A NEW REMEDY FOR AN OLD DIFFICULTY.
"Hengstenberg on the Lord's Day."
In the January number of the Bibliotheca Sacra, we find a notice of the pamphlet of Hengstenberg, in which he discusses the Sabbath question. The reviewer has given a brief synopsis of the argument; one or two items of which are worthy of being placed on record, as rare specimens of biblical interpretation. These arguments do not seem altogether satisfactory to the reviewer; and yet he suggests, "It may well prompt us to review, if not to revise, the grounds on which we have been wont to justify our observance of the Sabbath." From such a conclusion, of so high authority, we would be led to suppose that the German divine had discovered some new truth in biblical science, that had heretofore escaped the notice of New England theologians. Should it result in revising the theology of the Edwardean school of theologians, much of the glory that has clustered around the brow of the late lamented Dr. Edwards, for his zeal in promoting Sunday observance, will pass away. We have no right to suppose, that Dr. Edwards had any doubt of the soundness of his views upon the Sabbath question, nor yet that those of like sentiments with him have held the dogmas of their faith as questionable, and subject to a radical revision. The strength of the argument, by which theologians have sought to sanctify Sunday, and on which its observance as a Sabbath is based, may be determined by the argument which is likely to overthrow it. The following is given as the basis of the doctrine of Hengstenberg:— "He holds the Sabbath to be purely a Mosaic institution. He insists that there is not the slightest evidence of its observance before the time of Moses. The account of the creation bears decidedly an Israelitic stamp. God's labor and rest are made typical of our duty. This is anticipative of the giving of the law. This notice of the Sabbath pre-supposes the fall and its curse. The conduct of the Israelites in the desert, before the giving of the law, shows that the institution was entirely novel to them. With the giving of the law, obligation to keep the Sabbath commences; for the Sabbath had no existence as an institution before. The decalogue35is inseparably connected with the whole Mosaic economy. It stands and falls with the ceremonial law. But its spirit and divine sanction remain under the New Testament. The rest of the Sabbath is not the end of its institution, but a means to that end, and of the greatest importance to the observance of the day, to life in God, and the permanence of the church." When it is gravely proposed to make the above antinomian basis the occasion of a revision of Christian theology, we respectfully suggest that it be tried by the word of God. To make out this basis, the author has to combine absolute contradictions. In one sentence he seals the doom of the moral law with the ceremonial. In the next, he says, "its spirit and its divine sanction remain under the New Testament." Whence, we ask, arises the necessity of destroying an institution whose "spirit and divine sanction remain"? What has been destroyed, while so much remains! If the spirit and divine sanction of the law of the Sabbath remain, it all remains. And the great labor of the great theologian, has its counterpart in the throes of the mountain which brought forth a mouse. It was a useless labor; for, in the death and resurrection of the Sabbath, which he has so wonderfully accomplished, he, unfortunately for his purpose, has found no place for the introduction of the first for the seventh day. This whole basis has its foundation in the necessity of justifying a sentiment which has found its way into the creeds and practices of theologians. That sentiment is the one which teaches that the first day of the week is the Christian Sabbath. No person ever obtained his conviction of a change of the Sabbath from the word of God. Nor did the no-Sabbath sentiment ever come from that Holy Book. Theologians have opened their eyes, and found themselves keeping the first day of the week. They have opened the Bible, and found that declaring, "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." And because they were lovers of themselves more than God, they have sought to destroy the authority of the law of the Sabbath, and justify themselves in their practices. It is amusing, while it is an occasion of the deepest sorrow, to see the theories that have been started to evade God's law, and justify the practices of the church. They are of every cast and form possible, and only lack the authority of God to make them good. While we laugh at the sophistical, ludicrous, and contradictory theories held up to us, we most sincerely and prayerfully pity those who make them their guide. Hengstenberg misconceived altogether the nature and object of the Sabbath, when he said, "The rest of the Sabbath is not the end of its institution, but a means to that end, and of the greatest importance to the observance of the day, to life in God, and the permanence of the church." The very concise, plain language in which the institution is given, shows that the object of the Sabbath was and is by its rest to commemorate the creation. This is the reason, and only reason, given for its establishment. Thus the Sabbath, in its weekly recurrence, is a standing rebuke against infidelity in its atheistic form. Hengstenberg and his sympathizers rob themselves of the strongest argument against atheism, when they rob the Sabbath of its original character; and yet, for the support of their practice in desecrating "God's holy day," they readily do it. Were they in the observance of the Bible Sabbath, they could say each week, to all gainsayers, Behold in the Sabbath instituted at creation, and observed by Christians, a constant rebuke of your infidelity. Another important declaration in the argument of the German divine is, "The transfer of its (the Sabbath's) observance to the first day of the week, rests on the authority of the church, which, however, can absolutely effect no more than create a favorable judgment." Such a declaration, from one so high in the theological world, is indeed refreshing. Ye humble few disciples of Christ who have so oft re-iterated the above assertion, take courage. There is now high authority in the church for what you have dared to assert, that the first day of the week has only human authority for its observance. Well does the reviewer of Hengstenberg ask, "If the law of the Sabbath is perpetual as law, where is the authority for transferring its observance to another day? Can the authority of the church alter such a law of God? No such laws regulating external observance are given to the free church of the New Testament." We italicize the last sentence. It is a precious one. It is most truthful and in place. With Hengstenberg and his reviewers, we have the truths, that the change of the Sabbath from the seventh to the first day of the week rests upon the authority of the church, and that no such authority is vested in the church. After the trial of all remedies, the old difficulty remains. The church can not dispense with a Sabbath. It is essential to its prosperity. It is a necessary fact of Christianity. And yet one class of theologians would destroy the law of the Sabbath, because it specifies the seventh day and not the first as holy time, and then, to give the church the necessary benefit of a Sabbath, introduce a new day, and make a Sabbath of it. Another denies the authority of the church to make such a change, and insists upon the authority of the Sabbath law, but robs it of its authority as law by so changing its phraseology as to absolutely destroy its sense. Thus theological speculations destroy the Sabbath, and bring it to life again—change it, and make it the same—deny its authority, and acknowledge its necessity—destroy it absolutely, and acknowledge its spirit and divine sanction. Poor thing! How roughly it is treated, and how kindly caressed—how ruthlessly it is dissected, and kindly nursed. How it is owned and denied—changed, modified, strangled, revised, reviewed, revived, for the sake of giving sanction to the day that man has appointed for it, instead of the one God named, blessed, sanctified, and made perpetual. If theologians would receive the law as God gave it, and use the Sabbath for the purpose for which he appointed it, then would all difficulties and speculations about it cease.—Sab. Recorder.