Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!caen!news.cs.indiana.edu!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: davidbu@loowit.wr.tek.com (David E. Buxton) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: Sabbath change and History Message-ID: Date: 4 Jun 91 02:51:39 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Lines: 156 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu While the earliest authentic observance of Sunday can be traced no earlier than 140 AD, the bishops of Rome claim their Papal lineage back all the way to Peter. The earliest claims for these bishops are rather benign and then on through history more and more powers are acclaimed to these Bishops/Pope. And so it is with Sunday. Not until many years later is any sacredness attributed to Sunday. Here is what the earliest of writters had to say about Sunday: None of them claimed any divine authority for their observance of Sun- day. Nothing said about a change, or that it was the new Sabbath. Rather it was a weekly festival to be observed quite independent of the Sabbath question. There was no early connotation of sinning if work was performed on Sun- day. Primarily the idea of spending some time in worship on that day. Generally simply an assembly - for Bible reading, Lord's Supper cele- bration, collecting money. To be a day of rejoicing, while the Sabbath was increasingly inflicted with rules about fasting and somber solemnity. The knew was not to be bent in prayer on that day - standing prayers. [I believe he means "knee" --clh] Many of the early Fathers can be quoted both ways - Tertullian, for example: Insists that Sabbath keeping started at creation and elsewhere insists the patriarchs did not keep it. He claims that Christ broke the Sabbath and elsewhere proves that Jesus did not break the Sabbath. He states that the law was abolished and elsewhere teaches its eternal nature and authority. He insists that Christ abrogated the Sabbath and elsewhere that "Christ did not rescind the Sabbath . . . . an additional sanctity". Tertul- lian also states that Christ "furnished to this day [Sabbath] divine safeguards, -- a course which his adversary [Satan] would have pursued for some other days, to avoid honoring the Creator's Sabbath This last statement is remarkable and makes clear that what ever was going on relative to Sunday in Tertullian's day was not seen to be of divine ordi- nation, rather an admission that Jesus' adversary is the one pursuing some other day. "Kitto's Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature" states that Tertullian in 200AD, is the first writer to attaches the meaning of Christ's resurrection to "Lord's Day". "We, however, only on the Lord's day of the resurrection ought to guard, not only againts kneeling, but every posture and office of soli- citude; deferring even our business, lest we give any place to the devil. Similarly, too, in the period of Pentecost; which period we des- tinguish by the same solemnity of exultation." (Tertullian on Prayer, "Testimony of the Fathers", p. 67) Another quote from Tertullian: "As often as the anniversary comes round, we make offerings for the dead as birth-day honors. We count fasting or kneeling in worship on the Lord's day to be unlawful. We rejoice in the same privilege also from Easter to Whitsunday [Pentecost]. We feel pained should any wine or bread, even though our own, be cast upon the ground. At every for- ward step and movement, at every going in and out, when we put on our clothes and shoes, when we bathe, when we sit at table, when we light the lamps, on couch, on seat, in all the ordinary actions of daily life, we trace upon the forhead the sign [of the cross]. "If for these and other such rules, you insist upon having positive Scripture injunction, you will find none. Tradition will be held forth to you as the originator of them, custom as their strengthener, and faith as their observer. That reason will support tradition, and cus- tom, and faith, you will either yourself perceive, or learn from some one who has. (De Corona, "Testimony of the Fathers, pp. 68,69) Baptist -- William Owen Carver, "The Lord's Day In Our Day, p. 49: There was never any formal or authoritative change from the Jewish seventh-day Sabbath to the Christian first-day observance." Baptist -- Dr. Edward. T. Hiscox, author of "The Baptist Manual", in a paper read before the New York minister's conference held Nov. 13, 1893: "Of course, I quite well know that Sunday did come into use in early Christian history as a religious day, as we learn from the Christian Fathers and other sources. But what a pity that it comes branded with the mark of paganism, and christened with the name of the sun god, when adopted and sanctioned by the papal apostasy, and bequeathed as a sacred legacy to Protestantism!" Congregationalist -- Dr. Lyman Abbott, "Christian Union", Jan 19, 1882 "The current notion that Christ and His apostles authoritatively sub- stituted the first day for the seventh, is absolutel without any authority in the New Testament." Episcopal -- Sir William Domville, "Examination Of The Six Texts, P. 6,7: "Not any ecclesiastical writer of the first three centuries attributed the origin of Sunday observance either to Christ or to His apostles." Episcopal -- Issac Williams, D.D., "Plain Sermons On The Cathechism, Vol 1, pp. 334-336: "Where are we told in Scripture that we are to keep the first day at all? We are commanded to keep the seventh; but we are nowhere commanded to keep the first day . . . . The reason why we keep the first day of the week holy instead of the seventh is for the same reason that we observe many other things, not because the Bible, but because the church has enjoined it." Episcopal -- Phillip Carrington, "Toronto Daily Star", Oct 26, 1949: "The Bible commandment says on the seventh day thou shalt rest. That is Saturday. Nowhere in the Bible is it laid down that worship should be done on Sunday." Martin Luther, "Spiritual Antichirst", pp. 71,72: "I wonder exceedingly how it came to be imputed to me that I should reject the law of the Ten Commandments . . . . Whosoever abrogates the law must of necessity abrogate sin also." Lutherin - "Augsburg Confession Of Faith": "The observation of the Lord's day is founded not on any command of God. But on the authority of the church." Moody Bible Institute -- D. L. Moody, "Weighted and Wanting", p. 47: "The Sabbath was binding in Eden and it has been in force ever since. This fourth commandment begins with the word "Remember," showing that the Sabbath already existed when God wrote the law on the tables of stone at Sinai. How can men claim that this one commandment has been done away with when they will admit that the other nine are still bind- ing?" Noorman C. Deck, "Moody Bible Institute Monthly", Nov 1936, p. 138: "We have abundant evidence both in the New Testament and in the early history of the church to prove that gradually Sunday came to be observed instead of the Jewish Sabbath, apart from any specific com- mandment." Presbyterian -- T.C. Blake, D.D., "Theology Condensed", p. 474, 475: The Sabbath is a part of the decalogue -- the Ten Commandments. This alone forever settles the question as to the perpetuity of the institu- tion repealed, the Sabbath will stand . . . . The teaching of Christ confirms the perpetuity of the Sabbath." Dave (David E. Buxton)