Review of Objections to the Seventhday
Sabbath
J. N. Andrews
WE have ever doubted the right of any man, or body of men, to make a purely
human assertion the basis of an argument for changing the word of Jehovah. We
remain of the same opinion. Every "thus saith the Lord" is rock-bottom; and every
doctrine which rests on such a foundation must stand. But that argument which is
based on the assertion of men, has at best a very precarious foundation,
however strongly it may be stated.
OBJECTIONS
1. THE definite day - the seventh - is of the nature of a positive institute,
capable of change, while the observance of a day of rest, and worship and
commemoration, is moral and eternal.
2. The object to be obtained, of rest etc., can be as well carried out by the first
day, now observed, as by the seventh; being after six days of labor, and no
difference but in the number and name. It is more convenient and can only be
changed for Saturday with great difficulty.
3. The first day observance by Christ and the apostles, and John's calling it
the Lord's day, gave it sacredness, and caused its observance among the
primitive Christians, from the first century, and first writers that we have after the
apostles. D. I. R.
ANSWERS
1. In the first objection, the writer asserts that the fourth commandment of the
moral law is capable of
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being changed. In the second, he asserts that the commandment, when thus
changed, would answer the divine purpose as perfectly as though it had not been
altered. The third objection contains the writer's proof that the commandment has
actually been changed. Let us candidly consider the first objection.
Whether this objection is just or not, none will deny that it rests wholly on the
assertion of men. The writer - as many others have done - has here separated
the fourth commandment into what he is pleased to call its moral and its positive
parts. The requirement to keep a day is moral, and therefore eternal. But that
part of the commandment which tells us what day it is that God would have us
keep, is positive and therefore changeable. In other words, this argument may be
thus stated: That part of the fourth commandment which designates the seventh
day as the Sabbath has passed away and left only words enough in force, to
require that some day be kept.
We now ask for the commission by which men have been authorized to cut in
twain the fourth commandment. As the Scriptures do not furnish it, the answer
must be that reason authorizes this act. Reason, then, is sufficient to prepare for
destruction that part of the commandment which requires the observance of the
hallowed Rest-day of the Creator. Let us try the same engine upon the remainder
of the commandment, as follows:-
The duty to rest is no doubt a moral duty, and of an unchangeable character,
but the requirement to devote a day to this "is of the nature of a positive institute
capable of change" so as to require a part of each day, instead of the observance
of any entire day!
If this same mode of reasoning does not as effectually destroy the remaining
portion of the fourth commandment, as it does that part which it was aimed
against, we certainly fail to see the difference. Indeed it shows that the one part
of the commandment
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is equally as changeable and positive as the other. So that if it is sufficient to
prepare a part of the commandment for destruction, it is of equal value to those
who would destroy the remainder. When did God ever authorize men to take his
commandments to pieces in such a manner? Is not this the very course which
the Romish church has taken with the second and the tenth? Nay did not the
Protestant church borrow this very argument from the church of Rome? Here are
the words of the "mother church" on this point:
"As far as the commandment obliges us to set aside some part of our time for
the worship and service of our Creator, it is an unalterable and unchangeable
precept of the eternal law, in which the church cannot dispense; but forasmuch
as it prescribes the seventh day in particular for this purpose, it is no more than a
ceremonial precept of the old law, which obligeth not Christians. And therefore,
instead of the seventh day, and other festivals appointed by the old law, the
church has prescribed the Sundays and holy days to be set apart for God's
worship; and these we are now obliged to keep in consequence of God's
commandment, instead of the ancient Sabbath. Catholic Christian Instructed,
page 204.
From what has been said, two important facts are made plain: 1. That this
argument was invented by the church of Rome to justify the change of the
Sabbath. 2. That if this argument be just, it proves conclusively that no part of the
fourth commandment is moral, unless it be the requirement to rest.
This argument first cuts off from the commandment, the requirement to keep
the seventh day, because that is positive and susceptible of change to another
day; and it cuts off the duty of keeping any day, as such a requisition is also
positive, and susceptible of being changed so as to require the observance of a
part of each day. We think the fourth commandmen
