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CHRISTIAN SABBATH

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Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Dec 18, 1860

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 17, No. 5.

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"CHRISTIAN SABBATH."

(Concluded.)

FINDING that no aid or comfort is furnished in any respect to the Christian Sabbath by Acts xx, 7, we proceed to the next text adduced in its behalf, which is 1 Cor. xvi, 2: "Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come." Upon this Mr. Lee remarks: "From this it is plain that the Christian assemblies were convened on the first day of the week, and that such observance of the day had the apostle's sanction;" to which we reply that there is no evidence furnished by the text of Christian assemblies, nor that such observance of the day had the sanction of the apostle; for not a word is said about assembling, but about laying by for the poor saints as God had prospered them; and this was not in the contribution box of the congregation, but by each one at his own home. The expression παρ' ἑαυτῷ will admit no other sense. Robinson in his Lexicon of the New Testament, defines this phrase thus, "By or with oneself, in one's house, at home, French, Chez soi. 1 Cor. xvi, 2." So in John xx, 10, the disciples went away, πρὸς ἑαυτούς, "unto their own home." See also Greenfield's Lexicon, Bloomfield's Greek Testament, in loco, and Valpy's do. The old Syriac version renders this passage: "Let every one lay aside and preserve at his own house." Erasmus (A. D. 1520) paraphrases it: "Upon the first day of the week (that is to say, in the Sunday) let every one of you set aside at home, and lay up as much as he for this purpose thinketh meet." Tyndale (A. D. 1534) translates it: "Upon some Sunday let every one of you put aside at home and lay up whatsoever he thinketh meet, that there be no gatherings when I come." The Geneva translation (A. D. 1557) is similar: "Every first day of the week, let every one of you put aside at home," &c. "The inference deduced from 1 Cor. xvi, 2," says Milton, "is equally unsatisfactory [with that deduced from Acts xxi]; for what the apostle is here enjoining is not the celebration of the Lord's day, but that on the first day of the week (if this be the true interpretation of κατὰ μίαν σαββάτων, per unam sabbathorum) each should lay by him, that is at home, for the relief of the poor; no mention being made of any public assembly, or of any collection at such assembly, on that day." Christ. Doctrine, b. ii chap. 7. "From the last clause in the verse, it has been argued," says Whitby, that for each "to lay by in store" must signify "to put into a common box his charity; because if they had kept it 'at home,' there would have been need of gathering it when the apostle came. But," he justly replies, "the expression, ἕκαστος παρ' ἑαυτῷ τιθέτω, 'let every one place it with himself,' admits not this sense." Annotations in loco. In addition to all the above, and agreeing exactly with it, we have two Latin versions, three French, the German of Luther, the Dutch, the Italian, the Spanish, the Portugese, and the Swedish.
This surely is an array of evidence on 1 Cor. xvi, 2, sufficient for any mind, be it fair or unfair, prejudiced or unprejudiced, honest or dishonest.
We may remark further that this text like Acts xx, 7, not only does not favor the theory of our Sunday friends, but furnishes direct evidence against them; for reviewing the prosperity of the past, and counting up and laying aside gains as the Lord has prospered us is by no means suitable employment for the Sabbath; and this shows that the day devoted to such business could be regarded as no other than secular time. The reason expressed, "that there be no gatherings when I come," doubtless refers to the collecting necessary for each individual to perform in getting his contribution together (not money exclusively), and having it ready to deliver to the apostle when he should arrive. Paul wanted all this work performed before he came.
It thus appears that those who argue for the "peculiar institution" of Sunday-keeping, are exceedingly unfortunate in seizing the weapon of their defense by the blade instead of the handle. They are unfortunate in springing those mines with a view to blowing up the enemy, which, when discharged, blow up themselves.
Equally disastrous to his own position is the next text which Mr. Lee brings forward in its support, namely, Col. ii, 16: "Let no man, therefore judge you in meat or in drink, or in respect of an holy day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath-days." On this he remarks: "To what Sabbath does the apostle refer? It cannot be to the Christian Sabbath; for he was speaking of what was enjoined by the law, and that never was. Moreover, the Christian Sabbath was called the Lord's day and not the Sabbath. It must be then that the apostle refers to the seventh-day Sabbath; and he gives them clearly to understand that they are not morally bound to observe it." p. 10. How a person, believing in a divinely-appointed weekly Sabbath for this dispensation, one enjoined too by the fourth commandment, could commit such a fatal oversight as to apply Col. ii, 16 to that class of Sabbaths, it is difficult to conceive. For who does not at once perceive that if that text applies at all to the weekly Sabbath, to any Sabbath that ever was, or ever could be supposed to be, enjoined in the fourth commandment, the "Christian Sabbath is as completely swept away by it, as any other? If the apostle by that language gave the disciples to understand that they "were not morally bound to observe" any weekly Sabbath which existed previous to the death of Christ, he as explicitly tells us that we are not morally bound to any such that may have originated since. In his eagerness to demolish the seventh-day Sabbath Mr. Lee here again demolishes his own—like the woodman who ascended a tree to lop off the branches, and stupidly cut off the one on which he was standing.
