THE SEVENTH DAY IS THE SABBATH.
By James H. Waggoner
It is always a pleasure to us to answer questions asked by those who are seeking for light. A friend in Tulare county sends the SIGNS to his kindred in Manchester, England, and has received the following which he kindly forwards to us:— "Mother has shown me one or two of the religious papers that you have sent her, and from them it seems that you keep Saturday for the Sabbath and call Sunday the first day. But I cannot find any reason for the change. Everyone understands that God rested on the seventh day and called it holy. But what I want to know is why you say that Sunday is the first day. Of course Saturday must be the seventh day if you begin with Sunday. A very good authority has the following for Sunday: 'The day anciently dedicated to the sun,' 'The Christian Sabbath.' "This I think conclusive enough that Sunday is the Sabbath and rest-day for all Christians as is undoubtedly generally recognized. I shall be glad, however, to hear your views on the subject, particularly the reasons why you do not begin the week with Monday." The reasons are easily given. There is no reason whatever for beginning the week on Monday. In this we are sustained by all authority, by the literature of every denomination and class, and by the practice of all nations. 1. The Jews, to whom the Sabbath was identified in Arabia by a succession of miracles constantly recurring for the period of forty years, have always kept the seventh day, the day known as Saturday. If the week were to begin on Monday, and if Sunday were the seventh day, then we should find the Jews keeping the Sunday, for the true seventh day was committed to them. This is conclusive. 2. We are not making any change, but are protesting, by every means, against a change which has been made from the seventh day to Sunday without any sufficient authority. We say without any sufficient authority, because the change is not by divine authority, and divine authority is alone sufficient for such a change. 3. The authority quoted in the letter is not at all conclusive that Sunday is the Sabbath. All authorities agree that the day anciently dedicated to the sun was the first day of the week—and not the seventh day, which the commandment of God enjoins. Ex. 20:8-11. We cannot tell to whom the letter refers, but similar words are found in Webster's Dictionary, Unabridged; but in this Webster calls the Sunday the first day of the week. We quote as follows under the word Sunday:— "So called because this day was anciently dedicated to the sun, or to its worship. The first day of the week; the Christian Sabbath." Under the word Sabbath, and on Sabbath observance, he says it "has been continued by the Christian church, with the transference of the day observed from the last to the first day of the week." And on the name Saturday, he says:— "Saturday, Lat. dies Saturni. The seventh or last day of the week; the day following Friday and preceding Sunday." On the names of the other days of the week he numbers them accordingly, in harmony with the present usual reckoning. Chambers' Encyclopedia gives explicit and important testimony to the same effect. On the word Sabbath we find this language:— "Hitherto we have spoken of the observance of Saturday, the day of rest prescribed to the Jews, and to which exclusively the name of the Sabbath-day was anciently applied, and still continues to be given by every nation but the English and its off-shoots. At what date the Sunday, or first day of the week, began to be generally observed by Christians as a stated time for religious meetings, we have no definite information either in the New Testament or in the writings of the Fathers of the church. By none of the Fathers before the 4th century is it identified with the Sabbath, nor is the duty of observing it grounded by them either on the fourth commandment, or on the precept or example of Jesus or his apostles." With this agree the words of Dr. Scott, in his Commentary. On Acts 20:7, he says, "it is evident that Christians were accustomed to assemble for worship on the first day of the week; but the change from the seventh to the first, appears to have been gradually and silently introduced, by example rather than by express precept." We cannot see the least evidence in Acts 20:7, of the existence of such a custom as that of which Dr. Scott speaks, because a single instance, without any declaration to sustain it, does not prove a custom. But our point of discussion now is to show that we are correct in calling Sunday, the day generally observed as the "Christian Sabbath," the first day of the week. Smith's Bible Dictionary calls Sunday the first day of the week. Kitto, in his Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature, speaks of those "who take their stand upon the primitive determination of the Sabbath to the seventh day, in commemoration of the creation, and who therefore hold that the Saturday or seventh day must remain, to all time, the day of rest." And so on; there is scarcely any limit to the authorities which may be cited to show that Saturday is the seventh day, and Sunday is the first day of the week. 4. The entire Christian world of Sunday-keepers agree in the belief that Christ rose from the dead on the first day of the week, and they agree that Sunday is kept to commemorate that event. We say there is no Scripture warrant for keeping it as a commemorative day; but it proves that they unitedly believe that Sunday is the first day of the week. See Luke 23:56, and 24:1; also Matt. 28:1, and Mark 16:1, 2. It is beyond question that the day called the Sabbath, in these texts, was identical with the day now observed by the Jews, and generally called Saturday; while the first day of the week is identical with Sunday. We could add any amount of evidence to the same effect, but it cannot be required. That point is fixed beyond a doubt. We would call the attention of the inquirer to two points in his letter. 1. He quotes somebody, whom he does not tell, where the Sunday is called the Christian Sabbath, and thinks this is sufficient to prove that it is so. But the proof is quite insufficient. No merely human authority can settle such a question. Paul says the holy Scriptures are given to thoroughly furnish the man of God "unto that all good works." 2 Tim. 3:15-17. While all evidence shows that Sunday is the first day of the week, and all Sunday-keeping people that the Sabbath has been transferred from the seventh to the first day, we appeal to the holy Scriptures for authority, "the only rule of faith and practice;" these alone settle questions of duty, and determine "good works." Do the Scriptures teach that the first day of the week is the Sabbath? They do not. They teach that the seventh day, and alone, is the Sabbath. We are prepared to give admissions, to any required amount, made by Sunday advocates, that the change is not taught in the Scriptures, but is derived from tradition. And we are prepared to show when and by what authority the change was made. Dr. Scott well says it was not by any direct precept, which it would be if found in the Scriptures. Changes of law must be plain, even as laws themselves must be. It is not by inference nor implication that we learn that the seventh day is the Sabbath. Jehovah plainly said it, and wrote it in stone. We think if he had desired to withdraw that declaration he would have made it known somewhere in the teachings of the prophets, or of Christ and his apostles. But no hint of a change is found in all these. 2. There is no such thing in the Scriptures as the "Christian Sabbath," either in name or institution. Custom warrants the use of the expression; but the Lord says, "the customs of the people are vain." So indeed is every custom which is not founded on the word of God. The sole authority for the observance of a weekly Sabbath, recognized alike by all acknowledging the obligation to observe a Sabbath, is the fourth commandment of the decalogue. But this points to the seventh day as the Sabbath or rest-day of Jehovah, and to the creation of the heavens and the earth as the occasion of its being instituted. As marriage, it ante-dates Christianity, and, as marriage, is to-day just what it was before the fall of man. Both standing in the immutable statutes of the Lord our God, though both perverted by our fallen race. Every "custom" which tends to abrogate, to change, or in any way to impair "one jot or tittle" of this law "is vain." Men have so far departed from the law of God that he has seen fit to send forth a special message to prepare his people for the revelation of his Son in the clouds of heaven, to warn them against popular errors in worship, and to bring them back to the simplicity of primitive truth where they shall "keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus." Rev. 14:9-12. We shall be pleased to hear again from the same inquirer.