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Review and Herald, Vol. 38, No. 24.

EXAMINATION OF T. M. PREBLE'S FIRST-DAY SABBATH

Review and Herald

Nov 28, 1871

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 28, 1871

EXAMINATION OF T. M. PREBLE'S FIRST-DAY SABBATH.

By John Nevins Andrews

BY ELD. J. N. ANDREWS.
CHAPTER TEN.

HIS ARGUMENT FROM SABBATON CONTRADICTS ALL THE REST.

We have now carefully examined the book of Acts for "testimony" that the apostles changed the Sabbath. We have found many occasions that would call out the statement of the change were it really made, both from the historian Luke, and from the apostles themselves, who figure in the record as the speakers and the actors. Yet in each of these occasions we have seen that not one hint of the change is given, nor a single allusion made to it even in the remotest manner. In the fifteenth chapter of Acts, A. D. 52, we find the last mention of the apostles as a body; and it is not till eight years after this that we find the first day of the week so much as mentioned, and even this is done but once. Acts 20: 7. We have also briefly considered this passage and have seen that it does not furnish the slightest proof in support of the alleged change. Let us now resume our quotation of Eld. P.'s words, commencing with our last:
Change of days for the Sabbath. Now to the question, What is ‘the testimony?’ In the exercise of the power conferred upon the apostles, did they authorize a change of the Sabbath from the seventh to the first day of the week? If they did, then the change is as binding as if made by Christ himself. The ‘testimony’ is of two kinds: that of the Scripture record, and that of authentic ecclesiastical history. What, then, is the Scripture record? The apostles, and early disciples, were in the habit of meeting together, stated times for public worship. None will deny this. ‘Not forsaking the assembling of yourselves together, as the manner of some is.’ Sometimes ‘the whole church’ (1 Cor. 14: 23) would meet at ‘one place.’ The exercises of their meetings were prayer, and various kinds of religious instruction (1 Cor. 11: 1–20; 14: 23–40); exhortation (Rom. 12: 8; 1 Thess. 5: 11; Titus 2: 15; Heb. 3: 13); singing (Eph. 5: 19; Col. 3: 16); and the observance of the Lord’s supper. 1 Cor. 11: 20–34. Such meetings were not always held in private houses; but in places of public worship: for it is said (1 Cor. 11: 22–34), ‘What! have ye not [private] houses to eat and drink [your ordinary meals] in?’ ‘If any man hunger, let him eat at home,’ in his private house, and not come to your places of public worship, to turn the Lord’s Supper into a common meal, or place of riot! At the meeting at Troas (Acts 20: 7), ‘when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached,’ etc. From such considerations, it is evident that the meetings for observance of the Lord’s Supper were public meetings, in public places, held regularly for the benefit of the church. The question now arises, What day of the week did they observe for their PUBLIC STATED MEETINGS? was it on the seventh or was it on the first day of the week? what is ‘the testimony’? Pages 116–118.
This quotation has only a very remote bearing upon the case. It furnishes no argument, but we give it because Eld. P. designs by this statement to prepare the way for his argument. He refers, in the above, to Acts 20: 7, but as this has already been noticed, and as he elsewhere argues from it at length, we defer further remarks upon it till we quote his argument thereon. Let us now listen to the first argument of Eld. P. in continuation of the above:
"1. The old seventh-day Sabbath is not named in the New Testament, as a day for the assembling of Christians, after the resurrection of Christ, only as a day when PAUL met with them. And why he met with Jews on that day, is explained in 1 Corinthians 9: 20, to be for the express purpose of gaining the Jews. In Colossians 2: 16, the Sabbath is named, but the Sabbatarians will not admit that this refers to the seventh day, though many able critics so understand it." p. 118.
On this we remark:
1. That Col. 2: 16 relates to the annual Sabbath of the ceremonial law, called by Paul “the hand writing of ordinances” (See Lev. 23: 6–8, 16, 21, 24, 32, 39), and not to the weekly Sabbath of the moral law (Ex. 20: 8–11), is manifest from many plain facts. At this time we enter into no argument respecting this text inasmuch as Eld. P. has borne explicit testimony that it does not relate to the seventh-day Sabbath. Thus he says in words which he emphasizes to suit himself:
"And it is thus worthy of special attention that whenever the seventh-day Sabbath is mentioned in the New Testament, it is always to be found in the five historical books; and never once found in the epistles of any of the apostles." p. 47.
