The Sabbath and the Lord’s Day

 

By Herbert M. Riggle

 

 

 

 

 

Preface

 

Before the death of the first apostles of Christ certain law teachers troubled the churches, trying to impose upon them the rites of Moses' law. In a large assembly of apostles and elders at Jerusalem, it was fully decided and settled not to bind the law upon Gentile Christians (see Acts 15). In the Epistles of Paul powerful arguments are brought forth to teach the abrogation of the law and the superior qualities of the gospel, the law of Christ. The apostle declares the law teachers "pervert the gospel of Christ," are "vain janglers," "understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm."

After the death of the apostles a number of sects arose that taught the law is binding and enjoined the observance of the Jewish Sabbath. Among these were the Ebionites, who flourished in the second century and dissented from the general church. They were among the rankest heretics of their time.

About the time of the Reformation a body of people arose in England that zealously advocated the observance of the seventh day. They had many able ministers and writers, and published many books. Today their work has become entirely extinct.

A small body of people known as Seventh day Baptists arose in 1664. They are now very few in number.

In 1846 Seventh day Adventists began teaching the Jewish Sabbath. They have been very zealous. They have poured out their means by the millions and have filled the land with their literature. Probably no other small body of people on earth have published and circulated as much literature over the world as these. No other people have met with more disappointments during their existence. Miller, the founder of the Adventist movement finally opposed the Sabbath, and warned his followers against its observance. Scores of their most prominent ministers have at different times renounced the faith as an error. Many have been led into infidelity as a result of the mistakes of Adventism. We believe the whole system is a yoke of bondage.

These law teachers travel from hamlet to city, scattering their doctrines by lecturing in tents and halls and by distributing tracts, papers, and books among the people. Although but few accept the doctrine, hundreds become unsettled, and can scarcely be reached by the truth. To counteract this influence and to set forth the truth, is the object of this book. It will be found to be pointed and thorough on the subject. It is a complete treatise on all the important points relating to the Sabbath and the Lord's Day.

Having received a written permission from D. M. Canright, Grand Rapids, Mich., I have made some choice quotations from his excellent work Seventh Day Adventism Renounced. Mr. Canright was for a number of years a very prominent minister and writer of the Adventist faith. At the time he renounced their doctrines in 1887, he held a number of the highest offices in the society, and was, no doubt, one of the ablest ministers they have ever had. Hear his testimony:

"After keeping the seventh day and extensively advocating it for over a quarter of a century, I became satisfied that it was an error, and that the blessing of God did not go with the keeping of it. Like thousands of others, when I embraced the seventh day Sabbath I thought that the argument was all on one side, so plain that one hour's reading ought to settle it, so clear that no man could reject the Sabbath and be honest. The only marvel to me was that everybody did not see and embrace it.

"But after keeping it twenty eight years; after having persuaded more than a thousand others to keep it; after having read my Bible through, verse by verse, more than twenty times; after having scrutinized, to the very best of my ability every text, line, and word in the Bible having the remotest bearing upon the Sabbath question; after having looked up all these, both in the original and in many translations; after having searched in lexicons, concordances, commentaries, and dictionaries; after having read armfuls of books on both sides of the question; after having read every line in all the early church Fathers upon this point, and having written several works in favor of the seventh day, which were satisfactory to my brethren; after having debated the question for more than a dozen times; after seeing the fruits of keeping it, and weighing all the evidence in the fear of God, I am fully settled in my own mind and convinced that the evidence is against the keeping of the seventh day."—Seventh day Adventism Renounced, pages 185, 186.

Such testimony is of great value and weight. In the chapters "The Sabbath on a Round Earth," and "The Law," I quote from his work at some length. Also, scattered throughout the book are a few quotations from D. S. Warner's former book on The Sabbath. In some cases I have given extracts of the quotations, instead of giving them in full or verbatim. I ask the reader to give this book a careful study with unbiased mind; and I believe the truth contained in its pages will be flashlights from the throne of God to your understanding.

 

Yours in Christian love,

— H. M. Riggle

 

Introduction

 

If a system of worship is wrong, then all the labor to build up a system is misdirected effort. We sincerely believe that the whole Sabbatarian contention is resting upon a wrong premise. After a most careful study of the question, we believe that the Scriptures do not support the observance of the seventh day under the Christian dispensation.

All truth runs parallel. Truth never contradicts. If we can adduce a single truth against the observance of Saturday keeping under the gospel, then let it be borne in mind that every other truth is against it. If we can sustain our position by a single truth, then all truth upholds it. On this eternal principle we build our arguments. It is the truth we want. With open hearts let us carefully investigate the whole subject.

I kindly ask our Sabbatarian friends to go with me in the perusal of this important subject, and in our study together, may the Holy Spirit lead us into a correct knowledge of the truth. 

 

H. M. R.

 

The Sabbath;

When Originated
And
When First Enjoined Upon Man

 

The plan of redemption was conceived in the mind of God prior to the foundation of the world. It was a mystery then hid in him alone. Long ages before that mystery was unlocked to mankind in the person of Jesus Christ, who made the world's atonement, it cast a love betokening shadow upon earth. That shadow was the law. The law embraced the five books of Moses—Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. In proof of this, I cite a quotation from each book.

Paul says that women "are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law" (1 Cor. 14:34). Where does the law say this? In Gen. 3:16. I quote from the LXX: "The submission shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee." Genesis, then, is in the law. "The law had said, Thou shalt not covet" (Rom. 7:7). Where? In Exod. 20:17. So Exodus is in the law. Jesus makes two quotations from the law: 1. "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart." This is taken from Deut. 6:5. 2. "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." This is from Lev. 19:18. So both Deuteronomy and Leviticus are a part of the law. Again: "Have ye not read in the law, how that on the Sabbath days the priests in the temple profane the Sabbath, and are blameless?" (Matt. 12:5). This is from Num. 28:9. So all the five books of Moses are embraced in "the law."

