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BV 110 .G7 1884
Gray, George Seaman, 1835-
1885.
Eight studies of the Lord's^
With the Compliments of
€l)e ^Dutl^or.
•■ <v^ >;..;,:;,;
EIGHT STUDIES
THE LORD'S DAY
CAMBRIDGE
PRINTED FOR PRIVATE DISTRIBUTION
Copyriglit, 1884,
By nOUGUTON, MIFFLIN & CO.
PEEFACE.
No one who reads the " Barapton Lectures " of Dr.
Hessey can fail to appreciate alike his candor and his
devout spirit. And no one can escape the conviction
that if Dr. Hessey is right, the Lord's Day cannot stand
as an observance obligatory on Christians. In respect
to its authority he himself places it on a level with the
ordinance of ConjBrmation ; in respect of the character
of its celebration, with Christmas Day. Yet he himself
pleads for a peculiar observance of Sunday, to be en-
forced by the civil power, as well as a peculiar observ-
ance to be paid by believers. It cannot be that Dr. Hes-
sey is either wholly right or wholly wrong. Sunday is
manifestly not in every sense the Jewish Sabbath, nor in
every sense its successor. That the two are in some way
related, is proved by the relation of both to the contin-
uous week, by the continuous use of the Decalogue in the
public services of the Christian Church, and by the in-
eradical confidence of believers in the underlying unity
and consistency of the whole course of God's redemptive
dispensation.
In these Studies an attempt is made to present what
has seemed to the writer, with growing clearness through
many years, the just grouping of the facts. The first
IV PREFA CE.
principle on which these Studies are based is this : The
conduct of Christians must be guided solely by the Word
of God, intelligently examined, not merely as to isolated
passages long or short, but also as to its teaching as a
continuous developing and integral revelation. For this
purpose the book must be taken as it stands, and as it
has been always held by the Church, excepting, of course,
such emendations of its text or translation as general
Christian scholarship approves. For the cobweb criticism
of those who are incessantly spinning out of their own
fancies ever-varying theories of its composition and au-
thorship, accordant only in the denial of that which rests
at the foundation of faith, no regard is given in these
pages. Of the persons whom Caiaphas summoned to
testify against our Lord, it is written that their witness
agreed not together. So far the professors of the so-
called " higher criticism " are in the same category. No
arguments presented here would affect them, nor would
any others that could be framed, unless these were so
smuggled into the recesses of their imaginings as to seem
to their inner sight their own.
These Studies are addressed to believers of ordinary
intelligence and education. If the statements made rest
upon Scripture, they may certify themselves thereof. If
not, let the book go at once to the limbo of vanities.
Very little reference is made to other authorities, and
such authorities as are quoted are for the most part easy
of access. In no case is their testimony essential to the
argument pursued.
The writer is not wholly ignorant of, and not at all
indifferent to, the results of scholarship, research, and
PREFACE. V
discovery, in our own day. The illustrations of Scripture
which they furnish are happily becoming, almost as fast
as they are obtained, the common property of educated
Christians. But the Christian heart rests only on "the
law and the testimony." To them we appeal.
The second principle on which these Studies are based
in this. Christian consciousness, through the ages, has
been at heart always right. It has not been able at
once to analyze and define that which it has always felt.
The act of definition requires a perception of that which
is to be contrasted with the truth, or at least distinguished
from it. First, Antichrist must appear, then the Lord
will return. In this little book an effort is made to de-
fine and distinguish that which believei'S all feel. So
far as this book wins the acceptance of believers who
patiently and devoutly study the Scripture to learn the
meaning of the Lord's Day, it will be successful.
Probably some errors and inadvertencies may remain
undiscovered. Many points of interest and importance
have been passed over, or barely glanced at, for the sake
of brevity. Some of these may have been undeservedly
omitted. It is not unlikely that some statements are
deficient in clearness, or even in perfect accuracy, al-
though this has been the writer's special aim. If with
all their faults these Studies serve to direct and stimulate
Christian thought to appreciate both the divine and the
human side of the day of loyalty to Christ, and so his
name be honored, it is enough. Perhaps some other pen
may be moved more clearly and accurately to present the
truth, and then the writer will be satisfied though his
book should be forgotten.
CONTENTS.
STUDY I.
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY,
PAGE
Its names distinguished 2
The Church has not yet adequately expressed her thought
about the Lord's Day . . . . . . . . 2
General conditions for learning any particular path o£ duty . 2
The Lord's Day is, L, an institution . . . . . 4
The Lord's Day is, IL, a festival 9
The Lord's Day is, III., an observance associated with loyalty
to God 13
The Lord's Day compared w;th other observed da,ys in two
classes 14
Loyalty in first class involves citizenship — birthright —
heartiness 14
Special appeal in second class 15
The Lord's Day belongs to first class, hence is associated with
loyalty .......... 15
Loyalty further defined : subordination ; unchangeableness ;
spontaniety 16
Loyalty characteristic of Lord's Day ; essential reason for
public worship ........ . 16
Is public worship decreasing ? Effects of decrease or increase 26
Tendency to magnify loyalty to Christ as compared with dif-
ferences among Christians . . . . . . . 27
Recent evidences of confraternization . . . . . 27
Unity of the Church manifested in assemblies of the Lord's
Day 27
STUDY IL
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD's DAY.
The observance traced back to the Apostolic Age . . 30
General assembly for worship of Christ invariably feature of
the day 31
Definition or analysis of worship 33
Till
CONTENTS.
Festival character of the day equally ancient .
Acceptance of the name Sunday ....
Three premises : silence of Scripture ; inspired guidance of
Church ; explanation of Scripture
Peculiarity of the Lord's Day ; weekly, not annual
Significance of phrase " Lord's Day " as applied to first day
of the ■week .......
Significance of phrase "Lord's Day" as occurring once only
in Scripture
Impression of our Lord's living manhood by his appearances
Impression of our Lord's divinity by his non-appearances
Some reasons for brevity in inspired narratives
'* First day of the week " only note given of the time of the
resurrection .
Six days' interval between Resurrection Day and first day of
next week ........
The first evening interview with the disciples
The walk to Emmaus ......
The Lord's departure ; his majesty ; his abstention
The Lord's reappearance on the next Lord's Day .
Succeeding Sundays, and other appearances of the Lord
Paraphrase of the Pauline list of appearances
Assertions : The Lord's manifestations on 1st days probable ;
and 2, not inconsistent with any Scripture ; 3. Nothing
ever weakened the association of his presence with the day
Pentecost
Early converts; transient sojourners ; peculiar life of city
Paul's injunction to the Church at Corinth
Paul's Sunday at Troas .
Summary of the evidence from Scripture notices .
33
33
33
34
34
34
37
38
39
39
40
40
41
44-46
47
47
48
48
50
51
52
53
54
STUDY IIL
THE WEEK.
The Lord's Day has been continued by the influence of the
Holy Spirit, not by command . . . . . . 56
The Lord's Day connected with past history by the statement
that it is first of the iceek 57
1. The week is the invariable and unbroken succession of
days in sevens ......... 58
*^ George Smith's Assyrian Calendar .... 58
Nundines 59
No other time period invariable 69
CONTENTS. IX
2. The week is an arbitrary period ; meaning of arbitrary as
here used ......... 62
Hy])Othesis of a lunar origin of the week . . . 62
Hypothesis tested 63
Outline of argument 63
3. The -week a sacred period; meaning defined; argument
outlined 66
Historical argument ....... 66
A. The week used only by communities worshiping God 6 7
B. The week has a divine warrant . . . . . 69
C. The week has its origin and model in the example of
God himself 70
t- The week is a thought of God, not an invention of man 71
4. The week is maintained by the maintenance of its sacred
day 71
Conditions involved in its maintenance .... 72
•--Result of an obliteration of the religious character of
Sunday ......... 72
Possibility of a substitute ...... 73
Obliteration of all days of the week probable ... 73
Meaning of Scriptural emphasis on the week ... 75
The bond between God and man 76
STUDY IV.
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY.
History of sacred day has three parts. Its characteristics in
first and last ages are the essential ones
Compare Genesis with the New Testament
Five days mentioned in Noah's history as boundaries of
weeks ...........
Months in the Noachian story ; the date of the ark's grounding
A. Lunar months are a natural calendar
Requisites for any other calendar
B. Lunar months, Mosaic and Hebrew calendar
C. Lunar months explain the Noachian story
Assumed calendar of the ark ....
Sacred days in this calendar ....
The saci'ed days not Sabbaths in Jewish or Mosaic sense
The sattred days marked so as to be recognized
The sacred days marked by sacrifice ....
The sacred days factors in the idea of sacrifice
78
78
79
80
87
88
93
93
95
95
95
95
95
96
CONTENTS.
The sacred days, meaning of the silence of Scripture on this
point
The sacred day marked by re^citations of Scripture
The sacred day reproduced provisionally .
Why should men have kept such a day ?
Significance of the primeval sacred day .
97
97
99
100
100
STUDY V.
THE MOSAIC SABBATH.
Design of Mosaic laws to be studied rather than execution
Results of Israel's non-conformity .....
Why was this law not earlier introduced? Nation; race; ter
ritory
Three premises : (1.) Thoughts of God to be studied in this
legislation itself ........
(2.) As adapted to Canaan only ....
(3.) And to agricultural people
Mosaic system dual ; sacrifice ; sacred times .
Koot of all in the promise ......
Blessing was to come through sinful nation
Its end and means
Sabbath contrasted with sacrifice
Sabbath contrasted with primeval sacred day as to rest
Sabbath, token of national coherence ; national self-con
sciousness .........
Sabbath designated as the sign of national loyalty .
Sabbath rest compared with its employments
The agricultural village
"The stranger's observation of its Sabbath
Abuse of the Sabbath; due observance free and uncompelled
The Convocation
Essential sabbatic rest as related to the Convocation
Convocation in the wilderness .....
Convocation in the wilderness had traditionary effect
The Levites : (1.) Theologians
(2.) Not priests
(3.) Administrators
(4.) Pastors
(5.) Dependant
The Levites at the village Convocation ....
The instruction of children ......
The ideal village Sabbath
103
103
104
105
106
106
106
107
107
107
108
109
111
112
112
113
114
116
116
117
117
118
119
119
121
122
122
122
123
124
CONTENTS. XI
STUDY VI.
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL.
The promise twofold ; development of atonement and of loyalty 126
The Mosaic dispensation a trust ; routine disciplinary to pre-
pare for spontaneity 127
The weekly Sabbath alone insufficient for preparatory disci-
pline required 127
Members of the sabbatic system ; distinctions . . . 127
Members of the sabbatic system ; similarities . . .128
Effect of the system on agricultural villages . . . .132
I. Indefinite enlargement of their idea of the Sabbath . 132
II. Two contrasted administrations of society . . 135
III. Readjustment of social conditions .... 138
Readjustment according to law and record; birth-
right and divine patent ..... 139
IV. Removal of indignities 140
Removal of ancient slavery 141
V. Divine Providence : 1st. Prerogative; 2d. Benevo-
lence 142
A. Arrest of tillage 144
B. Non-accumulation of land . . . . 1 45
C. Universal sharing ...... 145
VI. National brotherhood; pursuits of sabbatic years . 146
Travel for trade, craft- work, or study . . . 147
Farmers in the larger cities 147
VII. Incompleteness and inadequacy of the system . . 149
Later Jewish Sabbath distinguished from the Mosaic 150
Meaning of text lost by disregarding illustrations . 151
Sabbatic ideas should have become perfectly famil-
iar 152
Sabbatic ideas when thoroughly familiar, then sensi-
bly incomplete 153
Riddles of Providence to be solved only by Christ . 154
Sacrificial system equally incomplete and inadequate 154
Prophecies of the consummation by the Coming One 155
STUDY vn.
THE PERMANEKT AXD THE TRANSIENT IN THE SABBATIC
SYSTEM.
Influences designed to impress its preparative and transient
nature 156
xii CONTENTS.
Consummation as yet unconceived ; hence threefold riddle . 158
I. Territorial riddle ; Sabbath pervasive in principle
but limited to territory 158
II. Administrative riddle ; inconsistent elements in reg-
ulations . . . . . . . .161
Evils tolerated for sake of educational contrast must
at some time be eliminated . . . . .163
III. Riddle of sacred times ; development of the idea of
sacredness ........ 165
Original familiarity with God to be unlearned; Cain;
the face of God . 166
Prominence of sacrifice after the flood. Intermission
of sacrifice in Egypt . . . . . .168
Riddle duplicate ; embracing week succession and
week plan . . . . . . . .170
Inconsistency in week succession at spring and fall
festivals explainable 171
Inconsistency in week plan ; preliminary ; quality of
number 172
System of sevens novel. Emi:)hasis in its progression
and symmetry . . . . . . .172
Sabbaths of Unleavened Bread and Tabernacles . 1 73
Pentecost compared Avith the other festivals ; its lib-
erty 183
Its reckoning (note) 183
Its enactment arbitrary; not anniversary of the
law; significance in future . . . .183
Its title; finished series of Sabbaths; greater
Sabbath succeeding 184
Jubilee ; most prominent observance ; repeats teach-
ing of Pentecost 184
Conditions of problem illustrated by industry of blossom and
fruit culture 190
Key to riddles in the Abrahamic promise . . . . 192
Indication of permanent and transient features in sabbatic
system . . . . . . . . . .193
The INlosaic Sabbath, wherein Mosaic necessarily transient . 193
A. It was not universally extensible . . . .195
Inseparable from system, except by Messiah. Sepa-
rate pharisaic Sabbath . . . . . .195
Physical obstacle to extension of Mosaic Sabbath . 198
B. It was not a positive, unalloyed blessing . . .201
CONTENTS.
Xlll
(a.) In verbal form ordinances were only restrictive .
Restrictions incongruous with development of
modern society .....
Negative and positive blessing compared
(b.) In practical operation the ordinances were com
pulsory
Freedom necessary for unalloyed blessedness
(c.) Mosaic Sabbath did not refer to the Seed who
blesses .......
The resurrection
201
202
203
204
204
206
206
STUDY VIII.
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT.
One living thought of God underlying both old and new cov-
enants
Illustration from tree life
Vital thoughts perpetuated from sabbatic rest ; system ; sep-
aration from sacrifice ........
Ancient preparation and prophecy for change from seventh to
first day : —
(«.) Emphasis on seventh day ....
(b.) Limited series of seventh days
(c.) After closed series, greater Sabbath on first day
(c?.) Perspective in the system ....
(e.) Practical experience of brotherhood
(/.) Practical experience of routine drill and training
(7.) Practical experience of expression of loyalty .
(h.) Practical experience of birthright
The vital principle underlying possible union of man to God
stated by God himself without human mediation
The Decalogue unique as to
I. External circumstances
II. Explicitness .....
III. Universal comprehensibility
IV. Treatment
V. Its title, covenant, and testimony
Names mutually explanatory
(Ritual law on account of transgression)
VI. Its correspondence with promise
Church has conformed to Scripture in using Decalogue in her
public services
. 220
222
. 223
. 224
. 225
. 226
. 227
230
207
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
213
216
216
218
231
XIV
CONTENTS.
Under superintendence of the Holy Spirit, Fourth Command-
ment necessarily applied to the Lord's Day
Covenant and testimony endure under Christian dispensation
Meaning of words " seventh day," before, under, and after
the sabbatic system
Meaning of words " not any work " ; two Mosaic interpreta-
tions
Meaning of suspension of bread-winner's efforts in both
(1.) No trace of the strict observance of the patriarchal age
(2.) Mosaic weekly Sabbath national
(3.) No considerable part of Church ever attempted
rigidity ........
(4.) Purpose of Mosaic stringency; uniformity; univer
sality .
(5.) " Not any work " an end or a means to an end
(6.) The Convocation " holy " ....
Essence of the command " keep it holy"; meaning illustrated
by original sentiment; exercises; typical significance
Harmony in this of Old and New Testaments
The Church " keeps holy " her Sabbath more fully and more
accurately than Israel could his ....
A. As institution
(a.) Testimony
Political acknowledgment of the Lord
(J.) Promise and expectation
B. Festival ; perfect removal of curse
Sociality ; instruction ; ease
All holy activity
C. Observance ; personal waiting on the Lord together
and apprehending Him ....
Sacrament of loyalty .....
Duty of public testimony ....
Imperial experience of care for vast interests of the
Church . ......
Communion with the Lord
The Lord's Supper
231
240
226
227
231
232
232
232
232
229
229
229
231
231
232
232
232
234
235
237
237
238
238
240
241
241
242
EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
ERRATA.
Page 10, line 16. Insert comma after " come."
" 14, " 15. For " all of " read " of all."
« 15, " 5. For " of " read " or."
" 24, " 14. For " any that " read " any think that."
" 24, " 16. Omit " the " before " moral."
« 25, « 22. For " little " read " tittle."
" 26, " 9. For "call " read "called."
" 37, " 23. For " of " read " on the."
" 45, " 33. For " not dependent" read " nor dependent."
" 46, " 18. For " Convention " read " Convocation."
« 72, " 25. For "to" read "by."
" 72, " 33. For " These " read " Three."
" 73, " 10. For " pregnant " read " frequent."
" 83, note. For " first. The " read " first, the."
" 85, line 28. For " barleys " read " barley."
" 105, note. For " Pharoah " read " Pharaoh."
" 106, line 3. Insert " to " before " its."
" 118, " 4. For " cloak " read " cloud."
" 150, " 12. For " imposition " read " interposition. "
" 170, " 24. For " Hahirath " read " Hahiroth."
" 185, " 5. For " it " read " yet."
" 236, " 13.
" 236, " 1 7. {- For " Israel " read " Israel's."
" 237, " 5.
XIV CONTENTS.
Under superintendence of the Holy Spirit, Fourth Command-
ment necessarily applied to the Lord's Day . . .231
Covenant and testimony endure under Christian dispensation 2-10
Meaning of words " seventh day," before, under, and after
the sabbatic system 226
Meaning of words " not any work " ; two Mosaic interpreta-
tions 227
Meaning of suspension of bread-winner's efforts in both . 231
(1.) No trace of the strict observance of the patriarchal age 232
EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
STUDY I.
