THE SABBATH IN AMERICA.
The first Sabbath-keeping church in America—Names of
its members—Origin of the second—Organization of the
Seventh-day Baptist General Conference—Statistics of the
Denomination at that time—Nature of its organization—Present
Statistics—Educational facilities—Missionary work—The American
Sabbath Tract Society—Responsibility for the light of the
Sabbath—The German S. D. Baptists of Pennsylvania—Reference
to Sabbath-keepers in Hungary—In Siberia—The Seventh-day
Adventists—Their origin—Labors of Joseph Bates—Of James
White—The Publishing Association—Systematic Benevolence—The
work of the preachers mainly in new fields—Organization of the
S. D. Adventists—Statistics—Peculiarities of their faith—Their
object—The S. D. Adventists of Switzerland—Why the Sabbath is
of priceless value to mankind—The nations of the saved observe
the Sabbath in the new earth.
The first Sabbatarian church in America originated at Newport, R. I. The
first Sabbath-keeper in America was Stephen Mumford, who left London
three years after the martyrdom of John James, and forty-four years
after the landing of the pilgrim fathers at Plymouth. Mr. Mumford, it
appears, came as a missionary from the English Sabbath-keepers.[1087] Mr.
Isaac Backus, the historian of the early New England Baptists, makes the
following record:—
“Stephen Mumford came over from London in 1664, and brought
the opinion with him that the whole of the ten commandments,
as they were delivered from Mount Sinai, were moral and
immutable; and that it was the Antichristian power which
thought to change times and laws, that changed the Sabbath from
the seventh to the first day of the week. Several members of
the first church in Newport embraced this sentiment, and yet
continued with the church for some years, until two men and
their wives who had so done, turned back to the keeping of the
first day again.”[1088]
Mr. Mumford, on his arrival, went earnestly to work to convert men to
the observance of the fourth commandment, as we infer from the following
record:—
“Stephen Mumford, the first Sabbath-keeper in America, came
from London in 1664. Tacy Hubbard commenced keeping the
Sabbath, March 11, 1665. Samuel Hubbard commenced April 1,
1665. Rachel Langworthy, January 15, 1666. Roger Baxter,
April 15, 1666, and William Hiscox, April 28, 1666. These
were the first Sabbath-keepers in America. A controversy,
lasting several years, sprung up between them and members of
the church. They desired to retain their connection with the
church, but were, at last, compelled to withdraw, that they
might peaceably enjoy and keep God’s holy day.”[1089] [Baxter
is Baster in the _S. D. B. Memorial_.]
Though Mr. Mumford faithfully taught the truth, he seems to have
cherished the ideas of the English Sabbatarians, that it was possible
for first-day and seventh-day observers to walk together in church
fellowship. Had the first-day people been of the same mind, the light
of the Sabbath would have been extinguished within a few years, as
the history of English Sabbath-keepers clearly proves. But, in the
providence of God, the danger was averted by the opposition which these
commandment-keepers had to encounter.
Besides the persons above enumerated, four others embraced the Sabbath
in 1666, but in 1668 they renounced it. These four were also members of
the first-day Baptist church of Newport. Though the Sabbath-keepers who
retained their integrity thought that they might lawfully commune with
the members of the church who were fully persuaded to observe the first
day, yet they felt otherwise with respect to these who had clearly seen
the Sabbath, and had for a time observed it, and then apostatized from
it. These persons “both wrote and spoke against it, which so grieved them
that they could not sit down at the table of the Lord with them, nor with
the church because of them.” But as they were members of a first-day
church, and had “no power to deal with them as of themselves without
the help of the church,” they “found themselves barred as to proceeding
with them, as being but private brethren. So they concluded not to bring
the case to the church to judge of the fact, viz., in turning from the
observation of the seventh day, being contrary-minded as to that.” They
therefore sent to the London Sabbath-keepers for advice, and in the mean
time refrained from communing with the church.
Dr. Edward Stennet wrote them in behalf of the London Sabbath-keepers:
“If the church will hold communion with these apostates from the truth,
you ought then to desire to be fairly dismissed from the church; which if
the church refuse, you ought to withdraw yourselves.”[1090] They decided,
however, not to leave the church. But they told “the church publicly
that they could not have comfortable communion with those four persons
that had sinned.” “And thus for several months they walked with little
or no offense from the church; after which the leading or ministering
brethren began to declare themselves concerning the ten precepts.” Mr.
Tory “declared the law to be done away.” Mr. Luker and Mr. Clarke “made
it their work to preach the non-observation of the law, day after day.”
But the Sabbath-keepers replied “that the ten precepts were still as
holy, just, good, and spiritual, as ever.” Mr. Tory “with some unpleasant
words said ‘that their tune was only the fourth precept,’ to which they
answered, ‘that the whole ten precepts were of equal force with them, and
that they did not plead for one without the other.’ And they for several
years, went on with the church in a halvish kind of fellowship.”[1091]
Mr. Bailey thus states the result:—
“At the time of their change of sentiment and practice,
[respecting the Bible Sabbath], they had no intention of
establishing a church with this distinctive feature. God,
evidently, had a different mission for them, and brought them
to it, through the severe trial of persecution. They were
forced to leave the fellowship of the Baptist church, or
abandon the Sabbath of the Lord their God.”[1092]
“These left the Baptist church on December 7, 1671.”[1093]
“On the 23d of December, just sixteen days after withdrawing
from the Baptist church, they covenanted together in a church
organization.”[1094]
Such was the origin of the first Sabbath-keeping church in America.[1095]
The second of these churches owes its origin to this circumstance: About
the year 1700, Edmund Dunham of Piscataway, N. J., reproved a person for
labor on Sunday. He was asked for his authority from the Scriptures. On
searching for this, he became satisfied that the seventh day is the only
weekly Sabbath in the Bible, and began to observe it.
“Soon after, others followed his example, and in 1707 a
Seventh-day Baptist church was organized, with seventeen
members. Edmund Dunham was chosen pastor and sent to Rhode
Island to receive ordination.”[1096]
The S. D. Baptist General Conference was organized in 1802. At its first
annual session, it included in its organization eight churches, nine
ordained ministers, and 1130 members.[1097] The Conference was organized
with only advisory powers, the individual churches retaining the matters
of discipline and church government in their own hands.[1098] The
Conference now embraces some eighty churches, and about 8000 members.
These churches are found in most of the northern and western States, and
are divided into five associations, which, however, have no legislative
nor disciplinary power over the churches which compose them. There
are, belonging to the denomination, five academies, one college, “and
a university with academic, collegiate, mechanical, and theological
departments in operation.”[1099] The S. D. Baptist missionary society
sustains several home missionaries who labor principally on the western
and southern borders of the denomination. They have within a few years
past met with a good degree of success in this work. It has also a
missionary station at Shanghai, China, and a small church there of
faithful Christians.
The American Sabbath Tract Society is the publishing agency of the
denomination. Its head-quarters are at Alfred Center, N. Y. It publishes
the _Sabbath Recorder_, the organ of the S. D. Baptists, and it also
publishes a series of valuable works relating to the Sabbath and the law
of God.
During the two hundred years which have elapsed since the organization
of the first Sabbatarian church in America, God has raised up among this
people men of eminent talent and moral worth. He has also in providential
ways called attention to the sacred trust which he so long since confided
to the S. D. Baptists, and which they have been slow to realize in its
immense importance.
Among those converted to the Sabbath through the agency of this people,
the name of J. W. Morton is particularly worthy of honorable mention.
He was sent in 1847 a missionary to the island of Hayti by the Reformed
Presbyterians. Here he came in contact with Sabbatarian publications,
and after a serious examination became satisfied that the seventh day
is the Sabbath of the Lord. As an honest man, what he saw to be truth
he immediately obeyed, and returning home to be tried for his heresy,
was summarily expelled from the Reformed Presbyterian church without
being suffered to state the reasons which had governed his conduct. He
has given to the world a valuable work, entitled, “Vindication of the
True Sabbath,” in which his experience is related, and his reasons for
observing the seventh day set forth with great force and clearness.
The S. D. Baptists do not lack men of education and of talent, and they
have ample means in their possession with which to sustain the cause of
God. If in time past they have not fully realized that they were debtors
to all mankind because of the great truth which God committed to their
trust, there is reason to believe that they are now to some extent
awakening to this vast indebtedness.[1100]
There is also in the State of Pennsylvania a small body of German S. D.
Baptists found in the counties of Lancaster, York, Franklin, and Bedford,
and in the central and western parts of the State. They originated in
1728 from the teaching of Conrad Beissel, a native of Germany. They
practice trine immersion, and the washing of feet, and observe open
communion. They encourage celibacy, but make it obligatory upon none.
Even those who have chosen this manner of life are at liberty to marry
if at any time they choose so to do. They established and successfully
maintained a Sabbath-school at Ephrata, their head-quarters, forty years
before Robert Raikes had introduced the system of Sunday-schools. This
people have suffered much persecution because of their observance of
the seventh day, the laws of Pennsylvania being particularly oppressive
toward Sabbatarians.[1101] The German S. D. Baptists do not belong to the
S. D. Baptist General Conference.
We have already noticed the fact that Sabbath-keepers are numerous
in Russia, in Poland, and in Turkey. We find the following statement
respecting Sabbath-keepers in Hungary:—
“A congregation of seventh-day Christians in Hungary, being
refused tolerance by the laws, has embraced Judaism, in order
to be allowed to exist in connection with one of the ‘received
religions.’”[1102]
The probability is that as the laws of the Austrian Empire bear very
heavily upon all religious bodies not belonging to some one of the
tolerated sects or orders, these “Seventh-day Christians” on “being
refused tolerance” in their own name, secured the privilege of observing
the seventh day by allowing their doctrine to be classed by the civil
authorities under the head of Judaism, and so bringing themselves under
the tolerance accorded to the “received religions.” We do not say that
this was right, even as a technicality, but it is evidently the extent of
what they did. There is no reason to believe that they abjured Christ. We
also learn that there are Sabbath-keepers in the north of Asia:—
“There is a sect of Greek Christians in Siberia who keep the
Jewish Sabbath (Saturday). Such sects already exist in the
United States, in Germany, and we believe in England.”[1103]
The Sabbath was first introduced to the attention of the Advent people
at Washington, N. H. A faithful Seventh-day Baptist sister, Mrs. Rachel
D. Preston, from the State of New York, having removed to this place,
brought with her the Sabbath of the Lord. Here she became interested
in the doctrine of the glorious advent of the Saviour at hand. Being
instructed in this subject by the Advent people, she in turn instructed
them in the commandments of God, and as early as 1844, nearly the entire
church in that place, consisting of about forty persons, became observers
of the Sabbath of the Lord.[1104] The oldest body of Sabbath-keepers
among the Seventh-day Adventists is therefore at Washington, N. H. Its
present number is small, for it has been thinned by emigration and by the
ravages of death; but there still remains a small company to bear witness
to this ancient truth of the Bible.
From this place, several Advent ministers received the Sabbath truth
during the year 1844. One of these was Eld. T. M. Preble, who has the
honor of first bringing this great truth before the Adventists through
the medium of the press. His essay was dated Feb. 13, 1845. He presented
briefly the claims of the Bible Sabbath, and showed that it was not
changed by the Saviour, but was changed by the great apostasy. He then
said:—
“Thus we see Dan. 7:25, fulfilled, the little horn changing
‘times and laws.’ Therefore it appears to me that all who keep
the first day for the Sabbath, are Pope’s Sunday-keepers, and
God’s Sabbath breakers.”[1105]
Within a few months many persons began to observe the Sabbath as the
result of the light thus shed on their pathway. Eld. J. B. Cook, a man
of decided talent as a preacher and a writer, was one of these early
converts to the Sabbath. Elders Preble and Cook were at this time in
the full vigor of their mental powers, and were possessed of talent
and a reputation for piety, which gave them great influence among the
Adventists in behalf of the Sabbath. These men were called in the
providence of God to fill an important place in the work of Sabbath
reform.
But both of them, while preaching and writing in its behalf, committed
the fatal error of making it of no practical importance. They had
apparently the same fellowship for those who rejected the Sabbath that
they had for those who observed it. Such a course of action produced
its natural result. After two or three years of this kind of Sabbath
observance, each of these men apostatized from it, and thenceforward used
what influence they possessed in warring against the fourth commandment.
The larger part of those who embraced the Sabbath from their labors were
not sufficiently impressed with its importance to become settled and
grounded in its weighty evidences, and, after a brief period, they turned
back from its observance. But enough had been done to excite bitter
opposition toward the Sabbath on the part of many Adventists, and to
bring out the ingenious and plausible arguments by which men attempt to
prove that God has abolished his own sacred law.
Such was the fruit of their course, and such the condition of things
at the time of their defection. But the result of their plan of action
taught the Advent Sabbath-keepers a lesson of value, which they have
never forgotten. They learned that the fourth commandment must be treated
as a part of the moral law, if men are ever to be led to its sacred
observance.
Eld. Preble’s first article in behalf of the Sabbath was the means of
calling the attention of our venerable brother, Joseph Bates, to this
divine institution. He soon became convinced of its obligation, and at
once began to observe it. He had acted quite a prominent part in the
Advent movement of 1843-4, and now, with self-sacrificing zeal, he took
hold of the despised Sabbath truth to set it before his fellow-men. He
did not do it in the half-way manner of Elders Preble and Cook, but as
a man thoroughly in earnest and fully alive to the importance of his
subject.
The subject of the heavenly Sanctuary began about this time to interest
many Adventists, and especially Eld. Bates. He was one of the first to
see that the central object of that Sanctuary is the ark of God. He also
called attention to the proclamation of the third angel relative to God’s
commandments. He girded on the armor to lay it down only when his work
should be accomplished. He has been instrumental in leading many to the
observance of the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus, and few
who have received the Sabbath from his teaching have apostatized from
it.[1106]
It was but a few months after Eld. Bates, that our esteemed and efficient
brother, Eld. James White, also embraced the Sabbath. He had labored
with much success in the great Advent movement, and he now entered
heartily into the work of Sabbath reform. Uniting with Eld. Bates in the
proclamation of the doctrine of the advent and the Sabbath as connected
together in the Sanctuary and the message of the third angel, he has,
with the blessing of God, accomplished great results in behalf of the
Sabbath.
The publishing interests of the Seventh-day Adventists originated through
his instrumentality. He began the work of publishing in 1849, without
resources, and with very few friends, but with much toil, self-sacrifice,
and anxious care; and with the blessing of God upon his efforts, he has
been the means of establishing an efficient office of publication, and
of disseminating many important works throughout our country, and, to
some extent, to other nations also. The publication of the _Advent Review
and Herald of the Sabbath_, the organ of the Seventh-day Adventists, was
commenced by him in 1850. For most of the years of its existence, he has
served as one of its editors; and for all its earlier years, he was both
publisher and sole editor. During this time, he has also labored with
energy as a minister of the gospel of Christ.
The wants of the cause demanding an enlargement of capital and more
extensive operations, to this end an Association was incorporated in
the city of Battle Creek, Michigan, May 3, 1861, under the name of the
Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association. This Association owns three
commodious publishing houses, with engine, power presses, and all the
fixtures necessary for doing an extensive business. There are about fifty
persons constantly employed in this work of publication. The Association
has a capital of about $82,000. Under God, it owes its prosperity to the
prudent management and untiring energy of Eld. James White.
The _Advent Review_ has at the present time (Nov., 1873) a circulation of
about 5000 copies. The _Youth’s Instructor_, a monthly paper designed for
the children of Sabbath-keeping Adventists, began to be issued in 1852,
and has now attained a circulation of nearly 5000 copies.
The _Advent Tidende_, a Danish monthly with a circulation of 800, is
published for the benefit of those who speak the Danish and Norwegian
tongues, of whom a considerable number have embraced the Sabbath.
The S. D. Adventists have taken a strong interest in the subject of
hygiene and the laws of health, and have established a Health Institute
at Battle Creek, Mich., which publishes the _Health Reformer_, a monthly
journal, magazine form, having a circulation of nearly 5000 copies.
Numerous publications on Prophecy, the Signs of the Times, the Coming
of Christ, the Sabbath, the Law of God, the Sanctuary, &c., &c., have
been issued within the past twenty years, and have had an extensive
circulation, amounting, in the aggregate, to many millions of pages.
The ordinary financial wants of the cause are sustained by a method
of collecting means known as Systematic Benevolence. By this system,
it is designed that each friend of the cause shall pay a certain sum
weekly proportioned to the property which he possesses. But there is no
compulsion in this matter. In this manner the burden is borne by all,
so that it rests heavily upon none; and the means needed for the work
flows with a steady stream into the treasury of the several churches, and
finally into that of the State Conferences. A settlement is instituted
each year at the State Conferences, in which the labors, receipts, and
expenditures, of each minister are carefully considered. Thus none are
allowed to waste means, and none who are recognized as called of God to
the ministry are allowed to suffer.