"The law having a shadow of good things to come" (Heb. 10:1). The whole law system was but a shadow, containing types and figures of the plan of perfect redemption. Its Passover, atonements, sacrifices, offerings, tabernacle, temple, altars, blood, priests, circumcision, and sabbaths, all belonged to the law of shadows going before.

Among the promises of coming redemption was that of Shiloh—the rest giver (Gen. 49:10). "And his rest shall be glorious" (Isa. 11:10). In fulfillment, Jesus came, saying, "Come unto me . . . and I will give you rest . . . And ye shall find rest unto your souls" (Matt. 11:28; 29). In the law of shadows there must be a type of this sweet and tranquil rest found in redeeming grace. Hence God set apart one day in seven, the seventh, as a "sabbath of rest."

"Sabbath" means "rest." Rest is the sole idea of the term. The law said, "Six days may work be done; but in the seventh is the Sabbath of rest" (Exod. 31:15). This is made still clearer in the Septuagint, where it is rendered, "But the seventh day is the Sabbath, a holy rest to the Lord." That sabbath, or rest, was "a shadow of things to come." It reached its fulfilment in Christ, in whom our souls have found an everlasting rest (see Col. 2:14-17; Heb. 4:1-11).

The Sabbath, then, was instituted by God, among the types and shadows of his great redemption. It pointed back to the creation, and forward to Christ, just as the Passover pointed back to Israel's exodus from Egyptian bondage and forward to "Christ our Passover, sacrificed for us." Whether, therefore, the Sabbath was instituted before Moses or not, it belonged to the law of types and shadows. Sacrifices began in the family of Adam, circumcision began with Abraham, yet both were nailed to the cross with all the ordinances of Moses.

But let us investigate, and find just when and where the Sabbath was first enjoined upon man. Saturday keepers lay no small stress upon a supposed pre Mosaic Sabbath. In fact, it is one of their main pillars. Back there in the dim past the events of an age were covered by a few lines in the Bible. Yet "the main reliance of Sabbatarians is upon arguments drawn from those remote times of darkness, while in the New Testament they find little to support their theories, but much to explain away.''

The scholarship of the world is somewhat divided on the subject of a pre Mosaic Sabbath. Much has been written on both sides of the question. In either case it has little bearing on present observance. But since our Sabbatarian friends rely greatly upon a belief in Sabbath observance from Eden, I desire to set before the reader what I sincerely believe to be the truth of the matter. After reading much on both sides of the controversy, I have been led into the settled conviction that the argument for Sabbath observance from Eden down through the Patriarchal age rests upon a very sandy foundation. I shall submit the following proofs against it:

There is not one command in the book of Genesis to keep the seventh day as a Sabbath. In the language of Canright, "There is no statement that any of the patriarchs kept the Sabbath or knew anything about it. Sabbatarians say the record is so brief that it was omitted. Their proof, then, is what was left out!"

The first mention of the Sabbath as a rest day enjoined upon man that is recorded in the Bible is found in Exod. 16:23-30. This was twenty five hundred years after the creation of man. It was a new command to the Jews. On Friday, Moses said to the people, "Tomorrow is a solemn rest, a holy Sabbath unto the Lord" (verse 23, Revised Version). On Saturday, he said, "Today is a Sabbath unto the Lord" (verse 25). "So the people rested on the seventh day" (verse 30). "And the people keep Sabbath on the seventh day" (LXX). This language, with its context, seems to prove that the children of Israel there and then began resting on the seventh day; that the keeping of the Sabbath was a new thing to them. Their deliverance from Egypt marked a new era in their history. At this time the Lord gave them a new year and a new beginning of months. (See Exod. 12:2.) So, also, he for the first time gave them the Sabbath (Exodus 16). Many scriptures teach this fact, a few of which are given below.

"Wherefore I caused them to go forth out of the land of Egypt, and brought them into the wilderness. Moreover also I gave them my sabbaths, to be a sign between me and them)' (Ezek. 20:10, 12). This text is conclusive. It simply states that God gave them the Sabbath when he brought them out of Egypt. "I gave them my sabbaths" implies the act of committing it to them, and proves that they did not have it before. It was a new thing to them, and only for them. The place where God gave Israel the Sabbath was: ``the wilderness." It was given as a sign between himself and that nation. So positively teaches the text quoted.

"And remember that thou west a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand, and by a stretched out arm: THEREFORE the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath Day" (Deut. 5:15). God commanded Israel to keep the Sabbath as a memorial of their deliverance from Egypt. Then, they never kept it until the reason existed for keeping it. Thus, it was first enjoined upon them in the wilderness.

The covenant enjoining the seventh day was not made before Moses. "The Lord our God made a covenant with us in Horeb. The Lord made not this covenant with our fathers, but with us, even us, who are all of us here alive this day" (Deut. 5:2, 3). "Then follows a recital of the Ten Commandments, the covenant referred to. So if we are to credit the inspired statement of Moses, we must admit that the law embodying the seventh day Sabbath had never been given to the ancestors of the Jewish nation. Nay, "The Lord made not this covenant with out fathers but with us, even us, who are all of us here alive this day."

We affirm that every assumption that the Sabbath had been previously given is a direct contradiction of these texts.

"Thou camest down also upon Mount Sinai, and spakest with them from heaven . . . and makest known unto them thy holy Sabbath" (Neh. 9:13, 14). "Though the Sabbath had been introduced a short time before when the manna first fell, it is but natural that Nehemiah should speak of it with the rest of the law, as given on Sinai, by the audible voice of God, . . . and made a statute in Israel. If, then, we credit the testimony of Nehemiah, we trace the origin of that Sabbath to Moses in the wilderness. There is where God came down and gave that law."

