Testament, for a meeting on the first day of the week. Luke says, "Upon
the first day of the week when the disciples came together to break
bread, Paul preached unto them, _ready to depart on the morrow_: and
continued his speech until midnight." Acts xx: 7. Now by following the
scripture mode of computing time, from 6 o'clock in the evening to 6
o'clock in the morning, as has been shown, Paul to commence on the
beginning of the first day would begin on what we call Saturday evening
at 6 o'clock, and preach till midnight. After that he restores to life
the young man, then breaks bread and talked till the break of day, which
would be Sunday morning. Then he commenced his journey for Jerusalem and
travelled and sailed all day Sunday, the first day of the week, and two
other days in succession. xx: 11-15. Now it seems to me, if Paul did
teach or keep the first day of the week for the Sabbath or a holy day he
violated the sanctity of it to all intents and purposes, without giving
one single reason for it; all the proof presented here is a night
meeting. Please see the quotation from the British Quarterly Review. But
let us look at it the way in which _we_ compute time: I think it will be
fair to premise, that about midnight was the middle of Paul's meeting;
at any rate there is but one midnight to a twenty-four hour day. _We_
say that Sunday, the first day of the week, does not commence until 12
o'clock Saturday night. Then it is very clear, if he is preaching on the
first day till midnight, according to our reckoning it must be on Sunday
night, and his celebrating the Lord's supper after midnight would make
it that he broke bread on _Monday, the second day_, and that the day
time on Sunday is not included, unless he had continued his speech
through the day till midnight. Now the text says that on the first day
of the week they came together to break bread. To _prove that [41]they
did break bread on that day_, we must take the mode in which the Jews
computed time, and allow the first day of the week to begin at 6 o'clock
on Saturday evening, and to follow Paul's example, pay no regard to the
first day, after daylight, but to travel, &c. If _our_ mode of time is
taken, they broke bread on the second day, and that would destroy the
meaning of the text. Here then, in this text, is the _only_ argument
that can be adduced in the scriptures of divine truth, for a _change of
the perpetual seventh day_ Sabbath of the Lord our God to the first day
of the week.
Now I'll venture the assertion, that there is no law or commandment
recorded in the bible, that God has held so sacred among men, as the
keeping of his Sabbath. Where then, I ask, is the living man that dare
stand before God and declare that here is the change for the church of
God to keep the first instead of the seventh day of the week for the
Sabbath. If it could be proved that Paul preached here all of the first
day, the only inference that could be drawn, would be, to break bread on
that day!
There is one more point worthy of our attention, that is, the teaching
and example of Jesus. I have been told by one that is looked up to as a
strong believer in the second coming of the Lord this fall, that Jesus
broke the Sabbath. Jesus says, I have kept my Father's commandments. It
is said that he "broke the Sabbath," because he allowed his disciples to
pluck the corn and eat it on that day, and the Pharisees condemned them.
He says, "If ye had known what this meaneth, I will have mercy and not
sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the _guiltless_." Then they were
not _guilty_. See Deut. xxiii: 25. He immediately cites them to David
and his men, shewing that it was lawful and right when hungry, even to
eat the shoe bread that belonged only to the priests, and told them that
he was Lord of the Sabbath day. Here he shows too, that he was with his
disciples passing to the synagogue to teach; they ask him if it is
lawful to teach on the Sabbath day. He asks them if they had a sheep
fall into the ditch on the Sabbath, if they would not haul him out? How
much better then is a man than a sheep? Wherefore it is lawful to do
well on the Sabbath days; and immediately healed the man with the
withered hand. Matt. xii: 1-13. On another Sabbath day, while he was
teaching, he healed a woman that had been bound of satan eighteen years;
and when the ruler of the synagogue began to find fault, he called him a
hypocrite, and said "doth not each one of you on the Sabbath [42]day
loose his ox or his ass from the stall and lead him away to watering;
and all his adversaries were _ashamed_." Luke xiii: 10-17. The xiv.
chapter of Luke is quoted to prove that he broke the Sabbath because he
went into the Pharisee's house with many others on the Sabbath day to
eat bread. Here he saw a man with the dropsy and he asked them if it was
lawful to heal on the Sabbath day. 'And they held their peace, and he
took him and healed him,' and asked them 'which of them having an ox or
an ass fall into the pit, would not straightway pull him out on the
Sabbath day; and they could not answer him again.' 1-6 v. And 'he
continued to teach them, by showing them when they made a feast to call
the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, and then they should be
blessed.' Read the chapter, and you will readily see that he took this
occasion, as the most befitting, to teach them by parables, what their
duty was at weddings and feasts, in the same manner as he taught them in
their synagogues.