THE PBCEXOMEXA OF THE DAY.
"But Christ is all and iu all." — Col. iii. 11.
What is the first day of the week ? How is it distin-
guished from other days ? How can the fundamental
conceptions of it, which actually exist in all minds, be
defined ? These are three forms of one question. In
order to obtain a correct answer, the limitation of the
question must be carefully observed. It does not refer to
what ought to be. It does not touch upon doctrine or
duty. It admits no argument on morals, hygiene, social
economics, political progress, or religion. Neither does it
refer to causes. It implies no investigation of historic
or any other reasons why. It refers to the visible atti-
tude of society, to the habitual conduct of individuals,
to the energy of common ideas manifested by common
impulses. Nothing whatever in the realm of nature marks
the day. Its phenomena are human altogether. Men's
actions answer to their ideas. Therefore the phenomena
of human conduct seen on a large scale must answer to
the underlying ideas which on a large scale dominate the
human mind. Therefore the most prevalent ideas, the
most fundamental conceptions of this day, must be mani-
fested by phenomena of such magnitude as to be appar-
1
,^, / J^IGIIT^ STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
enfc to 411, wliatevei' their religious or non-religious stand-
point. In fine, the qrtestion in hand is one of observed
fact. The correctness of the answers given may be
tested by any one competent to analyze the conduct of
the people at large, so as to note the particulars in
which it is accordant.
The first day of the week has three names. Sunday is
its legal name. The legitimacy of this name does not,
however, rest upon any statute. The names of the days
are not prescribed by law. The law merely presumes
their existence, and, by its uniform phraseology, sanctions
them. Sunday may therefore be called the " proper "
English name of this day. It is known to all, and it has
legal warrant. But the present age pays little regard
to the appropriate meaning of proper names, and never
thinks of associating this one with the sun. Christians
use it as well as those indifferent or averse to Christian
faith. It is precisely like the names of the other six
days, wholly secular, unknown to the Scriptures, un-
tinged by any religious sentiment.
The day is also known as the Sabbath, but this name
is by no means so often used. Whether in strict propri-
ety it ought to be used is debatable.^ But in fact it is
extensively used and perfectly understood. Being de-
rived from the Bible, it has evident religious associations.
It carries with it, now at least, two suggestions ; one of
duty to God, one of intermitted labor. Hence it is used
almost or quite exclusively by those who have some
knowledge of the Scriptures and of Christianity, and
^ '* Sabbath " is not popularly used to distinguish the sacred day
of Israelites from that of Christians. Whenever the Israelite Sab-
bath is intended, something in the context is needed to make that
appear. Unless in some way a reference to Israel is manifested, it
■will inevitably be understood that the name Sabbath is intended to
represent the first day of the week.
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 3
some interest in^tbe controversies over the clay's employ-
ments.
The Lord's Day is a third name, essentially Christian.
It comes from the New Testament. It is very seldom
used by any who are not believers on the Lord Jesus
Christ. Even they do not use it constantly or very
frequently. Yet it is well-known both to literature and
to common speech. But being the rarest of the three
names, its occurrence is usually emphatic. The speaker
or writer is understood as intending to imply some re-
lation between this day and the claim of Christians for
the supremacy of their Lord.
If in any company one should mention Sunday, the
use of that name would afford no hint whatever of the
person's rehgious position. A devout believer, or a scof-
fer, or an indifferent, or one as nearly as possible ignorant
of religion, might use it, each with equal readiness. But
not so if one said Sabbath. This word would necessarily
suggest that the speaker, whether a friend or foe to Chris-
tian faith, was not ignorant of it, nor indifferent to it.
He would almost certainly have in mind some thought
of a connection between this day and the belief in divine
revelation and divine authority over man. If, however,
one spoke of the Lord's Day, all would suppose that
he who uttered this name was a believer. Indeed the
natural inference would be that all were believers. For
even a believer would not be apt to use this name ex-
cept in addressing those of similar faith.
The coexistence of these three diverse names, and the
peculiarity of their use, corresponds with the coexistence
and peculiar distinctiveness of three classes who have to
do with the day. Those who use the third name use
both the others also. Those who use the second use also
the first, which is used by all. So the third class of those
whose conduct in relation to this day is now to be studied
4 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
is included in the otlier two, and the second in the first.
All are unicentric with lessening circles. The first class
includes the whole community, whatever may be their
religious or non-religious character. All call the day
Sunday, whether they think of it by any other name or
not. The second class includes only those who may very
broadly be called the religious part of the community :
those who in some sense acknowledge the God of the
Bible. Among these the name Sabbath is not infre-
quently used, and is sometimes bandied. The third class
includes only personal adherents to the Lord Jesus Christ,
w'ho alone are likely to say the Lord's Day. In each
of these classes may be noticed habitual and spontaneous
action in relation to this da3^ Their conduct presents,
it may be said, constant phenomena, which plainly ex-
press three underlying conceptions or ideas, severally
dominating these three classes, and together defining the
day. These three conceptions or ideas may be repre-
sented by the terms Institution, Festival, Observance.
I.
The first day of the week is an Listitution.^ This
conception underlies the conduct of the whole commu-
nity. For present purposes the word may be defined as a
centre or mode of activity, whose outward manifestation
is apparent and recognizable ; whose permanence is in-
dependent of local caprice, or of the volition of any indi-
^ An Institution is properly something instituted or set in action
by consent of human society ; as distinguished from an arrangement
of nature, and from the act of an individual : something having an
outward form or modality, in some way visible, tangible, definable;
as distinguished from an idea, and also from a custom : something
endowed with energy of its own, and exercising some certain recog-
nizable influence ; as distinguished from a condition or set of circum-
stances, and from a memorial or achievement or record.
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 5
vidual ; whose relations affect both the community as a
wliole and its members ; in brief, as a fact possessing the
three attributes of publicity, fixedness, and influence.
That which is now to be studied is not an institution of
the Church or of Christianity, but of organized society, as
it is found to-day in our own and other lands. To some
men a certain day may be more significant and more im-
pressive than to others. The question answered by the
word institution is this : to all among us, to each and
every one of every character, occupation, or faith, what
is the first day of the week ? To verify this answer ac-
cording to the definition of Institution already given, it
is asserted that all know the day ; that all yield, in some
respects, to it ; and that all feel, in some respects, its in-
fluence.
Seven days are known to the whole community by
their names. The week, as a recurring period, is also
known to all. The common meaning of this word is the
time from the beginning of one Sunday to the beginning
of the next, though it may be figuratively applied to any
period composed of seven equal times. Sunday makes
the ordinary week, not Monday or Thursday or any
other day. Saturday might also make the week, but in
our day, and with all but a small fraction of our popula-
tion, it is as insignificant in this respect as Thursday or
Monday. Whatever may be the reason for counting time
by weeks, or for taking Sunday as the point at which this
peculiar period always begins, the fact is familiar to all.
A fact thus recorded in the vocabulary of all classes
could not be a transient circumstance or a novelty. It is
in truth a legacy to us from an indefinite past. It has
come to us and it goes on with us just as regularly as
the months and years. No individual can divert or stop
its current. Yet its persistence is not absolute. Unlike
the arrangements of nature, any institution having begun
6 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
by human action may conceivably be ended by the same.
It is therefore possible that, by oblitei'ation of human re-
gard, the week might cease to be. But the changes in-
volved would be radical and sweeping in the extreme.
Even if it should have ceased, the influence of history
and literature (not to mention religion) would so strongly
favor it, that to reestablish might be easier than to sub-
vert it.
Meanwhile this first day of the week lies athwart every
man's path, and, whatever he may wish or intend, he is
compelled to adjust his steps to the social fact, or to re-
move beyond all social intercourse. All the members of
the community separately'-, and the community as an or-
ganized whole, are somehow impelled to act so as if it
were not for the influence of this institution they need
not act. One takes a weekly vacation, perhaps springs
to pleasure-seeking. Another reaps a weekly harvest of
pleasure-seekers' cash. Another engages in religious ex-
ercises. One expresses love for a weekly token of his
heavenly Father's grace. Another asserts hatred for this
weekly device of a faith whose suj)remacy he disowns.
One considers the Sunday an occasion for pecuniary,
another for physical, a third for spiritual, profit. The
motives of which men are conscious may be as diverse
as their Sunday conduct, but all agree in assuming and
taking it for granted that Sunday is like no other day.
It cannot, for example, be confounded with a social oc-
casion like New Year's Day, or with a public one like
Independence Day, or with any Saint's day, or with a
church day like Christmas. It is not, like these, an an-
niversary. It occurs fifty times more frequently, and this
makes an enormous difference. Some thought of it must
so often be entertained. Its approach must so often be
taken into reckoning with ordinary affairs. And every-
where, some things are done on this day and not on others,
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 1
or are not done on this day as on others. Be it custom,
be it law, be it religious feeling or anti-religious feeling,
or be it aught else, something specializes this day.
For everywhere in Christendom the law takes cogni-
zance of this day as an institution affecting the organ-
ized community. Not only does the law assume by its
phraseology that the institution exists and will continue,
but it also requires, permits, or forbids on this day things
not required, permitted, or forbidden on other days. In
different countries its provisions, of course, vary.i But
■whatever it provides, — whether that courts may not
sit, whether that legislatures 'and similar bodies may
not meet, whether that public offices must be wholly
or partly closed, whether that banks, exchanges, or other
institutions acting under authority or charter of law may
not do their ordinary business with the public, whether
that contracts may not be consummated, whether that
payments and executions may not be enforced, whether
that the exaction of any kind of common labor is for-
bidden, or whatever else may be the effect of the stat-
utes, — all such regulations testify, that in the eye of
the hiAv, — that is, of the organic mind of the state, —
this institution has a peculiar relation to the community
as an organic whole.
In another way many governments place themselves
in peculiar relations to Sunda^^ since they appropriate
1 In France, where there is perhaps the least Sunday legislation,
a law of the First Empire, now in force, requires that public offices,
the Bourse, etc., shall be closed on Sundays, and that no notary may
act officially. A note given on Sunday is good. Payment, however,
cannot be demanded on Sunday. The law of 1814 (the first Bourbon
restoration) which enjoined the closing of shops, and, during mass
hours, of restaurants, and which interdicted common labor,' — after
lying dormant many years, — was repealed in 1880. The present
law applies also to Easter, Pentecost, Ascension, Assumption, and
All- Saints' Day, and to July 14.
8 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
it to special state uses. Sometimes by regal or imperial
ceremonials ; sometimes by reviews ; sometimes by open-
ing reserved galleries, parks, or museums ; sometimes by
grand displays, as of the fountains at Versailles ; some-
times by holding elections or conscriptions, — the heads
of society show that they find in this day an institution
peculiarly available for official exhibitions of majesty,
because peculiarly related both to the state and its
citizens.
It is true that at some places in Christendom (so-called)
general trade seems to* go on, workshops are busy, and
even banks and exchanges open their doors. It may be
true that a Bourse somewhere may appoint Saturday as
a weekly day of closing. But it is not true that in any
such place there is no perceptible difference between
Sundays and other days. It is not true that in Paris,
Vienna, Hamburg, or Rome, the populace do not dis-
tinguish the day. Commercial reports are not the same
as on other days. The pomp of sovereignty is different.
There is a discrimination as to many details of person
and household. And there is the unfailing office of wor-
ship before the eyes of all. Whatever may be the dis-
position of individuals, tlie whole community know as a
fact that on this day occurs the regular normal service.
And besides this, here and there, before all eyes, even in
places like those mentioned, some shops are closed, some
business is suspended, some toil is dropped, in order that
honor may be paid to the Christian's Lord.
But if the Sunday be a holiday, — if it be a popular
recreation, valued for personal or social enjoyment, — if
the avenues of travel are regularly thronged, — if the
places of amusement expect a weekly freshet, — all this
is possible onl}" because this day is an institution, famil-
iar, fixed in popular regard, and influencing all to distin-
guish it from other days.
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 9
II.
The first day of tlie week is a festival. This word
may be defined as an occasion for sociaUty, privilege,
and encouragement. This conception interprets the con-
duct of that part of the community which may be called
its religious class, comprising all who by themselves, or
by others, are considered in any sense Christians. For
many practical purposes this class is dealt with as a
whole. Its influence and votes and money, for instance,
are sought and given as the influence, votes, and money
of persons who, whether church members or pew-holders,
or neither, and with infinite diversity or contrariety of
ecclesiastical prepossession, avow their interest in Chris-
tianity as the stay of morals. The conduct in regard to
Sunday, wherein all of this class agree, evinces the ideas
which rule them.
The most noticeable feature of the day, in its general
religious aspect, is assemblage. Wherever any degree
of religious sentiment exists people are wont to gather.
Their gatherings, moreover, much more than on other
occasions, are apt to contain whole families. Father,
mother, and children here, as seldom elsewhere in public,
are seen together. Seldom, indeed, elsewhere are all
ages, from the most venerable to the youngest, so inter-
spersed in open concourse. Rarely, also, does any other
company resemble an ordinary Sunday congregation in
the variety of its constituents. Certain sorts of persons
are, indeed, conspicuously absent. But such sorts do not
command the respect of the public or of themselves.
Every station, every occupation, every social or political
or industrial interest, which is undeniably reputable, is
here usually represented. And whatever portion of the
better elements of society may attend, the worst elements
plainly eliminate themselves.
10 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
But apart from tlie clay's public assemblies, its inher-
ent sociality is peculiarly distinctive. On no other day
do husbands and wives, parents and children, and all of
the household, see so much of each otlier ; or do neigh-
bors remain through its hours so near each other ; or do
friends whose very profoundest convictions and hopes are
alike act so evidently in sympathy therein with each
other. Solitariness and isolation are out of harmony with
the general aspect of the day. So far as it has any de-
gree of religious regard, it is the most potent influence
known for promoting the mutual acquaintance of all
classes, from highest to humblest, from oldest to young-
est, from the close circle of home to the widest of human
sympathy, only excluding such as by totally excluding
themselves from assemblages to which some from all
other classes come confess their class disrepute.
The opportunity for its characteristic sociality is secured
by the day's privilege, or intermission of ordinary obliga-
tions and restrictions. The privilege is partly maintained
by law, but very largely by custom. The law provides
for those who would enjoy the day a certain amount of
protection from exaction, and even from the pressure of
comjietition. No man can legally compel another to per-
form common labor, to transact any kind of ordinary busi-
ness, or to discharge the obligation of any contract. No
man can legally gain any advantage over another by pur-
suing his usual avocations while the other pauses. Cus-
tom among the religious class, and wherever religious
influence is strong, maintains the law in active exercise ;
sometimes, however, extending and sometimes contract-
ing its scope. The necessities and exigencies of the com-
munity, which are distinctly beyond the intent of the
law, are measured chiefly by local custom. Even the
service required by these supposed necessities and exigen-
cies is, in theory, rendered out of a benevolent regard for
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 11
public wants, and, in practice, is almost wholly voluntary.
The employ<^s of city street railways, and many others,
are usually kept, on the plea of public convenience, with-
out a Sunday respite ; but it is doubtful whether pecun-
iary loss or disadvantage ever falls upon any of them who,
on religious grounds, abstain from work on that day.
For the religious class in the largest sense, the " must"
of business is on this day transformed into the "may"
of enjoyment. Sociality is free. If there be an inward
impulse or conviction of duty, there is no tangible con-
straint, even to church-going. The practice has no direct
effect on material interests. Neither profit nor loss of
that kind hinges on it. Most of the commingling of
other days is stimulated by desire for a livelihood, or for
social advantage. But the encounters of this day have
no relation to bread-winning or to local aspirations. On
other days the atmosphere is as full of urgenc}'^ as on this
day of leisure and calm. The day does not bring wor-
ries, but rather affords a breathing space from their
harassing pursuit. Whatever may be the history or my-
thology of a Puritan Sabbath, neither compulsion nor
harshness is a featui-e of the existing institution. It is
resonant with invitation, it is affluent with ease. The
eagerness of other days is quieted. Relief from fatigue
and exertion is afforded. Absolute cessation of all ordi-
nary emplo^nnents would imply a constraint rather than
a privilege, and, in fact, does not anywhere exist. The
fact which does exist is a conviction that ordinary pur-
suits and efforts may be suspended on this day without
detriment. Whether as the effect of law, or of custom,
or of religious sentiment, evidently the day is regarded
as privileged.
The natural result of social intercourse enjoyed under
such privilege, by persons of good morals, would be re-
freshment, recuperation, renewed energy at the resump-
12 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
tion of regular occupations. But the day brings a more
positive experience. Among those who in the widest
sense may be called Christian, it paints before every eye,
it chants in every ear, it suggests to every heart, in an-
swer to its deepest longing, remedy for the sum of all
curses, deliverance from the sum of all pains, hope trium-
phant, illimitable, life beyond inevitable death. In other
festivals, contemplation of the darker side of life is usu-
ally avoided. Their enjoyment consists very much in
such avoidance. Contact with sorrow, vice, and igno-
rance tarnishes the gloss of their festivity, and tends to
destroy their coherence. But on Sundays, sorrow, vice,
and ignorance are dealt with in such a ssniy that the joy
and profit of the day are not marred, but increased. In-
stead of forgetting, for the time, life's evils, the general
Christian public, w^io as much as any class must and do
meet them, expect to find, on this day, influences that
help toward patience, toward righteousness, toward an
understanding of themselves, their surroundings, and.
their goal. Pride is said to be softened, sympathy to be
evoked, resolution to be strengthened. Both intellect
and emotion are exercised. The attention is directed
toward ultimate truth, or the search for it. The result
is a certain harmonious uplifting of the whole personal-
ity, a certain access of clear-sighted, high-hearted encour-
agement.
So far, then, as this institution practically affects the
relifjious class, it not only has the character of a festival,
but is also peculiarly exempt from incongruities. Other
festivals are more or less defective. Sometimes their fel-
lowship is not altogether natural or harmonious. Gen-
erally they are in danger of collapse if certain elements
liable to appear are not carefully prevented. Frequently
their cost is a sensible drain on purse, or thought, or vigor.
Too often their anticipated profit proves unsatisfactory.