I shall now quote from The Sabbath and also from Canright. "Smith and Barnum's Dictionary of the Bible says, 'In Exod. 16:23 29 we find the first incontrovertible institution of the day, as one given to, and to be kept by, the children of Israel. Shortly afterward it was re enacted in the fourth commandment.'

 

 

" 'There is no express mention of it previous to the time of Moses.'—Jahn's Biblical Archaeology.

" 'The celebration of the seventh day as a day consecrated to Jehovah, is first mentioned after the Exodus from Egypt, and seems to have preceded the Sinaitic legislation, which merely confirmed and invested it with the highest authority. There is no trace of its celebration in the patriarchal times.'—Chambers' Encyclopedia.

" 'The first record of its observance by the Jews is mentioned in Exod. 16:25, when, in addition to its being observed in remembrance of the original rest day of the creation, it was celebrated also in memento of the day of freedom of the Jews from Egyptian bondage.'—People's Cyclopedia.

"Smith's Bible Dictionary says of the argument on Gen. 2:1 3 for the institution of the Sabbath in Eden, 'The whole argument is very precarious.... There is no record of its celebration in patriarchal times.'

" 'The early Christian writers are generally . . . silent on the subject of a primitive Sabbath.... Such examination as we have been able to institute, has disclosed no belief in its existence, while some indications are found of a notion that the Sabbath began with Moses.'—Kitto.

"Justin Martyr, who wrote only forty four years after the death of John, and who was well acquainted with the doctrines of the apostles, denied that the Sabbath originated at creation. Thus after naming Adam, Abel, Enoch, Lot, and Melchizedek, he says: 'Moreover, all those righteous men already mentioned, though they kept no Sabbaths, were pleasing to God.'—Dialog with Trypho, chap. 19.

" 'Enoch and all the rest, who neither were circumcised after the flesh, nor observed Sabbaths, nor any other rites, seeing that Moses enjoined such observances.

" 'For if there was no need of circumcision before Abraham, or of the observance of the Sabbaths, . . . before Moses, no more need is here of them now.

" 'As, then, circumcision began with Abraham, and the Sabbath . . . with Moses, and it has been proved they were enjoined on account of the hardness of your people's hearts, so it was necessary, in accordance with the Father's will, that they should have an end in him, who was born of a virgin, of the family of Abraham.' —Justin Martyr to Trypho, a Jew." Thus it will be seen that Justin Martyr understood that the Sabbath began with Moses, and ended in Christ. This is in perfect harmony with the Scriptural teaching.

"Irenaeus says: 'Abraham believed God without circumcision and the Sabbath.'—Adv. Hoeres, Lib. IV, ch. 30.

"Tertullian, A. D. 200, said: 'Let them show me that Adam Sabbatized, or that Abel in presenting his holy offerings to God pleased him by Sabbath observance, or that Enoch who was translated was an observer of the Sabbath.'—Against the Jews, sec. IV."

Eusebius, A. D. 324 the father of church history, says: "They [the patriarchs] did not, therefore, regard circumcision, nor observe the Sabbath, neither do we.... Such things as these do not belong to Christians." Book I, ch. 4.

Here, then, we have the testimony from the historical records from the second and third centuries that the Sabbath was not enjoined upon, nor observed by, the people of God till Moses' time, or for 2,500 years after creation. The early church did not believe that the Sabbath originated at creation. I shall add the testimony of eminent men.

"The transactions in the wilderness above recited were the first actual institution of the Sabbath." — Paley: Watson's Institutes, vol. II, p. 515.

"The Sabbath is no where mentioned, or even obscurely alluded to, either in the general history of the world before the call of Abraham, or in that of the first three Jewish patriarchs."—Paley: Wakefield's Theology.

"Whether its institution was ever made known to Adam, or whether any commandment relative to its observance was given previous to the delivery of the law on Mt. Sinai . . . cannot be ascertained."—John Milton: Christian Doctrine, vol. I, p. 299.

"That the Israelites had not so much as heard of the Sabbath before this time [the wilderness], seems to be confirmed by several passages of the prophets." —John Milton.

"Now as to the imposing of the seventh day Sabbath upon men from Adam to Moses, of that we find nothing in holy writ, either from precept or example."—John Bunyan: Complete Works, page 892. On page 895 of the same book Bunyan says, "The seventh day Sabbath, therefore, was not from paradise, nor from nature, nor from the fathers, but from the wilderness and from Sinai." Bunyan was well versed in Scripture.

From all the foregoing it is clearly seen that the united scriptural testimony, the most authentic historical records, the teachings of the most highly learned and eminent men, all point to the wilderness and Sinai for the institution of the Sabbath. It is clearly traced to Moses and the law. Upon what, then, do Saturday keepers base their claim for a pre Mosaic Sabbath? Upon their own misinterpretation of the words of Moses in Gen. 2:2, 3. They argue that God rested, blessed, and sanctified the seventh day in Eden, and that hence an obligation rests upon all to observe it.

That this reasoning is incorrect and the whole argument unsound I shall now proceed to show.

1. The Book of Genesis, including these words, was not written at the time of the creation of man, but twentyfive hundred years later, by Moses himself. In fact, this statement of Moses' in Gen. 2:2, 3 was not written until after the covenant enjoining the seventh day Sabbath upon the Jews had been delivered upon Sinai.