There is still another passage, and I believe the only one, to which
reference has been made, (except where he opened the eyes of a man that
was born blind,) for proof that he broke the Sabbath. It is recorded in
John v: 5-17. Here Jesus found a man that had been sick thirty-eight
years, by the pool of Bethesda, 'he saith unto him rise, take up thy bed
and walk,--therefore did they persecute Jesus and sought to slay him
because he had done these things on the Sabbath day.' 16v. 'But Jesus
answered them, my Father worketh hitherto and I work.' If they did not
work every hour and moment of time, it would be impossible for man to
exist: Here undoubtedly he had reference to these and other acts of
necessity and mercy; but the great sin for which professors in this
enlightened age charge the Saviour with in this transaction, is, in
directing the man to take up his bed, contrary to law. It is clear the
people were forbidden to carry burthens on the Sabbath day, as in Jer.
xvii: 21, 22, but by reading the 24th v. in connection with Neh. xiii:
15-22, we learn that this prohibition related to what was lawful for
them to do on the other six days of the week, viz. merchandise and
trading. See proof, Neh. x: 31; also unlawful, as in Amos viii: 5. We
need not nor we cannot misunderstand the fourth commandment taken in
connection with the other nine; they were simple and pure written by the
finger of God; but in the days of our Saviour it had become heavily
laden with Jewish traditions, hence when Jesus appeals to them whether
it is [43]lawful to do good and to heal on the Sabbath days, their
mouths are closed because they cannot contradict him from the law nor
the prophets. The Saviour no where interferes with them in their most
rigid observance of the day; but when they find fault with him for
performing his miracles of mercy on that day, he tells them they have
broken the law; and in another place, "If a man on the Sabbath day
receive circumcision without breaking the law of Moses, are ye angry at
me because I have made a man every whit whole on the Sabbath day?" He
then says, "Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous
judgment." vii: 23, 24. Did he break the Sabbath? Now the law requires
that the beasts shall rest; but what is the practice of many of those
who are the most strict in keeping Sunday for the Sabbath. Sick, or
well, ministers or laymen, do they not ride back and forth to meeting?
Again, is it right and lawful to carry forth our dead on the Sabbath? or
carry the communion service back and forth. The Apostle says, 'believe
and be baptized.' Suppose this should be on the Sabbath and we were some
distance from the water, would any one interfere with us if we carried
our change of apparel with us and back again, or have we in so doing
transgressed the law; if we have, it is high time we made a full stop.
Jesus undoubtedly had good reasons for directing the sick man to take up
his bed and walk, but I cannot learn that he justified any one else in
carrying their bed on the Sabbath, unless in a case of necessity and
mercy, such as he cited them to, as watering their cattle, and pulling
them out of the ditch, and eating when hungry, and being healed when
sick. Be it also remembered that when the Sanhedrim tried him they did
not condemn him, as in the other cases cited; so in this, they failed
for want of scripture testimony. He was the Lord of the Sabbath, and the
law of ceremonies were now about to cease forever, the ten commandments
with the keeping of the Sabbath therefore were to be stripped of these
ceremonies and all of their traditions, and left as pure to be written
on the hearts of the Gentiles as when first written on tables of stone,
therefore Jesus taught that it was right to do good on the Sabbath day,
and whoever follows his example and teaching will keep the seventh day
Sabbath holy and acceptable to God. They will also judge righteous
judgment, and not according to appearance.
There is but one Christian Sabbath named, or established in the bible,
and that individual, whoever he is, that [44]undertakes to abolish or
change it, is the _real Sabbath breaker_. Remember that the keeping the
commandments is the only safe guide through the gates into the city.