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 13
Amusement, as such, certainly lias a real value, but it
does not endow with nerve for life's struggles. A share
in viewing triumphs of genius or special displays of splen-
dor or power may thrill and animate, but there is usually
a bill directly or indirectly to be paid afterward, and if
slowly, then the more heavily. Mutual endeavor, whether
in industrial pursuits, or in behalf of public interests, or
in the solemn ordeal of war, weaves strong and lasting
ties, whose occasional renewal is full of pleasure. But
even these ties are not like those of nature or like those
created by a common religious feeling. It can hardly be
doubted that they would pall and weary and become at
last repulsive, if celebrated on a purely social basis every
week. The sociality of the Christian Sabbath, on the
contrary, is developed naturally, out of the unities of
blood and neighborhood and fundamental correspondence
of soul. Its privilege is not hampered by the necessity
of earning, or the contingency of losing, or the enticement
of social ambition. Its encouragement not only refreshes
the vigorous and experienced, but also animates sufferers,
stimulates the feeble, emboldens the apprehensive, directs
the uncertain, helps to meet every contingency of the
present mixed life, and fortifies tenants of dissoluble bod-
ies for their entrance into the incorporeal state. What
institution known to human experience so perfectly ex-
emplifies an ideal festival ?
III.
The first day of the week is an observance. By
this word is meant (in this paper) an occasion observed
in order to express obligation. This conception of the
day explains that peculiar conduct wherein those coin-
cide who profess themselves adherents, not merely to
Christianity in some general form, but personally, to the
14 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
Christ whom the}^ call their Lord. The idea is embodied
in the name Lord's Day, which they sometimes use. This
name and conception belong to them alone. But the
phenomena or manifest facts of their constant and unan-
imous action are apparent to all. Indeed, they present
perhaps the most noticeable and the most special char-
acteristic of the day.
The general facts of their conduct may be thus stated.
Personal adherents to the Lord, believers, as they are
wont to call themselves, whatever their ecclesiastical ties,
and whatever their views about other uses of the day,
agree as to public worship on the Lord's Day. In such
worship, despite all varieties of doctrine or ritual, the
Lord Jesus Christ is uniformly honored and invoked as
the Divine Head and Lord of the Church and all of her
members. To Him as Head and Lord profession is al-
ways made of entire and absolute subjection and depen-
dence, of complete identification in purpose and hope.
There is no limit to the gratitude, devotion, aspiration,
and confidence expressed.
The essential element in this fact may be brought into
distinctness by a comparison of the Lord's Day with cer-
tain other days, whose observance also expresses some de-
gree of obligation. These may be grouped in two classes.
One class may be called civic or national observances, be-
cause they are celebrated by citizens in view of their
rights, privileges, and duties as such, and in relation to
some event which serves as a focus for all lines of national
or political thought. In this class are birthdays or coro-
nation days of reigning sovereigns, our own Independence
Day, and the like. In celebrating such occasions, citizens
acknowledge an obligation to their government and to
the person or persons in whom it is vested. They also
bring to mind the potency and honor of the civic body of
which they are members, and through which they, as its
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 15
members, are united to its chief. Moreover, tliey profess
that both obligation and membership are willingly and
gladly experienced, with no limitation to their extent and
supremacy. Most of all, very often they emphasize a
circumstance which, without their own ability of volition,
has made them citizens, and clothed them not only with
the citizen's legal relations, but with the citizen's senti-
ment, patriotism. It is their birthright. The substan-
tial fact implied by all these actions is loyalty.
The other class of observances may be described as
days of special appeal. Characteristically they are either
petitions or thanks for benefits. Such are our Thanks-
giving Day, certain public fast days, most saints' days,
and the like. These occasions usually commemorate
no particular event, or if any, then one regarded as a
good whose enjoyment may be prolonged, or as an evil
whose harmfulness may be abated. Personal advantage,
whether obtained or desired, inspires the celebration.
Sometimes the favor of the person honored or worshiped
is invoked. Sometimes his general benevolence is ac-
knowledged. Sometimes it is felt that his influence has
been specifically useful during a season past. Gratitude is
honorable. Self interest is not necessarily ignoble. These
observances, whether inspired by pure gratitude, by self-
interest, or by mixed motives, may be proper and useful,
but it will not be denied that in dignity and influence
they are lower than the others. At any rate, they are
contingent. They are celebrated because from time to
time circumstances warrant them. The others depend
on permanent facts. Loyalty rests on the citizen's birth
relation to his native land.
The Lord's Day evidently corresponds with the first of
these classes rather than the second. It is not a day spe-
cially designated as a thanksgiving to the Almighty for
the benefits of the six days past ; nor a day for specially
16 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
propitiating his displeasure and invoking his good-will.
So far as these things are proper on Sunday, they are
proper on every other day. In no respect are they empha-
sized by the return itself of the day. No class or com-
munity of Christians is known to have devoted Sunday
to the acknowledgment or solicitation of direct advan-
tages from God's providence. Observance of this da}' is
nowhere associated in men's minds with good harvests,
prosperous voyages, successful industrial enterprise, or
victorious campaigns, past or future. Thanks may be
given for such things or their bestowment asked on this
day or on any other. Nowhere is it the peculiar and
characteristic feature of the day's exercises to deal with
them. Any reference to them has a subordinate place
unless in some emergency.
On the other hand, like citizens in a national or civic
celebration. Christian believers, on the Lord's Day, in
their assemblies, both acknowledge before each other
their individual obligation to the Person who is the su-
preme Head of their body, and magnify the interests of
that body, which in its full extent they call his king-
dom. By all the circumstances of their assembl}', and
by all the expressions of thought and feeling associated
with it, testimony is given that the obligation is acknowl-
edged by all, voluntarily, heartily, gladly, and without
reserve or limit. Yet it is equally avowed that their
bond to their Lord and to his kingdom is a permanent
one, not maintained by their volition merely, but fas-
tened in some way upon their natures. As citizens of
political states are clothed with legal relations and en-
dued with civic feeling through the circumstances of their
birth, so citizens of the Lord's kingdom say that they
are clothed with moral (legal and something beside legal)
relations and inspired with Christian (something more
than civic) loyalty through what they call their new
birth.
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 17
Moreover, as these civic celebrations commemorate
some event of great importance to the state or to its
chief, and especially an event which has inaugnratecl
some grand civil epoch, or the life or reign of tlie ruler,
so the Lord's Day commemorates an event which is the
accredited inauguration, both of an epoch in the Chris-
tian commonwealth's history and of the super-mortal life
and reign of its Lord. He who had been known pre-
viously as a man, and one of the humblest rank, on this
day, as reported, assumed a state independent of any
earthly circumstance, and above any known condition of
humanity, announcing for Himself his accession to " all
power in heaven and in earth," and manifested or " de-
clared to be the Son of God with power." According
to Christian records, some glimpses only of a higher
nature had been vaguely noticed hitherto by a very few,
but on this day, through the whole that had been known
of Him to human perception, burst and shone the splen-
dor of eternal living light. According to Christian hope
and faith, an inconceivably glorious reorganization of
human society under his supremacy, to be constituted of
those who, like Him, after death shall have resumed cor-
poreal life free from all known corporeal contingencies, is
now preparing, by the development of that uniting, con-
trolling, inspiring principle, the vital force of his king-
dom, loyalty.
Loyalty is on different sides an obligation, a disposi-
tion, and an emotion. Its definition in each of these
aspects so far defines the actual observance of the Lord's
Day b}'- loyal believers, as their conduct and practice is
manifest to all.
A. The obligation of loyalty may be defined in respect
of the persons whom it unites, as the duty of subordina-
tion. In a strict sense it does not exist between equals.
It is the proper sentiment of one who owes toward the
2
18 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LOnD'S DAY.
person entitled to receive, of one subject to autbority
toward the person vested with authorit}^, of the indi-
vidual toward the body of which he is a member, of
the citizen toward his government. When the word is
tropically used concerning equals, it implies that the
loyal person feels bound to subordinate personal interests
to the interests of another. Thus either a husband or
wife is said to be loyal to the other, when no personal
indulgence, no desire of separate advantage, no default
of effort and cai'e, is suffered to mar the honor and com-
fort and success of the other. Loyalty and self-sacrifice,
if not synonymous, are certainly homogeneous terms.
Loyalty and self-seeking are certainly incongruous. L03'-
alty essentially exalts and prefers another, and subordi-
nates self to that other's benefit.
The obligation, in respect of its extent, must be de-
fined as the duty of unlimited subordination. If there
be a point in the line of sacrifice (wrong-doing of course
out of question) beyond which loyalty will not go, it is
not loyalty. If there be a point of time at which it
expects to cease, it is not loyalty. A mercenary soldier
hired by a foreigner may be loyal, in the tropical sense,
to his contract. But can his service be compared with
that of the man who offers his own blood for his own
father-land ? In the case of husband or wife or friend,
how can that be called loyalty which contemplates a de-
nial of wedlock or friendship ? Loyalty may be abused
and destroyed by the person toward whom it has been
entertained. A man ready to die for his king might be
compelled by honor and duty to foi'sake a recreant and
unworthy king. He might still be loyal to some One
higher. But the moment he intended desertion, loyalty
to that king would be dead. For loyalty may die, some-
times, without dishonor, but it cannot be limited while
living. Loyal meuj have abandoned property, turned
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 19
away from home, sacrificed every material comfort,
bealtb, limb, and life, at their country's call, and loyal
men, if need be, will do the same again. For loyalty
gives up all, measuring only the exigency which calls
upon it.
B. The disposition or quality of loyalty may be de-
fined by contrast to its opposite, disloyalty. The word
"traitor" seems to be charged with the detestation of
mankind. The obloquy of it besmears even the man's
good traits and meritorious actions. Benedict Arnold
did some effective service for his country, and endured
hardship therein, but his subsequent treason blackened
the whole record of his life. The lack of loyalty is dis-
honorable. The reverse of loyalty is detestable. There-
fore loyalty itself must be counted of the highest worth
and honor. There is an evident reason for this high
estimation. The traitor offends not against a single per-
son, or a few only, but against eveiy one. Whether
by his disloyal inaction or by his disloyal activity, he
so far imperils all, the persons of his countrymen, all
their property, and all that they hold precious. If a
crime against one person, though threatening only mod-
erate injury, deserves punishment by the community,
what is the desert of a crime threatening the greatest
loss and 'suffering against every member of that com-
munity ? For disloyalty aids the foe to military con-
quest. Full conquest involves absolute subjection to the
will of the conqueror, which is slavery. And although
the spirit of the age will not allow the logic of war to
be carried to its conclusion, the brand remains on the
traitor.
It is, therefore, presumed of every citizen that he is
loyal. It is also presumed that his loyalty has existed as
long as his life. For the disposition of loyalty relates to
all that has enveloped the citizen from his birth, summed
20 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
up in native land and native language. Land and tongue,
though not himself, are yet inseparable from himself.
His relation to them is like the ties of blood, — invol-
untary, unchangeable. As the child grows, the associa-
tions and interests of land and language grow x\y>o\\ him,
as plumage on a bird. Thus the citizen wears the dis-
position of loyalty without thinking of getting or keep-
ing it. Though he wears it, it is not a garment. It
cannot be put off and on like a soldier's uniform. It
cannot be manufactured by machinery, reasoning, or wit.
It cannot be bought or sold. It cannot be evolved by
stress of will. It cannot result from an accident. Obli-
gation will not produce it. The disposition is indepen-
dent of the duty. It sometimes outlives the dut}'. There
is such a thing as honest and lawful transfer of alle-
giance. But the loyalty of the adopted citizen cannot be
precisely like the loyalty of the home-born. The immi-
grant cannot take out of his heart a tenderness for his
childhood's home stronger and sweeter at some times, if
not at all times, than his devotion to the stranger land.
Certainly we in America have evidence enough that our
adopted citizens, however honestly and zealously atten-
tive to civic obligations, do, in fact, preserve for the
citizenship they have resigned a sj^'mpathy so strong that
it is frequently incongruous with their duty to this land,
sometimes quite repugnant thereto. Caelum non animam
mutant qui tratis mare currunt.
C. The emotion of loyalty may be defined by that
which rouses it into activity, and by the end to which its
energy is directed. It is the emotion kindling in the
contemplation of idealized and personified citizenship,
and impelling to the support and honor of that by which
and in whom citizenship is so idealized and personified.
It is a pleasurable emotion, attended by pride and satis-
faction, even when moving to sacrifice. Citizenship (not
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 21
loyalty) is a garment which may be put on and off. It
answers to the disposition in being colored also by all the
fellowship of language and land. It is as if all the glory
of this fellowship rested on the citizen, and were fastened
over his heart by the jewel of national authority. In
contemplation of his fellowship in the father-land, and
of the dignity, worth, and beauty of the sovereign unity
which clasps together that fellowship around him, the
citizen's emotion rises. It swells with the proud realiza-
tion that this fellowship and sovereignty belong to him,
befit him, and are his by birthright before the world. It
culminates in bowing, with all its array, as a bride to
her husband, before the sovereignty in which citizenship
centres, by which the nation is organically constituted,
while it expresses its identification with that will which
represents the nation's will.
Emotion is not the product of a sense of duty, and is
not to be confused with habit or disposition. A disposi-
tion or quality may exist and yet be dormant and un-
noticeable. Emotion is in its nature transient, conscious,
urgent. It lives by an impulse. It lives in the region
of conscious activity. It lives as a spark struck from
the grain of disposition by the impact of such an occa-
sign as fixes the attention on the theme of citizenship.
Such occasions may be emergencies or celebrations. But
emergencies may not occur once in a lifetime, while no
nation lives without national celebrations. For without
recurring celebrations the emotion of loyalty might
seldom, if ever, be experienced by the mass of citizens.
And without the quickening received from time to time
through aroused emotion, both the sense of obligation
and the disposition to loyalty might easily shrivel and
fade. " The day we celebrate," is the occasion that stirs
assembled loyal hearts, and stimulates loyal profession,
and strengthens united loyal hands for faithful duty in
emergencies, come as they may.
22 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
In peaceful times, indeed, it usually happens that,
while the underlying principles of loyalty may be re-
ferred to at civic celebrations (and never impugned), yet
attention is directed, naturally, to thoughts that inspire
complacency and pleasure rather than to uncalled-for
suggestion of stringent self-sacrifice or of indomitable
struggle. The time does not warrant these. The Church,
however, is always militant. Her avowed purpose is
supremacy over all human affairs which have any relation
to morals. She feels the brunt, moreover, of incessant
attacks. But while she resists, sometimes sorely suffer-
ing, sometimes almost cowed, or reduced to languid in-
ertness here and there, her constant endeavor, at home
and abroad, and wherever men dwell, is to make all sub-
ject to her Lord.
Therefore her assemblies, week by week, are always
stirred by stud}^ of all the terms and all the phases of
loyal duty, loyal character, and loyal impulse. Her
members are made familiar with all the ends of their
gatherings, so that their conduct in continuing to assem-
ble is, beyond question, intelligent and sincere. They
acknowledge the obligation of limitless subordination to
their Lord, — of giving up to Him anything, and, if
He require it, everything, — and of devotion to endless
ages. They evince the loyal disposition, by the value
they attribute to what they call their new birth or regen-
eration as the fundamental warrant for a share in their
fellowship, — by their sympathy with all who use their
language of prayer, and who count upon a perpetual
home in a land of which their Lord is undisputed
sovereign, — and by their treatment of apostasy, as
shown in branding a member who formally denies or
dishonors their Lord, with the punishment of utter dis-
fellowship. The day which assembles them, which re-
vives the picture of their Lord's triumph over death, and
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 23
wliicli celebrates with that their buoyant confidence in
their own personal resurrection, kindles thus a glowing
spark of living feeling. In its warmth and light they
contemplate the tie that holds them to each other and to
their Head. They realize each his own personal interest
in all that concerns the Church, and in all the words and
works and wishes of their Lord. With free, hearty im-
pulse they bow together before Him, in whom their
union is constituted, and profess their identification
with his supreme authority and will.
In these facts there is a sufficient (though not the
only) explanation for the maintenance of public worship.
Like every other community. Christians might meet oc-
casionally for business, if there were no public worship.
Publicity is not an essential element of Christian wor-
ship. They hold it as their Lord's teaching, that worship
is essentially the most private of all action, — the action
of the secret spirit within, — and most appropriate to a
closet in solitude, unknown to the thoughts or eyes of
any except the superhuman. Incessant display of devo-
tion repels Christian sensibilities. Patriotism, likewise,
cannot afford to go daily shouting through the streets
and swarming into forensic halls. Ordinarily loyalty
may be taken for granted. It voices its avowals only
when a celebration or an emergency rouses its emotion.
No private citizen chooses his own occasion for this.
To repudiate the day of public celebration, and use an-
other day, is as plain a disregard of loyalty as repudi-
ation of all celebration. And he who denies his land de-
nies its lord or its government. Who repudiates his
fellow-citizens, repudiates citizenship. This is true also
regarding Christians, notwithstanding diversities of opin-
ion among sincere believers. Some indeed insist upon
varying a few hours from the time adopted by the major-
ity. Some deny the relevancy of the fourth command-
24 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
ment. Some refuse to admit even apostolic authority for
the institution. Some hold it a matter of public conven-
ience or traditional preference, apart from dut}'. But
whether it be of human or divine origination, — whether
established by an emperor or preserved by tradition, —
whether resting on ecclesiastical authority or on the spon-
taneous choice and impulse of the faithful, — or whether
indicated by the risen Loi'd, and under the oversight of
the Holy Spirit, established as the successor and develop-
ment of the older Sabbath, — it exists, distinct and well-
known ; and is for all believers the one Lord's Day on
which all approve and desire public worship for the ex-
pression of loyalty to Him, If some believers do not
think it obligatory to go to church, do any that church-
going on this day ought to cease ? If some base the duty
of church-going on the moral or other expediency, do
any question the propriety of the act? Christian litera-
ture abounds in appreciation of inner spiritual life and
private communion with God, but neither in their own
meaning, nor in the sum of their influence, do these ut-
terances disparage believers' communion in worship, or
the public ascription of united homage to their Lord.