2. When Eld. P. gives the idea that Paul had no other regard for the Sabbath than simply that he “might gain the Jews,” he teaches a serious error. Let us quote the words referred to by him, 1 Cor. 9: 20, 21. “And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the law as under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law, to them that are without law, as without law (being not without law to God, but under the law to Christ), that I might gain them that are without law.” That Paul might reach the several classes of his hearers, he did, so far as he could in conscience do it, adapt himself to their varied circumstances. He takes particular pains, however, to state, when speaking of those “without law” (practical no-law men), that he was not such an one himself. He does not say “being without the law of God, and under the law of Christ” (which is the regular antinomian, no-Sabbath doctrine), but he says, “being not without law to God, but under the law to Christ;” and by this sentence he plainly acknowledges the authority of the law of God, and at the same time notes the peculiar relation that he sustains to it as one who has been pardoned by the interposition of the Son of God.
The truths of the Bible may be divided into two classes: 1. Primary; 2. Secondary. By “primary,” I mean those which simply define man’s duty toward God as he stood in his original innocence. By “secondary” truths, I mean such as would never have been obligatory upon man had he not become a sinner. Secondary truth is given not to take the place of, or to do away with, primary truth. It is given to enable man to recover from his violation of primary truth. Secondary truth may be divided into two parts. 1. That which was given to typify the way of rescue. 2. That which sets forth the rescue itself. The first of these two divisions of secondary truth is the ceremonial law. The second is the gospel itself. Now secondary truth is not given to supersede primary truth, but to bring man back to it. Primary truth is eternal and immutable. The first division of secondary truth, the ceremonial law, could not bring guilty man back to that innocence which he lost by transgressing God’s primary truth, the moral law. But this first division of secondary truth was given only to typify the second and to prepare the way for that; for the first could not restore man from the fall, but the second is able to do it.
We may distinguish these divisions of truth as follows: 1. Primary truth, which is but another name for the moral law. 2. Secondary truth embraces, 1st. The ceremonial law; 2d. The gospel of Christ. The moral law takes hold on all men. The ceremonial law ceased its obligation when Christ died for the sins of men and thus introduced the “good things” which could bring salvation. In Paul’s time, though the gospel had obtained the entire ground as the way of recovery, the Jews still retained the ceremonial law though it was no longer in force. But the Sabbath of the fourth commandment pertains not to the ceremonial law, the first division of secondary truth, but it is one of God’s primary truths, because it was made for man before the fall. When therefore Paul says that to the Jews he became as a Jew, he cannot refer to his observance of the fourth commandment inasmuch as this institution was a part of man’s original duty toward God, and one which the gospel, unlike its action in the case of the ceremonial Sabbath of Col. 2: 16, had not set aside. Eld. P.’s conclusion respecting 1 Cor. 9: 20, which he several times repeats in his book, is not only unnecessary but untruthful.
3. The Sabbath is referred to after the resurrection of Christ under the following circumstances:
1. At Antioch in Pisidia Paul and Barnabas “went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day,” and by invitation Paul addressed the people. Acts 13: 14–16.
2. In his speech he said that they who dwelt at Jerusalem read the prophets “every Sabbath day.” Verse 27.
3. “And when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles besought that these words might be preached to them the next Sabbath day.” Verse 42.
4. “And the next Sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God.” Verse 44.
5. When James pronounced sentence in the apostolic council at Jerusalem, he assigned as a reason for what he said, the following statement respecting the Sabbath: “For Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every Sabbath day.” Acts 15: 21.
6. When Paul, Silas, Timothy, and Luke began their labors in Philippi it is said: “And on the Sabbath we went out of the city by a river side, where prayer was wont to be made; and we sat down, and spake to the women which resorted thither.” Acts 16: 13.
7. The labors of Paul and his associates commenced at Thessalonica in the synagogue. Thus we read: “And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three Sabbath days reasoned with them out of the Scriptures.” Acts 17: 2.