2. The language clearly proves that God did not bless and sanctify the day back at Eden when he rested, but at a later date. "And he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it He had rested from all his work which God created and made." He blessed and sanctified the day "because in it HE HAD rested." He rested back in Eden. But God's rest did not make the day holy. It was not holy in itself. Twentyfive hundred years later God in the wilderness blessed and sanctified the seventh day as a holy day to the Jewish nation, and assigned as one reason for doing so that "in it he had rested." After God blessed and sanctified the day in the wilderness, Moses wrote the book of Genesis; and in writing the account of the creation he said that God began resting on the seventh day from all his work, and that the same day on which God had rested he now sanctified and blessed. Here again the inspired Word points to the wilderness for the institution of the Sabbath.

"As this narrative, i. e., Gen. 2:2, 3, was composed after the delivery of the law, for their special instruction, so this passage was only intended to confirm more forcibly I that institution; or that it is to be understood as if Moses had said, 'God rested on the seventh day, which he has since blessed and sanctified.' "—Kitto's Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature. To this we say amen. The language of Genesis II cannot be understood in any other light, unless the text is wrested.

"As the seventh day was erected into a Sabbath, on account of God's resting upon that day from the work of creation, it was but natural enough in the historian, when he had related the history of the creation, and of God's ceasing from it on the seventh day, to add, 'And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it, because that on it he had rested from all his work which God created and made'; although the blessing and sanctification, that is, the religious distinction and appropriation of that day, were not made till many ages after. The words do not assert that God then blessed and sanctified the seventh day, but that he blessed and sanctified it for that reason.'' Paley: Moral and Political Philosophy, Book IV, ch. 7.

On this point I quote the following from Canright:

"As Moses wrote his books after he came to Sinai, after the Sabbath had been given in the wilderness, he here mentions one reason why God thus gave them the seventh day, viz.: because God himself had set the example at creation; had worked six days and rested the seventh. Such use of language is common. We say General Grant was born at such a time. We do not mean that he was a general then, but we mention it by anticipation, using a title which he afterwards bore. So in Gen. 3:20, 'Adam called his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living.' Here is a future fact stated as though it had already occurred. So 1 Sam. 4 :1, the Jews 'pitched beside Ebenezer.' But the place was not named Ebenezer till years after (1 Sam. 7:12). 'Judas Iscariot, which also was the traitor' (Luke 6:16). Here a future fact with regard to Judas is mentioned when he is first spoken of, though the act of betrayal did not take place till years later. Just so when the seventh day is first mentioned, its sanctification is referred to, though it did not occur till afterwards."

3. "Though the record from Adam to Moses covers a period of twenty five hundred years; though we appear to have a full account of the religious customs and worship of the patriarchs, such as Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, etc., though we are told about circumcision, the altar, the sacrifices, the priests, the tithe, the oath, marriage, feast days, etc.; yet never a word is said about anyone keeping the Sabbath."—Canright.

The first mention of the Sabbath's being kept by anyone is recorded in Exodus 16. It began with Moses and was instituted in the wilderness. To go back of Moses for proof in favor of Saturday keeping is going outside the Bible, into the fogs and mists of speculation and darkness.

 

The Sabbath a Jewish Institution

 

Law teachers try in every way possible to evade the fact that the Sabbath was only Jewish. To admit this would prove that they are trying to revive an abolished institution which belonged wholly to a single nation in a former dispensation. But this is the truth set forth in the plainest terms.

Says God' "I gave them [the Jews] my sabbaths, to be a sign between me and them" (Ezek. 20:12). Not to angels in heaven and to Gentile nations on earth, but to the Jews, God gave the Sabbath. If I gave John a dollar, is it not John's dollar? "I gave them [the Jews] my Sabbath," saith the Lord. Is it not their Sabbath? Notice how plain the record is that God gave the Sabbath to the Jews, and to no others. "The Lord hath given you the Sabbath" (Exod. 16:29). "Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, Verily, my sabbaths ye shall keep" (Exod. 31:13.) "It is a sign between me and the children of Israel" (vs. 17). "The children of lsrael shall keep the Sabbath . . . through THEIR generations" (vs. 16).|

Surely this is plain. But right in the face of such positive declarations, Sabbatarians contend that the decalog enjoining the observance of the seventh day rules the universe of God; hence is binding upon angels in heaven. and upon all nations of earth. Therefore they argue that the angels keep the seventh day Sabbath. Let us examine it. I

"The Lord our God made a covenant with us in Horeb. The Lord made not this covenant with our fathers, but with us, even us, who are all of us here alive this day. The Lord talked with you face to face in the mount out of' the midst of the fire, . . . saying, I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage.... Keep the Sabbath Day to sanctify it, as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee. Six days thou shalt labor, and do all thy work: but the seventh! day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy man servant, nor thy maid servant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; . . . And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath." "These words the Lord spake unto all your assembly.... And he wrote them in two tables of stone" (Deut. 5:2 15, 22).

This is the Sabbath commandment as enjoined in the decalog. Saturday keepers contend that this command is obligatory upon all nations and even upon angels in heaven; but a careful reading of the foregoing will show that it was given only to the Jews, to the children of Israel. It was but a Jewish institution. This covenant enjoining the seventh day Sabbath Moses declares was not made with their fathers (the patriarchs), nor with Gentiles, nor with angels in heaven, "but with us, even us, who are all of us here alive this day."

It was made with the children of Israel only. It applied only to them. "I am the Lord thy God which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage." Were the angels in Egyptian bondage? Would not that sound a little queer to Gabriel and the heavenly host? Were the Gentile nations there? How does this apply to us Americans? Were we in Egypt? Not many of us. We are free born. Then, to whom are the words applicable? The answer is obvious: To the Jewish nation, and to no others. Notice the language: "Keep the Sabbath Day.... The seventh is the Sabbath. .. . Remember that thou west a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out . . . therefore [or for that reason] the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath Day." Language could not be framed to teach more clearly that the Sabbath commandment was to the Jews only. So it read on the tables of stone, and when law teachers apply such language to Gentile nations, or to angels in heaven, they prove that they "understand neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm" (1 Tim. 1:7).