Suppose it were proposed that public Christian worship
should hereafter be attended, not every week, but once
in a month or quarter or year ; not from any necessity,
as sometimes where people are few and scattered, but for
the purpose of freeing so many days from that engage-
ment ! The proposal would certainly be a pain and an
offense to the whole body of believers. The dullness of
religious services, and the tediousness of sermons, are
matters of not infrequent gibing, but the gibes seldom
come from the devout. There may be more or less dull-
ness and tedium. Whether there be or no. Christian be-
lievers by maintaining their weekly assemblies, whatever
the aesthetic or literary character of the exercises, prove
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 25
their abiding interest in the object for which these as-
semblies meet.
It is sometimes asserted that attendance on public wor-
ship has diminished and is still diminishing, if not abso-
lutely at least in j^roportion to the growth of population.
So much interest has been taken in this matter, that great
journals have several times taken a census of the congre-
gations in various cities, and usually with fair complete-
ness and accuracy. If the practice is continued, a com-
parison of many reports, taken in different places and at
successive intervals in each place, will at length furnish
much important information. But so far as relates to the
interest of church members in church-going, the reports
thus far obtained show almost nothing. They do not
even attempt to state the number of members included
in the census taken, although that may be fairly presumed
to be somewhat less than the whole attendance. If it
had been obtained, it might have suggested an estimate
of the number absent on account of ordinary contingen-
cies. On the essential question, whether more or fewer
church members attend than formerly, in proportion to
their whole number, these reports have thus far not a lit-
tle of evidence to offer. But there is available evidence
in statistics of church membership, church buildings, and
church contributions. Increasing membership naturally
implies increasing attendance. If accompanied by the
multiplication, enlargement, and improvement of church
edifices, it is absurd to suppose that church attendance
may be decreasing. The yearly outlay in this country
for maintaining, repairing, lighting, warming, and furnish-
ing counts by millions, without including clerical salaries.
This enormous expense is borne by millions of uncom-
pelled contributors, for the express and preeminent pur-
pose of enabling themselves and others comfortably to
assemble on the first day of each week in the capacity
26 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
of persons owing supreme allegiance to Jesus Christ as
Lord. It is not credible that these millions would con-
tinue to pay while ceasing to use. It is impossible that
their voluntary outlay should increase, while their inter-
est declined. The reverse is also true.^
But whether attendance is increasing or decreasing, it
is clear that a decrease would indicate a lessening of
Christian loyalty. It might or might not mean that
fewer persons " professed and call themselves Christians,"
but it would certainly imply less inclination to make sac-
rifices for the Christ. It might or might not indicate
a pi'evalent decadence from orthodoxy, or from what is
generally understood now by the phrase " evangelical
doctrine ; " but it would certainly betoken the likelihood
of general apathy toward religious subjects and enter-
prises. It might or might not be a sign of moral laxity ;
but it would be positive evidence that their Lord was less
thought of, and less honored, by his nominal followers.
Let a decline in public worship be pi-oven, and no argu-
ment would be needed to satisfy any one that private
worship had at least proportionally declined. It would
be clear enough that the coherence of the Church was
weakening, that the force which had bound Ciiristians
together was relaxing, that disintegration was beginning,
to prepare for dissolution.
But instead of disintegration, an impulse to larger com-
1 It would be intcrestinfi; to compare the average Sunday attend-
ance of church members with the attendance of members of other
societies, charitable and industrial, at their regular meetings. What
proportion of the shareholders in banks, railways, and other corpo-
rations are found at even annual meetings ? How much care and
solicitation is required to secure regularly a quorum of directors or
trustees of financial institutions ? How many subscribers to char-
itable and social organizations come to their regular meetings V
Perhaps, if the question could be fn'ly studied, the Church might
after all appear in the leading place.
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 27
bination has been felt widely and deeply. An inter-de-
nominational polity has grown np, corresponding fairly to
the development in the political sphere of international
law. A strong desire for more inclusive fellowship and
cooperation has become visible in the action of many of
the great organized ecclesiastical bodies. There has been
a Pan-Anglican movement, likewise a Pan-Presbyterian.
International councils of Methodists, Independents, and
others have been summoned. OflBcial delegates have
represented their constituents in these union movements.
The Evangelical Alliance is a manifest result of the same
tendency ; and likewise the generally acknowledged duty
of " comity " in missionary and other administration.
The same strong tendency is manifest among the indi-
viduals of the membership, apart from any official action,
and likewise apart from any merely benevolent or only
semi-religious interest. Thus the great Bible societies
have been sustained. More recently, the plan for identi-
cal Bible study in Sunday-schools has attained an enor-
mous extension. The " Week of Prayer " is observed in
all parts. " Unions " for simultaneous special religious
exercises have obtained, sometimes, tens of thousands of
participants from diverse sects and from far separate
places.
These are notable religious phenomena in our age, and
there are inferences to be drawn from them which cannot
be avoided. They do not imply indifference to doctrine
or feebleness of denominational energy. They do indi-
cate, however, that the general Christian mind is con-
vinced of a fundamental affinity between all who are loyal
to Christ, and that the Christian imagination is capti-
vated by this idea. The limited Christian fellowship ex-
perienced (chiefi}^ on the Lord's Day) evidently suggests
to millions of believers a vision of a religious community,
numerous, various, widespread beyond precise definition.
28 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
Its multiform unity is not so easil}' grasped by keen and
trained intellects. All nationalities and languages, all
conditions and varieties of mankind, are represented in it.
All manner of minds, all schools of philosophy, all equi-
pages of logic are symbolized. All kinds of organization
are displayed, simple and complex ; some slowly builded
during ages of struggle and fortitude ; some deliberately
constructed in milder times, after an approved and more
or less symmetric model; some the development of vague
impulse and crude judgment; some yet inchoate with
only a rudimentary cohesiveness. They show many
degrees in evangelistic activity, in intellectual apprehen-
sion of spiritual truth, in moral consistency. Some are
more or less confused. Some are more or less weighted
with prejudice. Some are more or less slow to shake off
" the former lusts of their ignorance." But all profess
unreserved loyalty to Jesus Christ the Lord, and in this
profession only they find their absolutely universal bond.
For, under whatever peculiarities of manners or doctrines
beating, the heart of a brother is by this sincere profes-
sion revealed and recognized. There is, in fact, a univer-
sal confidence resting upon statements in the Bible re-
garded by all as of divine authority", that whatever
imperfections, errors, or inadvertencies may mark a true
believer or a body of such, these blemishes may and will
be removed under superintendence of the Holy Spirit,
through deeper personal experience, wider acquaintance
with mankind, and closer study of the Scriptures ; and
further, that of their removal in due time the exhibition
of true loyalty is itself a guaranty.
Thus, in our age as never since the apostolic, have the
great mass of believers realized that in loyalty to their one
Lord stands the unity of their brotherhood, and the one
indefeasible evidence of a part in it. But of all the phe-
nomena which exhibit the loyalty and the affinity of Chris-
THE PHENOMENA OF THE DAY. 29
tians, what compares in significance or in sweep of influ-
ence with that institution which every week begins to
bear the Lord's name in tlie far-off Pacific, awakens be-
lievers in Japan, in Australasia, in China, and on through
every meridian in Asia, in Europe, in Africa, and in
America, away to the island kingdom of Hawaii and be-
yond ; until it ceases in the sea where it began, — calling
the whole Christian host of every nation and language
and race, under the whole circuit of the sun, to that day's
common united worship of Jesus the Lord ! What ubiq-
uitous consent like this has the world ever known ? In
what other associated action do all divisions of man par-
ticipate ? After all her centuries, what has Christianity
now or ever to show in evidence, not of her wise charity,
nor of her consistent morality, nor of her triumphant
civilization, — but of that which is her supreme charac-
teristic, — of that which surpasses, includes, guarantees
all these others, — of her loyal devotion to her Lord — so
public, so impressive, so convincing, as the world-round
worshiping assemblies of the Lord's Day ?
STUDY II.
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD"s DAY.
" The First Day of the Week." — Matt, xxviii. 1 ; Mark xvi. 2, 9 ;
Luke xxiv. 1 ; John xx. 1, 19.
As Christians now assemble on the Lord's Day to
worship their Lord by professing their loyalty to Him,
so have they always assembled. The observance is traced
clearly back to the days of the apostles. During the
whole period of the Church's existence, tlie first day of
each week has been the occasion for substantially the
same manner and spirit of celebration. There have
been, indeed, in various ages and places, additional days
for worship. For a long time the seventh day Avas kept
as sacred. Saints' days and festival days have sometimes
been more prominent. But along with all others — far
more than any other — the Lord's Day has been main-
tained in honor, not of saints nor of the absolute Deity,
but of Jesus Christ the Lord. References to the Lord's
Day in literature begin with the writings of men who
Pliny, Epist. wcre bom before all of the apostles were dead.
Lib. X. 97. Xhus Pliiy, the heathen governor, in his well-
known letter to Trajan, declared that the Christians con-
just.Mart. fesscd to meeting on a stated day to praise
Jp.°9°7f 98""' Christ. Justin, the Christian martyr, wrote
Londoli,i722. ^1^,^^.^ Qj^ ^jjg ^^^ called Sunday, they held their
assemblies for reading the Scrijjtures, prayer to Christ,
alms-giving, and the Lord's Supper. These men wrote
not far from a century after the resurrection. All that
TEE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. 31
remains from tlie earliest Christian authors confirms their
statements.
However it may have varied in other respects, the
Lord's Day has, therefore, come down through the Chris-
tian ages unchanged in this one feature of the general
assembly for the worship of the Lord Jesus Christ.
This worship, moreover, has always retained the ele-
ments mentioned in those earliest times, — praise to
Christ as God, prayer, reading of apostolic writings with
those of the Hebrew canon, alms-giving, addresses didac-
tic or hortatory, and the Lord's Supper. The festival
character of the day has also continued the same. Before
Pliny or Justin, a writer called Barnabas de- g Bamabas
Glared that Christians celebrate this day " for ^pist. §15.'
enjoyment " (ets eicfipoavvrjv^.^ The " fathers " indeed laid
stress upon this. They insisted that it was wrong to fast
or to give way to any sorrow on that day. Ter- Tertuinan,
tullian writes, " Sunday we indulge in glad- -'^p"^' ^ ^^-
ness. ^
As the influence of Christianity spread, the general
society of the Roman Empire, even so much of it as
remained heathen, shared more and more in the Chris-
tian method of counting time. The week became grad-
ually familiar. The peculiar series of planetary names,
whose equivalents we still employ, had been widely
known for ages. In ancient China, it is said, gaiiiy, as-
the zodiac was divided into twenty-eight parts, d'ienn^'ouc'
bearing this series of names four times re- ^"^^'P'"'-
peated. Thus the old Chinese year, it might be said,
was divided into four zodiacal weeks. Among the
Greeks the first seven days of each month seem to have
1 All) Kol &yofi(v T^v 7]^4pav tV oyZ6-r\v ^Is ivcppoavvf\v. Barnabas,
Epist. § 15.
^ -(3Eque si diem solis laetitise indulgemus, alia longc ratione quam
de religione solis, etc Tertull. Ap. 16.
32 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
borne the same series of names as sacred to those seven
deities of their Pantheon who were associated
7 contra with thesc heavenlv bodies: namely, Apollo,
Thebes, 806. . ^ . t^- a -v r tt
Artemis or JDiana, Ares or Mars, Hermes or
Mei'cury, Zeus or Jupiter, Aphrodite or Venus, and Saturn.
According to Dio Cassius, the Romans learned the
names of tlie week days from the Egyptians.'^ It seems
probable that in ancient Chaldea the names of these
orbs or deities were given to the seven days of a week.
The character of this week is not clearly ascertained,
but it was not the week as we know it. It is, how-
ever, almost certain that although this series of names
was known so widely, it was never in popular use until
Christian times. Believers readily accepted Sunday for
the title of the first day of the week, since it suggested
their Lord as the " Sun of Righteousness." Since early
Christianity seems to have gained the trading and ar-
tisan classes much more than the learned, political, or
agricultural, and thus to have brought its habits and
practices into contact with the details of social life, hea-
thendom, drifting involuntarily along with its current
of time-reckoning, found the series of seven names to fit
as never before. Under Constantine, the legal establish-
ment of Sunday as a day of vacation and as a substitute
* According to Dio (Hist. Rome, xxxvii. 18, 19) the Egj-ptians
divided the hours into sevens, allotting to each a planetary deity :
1, Saturn; 2, Jupiter; 3, Mars; 4, Sun; 5, Venus; 6, Mercury;
7, Moon. The planet assigned to the first hour of the day named
the day. And as 3 X 7 -}- 3 = 24, the first hour of the next day
and the next day would be named by the planet fourth in this series
from that naming the previous day. Suppose 1st hour 1st day =
Saturn, — 1st hour 2d day (1 + 24 = 3 X 7 + 4 = ) Sun, — 1st hour
3d day (1 + 24 + 24 = 7 X ' =:) INIoon, etc. Some ingenious
Egyptian palmed off this invention on Dio. The names of the days
are as old as the earliest Assyrian records, of which the cunning
priest who contrived this scheme of hours to fit the days doubtless
knew nothinor.
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. 33
for the Nundine was apparently acceptable to all par-
ties.
Thus it appears, that, as an institution with which
society and government are concerned, as a festival win-
ning a certain appreciation from unbelievers as well as the
faithful, as the observance by which his true followers
have testified in assembly their united loyalty to their
Lord, — the Lord's Day has been from the first essen-
tially what it is now. Overlooking therefore all the in-
tervening centuries, whatever their developments of doc-
trine or practice, we turn to the New Testament to
examine, as carefully as possible, its testimony concerning
the origination of the day.
For these studies, three premises will be accepted by
all Christian readers : —
1st. The silence as well as the utterance of Scripture
must be regarded as designed or inspired.
2d. The Holy Spirit, by whose authority the Scripture
speaks, has also guided the community of true believers
towards that development of doctrine and practice which
in essence corresponds with the intent of his Word.
3d. But the silence and the utterance of Scripture are
explained by other voices and by the general voice of all
Scripture, and by the results of the Holy Spirit's work
developed in history ; all these being in full accord, and
mutual support.
Taking up the New Testament in the light of these
principles, the fact becomes significant, that in it there is
so little concerning this day. Tliere is indeed less than
concerning baptism and the Lord's Supper. There is no
account of a formal institution. There is no distinct
command for maintenance. Yet the fact of the day's
existence and endurance shows that there must have been
something recorded or unrecorded in the commands or
the circumstances or the inheritance of the Early Church,
34 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
which not only gave the day its momentum, but also
made it so much more than a memorial. It would have
been natural, that is, it would have been in perfect con-
formity with the general custom of mankind, historically
exemjjlified a thousand times, if an annual celebi'ation of
the resurrection had been instituted. Our Easter is not
only a grateful and appropriate festival. It is so thor-
oughly consistent with the habits of all sorts of people,
of all places and times, that its observance might have
been expected. But contrary to all human experience,
Easter, as a Christian festival in honor of the resurrec-
tion, is not heard of for centuries. Probably the Pass-
over season reminded the Church rather of the Lord's
suffering. But whatever causes may have been imme-
diate, the divine Providence, overruling, did in fact pro-
vide that, before an annual festival, the natural, appro-
priate, customary, and entirely human memorial of the
resurrection should be adopted, — the weekly day, pe-
culiar, and unlike any human memorial, should be es-
tablished in the church's thought and heart, not so much
as a memorial, but much more as a reiteration of living
loyalty. Outside the history of our religion there was
nothing to suggest or explain it.
The phrase, " Lord's Day," occurs but once in the
Scriptures. This phrase is short, apt, complete.
' ' ' It expressed conveniently and accurately the
familiar thought of the Churclj. The peculiar relation
of this institution to the risen Saviour, as a celebration
of his assumption of majesty, including his subjugation
of nature as well as of nature's destroyer, — answered to
a peculiar homage and allegiance insured to him by this
unique day. Thus, the two words of this short Scripture
phrase imply a comparison of his day with the Mosaic
Sabbath, and of his Lordship with that of Him who or-
dained the seventh day as a sign to Israel. The com-
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. oD
parison is with these alone. No deity of the heathen, no
leader of men, has ever been honored with such a day.
The followers of Mohammed have never professed to keep
their Friday as the prophet's day. It is avowedly a con-
tinuation of that institution of a weekly day of worship,
recorded in the Bible, whose authority the Koran ac-
knowledges. Therefore Islam has never worshiped Mo-
hammed on its Friday, It asserts the worship of God
alone. But the Church on her Lord's Day has always
worshiped her Lord Jesus Christ. She worshiped
Him as in the highest sense even in essential deity one
with Him whom Moses called Jehovah : yet also as in a
certain sense distinct from Him whom He, Jesus him-
self, called Father. So, appearing side by side with the
older Sabbath, — facing it, each the head of the series
forward and backward of the weeks, absorbing the older
day in itself, as the highest exponent of that one week of
identical age-long succession, — the Lord's Day set forth
the continuity of that one religion handed down from
patriarchs and prophets, and completely embodied in the
person of our Lord. Yet, as in its name distinguished
from the day of God, Jehovah, and in its position ad-
vanced to the beginning of the week, it set forth a con-
trast between faith in God, who — in however many
ways He had come near to man, and by however many
material types and words and disciplinary providences
He had manifested a relation between himself and man
— was not of us or like us : and faith in Him, who,
however divine in essence, was man also, and man first of
all to human perception : the faith which made religion,
the tie between God and man, the simplest, dearest, first.
In these two woi'ds, " Lord's Day," the mysteries of the
Incarnation and of the Trinity are hidden. In them
" the Lord " is distinguished from God the Father, as
clearly as the seventh day from the first. But in mark-
86 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
ing the honor paid to our Lord of a weekly day of hom-
age, an honor which humanity in all the ages has never
paid to any less than Deity, these words express his one-
ness with the Eternal God, just as the light of Saturday's
and of Sunday's sun is the one Light which has not
ceased to encircle the world.