8. At Corinth, under similar circumstances, it is said, “And he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks.” See Acts 18: 4.
But there is only a single reference to the first day of the week in the entire book of Acts, and this, too, not till eight years after the apostles, as a body, have ceased to be mentioned in its records. And whereas Eld. P. objects to the Sabbath that it is not named as a day for Christians to assemble, but “only as a day when Paul met with them,” this single instance of a first-day meeting was held, not because it was the custom of the church, but, as the record intimates, because Paul was to take his final leave of them at its close. Acts 20: 7, 25. But Eld. P. has another argument for the change of the Sabbath which he next gives in these words:
"2. The phrase, ‘The first day of the week,’ never occurs in the Bible until AFTER the resurrection of Christ. Now why did the old familiar seventh-day Sabbath cease to be named, except in connection with Paul’s accommodation meetings; and the new term, first day of the week [Sabbaton] come into use unless there was a CHANGE OF DAYS? There was a change made from the seventh day of Sabbaton (‘week’) to the first day of Sabbaton (‘week’), so far as language is concerned, surely. And why this change of language, unless the day was changed for holding their religious meetings?" p. 118.
Of “Sabbaton” we shall speak in due time. Suffice it to say at this point that the phrase “seventh day of Sabbath” is one coined by Eld. P. out of his own heart, being never used in the original of the Scriptures, nor in any ancient writer. The seventh day is simply called “the Sabbath.” Other days were numbered as “first day of Sabbath” and so on through the six working days, but that day which stands at the close of each weekly cycle is called “the Sabbath.”
As to the change of language this is exactly what Eld. P. has not proved. For the phrase “first day of the week” or “first day of Sabbaton,” is not a sacred title, and is an appropriate designation of the day as the first of “the six working days.” Were it the case that after the resurrection of Christ the ancient Sabbath was called simply “seventh day of week,” and the first day of the week was honored with the title of “the Sabbath” or “the Christian Sabbath” then he might well speak of a change of language.
If he calls it a change of language that the day should be named several times, whereas in the Old Testament it is only mentioned once, and that on the occasion of the creation (Gen. 1: 5), we remark that although the first day of the week is named eight times in the New Testament, yet six of these instances pertain to that one first day on which Christ arose (Matt. 28: 1; Mark 16: 2, 9; Luke 24: 1; John 20: 1, 19), and only twice is the day named after that event. Acts 20: 7; 1 Cor. 16: 2. And what is to be specially noticed, though Eld. P. thinks the Sabbath was changed to the first day of the week in honor of Christ’s resurrection on that day, yet that day is six times mentioned in close connection with that event and no hint of the change is given! And the same abstinence from sacred titles in the mention of the day is preserved in the remaining two instances as in these six. There are eight instances in which the day is mentioned and in no one of them is a title given it which ranks it higher than any other of the six working days.
It is not true that the Sabbath ceased to be named “except in connection with Paul’s accommodation meetings” as the list of references to the Sabbath in the book of Acts plainly shows. Note in particular the testimony of Paul (Acts 13: 27), and of James (Acts 15: 21), in each of which the ancient Sabbath is not only recognized as still the Sabbath, but also as being the only Sabbath. So that each of these apostles absolutely forbids the idea that the first day of the week has any right to be called “the Sabbath.” And what is very remarkable, the only instance of a first-day meeting in the New Testament, is an “accommodation meeting” by St. Paul in which he preached all night in view of the fact that he should leave in the morning never to see that church again. Acts 20: 7. This, by the way, is one of the two cases in which the first day is mentioned after the resurrection of Christ. And the other one is a precept concerning the first day which could only be obeyed by the disciples at their own homes, and even this passage is given for a limited time. 1 Cor. 16: 2.
Even Eld. P. elsewhere makes an exception to this statement respecting “accommodation meetings;” for while objecting to the Sabbath he speaks thus of what Paul, Silas, Timothy and Luke did on that day:
"And there is but one single instance where we have an account of any of the apostles’ holding a meeting on that day, which appears to have been for a season of mutual worship among themselves, and that is the one mentioned in Acts 16: 13, where it is said: ‘And on the Sabbath we went out of the city by a river side where prayer was wont to be made: and we sat down, and spake to the women which resorted thither.’" p. 48.