My friends and neighbors, and especially my family, know that I have for
more than twenty years, strictly endeavored to keep the first day of the
week for the Sabbath, and I can say that I did it in all good conscience
before God, on the ocean, and in foreign countries as well as my own,
until about sixteen months since I read an article published in the Hope
of Israel, by a worthy brother, T. M. Preble, of Nashua, which when I
read and compared with the bible, convinced me that there never had been
any change. Therefore the seventh day was the Sabbath, and God required
me as well as him to keep it holy. Many things now troubled my mind as
to how I could make this great change, family, friends, and brethren;
but this one passage of scripture was, and always will be as clear as a
sunbeam. "_What is that to thee: follow thou me._" In a few days my mind
was made up to begin to keep the fourth commandment, and I bless God for
the clear light he has shed upon my mind in answer to prayer and a
thorough examination of the scriptures on this great subject. Contrary
views did, after a little, shake my position some, but I feel now that
there is no argument nor sophistry that can becloud my mind again this
side of the gates of the Holy City. Brother Marsh, who no doubt thinks,
and perhaps thousands besides, that his paper is what it purports to be,
THE VOICE OF TRUTH, takes the ground with the infidel that there is no
Sabbath. Brother S. S. Snow, of New York, late editor of the Jubilee
Standard, publishes to the world that he is the Elijah, preceding the
advent of our Saviour, restoring all things: (the seventh day Sabbath
must be one of the all things,) and yet he takes the same ground with
Br. Marsh, that the Sabbath is forever abolished. As the seventh day
Sabbath is a real prophecy, a picture (and not a shadow like the Jewish
Sabbaths,) of the thing typified which is to come, I cannot see how
those who believe in the change or abolition of the type, can have any
confidence to look to God for the great antetype, the Sabbath of rest,
to come to them.
Brother J. B. Cook has written a short piece in his excellent paper, the
ADVENT TESTIMONY. It was pointed and good, but too short; and as brother
Preble's Tract now before me, did not embrace the arguments which have
been presented since he published it, it appeared [45]to me that
something was called for in this time of falling back from this great
subject. I therefore present this book, hoping at least, that it will
help to strengthen and save all honest souls seeking after truth.
A WORD RESPECTING THE HISTORY. At the close of the first century a
controversy arose, whether both days should be kept or only one, which
continued until the reign of Constantine the Great. By his laws, made in
A. D. 321, it was decreed for the future that Sunday should be kept a
day of rest in all the cities and towns; but he allowed the country
people to follow husbandry. History further informs us that Constantine
murdered his two sisters husbands and son, and his own familiar friend,
that same year, and the year before boiled his wife in a cauldron of
oil.--The controversy still continued down to A. D. 603, when Pope
Gregory passed a law abolishing the seventh day Sabbath, and
establishing the first day of the week. See Baronius Councils, 603.
Barnfield's Eng. page 116, states that the Parliament of England met on
Sundays till the time of Richard II. The first law of England made for
keeping of Sunday, was in the time of Edward IV. about 1470. As these
two books are not within my reach, I have extracted from T. M. Preble's
tract on the Sabbath. Mr. Fisher says, it was Dr. Bound one of the rigid
puritans, who applied the name _Sabbath_ to the first day of the week,
about the year 1795. "The word Sunday is not found in the bible," it
derived its name from the heathen nations of the North, because the day
was dedicated to the sun. Neither is the Sabbath applied to the first
day any more than it is to the sixth day of the week. While Daniel
beheld the little horn, (popery) he said, among other things, he would
_think_ to change times and laws. Now this could not mean of men,
because it has ever been the prerogative of absolute rulers like
himself, to change manmade laws, nor the law of Moses, for that had been
abolished 570 years before the Pope finally changed the Sabbath to the
1st day of the week. Then to make the prophecy harmonize with the
scripture, he must have meant times and laws established by God, because
he might think and pass decrees as he has done, but he, nor all the
universe could ever change God's times and laws. Jesus says that "times
and seasons were in the power of the father." The Sabbath is the most
important law which God ever instituted. "How long refuse ye to keep my
commandments, and my laws, see for that the Lord hath given you [46]the
Sabbath." Exod. xvi: 28, 29. Then it's clear from the history, that this
is in part what Daniel meant. Now the second advent believers have
professed all confidence in his visions; why then doubt this. Whoever
feels disposed to defend and sustain the decrees of that "blasphemous"
dower, and especially Pope Gregory and the great Constantine, the
murderer, shown to be the _moral_ reformer in this work of changing the
Sabbath, are welcome to their principles and feelings. I detest these
acts, in common with all others which have emanated from these ten and
one horned powers. The Revelations show us clearly that they were
originated by the devil. If you say this history is not true then you
are bound to refute it. If you cannot, you are as much in duty bound to
believe it as any other history, even, that George Washington died in
1799! If the bible argument, and testimony from history are to be relied
on as evidence, then it is as clear as a sunbeam that the seventh day
Sabbath is a perpetual sign, and is as binding upon man as it ever was.