The single occurrence of this phrase may be compared
with the rarity of the word Christian in the New Testa-
ment, This word is found three times. But an apostle
1 Pet. 4:6. uscs it ouly ouce. Lithe other instances it is
Actfiii:26; in the mouths of unbelievers. Thus, as for the
first phrase, apostolic authority is given. But it
cannot be without purpose that such authority is given
only once. We must infer that while these names are
good, suitable, and approved of the Holy Ghost, the
stress of doctrine or practice must not be laid upon them
alone, but their meaning rather must be gathered from
all the rest of the Sacred Word. Experience has proved
that the name Christian may imply very much or very
little. It was pregnant enough before one of Nero's or of
Diocletian's prastors. In some quarters now it seems to
differ from heathen only as if it described one more va-
cant of regard for God. The expressiveness of the phrase
Lord's Day has varied quite as much. To English or
German eai's it is still full of solemn significance. But
to the Frenchman ^ or Spaniai-d or Italian, it is as color-
less as the name Sunday among us. It has simply taken
the place of our Sunday among the names of the days.
In fine the use of this phrase by an apostle once is
inspired testimony to the character of the day, as an
institution compared or contrasted with the Mosaic Sab-
bath, but devoted to our Lord, — the single occurrence of
the phrase is a warning not to lay undue weight upon
^ Frencli, Dimanche ; Italian, Dominica; Spanish, Domingo; all
are forms of the Latin Dominica (sc. Dies) = the Lord's Day.
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. 37
the name alone, but to seek elsewhere the divine pur-
pose which is the living spirit within the body of the
institution so named. Papists of southeastern Europe
call it always the Lord's Day, but they pay scant homage
to the Lord. Evangelical believers commonly call it
Sunday, but they delight to celebrate it by united wor-
ship to their Lord alone.
From the name, therefore, the mind turns to that
supreme moment in our Lord's career which gives the
name its force. Paul wrote to the Romans
that He was " declared to be the Son of God
with power ... by the resurrection from the dead."
The " power " of this declaration or " determination "
(margin A. V., R. V.) could not have been felt at once in
its full extent. The impression made upon the apostles,
who were staggering under the strain of faith, and the
wrench of hope, and the horrible shame of the cruci-
fixion day, can be compared with nothing but the im-
pression we shall receive when we shall have realized our
own resurrection. The effect was not produced at one
moment, nor by the one circumstance that their Lord
who had died reappeared living. Doubtless if the ap-
pearance of resurrection day could have sufficed for
human nature, our Lord would not have deferred his
ascension for foi'ty days. We must believe that all his
acts during those forty days were intended and adapted
to deepen and to perfect in its proportions the impres-
sion received on the resurrection day. Its reality was
first thoroughly fastened in their consciousness. Luke
(in the Acts) states that He showed his return to life by
many infallible proofs, specifying his repeated appear-
ances, and his discourses on such occasions. John notes
his obtaining personal recognition from individuals, his
benediction on the assembly, his eating with them, his
miracle of the draught of fish, and " many other signs."
38 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
Matthew, Mark, and Luke (in the gospel) simply record
how He was recognized, and how He proved his material
and bodily identity by eating and by showing his wounds.
Plainly, the utmost care was taken to convince his fol-
lowers that He was the very man Jesus who had died on
the cross, — the very body and soul and manhood, not
an appearance nor a disembodied spirit, or aught but his
own absolute self. Plainly, too, this fact was with the
utmost difficulty comprehended, and very slowly realized
by them. Plainly, however, they did at last become per-
fectly certain of the fact. After that they professed
themselves witnesses preeminentl}'' of his resurrection in
very body of flesh and bones. They built their gospel
on that fact.
But even these very brief narratives show that some-
thing more needed to be effected, and at last was effected.
For alongside of our Lord's manifestations must be set
his disappearances. He did not remain with his dis-
ciples. He showed himself for a time and then vanished.
Only a very few times thus must He have showed hira-
1 Cor. 15: ^®^^* Paul mentious five. He was not giving
^""" a catalogue, and omits some elsewhere men-
tioned, but could not have mentioned these five in such a
connection if there had been many more. His argument
is that there had been interviews enough, and with suf-
ficiently diverse persons and classes, to establish the fact,
and the capacity of the witnesses to certify it without
the possibility of being mistaken. It is taken for granted
that He was seen on not many of the forty days. He
did not live with his followers as formerly. He visited
them. With one exception, there is, however, nothing
by which to estimate the interval between these visits.
The narratives are all so framed as to countenance no
ritualistic use of such occasions. If it had been declared
that on the first day of each week, and then only, the
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. 39
Lord had appeared, a tradition might easily have gone
down that on such days only was He to be worshiped
or expected to bless or save. What might have come
out of such an idea during the thousand years of super-
stition,— the dark ages, — no one need conjecture. But
the Church has never known this error. There has never
been a day when believers have felt that their Lord was
inaccessible. This freedom has been in no small measure
preserved to us by the silence of the evangelists. Nor
has it been without the restraint of an overruling Provi-
dence, that the usurping hierarchy did not make Sunday
their special care, but rather obscured it by the introduc-
tion of other festivals and observances. Some of these
other days were the signs of homage to the hierarchy
and of subjection to superstition. The Lord's Day re-
mained through all these centuries, so far as it retained
any religious significance, a day for profession of faith in
Jesus the Lord, and of homage to Him personally. That
it should become the special day of general public homage
to Him, and remain at the same time, though special not
exclusive, and though consecrated yet divested of any
perfunctory dignity, hallowed for the purpose of worship-
ing the Lord, by no means hallowed for the purpose of
accomplishing any ritual, — the silence and omission of
Scripture with the continued discipline of the Spirit
provided. Since it did become at once the central fact
externally of the church's organic life, — that is, the
occasion when the church's activity as a church be-
came visible in her act of general worship, — it might
be expected that the one exception to the silence of the
Scripture would afford, when duly weighed, the explana-
tion of so momentous a fact otherwise not explained.
All the evangelists state that our Lord's resurrection
took place on the first day of the week. No other note
of time seems to have occurred to them. Fifteen or
40 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
twenty years must have passed before the first gospel
appeared, — more than fifty before tlie last was written.
The writers were mature in experience and in acquaint-
ance with the growing church. And they were inspired.
But apparently they felt no interest concerning the year
or the month or the day of the month. It must be that
the church of their age was equally indifferent to these
matters. The week was the one period in the church's
mind. There must have been something in the nature
of the week as a historical institution, and as an inherit-
ance of the apostles and of the Church, to account for
this. But John, in the latest gospel, shows how our
Lord, by his own acts, sanctioned the week and the
weekly Lord's Day. Yet this information is given inci-
dentally, as though the week ought of itself to be a suffi-
cient explanation of its own continuance.
In the twentieth chapter of this gospel John relates
certain particulars of the resurrection morning and of
our Lord's entry at the disciples' evening gathering.
Then, in order as it would seem to illustrate in the case
of Thomas what care our Lord took to satisfy all doubts
as to his bodily identity, something is recorded of another
gathering at which He appeared on the next Sunday.
In the twentj'-first chapter John proceeds : " After these
things Jesus showed himself again to the disciples at
the Sea of Galilee." Having described the recognition,
John adds (verse 14) : " This is now the third time that
Jesus showed himself to his disciples after that He was
risen from the dead." Thus we learn that the risen
Jesus appeared first on his resurrection day, the second
time on the next Sunday, and the third time, after an
unknown interval, at the lake-side. For six whole days
between the rising day and its octave He was absent.
John 20: Was this a slight matter to the timid company
19.26. ^Ijq received Him in their retreat behind closed
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. 41
doors ! Will it be supposed that their emotions were
calm and their reasoning cool at that first reunion. One
week before they had stood upon a pinnacle of triumph.
They had followed their Lord while He was welcomed
with acclamations to Jerusalem as the heir of David and
King of Israel. Half a week before they had been lifted
to a loftier height, in spiritual exaltation, as they lis-
tened with their own ears to that sublime and tender
discourse on the passover evening. Then with startling
suddenness they had seen the "King of Israel" a help-
less prey. They had seen their teacher and friend
mocked by authority and outraged in his person. They
had seen their Lord, their Christ, hung between wretched
thieves and dead upon a gibbet. It does not seem possi-
ble to exaggerate the strain which they endured. It did
not cease when the pierced body was laid in Joseph's
tomb. It did not cease through the Sabbath quietude.
It did not cease when the first dawn of the next week
called them to various errands of duty. Luke i,„]5e24:
has drawn a vivid sketch of their state in the ^^■^'^•
episode of the walk to Emmaus. They could not utterly
despair, yet they could not conceive of anything in which
hope could be embodied. They had, indeed, seen every
force of nature, and of the supernatural, so far as they
knew either, subject to his bare word. The dead three
times at least had been roused to the resumption of life
by his voice. In their very hearts they had trusted
" that it had been He that should have redeemed ,,„,„,
Luke 24 : 21.
Israel." But their confidence seems to have
been built on his physical and perhaps on his psychical
power. He was " mit^hty in deed and word „. ,„
^ & J _ Luke 24: 19.
before God and all the people." Such might
ought to have overcome the heathen and the gentile.
But it did not. It seemed to vanish at the touch of
Roman hands, as Samson's at the touch of Delilah's
42 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
shears. It was drowned in abject shame. The shame,
perhaps, was as potent as tlie horror to unman them.
Yet after all He had preserved his dignity to the end.
He had yielded but He had not been overcome. Every
word and act was full of the old authority. Sanhedrim,
king, and governor had felt his rebuke but had not seen
Him quail. The appealing wretch hanging beside Hira
had been comforted. The soldiers who pierced his hands
had heard Him invoke divine compassion on their igno-
rance. The Roman officer in charge of the execution
had been self-compelled to acknowledge Him as the Son
of God. And then the words were recalled in which He
himself had foretold them of this suffering and death
and of a third day on which He should rise.
Mark 9:9.^ . "^
They questioned much what this rising should
mean. It could not be like the recall of Jairus' daughter,
or of the young Nainite, or of Lazarus. With these this
recall was only an astonishing incident. It was of very
much more importance than a recovery from critical sick-
ness. But it was like that in relation to the other inci-
dents of their lives. On the other hand, our Lord's
rising was to be a climax. Both in the written proj)he-
cies and in his own words there w^ere power and glory
and victory, and the full majesty of the Messianic Do-
minion, certainly to come. This rising must, therefore,
precede them, — in some way introduce them. And on
this very day it was said that the tomb was empty and
He alive. But no such demonstrations as might an-
nounce the assumption of his kingdom had been made.
No clang of angelic shouts and trumpets had shaken the
world. The sun shone as quietly as on other days, and
the city went on as usual with all its affairs. The Ro-
man yoke had not been loosened a whit from their necks.
Thus the state of mind in which Cleopas and his com-
panion found themselves was not unlike that which be-
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. 43
lievers often now experience when bereaved of some one
very near and beloved. They may know facts which
prove that death to be a blessing. They may know and
believe the promises of God. They may have had pre-
cious communion with their Saviour in fellowship with
the departed. They may have full expectation of the
future life and its reunion for both the dead and them-
selves. All these things may be in their minds neither
forgotten nor unheeded, and yet the one supreme fact of
death may so engross their feelings with its shock and
bitterness that all other considerations seem intangible.
The mind perceives but cannot attend to them. Be-
lievers sorrow not as others but they sorrow wholly. So
Cleopas and his friend, though not in utter despair, were
sad. From many little touches in the narrative it is
evident that the state of mind of the two was that of all.
Their intellectual faculties were in a measure stunned,
paralyzed. When they all gathered at their evening
meal three of the brethren present, one of these an
apostle, testified to personal interviews with the Risen
One. Perhaps Mary also was there to tell her stor3\
Yet when Jesus entered suddenly they were all crazed
with terror and could think of nothing but a ghost ; so
that He upbraided them with their unbelief and Luke24:3s ;
hardness of heart. Even then He had to con- Marki6:i4.'
vince them by physical evidence that He was truly flesh
and blood. Then were they indeed glad, but ^^^^ 20:20-
not yet with a rational joy. Since, therefore, ^"■^^24:^1.
it was so difficult to rouse them to the simple external
fact of the resurrection, — a fact on which they knew the
fulfillment of prophecy turned, a fact of which He him-
self had again and again instructed them, a fact witnesses
to which had come forward among their own company
with explicit testimony impossible to gainsay, a fact which
the sight of his torn hands, the sound of his voice, and
44 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
his eating of their food, in addition to all that they other-
wise knew, attested in every way possible for the access
of knowledge to men, — how could the deeper meanings
and wider results of his rising come into their minds at
all. As the evangelists intimate, it was necessary to
meet them again and again in order to fasten this one
conviction upon all. The gathering on a mountain in
Galilee, whether of the five hundred or only of the
eleven, must have been at least the fourth in-
Matt. 28 : 17. . ^, , ■ • 11
terview. let even at this time we are told
some doubted.
Another impression was to be made. And, at length,
it was worked out into clear and durable relief. While
they learned his human identity, they were also learning
his majesty.
When He left the company that evening, what a whirl
of glad emotion was thrilling every breast ! But, He
had not been wont to hold himself aloof from them.
Were they startled by this unusual withdrawal ? Or were
they so absorbed in grasping his return, that they were
little affected by his act of departing? Or was there a
greater awe in his presence than they had ever felt be-
fore ? However it was, He went from them in the night.
Most grateful and refreshing must have been the sleep
that night brought. Enough had happened to exhaust
their active powers. There might well be given them
a period of quiet and contemplation longer than the
night.
So morning came — day and again night passed. Day
after day was vacant until six days had gone. Where
was their Lord ? He did not come to them. They could
not find Him. All the particulars of that first day were
naturally recounted. Every word and gesture was re-
called and commented on. Mary, Peter, Cleopas and his
friend, severally repeated, doubtless more than once, every
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. 45
circumstance of their conversations with Him. Well-re-
membered portions of his former discourses were surely
cited, and wonderingly compared with passages from the
prophets, the psalms, and the law, which might in the
least bear upon this great event. But where was He now?
Was there not, possibly, after all, some mistake. They
all had been intensely wrought up. Grief, shame, hope,
joy, all the diverse winds of human passion had swept
over them in a tornado whirl. Might not their over-
strained souls have seen a phantasm created by them-
selves ? Could they assure each other of their several
sanity? Could they attest the active consciousness of
each other, if they persisted in declaring that they had
seen Him ? Had they just seen Him, just once, and for
one hour ? If it were indeed really He, was this then all ?
Had He appeared for the moment to leave them entirely ?
Some had not seen Him. Would He not come again to
convince them ? He had spoken sometimes of being with
them always. When would He come again. If He were
really and truly alive from the dead. He must. He will
come back to them. They are his disciples. They are
his friends. They are his chosen employes. They love
Him. They believe in Him. They are ready to serve
Him. He will return to them if he is a living man.
Is it possible to exaggerate the effect of this blank
space of time, in fixing and defining the impressions re-
ceived through his visits ? Each day his majesty rises
and towers like a stately wall before their minds. How
clear, perhaps painfully clear, it becomes to them that
they can see only a little of his purposes and prepara-
tions. If He is living, then He is occupied with affairs
far above their grasp. The wisdom to plan and the force
to execute are not theirs, not dependent upon them.
Their isolation and weakness, apart from Him, become
drearily sensible. Thus by degrees, with hard but neces-
46 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
sary discipline, the truth is pressed upon their attention
and made familiar to their thought, that He is indepen-
dent of them, while they depend on Him ; that He lias
charge of affairs vaguely great, the Kingdom of God and
and the Kingdom of Israel, while they are helplessly and
unwittingly . waiting for Him ; that He who is greater
than death must be greater than the necessities of com-
mon life ; that He so near, so far, so close, so lofty, so
incomprehensible in his self-existence must partake of the
very being of the self-existent God.
The third day of that week came round. They may
have counted that there were only about forty hours from
the spear-thrust on Golgotha to the meeting with Peter,
— only about fifty hours to the benediction in their as-
sembly. But now another forty and fifty hours have
passed and He does not show himself. The monotonous
vacancy continues. On the fifth day of his absence there
is a Holy Convention in the temple, but He does not at-
tend. On the sixth day, the regular Sabbath arrives.
Will He honor this day by his presence ? He does not
come. It is as vacant as the rest. The risen Lord will
not distinguish it. The disciples still cannot find Him !
The strain is kept upon them until perhaps they can bear
it no longer, until at least the perfect moment comes that
shall fix the day and the interval forever and stamp his
title on the weeks.
Certainly this was not one moment too soon. It can-
not be a mistake to regard this six days' abstention as an
ordeal of constantly increasing severity to the disciples.
All their hopes, all their longings, which grew so much
vaster than their hopes, rested on a few circumstances
which Thomas and others denied, and which the rest
hardly dared affirm. If this were all they should see of
their risen Lord what would it all avail ? Where was his
expected glory ? Where was the promised kingdom ?
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. 47
Where was their own personal hope of a place in that
kingdom. Every clay's blank inaction mocked their hope
and tended to unsettle their confidence in the verity of
the resurrection itself. The few hours, or, it may be, the
hour. He had spent with them, grew dimmer to the rea-
son, and became more and more like a dream or a hallu-
cination. Hope and longing sickened — starved.
But the ordeal was not prolonged one moment be-
yond the perfect interval. On the octave of the resur-
rection day, the Lord revisited them. His familiar voice
gave the salutation " Peace." By bodily, physical proof,
He again convinced doubters and confirmed believers.
And this second appearance, on the eighth day of the
new era, must have wrought on his followers some new
impressions. They would now feel that his absence im-
plied his return ; that, as he returned on the resurrec-
tion octave, they might expect Him again on the next
octave ; that his act in thus emphasizing the week, in
view of its traditional meaning and august associations,
harmonized with that divine majesty which they in greater
awe now reverenced in Him ; and that the first day of
the week, which had its own types and analogues in the
law, was chosen by Him as the first step of his progress
toward his full regnal habilitation. This first step from
Sunday to Sunday, making the week his measure as it had
been his Father's measure, may well have helped ^ , ,^^ „^
Thomas to raise that adoring cry, " My Lord
and My God."
