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TO CORRESPONDENTS

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Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Apr 23, 1861

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 17, No. 23.

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TO CORRESPONDENTS.

By Editor

J. Bostwick: The expression, "In the end of the Sabbath," of Matt. xxviii, 1, cannot mean during the closing hours of the Sabbath, as I understand you that your opponents claim, but at the end of the Sabbath, or after the Sabbath had closed. It is singular that any such claim should be set up on this passage, when the accounts which the other evangelists give of the same transaction are taken into consideration. Mark says plainly, "When the Sabbath was past." Chap. xvi, 1. Luke says that the disciples rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment, and did not till the first day of the week come to the sepulcher. Chap. xxiv, 1. John says, "The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene, early while it was yet dark, unto the sepulcher," &c. John here expressly tells us that while it was yet dark it was the first day of the week, which proves that the day did not begin at sunrise, but had begun sometime before. Let those who would advocate the commencement of the day at sunrise look well to the slough of difficulty and inconsistency into which they plunge themselves.
But to return to Matt. xxviii, 1. The original of the expression "in the end of the Sabbath," is, Ὀψὲ δὲ σαββάτων. It will be noticed that the adverb ὀψὲ is here used with a genitive; and Robinson [Gr. Lex. of N. T.] defines this adverb in such a construction, thus: "With a genitive, at the end of, at the close of, after." He then quotes the passage in question [Matt. xxviii, 1], and translates it thus: "After the Sabbath, the Sabbath being now ended." It matters not in this instance whether we apply the word σαββάτων to the Sabbath day merely, or to the whole week, which it sometimes signifies, since the week closes with the Sabbath. And now while neither this text nor any other in the Bible affords any evidence that the day commences at sunrise, there stand on the other hand those positive declarations of the Bible that the day does begin at sunset; there stand also the concurrent testimonies of all Biblical commentators and scholars that the Jews so reckoned time in the days of our Saviour and the apostles. With all this, the question is settled beyond controversy.