The churches sustain their meetings for the most part without the aid of
preaching. They raise means to sustain the servants of Christ, but bid
them mainly devote their time and strength to save those who have not the
light of these important truths shining upon their pathway. So they go
out everywhere preaching the word of God, as his providence guides their
feet. During the summer months, the work in new fields is carried forward
principally by means of large tents, which enable the preacher to provide
a suitable place of worship, wherever he may think it desirable to labor.
The Seventh-day Adventists have thirteen State Conferences, which
assemble annually in their respective States. These bear the names of
Maine, Vermont, New England, New York and Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan,
Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri and Kansas, and
California. These Conferences are designed to meet the local wants of
the cause. There is also a General Conference, which assembles yearly,
composed of delegates from the State Conferences. This Conference takes
the general oversight of the work in all the State Conferences, supplying
the more destitute with laborers as far as possible, and uniting the
whole strength of the body for the accomplishment of the work. It also
takes the charge of missionary labor in those States which have no
organized Conferences.
There are about fifty ministers who devote their whole time to the
work of the gospel. There is also a considerable number who preach a
portion of the time and devote the remainder to secular labor. There are
about 6000 members in the several Conference organizations. But such
is the scattered condition of this people (for they are found in all
the northern States and in several of the southern), that a very large
portion have no connection with its organization. They are to be found
in single families scattered all the way from Maine to California and
Oregon. The _Review_ and _Instructor_ constitute, in a great number of
cases, the only preachers of their faith.
Those subjects which more especially interest this people, are the
fulfillment of prophecy, the second personal advent of the Saviour as an
event now near at hand, immortality through Christ alone, a change of
heart through the operation of the Holy Spirit, the observance of the
Sabbath of the fourth commandment, the divinity and mediatorial work
of Christ, and the development of a holy character by obedience to the
perfect and holy law of God.[1107]
They are very strict with regard to the ordinance of baptism, believing
not only that it requires men to be buried in the watery grave, but that
even such baptism is faulty if administered to those who are breaking one
of the ten commandments. They also believe that our Lord’s direction in
John 13 should be observed in connection with the supper.
They teach that the gifts of the Spirit set forth in 1 Cor. 12 and Eph.
4, were designed to remain in the church till the end of time. They
believe that these were lost in consequence of the same apostasy that
changed the Sabbath. They also believe that in the final restoration of
the commandments by the work of the third angel, the gifts of the Spirit
of God are restored with them. So the remnant of the church, or last
generation of its members, is said to “keep the commandments of God, and
have the testimony of Jesus Christ.”[1108] And the angel of God explains
this by saying, “The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.”[1109]
The spirit of prophecy therefore has a distinct place assigned to it in
the final work of Sabbath reform. Such are their views of this portion of
Scripture; and their history from the beginning has been marked by the
influence of this sacred gift.
In the face of strong opposition, the people known as Seventh-day
Adventists have arisen to bear their testimony for the Sabbath of the
Lord. They have had perils from open foes, and from false brethren; but
they have thus far overcome the difficulties of the way, and from each
have gathered strength for the conflict before them. They have a definite
work which they hope to accomplish. It is to make ready a people
prepared for the advent of the Lord.
Honorable mention should be made of the Seventh-day Adventists of
Switzerland. They first learned these precious truths from Elder M. B.
Czechowski, who a few years since instructed them in the commandments of
God and the faith of Jesus. Since his labors with them ceased, God has
given them strength to stand with firmness for his truth, and has added
to their numbers. They have a heart to obey the truth and to sacrifice
for its advancement. They number about sixty persons. There are a few
individuals of this faith also in Italy, Germany, and Denmark.
The observance of the Sabbath is sometimes advocated on the ground
that man needs a day of rest and will grow prematurely old if he labor
seven days in each week, which is doubtless true; and it has also been
advocated on the ground that God will bless in basket and in store those
who hallow his Sabbath, which may be true in many cases; but the Bible
does not urge motives of this kind in respect to this sacred institution.
Without doubt there are great incidental advantages in the observance of
the Sabbath. But these are not what God sets before us as the reasons
for its observance. The true reason is infinitely higher than all
considerations of this kind, and should constrain men to obey, even were
it certain that it would cost them all that is dear in the present life.
The Sabbath has been advocated on the ground that it secures to men a day
for divine worship in which by common consent they may appear before God.
This is a very important consideration, and yet the Bible says little
concerning it. It is one of the incidental blessings of the Sabbath,
and not the chief reason for its observance. The Sabbath was ordained to
commemorate the creation of the heavens and the earth.
The importance of the Sabbath as the memorial of creation is that it
keeps ever present the true reason why worship is due to God. For the
worship of God is based upon the fact that he is the Creator and that
all other beings were created by him. The Sabbath therefore lies at the
very foundation of divine worship, for it teaches this great truth in
the most impressive manner, and no other institution does this. The true
ground of divine worship, not of that on the seventh day merely, but of
all worship, is found in the distinction between the Creator and his
creatures. This great fact can never become obsolete, and must never be
forgotten. To keep it in man’s mind, God gave to him the Sabbath. He
received it in his innocency, and notwithstanding the perversity of his
professed people, God has preserved this sacred institution through the
entire period of man’s fallen state.
The four and twenty elders in the very act of worshiping Him who sits
upon the throne, state the reason why worship is due to God:—
“Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power;
for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are
and were created.”[1110]
This great truth is therefore worthy to be remembered even in the
glorified state. And we shall presently learn that what God gave to man
in Paradise, to keep this great truth before his mind, shall be honored
by him in Paradise restored.
The future is given to us in the prophetic Scriptures. From them we learn
that our earth is reserved unto fire, and that from its ashes shall
spring new heavens and earth, and ages of endless date.[1111] Over this
glorified inheritance, the second Adam, the Lord of the Sabbath, shall
bear rule, and under his gracious protection the nations of them which
are saved shall inherit the land forever.[1112] When the glory of the
Lord shall thus fill the earth as the waters cover the sea, the Sabbath
of the Most High is again and for the last time brought to view:—
“For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make
shall remain before me, saith the Lord, so shall your seed and
your name remain. And it shall come to pass, that from one new
moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, shall all
flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord.”[1113]
Does not Paul refer to these very facts set forth by Isaiah when he says,
“There remaineth therefore a rest [Greek, _Sabbatismos_, literally “A
KEEPING OF THE SABBATH”] to the people of God”?[1114] The reason for this
monthly gathering to the New Jerusalem of all the host of the redeemed
from every part of the new earth may be found in the language of the
Apocalypse:—
“And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as
crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.
In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the
river was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of
fruits and yielded her fruit every month; and the leaves of the
tree were for the healing [literally, the service][1115] of the
nations.”[1116]
The gathering of the nations that are saved to the presence of the
Creator, from the whole face of the new earth on each successive Sabbath,
attests the sacredness of the Sabbath even in that holy state, and sets
the seal of the Most High to the perpetuity of this ancient institution.
FOOTNOTES
[1] For the scriptural and traditional evidence on this point, see
Shimeall’s Bible Chronology, part i. chap. vi; Taylor’s Voice of the
Church, pp. 25-30; and Bliss’ Sacred Chronology, pp. 199-203.
[2] Isa. 57:15; 1 Sam. 15:29, margin; Jer. 10:10, margin; Micah 5:2,
margin; 1 Tim. 6:16; 1:17; Ps. 90:2.
[3] Dr. Adam Clarke, in his Commentary on Gen. 1:1, uses the following
language: “Created] Caused that to exist which previously to this moment,
had no being. The rabbins, who are legitimate judges in a case of verbal
criticism on their own language, are unanimous in asserting that the
word _bara_, expresses the commencement of the existence of a thing:
or its egression from nonentity to entity.... These words should be
translated: ‘God in the beginning created the _substance_ of the heavens
and the _substance_ of the earth; _i. e._, the _prima materia_, or first
elements, out of which the heavens and the earth were successively
formed.’”
Purchase’s Pilgrimage, b. i. chap, ii., speaks thus of the creation:
“Nothing but nothing had the Lord Almighty, whereof, wherewith, whereby,
to build this city” [that is the world].
Dr. Gill says: “These are said to be _created_, that is, to be made out
of nothing; for what pre-existent matter to this chaos [of verse 2] could
there be out of which they could be formed?”
“Creation must be the work of God, for none but an almighty power could
produce something out of nothing.” Commentary on Gen. 1:1.
John Calvin, in his Commentary on this chapter, thus expounds the
creative act: “His meaning is, that the world was made out of nothing.
Hence the folly or those is refuted who imagine that unformed matter
existed from eternity.”
The work of creation is thus defined in 2 Maccabees 7:28: “Look upon the
heaven and the earth, and all that is therein, and consider that God made
them of things that were not; and so was mankind made likewise.”
That this creative act marked the commencement of the first day instead
of preceding it by almost infinite ages is thus stated in 2 Esdras 6:38:
“And I said, O Lord, thou spakest from the beginning of the creation,
even the first day, and saidst thus: Let heaven and earth be made; and
thy word was a perfect work.”
Wycliffe’s translation, the earliest of the English versions, renders
Gen. 1:1, thus: “In the first, made God of naught heaven and earth.”]
[4] Heb. 11:3; Gen. 1.
[5] Gen. 1:1-5; Heb. 1.
[6] Gen. 1:6-8; Job 37:18.
[7] Gen. 1:9-13; Ps. 136:6; 2 Pet. 3:5.
[8] Gen. 1:14-19; Ps. 119:91; Jer. 33:25.
[9] Gen 1:20-23.
[10] Gen. 1:24-31; 2:7-9, 18-22; 3:20; Job 38:7.
[11] “On the sixth day God ended his work which he had made; and he
rested on the seventh day,” &c., is the reading of the Septuagint, the
Syriac, and the Samaritan; “and this should be considered the genuine
reading,” says Dr. A. Clarke. See his Commentary on Gen. 2.
[12] Gen. 2:2; Ex. 31:17.
[13] Isa. 40:28.
[14] Gen. 2:3; Ex. 20:11. In an anonymous work entitled “Morality of the
Fourth Commandment,” London, 1652, but not the same with that of Dr.
Twisse, of the same title, is the following striking passage:
“The Hebrew root for seven signifies _fullness_, _perfection_, and the
Jews held many mysteries to be in the number seven: so John in his
Apocalypse useth much that number. As, seven churches, seven stars, seven
spirits, seven candlesticks, seven angels, seven seals, seven trumpets;
and we no sooner meet with a seventh day, but it is blessed; no sooner
with a seventh man [Gen. 5:24; Jude 14], but he is translated.” Page 7.
[15] Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary on the words _sanctify_ and
_hallow_. Ed. 1859.
The revised edition of 1864 gives this definition: “To make sacred
or holy; to set apart to a holy or religious use; _to consecrate
by appropriate rites_; to hallow. God blessed the seventh day, and
_sanctified_ it. Gen. 2:3. Moses ... sanctified Aaron and his garments.
Lev. 8:30.”
Worcester defines it thus: “_To ordain or set apart to sacred ends_; to
consecrate; to hallow. God blessed the seventh day and _sanctified_ it.
Gen. 2:3.”
[16] Gen. 2:15; 1:28.
[17] Morality of the Fourth Commandment, pp. 56, 57, London, 1641.
[18] Hebrew Lexicon, p. 914, ed. 1854.
[19] Josh. 20:7; Joel 1:14; 2:15; 2 Kings 10:20, 21; Zeph. 1 7, margin.
[20] Ex. 10:12, 23.
[21] Dr. Lange’s Commentary speaks on this point thus, in vol. i, p. 197:
“If we had no other passage than this of Gen. 2:3, there would be no
difficulty in deducing from it a precept for the universal observance of
a Sabbath, or seventh day, to be devoted to God, as holy time, by all of
that race for whom the earth and its nature were specially prepared. The
first men must have known it. The words, ‘He hallowed it,’ can have no
meaning otherwise. They would be a blank unless in reference to some who
were required to keep it holy.”
Dr. Nicholas Bound, in his “True Doctrine of the Sabbath,” London, 1606,
page 7, thus states the antiquity of the Sabbath precept:
“This first commandment of the Sabbath was no more then first given when
it was pronounced from Heaven by the Lord, than any other one of the
moral precepts, nay, that it hath so much antiquity as the seventh day
hath being; for, so soon as the day was, so soon was it sanctified, that
we might know that, as it came in with the first man, so it must not go
out but with the last man; and as it was in the beginning of the world,
so it must continue to the end of the same; and, as the first seventh day
was sanctified, so must the last be. And this is that which one saith,
that the Sabbath was commanded by God, and the seventh day was sanctified
of him even from the beginning of the world; where (the latter words
expounding the former) he showeth that, when God did sanctify it, then
also he commanded it to be kept holy; and therefore look how ancient the
sanctification of the day is, the same antiquity also as the commandment
of keeping it holy; for they two are all one.”
[22] Ex. 20:8-11.
[23] Buck’s Theological Dictionary, article, Sabbath; Calmet’s
Dictionary, article, Sabbath.
[24] Ex. 16:22, 23.
[25] John 1: 1-3; Gen. 1:1, 26; Col. 1:13-16.
[26] Mark 2:27.
[27] Barrett’s Principles of English Grammar, p. 29.
[28] Job 14:12; 1 Cor. 10:13; Heb. 9:27.
[29] Dr. Twisse illustrates the absurdity of that view which makes the
first observance of the Sabbath in memory of creation to have begun some
2500 years after that event: “We read that when the Ilienses, inhabitants
of Ilium, called anciently by the name of Troy, sent an embassage to
Tiberius, to condole the death of his father Augustus, he, considering
the unseasonableness thereof, it being a long time after his death,
requited them accordingly, saying that he was sorry for their heaviness
also, having lost so renowned a knight as Hector was, to wit, above a
thousand years before, in the wars of Troy.”—_Morality of the Fourth
Commandment_, p. 198.
[30] Ex. 16:23.
[31] Ex. 16.
[32] Ex. 20:8-11.
[33] Compare Gen. 2:1-3; Ex. 20:8-11.
[34] Heb. 3:4; Jer. 10:10-12; Rom. 1:20; Ps. 33:9; Heb. 11:3.
[35] Antiquities of the Jews, b. i. chap. i. sect. 1.
[36] Works, vol. i. The Creation of the World, sect. 30.
[37] Isa. 58:13, 14; Heb. 9:10.
[38] Gen. 3; Rom. 5:12.
[39] Gen. 9:5, 7.
[40] Gen. 5:24; 6:9; 26:5.
[41] See the beginning of chap. viii. of this work.
[42] Ezra 3:1-6; Neh. 8:2, 9-12, 14-18; 1 Kings 8:2, 65; 2 Chron. 5:3;
7:8, 9; John 7:2-14, 37.
[43] “The week, another primeval measure, is not a natural measure of
time, as some astronomers and chronologers have supposed, indicated
by the phases or quarters of the moon. It was originated by divine
appointment at the creation—six days of labor and one of rest being
wisely appointed for man’s physical and spiritual well-being.”—_Bliss’
Sacred Chronology_, p. 6; _Hale’s Chronology_, vol. i. p. 19.
“Seven has been the ancient and honored number among the nations of the
earth. They have measured their time by weeks from the beginning. The
original of this was the Sabbath of God, as Moses has given the reasons
of it in his writings.”—_Brief Dissertation on the first three Chapters
of Genesis, by Dr. Coleman_, p. 26.
[44] Gen. 29:27, 28; 8:10, 12; 7:4, 10; 50:10; Ex. 7:25; Job 2:13.
[45] Ex. 16:22, 23.
[46] The interest to see the first man is thus stated: “Sem and Seth were
in great honor among men, and so was Adam above every living thing in the
creation.” Ecclesiasticus 49:16.
[47] Gen. 26:5; 18:19.
[48] Gen. 2-6; Heb. 11:4-7; 1 Pet. 3:20; 2 Pet. 2:5.
[49] Gen. 7; Matt. 24:37-39; Luke 17:26, 27; 2 Pet. 3:5, 6.
[50] Deut. 32:7, 8; Acts 17:26.
[51] Gen. 11:1-9; Josephus’ Ant., b. i. chap. iv. This took place in the
days of Peleg, who was born about one hundred years after the flood. Gen.
10:25, compared with 11:10-16; Ant., b. i. chap. vi. sect. 4.
[52] Rom. 1:18-32; Acts 14:16, 17; 17:29, 30.
[53] Gen. 12:1-3; Josh. 24:2, 3, 14; Neh. 9:7, 8; Rom. 4:13-17; 2 Chron.