Four more Sundays passed before the ascension. Did
our Lord appear on any or all of them ? The Scriptures
are silent. We do not know. He did appear ^^^^ ^^
again at least four times : once to five apostles ; i-i*^ ^^
once to five hundred disciples, beside the apos- ^^^^^ ^7.
ties ; once to James ; and once to all the apos- I'j-,^^ ^^ . ^
ties. Paul, in mentioning this last interview icor. i5:7.
48 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
with all the apostles, may have referred to the ascension,
which, of course, did not occur on a Sunda}^ On the
other hand, the meeting with the live hundred noted
by Paul, and the meeting with the eleven in Galilee,
recorded by Matthew, may have been two separate oc-
casions. Nowhere is it stated how many times the
Lord showed himself. In Paul's list the lake-side inter-
view is omitted. There may have been others, nowhere
recorded. While plainly intimating that his appear-
ances were few, the records show that He may have
appeared on every Sunday. Some reasons have been al-
ready advanced which may account for the silence of
the Scriptures on this point. Special studies of the week
and of the law may illuminate this silence ; and mani-
festly, in the establishment of the Lord's Day as an in-
stitution, at a time when the developing church was di-
rectly influenced by the actual words and bodily presence
of the Lord, there is proof tliat He allowed his disciples
to get no impression incongruous with its observance.
The resurrection day, the resurrection week, and the
resurrection octave, — the first succeeding Lord's Day, —
began a series, which, in fact, has shown enduring vi-
tality.
The disciples would naturally expect to see their Lord
again one week after the second meeting. They
Matt. 28 : ° . . . *^
10. had been instructed to go into Galilee. On
John 21: 1. , . „ ... . , ° , ,0111
this familiar ground, perhaps, when the Sabbath
was over at sunset, the five may have felt called to pro-
vide for the general wants by betaking themselves to
their old occupation. They toiled all night without suc-
cess. Sunday morning dawned. The Lord had twice
visited them in the late afternoon at the meal which
closed the day. They thought only of seeing Him at
the same time of the day, and when a voice on the shore
called to them out of the morning's gray, they did not
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. 49
recognize it. But He had special treatment for some or
all of these five, and so He met them unexpectedly. He
may or He may not have met the full company as usual
later in the day. There is no reason to suppose He did
not, because the nari-atives imply that his appearances
were not many. It must be noted that the passage in
the fifteenth chapter of First Corinthians, while specific
as to persons, is entirely vague as to time.^ In the Greek,
the verb is always in the aorist or indefinite tense. If
Paul had in his mind the thought of three classes of in-
terviews,— one with individuals, one with the apostolic
college, one with the whole believing brotherhood, and
wished to state, as evidence of the resurrection, that
during forty days Jesus held these three classes of in-
terviews, — his language would properly answer to that
thought. It may be paraphrased thus : " He showed
himself to Peter first, and then to James individually.
Then, too, He met the apostles from time to time. Then,
too. He was seen (once or oftener) by the whole body of
disciples, numbering more than five hundred. Finally
He was with all the apostles at an interview, or series of
interviews, closed by his ascension from their midst."
All these considerations may be said to warrant the
following assertions : —
1. The conduct of our Lord after the resurrection would
naturally lead his disciples to expect that he would con-
tinue to visit them on the first day of each week.
2. There is nothing in the Scripture inconsistent with
or unfavorable to the belief that He did so visit them.
^ The i^Ta and eireira, like our " then," may indicate succession in
time or in thought. By Peter unquestionably, He was seen first, and
by Paul last abnormally, after the forty days had passed. It is
scarcely possible that the other interviews are named in order of
occurrence. If this were so, it seems incredible that the mountain of
Matthew and the lake-side of John could have been omitted.
4
60 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
3. Whether or not He did see them every Sunda}', the
return of each Sunday continued to be in some way as-
sociated with Him, and nothing was permitted to occur
that should weaken this association.
There is recorded one later event which must have
been second only to the resurrection in its importance
both as an epoch in the Church's history, and as an im-
pulse to the perpetual observance of the Lord's Day.
Pentecost had a peculiar character among Jewish anni-
versaries. Moreover, its peculiarities seem to find their
antitype in the Lord's Day of the Church. But the dis-
cussion of them belongs to another study. It is doubted
by some, whether the seven weeks were to be counted from
the Sabbath which fell in the passover week, or from the
first day of unleavened bread which was treated
' ' as a Sabbath. But this year the first day of
unleavened bread was a Sabbath, and the Pentecost cer-
tainly fell on the first day of the week. On this day,
full of traditional solemnity, and the seventh Sunday
since the resurrection, the besrinnins of the oc-
Acts 1 : 15. ... ^ .
tave week, the disciples in Jerusalem, in num-
ber one hundred and twenty men and women, met " with
one accord." They did not gather for the cele-
bration of the festival, for the public services
were at the temple, and the family feasts would not be
sjDread until the late afternoon. Their " one accord "
was " for prayer and supplication. The striking Greek
word homothumad6n ^ Qofxo6vixaS6v') means, witli the same
heart-impulse. In every one of their hearts the same
fact, or experience, stirred them at the same time, in
the same direction. We are not authorized to presume
that it was such a meeting as occurred every day. The
1 There is another dfxodvtiaSSv in Acts i. 14. It is a coincidence
that tlierc was also another Lord's Day after the Ascension and be-
fore Pentecost.
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. 51
circumstances which, after this, obliged and enabled
them to devote every day to evangelization, did not j^et
exist. Doubtless they had to provide their living by daily
work. That some unrecorded monition from Heaven, or
charge left them by their Lord, induced them to hold
this meeting, is not impossible, nor is it in the least prob-
able. The known fact sufficiently accounts for every-
thing. It was that day of the week on which He had
risen, and on which He had revisited them after a whole
week's absence. Moreover, this was the seventh return
of that same first day of the week so marked by Him.
To their Jewish minds there was a deep significance in
this reduplication, aud uot improbably a vague appre-
hension of correspondences between the law and tradi-
tion of this unique observance of their nation and their
own circumstances as a body. Such facts in both mind
and heart could not fail to impel them to the general
gathering of this day. And so this general assembly on
the seventh return of the Lord's Day experienced the
formal inauguration of the church's career, by Him who
has been ever since her special Director therein. He, the
church's Teacher and Inspirer, b}^ thus taking this seven-
fold Lord's Day for the day of his manifestation, sealed
to the Church that custom of observing it, which the
action of the Lord had, established.
Probably the Lord's Day would have been more prom-
inent among the incidents related of the Early Church if
Jerusalem had been an ordinary city. For if the early
converts had been largely resident merchants and arti-
sans, they might not have been able to maintain daily
assembling and evangelizing. In that case, the weekly
congregation would necessarily have become nwre con-
spicuous. But in fact Jerusalem could have had scarcely
any trade beyond its own supplies. It seems to have
lived, like some other capitals and bournes of pilgrimage,
52 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
off its visitors. The early converts belonged to all parts
of the Roman empire and beyond it. Such persons, dur-
ing their stay, would be led, by their fervor, to throng the
daily assembly. Resident believers would have more lei-
sure than citizens of busy connnercial marts could com-
mand, and would warmly join with their relatives and
guests. The apostles, aware that very many of the new
adherents could remain with them for only a short time,
would use every precious moment for fellowship and in-
struction. Thus the narrative seems to imply that, so
far as religious meetings were concerned, the Lord's Day
could hardly have been distinguished from other days,
since every day was full. But when the Church had
spread to other points, devoid of the extraordinary char,
acter of Jerusalem society, the references to the Lord's
Day are such as coincide precisely with the ideal which
the Church in all ages has preserved.
On his second missionary journey Paul planted a
church in Corinth. A year or two later, while in Ephe-
sus, he wrote the first epistle to that church. Three of
1 Cor. 16- it^ members had visited him, and pi'obably had
•^'' asked for instruction, among other matters, on
the method of collecting the church's benevolent of-
ferings. Paul directed them to make their contribution
1 Cor. 16 : weekly on the first day of the week. There is
•^'^' a possible ambiguity in the words " lay by him
in store." This " store " may be an aggregate in each
man's own hands, or a common store in the hands of the
ofiicers of the church. But if each man kept his own,
the elders or the apostles must needs collect when the sum
was to be sent off. This would be directly against Paul's
provision, " that there be no gatherings," that no collec-
tions be made (R. V.), " when I come." The practical
disadvantages of asking men to keep their gifts until
called for, instead of receiving them when offered, are so
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. bo
evident, tliat one need not doubt whether a clear-headed
man like tlie great apostle could make such a blunder in
Galatia and repeat it in Corinth. There is no reasonable
doubt that in this passage a regular general assembly of
the Church is taken for granted, and that the collection is
recommended as a regular feature of that assembly.^
On the return from the third tour Paul came to Troas.
The vessel in which he sailed from Philippi* had
lagged five days on the way, arriving at last on
the second day of the week, our Monday. Paul had
stimulating recollections of Troas. It was probably an
important church centre just then, since seven of the
apostle's companions were sent there in advance. When
Paul met the whole Church there in its assembly, he was
so moved that he preached until midnight, and then, after
tlie accident to Eutychus, continued the services connected
with " the breaking of bread " until day dawned. It lies
certainly on the face of the narrative, that Paul " abode
there seven days " in order to attend their full meeting on
Sunda}"-, having lost the previous Sunday's meeting by
being detained two or three days longer than Actsi6:ii,
usual on the voyage. So here we find the ^^■
Lord's Day the occasion when the Church once in seven
days comes together in general assembly, with preaching,
and with sacramental breaking of bread.
In the various books of the New Testament, a number
of passages refer to the meetings of Christians, but only
those already discussed connect these meetings explicitly
with the Lord's Day. It would seem as if the Divine
Inspirer of the Scriptures had permitted only these few
^ The passage 2 Cor. ix. 6 indicates that Paul expected the repre-
sentatives of the Church, apparently the brethren to whom he had
spoken personally about it, namely, Stephanus, Fortunatus, and
Achaiciis (1 Cor. xvi. 17), themselves to hold the church's bounty
all ready in their own hands.
54 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
glimpses to appear in this part of the Sacred Canon, in
order that at the proper time men might see that while
the day miglit in them be traced to a distinct source, the
true conception of its character was to be drawn from a
larger view. These glimpses are sufficient, but no more
than sufficient. They present before us the first week
of the new era, showing how our Lord emphasized the
first day of the week, not only by his resurrection and
his visit to his disciples, but also by his abstention from
them until tlie next first day. Tiien the seventh return
of the first day is presented, showing by visible manifes-
tation the entry of the Divine Being upon a new disci-
pline of mankind through the Church. Then, after about
twenty years, a view is presented of a European church
holding its regular assemblies on the first day of the
week, and, by apostolic direction, regularly gathering the
alms of its members on that day. After perhaps another
year, there is a view of a church in Asia Minor likewise
assembling regularly on the first day of the week for
preaching and the Eucharistic Supper, while an apostle,
whose tardy vessel brought him into their harbor just too
late for one of these meetings, tarried a week,
though " pressed for time," in order to attend
the next.
Five and twenty years, perhaps, later, a scene ap-
pears in whose foreground is an aged apostle, the last
survivor of the original college, refreshing his solitude
at Patmos, by lofty communings with Heaven on the
Lord's Day. Li the distance is a circle of churches to
whom the divine messages and the Apocalypse are being
transmitted, who also have learned the expressiveness of
this short title for the first day of the week, and under-
stand the appropriateness to the Lord's Day of peculiar
religious privileges and enjoyments in the special and
' spiritual " worship of the Lord.
THE ORIGINATION OF THE LORD'S DAY. 55
Within the next half century, Pliny and Justin —
heathen and Christian, persecutor and martyr — wrote,
with many others, their testimony to the observance of
the Lord's Day by Christians in general, — and the sec-
ular history of the day begins.
STUDY III.
TELE "SVEEK.
"And God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it." — Gex. ii. 3.
The five glimpses of the Apostolic Lord's Day are pre-
sented in the New Testament incidentally. If the obser-
vance had ceased with that generation, and had never
been known to secular history, no one probably, in this
age, would be able from the New Testament notices alone
to conceive of it. But it has not ceased. Those few no-
tices are to be read with the illustrations which eighteen
centuries of Christian faith have placed beside them.
The experiences of the true Church, in which these illus-
trations consist, are the discipline of the Holy Spirit, and
thei-efore fitted to explain his word. Since He has led
the Church to maintain the Lord's Day as a loyal festival
with assemblies for worshiping the Lord, He must also
have controlled its establishment. These few notices,
therefore, give us glimpses of his early leading. By its
homogeneity the history of the day proves that it is, and
from the first has been, under his superintendence.
The mind indeed seeks for some word of direct institu-
tion, of explicit authorization. But since none is found,
it must be that none was needed. If it was not directly
instituted or explicitly authorized, it must have grown out
from something already existing, something already en-
dowed with prerogative. May there not be some older
institution, some larger ordinance, some permanent, pre-
cise, acknowledged fact, unnoticed, perhaps, because its
THE WEEK. 57
magnitude and grandeur are so familiar, — which yet
may be the foundation of the Lord's Day, resting deep
down on the bedrock of primeval humanity ?
One thing is certain : Christianity inherited all the
past relations between God and believing men. There is
a unity in the development of that which, in the largest
sense, we call the True Church. The New Testament
emphatically declares that it is one wdth the
Ech 2 : 20
old. The foundation is by prophets and apos-
tles, coordinate. The law and the prophets witness to
the righteousness which is b}^ faith of Him, who j^^^^ g.oj
said that He came to fulfil them. Christians jj^^t 5.17
are the legal children of Abraham. They are
not a totally new and distinct product of divine
grace, but are "grafted" into the old stock. Rom. 11 :
From the day of the first promise, given in ■^''-*-
Eden, the same spiritual sap which now nourishes it has
flowed in every age, through substantially the same ma-
turing body of the faithful.
With the more ancient history, every one of the evan-
gelists has connected the Lord's Day by the statement
so carefully recorded, that the Lord rose on the first
day of the week. This is the only statement which can
be said to bear directly, and not merely incideirtally,
upon the origination of the Lord's Day. Evidently the
Spirit of Wisdom has restrained other utterances. But
He has caused this statement to be reiterated five times,
— six times indeed, if the last paragraph of Mark is re-
ceived. The Church took up the succession of the weeks
just as it had come down the ages. She still maintains
it perfect and unbroken. Evidently both evangelists and
apostles expected that the week would continue. Per-
haps they could not explain the reason, yet they plainly
felt that its significance and prestige ought to insure its
persistence.
58 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
What then is the week ? First of all it must be dis-
tinguished from a week. A week is a period of seven
successive days. Tropically it may mean any period
composed of seven equal successive times, a week of
weeks, or of months, or of years. It is used also (rarely)
for small divisions of the month, whether of seven days
or not. But the week is the regular series of a particu-
lar set of seven days. There is a fixed beginning and
ending for each member of this series. It is therefore
comparable with the succession of the months and years.
It is defined in four particulars by its contrast with those
periods.
I. The succession of the weeks is invariable and un-
broken. No other time period larger than the day in
common use has been without occasional hiatus, variation,
or adjustment. Such modifications are required in order
that any recurring number of days should coincide with
recurring lunar or solar phases. Neither a month nor a
year can be broken into weeks without a remainder. In-
deed, neither the lunation nor the solar year consists of
an integral number of days. They cannot therefore be
accurately divided into equal parts consisting of days.
We do not attempt to have our months and years corre-
spond precisely with the time of sun and moon. They
vary, but their inequality is known, and so far conve-
nient. Accuracy with them would bring intolerable an-
noyance. But the week recurs with invariable accuracy.
This characteristic of the week distinguishes it from
not only months and years, but also smaller time meas-
ure. Mr. George Smith, about a score of years ago,
found among the Assyrian remains in the British Mu-
seum a calendar of ancient Nineveh. In it the months
were lunations, and consequently of twenty -nine and
thirty days alternately. The seventh, fourteenth, twenty-
first, and twenty-eighth days of each month were noted as
THE WEEK. 59
vacant days on which no business should be done. Here
certainly were weeks. But they were not invariable
weeks like ours. One out of every four consisted of
eight or nine days instead of seven. The series was
broken off and begun anew every month. The week
known to us and to the Scriptures is independent of the
months. If its beginning or end should coincide with
the beginning or end of a month, that is accidental. The
week is never stretched or compressed for any purpose.
Its succession has never been known to be broken or
modified. 1
The Nundine of the Romans was a time division,
widely known and long in use. The word (Latin nun-
dinum^ means a period of nine days. These nine days
consisted of two market days, with seven daj^s interven-
ing. According to our English idiom, we should say
that the nundine consisted of eight days, every eighth
day being the market day. These nundines ran on,
without regard to the months, in regular succession. But
the series never went through a whole year. There was
a sentiment, it is said, that the market should not be held
on any day sacred to a religious festival. Therefore, at
the beginning of each year, a certain college of priests
were charged to examine the calendar. After ascertain-
ing when the festivals would occur, they would select
such a starting-point for the nundines as would carry the
markets clear of any interference. The space between
the last nundine of one year and the first of the follow-
ing year would, therefore, be longer or shorter, according
to circumstances. The series never continued from year
to 3'ear. Unlike the week, it had no invariable, un-
broken, independent succession, but was contingent upon
other features of the year.
^ Assyrian Discoveries, by George Smith, Ep. Conon. Chal. Gen.
etc.; Lenormant, Beginnings of History, p. 414, Am. ed.
60 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
Some nations have had ten-day periods, and some, also,
five-day periods, in more or less use. But such periods
were, strictly, subdivisions of the month. They were
subject to modification whenever the month was varied.
Their series was never invariable and unbroken. In-
deed, it does not appear that it was ever used or regarded
as a series. There is, then, so far as the history of man
is yet known, no record of any time period believed to
be invariable, other than the week. No other like pe-
riod seems ever to have been intended for regular suc-
cession or adapted to such use. No men thought of pre-
serving such a sequence as a matter of importance, much
less as a matter of duty, except men to whom the God of
the Bible was known. For thousands of years this se-
quence has been perfectly maintained. There are good
reasons for believing that its integrity has continued from
the remotest age. But no other time period, or system
of time periods in actual use, has continued through any
considerable recurrence, without variation. One in four
of our years is varied. Our months differ still more.
