BRO. HIMES:—I was forcibly struck while reading several tracts with which I met while on my passage from New-York to Hartford, with the apparent disingenuousness of the writer. One argument on which he seemed to lay great stress in support of the seventh-day Sabbath, was this,—that Sabbath means rest,—that the seventh day is called a Sabbath in the New Testament,—the first day is not so called, but is always designated the first day of the week.
The truth is,—and Sabbatarians either do or ought to know it,—the evangelists never in the language in which the gospels are found, (the Greek,) called the first day of the week anything else but Sabbath. For the information of those who are shaken in their minds on this subject, I will transcribe the Greek text in Italics, containing the words rendered by our translators first day of the week, and also the word rendered by them Sabbath, meaning the seventh day.
Matt. xxviii, 1—English translation: "In the end of the Sabbath, as it begins to dawn toward the first day of the week." Greek—Opse de sabbaton, te epiphooskuse eis mian sabbaton. There the identical word in the same case, genitive plural, rendered Sabbath when referring to the seventh day, is rendered first day of the week in the very next clause of the verse. A literal rendering would be, if we adopt the principle of our translators of Anglicising instead of translating the word,—"And in the end of Sabbaths, as it began to dawn toward one of Sabbath."
Does not this indicate that one series of Sabbaths there ended, so far as obligation to observe it was concerned, and a new series was introduced? At any rate, the first is as positively called Sabbath as the seventh day. And all four of the evangelists designate it by the same word. Mark. xvi, 2—Kai lian proi tes mias sabbaton—"And very early the one of Sabbaths," &c. Luke xxiv, 1—Te de mia toon sabbaton—"And the one of the Sabbaths," &c. John xx, 1—Te de mia toon sabbaton—"And in the one of the Sabbaths," &c. Thus the four evangelists do agree in calling the first by the same name they do the seventh day of the week, and that word as certainly signifies rest in the one case as in the other. Let no one, therefore, hereafter contend that the writers of the New Testament never call the first day, Sabbath, or rest, for no New Testament writer has called it anything else, except John, (Rev. i, 10,) where it is called the "Lord's day." J. LITCH.
Philadelphia, July 16th, 1851.
REMARKS.—Lest any should gather from the above that the word Sabbath is represented by the phrase "first day of the week," we add that Sabbath is simply translated week in those texts—other words indicating the day of the week. The word Sabbath is originally a Hebrew word, and signifies rest; but occurring at regular intervals, by a metonymy it became significant of the periods separated by these rests. So that we have the seventh day of the rest, and the first day of the rest, week, or Sabbath.—ED. [Advent Herald.