20:7; Isa. 41:8; James 2:23.
[54] Gen. 18:19.
[55] Gen. 17:9-14; 34:14; Acts 10:28; 11:2, 3; Eph. 2:12-19; Num. 23:9;
Deut. 33:27, 28.
[56] Gen. 15; Ex. 1-5; Deut. 4:20.
[57] Ex. 12:29-42; Gal. 3:17.
[58] Ps. 105:43-45; Lev. 22:32, 33; Num. 15:41.
[59] Gen. 2:2, 3; 26:5; Ex. 16:4, 27, 28; 18:16.
[60] Ps. 90:2.
[61] Ex. 19:3-8, 24:3-8; Jer. 3:14, compared with last clause of Jer.
31:32.
[62] Ex. 20:2; 24:10.
[63] Ex. 20:10; Deut. 5:14; Neh. 9:14.
[64] On this verse Dr. A. Clarke thus comments:—“_On the sixth day they
gathered twice as much_—This they did that they might have a provision
for the Sabbath.”
[65] The Douay Bible reads: “To-morrow is the rest of the Sabbath
sanctified unto the Lord.” Dr. Clarke comments as follows upon this text:
“_To-morrow is the rest of the holy Sabbath._ There is nothing either
in the text or context that seems to intimate that the Sabbath was now
_first_ given to the Israelites, as some have supposed; on the contrary,
it is here spoken of as being perfectly well known, from its having been
generally observed. The commandment, it is true, may be considered as
being now _renewed_; because they might have supposed, that in their
unsettled state in the wilderness, they might have been exempted from the
observance of it. Thus we find, 1. That when God finished his creation he
instituted the Sabbath; 2. When he brought the people out of Egypt, he
insisted on the strict observance of it; 3. When he gave the LAW, he made
it a tenth part of the whole: such importance has this institution in the
eyes of the Supreme Being!”
Richard Baxter, a famous divine of the seventeenth century, and a decided
advocate of the abrogation of the fourth commandment, in his “Divine
Appointment of the Lord’s Day,” thus clearly states the origin of the
Sabbath: “Why should God begin two thousand years after [the creation of
the world] to give men a Sabbath upon the reason of his rest from the
creation of it, if he had never called man to that commemoration before?
And it is certain that the Sabbath was observed at the falling of the
manna before the giving of the law; and let any considering Christian
judge..... 1. Whether the not falling of the manna, or the rest of God
after the creation, was like to be the original reason of the Sabbath.
2. And whether if it had been the first, it would not have been said,
Remember to keep holy the Sabbath-day; for on six days the manna fell,
and not on the seventh; rather than ‘for in six days God created heaven
and earth, &c., and rested the seventh day.’ And it is casually added,
‘Wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath-day, and hallowed it.’ Nay,
consider whether this annexed reason intimates not that the day on this
ground being hallowed before, therefore it was that God sent not down
the manna on that day, and that he prohibited the people from seeking
it.”—_Practical Works_, Vol. iii. p. 784. ed. 1707.
[66] The Douay Bible reads: “Because it is the Sabbath of the Lord.”
[67] Ex. 16.
[68] It has indeed been asserted that God by a miracle equalized the
portion of every one on five days, and doubled the portion of each on the
sixth, so that no act of the people had any bearing on the Sabbath. But
the equal portion of each on the five days was not thus understood by
Paul. He says: “But by an equality, that now at this time your abundance
may be a supply for their want, that their abundance also may be a supply
for your want; that there may be equality; as it is written, He that had
gathered much had nothing over; and he that had gathered little had no
lack.” 2 Cor. 8:14, 15. And that the double portion on the sixth day was
the act of the people, is affirmed by Moses. He says that “on the sixth
day they gathered twice as much bread.” Verse 22.
[69] Gen. 7:4, 10; 8:10, 12; 29:27, 28; 50:10; Ex. 7:25; Job 2:13.
[70] By this three-fold miracle, occurring every week for forty years,
the great Law-giver distinguished his hallowed day. The people were
therefore admirably prepared to listen to the fourth commandment
enjoining the observance of the very day on which he had rested. Ex.
16:35; Josh. 5:12; Ex. 20:8-11.
[71] The twelfth chapter of Exodus relates the origin of the passover. It
is in striking contrast with Ex. 16, which is supposed to give the origin
of the Sabbath. If the reader will compare the two chapters he will see
the difference between the origin of an institution as given in Ex. 12,
and a familiar reference to an existing institution as in Ex. 16. If he
will also compare Gen. 2 with Ex. 12, he will see that the one gives the
origin of the Sabbath in the same manner that the other gives the origin
of the passover.
[72] This implies, first, the fall of a larger quantity on that day, and
second, its preservation for the wants of the Sabbath.
[73] This must refer to going out for manna, as the connection implies;
for religious assemblies on the Sabbath were commanded and observed. Lev.
23:3; Mark 1:21; Luke 4:16; Acts 1:12; 15:21.
[74] John 7:22.
[75] Gen. 17:34; Ex. 4. Moses is said to have given circumcision to
the Hebrews; yet it is a singular fact that his first mention of that
ordinance is purely incidental, and plainly implies an existing knowledge
of it on their part. Thus it is written: “This is the ordinance of the
passover: There shall no stranger eat thereof; but every man’s servant
that is bought for money, when thou hast circumcised him, then shall he
eat thereof.” Ex. 12:43, 44. And in like manner when the Sabbath was
given to Israel, that people were not ignorant of the sacred institution.
[76] Eze. 20:12; Ex. 31:17.
[77] Jer. 10:10-12.
[78] That the Lord was there in person with his angels, see besides the
narrative in Ex. 19; 20; 32-34, the following testimonies: Deut. 33:2;
Judges 5:5; Nehemiah 9:6-13; Ps. 68:17.
[79] Ex. 24:10; Lev. 22:32, 33; Num. 15:41; Isa. 41:17.
[80] Ps. 147:19, 20; Rom. 3:1, 2; 9:4, 5. The following from the pen of
Mr. Wm. Miller presents the subject in a clear light: “I say, and believe
I am supported by the Bible, that the moral law was never given to the
Jews as a people exclusively; but they were for a season the keepers of
it in charge. And through them the law, oracles, and testimony, have been
handed down to us. See Paul’s clear reasoning in Rom. chapters 2, 3, and
4, on that point.”—_Miller’s Life and Views_, p. 161.
[81] Ex. 19; Deut. 7:6; 14:2; 2 Sam. 7:23; 1 Kings 8:53; Amos 3:1, 2.
[82] Ex. 20:1-17; 34:28, margin; Deut. 5:4-22; 10:4, margin.
[83] Deut. 5:22.
[84] He who created the world on the first day of the week, and completed
its organization in six days, rested on the seventh day, and was
refreshed. Gen. 1; 2; Ex. 31:17.
[85] To this, however, it is objected that in consequence of the
revolution of the earth on its axis, the day begins earlier in the East
than with us; and hence that there is no definite seventh day to the
world of mankind. To suit such objectors, the earth ought not to revolve.
But in that case, so far from removing the difficulty, there would be no
seventh day at all; for one side of the globe would have perpetual day
and the other side perpetual night. The truth is, everything depends upon
the revolution of the earth. God made the Sabbath for man [Mark 2:27]; he
made man to dwell on all the face of the earth [Acts 17:26]; he caused
the earth to revolve on its axis that it might measure off the days of
the week; causing that the sun should shine on the earth, as it revolves
from west to east, thus causing the day to go round the world from east
to west. Seven of these revolutions constitute a week; the seventh one
brings the Sabbath to all the world.
[86] Luke 23:54-56; 24:1.
[87] See also Matt. 28:1; Mark 16:1, 2.
[88] Neh. 9:13, 14.
[89] This expression is strikingly illustrated in the statement of Eze.
20:5, where God is said to have made himself known unto Israel in Egypt.
This language cannot mean that the people were ignorant of the true God,
however wicked some of them might be, for they had been God’s peculiar
people from the days of Abraham. Ex. 2:23-25; 3:6, 7; 4:31. The language
implies the prior existence both of the Law-giver and of his Sabbath,
when it is said that they were “made known” to his people.
[90] It should never be forgotten that the term Sabbath day signifies
rest-day; that the Sabbath of the Lord is the rest-day of the Lord; and
hence that the expression, “Thy holy Sabbath,” refers the mind to the
Creator’s rest-day, and to his act of blessing and hallowing it.
[91] Ex. 20-24.
[92] Ex. 23:12.
[93] See also Ex. 20:10; Deut. 5:14; Isa. 56.
[94] Ex. 12:43-48.
[95] Ex. 24:3-8; Heb. 9:18-20.
[96] Dr. Clarke has the following note on this verse: “It is very likely
that Moses went up into the mount on the first day of the week; and
having with Joshua remained in the region of the cloud during six days,
on the seventh, which was the Sabbath, God spake to him.”—_Commentary
on Ex._ 24:16. The marking off of a week from the forty days in this
remarkable manner goes far toward establishing the view of Dr. C. And if
this be correct, it would strongly indicate that the ten commandments
were given upon the Sabbath; for there seems to be good evidence that
they were given the day before Moses went up to receive the tables of
stone. For the interview in which chapters 21-23 were given would require
but a brief space, and certainly followed immediately upon the giving of
the ten commandments. Ex. 20:18-21. When the interview closed, Moses came
down to the people and wrote all the words of the Lord. In the morning he
rose up early, and, having ratified the covenant, went up to receive the
law which God had written. Ex. 24:3-13.
[97] Ex. 24:12-18.
[98] Ex. 25-31.
[99] Ex. 31:12-18.
[100] Eze. 20:11, 12, 19, 20.
[101] See third chapter of this work.
[102] “To sanctify, _kadash_, signifies to consecrate, separate, and set
apart a thing or person from all secular purposes to some religious use.”
_Clarke’s Commentary on Ex._ 13:2. The same writer says, on Ex. 19:23,
“Here the word _kadash_ is taken in its proper, literal sense, signifying
the separating of a thing, person, or place, from all profane or common
uses, and devoting it to sacred purposes.”
[103] Gen. 17:7, 8; 26:24; 28:13; Ex. 3:6, 13-16, 18; 5:3; Isa. 45:3.
[104] Lev. 11:45.
[105] See chapter third.
[106] As a sign it did not thereby become a shadow and a ceremony, for
the Lord of the Sabbath was himself a sign. “Behold, I and the children
whom the Lord hath given me are for signs and wonders in Israel from the
Lord of hosts, which dwelleth in Mount Zion.” Isa. 8:18. In Heb. 2:13,
this language is referred to Christ. “And Simeon blessed them, and said
unto Mary his mother, Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising
again of many in Israel; and for a sign which shall be spoken against.”
Luke 2:34. That the Sabbath was a sign between God and Israel throughout
their generations, that is, for the time that they were his peculiar
people, no more proves that it is now abolished than the fact that Jesus
is now a sign that is spoken against proves that he will cease to exist
when he shall no longer be such a sign. Nor does this language argue that
the Sabbath was made for them, or that its obligation ceased when they
ceased to be the people of God. For the prohibition against eating blood
was a perpetual statute for their generations; yet it was given to Noah
when God first permitted the use of animal food, and was still obligatory
upon the Gentiles when the apostles turned to them. Lev. 3:17; Gen.
9:1-4; Acts 15.
The penalty of death at the hand of the civil magistrate is affixed to
the violation of the Sabbath. The same penalty is affixed to most of
the precepts of the moral law. Lev. 20:9, 10; 24:15-17; Deut. 13:6-18;
17:2-7. It should be remembered that the moral law embracing the Sabbath
formed a part of the civil code of the Hebrew nation. As such, the great
Law-giver annexed penalties to be inflicted by the magistrate, thus
doubtless shadowing forth the final retribution of the ungodly. Such
penalties were suspended by that remarkable decision of the Saviour that
those who were without sin should cast the first stone. But such a Being
will arise to punish men, when the hailstones of his wrath shall desolate
the earth. Our Lord did not, however, set aside the real penalty of the
law, the wages of sin, nor did he weaken that precept which had been
violated. John 8:1-9; Job 38:22, 23; Isa. 28:17; Rev. 16:17-21; Rom. 6:23.
[107] This fact will shed light upon those texts which introduce the
agency of angels in the giving of the law. Acts 7:38, 53; Gal. 3:19; Heb.
2:2.
[108] Ex. 32; 33.
[109] Ex. 34; Deut. 9.
[110] Ex. 34:21.
[111] The idea has been suggested by some from this verse that it was
Moses and not God who wrote the second tables. This view is thought to
be strengthened by the previous verse: “Write thou these words: for
after the tenor of these words I have made a covenant with thee and
with Israel.” But it is to be observed that the words upon the tables
of stone were the ten commandments; while the words here referred to
were those which God spoke to Moses during this interview of forty days,
beginning with verse 10 and extending to verse 27. That the pronoun
_he_ in verse 28 might properly enough refer to Moses, if positive
testimony did not forbid such reference, is readily admitted. That it
is necessary to attend to the connection in deciding the antecedents of
pronouns, is strikingly illustrated in 2 Sam. 24:1, where the pronoun
_he_ would naturally refer to the Lord, thus making God the one who
moved David to number Israel. Yet the connection shows that this was
not the case; for the anger of the Lord was kindled by the act; and 1
Chron. 21:1, positively declares that _he_ who thus moved David was
Satan. For positive testimony that it was God and not Moses who wrote
upon the second tables, see Ex. 34:1; Deut. 10:1-5. These texts carefully
discriminate between the work of Moses and the work of God, assigning the
preparation of the tables, the carrying of them up to the mount and the
bringing of them down from the mount, to Moses, but expressly assigning
the writing on the tables to God himself.
[112] Ex. 34:1, 28; Deut. 4:12, 13; 5:22.
[113] Ex. 24:12.
[114] Deut. 33:2. That angels are sometimes called saints or holy ones,
see Dan. 8:13-16. That angels were present with God at Sinai, see Ps.
68:17.
[115] Deut. 10:4, 5; Ex. 25:10-22.
[116] 1 John 3:4, 5.
[117] Ex. 32; Josh. 24:2, 14, 23; Eze. 20:7, 8, 16, 18, 24.
[118] Amos 5:25-27; Acts 7:41-43; Josh. 5:2-8.
[119] Num. 14; Ps. 95; Eze. 20:13.
[120] Eze. 20:13-24.
[121] Ex. 32.
[122] Num. 14.
[123] Deut. 9:24.
[124] Num. 14; Heb. 3:16.
[125] Ex. 16; Josh. 5:12.
[126] Num. 11; 21.
[127] A comparison of Ex. 19; 20:18-21; 24:3-8, with chapter 32, will
show the astonishing transitions of the Hebrews from faith and obedience
to rebellion and idolatry. See a general history of these acts in Ps. 78;
106.
[128] For a notice of this penalty see chapter 5.
[129] Ex. 35:1-3.
[130] Lev. 24:5-9; Num. 28:9, 10.
[131] The Bible abounds with facts which establish this proposition. Thus
the psalmist, in an address to Jerusalem, uses the following language:
“He giveth snow like wool; he scattereth the hoar-frost like ashes. He
casteth forth his ice like morsels; who can stand before his cold? He
sendeth out his word, and melteth them; he causeth his wind to blow,
and the waters flow. He showeth his word unto Jacob, his statutes and
his judgments unto Israel.” Ps. 147:16-19. Dr. Clarke has the following
note on this text: “At particular times the cold in the East is so very
intense as to kill man and beast. _Jacobus de Vitriaco_, one of the
writers in the _Gesta Dei per Francos_, says that in an expedition in
which he was engaged against Mount Tabor, on the 24th of December, the
cold was so intense that many of the poor people, and the beasts of
burthen died by it. And _Albertus Aquensis_, another of these writers,
speaking of the cold in Judea, says that _thirty_ of the people who
attended Baldwin I., in the mountainous districts near the Dead Sea,
were killed by it; and that in that expedition they had to contend with
horrible hail and ice; with unheard of snow and rain. From this we find
that the winters are often very severe in Judea; and that in such cases
as the above we may well call out, Who can stand against his cold!”
See his commentary on Ps. 147. See also Jer. 36:22; John 18:18; Matt.
24:20; Mark 13:18. 1 Maccabees 13:22, mentions a very great snow storm in
Palestine, so that horsemen could not march.
[132] The testimony of the Bible on this point is very explicit. Thus we
read: “Six days thou shalt do thy work, and on the seventh day thou shalt
rest: that thine ox and thine ass may rest, and the son of thy handmaid,
and the stranger, may be refreshed.” Ex. 23:12. To be without fire in
the severity of winter would cause the Sabbath to be a curse and not a
refreshment. It would ruin the health of those who should thus expose
themselves, and render the Sabbath anything but a source of refreshment.
