The Sabbatarian Argument
By A. H. Lewis
From the Springfield (Mass.) Daily Republican. The Sabbatarian Argument.
THE FUTURE OF THE SABBATH AND THE SUNDAY IN AMERICA.
PRACTICALLY and theologically this question is full of interest. The necessity of a weekly rest-day, and the character of its observance is generally conceded, but it is a remarkable fact that, thus far in the history of the church, whatever discussion has arisen has been mainly concerning a Sabbath or no Sabbath, rather than the Sabbath. Let us glance at the past and present of the question, and so judge of the future, remembering that in our brief space, we can do scarcely more than speak in general and in outline, holding ourself responsible for each statement. The popular opinion concerning the authority, time and manner of the change from the Sabbath to the Sunday, is full of error. In the half-dozen passages in the New Testament where reference is made to the first of the week, no reference is ever made to it as a Sabbath, or even as a commemorative festival. The history given in the book of Acts, has abundant proof of the observance of the Sabbath for many years after Christ. The term Sabbath is never applied to any day but the seventh, for more than one thousand years after Christ. In secular history, there is no evidence of any observance of the Sunday, earlier than about the middle of the second century. It then began to be a sort of a festival in common with the Wednesday and Friday, the three commemorating the passion and resurrection, made such by custom of the church, and without claim to divine authority. During the third century, opposition to Judaism and loose ideas concerning the nature of the law and its abrogation, led to the adoption of the "no Sabbath" theory, by the leading men of the western church. Some of them went so far as to oppose the festival observance of the dominical day, as it was beginning to be called. The tendency to festival days, however, increased; and soon came the introduction of those commemorating the ascension, the pentecost, the birth of Christ, the saints' day, &c. By the close of this century, the Sabbath was stigmatized as Jewish and odious, and in the churches in and about Rome was made a fast, and thus distasteful. It was, however, observed for some time after in this part of the church, and in the eastern church was prominent even down to the sixth and eighth centuries, while in Abyssinia and Armenia it has continued to be observed until the present time. The opening of the fourth century, and the assumption of the control of the church by Constantine the Great, brought in this, as in many other respects, great changes into the church. He was born and educated a heathen. His whole life shows him to have been selfish, cruel, treacherous, unscrupulous and proud, loving to be compared to Apollo, the god of the sun, his patron deity. He never avowed himself, in any full degree, a Christian, even in theory, until two or three years after the passage of his Sunday edict, and did not submit to baptism until on his death bed, many years after. The first Sabbatic character ever given to the Sunday, was by his edict of the 7th of March, A. D. 321, in which he ordered that the "venerable day of the sun" should be honored by a closing of the courts of justice, and the cessation of general labor in the cities, but giving free scope to all agricultural labor. Similar laws were common concerning many of the heathen festivals. On the day following, he passed another purely heathen edict relative to the consulting of the soothsayers in case of public calamity. This "venerable day of the sun," being identical with the resurrection festival, and this law being enforced gradually upon all classes, the Sunday came in time, into a prominence over the other weekly festivals, and, by virtue of a civil and ecclesiastical law, grew to be a sort of Sabbath, although agricultural labor, and many kinds of public amusements were not suppressed until the 12th and 13th centuries in many parts of Europe; and then only by the most incredible falsehoods concerning alleged miracles and the arm of the law. In all this time it was never claimed as a Sabbath other than by church appointment, and Constantine's edict makes no sort of mention of the day as a Christian institution, or as relating to the church, or connected with the resurrection, or in any way, other than the heathen "day of the sun." (For a fuller account of Constantine, and this and the other heathen festivals, see Andrew's History of the Sabbath, Dr. Schaff, in the Continental Monthly for August, 1864, Stanley's History of the Eastern Church, Bingham's Antiquities, &c.) In the reformation, the doctrine that there was no Sabbath by divine appointment, was prominent, and the opposite idea that none was needed except on grounds of convenience or policy, was taught by the leading men. See the Augsburg confession, Calvin's institutes, Bullinger's sermons, the works of Frith and Tyndale and others. No doctrine is more clearly set forth by these men than this, that there is no sacred time under the gospel. In the second wave of the reformation, which arose out of the political and ecclesiastical agitations in England, and during which Puritanism came to the surface, is found the first ideas of a sacred Sabbath in the Protestant church, and it is only where the footprints of Puritanism are found in Europe, that there has ever been, or is now, even any theoretical, much less practical recognition of a Sabbath claiming sacredness by virtue of the fourth commandment. It came about in this way: Among the many things which the parliamentary party sought to reform, was the manner of observing the so-called Lord's Day. Discarding as they did the authority of the church, something was requisite to show cause why the Sunday should be more strictly observed, or even observed at all. The true idea of a Sabbath was in some degree recognized, and in 1595, Nicholas Bound, D. D., of Norton, in Suffolk, put forth the first work advocating a Sabbath as taught in the Decalogue, and founded upon