Uncertainty concernincr the length and succession of
years is a great obstacle to the study of ancient chronol-
ogy. The lunar calendar, which the Mohammedan world
still follows, begins each month and each year with a new
moon. Its months, therefore, have twenty-nine and
thirty days alternately. But once in seventeen months
another day must be inserted, in order to keep the first of
the month in accord with the first of the moon. Then
the series of twenty-nines and thirties is broken off, two
thirties come together, and a new series of twenty-nines
and thirties is begun.
These facts invest the week with venerable and singu-
lar dignity. Of all the time periods, large or small, into
which men have been wont to group their days, this one
alone has come down from inscrutable antiquity, with no
THE WEEK. 61
variation or the slightest irregularity. Lunations,^ years,
centuries, and all the cycles of cosmic time, go on, it is
true, with unswerving precision. But man's perception
of the termini of these periods is necessarily imperfect.
The rotation of his planetary home does not coincide
with the grander rounds marked by the bodies in his
sky. The conditions of his activity are, in many ways,
controlled by the phases of sun and moon. But in reck-
oning time he has never been able to count his months
or years from the moment when the solar or lunar course
is completed. Each year is distinct, each month is indi-
vidualized, but the exact boundaries of each are confused
and imperceptible. A day that is the ordinary alterna-
tion of darkness and light is fixed ^ in nature as the
world's time unit. Months and years, even now, are
thought of as rather vaguely containing about so many
days. For many social and business purposes a theoret-
ical month of thirty and year of three hundred sixty days
are still used. But the day is never conceived as the
exact fraction of a month or year. It is, therefore, true
that the week is the largest multiple of the day which
1 A lunation consists of 29 days, 12 hours, 44 min., 2 -^^ sec, or
decimally, 29.53058872 days. Hence, 17 lunations = very nearly
502 days (502.02000824) = 9 X 30 -f- 8 X 29. If the first month
have 29 days, the second 30 days, and so on, then the 17th must
have 30 as well as the 16th. Then the 18th month of 29 days and
the 19th of 30 days may begin a new series of 17 months.
' The idea of regular and invariable succession belongs to the
■whole day, including night. In high latitudes, as daylight grows
longer or shorter, darkness correspondingly grows shorter or longer,
so that no difference in the length of the whole alternation is noticed.
The time for beginning our legal day, midnight, is, of course, arbi-
trarily fixed for convenience. The poinilar mind is just beginning
to entertain ideas of an international, intercontinental, and even
terrene datum for the conventional or legal day. Observe that the
feeblest minded races are perfectly able to grasp the idea of a seven-
day period.
62 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
mankind have ever been able to use. This dignity of
the week unquestionably must have been very deeply im-
pressed on the early disciples. The precision in measur-
ing time, to which all in this day ai'e accustomed, could
not have been comprehended by Peter and his associates.
To them the count of years and the progress of months
was far more vague than to us, who carry watches and
read daily journals. To them, therefore, even more than
to us, the week must have been the standard and the
ideal of an invariable period and of unfluctuating recur-
rence.
II. In the second place, the week is an arbitrary pe-
riod — the only entirely arbitrary period known to human
use. By this phrase, " arbitrary period," is meant a
measure of time dependent upon no natural phenomena,
and brought into use or kept in use by authority alone.
The precise legal termini of all time measures are, of
course, arbitrary ; but all the other time measures are
related to visible facts. Thus the length of our j^ear is
marked by the sun. The law merely ordains a starting-
point, and provides that the legal year shall not vary a
whole day from the natural. The months in use are an
approximation to an aliquot division of the j'^ear. Their
number represents the fact that there are twelve luna-
tions in every solar year. Their irregularities are due to
the" adjustments by which, in the course of ages, the sur-
plus of eleven days over the twelve full lunations has
been distributed among them. Among the JMoslems the
lunation is the basis of their calendar. Instead of stretch-
ing their months to fill out the year, as we do, they
shorten their year to twelve lunar months. But neither
our months nor their year are arbitrary in the same sense
as the week. Every calendar is, of course, dependent
upon law, or upon custom which carries the authority of
law. In regard to months and years, however, the law
THE WEEK. 63
simply fixes, for public convenience, the termini of pe-
riods, which nature compels us to observe with vague
boundaries. The week corresponds with no time mark
in the sky. Neither sun, nor moon, nor any star sug-
gests it or approximates to it. Science finds some traces,
not altogether decisive, of hebdomadal periodicity, in both
the normal and the diseased functions of physical life.
But these could not possibly have suggested the week.
At the very utmost they could show, if proved to exist,
only that the week, though disconnected, is not inharmo-
nious with nature.
Here, again, the distinction must be drawn between a
week, that is, merely a group of seven days, without
regular recurrence, and the ever on-rolling week of the
ages. It might be granted, — since, whether true or not,
it does not concern this study, — that there may be facts
in nature capable of suggesting a special significance in
the number seven as applied to time. No doubt seven
prominent celestial bodies were very early distinguished.
Perhaps, also, the seven chords of music. If no other
than an occasional week were known, and no better rea-
son could be found for the existence of that, its suirsfes-
tion might provisionally be referred to them. But since
the week can be traced farther back than astronomy or
music, such conjectures are of little weight. And they
have no relation, in any case, to the week in its grand
continuity. Absolutely nothing has been found in the
physical world to show why any body of men should
preserve from generation to generation, and from age
to age, the invariable and unbroken succession of the
weeks.
It is true that some writers have endeavored to find
the origin of the week in the moon's phases. Thei-e is,
however, no historical basis for such a theory. Half a
lunar month is very nearly fifteen, not fourteen days. A
64 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
very large part, if not all of the ancient heathen world,
divided their month by counting five, ten, or fifteen days
from its beginning. The people who had weeks in com-
mon use, as divisions of the lunar month, are yet to be
heard of. Their records have not been discovered. The
Ninevite calendar of Mr. Smith is no exception. In this
calendar the 7th, 14th, 21st, and 28th were noted as holi-
days or sacred days. The first division of each month,
therefore, began on the 29th of the preceding month.
But it is not credible that a lunation would have been so
divided as to make its first quarter begin while the old
moon was still visible in the morning sky, one or two
days before the new crescent appeared. If a subdivision
of the lunar month had been intended, the first quarter
would have begun with the new moon. The days noted
would, in that case, have been the 1st, 8th, 15th, and
22d, or more probably the 1st, 8th, 16th, and 23d.
Among all nations the new moon has been the most
striking and impressive of lunar phases. This calendar
ignored the new moon in order to embody the tradition
of a sacred seventh day. This at least is the only reason-
able explanation of it warranted by our present knowl-
edge. It is as if the men who used this calendar, hav-
ing come to adore the moon and other celestial bodies
as divinities in place of the One only Creator and Lord,
distorted the week series into a conformity with the
lunations, and yet so vividly remembered the religious
associations of the seventh day that they set their de-
graded monthly imitation of it above the day of the
new moon. But whatever argument for the antiquity of
the Sabbath may be drawn from this calendar, it cer-
tainly bears testimony against the theory that the week
originated in observation of the moon. That theory,
however, is most easily tested by a consideration of the
facts or actions which it implies. Let it then be sup-
THE WEEK. 65
posed, that away back in some primeval age a man of
influence, impressed by the phenomena of the moon's
quartering, resolves that his community shall begin to
count time by what he deems the period of that quarter-
ing, namely, seven days. Having secured the assent of
his tribe, he selects a certain day for the inauguration
of the new system. This day may be the next new
moon. All are carefully instructed to begin on the same
day. Having now introduced the series of weeks out of
regard to the moon's changes, chief and people straight-
way abandon all reference to the moon, and keep up this
count by sevens without the slightest further attention
to the phenomena which suggested it. Moreover, the
originator of this hebdomadal calendar provides means for
maintaining a correct count, and for pi-eventing any indi-
vidual from adding or losing a day. For this purpose it
is ordained that the first or last day of each week, one
of its boundaries, shall be a market day, or a day of wor-
ship, or in some other way publicly distinguished ; or,
the calendar is put in charge of a body of priests or
elders or other officials. All are so captivated with this
plan that successors are trained, who continue it indefi-
nitely. By the theory, the only motive for all this ex-
penditui'e of energy, ingenuity, and persistence, is the
observation of the moon's quartering, which observation
is utterly disregarded from the moment when its weekly
celebration is begun !
However ridiculous this theory, it supposes what is,
after all, wholly an arbitrary introduction of the week.
The authority of some one is presumed as the originat-
ing and maintaining power. But for that authority the
supposed series of weeks would have been broken up
and dissipated by the first return of a new moon. Since,
therefore, the physical world has nothing by which to
impress such a series of periods on the attention of men,
6
66 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
— nothing that can mark the regular beginning or end-
ing of any members of such a series, nothing which
would enable men to recover their true order and se-
quence if these sliould ever be lost, — and since the series
does exist, and has come down to ns from the dim per-
spective of an unmeasured antiquity, seemingly without
variation or intermission, there is no escape from the
conclusion that the week was instituted by personal au-
thority. It has not come from the physical, yet it is.
Therefore it must have come from the spiritual, from
the will. It is, the refore,in the sense already defined,
an arbitrary period. Whether its author was Moses or
some One earlier than Moses, he was One whose prerog-
ative is plainly certified by it. Whatever may have been
the date of its establishment, it was as distinct in its
origin, as in its inflexible regularity, from all the other
combinations of days used by man to measure duration.
Months and years are independent of human notice.
They had their course before man existed. They go on
whether men regard them or not. But the week is
wholly dependent on man's will. If men cease to ob-
serve it, it has ceased to exist.
III. The week, therefore, and it only, is a religious
period. It is the token or sign of a certain relation
between those who observe it and the authority which
has instituted it. This may be asserted either as a log-
ical deduction from what has been already advanced, or
as a summary of the historical facts. The logical chain
may be stated tlius : The week series exists. But it has
no relation to natural phenomena. Therefore its exist-
ence must be due to an arbitrary act of some personal
will. But it could not exist as a continuous series, unless
observed and counted by communities and through gen-
erations. Therefore the arbitrary act whicli established
it must have been intended to influence communities and
THE WEEK. 67
generations. Therefore, also, these must have accepted
that act and submitted to its influence. But the im-
position of an arbitrary act of some one upon a com-
munity, and its acceptance by the community, constitute
a tie between the one imposing and the body accepting.
Therefore the use and practice of that which is so im-
posed betokens and manifests the relation of authority
and loyal t3^ But the expression of a tie between the
community of mankind and a supreme authority is the
root idea of the word religion. Therefore the week ex-
presses a religious authority and a religious loyalty. Or-
ganized human society counts time by weeks because
it recognizes the supreme ^ authority of God.
The corresponding argument from history may be
summed up in three statements : —
A. The week has been used by no communities ex-
cept such as have professed to worshijD the one supreme
God.
B. The week has a divine warrant for its use, in that
it was required by the command that Israel should ob-
serve the Sabbath ; and also, in that its continuance was
sanctioned by the Divine Head and the inspired founders
of the Christian Church.
C. The week has its origin and model in the example
of God himself, who, in his earliest communication to
man, represented himself as beginning the count of mun-
dane time with the week.
A. Concerning the first of these statements it should
be noted that Islam, which continues our week, professes
to worship our God. Polytheism, however, which knows
1 It is said that the queue was imposed on the Chinese by the first
Mantcliu dynasty as a test of loyalty in applicants for literary de-
grees or for office. Its use is still therefore a symbol or manifesta-
tion of national loyalty to their emperors, though possibly few may
think of its signi6cance in these days.
68 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
nothing of our week in its unvarying succession, has
some knowledge of an occasional week. Traces of such
a week are said to be found among nations so far apart
as the Chinese and the Peruvians. They ai'e compar-
atively luimerous from the Ganges to the Nile. They
usually, perhaps always, appear in some religious con-
nection, as though some dim, vague, yet persistent tradi-
tion maintained in all minds an association between
divine affairs and the period of seven days. But the
chance week of heathendom does not specially concern
us now. The important fact involved in the present
statement is this : The week now known to the world,
wherever either Christian or Moslem influence is felt, is
the result wholly of the spread of Christianity. The
converts adopted it as one of the institutions or concom-
itants of their faith. It was nowhere in use at the Chris-
tian era, except among the Jews. The Roman Empire
was fortified against it, by its system of nundines, which
did not yield until the empire itself submitted to Christ.
A heathen historian, Dio Cassius, in the last century of
the struggle between the two worships, declared that the
Romans learned the week from the Egyptians, and that
the peculiar order of the seven names for its days was
ingeniously deduced from the Pythagorean cosmology.
But we now know that the same names in the same
strange order were recorded a thousand years before Py-
thagoras. Moreover, the Egyptians, whatever dubious
tradition their priest guild may have preserved, had as a
people no recurring week of which to tell the Romans.
Extant literature abundantly proves, that both learned
something of it first from Judaism, and were forced to
adopt it, by the increasing domination of Christianity.
And ever since, as nation after nation has accepted Chris-
tianity, each has taken with it the Christian week. It
will be the sign of national submission to the cross, when
the people of China and Japan shall use it familiarly.
THE WEEK. 69
B. According to the second statement, a certain divine
warrant for the use of the week stands in the history.
This warrant stands in every particular now. For the
Christian week is identical with the JMosaic. It is not
merely like it. It is not a successor to it. It is precisely
and exactly the same series. God ordained our present
week for his people redeemed from bondage. The risen
Lord observed our present week when He withheld him-
self, after the resurrection, until that week had closed.
It does not matter, as to this point, whether the series
began at Sinai or before. Nor would it affect this his-
torical argument if the week had been a natural period
like the month and the year. If the Almighty had chosen
to take a certain period, which men had learned from
nature to observe occasionally, and if He had chosen
to command, for a special duty, the regular observance
of that period, then it would have become a sign of
his prerogative, just as the rainbow is now a sign of his
promise. Much more emphatically, therefore, does the
week represent his august authority, since there is noth-
ing to which its conception can be referred, except his
own charge. And, even more than this, as if to rivet the
impression that the week was clothed with a divine sanc-
tion of a different kind from that of all other divisions of
time, God, in the statutes prescribed for Israel, grouped
months and years in weeks, and reduplicated weeks of
weeks and weeks of years, so that, all religious times
must go by sevens, and also, that the observance of the
sevens would be the most distinct ^ outward token of loy-
alty to Him. And, however the letter of some of these
statutes may have been limited by the land of Israel,
their spirit affects all men who are loyal to God. For
they clearly set forth the intent of God, that his prerog-
ative should be manifested in the observance of septimal
^ "Most distinct," because no heathen ever had the Uke.
70 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
time, arranged according to a fixed and arbitrary scheme,
independent of nature, resting on his will alone. Our
present week, being the identical week of Moses' age, ex-
pi'esses now, as then, that acknowledgment of God's su-
premacy, and of human loyalty, which in a general sense
we call religion. It may be said that, for communities
to count by weeks, is, for them to wear the uniform of
theism.
C. According to the third statement, the week has its
historic origin and model in the example of God, who,
in revealing the creation, represents himself as beginning
our world's count of time with the week. This state-
ment has no relation to science. Whatever, during the
creative processes, may have been the lapse of time, as
compared with measures now familiar to us, — whatever
may have been the limits, the interspaces, the distinctive
features of the creative periods, as geology, if it were
perfected, could describe them, — the fact remains that
God has chosen to represent the whole as framed in a
week of seven days. Again, at whatever point of time,
during the existence of our race, the present week se-
ries began, — whether in the sunshine of Eden, or__ after
the fall, or at the exodus from Goshen, — the fact remains
that God has referred to his creative week as its model.
So far as history speaks at all on this subject, it un-
equivocally pronounces the week no invention of man,
but a thought of God. As the spiritual world is beside
the material, coexistent, therefore consistent, yet indepen-
dent ; as the Church is beside the secular organism of
society, the state, alike in the demand for and acceptance
of individual allegiance, yet so distinct that allegiance to
each is independent of the other ; as the functions of re-
ligion, the acts of associated and of individual worship,
are beside the other duties and activities of life, the one
coloring, supporting, directing the other, yet each having
THE WEEK. 71
an independent purpose ; so is the week athwart the roll
of all secular times, which are measured by the material
works of God. It is not incongruous with them, yet not
in the least dependent ; not hindering or confusing, but
rather helping men in their use, yet not allied in the least,
— a distinct, separate time succession, dependent for its
norm, not on any or all the works of God, but on his
simple word.
IV. The successive week, like no other time measure,
is maintained by the institution of a sacred day to mark
its boundary. This sacred day defines the week. It
brings before all minds the week's end and beginning.
It marks the transition from an old to a new week. No
community would be able to keep the reckoning, without
the help of some circumstance which should bring the
fact of a week's conclusion plainly and unavoidably to
general notice. Perhaps, if there were sufficient induce-
ment, a body of officials or a college of priests might be
able to keep such a reckoning by methods of their own,
without any popular observance. It is possible (and no
more) that this may have been done in Egypt. The
difficulties would be very great. Any one who has lost
count of the days in some foreign city destitute of those
familiar signs which usher in the week at home, can
realize this. After some time at sea, or in forest, or
desert, away from human intercourse, or when tied to
the monotony of a sick-bed, it becomes no easy task to
keep np with the day of the month, or sometimes to re-
member which month is passing, much less to tally the
week days all alike.
It might be possible to maintain the succession of
weeks for a time, by the institution of a mai-ket on the
first or last day of each. But that would be carried on
only so long as its advantages were felt. There could be
no restraint upon a change of day, if that should seem
(- EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
desirable. If war, pestilence, or any other cause pre-
vented for a time the regular market, the series of weeks
would be broken off and probably forgotten. But there
is no record of such an institution. We, in fact, know
the week only as it is marked by a religious day. It is
the plant of which that day is the blossom. It is the
husk of which that day is the kernel. It is the setting
of which that day is the gem. It is the man of which
that day ^ is the face and head. Yet the week is not
wholly incidental to the institution of a sacred day.
