BOTH SIDES OF THE SABBATH QUESTION.
Preble.—"But let us here pause a moment, and inquire, Where are now the two tables of stone? And echo must answer, WHERE? For that once holy place, where those tables were kept, is now destroyed; and the veil which kept all but the high priest from the mercy-seat, has been rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the ark and the two tables of stone have also been destroyed. The priesthood, which made atonement for the people at that time, has been changed; and as the apostle says, there has been a change also of the law, or of the covenant. If therefore the tables of stone which contained it as law, or the covenant, for keeping the seventh-day Sabbath,—the most holy place where the tables and covenant were kept, the mercy-seat above them,—and God's ancient dwelling-place 'between the cherubims' all destroyed; and a new and living way, which the living Jesus hath consecrated (or new made—margin) for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh [x. 20]: I say, if all this change has taken place, WHERE IS THERE NOW ANY LAW OR COVENANT TO BE FOUND FOR KEEPING THE SEVENTH-DAY SABBATH? Let the man who is able point it out if he can!" REPLY.—Eld. P. may not be aware of the fact, but he has here proposed no very hard task; for he only calls upon the "man who is able" to point it out "if he can;" but the man "who is able," certainly "can" do it without any difficulty. He asks "Where are now the two tables of stone? and echo, he says, must answer, 'Where!' The Sabbath question is a very singular question, exciting such opposition to itself, Rom. viii, 7, that even 'echo' can scarcely give a correct response concerning it. In reply to the question, "Where in the New Testament do we find any command to keep the seventh day?" echo once answered, "No where!" See Review of Fillio, p. 41. Eld. P.'s echo is a little more within bounds as it does not supply words not found in the question; yet it is a little singular that echo which usually deals with the closing portion of an exclamation should patiently wait till the sentence is finished, and then go back and repeat the first word, with such emphasis, dropping all the rest. But we return to the question, Where are now the two tables of stone? In answering this question, we shall show that it matters not what has become of the tables that existed in the sanctuary of old; for there are tables of that law, still existing, as superior to those as the heavens are higher than the earth. We therefore turn from the ghostly visions of the "old dead schoolmaster," which have thus far seemed to haunt Eld. P., to give a moment's attention to the subject of the sanctuary. The sanctuary has ever been to us, since we received the light on it, a delightful subject. Neither is it so foreign to the Sabbath as might at first sight be supposed; for it throws around the perpetuity and immutability of the great law of ten commandments, bulwarks of adamant, which will stand fast forever. The tables of stone, as they existed on earth under the former dispensation, were written by God and delivered to Moses on Mt. Sinai. They were carefully deposited in an ark, not "made expressly for the purpose," as Eld. P. asserts; for it had other uses besides being a mere receptacle of the law; but a very sacred part of the furniture of the sanctuary. This ark was then placed in the most holy place of the earthly sanctuary, into which no man was to enter, but the high priest once every year. These distinguishing honors bestowed upon the law, its being spoken with God's own voice, written with his own finger, placed in the ark, and that placed in the holy of holies, all go to show that the law engraved upon the tables, in the very bosom of which rested the Sabbath commandment, was the most sacred object connected with that dispensation. The ark, on account of its containing the tables of the law, was called the ark of the29covenant, and the tables, the tables of the covenant; for, as we have seen, God declared his ten commandments to be his covenant; and the ark could not, and would not, have been called the ark of the covenant, had it not contained the tables of the ten commandments. Bear this fact in mind till we make the application. Into a description of the sanctuary, the building erected by Moses, with its holy and most holy places, we need not enter. It will be found in great minuteness in Ex. xxv-xxxi; of the ark as the furniture of the most holy place, we have already spoken. In the holy place there were the table of show-bread, the candlestick with its seven lamps, and the altar of incense. The service connected with the sanctuary was briefly this: The man who had sinned brought his victim to the door of the tabernacle, placed his hand upon the victim's head, and confessed over him his sin, thus transferring to him his guilt, and by giving him up to be a sin-offering, acknowledging himself to be worthy of death. The blood of the victim was taken, and by the priest carried into the sanctuary and sprinkled before the veil. This service went on daily through the year. At the close of this yearly service, the high priest went into the most holy place, with the blood of a sin-offering, before the ark containing the law of God which the people had transgressed, and sprinkled that blood upon the mercy-seat which was the cover of the ark, and before the mercy-seat to make atonement for the sins of the people, and to cleanse the sanctuary. Let the reader now seriously ask himself what the object of this singular arrangement could be. As Eld. P. has said, that once holy place is now destroyed. The earthly sanctuary is gone, and its service discontinued. Was it a mere arbitrary arrangement which has failed of its purpose, and passed away? or did it possess some significance which is meeting its accomplishment in this dispensation? That the ministry of those ancient priests, typified the ministry of our Lord Jesus Christ, none