The prophet uses the following language: “If thou turn away thy foot from
the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day: and call the Sabbath
a delight, the holy of the Lord, honorable,” etc. The Sabbath then was
designed by God to be a source of delight to his people, and not a cause
of suffering. The merciful and beneficent character of the Sabbath is
seen in the following texts: Matt. 12:10-13; Mark 2:27, 28; Luke 14:3-6.
From them we learn that God regards the sufferings of the brute creation,
and would have them alleviated upon the Sabbath; how much more the
distress and the needs of his people, for whose refreshment and delight
the Sabbath was made.
[133] Ex. 29:9; 31:16; Lev. 3:17; 24:9; Num. 19:21; Deut. 5:31; 6:1; 7.
The number and variety of these allusions will surprise the inquirer.
[134] Ex. 16:23.
[135] Ex. 12; Deut. 16.
[136] The law of the passover certainly contemplated the arrival of the
Hebrews in the promised land before its regular observance. Ex. 12:25.
Indeed, it was only once observed in the wilderness; namely, in the year
following their departure from Egypt; and after that, was omitted until
they entered the land of Canaan. Num. 9; Josh. 5. This is proved, not
merely from the fact that no other instances are recorded, but because
that circumcision was omitted during the whole period of their sojourn in
the wilderness; and without this ordinance the children would have been
excluded from the passover. Ex. 12; Josh. 5.
[137] Dr. Gill, who considered the seventh-day Sabbath as a Jewish
institution, beginning with Moses, and ending with Christ, and one with
which Gentiles have no concern, has given his judgment concerning this
question of fire on the Sabbath. He certainly had no motive in this case
to answer this popular objection only that of stating the truth. He says:—
“This law seems to be a temporary one, and not to be continued, nor is it
said to be throughout their generations, as elsewhere, where the law of
the Sabbath is given or repeated; it is to be restrained to the building
of the tabernacle, and while that was about to which it is prefaced; and
it is designed to prevent all public or private working on the Sabbath
day in any thing belonging to that;” etc.—_Commentary on Ex._ 35:3.
Dr. Bound gives us St. Augustine’s idea of this precept: “He doth not
admonish them of it without cause; for that he speaketh in making
the tabernacle, and all things belonging to it, and showeth that,
notwithstanding that, they must rest upon the Sabbath day, and not
under the color of that (as it is said in the text) so much as kindle a
fire.”—_True Doctrine of the Sabbath_, p. 140.
[138] Lev. 19:1-3, 30.
[139] Lev. 23:3. It has been asserted from verse 2, that the Sabbath was
one of the feasts of the Lord. But a comparison of verses 2, 4, shows
that there is a break in the narrative, for the purpose of introducing
the Sabbath as a holy convocation; and that verse 4 begins the theme
anew in the very language of verse 2; and it is to be observed that the
remainder of the chapter sets forth the actual Jewish feasts; viz.,
that of unleavened bread, the Pentecost, and the feast of tabernacles.
What further clears this point of all obscurity is the fact that
verses 37, 38, carefully discriminate between the feasts of the Lord
and the Sabbaths of the Lord. But Ex. 23:14, settles the point beyond
controversy: “Three times thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year.”
And then verses 15-17 enumerate these feasts as in Lev. 23:4-44. See also
2 Chron. 8:13.
[140] Lev. 26:1, 2.
[141] Eze. 20:15, 16.
[142] Num. 13:14.
[143] Num. 15:32-36.
[144] Eze. 20:15, 16 comp. with Num. 14:35.
[145] Num. 15:30.
[146] Eze. 20.
[147] Hengstenberg, a distinguished German Anti-Sabbatarian, thus
candidly treats this text: “A man who had gathered wood on the Sabbath
is brought forth at the command of the Lord, and stoned by the whole
congregation before the camp. Calvin says rightly, ‘The guilty man did
not fall through error, but through gross contempt of the law, so that he
treated it as a light matter to overthrow and destroy all that is holy.’
It is evident from the manner of its introduction that the account is
not given with any reference to its chronological position; it reads,
‘And while the children of Israel were _in the wilderness_, they found a
man that gathered sticks upon the Sabbath day.’ It stands simply as an
example of the presumptuous breach of the law, of which the preceding
verses speak. He was one who despised the word of the Lord and broke his
commandments [verse 31]; one who with a high hand sinned and reproached
the Lord. Verse 30.”—_The Lord’s Day_, pp. 31, 32.
[148] Deut. 5:1-3.
[149] See the pledges of this people in Ex. 19; 24.
[150] See the second chapter of this work.
[151] See chapter third.
[152] Deut. 5:12-15.
[153] Compare Ex. 19; 20; Deut. 1.
[154] Ex. 20:8-11.
[155] Ex. 12; 13.
[156] Deut. 24:17, 18.
[157] Deut. 4:12, 13.
[158] Ex. 34:1; Deut. 10:2.
[159] Ex. 34:28; Deut. 10:4.
[160] Deut. 9:10.
[161] Deut. 5:22.
[162] Deut. 5:12-15, compared with Ex. 20:8-11.
[163] Deut. 5, compared with Ex. 20.
[164] Ex. 12; 1 Cor. 5:7, 8.
[165] Lev. 23:10-21; Num. 28:26-31; Deut. 16:9-12; Acts 2:1-18.
[166] Lev. 23:34-43; Deut. 16:13-15; Neh. 8; Rev. 7:9-14.
[167] Num. 10:10; 28:11-15; 1 Sam. 20:5, 24, 27; Ps. 81:3.
[168] Ex. 12:15, 16; Lev. 23:7, 8; Num. 28:17, 18, 25.
[169] Lev. 23:21; Num. 28:26.
[170] Lev. 23:24, 25; Num. 29:1-6.
[171] Lev. 23:27-32; 16:29-31; Num. 29:7.
[172] Lev. 23:39.
[173] Ex. 23:10, 11; Lev. 25:2-7.
[174] Lev. 25:8-54.
[175] Lev. 26:34, 35, 43; 2 Chron. 36:21.
[176] Ex. 12:25.
[177] On this point Mr. Miller uses the following language: “Only one
kind of Sabbath was given to Adam, and one only remains for us. See Hosea
2:11. ‘I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast days, her
new moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts.’ All the Jewish
sabbaths did cease when Christ nailed them to his cross. Col. 2:14-17.
These were properly called Jewish sabbaths. Hosea says, ‘her sabbaths.’
But the Sabbath of which we are speaking, God calls ‘my Sabbath.’ Here
is a clear distinction between the creation Sabbath and the ceremonial.
The one is perpetual; the others were merely shadows of good things to
come.”—_Life and Views_, pp. 161, 162.
[178] Ex. 12:16.
[179] Ex. 20:10; 31:13; Isa. 58:13; compared with Lev. 23:24, 32, 39;
Lam. 1:7; Hosea 2:11.
[180] Lev. 23:37, 38.
[181] Isa. 1:13, 14.
[182] Isa. 56:1-7; 58:13, 14.
[183] Hosea 2:11.
[184] Lam. 1:7; 2:5-7.
[185] Deut. 16:16; 2 Chron. 7:12; Ps. 122.
[186] Jer. 17:19-27; Neh. 13:15-18.
[187] Isa. 56. See the eighth chapter of this work.
[188] See chapter x.
[189] 2 Kings 4:23.
[190] 1 Chron. 9:32. It is true that this text relates to the order of
things after the return from Babylon; yet we learn from verse 22, that
this order was originally ordained by David and Samuel. See verses 1-32.
[191] Compare these two cases: Ex. 16:23; 1 Chron. 9:32.
[192] See chapters ii. and iii.
[193] Josh. 6.
[194] See Dr. A. Clarke’s commentary on Josh. 6:15.
[195] Josh. 10:12-14.
[196] 1 Sam. 21:1-6; Matt. 12:3, 4; Mark 2:25, 26; Luke 6:3, 4.
[197] Lev. 24:5-9; 1 Chron. 9:32.
[198] 1 Sam. 21:5, 6; Matt. 12:4.
[199] See the tenth chapter of this work.
[200] 1 Chron. 23:31; 2 Chron. 2:4; 8:13; 31:3; Neh. 10:31, 33; Eze.
45:17.
[201] See chapter vii. of this work.
[202] 1 Chron. 9:32.
[203] Cotton Mather says: “There is a psalm in the Bible whereof the
title is, ‘A Psalm or Song for the Sabbath day.’ Now ’tis a clause
in that psalm, ‘O Lord, how great are thy works! thy thoughts are
very deep.’ Ps. 92:5. That clause intimates what we should make the
subject of our meditations on the Sabbath day. Our thoughts are to be
on God’s works.”—_Discourse on the Lord’s Day_, p. 30, A. D. 1703. And
Hengstenberg says: “This psalm is according to the heading, ‘A Song for
the Sabbath day.’ The proper positive employment of the Sabbath appears
here to be a thankful contemplation of the works of God, a devotional
absorption in them which could only exist when ordinary occupations are
laid aside.”—_The Lord’s Day_, pp. 36, 37.
[204] 2 Kings 4:23.
[205] Isa. 66:23; Eze. 46:1; Amos 8:5.
[206] Ex. 16:29.
[207] 2 Kings 11:5-9; 2 Chron. 23:4-8.
[208] Amos 8:4-6.
[209] 2 Kings 16:18.
[210] Isa. 56:1-8.
[211] For the coming of this salvation see Heb. 9:28; 1 Pet. 1:9.
[212] Ex. 12:48, 49; Isa. 14:1; Eph. 2:12.
[213] See chapter vii.
[214] Deut. 28:64; Luke 21:24.
[215] Isa. 58:13, 14.
[216] Matt. 8:11; Heb. 11:8-16; Rev. 21.
[217] On this text Dr. A. Clarke comments thus: “From this and the
following verses we find the ruin of the Jews attributed to the breach
of the Sabbath: as this led to a neglect of sacrifice, the ordinances of
religion, and all public worship; so it necessarily brought with it all
immorality. The breach of the Sabbath was that which let in upon them all
the waters of God’s wrath.”
[218] For an inspired commentary on this language, see Neh. 13:15-18.
[219] This language strongly implies that the violation of the Sabbath
had ever been general with the Hebrews. See Jer. 7:23-28.
[220] Jer. 17:20-27.
[221] Eze. 22:7, 8, 26; 23:38, 39.
[222] Eze. 20:23, 24; Deut. 32:16-35.
[223] Eze. 23:38, 39.
[224] 2 Chron. 36:16-20.
[225] Eze., chapters 40-48.
[226] Eze. 43:7-11.
[227] Eze. 44:24; 45:17; 46:1, 3, 4, 12.
[228] Eze. 46:1.
[229] Neh. 9:13, 14.
[230] Neh. 9:38; 10:1-31.
[231] Neh. 10:31.
[232] A few words relative to the time of beginning the Sabbath are
here demanded. 1. The reckoning of the first week of time necessarily
determines that of all succeeding weeks. The first division of the
first day was night; and each day of the first week began with evening;
the evening and the morning, an expression equivalent to the night and
the day, constituted the day of twenty-four hours. Gen. 1. Hence, the
first Sabbath began and ended with evening. 2. That the night is in the
Scriptures reckoned a part of the day of twenty-four hours, is proved
by many texts. Ex. 12:41, 42; 1 Sam. 26:7, 8; Luke 2:8-11; Mark 14:30;
Luke 22:34, and many other testimonies. 3. The 2300 days, symbolizing
2300 years, are each constituted like the days of the first week of time.
Dan. 8:14. The margin, which gives the literal Hebrew, calls each of
these days an “evening morning.” 4. The statute defining the great day of
atonement is absolutely decisive that the day begins with evening, and
that the night is a part of the day. Lev. 23:32. “It shall be unto you
a Sabbath of rest, and ye shall afflict your souls: in the ninth day of
the month at even, from even unto even shall ye celebrate your Sabbath.”
5. That evening is at sunset is abundantly proved by the following
scriptures: Deut. 16:6; Lev. 22:6, 7; Deut. 23:2; 24:13, 15; Josh. 8:29;
10:26, 27; Judges 14:18; 2 Sam. 3:35; 2 Chron. 18:34; Matt. 8:16; Mark
1:32; Luke 4:40. But does not Neh. 13:19, conflict with this testimony,
and indicate that the Sabbath did not begin until after dark? I think
not. The text does not say, “When it began to be dark at Jerusalem before
the Sabbath,” but it says, “When the _gates_ of Jerusalem began to be
dark.” If it be remembered that the gates of Jerusalem were placed under
wide and high walls, it will not be found difficult to harmonize this
text with the many here adduced, which prove that the day begins with
sunset.
Calmet, in his Bible Dictionary, article, Sabbath, thus states the
ancient Jewish method of beginning the Sabbath: “About half an hour
before the sunset all work is quitted and the Sabbath is supposed to be
begun.” He speaks thus of the close of the Sabbath: “When night comes,
and they can discern in the heaven three stars of moderate magnitude,
then the Sabbath is ended, and they may return to their ordinary
employments.”
[233] Neh. 13:15-22.
[234] Speaking of the Babylonish captivity, in his note on Eze. 23:48,
Dr. Clarke says: “From that time to the present day the Jews never
relapsed into idolatry.”
[235] 1 Mac. 1:41-43.
[236] 1 Mac. 2:29-38; Josephus’ Antiquities, b. xii. chap. vi.
[237] 2 Mac. 5:25,26.
[238] 1 Mac. 2:41.
[239] 2 Mac. 6:11.
[240] 2 Mac. 8:23-28.
[241] 1 Mac. 9:43-49; Josephus’ Antiquities, b. xiii. chap. i.; 2 Mac. 15.
[242] Antiquities of the Jews, b. xiv. chap. iv. Here we call attention
to one of those historical frauds by which Sunday is shown to be the
Sabbath. Dr. Justin Edwards states this case thus: “Pompey, the Roman
general, knowing this, when besieging Jerusalem, would not attack them on
the Sabbath; but spent the day in constructing his works, and preparing
to attack them on Monday, and in a manner that they could not withstand,
and so he took the city.”—_Sabbath Manual_, p. 216. That is to say, the
next day after the Sabbath was Monday, and of course Sunday was the
Sabbath! Yet Dr. E. well knew that in Pompey’s time, 63 years before
Christ, Saturday was the only weekly Sabbath, and that Sunday and not
Monday was the day of attack.
[243] Sabbath Manual of the American Tract Society, pp. 214, 215.
[244] Gal. 4:4, 5; John 1:1-10; 17:5, 24; Heb. 1.
[245] Dan. 9:25; Mark 1:14, 15.
[246] Luke 4:14-16.
[247] Luke 4:30-39; Mark 1:21-31; Matt. 8:5-15.
[248] See, on this point, the conclusion of chapter viii.
[249] Mark 1:32-34; Luke 4:40.
[250] Matt. 12:1-8; Mark 2:23-28; Luke 6:1-5.
[251] Mark 2:27, 28.
[252] Comp. John 1:1-3; Gen. 1:1, 26; 2:1-3.
[253] See chap. viii.
[254] Num. 28:9, 10.
[255] Lev. 24:5-9; 1 Chron. 9:32.
[256] Hosea 6:6.
[257] Thus the Greek Testament: Καὶ ἔλεγεν αὐτοῖς· Tὸ σάββατον διὰ τὸν
ἄνθρωπον ἐγένετο, ουχ ὁ ἄνθρωπος διὰ τό σάββατον.
[258] 1 Cor. 11:9.
[259] Gen. 2:1-3, 7, 21-23.
[260] Matt. 19:3-9.
[261] Ex. 16:23; 23:12; Isa. 58:13, 14.
[262] See conclusion of chap. ix.
[263] Matt. 5:17-19; Isa. 42:21.
[264] Matt. 12:9-14; Mark 3:1-6; Luke 6:6-11.
[265] Mark 6:1-6.
[266] John 5:1-18.
[267] Dr. Bloomfield’s Greek Testament on this text; family Testament of
the American Tract Society on the same; Nevins’ Biblical Antiquities, pp.
62, 63.
[268] Compare Jer. 17:21-27 with Nehemiah 13:15-20.
[269] Gen. 2:1-3; Ex. 20:8-11; Isa. 56; 58:13, 14; Eze. 20.
[270] Gal. 4:4; Matt. 5:17-19; 7:12; 19:17; Luke 16:17.
[271] John 5:19.
[272] John 7:21-23.
[273] Grotius well says: “If he healed any on the Sabbath he made it
appear, not only from the law, but also from their received opinions,
that such works were not forbidden on the Sabbath.”—_The Truth of the
Christian Religion_, b. v. sect. 7.
[274] John 9:1-16.
[275] Luke 13:10-17.
[276] 1 Pet. 3:6.
[277] Luke 14:1-6.