"Take the Sabbath commandment: 'Thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man servant, nor thy maid servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates' (Exod. 20:10). Think of that commandment being given to angels in heaven! 'Sons,' 'daughters,' and 'thy neighbor's wife' (vs. 17), when they neither marry nor are given in marriage. Again: 'Cattle,' 'ox' 'ass,' etc. Do the angels own cattle and work oxen and asses in heaven? So 'man servants and maid servants.' This means bond servants or slaves, such as the Hebrews owned in those days.... [Their 'man servants and maid servants' (Exod. 20:17).] But do the angels own slaves? Did Adam have servants in Eden? [Do Christians now have slaves?] Will the redeemed own them hereafter? What nonsense to apply this law to the angels and to Eden and to heaven! This word was specially adapted to the social condition of the Jews as a nation in the land of Canaan, and to no others.

"Once more: 'Thy stranger that is within thy gates' (vs. 10). As everybody knows, 'the stranger' was the Gentile. 'Within thy gates' was a common expression meaning within your cities or dwelling in your land. It has no reference to living on your farm or inside the gates that enclose your farm, as Adventists always explain it. The towns were walled in and entered by gates. Here is where the judges sat and business was done. Thus: 'All that went in at the gate of his city' (Gen. 23: 10). 'Judges and officers shalt thou make thee in all thy gates' (Deut. 16:18). To this custom of the Jews the Sabbath commandment refers. All the Gentiles dwelling in their cities among them must be made to keep the Sabbath. This shows it to be a national law, worded in all its parts to fit the circumstances of the Jews at that time.

"This command, then, could not apply to any but the Jews."—Canright.

"The laws regulating how the Sabbath should be kept show that it was a local institution adapted only to the Jewish workshop and to that warm climate." "All the rigorous limitations and exactions of the Sabbath Day, as under the Jewish law, could only be carried out by a small people in a limited territory where the church bore rule. A particular day, the seventh (Deut. 5: 12, 13); definite hours, sunset to sunset (Lev. 23:32); no fires must be built on the Sabbath (Exod. 35:3); they must neither bake nor boil that day (Exod. 16:23); they must not go out of the house (Exod. 16:29); they were stoned to death for picking up a stick (Num. 15:32). Their priests must offer two lambs that day (Num. 28:9); they must compel all among them, living in their land, to keep it (Exod. 20:10). It was to be wholly a day of rest." —Canright.

Such was the Jewish law. We are not Jews, nor under the Jewish law. "What things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law" (Rom. 3:19). But the Gentiles "have not the law" (Rom. 2:14); and Christians "are not under the law, but under grace" (Rom. 6:14).

That Jewish law could not be universal. In cold countries people would freeze without fires, and suffer without warm food. Adventists with all their blind zeal cannot keep the day according to the law. "They go many miles on the Sabbath and drive; they offer no lambs; they can compel no one to keep it; nor do they stone those who break it." In this they expose their folly in trying to observe an obsolete Jewish day.

In Hos. 2:11 the Sabbath is plainly said to be "her sabbaths" that is, Israel's sabbaths. It is classed in with Jewish "feasts" and "new moons," and all belonged to "her"—Israel. This settled the matter. The seventh day Sabbath is the Jewish Sabbath. To this day the Jews claim the Sabbath as their institution.

 

The Jewish Sabbath Ceremonial in Nature

 

"Ceremony. Outward rite; external form in religion." —Webster. "An outward form or rite in religion; anything or observance held sacred."—International Encyclopaedic Dictionary. This is exactly what the observance of the Sabbath was in Jewish worship. The day in itself was not holy. One twenty four hours of time is no better than another, unless made so. In the nature of days there is no difference; there is nothing in one that makes it differ from another. All nature continues the same. Then, the only way in which one day can become holy is by divine appointment.

Moral obligations are not made, or do not become so by mere appointment. They exist in their very nature. Murder, idolatry, blasphemy, stealing, adultery, etc., are morally wrong. Had God given no special command against these things, they would have been wrong in their nature. But it would never have been wrong to work on the seventh day unless God had given a commandment to rest in it. The day in itself was not holy, any more than the other days. God made it holy. He "sanctified it" (Gen. 2:3); he "hallowed it" (Exod. 20:11). This act of the Lord made the day holy. But did it make it holy for all time and eternity? I mean this: Did God's appointment, his sanctification of that particular day, set it apart as being holy forever? If so, then every other day and thing made holy by God's appointment would remain so forever.

Other days were made just as holy as the seventh day. In Leviticus 23 are the feasts of the Lord, which were all "holy convocations." These were the ceremonial seasons. The first of these feasts on the list is the weekly seventh day Sabbath. Verses 1 3. It is spoken of as a "rest, an holy convocation; ye shall do no work therein." Next comes the Lord's Passover. Verses 5 8: "In the first day ye shall have an holy convocation: ye shall do no servile work therein." Next the feast of harvest (vss. 1014). After this the feast of Pentecost (vss. 15 21). It also was "a holy convocation," and the Jews were forbidden to work on that day (vs. 21). In fact, a careful reading of the entire chapter shows that all those special feast days were holy days. They were made so by God's appointment.

The Day of Atonement was just as holy as the weekly Sabbath. "There shall be a Day of Atonement: it shall be an holy convocation unto you; . . . and whatsoever soul it be that doeth any work in that same day, the same soul will I destroy from among his people. Ye shall do no manner of work: . . . It shall be unto you a Sabbath of rest" (vss. 27 32).

