Lessons for Bible Students.
(History of the Sabbath, pp. 103–114.) What promise did God make to the Jews through the prophet Jeremiah in the year B. C. 601? What did he testify if they would not keep the Sabbath? What is Clarke's comment upon this passage? Did the people accept this gracious offer from God? How long after the offer was given, did Ezekiel testify in regard to it? What were the besetting sins of the Hebrews in the wilderness? Did these sins cleave to them when settled in Canaan? What prevented them from regarding the voice of warning? How did they treat their own children? Thus iniquity came to the full, and wrath to the uttermost overtook them; what scripture records the destruction then visited upon them? What offer did God make to the Hebrews while in the Babylonish captivity? What scripture contains the offer? Was the promise here given them, conditional or absolute? Did they ever comply with the conditions so as to receive the promise? In this offer are several allusions to the Sabbath; what one is worthy of particular notice? What distinction is here plainly marked? After the Jews had returned from their captivity in Babylon, what testimony do they give in regard to the Sabbath? See Neh. ix, 13. 14. In view of their former disobedience, what did the people now pledge themselves to do? In the absence of Nehemiah was this covenant kept? What did he find on his return? In what scripture is this testimony given? What prophecy is confirmed by this language? What closes the history of the Sabbath in the old Testament? TIME TO COMMENCE THE SABBATH. (p. 107 Note.)
WHAT does the reckoning of the first week of time necessarily determine? How did each day of the first week begin? How much time does the expression evening and morning cover? With what, then, did the first Sabbath begin and end? What scriptures show that the night is in scripture reckoned as a part of the day of twenty-four hours? What does the statute respecting the great day of atonement prove? What scriptures show that evening is at sunset? THE SABBATH FROM NEHEMIAH TO CHRIST.
How long a period intervenes between the time of Nehemiah and Christ? During this time what extraordinary change came over the Jewish people in relation to idolatry and the Sabbath? In the year before Christ 170, what decree was issued by Antiochus Epiphanes? What did the Jews do under these circumstances? Who executed a like massacre in Jerusalem? In view of these dreadful acts of slaughter, what did Mattathias decree? What advantage did Pompey, about the year 63 before Christ, take of this custom? Mention some of the superstitions with which the Jewish doctors had loaded the Sabbath, at the time of our Lord? What was the Sabbath rendered by these oppressive ceremonies? At this point who appears on the stage of action?