"SABBATH OR LORD'S DAY, WHICH?"
By Editor
THERE has been sent to us an article with the above title, clipped from the Christian Standard of September 2, 1893, with a request that we review some of its alleged points and arguments. The paper from which the article is taken is an organ of the Christian denomination, or, as they are sometimes called, "Campbellites," and we suppose that the writer, Mr. G. W. Tate, belongs to the same denomination. However, this matters little; we will let his arguments, proofs, and statements weigh in proportion to their merit. As the Bible, the word of God, is the professed "standard" of most Christians (we would that it were of all) we will weigh the question in its unerring scales. 1. Mr. Tate starts out with the statement that the Jews had four sabbaths, the seventh day, the seventh month, the seventh year, and the seventh sabbath of years, "and each sabbath was made sacred and holy." But Mr. Tate does not tell us where the record of the seventh-month sabbath is. The fact is, there was no whole month so kept. Certain days of the seventh month were holy (see Lev. 23: 24–36). And of the remaining sabbaths mentioned, but two were peculiarly Jewish, namely, the seventh year and the fiftieth year. The Jews really had seven annual sabbaths and feast days, as recorded in Leviticus 23, but these were distinct from "the Sabbaths of the Lord," the weekly Sabbath. See verse 38 compared with Ex. 20: 8–11. 2. He thus speaks of the first seventh day:— God blessed and sanctified the seventh day because he rested on that day from his work. Gen. 2:2. But we have no evidence here that the seventh day was given as a religious institution. If Gen. 2: 2, 3 does not constitute evidence, we do not know what could. Note the acts of God: (1) He rested, and that made it God's rest day. (2) He blessed the day. His blessing, doubtless, was over all his works, but he specially blessed that day above all the others, by putting into it himself; and what God blesses is blest. (3) He sanctified (or hallowed, Ex. 20: 11, the original word is the same) the day. Sanctify means to set apart, to appoint to a holy or sacred use. He set apart the day for a blessed day, and it was to be used by man for that purpose. When was man to so use and keep it?—In the beginning, when both Sabbath and man came from the hand of their Creator. Mark 2: 27, 28; Col. 1: 16. And these acts of God made the seventh day a holy day, God's blessed Sabbath. See the use of the word "sanctify" in the case of Mt. Sinai (Ex. 19: 23, 12), where God's own presence sanctified, or made holy, the mount, and which sanctification involved a command to the people. In Josh. 20: 7 we are told that God "sanctified" (margin, or "appointed") cities of refuge. What for?—For man to regulate and use as God commanded. In what stronger way could the Lord show that the day was a religious holy day? We have no evidence that it was used as a sacred day throughout the patriarchal age. We have sufficient evidence. But absence of evidence of this character does not prove the non-observance or non-obligation of an institution of God. The Sabbath is not mentioned from the days of Moses to the days of David, a period of over 400 years, yet no one doubts that it was kept during that time. Other moral precepts are not mentioned in Genesis, but all know they were observed by the faithful. If the government of the United States had issued but one gold dollar in the year 1781, and that dollar had been hidden away until now, the fact that men had lost sight of it would not affect its value. It would be worth its face now as then. Its non-circulation would not affect it. The only question to be settled would be the genuineness of the government stamp. The seventh-day Sabbath bears from the beginning the image and superscription of the Creator. The evidence is very clear in this case that the rulers [elders] were not accustomed to the Sabbath. And this doubtless was true. The Egyptians, whose slaves the Hebrews had been, were sun worshippers, and in Egypt, as in all sun-worshipping countries, the Sabbath was crushed out. The slaves were not allowed to keep the Sabbath. It was evidently attempted, for the old sun-worshipping king, or Pharaoh, whose very title indicated his idolatry, complained, "Behold, the people of the land now are many, and ye make them rest [Hebrew, shabath] from their burdens" (Ex. 5: 5); and, therefore, Pharaoh increased their burdens. It was because of this that the Lord, through Moses, demanded, "Let my people go, that they may serve me." Ex. 10: 3. And as soon as they were delivered, the Lord proved them by the Sabbath.100 5. Upon the fourth commandment Mr. Tate thus speaks:— Then, when the law was given, the Lord said, "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy." Ex. 20: 8. This is the first time it was enacted as a statutory law. God does not enact moral laws; they exist by the very nature of things; he simply proclaimed his constitution. It might as well be said that there were no prohibitions against idolatry, profanity, murder, theft, or adultery prior to the proclamation of the Decalogue on Sinai. Genesis is not a book of law, but a brief history of 2,500 years of the race, and God's providential dealings with them. But, brief as it is, it does show this: (1) That men were righteous, that is, they "walked with God" (Gen. 5: 22; 6: 9; 26: 5), thus showing perfect agreement with his character (Amos 3: 3). Now as God is righteous (John 17: 25)—"there is no unrighteousness in him" (Ps. 92: 15)—and as "all unrighteousness is sin" (1 John 5: 17), and "sin is