IS SUNDAY THE TRUE SEVENTH DAY.
WHILE in Parma, Mich., not long since, I was informed that the M. E. minister of that place had preached against the Lord's Sabbath, and one of the positions taken by him was that Sunday was the true seventh day. Since that time I have received a copy of the Wesleyan, sent by some person, to me unknown, in which is an article headed "The Sabbath chronologically determined," in which the same Sunday-seventh-day theory is set forth. The writer says: "This original Sabbath continued in force until that year, (A. M. 2512,) in which year the Israelites went out of Egypt. In that remarkable year two remarkable alterations were made by God's authority. First, the month which was anciently and throughout the Patriarchal dispensation, the seventh month of the year, was now ordered to become the first. Secondly, that which was anciently the seventh day of the week, was now ordered to become the first day of unleavened bread. This feast was appointed to continue seven days. They were themselves the seven days of the newly instituted week, and of the same authority with the original institution. This newly instituted Sabbath, was in force until the year of our Saviour's passion. "It is much more to be wondered, that the change of the Sabbath at the going out of Egypt, should have been overlooked, than that it should be discovered, explained and proved. And it is worthy of remark that the religious solemnity which had hitherto been paid to the seventh day of the Patriarchal week, was transferred authoritatively to the first day of unleavened bread, on what day of the week soever, by the changeable course of the moon, it might happen to fall. In Genesis ii, 3, it is said, 'God blessed the seventh day.' But in Exodus xx, 11. we read, 'God blessed the Sabbath day.' The reason for substituting 'Sabbath day,' instead of 'Seventh day,' may be accounted for, it being evident that the Patriarchal Sabbath was not the seventh day of the week to an Israelite, but the first." We read of darkening counsel by words without knowledge, but have seldom seen it carried out to such an extent as in the article from which the above extracts are taken. The theory cannot be sustained by any proof, or any just reasoning. The article is most deceptive, as it professes to determine its facts by astronomical calculations, by which the days of the week are ascertained from creation to the crucifixion; and therefore assumes to be more than a mere theory, even a demonstration. We will point out some of its fallacies and falsities. 1. The fourth commandment as given to Israel pointed out and enforced the Patriarchal or original Sabbath. The reason for its observance is the same as in Gen. ii; and these facts cannot be predicated of two different days. 2. The commandment wherein the Lord says he blessed the Sabbath day, defines it to be the seventh day, and not the sixth day, as the article avers: neither is it a seventh day peculiar to the Jews, and not the seventh to the Patriarchs, as the writer says, but the seventh day on which God rested, as in Gen. ii. 3. The Lord blessed it because he had rested on it, and not because he spared the Israelites when he slew the Egyptians. 4. The change of the month is distinctly stated, in the Scriptures, but no change of the weekly Sabbath is intimated, so that we cannot reason from one to the other. 5. The writer blunders in his calculation, for he says—"That which was anciently the seventh day of the week became the first day of unleavened bread," from which he argues that the original seventh day thenceforth became the sixth day of the "newly instituted week," whereas the first day of unleavened bread was on the fifteenth day of the month, without