Letter From Japan by Editor

Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, California · Jun 26, 1879

Letter From Japan.

By Editor

YOKOHAMA, JAPAN, May 28, 1879.

DEAR BRETHREN IN CHRIST:—I have just found an old number of your paper, dated July 26, 1877, in which I find much to interest me, especially the contents of Lesson Eleven. Not knowing who may now be editors of your paper, or even, in fact, whether you are still continuing to publish that paper, I venture to write, making one or two inquiries in regard to the Sabbath question. The first is, How can we know when the real seventh day or any other day of the week occurs?

Since the many changes and discrepancies that have occurred in the various calendars have so obliterated the old time reckoning that we cannot now even know in what month of the year our Saviour was born, is it not equally true that we cannot know which is really the first day or the seventh day of the week, and might we not then accept any one of the seven, and join with the rest of the world in the observance of one-seventh part of time as sacred to the Lord?

Again, as the different longitudes of the earth must necessarily make a difference in time of day and night, your Sabbath and ours, in the eastern and western hemispheres, cannot be identical, and does not this fact again compel us to accept the "one-seventh of time" plan, and so let the Christian Sabbath roll round the earth with the sun? I do not ask these questions in a spirit of controversy, but these are difficulties in my own mind which I present to you to see if you can give me any solution.

I sincerely believe that the question of the observance of the divine command to "remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy" is a very important Christian doctrine to be taught everywhere, and I desire to observe it in the letter and in the spirit too, and I therefore seek for light on the subject. I have long been pained with the light regard shown for God's holy day by many nominal Christians in this country, and since the adoption of the Christian calendar by this Japanese government, there is a strong tendency to make the German and French Sunday holiday a national institution in this country, which I very much regret. If you can give me any new light which will help me in stemming this tide of error, I shall be glad to hear from you. I reject the idea that the Catholic or any other church has ever had any authority to change God's ordinances, and wish to rest my faith only upon the infallible word. Therefore I disregard all such holy days as Christmas, Easter, Good Friday, Ascension, etc., etc. If I can know and keep what God has commanded this is enough for me.

If, from my ignorance or any other difficulty, I cannot know and keep all the holy law in the full letter thereof, still I hope and pray that I may be enabled to keep it in the spirit thereof.

If this shall reach your hands will you kindly let me hear what you have to say for the edification of the hermit of Japan.

Yours ever in hope, M. U. 1859. J. G.

WE take great pleasure in answering this letter from an unknown friend and inquirer. As our paper is sent to hundreds and even thousands who are unacquainted with the reasons of our faith, we presume that many have their minds exercised in the same manner. The question here presented on the Sabbath is two-fold: 1. In relation to the identity of the seventh day as it may be affected by calendars, and changes or loss in computation. 2. In relation to the identity of days as affected by the rotundity of the earth or differences of longitude. Our room will permit us to answer only one of these at a time.

Different calendars or computations of time, or loss of years in chronology, have no effect whatever on the identity of the days of the week; though at first glance it would appear that they have. For all calendars and computations agree in the identity of the days of the week,—they all give the same numerical order.

The change from Old to New Style affected the days of the month, but not of the week. If it were resolved to call the next day after July 4, 1879, the 15th instead of the 5th, it would be Saturday just the same, for no day of the week is necessarily attached to a particular day of the month. They are forever varying. The day after February 28, 1879, was March 1. If this were leap-year, it would be February 29 instead of March 1. But in both cases it would be Saturday. The Scientific Calendar, which contains the calendar for 2000 years in both Old and New Style, gives the following illustration:—

"Washington was born Feb. 11th, Old Style, or Feb. 22d, New Style, 1732. It being a leap-year, the Dominical letter for February, Old Style, was B, and for New Style it was F. The table being entered with the former letter, shows the 11th to be Friday; and being entered with the latter, shows the 22d, of course, to be on the same day of the week."

The same is shown also by the fact that those who now reckon by Old Style, as the Russians do, agree in the numbering of the days of the week with those who reckon by New Style. New Style was not adopted by all the nations at once, but that occasioned no disarrangement of the days of the week.

Let us divide the age of the world into three periods. The first, from Adam to Moses. If we were to suppose that the order of the days of the week was lost during this period (which we cannot), it was surely restored by the word and providence of God; for he commanded the people to keep the seventh day, because he rested on it from the work of creation, and pointed out the day by the oft-recurring miracles of withholding manna on that day, and preserving that which was gathered the day before. They certainly knew the true Sabbath, or rest day, of Jehovah, in the days of Moses.

The second, from Moses to Christ. It is highly unreasonable to suppose that Israel lost the Sabbath during this period. We know they did not, for they had it when our Saviour was upon the earth. Notice these points: (1) Jehovah commanded Israel to keep the seventh day, which is the Sabbath. (2) After the Lord's crucifixion they "rested the Sabbath-day according to the commandment." (3) That Sabbath day was the seventh day, the same that was mentioned in the commandment, for the day following was "the first day of the week." See Luke 23 and 24. Thus the true Sabbath, the seventh day, was known in the days of our Saviour.

The third period, from Christ to the present time. Has the day been lost during this period? That cannot be so. The Jews were scattered all over the world, in one hundred and twenty-seven provinces in the days of Ahasuerus, Esther 8:9, and in "every nation under heaven," in the beginning of the Christian era; Acts 2:5. But they all had the same seventh-day Sabbath. Its identity was easily preserved, for three times a year all the men of the Israelites gathered together at Jerusalem to their feasts. No one of these nations could lose or change the day, for it would be detected by the others. And so through the whole era. Besides, there have been rivals to the Sabbath. The pagans reverenced the first day of the week, and from the time of Constantine it became a day of observance. Conflicting claims were set up for the two days. Could either party or both parties lose their day, and nobody know it? For if it has been lost or changed, that fact is unknown to every body. All can see the impossibility of this.

Again, eclipses have been recorded which occured on certain days of the week, even before the days of our Saviour. Astronomers at this time compute those eclipses, and find that they did indeed occur on the days thus recorded according to our reckoning. This proves positively that our reckoning of the days of the week is their theirs. Thus it is proved that the reckoning of the days of the week is not lost. We have the true seventh day of the week from the creation.

In our next we will examine the question of longitude in relation to the identity of the day.