No-Sabbath men, we are aware, are accustomed thus to wrest this text from its legitimate meaning, and apply the word sabbaths to the weekly Sabbath of the moral law, contrary to the whole context, which, by associating it with meats and drinks, confines it to the yearly and ceremonial sabbaths of the Jews. See Lev. xxiii. These were component parts of that typical and shadowy system; and Paul says that the sabbaths and other things of which he speaks, were shadows of things to come; but the body was of Christ. There was nothing shadowy about the Sabbath instituted in Eden, before the fall, and guarded by the fourth commandment. We were hardly prepared to see a strenuous Sunday-keeper thus deliberately go over to no-Sabbath ground.
And this is the sum of Mr. Lee's Scripture testimony for the Christian Sabbath. Thus meagre and self-destructive is the evidence he adduces in its favor.
We come now to historical evidence the sum total of which is the following: The expression "Lord's day" in Rev. i, 10, and a few extracts from Ignatius, the epistle of Barnabas (!) and Eusebius. We shall detain the reader but a moment on this part of the subject, inasmuch as we need not re-iterate the testimony which has already been frequently presented, and is well embodied in the "History of the Sabbath," for sale at this Office. Respecting this testimony we will make a few statements, which, if any one questions them, we are prepared to defend at greater length.
By the expression, "Lord's day" in Rev. i, 10, John does not tell us what day of the week is meant. The only reasonable conclusion therefore to come to on this text is that that day is the Lord's day which he openly claims as his. He does thus claim the seventh day. Isa. lviii, Mark ii. He never has thus claimed the first day. In answer to the repeated claim that Sunday was familiarly known as the "Lord's day," in the time of John, we reply that no writer of that age applied that title to the first day of the week, till the time of Tertullian, more than one hundred years after the book of Revelation was written.
Ignatius is made to sustain Sunday-keeping by means of a gross fraud. He says nothing about keeping the Lord's day, as an appeal to the original of his epistle shows. His testimony is about living according to the Lord's life.
The Epistle of Barnabas is simply a forgery. All writers whose testimony is entitled to any respect admit this.
As for Eusebius, he was a no-Sabbath man, and therefore affords our Sunday-keeping friends no aid in their peculiar theory. He ranks all Sabbath-keeping among the carnal ordinances of the Jews, and not binding on Christians. We tender him as a strong witness that Sunday is not the Sabbath.
We have now followed Mr. Lee through all his fruitless search after evidence for Sunday-keeping either prophetical, preceptive, or historical. One more consideration remains to be noticed and we close. He says that the first day of the week secures all that could be secured by the seventh-day Sabbath. p. 16. So far as the Sabbath is designed merely as a physical blessing to man, this may be true. But this is but half, and by no means the most important half, of the object of the sabbatic institution. The honor of God is concerned in the matter as well as the good of man. Read Isa. lviii, 13: If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord honorable; and shalt honor him, not doing thine own ways, &c. But we cannot honor him in Sabbath-keeping unless we keep the very day that he has enjoined upon us, and in the very manner that he has prescribed. No doubt the fire offered by Nadab and Abihu [Lev. x], was just as effective in the purposes for which it was used, as the fire from the altar; but it was not the kind prescribed, and God showed his appreciation of such services by consuming them before the people. So far then from securing all the advantages secured by the seventh-day Sabbath, the substitution of Sunday forfeits all the blessings promised to faithful obedience.
To sum up our evidence, we have seen,
1. That there is no prophetic allusion to a change of the Sabbath.
2. That such a change is wholly uncalled for.
3. That in the very nature of things such a change is impossible, and the institution still exist.
4. That the New Testament contains no hint that Christ or his apostles accomplished any such change.
5. That ecclesiastical history from the first centuries after Christ and onward, contains no evidence for Sunday as a divine institution, but only the melancholy record of the steps by which the heathen festival of the sun, has supplanted the ancient and hallowed institution of Jehovah.
May the Lord of the Sabbath bestow his blessing upon all who are honestly inquiring for the old paths and desiring to walk therein, enable them to see the beauty of his truth and turn their feet into his testimonies, lest they be found among those who are left "without," when they who "keep his commandments," according to Rev. xxii, 14, under the bright escort of angels and the great Captain of their salvation, shall enter through the gates of the city into their everlasting rest.