will deny. Did it ever occur to you that the place where those ancient priests ministered, the sanctuary, built at the express direction of God, was also designed to be a type or figure of the place where Christ performs his priestly office? Yet this is stated in the Scriptures, no less distinctly than the former. Listen to a few of the numerous instances in which the earthly sanctuary is declared to be but a pattern of the true: "Let them make me a sanctuary," said the Lord to Moses, "according to all that I show thee, after the pattern of the tabernacle, and the pattern of all the instruments thereof, even so shall ye make it." Ex. xxv. 8, 9. Then the tabernacle and its instruments made by Moses, were not the original. They were but duplicates, made according to some great original which existed somewhere else. Again: "And thou shalt rear up the tabernacle according to the fashion thereof which was showed thee in the mount." Verse 40. See also chap. xxvi, 30; xxvii, 8. We read in Acts vii, 44, "Our fathers had the tabernacle of witness, in the wilderness, as he had appointed, speaking unto Moses that he should make it according to the fashion that he had seen." And Heb. ix, 24, says, "For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true." From this testimony but one conclusion can be drawn; namely, that there is a true or original sanctuary, which constituted the pattern from which the earthly tabernacle was erected. What is this true sanctuary or tabernacle, and where is it located? Paul definitely answers both these questions in Heb. viii. 1, 2. He has been showing the transfer of the priesthood from the house of Aaron to the everlasting priesthood of Christ, after the order of Melchisedec, and says, "Now of the things which we have spoken, this is the sum: We have such an high priest who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the Heavens, a minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched and not man." There can be no question but that Paul is here speaking of the antitype of the earthly sanctuary; for he contrasts it with that built by man. That was built by human instrumentality, this by the Lord. And Paul here states positively that the true sanctuary is in Heaven, and that Christ is our High Priest, ministering for us in that Heavenly building. He then goes on in the remainder of the chapter to argue that as the priests on earth had a ministry to perform and sacrifices to offer, so Christ should minister in the sanctuary above; that the earthly building was made after the pattern of the Heavenly; and that the priests who served therein, served unto the example and shadow of Heavenly things. And he then proves that this change has taken place from the earthly to the Heavenly, by what? Nothing less than an application of Jeremiah's prophecy that the days should come when a new covenant should be made with the house of Israel. Then this arrangement, this Heavenly sanctuary, and the superior priesthood of Christ is established by, and exists under, the new covenant. Paul says of the first covenant, Heb. ix, 1, "Then verily the first covenant had also ordinances of divine service and a worldly sanctuary." This word, worldly, must have been introduced to express a contrast; for if no other covenant was to have a sanctuary, or if that was the only sanctuary that ever had existed, or was to exist, Paul would simply have said that that covenant had a sanctuary, without any qualifying word; but that was not sufficient; the idea must be expressed by way of contrast, that it was a worldly sanctuary. Paul is contrasting in the book of Hebrews, the two covenants, the old and the new, and the contrast expressed on the sanctuary must be respecting the sanctuaries of these two covenants. The first was a worldly or earthly sanctuary, that is, built by man; and what is the other? Answer, a heavenly sanctuary as Paul has shown, built by the Lord himself. To express it in full, it would then read like this: Then verily the first covenant had also ordinances of divine service and a worldly sanctuary; the second covenant has a "more excellent" system of service, and a heavenly sanctuary. Paul makes this subject clear, beyond misapprehension, to those who will carefully study his language. The book of Hebrews having clearly given us the theory of the Heavenly sanctuary, John in the Revelation gives us a view of the thing itself. In chap. iv, 1, he says that "a door was opened in Heaven;" not Heaven itself opened, but some building, some apartment, in Heaven, opened. In verse 5 he says that there were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, which are the seven Spirits of God, corresponding to the candlestick with its seven lamps in the first apartment of the earthly sanctuary. In chapter viii, 3, 4, we read that an angel "came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer" and offered much incense, &c. Then here we have a view of the altar of incense, and a censer; but these were instruments of the sanctuary, the altar of incense being located, with the candlestick in the first apartment. All this shows clearly that John is looking into the first apartment of the Heavenly temple which the Lord pitched, and not man. We come down still further, to chapter xi, 19, and read, "And the temple of God was opened in Heaven," not the first apartment for that we have seen opened already, but the second apartment, as is proved by what John beheld therein, "and there was seen in his temple," he says, "the ark of his testament." We have now reached the point where the application of the foregoing remarks can be seen. It matters not to our present argument at what particular time the event here brought to view, the opening of the temple in Heaven, takes place, as all will agree that it transpires sometime in the present dispensation, which is sufficient for our purpose. And now we ask the reader to look again at the fact that