made it plain. The fair inference is that the particular day is immaterial. God worked six of his days, then rested one. Man too was to labor six days then rest one. First-day Christians as literally

follow Genesis as do seventh-day believers, not excepting the hour of beginning the day, for our Revised Version says simply of each day, "There was evening and there was morning." These days being æons the phrase is figurative. A day's work is ended, a rest as of night follows. Then with the light a new day begins. Nature's division of time was followed. The phrase is not repeated for the seventh day, since the morning of verse 21 [31] is the dawning of the seventh, showing the sixth complete.

Later in Israelitish history, the observance of Sabbath was apparently and of necessity lost during the 400 years of bitter Egyptian bondage among a people who measured their time by tens instead of sevens; and Moses apparently re-instituted it by God's command, at the exodus on the day that just one week previous had been used for a long march by God's command. Ex. 14. Perhaps God designed thus to show that the particular day was immaterial.

The fourth commandment at Sinai again enjoins the holy keeping of the seventh day as Sabbath, without telling on what day by name that seventh day fell, and as it had been changed once and may have been changed, or lost, at other times before or after the flood, we can only infer that God commands a day—a whole day—kept holy, and this day shall follow six of work, and thus be the seventh day. The Jewish nation as such had its beginning at the exodus, when God re-instituted the Sabbath on a new day partly in memory of that exodus and their birth as a nation. Deut. 5: 15.

The Eden Sabbath was for all mankind to the end of time. Day not known. The Jews since the exodus, so far as we know, have observed Saturday as their Sabbath. Christian nations observe Sunday. When was the change made? No one knows positively, nor is it at all important, as we believe. Had it been of consequence we should have definite information. Proof is abundant that Sunday was observed as Sabbath long before Emperor Constantine, and before the Papal Church had a beginning, with strong evidence that during the first few centuries both Saturday and Sunday were observed by believers, presumptive evidence that the change must have required high if not the highest authority, and to my mind satisfactory proof of apostolic usage.

Again, we know it is a geographical impossibility for persons living in different parts of the world to observe the same hour as holy time. There is a gradual change extending over twenty-four hours, till on adjacent Alaskan islands the Sunday of one is the Saturday of the other. Which, if either, is the Sabbath of Eden or the exodus, who can tell? More than nine-tenths of the Christian world insist that it is contrary to the spirit of Christianity to be thus bound by the letter (the Jewish usage of the seventh day) when every requirement of the Eden Sabbath or the fourth commandment is as fully met by those who keep their seventh day on Sunday as Saturday.

The tendency of all Christian growth is toward dropping non-essentials and toward fellowship. The essentials to salvation are the atonement, repentance, and faith. The form of baptism or church government, or the day we celebrate, is certainly not essential to salvation. Success in saving souls and doing Christ's work, shows God's hearty co-operation with all. Let us be like-minded. "That they all may be one," is our Saviour's prayer, not all Baptists or Methodists, but one in love and devotion. To this end, agreement in essentials—charity in non-essentials. Is there hope that Saturday will be generally adopted as the Christian Sabbath? Apparently not. Then if the day is a non-essential, but the Sabbath of vast importance, there should be hearty co-operation to secure it.

But you say, How can we support Sabbath laws that oppress us? Exceptions should be made for certain classes. It should be sufficient defense to a prosecution for servile labor the first day of the week, that "the defendant uniformly keeps another day of the week as holy time and does not labor upon that day, and that the labor complained of was done in such manner as not to interrupt or disturb other people in observing the first day of the week as a day of rest and religious worship." With this exception our present laws are, if well enforced, usually satisfactory. In some States they need revision.

Law cannot control religious belief or give us a religious Sabbath. It should give us a civil Sabbath, that is, a non-legal one, wherein governmental and public business shall be suspended, and all labor and recreation so far restrained as not to interfere with the enjoyment of a religious Sabbath by those who wish it. This is all we ask and less would not protect the Sabbath. Such a law would be burdensome to those who have already abstained from labor one day, but could not violate their conscience, and with the above proviso the burden would be light as possible.

This burden we ask you to bear from love to God and religion and from motives of patriotism. The irreligious with false notions of personal liberty, object to having their rights infringed upon on any day of the week, but we answer, law must consult the greatest good of the greatest number, and the same rule applies to us all. If we cannot see alike, let us credit each other with candor, honesty, and a desire to obey the Lord of the Sabbath, and may none of us be found shrinking from any self-denial by which we may help preserve the Sabbath, and thus help save a world that Christ loved even unto death.