We have quoted Eld. P.’s arguments to prove that “the day was changed for holding their religious meetings.” His argument has been shown to be futile. And now we return to his question, “What day of the week did they observe for their public stated meetings?” Unquestionably that day on which, in obedience to the divine command, they rested from worldly labor. When God made the world, and formed man from its dust, he set apart from all secular purposes the day on which he rested. This appointment gave to mankind a stated day for divine worship. It is one of God’s primary truths. It was made for man as a race, and God gave it a place in the moral law. It is not therefore a church ordinance, but something which pertains alike to saints and to sinners, and which belongs to each dispensation. The question is, whether the apostles observed this day whose appointment is one of the primary truths of revelation, and whose existence is many times recognized in the book of Acts, or whether they kept a day which was never commanded by God nor by Christ nor even by themselves, and which is not even mentioned in the book of Acts till some eight years after the apostles as a body are dropped from its record, and then only once named on a special occasion which is there named, and when the object of the meeting was not to commemorate that which occurred upon the first day of the week, but that which occurred upon the sixth.
When on one side we have an established institution of the highest authority, and on the other side an alleged improvement upon that institution, for which no word of authority can be adduced, either as instituting, enforcing, or regulating it, then even the silence of the book of Acts respecting this new institution through the entire period of the history of the apostles as a body (were there no marked references to the original institution), becomes an argument absolutely fatal to the so-called new institution. For it is absolutely incredible that the well established sacred day should be superseded by a new day previously destitute of all sacredness, and yet not one word of controversy concerning it ever appear in that history. For though the subject of the Sabbath made trouble between Christ and the Jews, not as to the question of obligation, but as to the manner of its observance, it is worthy of special notice that the apostles and the Jews never had any dispute concerning the Sabbath, though they did concerning circumcision; a very convincing proof that they did not observe as their Sabbath the first of the six working days.
We come now to Eld. P.’s favorite first-day argument, drawn from the Greek word Sabbaton. We give it at length in his own words:
"The original Greek words for Sabbath, as found in the New Testament, in their singular and plural forms, are Sabbaton and Sabbata. The number of times these words occur in the New Testament is sixty-eight. They are found in different books as follows: In Matthew, eleven times; in Mark, twelve times; in Luke, twenty times; in John, thirteen times; in Acts, ten times; in 1 Corinthians, once; in Colossians once. These words are transferred (not translated) into our English version, in all, fifty-nine times; and thus called Sabbath, or Sabbath days, etc. But the translator saw fit to render the word Sabbaton, by the word ‘week,’ in nine cases out of the whole number sixty-eight, and these nine cases are found in the following places: In Matt. 28: 1; Mark 16: 2, 9; Luke 18: 12; 24: 1; John 20: 1, 19; Acts 20: 7; 1 Cor. 16: 2. In Matthew it reads, ‘In the end of the Sabbath [Sabbaton], as it began to dawn toward the first [day in a word supplied by the translators]
of the week [Sabbaton], came Mary,’ etc. In Mark: ‘And very early in the morning, the first of the week [Sabbaton], came,’ etc. ‘Now when Jesus was risen early the first of the week [Sabbaton], he appeared,’ etc. In Luke: ‘I fast twice in the week [Sabbaton], I give tithes,’ etc. ‘Now upon the first of the week [Sabbaton], very early in the morning,’ etc. In John: ‘The first of the week [Sabbaton] cometh Mary Magdalene early,’ etc. ‘Then the same day, at evening, being the first of the week [Sabbaton], when the doors were shut,’ etc. In Acts: ‘And upon the first of the week [Sabbaton], when the disciples came together to break bread,’ etc. In 1 Corinthians: ‘Upon the first of the week [Sabbaton], let every one of you lay by him in store,’ etc.
