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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Oct 23, 1913

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 90, No. 43.

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Editorial

By Editor

The Gamble Sunday-Sabbath Theory

YEARS ago, when Mr. S. W. Gamble, a Methodist minister, published his Sunday-sabbath theory, it was hoped by many that it would supply a long-felt want. By a curious process of confusing the weekly Sabbath with the annual feasts of the Levitical service, he contrived to lose the day of the Sabbath in the Old Testament, and then in the Greek text of the New he found it again, where, lo, it was Sunday.
Great was the joy, for the moment, of opponents of the Bible Sabbath. It was Dr. W. F. Crafts, we believe, who hailed the discovery as "the Waterloo of the Saturdarians." But as soon as wiser heads in the churches looked at the theory, they hastily put it out of sight, so far as they were able to do so.
But during the last year workers have reported meeting the teaching here and there, and not long since Elder J. J. Westrup told in these columns of finding it used by some missionaries in China, brought forward apparently as a last resort. Not long since we came across a review of the theory by a Methodist scholar, written years ago, but so clear and emphatic in its statement of facts that it may well be put on record in our columns. First, however, let us note one characteristic of the common weekly calendar in use in Palestine and other parts in ancient times, which makes perfectly plain, even to the eye, the matter of the New Testament text.
Our readers understand that in current usage among the Hebrews, Syrians, and others it was customary to speak of so many weeks as so many Sabbaths. The Sabbath, being the completion of the week, stood for the full cycle of days; and the days were designated as the first, second, etc., of or in the "Sabbath," or week. Horne, in his "Introduction to the Holy Scriptures," speaks of the wide-spread use of this term for week in ancient times,—
the word Sabbat, or Sabbata, denoting a week among the Syrians, Arabians, Christian Persians, and Ethiopians, as in the following ancient Syriac calendar, expressed in Hebrew characters:—
One of the Sabbath, or week, Sunday
Two of the Sabbath, Monday
Three of the Sabbath, Tuesday
Four of the Sabbath, Wednesday
Five of the Sabbath, Thursday
Eve of the Sabbath, Friday
The Sabbath, Saturday
The high antiquity of this calendar is evinced by the use of the cardinal numbers, one, two, three, and so forth, instead of the ordinals, first, second, third, and so forth, following the Hebrew idiom; as in the account of the creation, where we read in the original, "one day—two day—three day," and so forth. . . . It is remarkable that all the evangelists follow the Syriac calendar, both in the word Sabbata, used for "a week," and also in retaining the cardinal number mia Sabbaton, "one of the week," to express the day of the resurrection. (Matt. 28:1; Mark 16:2; Luke 24:1; John 20:1.)—Vol. II, part 2, chap. 4.
With this calendar before the eyes, no one can fail to see that when Matthew wrote about events following the end of "the Sabbath," as it began to dawn toward the "one of the Sabbath," the only possible translation of the thought into modern English is just that of our Bibles, "In the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week." But Mr. Gamble's discovery announced that the rendering, "first day of the week," was incorrect; that the word day was not to be understood there at all; and that the text meant that Sunday was really the first Sabbath, or original Sabbath of Eden.
Then it was that Dr. Wilbur Fletcher Steele, a Methodist scholar, wrote an article in the Methodist Review (May, 1899), entitled "Must Syntax Die That the Sabbath May Live?" He said:—
In the context with the tireless seventh-day Sabbatarians increasingly are certain Methodist writers insisting that the resurrection of Christ upon the first day of the week recovered and reenacted the original, creational, and true Sabbath. With hearty sympathy does the writer view their every legitimate argument to establish the sanctity and foster the hallowing of the Lord's day. But when a claim on its behalf is distinctly based upon, or forcibly corroborated by, a gross wrestling of the Holy Scriptures, suspicion as to its validity instinctively sets in, to say nothing of mortification and repugnance.
Taking up the acclaimed discovery in the New Testament text, he continued:—
This widely heralded Klondike discovery as to mian Sabbaton turns out to be only the glitter of fool's gold. It rests upon the profoundest ignoring or ignorance of a law of syntax fundamental to inflected speech, and especially of the usage and influence of the Aramaic tongue which was the vernacular of Jesus and his apostles. Must syntax die that the Sabbath may live?
Let these affirmations [of the theory] be traversed: "4. No Greek word for 'day' occurs in any of the passages."
Made for simple readers of English, that statement lacks candor. Said word is there, latent, to a much greater degree than it is in our phrase, "The twenty-fifth of the month." Upon being asked, "The twenty-fifth what?" the veriest child instantly replies, "Day." But stronger yet is the case in hand. The adjectival word mian is in the feminine gender, and an immutable law requires adjective modifiers to agree with their nouns in gender. Sabbaton is of the neuter gender, and out of the question. What feminine Greek word is latent in this phrase, and yet so patent as to reflect upon this adjective numeral its feminine hue? Plainly the feminine word hemera, "day," as analogously it is found in Mark 14:12, prote hemera ton asumon, "the first day of unleavened bread." Boldly to aver that "no Greek word for 'day' occurs in any of the passages," is to blind the simple English reader to the fact that an inflected language, by its numerous genders and cases, can indicate the presence and force of latent words to an extent undreamed of in English.
Speaking of the West Aramaic speech of Palestine in the days of Christ, Mr. Steele says:—
In that language we have the names of the days of the week as Mary taught them to her son Jesus.
Then he gives a sample of the ancient calendar, similar to the one we have quoted from Horne, only this one runs, "One in the Shabba," "second in the Shabba," "third in the Sabbath," etc., on to "eve of the Sabbath," and "the Sabbath." Such were the calendars that Matthew, and Mark, and Luke were familiar with, the current language of the street as men or children spoke of the days of the week. That is the language of the New Testament, as all translators have known. Mr. Steele concluded his review and exposure of the Gamble theory with the words:—
As a vital or corroboratory part of any argument for the sanctifying of the Lord's day this traversed exegesis, instead of being a monumental discovery, is but a monumental blunder. Thereby our foes will have us in derision.
Tell it not in Gath, Publish it not in the streets of Battle Creek, Lest the daughters of the Sabbatarians rejoice, Lest the daughters of the Saturdarians triumph.
It will be remembered that at the time he wrote, the Seventh-day Adventist headquarters were in Battle Creek, Mich. W. A. S.