there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament. What was the ark? The chest in which the tables of the ten commandments were deposited. And is there such an ark under this dispensation, in the temple in Heaven? John says it was seen there, and hence we believe it is there. What is there in that ark in Heaven? John says it is the ark of his testament; and the word rendered testament is diatheke, the very same word that is in other places rendered covenant; the word which is rendered covenant in Deut. iv, 13, "And he declared unto you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, even ten commandments." And as the ark of old, was called the ark of the covenant, only because it contained God's covenant of ten commandments, so when John beholding the ark in Heaven,30calls it the ark of his [God's] testament or covenant, it is proof positive that that ark contains the same commandments. And that ark is connected with the sanctuary of this dispensation. It contains the law for this dispensation; and that law, just as it was when spoken by Jehovah from Sinai, is still called his covenant. Thus we see that as the earthly sanctuary and its instruments, were but figures or patterns of the true, built after that great original, so the law given to Israel to be kept in that sanctuary, was but a copy, duplicate, or transcript of the original tables which he still retained in the ark in the sanctuary above. And this is our answer to Eld. P.'s question, "Where is there now any law or covenant for keeping the seventh-day Sabbath?" There it is, safely deposited in the archives of Heaven, beneath the eye of its great Author, who slumbers not nor sleeps. If Eld. P. had not lost sight of this great original, he never would have asked this question; but having lost sight of it, and seeing nothing but the earthly arrangement, when that came to an end, when the sanctuary, and, so far as we know, the ark and those duplicate tables of stone, were destroyed, he seems to think that every thing went by the board, and that God rubbed all out, and began anew. But nothing then perished that had not subserved its purpose, nothing failed of accomplishment; that sanctuary and that system had answered the end for which it was designed, and then what? No abolition of moral law, no break in the plan of salvation, no cessation of the work, but simply a transfer from the type to the antitype, from the shadow to the substance; and now we look away from earth to Heaven, and behold in the true tabernacle, the plan of salvation still going on, and our great High Priest there ministering for us; and there we behold the ark of his testament, and God's great moral law, reposing in security and glory beneath the mercy-seat, safe from all the opposition of men, or the malice of devils. The poet has well expressed it, For God well knew perdition's son,
Would ne'er his precepts love,
He gave a duplicate alone,
But kept his own above. And as God so dealt with his law in the former dispensation, as to show that it was the most sacred object connected with that system of worship, does he not, by revealing it to us in the sacred ark in the holy of holies of the Heavenly temple, show that it is the most sacred of all inanimate objects even in the Heaven of heavens? And can that law be changed or abolished? Oh, the infinite presumption of the thought! Vain man! Mount up to Heaven, drive the angels from your august presence, burst into the heavenly temple, remove Christ, dethrone Jehovah, clothe yourself with omnipotence, and then change that holy law! but never before that, never! It will now be still more clearly seen that the law of God occupies the same position in both dispensations, or under both covenants. Under the former, a copy of that law was deposited in the typical sanctuary, and transgressions of it were typically atoned for by the blood of beasts; under the present, the original of that law exists in the ark in the sanctuary in Heaven, and transgressions of it, are in reality pardoned through the blood of Christ. But reader, can you approach the mercy-seat which covers that Heavenly ark, before which Christ pleads his blood, while beneath that mercy-seat lies the holy law you have transgressed,—we say, can you approach there with confidence, unless you are conscious that you are trying to keep every precept of that law just as it is written? And mark that the fourth precept reads, "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." This little digression on the subject of the sanctuary has been rendered necessary in order to answer Eld. P.'s question, Where is there now any law or covenant for keeping the seventh day Sabbath? and we trust we have made this matter plain to every one however skeptical he may have been. We are now prepared to listen again to Eld. P. Preble.—"But, says the objector, 'I do not believe the new covenant is now in force; neither do I believe it can be until God writes his laws upon the heart, and all shall know him from the least to the greatest; and that, of course, cannot be until Christ comes the second time; and hence the law, or covenant, which contains the law for the Sabbath, will hold good until the end of the world, or until Christ comes. But if it can be shown that the new covenant is now in force, then I will give up that you are right.' Very well. Now in regard to this objection and admission, we will test the whole matter by the word of truth." REPLY.—Eld. P. here seems to be making huge preparations to demolish a man of straw. We have never heard the objection raised by any Sabbath-keeper, that the new covenant is not now in force. We know of none who hold that position. But if Eld. P. has found such a curiosity in the way of an opponent, we find ourselves under the necessity of listening to his answer, as we have promised to give his articles entire, though it has no application to seventh-day Adventists. Preble.