In all, there were seven of these yearly holy days. One of them, the Day of Atonement, was a holy sabbathday—so holy that it was death to work on it; yet all those holy days have ceased to be such, and are now common working days. Adventists admit that those holy days—made so by God's appointment—were ceremonial and nailed to the cross. They do not attempt to keep them. But the seventh day was exactly like these—made holy by God's appointment. Hence it was ceremonial, and was nailed to the cross. I quote from Canright:

"So, then, holiness can be put upon a day, taken from it, or changed to another day. It is not necessarily a permanent, unchangeable affair. Let Sabbatarians meditate here awhile. More still: A day once appointed, and made a holy sabbath day by God himself, may cease to be such and become even hateful to God. Thus: Isa. 1 :13, 14, 'The new moons and sabbaths, the calling of the assemblies, I cannot away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary to bear them.' All these holy days God himself had appointed. Is it any proof, then, that a particular day is holy now because it was once holy? None whatever.

"Notice also how many other things were made holy by God's appointment. Under the law we read of 'the holy temple,' 'the holy hill,' 'the holy ark,' 'the holy instruments,' 'the holy vessels,' 'the holy water,' 'the holy perfume,' 'the holy altar,' 'the holy veil,' 'the holy linen coat,, 'the holy ointment,' 'the holy nation,' 'the holy Sabbath,' etc. Those pertained to the worship and service of God in his holy temple [tabernacle], which was 'only a shadow,' 'figure,' or 'type of the true temple'— the 'spiritual house' of Christ, 'his body, the church.' While they stood as types they were 'holy,' and no longer. They had no inherent holiness, but were made holy by the command of God. (Law and Gospel, p. 43, by S. C. Adam.)

"Like all these holy things, the seventh day had no holiness in itself. It had to be 'made' so (Mark 2:27). The sanctity of the day did not rest upon the nature of the day itself, but, like a hundred other hallowed things, simply upon God's appointment, which may be altered any time at his will."

No man could murder, blaspheme, commit adultery, steal, etc., for years and be a Christian. Why? Because these things are morally wrong. But the most zealous Saturday keepers admit that such men as Luther, Wesley, Bunyan, and thousands of others, who never kept the seventh day (some of whom wrote against its observance), were highly eminent Christian men. Adventists' literature says so. They readily admit that there are many Christians who do not keep Saturday. How is this? A moment's reflection here ought to convince them that the keeping of the Sabbath as enjoined in the law was ceremonial in its nature.

 

The Sabbath on a Round Earth*

 

*Much of the substance of this chapter is selected from "Seventh Day Adventism Renounced," by Cauright

 

In their very nature all purely moral laws are universal and eternal in their application, are binding in heaven, in Eden, on Jews or Gentiles, saints or sinners, now or hereafter. Test the particular seventh day, Saturday, by that rule, and it fails everywhere. All the universe might keep a seventh part of time, but not the same seventh part. Not knowing this, see what blunder Mrs. White made. She says: "I saw that the Sabbath would never be done away, but the redeemed saints, and all the angelic host, will observe it in honor of the great Creator, to all eternity."—Spiritual Gifts, vol 1., p. 113. Uriah Smith, a leading Adventist, says: "We infer that the higher orders of his intelligences keep the Sabbath also.... The Sabbath of each of his creatures will be the Sabbath of all the rest, so that all will observe the same period together for the same purpose."—Biblical Institute, page 145. In a discussion held at Oakland, Pa., I publicly asked leading ministers of the Adventist movement whether it is their teaching that God and the angels of heaven keep the seventh day with them. I asked in particular "Do you believe that when the sun sets on Friday evening and you begin keeping Sabbath, that God and the angels begin also to keep the same time, and thus the heavenly hosts and you folks on earth keep the same identical time together?" They both replied: "This is our teaching."

Look at the utter absurdity and impossibility of the theory. All intelligent beings in heaven and earth and on all the planets, keep "the same period together." Adventists, like the Jews, keep Sabbath from sunset to sunset (Lev. 23:32). Now I shall prove by stubborn facts that they cannot all "observe the same period together."

Everybody knows that it is Saturday in India some twelve hours sooner than it is here, and that it is Saturday here twelve hours after it has ceased to be Saturday there. In Australia the day begins eighteen hours sooner than it does in California. So the seventh day brethren in California are working nearly the whole time that their brethren in Australia are keeping Sabbath' Come even nearer home than that. The sun sets about three hours later in California than it does in Maine. So when the Seventh day Adventists in Maine begin to keep the Sabbath at sunset Friday evening their own brethren in California, where the sun is yet three hours high, will still be at work for three hours! So very few of them on this earth "observe the same period together." While some of them are keeping Sabbath on one part of the earth, others of them are at work on another part of the earth. How much less, then, do all the heavenly host keep the same period with men on earth.

Now, if, as Mrs. White and Uriah Smith say, the angels keep our Sabbath, the question is, With which party do they keep it ? With those in Australia, or those in America ? If the angels keep the Sabbath at the same time the Sabbatarians keep it in Australia, then the Sabbatarians in America are working while the angels keep Sabbath, and so, of course, the angels work while those here rest. So we see how absolutely false and absurd is the theory that all can keep the Sabbath at the same time.

Adventists at Washington, D. C., really suppose that when the sun sets Friday evening and they begin keeping Sabbath, the Lord and the angels begin keeping it, too. Oh, what blindness! If the Lord keeps the Sabbath with them at Washington, then he does not keep it with their brethren on the other side of the globe, because they begin the Sabbath at least twelve hours earlier than we do here. In fact, it takes just forty eight hours, or the time of two whole days, from the time any one day begins in the extreme east till it ends at the farthest place in the west. Will the reader stop and think carefully, sharply, on this point, for it is an important one? It takes twenty four hours for the first end of a day to go clear around the earth. Then, as the last end of the day is twenty four hours behind the first end, it must also have twenty four more to go clear around the earth, and that makes forty-eight hours in all that each day is on the earth somewhere. So for the Lord and the heavenly host to keep Sabbath with all the Adventists on earth, they would have to keep the time of two whole days each week. And in that case, those on this side of the earth would be working while the Lord was keeping the Sabbath with those on the other side of the earth; and those on the opposite side of the earth would be working while the Lord was keeping Sabbath with those on this side. Thus, none of them would keep Sabbath with the Lord, after all! In fact, there is not a single hour in the week when there is not some Sabbatarian at work on some part of the earth!