COMMENTS ON THE ABOVE.

The sum of the above letter is this: Nine-tenths of the Christian world insist that it is wrong to rest upon the seventh day of the week, therefore those who believe that it is right so to do ought to throw aside their conscientious convictions and join with the nine-tenths of the Christian world in forcing the non-Christian world to adopt a certain form of religion. The appeal for help from the seventh-day observers is based on the attempted argument to show that Saturday is not the Sabbath, and therefore we will briefly notice the positions taken by Mrs. Bateham.

1. The claim is made that in Eden God set apart and blessed the Sabbath-day, which was no day in particular. Says the writer:—

"God's days were doubtless long ages—æons, during six of which the creation was finished, so that all earthly time is a part of God's Sabbath, in which he rests from creative work."

The word "doubtless" means, "without doubt or question; unquestionable." A thing that is so well established that there is no chance for question in regard to it, must be able to present a long array of positive proof. We look around for the proof that the days of creation were long ages, but we find none at all. All that we have ever heard offered is the vain imaginations of skeptical devotees of science falsely so-called, who ignore the agency of an almighty God in creation, and assert that it is impossible that the world should have been created in six literal days. The great body of professed Christians, fearing lest they should be thought ignorant of the "latest deductions of modern science," have hastened to accept this baseless theory of infidel geologists and evolutionists, forgetting that by so doing they were either limiting the power of God, or else ignoring him as Creator. The idea that the world was formed during long ages of time, is a modern device gotten up expressly for the purpose of avoiding the necessity of admitting the power of God. To be sure, some who hold to this theory admit that God had something to do with creation, that is, that he started it, and that after he had brought protoplasm into existence, the rest of the work did itself. But the logical result of the whole theory is to deny that God had anything to do with the creation of the world.

One thing is certain, and that is, that it is no greater tax of faith to believe that God created the world in six literal days, than to suppose that he took six thousand or six million years. The Bible says that in six days God created the heaven and the earth, and we believe it. The first chapter of Genesis informs us plainly what kind of days these days were. They were days composed of an evening and a morning, that is, a dark part and a light part. This succession of light and darkness is caused only by the revolution of the earth on its axis. Those who hold to the æon theory, would confer a favor by telling us what there is besides the revolution of the earth on its axis which causes the succession of light and darkness on the earth, and also how much of each long period was dark and how much was light. Moreover, those days were such days as the sun and moon were made to rule over. See Gen. 1:14-19. Will Mrs. Bateham kindly inform us whether the sun and moon here referred to are the same bodies with which we are so familiar? And if they are, how does it happen that now they rule over days of just twenty-four hours' length, instead of long periods of time?

We are told that "all earthly time is a part of God's Sabbath in which he rests from creative work." That is to say, that the present time is God's Sabbath-day. Let us see how well this agrees with the Scripture. In Gen. 2:2, 3 we read that God rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made, and that God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, "because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made." This brings to view a Sabbath rest completed before the blessing was pronounced upon it. God blessed the seventh day because that in it he had rested. This simple statement of the Bible brushes away all the speculations of men, as an elephant would brush away a cobweb from his path. When the Bible says that God's rest upon the seventh day was in the past, and that he blessed it and sanctified it because he had rested, we care nothing for the human conjecture that God's Sabbath-day is all earthly time.

Once more, the fourth commandment refers to the work of creation as recorded in the first chapter of Genesis, and repeats the statements found in Gen. 2:2, 3. There we learn that we are commanded to rest upon the seventh day because God did so. To sanctify means "to appoint," as in Joel 1:14. And thus we understand the fourth commandment and Gen. 2:3 to read that God blessed the seventh day and appointed it for man's observance, because that in it he had rested from all his work. And this allows no other conclusion but that the seventh day which man is commanded to observe, is of the same length as that upon which God rested.

It seems that Mrs. Bateham is a little confused in her own mind as to this matter, for in the same paragraph in which she says that all earthly time is a part of God's Sabbath, she also says, "We claim that no man can possibly tell on what day of the week that first Sabbath fell." It would indeed puzzle almost anybody to tell on what day of the week "the whole period of earthly time" falls. The less cannot include the greater; and if "the whole period of earthly time" should fall on one day of the week, it would crush it to almost as attenuated proportions as Mrs. Bateham's Sabbath argument. She says also that time is reckoned from Adam's first day, but of how much of that sixth æon Adam had lived before Eve's creation, there is no record. Then she says: "The next day was the Sabbath; it was Eve's first day, not seventh day." She has already told us that that Sabbath-day is all earthly time, yet she says, "If the particular day upon which that Sabbath fell is important, God would surely have made it plain." So we have two views offered us: One is that Adam and Eve died sometime in that seventh day, and that Adam did not live 930 years, but only a part of two days; also that Eve was created and died within the compass of that seventh day, so that it was not only her first day, but her last day. And then coming down to the literal reckoning of time, we are told that the seventh day was Eve's first day. Thus it is implied that each individual must begin to reckon time for the observance of the Sabbath from the day following his birth. And yet we are requested to join in a movement compelling all people to rest on Sunday, because it is claimed that that is the true Sabbath day. Does Mrs. Bateham believe that everyone was born on Saturday?

