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Of Heathen Origin

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park, Washington, D. C. · Aug 29, 1912

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 89, No. 35.

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Of Heathen Origin

The Chicago Israelite speaks truly when it says that the Sunday sabbath is of heathen origin. In its issue of Aug. 3, 1912, it says:—
The Christian Advocate is somewhat taken back because not a single word of protest was uttered by Americans against running the Marathon race at Stockholm on the “Lord’s day.” It is indeed surprising that the Stockholm Olympic games were permitted to operate on Sunday. The Christian Advocate remarks that the “Olympic games originated in a festival to a heathen god.” Perhaps that journal has forgotten that Sunday originated out of a veneration for a heathen god. Sunday was not originally the day of the Son, but the day of the sun. It was the day sacred to Apollo, the sun-god, the dies veneris solis, the venerable day of the sun. Perhaps the men who arranged the Stockholm games knew that Sunday was of heathen origin just as they did that the Olympic games were of pagan source, and the eternal fitness of things suggested the utilizing of both to further the interest in the Marathon race.