"Now, let us turn back to Matt. 28: 1, and see if we can ascertain the true import of this word ‘week,’ as it has been then found in the cases above referred to. It appears that the word Sabbaton, as found in this verse, occurs twice, and, in both instances, it is in the plural form; and this being the case, the true rendering of the passage requires us to read it, in substance, like this: At the end of Sabbaths, in the beginning of the first of Sabbaths, etc. Or as Mark has it: And very early in the first of Sabbaths (lit. of one of Sabbaths), etc. But Luke and John appear to have it still stronger: And in the first of the Sabbaths, etc.: the definite article the being placed before the noun Sabbaton. Now it is evident that if the translators had transferred the word Sabbaton, in these nine cases just examined, as they did in the other fifty-nine instances above referred to, then we should have had less difficulty than we now have, and we should see that at the END of the seventh-day Sabbath (or at the end of the Jewish Sabbath—which was given to the ‘children of Israel’ to be a ‘sign’ unto them ‘throughout their generations’) there WOULD BE THE BEGINNING OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST’S DAY, OR SABBATH. Or, in other words, where one series of days ended, there another series of days began." Pages 44–46.
The emphatic words are thus given by Eld. P. We have given this lengthy quotation because it presents as much show of argument as anything in his book, and because he is continually making reference to it. It even appears that the title of his book, and the name of the institution whose existence and whose authority it attempts to establish, are both selected by him in deference to this peculiar argument. Let us examine it.
1. If the argument drawn from this new translation, can be depended upon, then we have, in the first day of the week, a new Sabbath which has superseded the ancient Sabbath of the Lord. But it should be observed in this case, 1st. That all Eld. P.’s extended argument to prove that the apostles had power to change the Sabbath, and that they actually did make the change, is absolutely false, our friend, Eld. P., being judge, inasmuch as the new Sabbath was in existence, as it now appears, at the very time when Christ was resurrected. Pages 110, 117. 2d. That Eld. P.’s remarkable argument from Heb. 4: 10, in proof that Christ made the first day into the Christian Sabbath by resting upon it, blessing and sanctifying it, is also false, inasmuch as it was “the first-day Sabbath” on which he arose from the dead, provided the present argument is correct. pp. 131, 302–304. 3d. Nor is it true that “the first decisive indications of this change” of the Sabbath are to be looked for in the history of the apostles rather than in the “history of Christ himself,” if it be true that the four evangelists expressly recognize “the first-day Sabbath” at the very time when Christ arose from the dead. p. 110.
2. But as Eld. P. maintains these three propositions, viz., 1st. That there are no decisive indications of the change of the Sabbath in the history of Christ; 2d. That Christ, after his resurrection, actually made the change, in that he rested upon, blessed, and hallowed, the first day of the week; 3d. That the change, though made by the apostles, is as valid as if made by Christ himself, it is manifest that he has no real faith in his argument for “the first-day Sabbath” from his new translation. For if the first day actually was the Sabbath at the time when the Saviour arose from the dead, these propositions, though maintained by him, are all false, as well as mutually contradictory of each other.
3. But again, if this present argument from Eld. P.’s translation is correct, and Christ actually rose from the dead on the first-day Sabbath, then we have a difficult problem to solve. How did this day become the Sabbath? It was not by virtue of Christ’s resurrection, for it was the first-day Sabbath on which he arose. It did not become such by his resting upon, blessing, and sanctifying, it after his resurrection, for, according to this argument, it was the first-day Sabbath before the occurrence of any of those acts which Eld. P. alleges that he wrought. Moreover, it did not become such by the action of the apostles, for their power to act, according to Eld. P. himself, did not come upon them till fifty days after “the first-day Sabbath” was in actual existence. How, then, did this first-day Sabbath come into being?
4. It is indeed remarkable that Eld. P. actually fixes the commencement of the first one of the first-day Sabbaths at the close of what he calls the last seventh-day Sabbath. Thus he says—the emphasis being his: “AT THE END of the seventh-day Sabbaths . . . THERE would be the BEGINNING of the LORD JESUS CHRIST’S DAY OF SABBATH. Or, in other words, where one series of days ended, there another series of days began.” p. 46. The first of the first-day Sabbaths did, therefore, commence to untest on Saturday evening next following the crucifixion, and at a time when our Lord was still under the power of death! A plain proof, indeed, that the first day is not the Sabbath by virtue of Christ’s resurrection! What he says in this connection concerning the Sabbath as a sign between God and Israel, will be noticed hereafter.
