EARLY FIRST-DAY OBSERVANCE.
By John Nevins Andrews
IN our examination of the writings of the earliest observers of Sunday we will next quote the epistle to the Magnesians in its longer form, which though not written by Ignatius was actually written about the time that the Apostolical Constitutions were committed to writing. Here are the words of this epistle:— "And after the observance of the Sabbath, let every friend of Christ keep the Lord's day as a festival, the resurrection day, the queen and chief of all the days." The writer of the Syriac Documents concerning Edessa comes last, and he defines the services of Sunday as follows: "On the first [day] of the week, let there be service, and the reading of the Holy Scriptures, and the oblation." These are all the passages in the writings of the first three centuries which describe early first-day observance. Let the reader judge whether we have correctly stated the nature of that observance. Next we invite attention to the several reasons offered by these fathers for celebrating the festival of Sunday. The reputed epistle of Barnabas supports the Sunday festival by saying that it was the day "on which Jesus rose again from the dead," and it intimates that it prefigures the eighth thousand years, when God shall create the world anew. Justin Martyr has four reasons:— 1. "It is the first day on which God, having wrought a change in the darkness and matter, made the world," 2. "Jesus Christ our Saviour on the same day rose from the dead." 3. "It is possible for us to show how the eighth day possessed a certain mysterious import, which the seventh day did not possess, and which was promulgated by God through these rites," i. e., through circumcision. 4. "The command of circumcision, again, bidding [them] always circumcise the children on the eighth day, was a type of the true circumcision, by which we are circumcised from deceit and iniquity through Him who rose from the dead on the first day after the Sabbath." Clement, of Alexandria, appears to treat solely of a mystical eighth day or Lord's day. It is perhaps possible that he has some reference to Sunday. We therefore quote what he says in behalf of this day, calling attention to the fact that he produces his testimony, not from the Bible, but from a heathen philosopher. Thus he says:— "And the Lord's day Plato prophetically speaks of in the tenth book of the Republic, in these words: 'And when seven days have passed to each of them in the meadow on the eighth day they are to set out and arrive in four days.'" Clement's reasons for Sunday are found outside the Scriptures. The next father will give us a good reason for Clement's action in this case. Tertullian is the next writer who gives reasons for the Sunday festival. He is speaking of "offerings for the dead," the manner of Sunday observance, and the use of the sign of the cross upon the forehead. Here is the ground on which these observances rest:— "If, for these and other such rules, you insist upon having positive Scripture injunction, you will find none. Tradition will be held forth to you as the originator of them, custom, as their strengthener, and faith, as their observer. That reason will support tradition, and custom, and faith, you will either yourself perceive, or learn from one who has." Tertullian's frankness is to be commended. He had no Scripture to offer, and he acknowledges the fact. He depended on tradition, and he was not ashamed to confess it. The next of the fathers who give Scripture evidence in support of the Sunday festival, is Origen. Here are his words:— "The manna fell on the Lord's day, and not on the Sabbath to show the Jews that even then the Lord's day was preferred before it." Origen seems to have been of Tertullian's judgment as to the inconclusiveness of the arguments adduced by his predecessors. He therefore coined an original argument which seems to have been very conclusive in his estimation as he offers this alone. But he must have forgotten that the manna fell on all the six working days, or he would have seen that while his argument does not elevate Sunday above the other five working days, it does make the Sabbath the least reputable day of the seven! And yet the miracle of the manna was expressly designed to set forth the sacredness of the Sabbath and to establish its authority before the people.463Cyprian is the next father who gives an argument for the Sunday festival. He contents himself with one of Justin's old arguments, viz., that one drawn from circumcision. Thus he says:— "For in respect of the observance of the eighth day in the Jewish circumcision of the flesh, a sacrament was given beforehand in shadow and in usage; but when Christ came, it was fulfilled in truth. For because the eighth day, that is, the first day after the Sabbath, was to be that on which the Lord should rise again, and should quicken us, and give us circumcision of the Spirit, the eighth day, the first day after the Sabbath, and the Lord's day, went before in the figure; which figure ceased when by and by the truth came, and spiritual circumcision was given to us." Such is the only argument adduced by Cyprian in behalf of the first-day festival. The circumcision of infants when eight days old was, in his judgment, a type of infant baptism. But circumcision on the eighth day of the child's life, in his estimation, did not signify that baptism need to be deferred till the infant is eight days old, but, as here stated, did signify that the eighth day was to be the Lord's day! But the eighth day, on which circumcision took place, was not the first day of the week, but the eighth day of each child's life, whatever day of the week that might be. The next father who gives a reason for celebrating Sunday as a day of joy, and refraining from kneeling on it, is Peter of Alexandria, who simply says, "Because on it he rose again." Next in order came the Apostolical Constitutions, which assert that the Sunday festival is a memorial of the resurrection:— "But keep the Sabbath, and the Lord's day festival; because the former is a memorial of the creation, and the latter of the resurrection." The writer, however, offers no proof that Sunday was set apart by divine authority in memory of the resurrection. But the next person who gives his reasons for keeping Sunday "as a festival" is the writer of the longer form of the reputed epistle of Ignatius to the Magnesians. He finds the eighth day prophetically set forth in the title to the sixth and twelfth psalms! In the margin, the word Sheminith is translated "the eighth." Here is this writer's argument for Sunday:— "Looking forward to this, the prophet declared, 'To the end for the eighth day,' on which our life both sprang up again, and the victory over death was obtained in Christ." There is yet another of the fathers of the first three centuries who gives the reasons then used in support of the Sunday festival. This is the writer of the Syriac Documents concerning Edessa. He comes next in order and closes the list. Here are four reasons:— 1. "Because on the first day of the week our Lord rose from the place of the dead."
2. "On the first day of the week he arose upon the world," i. e., he was born upon Sunday.
3. "On the first day of the week he ascended up to Heaven."
5. "On the first day of the week he will appear at last with the angels of Heaven." The first of these reasons is as good a one as man can devise out of his own heart for doing what God never commanded; the second and fourth are mere assertions of which mankind know nothing; while the third is a positive untruth, for the ascension was upon Thursday. We have now presented every reason for the Sunday festival which can be found in all the writings of the first three centuries. Though generally very trivial, and sometimes worse than trivial, they are nevertheless worthy of careful study. They constitute a decisive testimony that the change of the Sabbath by Christ or by his apostles from the seventh to the first day of the week was absolutely unknown during that entire period. But were it true that such change had been made they must have known it. Had they believed that Christ changed the Sabbath to commemorate his resurrection, how emphatically would they have stated that fact instead of offering reasons for the festival of Sunday which are so worthless as to be, with one or two exceptions, entirely discarded by modern first-day writers. Or had they believed that the apostles honored Sunday as the Sabbath or Lord's day, how would they have produced these facts in triumph! But Tertullian said that they had no positive Scripture injunction for the Sunday festival, and the others, by offering reasons that were only devised in their own hearts, corroborated his testimony, and all of them together establish the fact that even in their own estimation the day was only sustained by the authority of the church. They were totally unacquainted with the modern doctrine that the seventh day in the commandment means simply one day in seven, and that the Saviour, to commemorate his resurrection, appointed that the first day of the week should be that one of the seven to which the commandment should apply!