[278] Matt. 23:23.
[279] Matt. 24:15-21.
[280] Dan. 9:26, 27.
[281] Luke 21:20.
[282] Jewish Wars, b. ii. chap. xix.
[283] Id. b. ii. chap. xx.
[284] Eccl. Hist. b. iii. chap. v.
[285] Jewish Wars, b. ii. chap. xix.
[286] Deut. 16:16.
[287] Thus remarks Mr. Crozier in the _Advent Harbinger_ for Dec. 6,
1851: “The reference to the Sabbath in Matt. 24:20, only shows that the
Jews who rejected Christ would be keeping the Sabbath at the destruction
of Jerusalem, and would, in consequence, add to the dangers of the
disciples’ flight by punishing them perhaps with death for fleeing on
that day.”
And Mr. Marsh, forgetting that Christ forbade his disciples to take
anything with them in their flight, uses the following language: “If
the disciples should attempt to flee from Jerusalem on that day and
carry their things, the Jews would embarrass their flight and perhaps
put them to death. The Jews would be keeping the Sabbath, because they
rejected Christ and his gospel.”—_Advent Harbinger_, Jan. 24, 1852.
These quotations betray the bitterness of their authors. In honorable
distinction from these anti-Sabbatarians, the following is quoted from
Mr. William Miller, himself an observer of the first day of the week:—
“‘Neither on the Sabbath day.’ Because it was to be kept as a day of
rest, and no servile work was to be done on that day, nor would it be
right for them to travel on that day. Christ has in this place sanctioned
the Sabbath, and clearly shows us our duty to let no trivial circumstance
cause us to break the law of the Sabbath. Yet how many who profess to
believe in Christ, at this present day, make it a point to visit, travel,
and feast, on this day? What a false-hearted profession must that person
make who can thus treat with contempt the moral law of God, and despise
the precepts of the Lord Jesus! We may here learn our obligation to
remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.”—_Exposition of Matt._ 24, p.
18.
[288] Jewish Wars, b. ii. chap. xix.
[289] Id. b. ii. chap. xix.
[290] See chap. xvi.
[291] President Edwards says: “A further argument for the perpetuity of
the Sabbath we have in Matt. 24:20: ‘Pray ye that your flight be not in
the winter, _neither on the Sabbath day_.’ Christ is here speaking of the
flight of the apostles and other Christians out of Jerusalem and Judea,
just before their final destruction, as is manifest by the whole context,
and especially by the 16th verse: ‘Then let them which be in Judea flee
into the mountains.’ But this final destruction of Jerusalem was after
the dissolution of the Jewish constitution, and after the Christian
dispensation was fully set up. Yet it is plainly implied in these words
of our Lord, that even then Christians were bound to a strict observation
of the Sabbath.”—_Works of President Edwards_, vol. iv. pp. 621, 622, New
York, 1849.
[292] Matt. 27; Isa. 53.
[293] Dan. 9:24-27.
[294] Col. 2:14-17.
[295] For an extended view of these Jewish festivals see chapter vii.
[296] Deut. 10:4, 5, compared with 31:24-26. Thus Morer contrasts the
phrase “in the ark,” which is used with reference to the two tables, with
the expression “in the side of the ark,” as used respecting the book
of the law, and says of the latter: “In the side of the ark, or more
critically, in the outside of the ark; or in a chest by itself on the
right side of the ark, saith the Targum of Jonathan.”—_Morer’s Dialogues
on the Lord’s Day_, p. 211, London, 1701.
[297] See chap. vii.
[298] See chap. ii.
[299] Mark 2:27.
[300] Lev. 23:37, 38.
[301] Gen. 2:1-3; Ex. 20; Matt. 5:17, 19.
[302] Isa. 66:22, 23. See also the close of chap. xxvii of this work.
[303] Luke 23:54-56.
[304] James 2:8-12; Matt. 5:17-19; Rom. 3:19, 31.
[305] Heb. 9; 10; Luke 23:46-53; John 19:38-42.
[306] Luke 23:54-56.
[307] Matt. 28:1; Mark 16:1, 2, 9; Luke 23:56; 24:1; John 20:1, 19.
[308] Eze. 46:1.
[309] See the origin of the ancient Sabbath in Gen. 2:1-3.
[310] Mark 16:14. That this interview was certainly the same with that in
John 20:19, will be seen from a careful examination of Luke 24.
[311] Matt. 19:26; Titus 1:2.
[312] Isa. 65:16; Ps. 119:142, 151.
[313] Rom. 1:25.
[314] It is just as easy to change the crucifixion-day from that day of
the week on which Christ was crucified, to one of the six days on which
he was not, as to change the rest-day of the Creator from that day of the
week on which he rested, to one of the six days on which he wrought in
the work of creation.
[315] John 20:26.
[316] John 21.
[317] Acts 1:3. Forty days from the day of the resurrection would expire
on Thursday.
[318] When the resurrection day was “far spent,” the Saviour and two
of the disciples drew near to Emmaus, a village seven and a half miles
from Jerusalem. They constrained him to go in with them to tarry for
the night. While they were eating supper they discovered that it was
Jesus, when he vanished from their sight. Then they arose and returned
to Jerusalem; and after their arrival, the first meeting of Jesus with
the eleven took place. It could not therefore have lacked but little of
sunset, which closed the day, if not actually upon the second day, when
Jesus came into their midst. Luke 24. In the latter case, the expression,
“the same day at evening being the first day of the week,” would find an
exact parallel in meaning, in the expression, “in the ninth day of the
month at even,” which actually signifies the evening with which the tenth
day of the seventh month commences. Lev. 23:32.
[319] Those who were to come before God from Sabbath to Sabbath to
minister in his temple, were said to come “after seven days.” 1 Chron.
9:25; 2 Kings 11:5.
[320] “After six days,” instead of being the sixth day, was about eight
days after. Matt. 17:1; Mark 9:2; Luke 9:28.
[321] That sunset marks the close of the day, see the close of chapter
viii.
[322] Acts 2:1, 2.
[323] Luke 24:49-53; Acts 1.
[324] Horatio B. Hacket, D. D., Professor of Biblical Literature, in
Newton Theological Institution, thus remarks: “It is generally supposed
that this Pentecost, signalized by the outpouring of the Spirit, fell on
the Jewish Sabbath, our Saturday.”—_Commentary on the Original Text of
the Acts_, pp. 50, 51.
[325] In 1633, William Prynne, a prisoner in the tower of London,
composed a work in defense of first-day observance, entitled,
“Dissertation on the Lord’s Day Sabbath.” He thus acknowledges the
futility of the argument under consideration: “No scripture ... prefers
or advanceth the work of redemption ... before the work of creation;
both these works being very great and glorious in themselves; wherefore
I cannot believe the work of redemption, or Christ’s resurrection alone,
to be more excellent and glorious than the work of creation, without
sufficient texts and Scripture grounds to prove it; but may deny it as
a presumptuous fancy or unsound assertion, till satisfactorily proved,
as well as peremptorily averred without proof.”—Page 59. This is the
judgment of a candid advocate of the first day as a Christian festival.
On Acts 20:7, he will be allowed to testify again.
[326] Luke 21:28; Rom. 8:23; Eph. 1:13, 14; 4:30.
[327] Eph. 1:7; Gal. 3:13; Rev. 5:9.
[328] 1 Cor. 11:23-26.
[329] Rom. 6:3-5; Col. 2:12.
[330] Ps. 118:22-24.
[331] Eph. 1:20-23; 2:20, 21; 1 Pet. 2:4-7.
[332] 1 Thess. 5:16.
[333] John 8:56.
[334] See chap. iii.
[335] Matt. 5:17-19.
[336] Eph. 2:13-16; Col. 2:14-17.
[337] Matt. 28:19, 20; Mark 16:15.
[338] Dan. 9:24-27; Acts 9; 10; 11; 26:12-17; Rom. 11:13.
[339] 1 Cor. 11:25; Jer. 31:31-34; Heb. 8:8-12; Dan. 9:27; Eph. 2:11-22.
[340] Matt. 5:17-19; 1 John 3:4, 5; Rom. 4:15.
[341] Heb. 9:1-7; Ex. 25:1-21; Deut. 10:4, 5; 1 Kings 8:9.
[342] Heb., chaps. 7-10; Lev. 16.
[343] Heb. 8:1-5; 9:23, 24.
[344] Rev. 11:19.
[345] Ex. 25:21, 22.
[346] Rom. 3:19-31; 5:8-21; 8:3, 4; 13:8-10; Gal. 3:13, 14; Eph. 6:2, 3;
James 2:8-12; 1 John 3:4, 5.
[347] Ex. 19; 20; 24:12; 31:18; Deut. 10.
[348] Lev. 16.
[349] Rom. 3:19-31; 1 John 3:4, 5.
[350] Ps. 40:6-8; Heb. 10.
[351] Heb. 9; 10.
[352] Jer. 31:33; Rom. 8:3, 4; 2 Cor. 3:3.
[353] Ps. 19:7; James 1:25; Ps. 40.
[354] Rom. 5.
[355] Rom. 3:19.
[356] Rom. 3:31.
[357] Rom. 3:20; 1 John 3:4, 5; 2:1, 2.
[358] Jer. 11:16; Rom. 11:17-24.
[359] Rom. 4:16-18; Gal. 3:7-9.
[360] Ex. 19:5, 6; 1 Pet. 2:9, 10.
[361] Gen. 11:1-9; Acts 2:1-11.
[362] Rom. 7:12, 13.
[363] James 2:8-12.
[364] See chapter x.
[365] Acts 13:14.
[366] Verse 27.
[367] Dr. Bloomfield has the following note on this text: “The words,
εἰς τὸ μεταξὺ σαββ., are by many commentators supposed to mean ‘on some
intermediate week-day.’ But that is refuted by verse 44, and the sense
expressed in our common version is, no doubt, the true one. It is adopted
by the best recent commentators, and confirmed by the ancient versions.”
_Greek Testament with English notes_, vol. i. p. 521. And Prof. Hacket
has a similar note.—_Commentary on Acts_, p. 233.
[368] Verses 42-44.
[369] Acts 15.
[370] Acts 15:10, 28, 29; James 2:8-12.
[371] Verses 1, 5.
[372] Verse 29; 21:25.
[373] Ex. 34:15, 16; Num. 25:2; Lev. 17:13, 14; Gen. 9:4; Lev. 3:17; Gen.
34; Lev. 19:29.
[374] Acts 15:19-21.
[375] Acts 16:12-14.
[376] Paul’s manner is exemplified by the following texts, in all of
which it would appear that the meetings in question were upon the
Sabbath. Acts 13:5; 14:1; 17:10, 17; 18:19; 19:8.
[377] Acts 17:1-4.
[378] 1 Thess. 2:14.
[379] 1 Thess. 1:7, 8.
[380] Acts 18:3, 4.
[381] Acts 10:2, 4, 7, 22, 30-35; 13:43; 14:1; 16:13-15; 17:4, 10-12.
[382] 1 Cor. 16:1, 2.
[383] Vindication of the True Sabbath, Battle Creek ed., pp. 51, 52.
[384] Greek Testament with English Notes, vol. ii. p. 173.
[385] Sabbath Manual of the American Tract Society, p. 116.
[386] Family Testament of the American Tract Society, p. 286.
[387] Eze. 46:1.
[388] Prof. Hacket remarks on the length of this voyage: “The passage on
the apostle’s first journey to Europe occupied two days only; see chapter
16:11. Adverse winds or calms would be liable, at any season of the year,
to occasion this variation.”—_Commentary on Acts_, p. 329. This shows
how little ground there is to claim that Paul broke the Sabbath on this
voyage. There was ample time to reach Troas before the Sabbath when he
started from Philippi, had not providential causes hindered.
[389] Acts 20:6-13.
[390] Thus Prof. Whiting renders the phrase: “The disciples being
assembled.” And Sawyer has it: “We being assembled.”
[391] 1 Cor. 11:23-26.
[392] Matt. 26.
[393] Acts 2:42-46.
[394] This fact has been acknowledged by many first-day commentators.
Thus Prof. Hacket comments upon this text: “The Jews reckoned the day
from evening to morning, and on that principle the evening of the first
day of the week would be our Saturday evening. If Luke reckoned so here,
as many commentators suppose, the apostle then waited for the expiration
of the Jewish Sabbath, and held his last religious service with the
brethren at Troas, at the beginning of the Christian Sabbath, _i. e._,
on Saturday evening, and consequently resumed his journey on Sunday
morning.”—_Commentary on Acts_, pp. 329, 330. But he endeavors to shield
the first-day Sabbath from this fatal admission by suggesting that Luke
probably reckoned time according to the pagan method, rather than by that
which is ordained in the Scriptures!
Kitto, in noting the fact that this was an evening meeting, speaks thus:
“It has from this last circumstance been inferred that the assembly
commenced after sunset on the Sabbath, at which hour the first day
of the week had commenced, according to the Jewish reckoning [Jahn’s
Bibl. Antiq., sect. 398], which would hardly agree with the idea of a
commemoration of the resurrection.”—_Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature_,
article, Lord’s day.
And Prynne, whose testimony relative to redemption as an argument for the
change of the Sabbath has been already quoted, thus states this point:
“Because the text saith there were many lights in the upper room where
they were gathered together, and that Paul preached from the time of
their coming together till midnight, ... this meeting of the disciples
at Troas, and Paul’s preaching to them, began at evening. The sole doubt
will be what evening this was.... For my own part I conceive clearly that
it was upon Saturday night, as we falsely call it, and not the coming
Sunday night.... Because St. Luke records that it was upon the first day
of the week when this meeting was ... therefore it must needs be on the
Saturday, not on our Sunday evening, since the Sunday evening in St.
Luke’s and the Scripture account was no part of the first, but of the
second day; the day ever beginning and ending at evening.”
Prynne notices the objection drawn from the phrase, “ready to depart
on the morrow,” as indicating that this departure was not on the same
day of the week with his night meeting. The substance of his answer is
this: If the fact be kept in mind that the days of the week are reckoned
from evening to evening, the following texts, in which in the night, the
morning is spoken of as the morrow, will show at once that another day of
the week is not necessarily intended by the phrase in question. 1 Sam.
19:11; Esth. 2:14; Zeph. 3:3; Acts 23:31, 32.—_Diss. on Lord’s Day Sab._,
pp. 36-41, 1633.
[395] See the conclusion of chap. viii.
[396] Luke 23:56; 24:1.
[397] Rom. 14:1-6.
[398] James 2:8-12.
[399] Rom. 7:12, 13; 1 John 3:4, 5.
[400] Rom. 3.
[401] Ex. 20.
[402] Lev. 23. These are particularly enumerated in Col. 2, as we have
already noticed in chapter vii, and in the concluding part of chapter x.
[403] Acts 2:1-11; Rom 2:17; 4:1; 7:1.
[404] Ex. 16:4, 21, 27, 28.
[405] Cor. 15:27; Ps. 8.
[406] Rev. 1:10.
[407] To show that Paul regarded Sabbatic observance as _dangerous_,
Gal. 4:10, is often quoted; notwithstanding the same individuals claim
that Rom. 14 proves that it is a matter of _perfect indifference_; they
not seeing that this is to make Paul contradict himself. But if the
connection be read from verse 8 to verse 11, it will be seen that the
Galatians before their conversion were not Jews, but heathen: and that
these days, months, times, and years, were not those of the Levitical
law, but those which they had regarded with superstitious reverence while
heathen. Observe the stress which Paul lays upon the word “again,” in
verse 9. And how many that profess the religion of Christ at the present
day superstitiously regard certain days as “lucky” or “unlucky days;”
though such notions are derived only from heathen distinctions.
[408] See chapter x.
[409] Rev. 1:9-11.
[410] Dr. Bloomfield, though himself of a different opinion, speaks thus
of the views of others concerning the date of John’s gospel: “It has been
the general sentiment, both of ancient and modern inquirers, that it was
published about _the close of the first century_.”—_Greek Testament with
English Notes_, vol. i. p. 328.
Morer says that John “penned his gospel two years later than the
Apocalypse, and after his return from Patmos, as St. Augustine, St.
Jerome, and Eusebius, affirm.”—_Dialogues on the Lord’s Day_, pp. 53, 54.
The Paragraph Bible of the London Religious Tract Society, in its preface
to the book of John, speaks thus: “According to the general testimony of
ancient writers, John wrote his gospel at Ephesus, about the year 97.”
In support of the same view, see also Religious Encyclopedia, Barnes’
Notes (gospels), Bible Dictionary, Cottage Bible, Domestic Bible, Mine
Explored, Union Bible Dictionary, Comprehensive Bible, Dr. Hales, Horne,
Nevins, Olshausen, &c.