What, then, becomes of Mrs. White's statement that "all the angelic hosts" keep our Sabbath? or Uriah Smith's hypothesis that all the universe "will observe the same period together"? Both are utterly absurd. The same definite seventh day cannot be kept by all the universe; even on this earth alone it cannot be kept by all at the same time. This adds another proof that the seventh day Sabbath with its rigorous limitations and exactions, as enjoined in the law, was only a Jewish institution, to be carried out by a small people, in a limited territory—the land of Canaan. Under the new dispensation, the gospel was to go to all nations, to all climates, around the earth. Hence the keeping of a definite Sabbath Day is left out of the gospel system, the rest now enjoyed by Christians being a spiritual rest of the soul, every day of the week.

Test the seventh day theory in the frozen regions of the north. The law declared that the day must be kept from sunset to sunset (see Lev. 23:32). In the extreme north in the winter there are months when the sun is not seen there at all, so they have no sunset. And again, in summer there are months when the sun is above the horizon all the time, when there is no sunrise. This difficulty confronts the Adventists of northern Sweden and Norway. Here their theory breaks down again. They have to reckon the day by artificial means. This again proves that that law was for the Jews. What endless and needless difficulties people get themselves into trying to keep a law that was designed only for the Jews in a limited locality! How contrary to the freedom and simplicity of the gospel!

Another great difficulty that stands in the way of Sabbatarianism is, Where shall we begin the day, If a man's salvation depends upon keeping the same day to the hour that God kept it at creation, then it is infinitely important that we know exactly where his day began, so as to begin ours there too. But the Lord has not said a word about it, nor given the least clue respecting where to begin the day. The day is now generally reckoned to begin at a certain line 180 degrees west from Greenwich, England. It runs north and south through the Pacific Ocean about 4,000 miles west of America.

Prof. E. S. Holden of Lick Observatory says: "There is no one date when the day line was established there; but it was during the last hundred years. It was established there for convenience. Besides Greenwich, it has been reckoned from Canary Islands, Tenereffe, Ferro, Paris, Berlin, Jerusalem, Washington, etc." So we see: 1. It is only within the last hundred years that the day line has been fixed where it now is. 2. This was done merely for convenience, not because there was anything in nature requiring it. 3. At different times the day line has been counted from at least seven different places, from Jerusalem in the east to Washington in the west, about 8,000 miles difference, or one third the way around the earth. Hence the beginning of the seventh day has varied this much at different times. 4. In another century it may be changed again. 5. There is just as much authority for one place as the other, and no divine authority for either, as it is all man's work and done at haphazard. 6. Hence so far as duty to God is concerned, any nation, church or society is at liberty to begin the day wherever they please. One place will be just as apt to be in harmony with God's day line as another.

Sabbatarians in America can fix their day line in the Atlantic instead of in the Pacific, and then our Sunday will be Saturday, and they will be all right and convert a nation in a day! Indeed, this is exactly parallel to what Seventh day Adventists have done in the case of a colony in the Pacific Ocean. Pitcairn Island, in the Pacific, was settled one hundred years ago by persons who brought their reckoning eastward from Asia. But it happens to be on the American side of the present day line; hence their Sunday was our Saturday, and they all kept it one hundred years as Sunday. According to Adventists, this was an awful thing, for Sunday is the Pope's Sabbath, the mark of the beast! So the Adventists went there and persuaded them all to keep Saturday. How? They simply induced them to change their reckoning of the day line a few miles, and lo! their Sunday was Saturday! Now they are all pious Sabbath keepers, while before they were keeping Sunday, the mark of the beast! And yet they are keeping exactly the same day they kept before. If this is not hair splitting, tell me what is. It illustrates the childishness of the whole Sabbatarian business. Now let the Adventists just shift their day line a little farther east to include America, and they can keep Sunday with the other people. Does the salvation of a man's soul depend upon such mathematical uncertainties as these? If it does, we may well despair of heaven.

The law said keep the seventh day from sunset to sunset (Exod. 20:8 11; Lev. 23:32). Now, let two Adventists start from Chicago, one going east, the other west, around the earth. Each keeps carefully the seventh day as the sun sets. When they meet again at Chicago they will be two days apart! One will be keeping Sunday and the other Friday. How will they now manage it? Each gives up his seventh day, and both take that of the world. So they have only a worldly day, after all.

Look, also, at the difficulty in crossing this supposed day line in the Pacific Ocean. Going west, a day is dropped going east it is added, and this is done at noon of the day which finds them nearest the supposed line. On the vessel, a man going west sits down to dinner 11:50 a. m. Friday. While he is eating the time is changed, and he rises from dinner Saturday noon! Then he has only six hours of Sabbath till sunset. But coming east, he sits down to dinner Saturday noon and rises from dinner Friday noon! He has kept eighteen hours Sabbath; then it is gone in a second at high noon, and he has six hours to work till sunset. Now he must begin Sabbath once more and keep it over again—twenty four hours. In one case he keeps only six hours Sabbath, and in the other case he keeps forty two hours!

These stubborn facts demonstrate the utter absurdity of the Sabbatarian view. It proves that the strict keeping of days was confined to the Jews in Palestine.