But we are told we must keep the first day of the week for the Sabbath
as an ordinance to commemorate the resurrection of Jesus. I for one had
rather believe Paul. See Rom. vi: 3-5; Gal. iii: 27; Col. ii: 12.
A word more respecting time. See 31st page. Here I have shown that the
sun in the centre, regulates all time for the earth--fifty-two weeks to
the year, one hundred and sixty-eight hours to the week, the seventh of
which is twenty-four hours. Jesus says there are but twelve hours in the
day, (from sunrise to sunset.) Then twelve hours night to make a
twenty-four hour day, you see, must always begin at a certain period of
time. No matter, then whether the sun sets with us at eight in summer or
4 o'clk in winter. Now by this, and this is the scripture rule, days and
weeks can, and most probably are, kept at the North and South polar
regions. What an absurdity to believe that God does exonerate our
fathers and brothers from keeping his Sabbath while they are in these
polar regions, fishing for seals and whales, should it be with them
either all day or all night. If they have lost their reckoning of days
and weeks, because there was, or was not any sun six months of the time,
how could they learn what day of the week it was when they see the sun
setting at 6 o'clock on the equator, if bound home from the South? By
referring to Luke, xxiii ch. 55, 56, and xxiv: 1, we see that the people
in Palestine had kept the days and weeks right from [47]the creation;
since which time, astronomers teach us that not even fifteen minutes
have been lost. God does not require us to be any more exact in keeping
time, than what we may or have learned from the above rules, but I am
told there is a difference in time of twenty-four hours to the mariner
that circumnavigates the globe. That, being true, is known to them, but
it alters no time on the earth or sea.
But, says one, I should like to keep the Sabbath in _time_, just as
Jesus did. Then you must live in Palestine, where their day begins seven
hours earlier than ours; and yet it is at 6 o'clock in the evening the
same period, though not the same by the sun, in which we begin our day.
Let me illustrate: our earth, something in the form of an orange, is
whirling over every twenty-four hours. It measures three hundred and
sixty degrees, or about twenty-one thousand six hundred miles round, in
the manner you would pass a string round an orange. Now divide this
three hundred and sixty degrees by the twenty-four hour day, and the
result is fifteen degrees, or nine hundred miles. Then every fifteen
degrees we travel or sail eastward, the sun rises and sets one hour
earlier in the period of the twenty-four hours: therefore those who live
in Palestine, one hundred and seven degrees east of us, begins and
closes the day seven hours earlier, so in proportion all the way round
the globe, the sun always stationary! Then the Sabbath begins precisely
at 6 o'clock on Friday evening, every where on this globe, and ends at
the same period on what we call Saturday evening. God says 'every thing
on its day,' 'from even unto even shall ye celebrate your Sabbath;' 'the
evening and the morning was the first day.' He is an exact time keeper!
I say then, in the name of all that is holy, heavenly and true, and as
immortality is above all price, let us see to it that we are found
fearing God and keeping his COMMANDMENTS, for this, we are taught, 'is
the whole duty of man.' The proof is positive that the seventh day
Sabbath is included in the commandments.
Bro. Marsh says, "Keeping the Sabbath is embraced in this covenant,
Deut. v: 1-6, made with the children of Israel at Horeb. It was not made
with their Fathers (the Patriarchs) but with us, even us, who are all of
US HERE ALIVE THIS DAY. v. 3. This testimony first _negative_, he made
it not with our Fathers, and then _positive_ with _us_, is conclusive.
Not a single proof can be presented from either the old or new testament
that it was instituted for any other people or nation." Now it is clear
and positive [48]that if the Sabbath is not binding on any other people
than the Jews, by the same rule not one of the commandments is binding
on any other people, who dare take such infidel ground? Was not the
second covenant written on the hearts of the Gentile, even the law of
Commandments? which Paul says 'is Holy, just and good.' Thirty years
after the crucifixion he directs the Ephesians to the keeping the fifth
commandment, that they may live long on the _earth_ not the land of
Canaan. vi: 2, 3. Did not God say that Abraham kept his commandments,
statutes, and laws? This embraced the Sabbath for circumcision, and the
Sabbath were then the only laws, or statutes, or commandments written.