the transgression of that law" (1 John 3: 4) which says, "Thou shalt not covet" (Rom. 7: 7), and as God is unchangeable in character (Ps. 89: 34; James 1: 17), it therefore follows that the law which point out sin is the eternal expression of God's character. And thus it is declared not only that his commandments are righteous (Ps. 119: 172), but the people that know righteousness are the people in whose hearts is God's law, and that his righteousness shall not be abolished (Isa. 51: 6, 7). This also Jesus declares, not even to one jot or tittle. (2) All God's law was in force from the beginning, and those who transgressed any principle of the Decalogue prior to its proclamation from Sinai, sinned. See transgression of second commandment, Gen. 35: 2; of fifth, 9: 22–25; of the seventh, 39: 9; of the eighth, 31: 19; of the sixth, 4: 8; of the fourth, Ex. 16: 26–28. Much more proof might be given. The existence of the sin implies necessarily the existence of the law. See Rom. 5: 12, 13. Therefore the Sabbath was as much a part of that law before Sinai as it was afterward. But, further, we have shown that the record of the institution of the Sabbath shows there must have been a law. On this point take the following from the celebrated German commentator, Lange:— If we had no other passage than this of Gen. 2: 3, there would be no difficulty in deducting from it a precept for the universal observance of a Sabbath, or seventh day, to be devoted to God as holy time by all of that race for whom the earth and its nature were specially prepared. The first man must have known it. The words, "He hallowed it," can have no meaning otherwise. They would be a blank unless in reference to some who were required to keep it holy. And all this the commandment states, not as then taking place, 2,500 years after the creation, but at the close of the creation week. God now takes his rest day and gives it to Israel to commemorate their rest from slavery in 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." Deut. 5: 15. Thus we see the Sabbath was given to the Jews for reasons that cannot be applied to other people. It had never been given as a law to any other people. Witness the following: "The Lord made not this covenant with our fathers, but with us, even us, who are all of us here alive this day." Deut. 5: 3. The Sabbath had never been revealed to them before they crossed the Red Sea. The prophet says: "Thou madest known unto them thy holy Sabbath, and commandedst them precepts, statutes, and laws, by the hand of Moses thy servant." Neh. 9: 14. The covenant here referred to is not God's covenant commanded (Deut. 4: 13), but the covenant made with Israel, to which Israel was a party, as recorded in Ex. 19: 5–8; 24: 3–8. The tables of the law were yet not given. We wonder why the objectors to the seventh-day Sabbath do not quote the commandment in showing the reason why God gave the Sabbath. The commandment shows that God gave the Sabbath as a memorial of creation. He has by it made "his wonderful works to be remembered." Ps. 111: 4. And as long as men remember the Sabbath of the Lord for the purpose for which God gave it, they will never forget God, their Creator. If man had never sinned, this would have been the sole purpose of the Sabbath as a token, the memorial of God's power in creation. But man fell and must be redeemed if saved at all. The redemption and salvation of man can be accomplished only by creative, almighty power, for the regeneration of man is recreation. See Eph. 2: 10; 4: 24; 2 Cor. 5: 17; Col. 1: 13; 3: 10. God through Christ is the great Creator and Re-creator and Redeemer. 1 Cor. 8: 6; Col. 1: 13–20; Isa. 45: 18, 21; 49: 26. Now the Lord, the Creator, the mighty One of Jacob, was the one who redeemed Israel from the bondage of Egypt. "The Lord brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt." Deut. 7: 8. The obligation to observe the Sabbath rested equally upon Israel with all the race in their duty to their Creator, and this is expressed in the fourth commandment; but now the mighty power of God, manifested in their deliverance from Egyptian bondage, demanded special gratitude and increased obligation to their Redeemer as well as Creator. It was in this twofold way that the Sabbath was made known—as declared by Nehemiah—as a memorial of God's power in creation, as a continual token of God's power in redemption. And so the Lord says in Eze. 20: 12: "Moreover also I gave them my Sabbaths, to be a sign between me and them, that they might know that I am the Lord that sanctify them." The Sabbath is a continual sign of the sanctifying, redeeming, recreating power of Christ continually manifest toward his people in saving and keeping them from sin. Therefore again the Lord says: "And hallow my Sabbaths; and they shall be a sign between me and you, that ye may know that I am the Lord your God." Eze. 20: 20. How much does God design to be the Lord our God? In creation alone?—Nay, but in eternal redemption or recreation. Isa. 66: 2, 23. Now all men owe God their allegiance because they belong to him by creation. Every genuine Christian will acknowledge that he is under additional obligation to God, because God has redeemed him from the bondage of the Egypt of sin, recreated him anew in Christ Jesus, and he will therefore regard with special delight God's rest day, the sign of that power which redeemed him and keeps him. The Sabbath was, therefore, instituted in the beginning, binding upon all men, and is now especially obligatory upon all who acknowledge the redemption which in is Christ Jesus. More of this in our next.