 

The Covenant From Sinai

 

THE FIRST OR OLD COVENANT FROM SINAI INCLUDED THE TEN COMMANDMENTS, AND
ENJOINED THE OBSERVANCE OF THE SEVENTH DAY SABBATH

 

We now come to the Sabbath as instituted in the Ten Commandment law given on Sinai. With this law the Sabbath either stands or falls. A covenant was made with the children of Israel "from Sinai, which gendereth to bondage" (Gal. 4:24). Paul terms it the "first covenant" (Heb. 8:7); the "old" covenant (vs. 13). The question, then, to be settled is, What constituted the old or first covenant which came from Sinai? The Bible answer is clear. "And Moses rose up early in the morning, and went up unto Mount Sinai, as the Lord had commanded him, and took in his hand the two tables of stone." "And he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights; he did neither eat bread, nor drink water. And he wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, the ten commandments" (Exod. 34:4, 28). "The Lord our God made a covenant with us in Horeb. The Lord made not this covenant with our fathers, but with us.... The Lord talked with you face to face in the mount out of the midst of the fire, . . . saying, . . . [1] Thou shalt have no other gods before me. [2] Thou shalt not make thee any graven image: . . . thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them.... [3] Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. ... [4] Keep the Sabbath Day.... The seventh day is the Sabbath.... [5] Honor thy father and thy mother. . . . [6] Thou shalt not kill. [7] Neither shalt thou commit adultery. 1 81 Neither shalt thou steal. [9] Neither shalt thou bear false witness.... [10] Neither shalt thou covet.... These words spake the Lord unto all your assembly in the mount: . . . and he added no more. And he wrote them in two tables of stone, and delivered them unto me" (Deut. 5:2 22).

"And he declared unto you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, even Ten Commandments; and he wrote them upon two tables of stone" (Deut. 4:13).

"when I was going up into the mount to receive the tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant which the Lord made with you" (Deut. 9:9). "The Lord gave me the two tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant." (vs. 11).

"The ark, wherein is the covenant of the Lord, which he made with our fathers, when he brought them out of the land of Egypt" (1 Kings 8:21). "There was nothing in the ark save the two tables of stone" (1 Kings 8:9), "the tables of the covenant" (Heb. 9:4).

Comments could not make these texts prove more clearly that the ten commandments were the covenant from Sinai. Eight clear texts declare that that "covenant" was "the Ten Commandments."

I shall next prove that the breaking of any of the Ten Commandments was called breaking the covenant.

"They have forsaken the covenant of the Lord God of their fathers, which he made with them when he brought them forth out of the land of Egypt: for they went and served other gods, and worshipped them" (Deut. 29:25, 26). "This people will rise up, and go a whoring after the gods of strangers . . . and will forsake me, and break my covenant which I have made with them" (Deut. 31:16).

"And it came to pass, when the judge was dead, that they returned, and corrupted themselves more than their fathers, in following other gods to serve them, and to bow down unto them; . . . this people hath transgressed my covenant" (Judges 2:19, 20).

"Ye have transgressed the covenant of the Lord your God, . . . and have gone and served other gods, and bowed yourselves to them" (Josh. 23:16). Also read 1 Kings 11:9 11; Jer. 11:10; 22:9.

Here we have seven texts which declare that by the children of Israel's breaking the first commandments of the Decalog they "broke," "forsook," and "transgressed" God's covenant. This proves beyond question that the Decalog was the first covenant; for "the Lord had made a covenant, and charged them, saying, Ye shall not fear other gods, nor bow yourselves to them, nor serve them" (2 Kings 17:35).

Again in 2 Kings 17:15, 16, we read that they made "molten images" and worshipped them, and by so doing rejected "his covenant that he made with their fathers." So by breaking the second commandment of the Decalog they rejected his covenant. "Lest ye forget the covenant of the Lord . . . and make you a graven image, or the likeness of anything" (Deut. 4:23).

On account of Israel's stealing and coveting, thus breaking the eighth and tenth commandments of the Decalog, God said, "Israel hath sinned, and they have also transgressed my covenant" (Josh. 7:10 12, 21). By breaking the sixth commandment Israel forsook the covenant. (2 Kings 19:9, 10)

Surely the twenty foregoing texts are sufficient to prove that the "Ten Commandments" were the first covenant, the one from Sinai. It must be a desperate case that will cause people to reject these plain statements of the Bible, and look elsewhere for that covenant.

"Therefore it is fixed and settled by all the above quotations, and the concurrence of all other scriptures, that the Sinai covenant embraced the 'ten words' of the stone tables. Now, the law for the seventh day Sabbath is found in this covenant, written on stone. Therefore every time the Word of God declares that the covenant delivered on Sinai is abolished it asserts the abrogation of the seventh day Sabbath. And because of the strong array of New Testament scriptures which positively assert the abrogation of that Ten Commandment covenant made on Sinai, the Adventists have diligently sought out some new device to deny that the Decalog is the covenant which God made with Israel at that time, and to find something else to which they can apply the covenant.

"But let us examine their new invention. Avoiding the definition that God give us no less than twenty times, of the covenant that he made on Sinai, they appeal to the dictionary and find this definition: 'Covenant. A mutual agreement of two or more persons or parties, in writing and under seal,' etc. Then confining the covenant made on Sinai within this single definition, they look for something that answers .thereto, or rather they search for something else besides the Ten Commandments to which they may apply those scriptures that declare the abrogation of the old covenant. So in their literature and preaching they light upon Exod. 19:5 8. 'Here,' say they, 'is an agreement between God and the people; and this promise on the part of Israel to do all that God had spoken, is the covenant made on Sinai.'

"An argument is drawn from the fifth verse, which reads thus: 'Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people.' The word 'covenant' occu