—"The particular prophecy in relation to this new covenant is found in Jer. xxxi. 31-34. But as the apostle quotes this in Heb. viii. 10-13, I trust all will be candid enough to take the same view of it as is given in the New Testament; and hence we proceed:— 'For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord: I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts; and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people; and they shall not teach every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord; for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more. In that he saith, a new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.' 'The objection to my view, as has just been raised, consists in this:—When this new covenant is in force, the Lord is to put his laws into their minds, and write them in their hearts, and 'all shall know the Lord, from the least to the greatest.' Now the first question to be settled is this:—To whom, or to what class of persons does this 'all' refer? Does it refer to all mankind living at that time? Or does it refer to all of that particular class who believe in or observe this covenant? I will now show that it must refer to a particular class, and not to every body, as will be seen by the passage just quoted that the covenant is made 'with the house of Israel.' Now let it be remembered, that the Lord has nowhere even intimated that he will ever make a covenant with the Gentiles, as such, and then bring in the 'house of Jacob' under such a covenant as that. But, as we see by the passage under consideration, he has promised to make a covenant 'with the house of Israel;' and all candid minds will see that the Gentiles will be brought in under this. This great truth is clearly presented in the 11th of Romans. The apostle inquires:—'What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for; but the election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded; (or hardened—margin), and then adds,—through their fall salvation is come to the Gentiles.' (Rom. xi. 7, 11.) Hence we see that Israel is not grafted in among the Gentiles, but the Gentiles are grafted in among them, the natural branches." REMARKS.—We say remarks; for we have nothing to "reply" to here, inasmuch as we endorse it all; but we cannot forbear reminding the reader, of Eld. P.'s previous reasoning on this point. When speaking of the middle wall of partition between Jews and Gentiles that had been broken down, in his zeal to show that the Gentiles had nothing to do with the law by which the Jews were governed, he asked the following question: "Was the middle wall of partition broken down that the Gentiles might go on where the Jews had been? or were the Jews to come out where the Gentiles were?" He was then arguing that the Jews, leaving all the institutions committed to their charge, were to come out to the Gentiles; we are glad to find him now turned square about, and arguing on the right side of this question, namely that the Gentiles were admitted into the commonwealth of Israel to be partakers with them of their blessings. We submit to the reader that his present argument sounds much better than his former. Preble.—"Therefore Israel proper are the natural branches of 'their own olive tree,' and the Gentiles are grafted in among them. Hence the blindness—or hardness—is happened to Israel, 'until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in. And so all Israel shall be saved.' The apostle then immediately adds,—'For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins.' (Rom. xi. 25-27) Now if we can find when God shall take away their sins, then we find when his new covenant shall be with them. We have now reached a point where I will propose to my objector above alluded to the following question:— WHEN WILL THE LORD TAKE AWAY, OR FORGIVE MEN THEIR SINS?—Will it be in this world, while Christ is the 'mediator between God and men'? Or will it not be until after Christ comes the second time, to 'judge the quick and the dead'? O, says the objector, in this world, certainly. Very well. This shows us that if men's sins are forgiven them in this world, (Matt. xii. 31, 32), then the new covenant is for this world; for we are now considering the passage which says: 'This is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins.' But again, the Greek word here rendered 'take away,' is aphaireo; and it is found elsewhere in the New Testament but once, when it is applied to sin; and this will be found in Heb. x. 4: 'For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away [aphaireo] sins.' So of the passage in Romans: 'This is my covenant unto them when I shall take away [aphaireo] their sins.' By this, then, we learn that it was impossible for the blood of bulls and of goats to take away sins under the first covenant, and therefore those who lived under the first covenant must have their sins forgiven by virtue of the 'mediator of the New Testament,' or covenant, as we learn by the following passage: 'And for this cause he is the mediator of the New Testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.' Heb. ix. 15. "But a few words here in relation to this word which is translated testament in this last quotation. In the Greek this word is diathekee; and it is found in the New Testament thirty-three times. It is rendered covenant twenty, and testament thirteen times. Its meaning according to Greenfield's Greek Lexicon, is 'any disposition, arrangement, institution, dispensation,' etc. Thus we are to understand this word diathekee in the sense of covenant; and to mean the Lord's institution, or arrangement, to save men, whether it was under the old or the new dispensation. The first diathekee, or covenant, written upon 'tables of stone,' is disannulled; (Heb. vii. 18); but the diathekee, or covenant, written 'in fleshy tables of the heart,' is also for the benefit and salvation of men." REMARKS.