5. But does not Eld. P. make out a strong case by his translation and comments, especially on Luke and John? Listen to him: “At the end of Sabbath, in the beginning of the first of Sabbaths, etc. Or, as Mark has it: And very early in the first of Sabbaths (lit. of one of Sabbaths), etc. But Luke and John appear to have it still stronger: And in the first of the Sabbaths, etc.; the definite article the being placed before the noun Sabbaton.” p. 46. Does not this imply just what Eld. P. claims that it does, viz., that Luke and John not only speak of that first day on which Christ arose, as the Sabbath, but as being the first Sabbath of a new series? So Eld. P. would have it; yet mark how plain a fact will show such reasoning false. Luke speaks of the first day of the week about thirty years after this time and he uses this same form of expression in the Greek, compare Luke 24: 1; Acts 20: 7. Now if the day of Christ’s resurrection is proved, by this language, to be the first one of a new series of Sabbaths, the same thing can be proved in the same way, concerning the day on which Paul broke bread at Troas! which would be a palpable falsehood.
6. But which is correct, our common translation, or that one which Eld. P. has given us? If the first is correct, then no trace of the first-day Sabbath is found in the several texts under consideration. But if Eld. P.’s translation is correct, then we have the first-day Sabbath in existence before the resurrection of Christ! But there is the strongest presumption that our common version is correct, and that of Eld. P. erroneous. The translators of our version, whom he implicitly censures for not having made his task one of “less difficulty,” were all first-day men, and had no motive to hide the evidence in favor of Sunday. Again, the world is full of Sunday-Sabbatarian writers who have a thorough knowledge of the Greek language. Yet such writers discard this peculiar argument and pass it by as worthless, a most convincing proof that it is really such. (For an exhaustive argument on the word Sabbaton, see the tract on Sabbaton by Rev. Uriah Smith, published at the ADVENT REVIEW Office, in which the common version of these texts is ably vindicated.)
7. The following from Dr. Wm. Hales’ “New Analysis of Chronology,” page 18, in which he gives the method of numbering the days of the week in the time of Christ, makes this subject perfectly simple to every mind. He gives the ancient Syriac calendar thus:
"One of the Sabbath or week [Sunday]. Two of the Sabbath or week [Monday]. Three of the Sabbath or week [Tuesday]. Four of the Sabbath or week [Wednesday]. Five of the Sabbath or week [Thursday]. Eve of the Sabbath or week [Friday]. The Sabbath . . . . . [Saturday]."
8. And now I add that Eld. P., in his quotation from Dr. Heylyn’s History of the Sabbath, fully confirms what I have taken from Dr. Hales and manifests the futility of his own argument from Sabbaton. Thus, on pages 106, 107, he quotes these words, with many others from Dr. H:
"We must take notice that the Jews, in honor of their Sabbath, used to refer their times to that, distinguishing their days by prima Sabbati, secunda Sabbati, and so on until they came unto the Sabbath itself. . . . Now the apostles, being Jews, retained the custom of the Jews; and for that reason called that day on which our Saviour arose, mia Sabbaton, una Sabbati, the first day of the week, as our English reads it. The fathers, many of them, followed their example. St. Austin thereupon calls Thursday by the name of quintum Sabbati (Epist. 118), and so did venerable Bede (Hist. Bib. 4. c. 25.) St. Jerome, Tuesday, tertium Sabbati, in Epitaph. Paulæ: Tertullian, Friday, by the old name parascen. (l. 4. advers. marcian.) Saturday, they called generally the Sabbath; and Sunday, sometimes dies solis, and is sometimes dies Dominicus."
9. These words of Dr. Heylyn, found in Eld. P.’s own book, show how unreasonable and absurd is his argument that Matt. 28: 1, and its parallels, confers a sacred title on Sunday. The title, “one of the Sabbath,” or Sunday, “two of the Sabbath,” or Monday, is the common style of designating the six working days in the times of the evangelists. This title, “one of the Sabbath,” is the name of that day which began at the close of the Sabbath. If, therefore, Eld. P. still claims it as a sacred title of the so-called Christian Sabbath, it follows that that Sabbath was in existence some hours before the resurrection of Christ, and cannot, therefore, have originated in commemoration of that event! It is, therefore, either no argument at all, or it is one that overthrows not only all the leading first-day arguments hitherto examined, but it overthrows the so-called Christian Sabbath itself, in that it proves it to be in existence before that event had transpired which it is said to have been instituted to commemorate!