The fourth commandment was given two thousand years before Abraham was
born! Is not the stranger and all within their gates included in the
covenant to keep the Sabbath? See Exod. xx: 10. And did not God require
them to keep THE Sabbath before he made this covenant with them in
Horeb? See Exod. xvi: 27-30. Does not Isaiah say that God will bless the
_man_, and the _son_ of _man_, and the _sons_ of the _stranger_, that
keep THE Sabbath? These certainly mean the Gentiles. lvi: 2-3, 6-7.
Also, in the lviii. ch. 13, 14, the promise is to all that keep the
Sabbath. To what people _did_ the Sabbath belong at the destruction of
Jerusalem, nearly forty years after the crucifixion? Matt. xxiv: 20. The
Gentiles certainly were embraced in the covenant by this time! Why was
it Paul's manner always to preach on the seventh day Sabbath to Jews and
Gentiles?
By what authority do you call the seventh day Sabbath, the Jewish
Sabbath? The bible says it is the Sabbath of the _Lord our God_! And
Jesus said that he was the 'Lord of the Sabbath day.' He moreover told
the Jews that the Sabbath was made for MAN! Where do you draw the
distinguishing line, to show which is and which is not MAN between the
_natural seed of Abraham_ and the Gentiles? "Is he the God of the Jews
only? Is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also!" Then
Paul says 'there is no difference,' and that 'there is no respect of
persons with God.' Is it not clear, then, that the Sabbath was made for
Adam and his posterity, the whole family of _man_? How very fearful you
are that God's people should keep the bible Sabbath! You say, 'let us be
cautious, lest we disinherit ourselves by seeking the inheritance under
the wrong covenant.' Your meaning is, not to seek to keep the Sabbath
covenant, but the one made to Abraham. [49]If you can tell us what
precept there is in the Abrahamic covenant that we must now keep to be
saved, that is not embraced in the one given at Mount Sinai, then we
will endeavor to keep that too, with the Sabbath of the Lord our God. If
the Sabbath, as you say, is abolished, why do you, JOSEPH MARSH,
continue to call the first day of the week the Sabbath. See V. T., 15th
July. If you profess to utter the VOICE OF TRUTH from the bible, do be
consistent, and also willing that _other papers_, besides yours and the
Advent Herald, should give the present truth to the flock of God. I say
let it go with lightning speed, every way, as does the political news by
the electric telegraph. If the whole law and the prophets hang on the
commandments, and by keeping them we enter into life, how will you, or
I, enter in if we do not 'keep the commandments.' See Exod. xvi: 28-30.
Jesus says, "therefore whosoever shall break one of these least
commandments and shall teach men so, shall be called the least in the
kingdom," &c. "Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole
duty of man." Amen!
GOD HAS MADE THREE EVERLASTING COVENANTS WITH MAN.
The first one is the Covenant of Inheritance "confirmed unto Jacob for a
law and unto Israel for an _everlasting_ Inheritance." See Psl. cv:
8-11. Acts vii: 3-6. Eph. i: 14.
Second is an "_everlasting Covenant of Redemption_." See Isa. lxi: 8, 9.
"I have made a Covenant with my chosen, I have sworn unto David my
servant, thy seed will I establish forever." Psl. lxxxix: 2-5. See also
34-37 vs. "My Covenant will I not _break_, nor alter the thing that is
gone out of my lips. Once have I sworn by my holiness that I will not
lie unto David, his seed shall endure forever, and his throne as the sun
before me--It shall be established forever as the moon and as a faithful
witness in heaven." Isa. says it is sure, lv: 3; liv: 13, 14. Ezekiel
calls it a Covenant of peace. xxxiv: 25. In xxxvii ch. 25 and 26 v. he
shows clearly that David is Christ, and this "Covenant of peace is an
everlasting Covenant with his Israel, and will be _known_ when his
sanctuary is in the midst of them forever more." 28 v. The very same is
brought to view by Paul. Rom. xi: 26, 27.