[411] The Encyclopedia Britannica, in its article concerning the Sabbath,
undertakes to prove that the “religious observation of the first day of
the week is of apostolical appointment.” After citing and commenting upon
all the passages that could be urged in proof of the point, it makes the
following candid acknowledgment: “Still, however, it must be owned that
these passages are not sufficient to prove the apostolical institution of
the Lord’s day, or even the actual observation of it.”
The absence of all scriptural testimony relative to the change of the
Sabbath, is accounted for by certain advocates of that theory, not by the
frank admission that it never was changed by the Lord, but by quoting
John 21:25, assuming the change of the Sabbath as an undoubted truth,
but that it was left out of the Bible lest it should make that book
too large! They think, therefore, that we should go to Ecclesiastical
history to learn this part of our duty; not seeing that, as the fourth
commandment still stands in the Bible unrepealed and unchanged, to
acknowledge that that change must be sustained wholly outside of the
Bible, is to acknowledge that first-day observance is a tradition which
makes void the commandment of God. The following chapters will, however,
patiently examine the argument for first-day observance drawn from
ecclesiastical history.
[412] Gen. 2:3.
[413] Ex. 16:23.
[414] Ex. 20:8-11.
[415] Isa. 58:13, 14.
[416] Mark 2:27, 28.
[417] An able opponent of Sabbatic observance thus speaks relative to
the term Lord’s day of Rev. 1:10: “If a current day was intended, the
only day bearing this definition, in either the Old or New Testament, is
Saturday, the seventh day of the week.”—_W. B. Taylor, in the Obligation
of the Sabbath_, p. 296.
[418] Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chap. xv.
[419] Acts 20:29, 30.
[420] 2 Thess. 2:3, 4, 7, 8.
[421] 2 Tim. 4:2-4; 2 Pet. 2; Jude 4; 1 John 2:18.
[422] Book ii. chap. i. sect. 1.
[423] Eccl. Researches, chap. vi. p. 51, ed. 1792.
[424] The Modern Sabbath Examined, pp. 123, 124.
[425] Rose’s Neander, p. 184.
[426] Hist. of the Popes, vol. i. p. 1, Phila. ed., 1817.
[427] History of Romanism, book ii. chap. i. sects. 3, 4.
[428] Lectures on Romanism, p. 203.
[429] Commentary on Prov. 8.
[430] Autobiography of Adam Clarke, LL. D., p. 134.
[431] Christianography, part ii. p. 59, London, 1636.
[432] Translation of the Apologies of Justin Martyr, Tertullian, and
others, vol. ii. p. 375.
[433] John 21:20-23.
[434] 2 Tim. 3:16, 17.
[435] Note of the Douay Bible on 2 Tim. 3:16, 17.
[436] Obligation of the Sabbath, pp. 254, 255.
[437] Acts 20:7; 1 Cor. 16:2; Rev. 1:10.
[438] A Treatise of Thirty Controversies.
[439] The writer has prepared a small work entitled, “The Complete
Testimony of the Fathers of the first Three Centuries concerning the
Sabbath and First Day,” in which, with the single exception of Origen,
some of whose works were not at that time accessible, every passage in
the fathers which gives their views of the Sabbath and first-day is
presented. This pamphlet can be had of the publishers of the present work
for fifteen cents. To save space in this History, a general statement of
the doctrine of the fathers is here made with brief quotations of their
words. But in “The Complete Testimony of the Fathers” every passage is
given in their own words, and to this little work the reader is referred.
[440] Those who dispute these statements are invited to present the words
of the fathers which modify or disprove them. The reader who may not have
access to the writings of the fathers is referred to the pamphlet already
mentioned in which their complete testimony is given.
[441] See the testimony on page 189 of this work.
[442] Justin Martyr’s First Apology, chap. lxvii.
[443] Eusebius’s Eccl. Hist., book iv. chap. xxiii.
[444] See chap. xviii. of this History.
[445] See his Ecclesiastical History, book iv. chap. xxvi.
[446] Sabbath Manual, p. 114.
[447] See chap. xvi. of this work; and also Testimony of the Fathers, pp.
44-52.
[448] The Miscellanies of Clement, book v. chap. xiv.
[449] The Miscellanies of Clement, book vii. chap. xii.; Testimony of the
Fathers, p. 61.
[450] The Miscellanies, book vii. chap. vii.; Testimony of the Fathers,
p. 62.
[451] Kitto’s Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature, original edition,
article Lord’s Day.
[452] Tertullian on Prayer, chap. xxiii.; Testimony of the Fathers, p. 67.
[453] On Idolatry, chap. xiv.; Testimony of the Fathers, p. 66.
[454] _Ad Nationes_, book i. chap. xiii.; Testimony of the Fathers, p. 70.
[455] _De Corona_, sects. 3 and 4; Testimony of the Fathers, pp. 68, 69.
[456] An Answer to the Jews, chap. iv.; Testimony of the Fathers, p. 73.
[457] Against Celsus, book 8. chap. xxii.; Testimony of the Fathers, p.
87.
[458] Eusebius’s Eccl. Hist., book v. chap. xxiv.
[459] Socrates’s Eccl. Hist., book v. chap. xxii.
[460] Anatolius, Tenth Fragment.
[461] Socrates’s Eccl. Hist., book v. chap. xxii.
[462] Sozomen’s Eccl. Hist., book vii. chap. xviii.; see also Mosheim,
book i. cent. 2, part ii. chap iv. sect. 9.
[463] Socrates’s Eccl. Hist., book v. chap. xxii.; McClintock and
Strong’s Cyclopedia, vol. iii. p. 13; Bingham’s Antiquities, p. 1149.
[464] Maclaine’s Mosheim, cent. 1, part ii. chap. iv. sec. 4. I have
given Maclaine’s translation, not because it is an accurate version of
Mosheim, but because it is so much used in support of the first-day
Sabbath. Maclaine in his preface to Mosheim says: “I have sometimes
taken considerable liberties with my author.” And he tells us what these
liberties were by saying that he had “often added a few sentences, to
render an observation more striking, a fact more clear, a portrait more
finished.” The present quotation is an instance of these liberties. Dr.
Murdock of New Haven who has given “a close, literal version” of Mosheim,
gives the passage thus:—
“The Christians of this century, assembled for the worship of God, and
for their advancement in piety, on the first day of the week, the day
on which Christ reassumed his life: for that this day was set apart
for religious worship, by the apostles themselves, and that, after the
example of the church of Jerusalem, it was generally observed, we have
unexceptionable testimony.”—_Murdock’s Mosheim_, cent. 1, part ii. chap.
iv. sec. 4.
[465] Neander’s Church History, translated by H. J. Rose, p. 186. To
break the force of this strong statement of Neander that “the festival
of Sunday, like all other festivals, was always only a human ordinance,
and it was far from the intentions of the apostles to establish a divine
command in this respect, far from them, and from the early apostolic
church, to transfer the laws of the Sabbath to Sunday,” two things have
been said:—
1. That Neander, in a later edition of his work, retracted this
declaration. It is true that in re-writing his work he omitted this
sentence. But he inserted nothing of a contrary character, and the
general tenor of the revised edition is in this place precisely the same
as in that from which this out-spoken statement is taken.
In proof of this, we cite from the later edition of Neander his statement
in this very place of what constituted Sunday observance in the early
church. He says:—
“Sunday was distinguished as a day of joy, by being exempted from fasts,
and by the circumstance that prayer was performed on this day in a
standing and not in a kneeling posture, as Christ, by his resurrection,
had raised up fallen man again to Heaven.”—_Torrey’s Neander_, vol. i. p.
295, ed. 1852.
This is an accurate account of early Sunday observance, as we shall
hereafter show; and that such observance was only a human ordinance,
of which no feature was ever commanded by the apostles, will be very
manifest to every person who attempts to find any precept for any
particular of it in the New Testament.
2. But the other method of setting aside this testimony of Neander is
to assert that he did not mean to deny that the apostles established
a divine command for Sunday as the Christian Sabbath, but meant to
assert that they did not establish a divine command for Sunday as a
Catholic festival! Those who make this assertion must know that it is
false. Neander expressly denies that the apostles either constituted
or recognized Sunday as a Sabbath, and he represents Sunday as a mere
festival from the very first of its observance, and established only by
human authority.
[466] See chapters x. and xi., in which the New Testament has been
carefully examined on this point.
[467] Epistle of Barnabas 13:9, 10; or, as others divide the epistle,
chapter 15.
[468] Eccl. Hist., cent. 1, part ii. chap. ii. sect. 21.
[469] Historical Commentaries, cent. 1, sect. 53.
[470] Rose’s Neander, p. 407.
[471] Note appended to Gurney’s History, Authority, and Use of the
Sabbath, p. 86.
[472] Ancient Church, pp. 367, 368.
[473] Commentary on Acts, p. 251.
[474] History of the Church, cent. 1, chap. xv.
[475] Cyc. Bib. Lit., art. Lord’s day, tenth ed. 1858.
[476] Encyc. of Rel. Knowl., art. Barnabas’ Epistle.
[477] Eccl. Hist., book iii. chap. xxv.
[478] The Sabbath, or an Examination of the Six Texts commonly adduced
from the New Testament in proof of a Christian Sabbath, p. 233.
[479] Ancient Christianity, chap. i. sect. 2.
[480] Epistle of Barnabas, 9:8. In some editions it is chap. 10.
[481] Coleman’s Ancient Christianity, pp. 35, 36.
[482] Ancient Christianity Exemplified, chap. 26, sect. 2.
[483] Buck’s Theological Dictionary, art. Christians.
[484] Tertullian’s Apology, sect. 2.
[485] Obligation of the Sabbath, p. 300.
[486] Historical Commentaries, cent. 1, sect. 47.
[487] 1 Pet. 1:1. See Clarke’s Commentary, preface to the epistles of
Peter.
[488] Ignatius to the Magnesians, 3:3-5; or, as others divide the
epistle, chap. 9.
[489] Ancient Church, pp. 413, 414.
[490] Id. p. 427.
[491] Future Life, p. 290.
[492] Examination of the Six Texts, p. 237.
[493] Ecclesiastical Researches, chap. vi. pp. 50, 51, ed. 1792.
[494] Ignatius ad Magnesios, sect. 9.
[495] Cyc. Bib. Lit., art. Lord’s day.
[496] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, pp. 206, 207.
[497] A first-day writer, author of the “History, Authority, and Use, of
the Sabbath.”
[498] Examination of the Six Texts, pp. 250, 251.
[499] For a more full statement of the case of Ignatius, see the
“Testimony of the Fathers,” pp. 26-30. The quotation from Ignatius
examined in this chapter is there shown, according to the connection, to
relate, not to New-Testament Christians, but to the ancient prophets.
[500] Sabbath Manual, p. 120.
[501] See his “History, Authority, and Use, of the Sabbath,” chap. iv.
pp. 87, 88.
[502] Examination of the Six Texts, pp. 258-261.
[503] The date in Baronius is A. D. 303.
[504] Examination of the Six Texts, pp. 263-265.
[505] Note by Domville. “_Dominicum_ is not, as may at first be supposed,
an adjective, of which _diem_ [day] is the understood substantive. It
is itself a substantive, neuter as appears from the passage, ‘_Quia non
potest intermitti Dominicum_,’ in the narrative respecting Saturninus.
The Latin adjective _Dominicus_, when intended to refer to the Lord’s
day, is never, I believe, used without its substantive _dies_ [day] being
expressed. In all the narratives contained in Ruinart’s _Acta Martyrum_,
I find but two instances of mention being made of the Lord’s day, and in
both these instances the substantive _dies_ [day] is expressed.”
[506] This testimony is certainly decisive. It is the interpretation of
the compiler of the _Acta Martyrum_, himself, and is given with direct
reference to the particular instance under discussion. An independent
confirmation of Domville’s authorities, may be found in Lucius’s Eccl.
Hist., cent. 4, chap, vi.: “Fit mentio aliquoties locorum istorum in
quibus convenerint Christiani, in historia persecutionis sub Diocletiano
& Maximino. Et apparet, ante Constantinum etiam, locos eos fuisse
mediocriter exstructos atque exornatos: quos seu Templa appellarunt seu
Dominica; ut apud Eusebium (li. 9, c. 10) & Ruffinum (li. 1, c. 3).”
It is certain that _Dominicum_ is here used as designating a place of
divine worship. Dr. Twisse in his “Morality of the Fourth Commandment,”
p. 122, says: “The ancient fathers, both Greek and Latin, called temples
by the name of dominica and κυρίακα.”
[507] Domville cites St. Augustine’s Works, vol. v. pp. 116, 117, Antwerp
ed. A. D. 1700.
[508] Examination of the Six Texts, pp. 267, 268.
[509] Id. pp. 270, 271.
[510] Id. pp. 272, 273.
[511] Historical Commentaries, cent. 1, sect. xxxii.
[512] The Sabbath, by James Gilfillan, p. vii.
[513] To break the force of Domville’s statement in which he exposes
the story originally told by Bishop Andrews as coming from the _Acta
Martyrum_, it is said that Domville used Ruinart’s _Acta Martyrum_, and
that Ruinart was not born till thirty-one years after Bishop Andrews’
death, so that Domville did not go to the same book that was used by
the bishop, and therefore failed to find what he found. Those who raise
this point betray their ignorance or expose their dishonesty. The _Acta
Martyrum_ is a collection of the memoirs of the martyrs, written by
their friends from age to age. Ruinart did not write a new work, but
simply edited “the most valued collection” of these memoirs that has
ever appeared. See McClintock and Strong’s Cyclopedia, vol. i. pp.
56, 57. Domville used Ruinart’s edition, because, as he expresses it,
it is “the most complete collection of the memoirs and legends still
extant, relative to the lives and sufferings of the Christian martyrs.”
Domville’s use of Ruinart was, therefore, in the highest degree just and
right.
[514] Ibique celebrantes ex more Dominica Sacramenta.—_Baronius_, _Tome
3_, p. 348, A. D. 303, No. xxxvi. Lucæ, A. D. 1738.
[515] Qui contra edictum Imperatorum, & Cæsarum Collectam Dominicam
celebrassent.—_Baronius_, _Tome 3_, p. 348, A. D. 303, No. xxxix.
[516] Utrum Collectam fecisset. Qui cum se Christianum, & in Collecta
fuisse profiteretur.—_Id. Ib._
[517] Nam & in Collecta fui, & Dominicum cum fratribus celebravi, quia
Christiana sum.—_Id._ No. xliii. p. 344. This was spoken by a female
martyr.
[518] Dominicum celebravimus. Proconsul ait: Quare? respondit: Quia non
potest intermitti Dominicum.—_Id._ No. xlvi. p. 350.
[519] In cujus dome Collecta facta fuit.—_Id._ No. xlvii. p. 350.
[520] Intermitti Dominicum non potest, ait. Lex sic jubet.—_Id._ No.
xlvii. p. 350.
[521] In tua, inquit proconsul, domo Collectæ factæ sunt, contra
praecepta Imperatorum? Cui Emeritus sancto Spiritu inundatus: In domo
mea, inquit, egimus Dominicum.... Quoniam sine Dominico esse non
possumus.—_Id._ No. xlix. pp. 350, 351.
[522] Non quaero an Christianus sis sed an Collectam feceris.... Quasi
Christianus sine Dominico esse possit.—_Id._ No. li. p. 351.
[523] Collectam, inquit, religiosissime celebravimus; ad scripturas
Dominicas legendas in Dominicum convenimus semper.—_Id. Ib._ p. 351.
[524] Cum fratribus feci Collectam, Dominicum celebravi.—_Id._ No. lii.
p. 351.
[525] Post quem junior Felix, spem salutemque Christianorum Dominicum
esse proclamans.... Ego, inquit, devota menta celebravi Dominicum;
collectam cum fratribus feci, quia Christianus sum.—_Id._ liii.
[526] Utrum egeris Dominicum. Cui respondit Saturninus: Egi Dominicum,
quia Salvator est Christus.—_Id. Ib._ p. 352.
[527] Per Collectam namque, & Collectionem, & Dominicum, intellegit
semper auctor sacrificium Missæ.—_Baronius_, _Tome 3_, A. D. 303, No.
xxxix. p. 348.
[528] Scilicet lex Christiana de Dominico, nempe sacrificio
celebrando.—_Id._ No. xlvii. p. 350.
[529] De celebratione Dominici; Quod autem superius in recitatis actis
sit demonstratum, flagrantis persecutionis etiam tempore solicitos fuisse
Christianos celebrare Dominicum, nempe (ut alias pluribus declararimus)
ipsam sacrosanctum sacrificium incruentum.—_Id._ No. lxxxiii. p. 358.