THE SABBATH NOT LOST.

2. Then we are told that the observance of the Sabbath was of necessity lost during the Egyptian bondage, because the Egyptians measured their time by tens instead of by sevens. That is as much as to say that if nine-tenths of the people should reckon their time by tens it would be impossible for the other tenth to reckon by sevens. There is not the slightest evidence that the Sabbath was ever lost. It is very probable, however, that the Jews were compelled to labor on the Sabbath during a part, at least, of their Egyptian bondage; but God delivered them from that bondage in order that they might keep his Sabbath; and even allowing that they had lost all knowledge of the day, they certainly had full knowledge of it after God made it known to them in the wilderness. Moses did not re-enact the Sabbath, but he himself said, "See, for that the Lord hath given you the Sabbath." Ex. 16:29. Mrs. Bateham says that "Moses apparently re-instituted it by God's command, at the exodus on the day that just one week previous had been used for a long march by God's command. Ex. 14." It is quite evident to our mind that Mrs. Bateham has not studied the Sabbath question very extensively; for Ex. 14 says nothing about any long march made by the Israelites, except their passage of the Red Sea, which was made in the night, and it says nothing about the Sabbath; neither does that chapter nor any other say anything about the Sabbath being re-instituted by Moses. With these three exceptions, her statement is correct.

Mrs. Bateham says that although the fourth commandment enjoins the keeping of the seventh day as the Sabbath, we cannot tell when it comes, because that day is not mentioned by name; and that "it had been changed once, and must have been changed or lost at other times before or after the flood;" and that consequently "we can only infer," etc. What a delightfully indefinite foundation she has laid upon which to build and enforce the observance of a definite Sunday. But the Sabbath of the fourth commandment is the same as that of creation; so it was not changed, and although the Sabbath "might have been lost," we know full well that it never was lost. It was kept constantly before the Israelites. Dire calamities were threatened them in case they should neglect its observance, and they were finally carried into captivity as a punishment for breaking the Sabbath. No one who believes in the justice of God can claim that he would punish his people for neglecting to observe a day which had been lost. After the Babylonian captivity the Jews never again relapsed into idolatry, and when Christ came he recognized the day which they were observing as the Sabbath. Mrs. Bateham herself allows that the Sabbath has not been lost since that time, because she makes a claim for uninterrupted Sunday observance from that time to this. And so we are sure that the seventh day which we observe is the day which God sanctified in Eden. Neither is it true that when the seventh day was set apart it was not named. God said, "The seventh day is the Sabbath." That is the name,—"seventh day."

SUNDAY AND THE 'MAN OF SIN.'

3. A feeble attempt is made to rescue Sunday from its papal parentage, the only argument against its being a Papal institution being that it was observed before the Emperor Constantine, and before the Catholic Church had a beginning. The same argument would prove that purgatory, prayers for the dead, and the sign of the cross, are not Papal institutions, because they were in the Christian church long before the time of Constantine. The fact that Sunday was observed from a comparatively early period, is no more evidence of divine authority for it, than is the fact that the sign of the cross was practiced by Christians in the second century, and that images were worshiped by Christians as early as the third century, any evidence that the apostles enjoined these ceremonies. It may not take much evidence to satisfy Mrs. Bateham, but if she wishes to convince seventh-day believers that Sunday is the Sabbath, she will have to give direct and positive statements of Scripture and not "presumptive evidence." In a matter of this kind, we dare not presume.