—Eld. P. has here given us a good definition of the word covenant; it is "the Lord's arrangement to save men," whether "under the old or new dispensation." Now if, in speaking of the first covenant, he would be careful to confine it, according to his definition of that covenant, to the arrangement that then existed to save men, he would save himself and his readers much confusion. But here we find him saying that the first covenant was written on tables of stone. But there was no "arrangement to save men" written on the tables of stone. Nothing of the kind. But under that arrangement, God's law was written on the tables of stone, and that only. Hence, the tables of stone do not constitute the covenant which has been disannulled. But that typical arrangement has been disannulled, and a better one instituted in its place; and under this new arrangement, the law, not the arrangement or covenant, is written in the hearts of God's people, the same law which under the former arrangement was written on the tables of stone. Preble.—"We have already seen that sins could not be taken away under the first covenant. Let us now examine and see if sins can be taken away, or forgiven, under the 'new covenant.' The apostle explains this by saying: 'The Holy Ghost this signifying, that the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest, while as the first tabernacle was yet standing: which was a figure for the time then present, in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices, that could not make him that did the service perfect, as pertaining to the conscience; which stood only in meats and drinks, and divers washings, and carnal ordinances, imposed on them until the time of reformation. But Christ being come an High Priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building. Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood, he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us. For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit, offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?' Heb. ix. 8-14. 'But the apostle continues and says: 'For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect. For then would they not have ceased to be offered? because that the worshippers once purged should have had no more conscience31of sins. But in those sacrifices there is a remembrance again made of sins every year. For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins. Wherefore, when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me: in burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou hast had no pleasure. Then said I, Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me,) to do thy will, O God. Above, when he said, Sacrifice and offering and burnt offering and offering for sin thou wouldest not, neither hadst pleasure therein; which are offered by the law; then said he, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second. By the which will we are sanctified, through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.' Heb. x. 1-10. 'And again he says: 'Whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us; for after that he had said before, this is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them; and their sins and iniquities will I remember no more. Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin. Having, therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which he has consecrated for us through the veil, that is to say, his flesh; and having an High Priest over the house of God; let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.' Heb. x. 15-22. 'By these three portions of scripture we are shown how and when sins are taken away. In the first it is said, 'The Holy Ghost this signifying'; that 'gifts and sacrifices' under the first covenant 'could not make' any one 'perfect, pertaining to the conscience.' But under the new covenant, Christ being come an High Priest of good things to come by his own blood, through the eternal Spirit, could purge the conscience; so we can serve the living God. Hence we see that our sins can be taken away by the blood of Christ, and not merely carried into the wilderness on the head of a 'live goat,' as was the case under the first covenant. 'In the second it is said, 'The law, being a shadow of the good things to come, can never with those sacrifices make the comers thereunto perfect. For if this could have been done, the worshipers once purged would have had no more conscience of sins. But in those sacrifices there is a remembrance again made of sins every year. Because it was not possible for the blood of bulls and of goats to take away sins. But when Jesus Christ came, he said, 'Lo, I come to do thy will, O God.' And so Jesus, our High Priest, took away the first covenant, that he might establish the second covenant. And by this will, or covenant, we are sanctified. Praise God, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 'In the third it is said, The Holy Ghost also is a witness to us, as it had been said before. This is the covenant that the Lord promised unto our fathers; and under it, brethren, we have boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which has been 'consecrated for us.' Then 'let us draw near with a true heart,' 'having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience.'" REMARKS.—The reader will now appreciate in a measure, if he has not before, our remarks in the last number about the unnatural length to which Eld. P. drew out his articles, after our reply was commenced, and the publication of his side in full promised. For what other purpose than the one there intimated could this imaginary objection, about the new covenant not being now in force, have been raised, and then these ponderous quotations of scripture introduced to rebut it? We call it an imaginary objection; for Eld. P. must have known that such was not our position; at least he had no excuse for not knowing it, for a few moments' examination of any of our publications touching that point, would have satisfied him that we held no such view.