[530] Quod etsi sciamus eamdem vocem pro Dei templo interdum accipi
solitam; tamen quod ecclesiæ omnes solo æquatæ fuissent; ex aliis
superius recitatis de celebratione Dominici, nonisi sacrificium missæ
posse intelligo, satis est declaratum.—_Id._ lxxxiv. p. 359.
[531] Collecta, Dominicum, Missa, idem, 303, xxxix. p. 677.
[532] Missa idem quod Collecta, sive Dominicum, 303, xxxix. p. 702.
[533] Dominicum celebrare idem quod Missas agere, 303, xxxix.; xlix.; li.
p. 684.
[534] Vol. xviii. p. 409.
[535] Verstegan’s Antiquities, p. 10, London, 1628.
[536] Antiquities, p. 68.
[537] Jewish Antiquities, book iii. chap. i. See also McClintock and
Strong’s Cyclopedia, 4, 472, article Idolatry; Dr. A. Clarke on Job
31:26; and Dr. Gill on the same; Webster under the word Sabianism, and
Worcester, under Sabian.
[538] Id. book iii. chap. iii.
[539] Vol. xviii. p. 409.
[540] Pp. 61, 62.
[541] 2 Kings 23:5; Jer. 43:13, margin.
[542] Dialogues on the Lord’s day, pp. 22, 23.
[543] Apology, chap. lxvii.; Testimony of the Fathers, pp. 34, 35.
[544] Apology, sect. 16; Testimony of the Fathers, pp. 64, 65.
[545] Ad Nationes, book i. chap. xiii.; Testimony of the Fathers, p. 70.
[546] Eccl. Hist., cent. 1, part ii. chap. iv. note ‡ to sect. 4.
[547] Eccl. Hist. cent. 2, part. ii. chap. i. sect. 12.
[548] History of the Sabbath, part ii. chap. i. sect. 12.
[549] Id. part ii. chap. iii. sect. 4.
[550] Hist. of the Sabbath, part ii. chap. i. sect. 10.
[551] Examination of the Six Texts, Supplement, pp. 6, 7.
[552] Du Pin’s Eccl. Hist. vol. i. p. 50.
[553] Hist. Church, cent. 2, chap. iii.
[554] Justin Martyr’s First Apology, translated by Wm. Reeves, p. 127,
sects. 87, 88, 89.
[555] The Spirit of Popery, pp. 44, 45.
[556] Ductor Dubitantium, part i. book ii. chap. ii. rule 6, sect. 45.
[557] Brown’s Translation, pp. 43, 44, 52, 59, 63, 64.
[558] Sabbath Manual, p. 121.
[559] Dialogue with Trypho, p. 65.
[560] Sabbath Manual, p. 114.
[561] Examination of the Six Texts, pp. 131, 132.
[562] Id. p. 128.
[563] Id. p. 130.
[564] See his full testimony in the Testimony of the Fathers, pp. 44-52.
[565] Against Heresies, book iv. chap. xvi. sects. 1, 2; Id. book v.
chap. xxviii. sect. 3.
[566] Id. book iv. chap. xvi. sects. 1, 2.
[567] Id. book v. chap. xxxiii. sect. 2.
[568] Against Heresies, book iv. chap. xv. sect. 1; chap. xiii. sect. 4.
[569] Bower’s History of the Popes, vol. i. pp. 18, 19; Rose’s Neander,
pp. 188-190; Dowling’s History of Romanism, book i. chap. ii. sect. 9.
[570] History of the Popes, vol. i. p. 18.
[571] History of Romanism, heading of page 32.
[572] History of the Popes, vol. i. p. 18.
[573] Id. pp. 18, 19; Giesler’s Eccl. Hist. vol. i. sect. 57.
[574] History of the Sabbath, part ii. chap. ii. sects. 4, 5.
[575] Boyle’s Historical View of the Council of Nice, p. 52, ed. 1842.
[576] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. ii. sect. 5.
[577] Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chap. xxvii.
[578] Id. chap. xxxviii.
[579] Tertullian’s Apology, sect. 16.
[580] Tertullian _Ad Nationes_, book i. chap. xiii.
[581] History of the Sabbath, part 2, chap. ii. sect. 3.
[582] Sermons on the Sacraments and Sabbath, p. 166.
[583] Neander, p. 186.
[584] Ancient Church History, part i. div. 2, A. D. 100-312, sect. 69.
[585] Enquiry into the Constitution of the Primitive Church, part ii.
chap. vii. sect. 11. See also Schaff’s “History of the Christian Church,”
vol. i. p. 373.
[586] Epistle of Barnabas, chap. xv.
[587] Justin Martyr’s First Apology, chap. lxvii.
[588] Lost Writings of Irenæus, Fragments 7 and 50.
[589] Book of the Laws of Countries.
[590] Tertullian’s Apology, sect. 16.
[591] On Idolatry, chap. xiv.
[592] Hist. Sab. part 2, chap. viii. sect. 13.
[593] On Prayer, chap. xxiii.
[594] De Corona, sect. 3.
[595] Ad Nationes, book i. chap. xiii.
[596] Canon 15.
[597] Ante-Nicene Library, vol. xiv. p. 322.
[598] Apostolical Constitutions, book ii. sect. 7, par. 59.
[599] Id. book v. sect. ii. par. 10.
[600] Id. book v. sect. iii. par. 20.
[601] Epistle to the Magnesians (longer form), chap. ix.
[602] Syriac Documents, p. 38.
[603] Epistle of Barnabas, chap. xv.
[604] Justin’s First Apology, chap. lxvii.
[605] Id. Ib.
[606] Dialogue with Trypho, chap. xxiv.
[607] Id. chap. xli.
[608] Clement’s Miscellanies, book v. chap. xiv.
[609] _De Corona_, sect. 4.
[610] _Origen’s Opera_, Tome ii. p. 158, Paris, A. D. 1733, “Quod si ex
Divinis Scripturis hoc constat, quod die Dominica Deus pluit manna de
cælo et in Sabbato non pluit, intelligant Judæi jam tunc prælatam esse
Dominicam nostram Judaico Sabbato.”
[611] Cyprian’s Epistle, No. lviii. sect. 4.
[612] Peter’s Canons, No. xv.
[613] Apostolical Constitutions, book vii. sect. ii. par. 23.
[614] Epistle to the Magnesians, chap. ix.
[615] Syriac Documents, p. 38.
[616] Id. Ib.
[617] Id. Ib.
[618] Id. Ib.
[619] Fragment 7.
[620] Tertullian on Prayer, chap. xxiii.
[621] _De Corona_, sect. 3.
[622] Origen against Celsus, book viii. chap. xxii.
[623] Instructions of Commodianus, sect. 75.
[624] Apostolical Constitutions, book v. sect. 3, par. 20.
[625] _De Corona_, sects. 3 and 4.
[626] Dialogue with Trypho, chap. x.
[627] Dialogue with Trypho, chap. xi.
[628] Id. chap. xii.
[629] Tertullian on Idolatry, chap. xiv.
[630] Id. Ib.
[631] Tertullian Against the Jews, chap. iv.
[632] Epistle of Barnabas, chap. xv.
[633] Dialogue with Trypho, chap. xii.
[634] Id. chap. xviii.
[635] See the third chapter of this History.
[636] Dialogue with Trypho, chap. xxiii.
[637] Id. chap. xxix.
[638] Id. chap. xi.
[639] Lost Writings of Irenæus, Fragment 7.
[640] Against Heresies, book iv. chap. viii. sect. 2.
[641] Id. book iv. chap. xvi. sect. 1.
[642] Irenæus against Heresies, book v. chap. xxxiii. sect. 2.
[643] Id. book. v. chap. xxviii. sect. 3.
[644] Ex. 31:17; Eze. 20:12, 20.
[645] Isa. 66:22, 23; Dan. 7:18, 27.
[646] Answer to the Jews, chap. ii.
[647] Tertullian against Marcion, book iv. chap. xii.
[648] Compare his works as follows: Answer to the Jews, chaps. ii. iii.
iv. vi.; Against Marcion, book i. chap. xx.; book v. chaps. iv. xix. with
De Anima, chap. xxxvii.; and, On Modesty, chap. v.
[649] Isa. 1:13, 14.
[650] Answer to the Jews, chap. iv.; Against Marcion, book iv. chap. xii.
[651] Isa. 56:2; 58:13.
[652] Answer to the Jews, chap. iv.; Against Marcion, book iv. chap. xii.
[653] Against Marcion, book ii. chap. xxi.
[654] Against Marcion, book iv. chap. xii.
[655] De Principiis, book iv. chap. i. sect. 17.
[656] Ex. 16:29; Lev. 23:3.
[657] Creation of the World, sect. 4.
[658] Id. sect. 5.
[659] Id. Ib.
[660] Creation of the World, sect. 5.
[661] Irenæus Against Heresies, book iv. chap. xv. sect. 1.
[662] Jer. 31:33; Rom. 7:21-25; 8:1-7.
[663] Irenæus Against Heresies, book iv. chap. xvi. sect. 4.
[664] Matt. chapters 5, 6, 7.
[665] Theophilus to Autolycus, book ii. chap. xxvii.
[666] Id. book iii. chap. ix.
[667] Id. Ib.
[668] _De Anima_, chap. xxxvii.
[669] On Modesty, chap. v.
[670] Recognitions of Clement, book iii. chap. lv.
[671] Novatian on the Jewish Meats, chap. iii.
[672] Apostolical Constitutions, book ii. sect. 4, par. 36.
[673] Id. book vi. sect. 4, par. 19.
[674] Epistle of Barnabas, chap. xv.
[675] Irenæus Against Heresies, book v. chap. xxxiii. sect. 2.
[676] _De Anima_, chap. xxxvii.
[677] Tertullian Against Marcion, book iv. chap. xii.
[678] Origen Against Celsus, book vi. chap. lxi.
[679] Novatian on the Jewish Meats, chap. iii.
[680] Divine Institutes of Lactantius, book vii. chap. xiv.
[681] Poem on Genesis, Lines 51-53.
[682] Apostolical Constitutions, book vii. sect. 2, par. 36.
[683] Tertullian Against Marcion, book iv. chap. xii.
[684] Id. Ib.
[685] Tertullian Against Marcion, book iv, chap. xii.
[686] Disputation with Manes, sect. 42.
[687] Dialogue with Trypho, chap. xlvii.
[688] Id. Ib.
[689] Clement’s Miscellanies, book vi. chap. xvi.
[690] Id. Ib.
[691] Compare Clement of Alexandria, vol. ii. pp. 386-890, Ante-Nicene
library edition, or the Miscellanies of Clement, book vi. chap. xvi. with
Bohn’s edition of Philo, vol. i. pp. 3, 4, 29, 30, 31, 32, 54, 55; vol.
iii. p. 159; vol. iv. p. 452.
[692] Bohn’s edition of Philo Judæus, vol. i. p. 4.
[693] Tertullian on Prayer, chap. xxiii.
[694] _Origen’s Opera_, Tome 2, p. 358, Paris, 1733, “Quæ est autem
festivitas Sabbati nisi illa dequa Apostolus dicit, ‘relinqueretur ergo
Sabbatismus,’ hoc est, Sabbati observatio, ‘populo Dei’? Relinquentes
ergo Judaicas Sabbati observationes, qualis debeat esse Christiano
Sabbati observatio, videamus. Die Sabbati nihil ex omnibus mundi actibus
oportet operari. Si ergo desinas ab omnibus sæcularibus operibus, et
nihil mundanum geras, sed spiritalibus operibus vaces, ad ecclesiam
convenias, lectionibus divinis et tractatibus aurem præbeas, et de
cœlestibus cogites, de futura spe sollicitudinem geras, venturum judicium
præ oculis habeas, non respicias ad præ sentia et visibilia, sed ad
invisibilia et futura, hæc est observatio Sabbati Christiani.”—_Origenis
in Numeras Homilia_ 23.
[695] Epistle to the Magnesians (longer form) chap. ix.
[696] Ancient Church, p. 212.
[697] Historical Commentaries, cent. 1. sect. 51.
[698] Apostolical Constitutions, book ii. sect. 4, par. 36.
[699] Id. Ib.
[700] Id. book vii. sect. 2, par. 23.
[701] Id. book vii. sect. 2, par. 36.
[702] Apostolical Constitutions, book ii, sec. 4, par. 36.
[703] Id. book viii. sect. 4, par. 33.
[704] Id. book vii. sect. 2, par. 36.
[705] Victorinus says, “Let the sixth day become a rigorous fast, lest we
should appear to observe any Sabbath with the Jews.”—_On the Creation of
the World_, sect. 4. And Constantine says, “It becomes us to have nothing
in common with the perfidious Jews.”— _Socrates’ Eccl. Hist._ book v.
chap. xxii.
[706] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, p. 189.
[707] Morality of the Fourth Commandment, p. 9, London, 1641.
[708] 1 Cor. 5:6-8.
[709] Eccl. Hist. vol. i. chap. ii. sect. 30.
[710] Eccl. Hist. book i. cent. 1, part ii. chap. iv. sect. 4. Dr.
Murdock’s translation is more accurate than that above by Maclaine.
He gives it thus: “Moreover, those congregations, which either lived
intermingled with Jews, or were composed in great measure of Jews, were
accustomed also to observe the _seventh day_ of the week, as a SACRED
day: for doing which, the other Christians taxed them with no wrong.”
[711] Id. margin.
[712] See chap. xiv. of this History.
[713] Ancient Christianity Exemplified, chap. xxvi. sect. 2.
[714] Anc. Christ. Exem. chap. xxvi. sect. 2.
[715] Id. Ib.
[716] Id. Ib.
[717] _Ductor Dubitantium_, part i. book ii. chap. ii. rule 6, sect. 51.
[718] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, p. 66.
[719] A Treatise of the Sabbath Day, containing a “Defense of the
Orthodoxal Doctrine of the Church of England against Sabbatarian
Novelty,” p. 8. It was written in 1635 at the command of the king in
reply to Brabourne, a minister of the established church, whose work,
entitled “A Defense of that most Ancient and Sacred Ordinance of God’s,
the Sabbath Day,” was dedicated to the king with a request that he would
restore the Bible Sabbath! See the preface to Dr. White’s Treatise.
[720] Dec. and Fall, chap. xv.
[721] See chap. x.
[722] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, p. 67.
[723] Treatise of the Sabbath Day, p. 8.
[724] Antiquities of the Christian Church, book xvi. chap. vi. sect. 2.
[725] Page 280. Cox here quotes the work, entitled “The Modern Sabbath
Examined.”
[726] Learned Treatise of the Sabbath, p. 77, Oxford, 1631.
[727] This edict is the original fountain of first-day authority, and
in many respects answers to the festival of Sunday, what the fourth
commandment is to the Sabbath of the Lord. The original of this edict may
be seen in the library of Harvard College, and is as follows:—
IMP. CONSTANT. A. ELPIDIO.
Omnes Judices, urbanæque plebes, et cunctarum artium officia
venerabili die solis quiescant. Ruri tamen positi agrorum
culturæ libere licenterque inserviant: quoniam frequenter
evenit, ut non aptius alio die frumenta sulcis, aut vineæ
scrobibus mandentur, ne occasione momenti pereat commoditas
coelesti provisione concessa. Dat. Nonis Mart. Crispo. 2 &
Constantino 2. Coss. 321. Corpus Juris Civilis Codicis lib. iii
tit. 12. 3.
[728] Encyc. Brit. art. Sunday, seventh edition, 1842.
[729] Encyc. Am. art. Sabbath.
[730] Eccl. Hist. cent. iv. part ii. chap. iv. sect. 5.
[731] Chap. xiv.
[732] Duct. Dubitant. part i. book ii. chap. ii. rule 6, sect. 59.
[733] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, p. 233.
[734] Examination of the Six Texts, p. 291.
[735] Cox’s Sabbath Laws, &c. pp. 280, 281. He quotes The Modern Sabbath
Examined.
[736] Hessey’s Bampton Lectures, p. 60.
[737] History of Christianity, book iii. chap. i.
[738] Id. book iii. chap. iv.
[739] These dates are worthy of marked attention. See Blair’s
Chronological Tables, p. 193, ed. 1856; Rosse’s Index of Dates, p. 830.
[740] _Imp. Constantinus A. Ad Maximum._ Si quid de Palatio Nostro, aut
ceteris operibus publicis, degustatum fulgore esse constiterit, retento
more veteris observantiae. Quid portendat, ob Haruspicibus requiratur,
et diligentissime scriptura collecta ad Nostram Scientiam referatur.
Ceteris etiam usurpandae huius consuetudinis licentia tribuenda: dummodo
sacrificiis domesticis abstineant, quae specialiter prohibita sunt. Eam
autem denunciationem adque interpretationem, quae de tactu Amphitheatri
scriba est, de qua ad Heraclianum Tribunum, et Magistrum Officiorum
scripseras, ad nos scias esse perlatum. Dat. xvi. Kal. Jan. Serdicae
Acc. viii. Id. Mart. Crispo ii. & Constantino ii. C. C. Coss. 821. Cod.