But we will leave the Sabbath argument and notice briefly the plea for a civil law. On this we will say first, that Sunday legislation has not the slightest connection with the temperance cause, even though the Women's Christian Temperance Union has gone aside from its legitimate work to form a "Sabbath Observance Department." A man may observe Sunday strictly and be an intemperate man still. He may be a strict temperance man and not regard any day as the Sabbath. Sunday legislation is in the interest of Sunday alone, and not of temperance. Those who observe the seventh day of the week are uniformly temperance people, but they do not believe that shutting up liquor saloons one day in the week would make any diminution of the cursed liquor traffic. Whenever it is proposed to submit to the people a constitutional amendment entirely prohibiting the sale of liquor, we promise that seventh-day observers will, to a man, work with them. We believe it is a crime to sell intoxicating liquors, and we would have it prohibited just as the promiscuous sale of other poisons is prohibited. And if it is only in the interests of temperance that Sunday legislation is asked for, then entire prohibition would secure that end.

Second. It is idle to talk of the enforcement of Sunday as a civil institution. Sunday, although not a divine institution, is a religious institution. Its religious character was given to it by human authority; nevertheless, since it was appointed by "the church," it is primarily and wholly a religious institution. Now under whatever pretext Sunday observance is enforced, it will be a fact that the State is enforcing the observance of a religious custom. The day cannot be separated from its churchly connection any more than a man can be separated from his character. So that to ask us to unite with them in securing laws in favor of Sunday, is simply asking us to help make laws to enforce the observance of Sunday as the Sabbath, when it has no shadow of claim to be regarded as the Sabbath.

Third. Sunday legislation is not Sabbath legislation. We believe in working for the upbuilding of the Sabbath, but we cannot do it by working for Sunday. It does not matter if the majority do regard Sunday as the Sabbath, that does not make it the Sabbath. As well might the Chinese say to the few missionaries who are in that empire, "There is no hope that Jehovah will ever be generally accepted in this empire as God, then why not join with us in enforcing the worship of Joss, that thus we may work together in unison for the universal worship of deity?" The missionaries would justly say, "There is no God but one, and it is not enough that people should worship some being, but if they would offer true worship they must recognize God who made the heaven and the earth." They would readily recognize the fact that they would not be working in the interest of morality if they should attempt simply to secure the worship of some deity whom the majority would recognize, and not worship God. And so we say if we should engage with our sisters of the National Temperance Union in attempting to secure Sunday laws, we should not be working for the Sabbath.

It is not enough to be told that we will be allowed to rest upon the seventh day; the question is, Would we be allowed our God-given privilege of laboring on the first day? The answer is that they would allow us to work a little. They purpose to make the burden upon us "as light as possible." This in itself is an admission that they know that the enforcement of a Sunday law will work injustice to some. Now the law is not simply for the greatest good to the greatest number, but it is for equal justice to all. A law that works injustice to a single individual is an unjust law. A law that cannot be observed by every individual of the commonwealth, without someone being deprived of the privileges which God allows him to enjoy, has no business to be enacted.

We are willing to give Mrs. Bateham and all her sisters of the Temperance Union, credit for honesty of purpose. We are willing to grant that as an association they would not desire to see a single individual oppressed for the observance of the seventh day. But no matter how kind their intentions may be, when their law is once enacted, their power over it ceases. Then the most bigoted and benighted individual in the country has the power to secure its enforcement, and while they would not wish to injure anyone who observes the Sabbath of the Lord, and might wish to enforce it simply upon non-professors, they could not hinder the bigot from securing its enforcement upon all, thus making it a means of wreaking his spite upon those who differ with him in religious belief.

More than this, we would not work with them for the enactment of a Sunday law, if we could have a bond given by them collectively and individually, assuring us that they would not only grant us immunity from punishment for laboring on Sunday, but would secure us against all possible molestation. The reason why is this: Sunday is not the Sabbath; it has no claim to be so regarded; the seventh day (Saturday) is the Sabbath of the Lord; God has given a solemn and emphatic command that it should be kept; and we regard it as our imperative duty to enlighten people concerning the nature and obligation of the Sabbath. Now if we should join in a movement to secure the civil recognition of Sunday,

we should be only nullifying our efforts to induce men to regard the seventh day and that only as the Sabbath. It would be an agreement on our part to assist in forging chains for others, providing we could be allowed to go free, and would be an announcement to the world that while we ourselves purposed to keep the seventh day, we did not regard it as necessary that other people should do so. But we do regard it as of vital importance to keep the seventh day according to the commandment of God, and although but few may listen to the teaching of the Bible on this subject, that does not absolve us from our duty to teach the truth, not alone by our words, but by our acts.

We repeat: We are willing and even anxious to join in any purely temperance work, but even the so-called "Sabbath Observance Department of the National Women's Christian Temperance Union" cannot make us believe that Sunday is the Sabbath, nor beguile us into working for a Sunday law under the guise of temperance. "Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird." Prov. 1:17.