God's example at creation. Arguing well and truthfully the doctrine of the Sabbath, he then by a sort of a slipshod logic applied the argument to the Sunday. This became the doctrine of the Puritans and was most rigidly enforced by the parliamentary party while it retained the civil power, the day being made outwardly sacred in observance by the greatest care on the part of the civil officers, all infringement of statute laws being punished by fine or imprisonment. When the royal or church party regained control of the government, these restrictions were removed, and the day took its place with the other institutions of the church. Puritanism found a resting place on our shores, and with it these ideas of a Sabbath. With the decline in the theory and practice on this point in our theology, your readers are acquainted. With the present reactionary tendencies, they are familiar, which brings us to ask what are the elements of agitation at the present time? I answer— 1. The reaction now going on. We can scarcely overestimate the power of such tendencies. History is full of examples of it. That it is rapidly increasing in our own land is too evident to be questioned. The efforts of such organizations as the New York Sabbath committee, and kindred efforts, however noble in their spirit or wisely put forth, will increase the agitation. It is like the meeting of two opposing currents, or, perhaps, more nearly like an effort to check a current already strongly setting seaward. The large foreign population, the money-loving spirit of the age, the tendencies of all classes to free thinking, and the manifest necessity, when pressed, of acknowledging no divine, and only an ecclesiastical authority for the observance of the Sunday, all conspire to accelerate this reaction. Left to itself, there can122be little question as to the result. A holiday, and not a Sabbath, is all that we could hope for in a little time, especially when not a few leading men in the church are tending to such a point. 2. ELEMENTS WHICH OPPOSE THE SUNDAY AND DEFEND THE SABBATH. (a.) The Seventh-day Baptists: In the Puritanic reformation in Europe, not a few were found, who, by word and pen defended, and in practice conformed to the law of the Sabbath, and Seventh-day Baptist churches were early organized in England and probably on the continent. In 1664, one Stephen Mumford, a Seventh-day Baptist, coming from England, settled at Newport, R. I., where he united with a First-day Baptist church. His difference from the main body provoked discussion. Others, on investigation, agreed with him, and, as the result "the first Seventh-day Baptist church in America was organized at Newport, December 23, 1671." Soon after, by immigration, or otherwise, Sabbath-keepers appeared in New Jersey. From these points the Seventh-day Baptists have spread westward until they are now found in Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Virginia and Pennsylvania. Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Kansas, Nebraska, &c., with scattered families in many other localities. They number about sixty churches, with a membership of a little more than six thousand. They are largely identified with all reformatory and educational movements, have six academies, a university with academic, collegiate, and theological departments, publishing interests and many other elements of strength resulting from the slow growth of almost two centuries, under constant opposition and necessary self-defense. All this is backed by a growing spirit of agitation with reference to the question before us. (b.) The Seventh-day Adventists: The history of this people and their position on this question, is full of significance and worthy of study. After the disappointment in 1844, many honest ones, believing that we were still in the closing years of the world's history, sought to know what great work was yet to be done before the final consummation. The conclusion was soon reached that the apostasy foretold in Dan. vii, 25, referred to the change of the Sabbath by the papist power, and that the work of the "three angels' messages" of Rev. xiv, marks the restoration of the observance of all of God's commandments by his honest children. They found the Sabbath argument, as do the Seventh-day Baptist, upon the immutability of all law in the higher sense of the term, and the fact that no change has ever been authorized by any divine authority. They have the enthusiasm which youth and the consciousness of an especial and important mission inspires, and devote themselves most earnestly to their work. The following, from the pen of the editor of their weekly organ, will give an idea of their present strength: "We send single papers to about one thousand different post-offices, to one family or perhaps one individual Sabbath-keeper in the place. Probably not more than half of our people are organized into churches. The whole number is estimated at about twelve thousand. We have thirty-five evangelists in the field. We issue of our weekly Review and Herald, 4000 copies . . . publishing department has a capital stock of $25,215.11, . . . business for the year ending May, 1865, $64,029.58, . . . issued from the press within thirty months, 9,172,608 pages, past thirteen years 34,230,608 pages in books and tracts." Thus has God evidently called out another people to aid in the agitation and reform on this subject, and we may sum up the elements now at work as follows: 1. The reaction from former Puritanic vigor, the tendency of the age to free thinking and disregard of former landmarks, and the efforts of the friends of the Sunday to prevent this reaction. 2. The Seventh-day Baptists with the experience and appliances of age. 3. The Seventh-day Adventists with the enthusiasm and devotion of youth (their earliest tract in favor of the Sabbath, dating back only to 1845), and the zeal which the consciousness of an especial mission and a brief period of time in which to perform it, naturally inspires. The agitation is before us. The results God only knows, and time only will reveal to us.—A. H. Lewis