Theodos. xvi. 10, 1.—_Library of Harvard College._
[741] See Jortin’s Eccl. Hist. vol. i. sect. 31; Milman’s Hist.
Christianity, book iii. chap. i.
[742] See Webster; for an ancient record of the act, see Eze. xxi. 19-22.
[743] Historical Commentaries, cent. iv. sect. 7.
[744] Dec. and Fall of the Roman Empire, chap. xx.
[745] Marsh’s Eccl. Hist. period iii. chap. v.
[746] Dec. and Fall of the Roman Empire, chap. xviii.
[747] Sunday and the Mosaic Sabbath, p. 4, published by R. Groombridge &
Sons, London.
[748] See chap. xviii.
[749] Omnium vero dierum per septimanam appellationes (ut Solis, Lunae,
Martis, etc.), mutasse in ferias: ut Polydorus (li. 6, c. 5) indicat.
Mataphrastes vero, nomina dierum Hebraeis usitata retinuisse eum,
tradit; SOLIUS PRIMI DIEI APPELLATIONE MUTATA, QUEM DOMINICUM DIXIT.
Historia Ecclesiastica per M. Ludovicum Lucium, cent. iv. cap. x. pp.
739, 740, Ed. Basilea, 1624. _Library of Andover Theological Seminary._
The Ecclesiastical History of Lucius is simply the second edition of the
famous “Magdeburg Centuries,” which was published under his supervision.
[750] Quoted in Elliott’s Horæ Apocalypticæ, fifth edition, vol. iv. p.
603.
[751] McClintock and Strong’s Cyclopedia, vol. iv. p. 506.
[752] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. iii. sect. 12.
[753] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. iii. sect. 1.
[754] Id. Ib.
[755] Dec. and Fall, chap. xxviii.
[756] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. iii sect. 5.
[757] Eccl. Hist. book i. chap. iv.
[758] Eusebius’ Commentary on the Psalms, quoted in Cox’s Sabbath
Literature, vol. i. p. 361; also in Justin Edward’s Sabbath Manual, pp.
125-127.
[759] Id. Ib.
[760] Id. Ib.
[761] Eusebius’ Life of Constantine, 3, 33, quoted in Elliott’s Horæ
Apocalypticæ, vol. i. p. 256.
[762] Cox’s Sabbath Literature, vol. i. p. 361.
[763] Appendix to Gurney’s History, &c., of the Sabbath, pp. 115, 116.
[764] Sermons on the Sacraments and Sabbath, pp. 122, 123.
[765] Quod non oportet Christianos Judaizere et otiare in Sabbato, sed
operari in eodem die. Preferentes autem in veneratione Dominicum diem
si vacare voluerint, ut Christiani hoc faciat; quod si reperti fuerint
Judaizare Anathema sint a Christo.
[766] Dissertation on the Lord’s-day Sabbath, pp. 33, 34, 44. 1633.
[767] Sunday a Sabbath, p. 163. 1640.
[768] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, p. 188; Hessey’s Bampton Lectures, pp.
72, 304, 305.
[769] Tertullian’s De Corona, sections 3 and 4.
[770] Sabbath Laws, &c. p. 138.
[771] Sabbath Laws, &c. p. 138.
[772] Cyc. Bib. Lit. art. Lord’s Day; Heylyn’s Hist. Sab. part ii. chap.
ii. sect. 7.
[773] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. iii. sect. 9.
[774] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, p. 234; Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. iii.
sect. 7.
[775] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, pp. 236, 237.
[776] Treatise of the Sabbath, p. 219.
[777] Sabbath Laws, &c. p. 284.
[778] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. iv. sect. 8.
[779] Sabbath Manual, p. 123.
[780] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, p. 259.
[781] Id. p. 260.
[782] Socrates, book v. chap. xxii.
[783] Sozomen, book vii. chap. 19; Lardner, vol. iv. chap. lxxxv. p. 217.
[784] 2 Thess. 2.
[785] Dan. 7.
[786] Shimeall’s Bible Chronology, part ii. chap. ix. sect. 5, pp. 175,
176; Croly on the Apocalypse, pp. 167-173.
[787] Dan. 7:8, 24, 25; Rev. 13:1-5.
[788] Rev. 12.
[789] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. iv. sect. 1.
[790] Learned Treatise of the Sabbath, p. 73, ed. 1631.
[791] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. ii. sect. 12.
[792] Treatise of the Sabbath Day, p. 202.
[793] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. v. sect. 13.
[794] Id. part ii. chap. v. sect. 6.
[795] Treatise of the Sabbath Day, pp. 217, 218.
[796] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, pp. 263, 264.
[797] The Lord’s Day, p. 58.
[798] Dictionary of Chronology, p. 813, art. Sunday.
[799] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, p. 265.
[800] Id. pp. 265, 266; Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. iv. sect. 7.
[801] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, p. 68.
[802] Historical and Practical Discourse on the Lord’s Day, p. 174.
[803] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, p. 282.
[804] Fleury, Hist. Eccl. Tome viii. Livre xxxvi. sect. 22; Heylyn’s
Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. v. sect. 1. Dr. Twisse, however, asserts that
the pope speaks of two classes. He gives Gregory’s words as follows:
“Relation is made unto me that certain men of a perverse spirit, have
sowed among you some corrupt doctrines contrary to our holy faith; so
as to forbid any work to be done on the Sabbath day: these men we may
well call the preachers of Antichrist.... Another report was brought
unto me; and what was that? That some perverse persons preach among you,
that on the Lord’s day none should be washed. This is clearly another
point maintained by other persons, different from the former.”—_Morality
of the Fourth Commandment_, pp. 19, 20. If Dr. Twisse is right, the
Sabbath-keepers in Rome about the year 600 were not chargeable with the
Sunday observance above mentioned.
[805] The idea is suggested by the language of an anonymous first-day
writer of the seventeenth century, Irenæus Philalethes, in a work
entitled “_Sabbato-Dominica_,” pref. p. 11, London, 1643.
[806] Dialogues on the Lord’s Day, p. 267.
[807] Id. p. 283.
[808] Dialogues, &c. p. 268.
[809] Id. pp. 283, 284.
[810] Id. p. 268.
[811] Id. p. 284.
[812] Dialogues, &c. p. 269.
[813] Id. p. 270.
[814] Id. p. 271.
[815] Dialogues, &c. p. 271; Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. v. sect. 7.
[816] Dialogues, &c. p. 272.
[817] Dialogue, &c. p. 261.
[818] Ex. 20:8-11; Deut. 33:2.
[819] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. v. sect. 7; Morer, p. 272.
[820] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. v. sect. 7; Morer, p. 272.
[821] Dialogues, &c. pp. 261, 262.
[822] Id. pp. 284, 285.
[823] Dialogues, &c. p. 274.
[824] Id. p. 285.
[825] Id. p. 286.
[826] Id. Ib.
[827] Id. pp. 286, 287.
[828] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. v. sect. 2.
[829] Dialogues, &c. p. 274.
[830] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. v. sect. 2.
[831] Dialogues, &c. p. 68.
[832] Binius, vol. iii. p. 1285, ed. 1606.
[833] Hist. Sab. part ii. chap. v. sect. 13.
[834] Morer, p. 288; Heylyn, part 2. chap. vii. sect. 6.
[835] Roger de Hoveden’s Annals, Bohn’s ed. vol. ii. p. 487.
[836] Id. Ib.
[837] Hoveden, vol. ii. pp. 526-528.
[838] See Matthew Paris’s Historia Major, pp. 200, 201, ed. 1640; Binius’
Councils, ad ann. 1201, vol. iii. pp. 1448, 1449; Wilkins’ Concilia
Magnæ Britaniæ et Hibernæ, vol. i. pp. 510, 511, London, 1737; Sir David
Dalrymple’s Historical Memorials, pp. 7, 8, ed. 1769; Heylyn’s History
of the Sabbath, part ii. chap. vii. sect. 5; Morer’s Lord’s Day, pp.
288-290; Hessey’s Sunday pp. 90, 321; Gilfillan’s Sabbath, p. 399.
[839] Maclaine’s Mosheim, cent. xiii. part ii. chap. i. sect. 5.
[840] Murdock’s Mosheim, cent. xiii. part ii. chap. i. sect. 5, note 19.
[841] Matthew Paris’s Historia Major, p. 201. His words are: “Cum autem
Patriarcha et clerus omnis Terræ sanctæ, hunc epistolæ tenorem diligenter
examinassent; communi omnium deliberatione decretum est, ut epistola
ad judicium Romani Pontificis transmitteretur; quatenus, quicquid ipse
agendum decrevit, placæt universis. Cumque tandem epistola ad domini
Papæ notitiam pervenisset, continuo prædicatores ordinavit; qui per
diversas mundi partes profecti, prædicaverunt ubique epistolæ tenerem;
Domino cooperante et sermonem eorum confirmante, sequentibus signis.
Inter quos Abbos de Flai nomine Eustachius, vir religiosus et literali
scientia eruditis, regnum Angliæ aggressus: multis ibidem miraculis
corruscavit.”—_Library of Harvard College._
[842] History of the Popes, vol. ii. p. 535.
[843] M’Clintock and Strong’s Cyclopedia, vol. iv. p. 590.
[844] Id. vol. iv. p. 592.
[845] See page 274 of this work.
[846] Hoveden, vol. ii. p. 528.
[847] Hoveden, vol. ii. p. 528.
[848] Id. p. 529.
[849] Hoveden, vol. ii. pp. 529, 530.
[850] Id. Ib.
[851] Dialogues, &c. p. 290.
[852] Gilfillan’s Sabbath, p. 399.
[853] Binius’s Councils, vol. iii. pp. 1448, 1449; Heylyn, part ii. chap.
vii. sect. 7.
[854] Heylyn, part ii. chap. vii. sect. 7.
[855] Dialogues, &c. pp. 290, 291.
[856] Id. p. 291.
[857] Id. p. 275.
[858] Id. Ib.
[859] Id. pp. 293, 294.
[860] Id. p. 279.
[861] Isa. 29:13; Matt. 15:9.
[862] Morer, p. 280.
[863] Id. pp. 281, 282.
[864] Mr. Croly says: “With the title of ‘Universal Bishop,’ the power of
the papacy, and the Dark Ages, alike began.”—_Croly on the Apocalypse_,
p. 173.
[865] M’Clintock and Strong’s Cyclopedia, vol. iv. p. 591.
[866] History of the Baptist Denomination, p. 50, ed. 1849.
[867] Dan. 8:12.
[868] Ps. 119:142, 151.
[869] See chap. xx. of this work.
[870] M’Clintock and Strong’s Cyclopedia, vol. ii. pp. 600, 601;
D’Aubigné’s History of the Reformation, book xvii.
[871] M’Clintock and Strong’s Cyclopedia, vol. ii. p. 601.
[872] Id. Ib.
[873] Id. Ib.
[874] Butler’s Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and principal Saints,
article, St. Columba, A. D. 597.
[875] The Monks of the West, vol. ii. p. 104.
[876] Gilfillan’s Sabbath, p. 389.
[877] Id. pp. 32, 33.
[878] Waddington’s History of the Church, part iv. chap. xviii.
[879] Jones’s History of the Church, vol. ii. chap. v. sect. 1.
[880] Jortin’s Eccl. Hist. vol. ii. sect. 38.
[881] Edward’s Hist. of Redemption, period iii. part iv. sect. 2.
[882] Hist. Bapt. Denom. p. 33.
[883] Id. p. 31.
[884] Variations of Popery, p. 52.
[885] Eccl. Hist. of the Ancient Churches of Piedmont, p. 167.
[886] History of the English Baptists, vol. i. pref. p. 35.
[887] Mr. Jones, in his “Church History,” vol. i. chap. iii., note at the
end of the chapter, explains this charge as follows: “But this calumny
is easily accounted for. The advocates of popery, to support their
usurpations and innovations in the kingdom of Christ, were driven to the
Old Testament for authority, adducing the kingdom of David for their
example. And when their adversaries rebutted the argument, insisting that
the parallel did not hold, for that the kingdom of Christ, which is not
of this world, is a very different state of things from the kingdom of
David, their opponents accused them of giving up the divine authority of
the Old Testament.”
[888] Eccl. Hist. Ancient Churches of Piedmont, pp. 231, 236, 237.
[889] Id. pp. 175-177.
[890] Id. p. 209.
[891] Hist. Church, chap. v. sect. 1.
[892] Gen. Hist. Bapt. Denom. vol. ii. p. 413, ed. 1813.
[893] Ecclesiastical Researches, chap. x. pp. 303, 304.
[894] Jones’s Hist. Church, vol. ii. chap. v. sect. 1.
[895] General Hist. Baptist Denom. vol. ii. p. 413.
[896] Circumcisi forsan illi fuerint, qui aliis Insabbatati, non quod
circumciderentur, inquit Calvinista [Goldastus] sed quod in Sabbato
judaizarent.—_Eccl. Researches_, chap. x. p. 303.
[897] Thomas’ Dictionary of Biography and Mythology, article Goldast.
[898] D’Aubigné’s Reformation in the time of Calvin, vol. iii. p. 456.
[899] Nec quod in Sabbato colendo Judaizarent, ut MULTI PUTABANT, sed a
zapata.—_Eccl. Researches_, chap. x. p. 304; _Usher’s De Christianar.
Eccl. success. et stat._ cap. 7.
[900] Jones’s Church History, vol. ii. chap. v. sect. 2.
[901] Reformation in the time of Calvin, vol. iii. p. 249.
[902] Id. pp. 250, 251.
[903] Reformation in the time of Calvin, vol. i. p. 349; D’Aubigné cites
as his authority, “_Histoire des Protestants de Picardie_” by L. Rossier,
p. 2.
[904] Jones’s Church History, vol. ii. chap. v. sect. 4.
[905] History of the Vaudois by Bresse, p. 126.
[906] Benedict’s Hist. Bapt. p. 41.
[907] Hist. Church, chap. iv. sect. 3.
[908] Eccl. Hist. of the Ancient Churches of Piedmont, pp. 168,
169, Boston, Pub. Lib. The author, Rev. Peter Allix, D. D., was a
French Protestant, born in 1641, and was distinguished for piety and
erudition.—_Lempriere’s Universal Biography._
[909] Id. p. 170.
[910] Horæ Apocalypticæ, vol. ii. p. 291.
[911] Eccl. Researches, chap. x. pp. 305, 306.
[912] Horæ Apocalypticæ, vol. ii. p. 342.
[913] Eccl. Hist. cent. xii. part ii. chap. v. sect. 14.
[914] General Hist. Bapt. Denom. vol. ii. p. 414, ed. 1813.
[915] Acts and Decrees of the Synod of Diamper, p. 158, London 1694.
[916] Eccl. Hist. of the Ancient Churches of Piedmont, p. 224.
[917] Id. p. 225.
[918] Hist. of the Church, chap. iv. sect. 3.
[919] Treatise of the Sabbath day, p. 8.
[920] Eccl. Hist. of the Ancient Churches of Piedmont, p. 162.
[921] History of the Sabbath, part ii. chap. v. sect. 1.
[922] Bower says of Gregory: “He was a man of most extraordinary
parts, of an unbounded ambition, of a haughty and imperious temper,
of resolution and courage incapable of yielding to the greatest
difficulties, _perfectly acquainted with the state of the western
churches_, as well as with the different interests of the Christian
princes.”—_History of the Popes_, vol. ii. p. 378.
[923] History of the Popes, vol. ii. p. 358.
[924] Theological Dict. art. Anabaptists.
[925] Hist. Church, vol. i. pp. 183, 184.
[926] Treatise of the Sabbath day, p. 132. He cites Hist. Anabapt. lib.
6, p. 153.
[927] The Rise, Spring, and Foundation of the Anabaptists or Rebaptized
of our Times. By Guy de Brez, A. D. 1565.
[928] Acts 8:26-40.
[929] M’Clintock and Strong’s Cyclopædia, vol. i. p. 40.
[930] Dec. and Fall, chap. xlvii.
[931] Maxson’s Hist. Sab. p. 33, ed. 1844.
[932] Church Hist. of Ethiopia, p. 31.
[933] Id. p. 96; Gibbon, chap. xv. note 25; chap. xlvii. note 160.
M’Clintock and Strong’s Cyclopedia, vol. i. p. 40.
[934] Church Hist. Ethiopia, pp. 34, 35; Purchas’s Pilgrimage, book ii.
chap. v.
[935] Ch. Hist. Eth. pp. 87, 88.
[936] Id. Ib.