10. But we have one thing more to call to view. In 1851, Eld. Josiah Litch gave this same argument for Sunday through the Advent Herald. In it, Eld. L. used this language:
"The truth is—and Sabbatarians either do, or ought to, know it—the evangelists never, in the language in which the gospels are found (the Greek), called the first day of the week anything else but Sabbath."
Again, rendering Matt. 28: 1 as our friend Eld. P. now renders it, he says:
"Does not this indicate that one series of Sabbaths there ended, so far as obligation to observe it was concerned, and a new series was introduced? At any rate, the first, is as positively called Sabbath as the seventh, day."
The editor of the Herald, S. Bliss, an honest, clear-headed, well-informed critic, appended the following correction:
"Remarks.—Lest any should gather from the above, that the word Sabbath is represented by the phrase ‘first day of the week,’ we add that Sabbath is simply translated week in those terms—other words indicating the day of the week. The word Sabbath is originally a Hebrew word, and signifies rest; but occurring at regular intervals, by a metonymy it became significant of the periods separated by these rests. So that we have the seventh day of the rest, and the first of the rest, week, or Sabbath. Ed."
One would suppose this sufficient, so far as the authority of Mr. Bliss could do it, to put an effectual quietus upon the argument for first-day sacredness from “Sabbaton.” But Eld. P., whose attention was specially called to it in “Both Sides,” comes out in this present work and boldly claims Mr. Bliss on his side. Thus he says:
"But let the reader mark well the closing remark of S. Bliss in his note: ‘So that we have the seventh day of the rest, and the first of the rest, week, or Sabbath.’ Thank the Lord that our late and much lamented Bro. Bliss ever penned these words for us. They are just to the point—just what I believe, and have argued as well as I could." p. 262.
I should suppose this claim on the part of Eld. P. the result of some strange peculiarity of mind, such as seems to have enabled him to see harmony in first-day arguments that squarely contradict each other, were it not that Mr. B. more than once afterward bore faithful testimony against this singular argument. Here is a fair sample published seven years before Eld. P.’s “First-day Sabbath,” and at a time when Eld. P. appears to have been both a subscriber to, and a correspondent of, that paper. Here are Mr. Bliss’ own words:
"‘. . . M. Sabbaton, in Matt. 28: 1, and the other places you refer to, is used by a metonymy for the week period that is measured by Sabbaths, and therefore is properly rendered ‘week.’ The first of the Sabbaton, then, would be simply the first of week."
"‘Your argument would make every day of the week a Sabbath; for they are the first, second, &c., to the seventh, of the Sabbaton or week. The truth is always injured by advancing a weak and fallacious argument, or when it is attempted to be sustained by sophistical and fallacious reasoning.’"—Advent Herald of 1860, Vol. 21, No. 30.
The circumstances of this case are such that we cannot believe Eld. P. to have been ignorant of these words; and it is impossible that even he could so interpret them as to believe in his heart that Mr. Bliss was in this thing in harmony with him.

Thine.

By The Christian

Little to me it matters Whether my feet are led, If in the burning desert Or the pastures green I'm fed,— Whether the storm or sunshine Be in the path I take; For my hand is in thine, my Father, Thou'lt not thy child forsake.
And it shall not cause me to sorrow, Though the path be steep and rough; I am thine, thine own forever, And that shall be joy enough. Thine is the care, my Father— The work of providing, thine; Only the trust and the pleasure And the calm content are mine.
Neither shall I be anxious For the dear ones whom I love; From thee they are never absent— Thou reachest them from above. And Lord, I know they are dearer To thee than they are to me, So I only ask thee to take them, And do as it pleaseth thee.
But others are only strangers, And know not the perfect peace Of those who beneath thy banner Are finding their sorrow cease. They are away in the darkness, In the gloomy and silent night; O Father, receive them also, And welcome them into the light.
So, then, it will not matter, Whatever the future be; Gladly we take our journey, Leaving the rest to thee. And in darkness, or gloom, or tempest, Still shall the best light shine; And the joy shall come to our spirits; For, Father, we all are thine. —The Christian.
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