One distinct purpose of the day is the preservation of
the week series intact. For it is not any one day in
seven that may be treated as sacred. Xothing more, it
is true, than that is necessarily implied in the command
to keep boly the seventh day. But the history of our
religion shows that, in fact, the sacred day has always
been a mark or boundary of the unchanging week.
Since divine superintendence has always been over the
faithful, we must believe that this principle, always main-
tained, expresses the divine will. Both the period as
such and the day as such are religious or sacred in the
sense before defined ; namely, as signs of a relation be-
tween God and a community of men, because alike used
onh' by communities who acknowledge God, alike sanc-
tioned to Him, alike originating in his own representa-
tion of his creative work. Therefore the week cannot
exist without the day, or the day stand without the week.
Each implies the other. Each supports the other.
It may, however, be necessary to entertain the ques-
tion, whether, if it were possible to obliterate entirely
the religious character of Sundaj', so that no one should
in any way be reminded of God by its return, the week
might not still continue in popular use. Those influences
tending to maintain it may be now discerned. These
1 George Herbert, Sunday.
THE WEEK. V3
are religious doty, familiar custom, and convenience. Of
course if the religious character of Sunday should van-
ish, there would be no religious impulse for counting
the weeks. But this might be kept up for the sake of
custom and convenience, if a secular holiday could be
established after the elimination of the holy day. There
would certainly be some in England and America, if not
elsewhere, who would advocate, on grounds of public
expediency wholly apart from religious considerations, a
legal holiday as pregnant as the present Sunday. But it
would, of course, be necessary to create this holiday by
statute. Moreover, to protect those for whose benefit it
is intended, employers (other than those whose business
is presumably indispensable) must be compelled to sus-
pend work. Whenever such a law should be proposed, it
is absolutely certain that it would be vehemently opposed
bv two classes. One would urge, reasonably enough from
their point cf view, that to enact a weekly holiday would
be substantially to reinstate the discarded sacred day ;
and so they would plead for a day unmistakably distinct,
the eighth or tenth day, or some particular day or days
of the month. To them the week could not be other
than a reminder of God. It should go with his day.
Another class, larger probably and more influential,
would argue, in the interest of commerce and industry,
against frequent holidays. They would show that a day
of pleasure-seeking and dissipation unfitted men for the
next day's work. The restraints of religion having been
removed, the proposed holiday would infallibly (judging
from experience) be much more a day of reckless in-
dulgence and debauchery than the worst-kept Sunday is
now. As, therefore, the proposed day would really in-
volve the loss of two or three days of profitable work,
the business class would strenuously endeavor to have
it occur only once in two or three weeks, or after a longer
74 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
interval. It is as certain as any deduction from experi-
ence can be, that this opposition to a weekly holiday
would prevail. Those who favored it could not prove,
on humanitarian grounds, that precisely one day in seven
was needed for relaxation rather tlian one day in eight,
or ten, or tl^irt3^ Physicians and scientific men would
express widely different opinions. The result would be,
at best, a compromise. The proposed holiday, if en-
acted, would be fixed on certain days of the month, and
bear no reference to the week at all. Probably it would
be shifted about from time to time by successive legisla-
tures, sometimes more, sometimes less frequent, some-
times threatening to disappear. True religion, or false
religion, or the most shadowy superstition, can maintain
an indefinite number of holidays. In some lanJs so
many are now enforced in this way as to be a serious
drain upon production, and a stubborn hindrance to all
improvement. But commerce is an enemy of all holi-
days. They are incongruous with its life. It always
opposes their establishment. It always encroaches upon
them. They are not profitable. It may be true that, in
the long run, more wealth can be gained in six days, fol-
lowed by a regular Sabbath spent religiously, than in un-
interrupted devotion to business. But herein is involved
the consideration of physical, mental, and moral benefits
accruing from the religious observance. Take those
away, and business men will never believe that six days
can be more profitable than seven. The great body of
wage-earners will believe it just as little. Then when
once a generation should have grown up in utter igno-
rance of any religious association with the week, it is
difficult to see how custom or convenience could keep
it in familiar use. Custom could preserve nothing but
the series of seven day-names. Every day is now dis-
tinguished in two ways. One is sufficient. For com-
THE WEEK. 75
niercial and legal purposes one only is commonlj^ used.
The merchant and the lawyer write July 1st. The
newspaper and familiar letters may be dated Tuesday,
July 1st. In conversation probably the day would be
more frequently mentioned as Tuesday than as July 1st.
And there is a reason for this. Sunday is a fact which
influences our lives in a thousand ways. Every day of
the week is involuntarily and unintentionally regarded
in reference to its distance from that. The significance
of Friday is ^ that it is two days, of Thursday, that it is
three days, before Sunday. Let Sunday be made pre-
cisely like Thursday or Friday, and those names would
become meaningless. What possible difference could it
make whether the day were called Thursday or Friday,
if Saturday, Sunday, and Monday are to follow with
nothing to distinguish between them. Remembering the
week name of the day would become more and more
difficult from the lack of points for comparison. And
the recollection would serve no practical end. To note
the day of the month is sufficient for all uses and require-
ments, when there is no reference either to the religious
character of Sunday, or to those features which it has
derived, directly or indirectly, from that character. It
is as certain as any forecast of human affairs can be that
in no long time, under such conditions, the names of the
week days would fade out of popular knowledge, and
live among the learned, like the names of Greek or
Hebrew months.
When thoroughly examined, the perfect consistency
of the Scriptures, and the exact correlation of all their
parts, become the better understood. It cannot be that
among the very brief records permitted by the Spirit of
Wisdom to reach us concerning the most important event
^ For example, the Germans call Wednesday "Mittwoch," or
" Midweek," instead of Wodenstag, the old name.
76 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
in all history, a statement repeated five times should be
accounted trivial, or even of secondary moment. He by
whom apostles as well as prophets spake has thus em-
phasized the fact that the resurrection of our Loi-d is in
some preeminently significant way related to the week.
When the nature of the week is comprehended, the
reason for this emphasis begins to appear. The week
has been, through the ages as now, the sign of a relation
between God and man. It is a witness, not — like months
and years — to the material, but to the spiritual. It tells
not of sun, moon, and stars, which are seen, but of a
Spirit unseen. It exists, not in accordance with con-
ditions and circumstances inherent in nature, but by the
arbitrament of a Supreme Will, communicated to loyal
dependents. It is fitted for human use, kept in its
regular unvarying succession before human notice, and
maintained as the assurance of divine regard for man,
by the institution of a sacred day which marks its boun-
dary and illuminates the transition from one week to
the next. The emphasis, then, of the fivefold gospel
statement is on this circumstance, that our Lord's resur-
rection day is the boundary, the defining day of a new
week, — identical with the old, yet transfigured in this
new moi-ning's light. So, then, all the significance of
that day, which seals to man his one great all-compre-
hending divinely-centred hope, is blended with the sig-
nificance of that period which, through the ages, has
assured a bond between God and man, — when the
transcendent day of days is described as the first day
of the week.
STUDY IV.
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY.
" The Lord said unto Noah . . . The Lord shut him in." — Gen. vii. 1, 16.
Unlike the unvarying monotony of the week the his-
tory of its sacred day is a development. This development
has three distinct stages, the second of which corresponds
with the national^ career of Israel. In this second or
central stage the day appears as one member of a system
of observances, closely related in their manner, and all
defined and enforced by special statutes. Since this sys-
tem of statutes and observances was not known in the
earlier pre-Israelite age, and since it has been in abeyance
during the later or post-Israelite age, it is evident that
the essential and universal and perpetual features or char-
acteristics of the sacred day must be independent of that
system. The nation ^ of Israel, and its national laws,
lived only about fifteen hundred years. That which char-
acterized the sacred day during the thousands of years
preceding and succeeding Israel's age must be its core
and heart and life, not that which was known and pre-
scribed only during the comparatively brief space inter-
mediate. Yet, since the statutes pertaining to this inter-
mediate stage — even those clearly evanescent — are all
^ By "nation" ("national") is meant here a people organized
and localized, that is having a government and territory of tlieir
own, as distinguished from the race, those sprung from one root
(radix). The organized and localized nation of Israel has vanished.
The race still endures.
78 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
divine in their origin and authority, expressing God's
thought ; and since all the works, all the plans, and all
the arrangements of Him who is perfect wisdom, must
be harmonious and cooperative, therefore, all that is
limited to this central stage, as its peculiar characteristic,
must be the development and illustration and enforce-
ment of something which, before and after, as well as all
through that time, continued to be the real, unvarying,
and deepest principle of the observance. Through all
the long ages humanity has grown stronger and wiser.
The divine plans have been unfolded and explained as
the human capacity to understand them and act upon
them has grown. It is not, therefore, in debate whether
the nineteenth Christian century — the heir of all the
Christian and of all the Israelitish ages — mayor may
not have a larger interest in this sacred day than any
antediluvian. But, on the other hand, it is no less be-
yond controversy that those interests in the day which
we share with the antediluvians must be, as the earliest,
so the most enduring, therefore the most profoundly and
essentially vital, — the most human of all.
The Book of Genesis, in its relation to the sacred sev-
enth day, presents some remarkable parallels to the New
Testament in its treatment of the Lord's Day. The
Lord's Day is so styled in the New Testament once ; the
seventh day, in Genesis once. The event to which the
Lord's Day refers is clearly described in the New Tes-
tament ; the event to which the seventh day refers is
equally clear in Genesis. The action of our Lord, in
observing the week by his abstention and in glorifying
its boundary day by his manifestation, answers to the
action of the Creator who obsei-ves the week in the de-
velopment of his Kosmos, and crowns the seventh day
with his personal benediction. Li the New Testament
there is no formal command to observe the Lord's Day ;
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY. 79
in Genesis, no formal command to observe tlie seventh
day. But as the observance of the Lord's Day, after
the close of the New Testament canon, throws light upon
the few alhisions in tlie text, so the observance j.^ ^g. 22-
of the seventh day, after the close of Genesis ^"•
and before the enactments at Sinai, throws light upon
the earlier records. Nevertheless, alike in the New Tes-
tament and in Genesis, the facts of the actual observance
of the sacred days are stated incidentally, not directly,
as though the author of Holy Writ intended that their
meaning should be yielded up to those of later times, pre-
pared by the discipline of the ages to use it. On their
earliest readers (or reciters) the impression which induced
them to maintain their sacred day was made by some-
thing more than this bare record.
There is a minor correspondence in the circumstance
that the first day of the week is five ^ times mentioned
in the New Testament as the resurrection day, and five
days in Genesis are mentioned as the boundaries of hu-
man weeks. No circumstance is trivial in these stories.
That fivefold repetition in the gospels certifies the adop-
tion of the Aveek by Christianity. Those five days in
Genesis certify the maintenance of the week in all the
primeval age. They occur on the border between an-
cient and most ancient time in the history of the flood.
"And the Lord said unto Noah, Come thou Gen. 7: 1.
and all thy house into the ark. . . . For yet Gen. 7:4.
seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth. . . .
And it came to pass, after seven days, that the Gen. 7: 10.
waters of the flood were upon the earth. In Gen. 7: 11.
1 There are six notices of the resurrection on the first day of the
•week if the last verses of Mark are accepted. There are also six
days in Genesis if the flight of the raven occurred a week before the
first flight of the dove from the ark, as suggested by the words
'^^ other seven days."
80 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second
month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day
were all the fountains of the great deep broken up. . . .
Gen. 7: 13. In the self-same day entered Noah . . . into the
Gen. 7:16. ark; . . . and the Lord shut him in." The
command to enter came seven days before the shutting
in. Two days therefore are fixed here, the tenth and
the seventeenth of the second month, each the boundary
of a week.
When the flood had largely abated, Noah sent out
„ „ a dove which soon returned weary. After a
Gen. 8 : 8, 9. , , i i • i
Gen. 8: 10, wcek he again sent out the dove, which again
"■ returned, but this time bringing a sproutlet of
Gen. 8: 12. welcome grccn. Yet again, after another week,
he let go the dove, to see her no more. Here are three
days, each the boundary of a week. Before sending out
the dove Noah had dispatched a raven. Whether this
was immediately before and on the same day, or whether
it was seven days before, is not certain. The words
" other seven days," in Hebrew as in English, may imply
a previous week's interval. The raven went forth on the
fortieth day after the first of the tenth month.
Counting the tenth month as of twenty-nine
days and including its first day in the forty, the day of
the raven would be the eleventh of the next month. If
the dove was let go first, after a week, then its days were
the eighteenth and twenty-fifth of the eleventh month,
and the second of the twelfth. These are all counted as
lunar months.
Were they lunar months ? Some have thought that
they were all to be taken as of thirty days each. This
opinion is based upon the mention of the ark's grounding
" in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day
of the month," just five months after the flood
began ; and upon the statement in the same connection,
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY. 81
that " the waters prevailed upon the earth an hundred and
fifty days ; " and " after the end of the hundred Gen. 7: 24.
and fifty days the waters were abated." It has Qen. s: 3.
been assumed that the five months and the hundred and
fifty days were the same period. But the narrative does
not warrant this assumption, and is forced into an un-
natural if not absurd interpretation by accepting it.
And if the assumption were accepted it would prove
that the months in question did not consist of thirty days
each.
There is a radical difference in character between the
two series of events to which the five months and the
hundred and fifty days are respectively referred. The
" shuttino; in " the ark was a definite circumstance un-
erringly associated with a definite day. The resting upon
Ararat was an equally definite circumstance, equally fixed
in its association with a definite day. Each involved an
impact, a sensible physical efifect, at a certain precise
moment. Each necessarily evoked the liveliest interest
and the most particular notice of Noah and his party.
There could be no uncertainty or misconception here.
But there could be no precise statement of the time
during which the waters prevailed. Who could fix the
height which was to be taken as the level of their prev-
alence ? Who could ascertain when that level was sur-
passed and when it was regained on the ebb ? Such a
statement as we have here, if made by a modern engi-
neer provided with all his instruments of precision, would
be taken as an indefinite round number, and would be so
intended by him. The inmates of the ark had appar-
ently very little outlook before the removal of its cover-
ing. They saw when the hill-tops had disappeared, and
noticed when they had emerged again. But they could
have had no view of the general surface. They sent out
the birds to gather information of that. They knew
82 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
probably that t^ey must be fifteen cubits above the land
^ „ n. when their vessel, thirty cubits high, was float-
Gen. 7: 20. , . •' °
ing. But in the nature of things they did not
and could not fix the moment or the day when the wa-
ters began or ceased " to prevail." The time of their
prevalence is properly expressed by a round number.
Moreover, the identification of these hundred and fifty
days with the five months involves the absurdity of sup-
posing that the flood rose to a vast height over the whole
region on the very day when it began to rain. For if
this identification be true, then the time of prevalence
ceased when the waters were still about twenty feet deep
on the height where the ark rested, and of course very
much deeper over the plain. And since, on this the-
cr}'^, the prevalence began on the first day of the flood,
the waters must have risen immediately to a correspond-
ing height. But to suppose that, wath less than one
whole day of rain, the inundation was so great as to float
the ark and to prevail twenty feet deep over the coun-
try, seems to be pressing the miraculous equally be-
yond the limits of the record and of sound common
sense. To meet all the requirements of the verbal state-
ments in the narrative with perfect consistency, w^e have
only to understand that, after the forty days' rain, the
general submergence continued for a long period, stated
in round numbers as one hundred and fifty days, during
which the ark, however, rested on some higli point.
But if it were believed that the deluge reached its
height instantaneousl}', so that the time when it prevailed
could be said to be ended as the ark grounded, then the
necessary conclusion must be, that the five months did
not consist of thirty days each. For it is certain, accord-
ing to the Hebrew idiom, and according to oriental ideas
and the general practice of antiquity, that if these hun-
dred and fifty days are to be taken precisely, then we
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY. 83
must count the starting-point,^ the seventeenth clay of
the second month, as the first of tliem, leaving only a
hundred and forty-nine days to the five months.
Leaving then this theory to shift for itself, it is time
to notice three facts, disconnected and independent of
each other, which present good evidence that the Noa-
chian calendar must have been made of lunar months, al-
ternating twenty-nine and thirty days.
The first fact is, that such is the natural calendar.
The firmanent is nature's clock-face. The sun and moon
are the hands upon the dial. They serve men who are
without almanacs and without science. They regulate
themselves. On this celestial clock-face the moon is the
minute-hand, whose movements are most rapid and most
noticeable. The new moon begins each month. Men soon
learn by experience precisely when to look for it. Though
the heavens be covered with clouds, and the crescent there-
fore hidden, yet count is made from the last quartering
or other circumstance w^ith little room for error. And
the first clear night corrects any error that may occur.
The beginning of the year in Mesopotamia would doubt-
less be at the new moon first and. after (or nearest to)
the autumnal equinox, the beginning of the rainy season.
Every third year would have thirteen new moons. But
there would be no need to count the lunations so as to
allot the intercalary one to its proper place. Probably
the beginning of the rains would be the sign observed in
practice, rather than the sun's course. If, therefore, when
the rains began twelve new moons had appeared, that
year would have twelve months. But if the thirteenth
moon appeared before the rains, then there would be
thirteen months. We know that on the average this
would occur every third year. Thus there would be a
^ Gen. 7: 10 has " after seven days," of whicli seven the lOtli day
of the 2d month was the first. The day after the eighth.
84 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
variation in the length of one year out of three. With
us also the years vary ; one out of four being longer by a
day. But though the variation in the natural is so much
greater than in our own highly artificial calendar of the
years, it matters nothing for simple peoples, for agricul-
tural and pastoral lives, and for all the demands of loosely
organized society, or of rudimentary bartering trade. If,
by any chance, some one should begin the month a day
too soon or the year a month too soon, the error would
infallibly be corrected at the next new moon or new year.
No minute computation of rent, or of interest, or official
tenure, would be thought of by such folk, and no matter
of weight and concern to them would be affected by an
error if it were made. Probably it was never made.
On the other hand, an artificial calendar cannot exist,
except under the two conditions that a demand for it is
felt and that means for providing it are available. That
is, the i^eople must be supposed to have reached such a
stage of civilization and of commerce that the variation
in the years, by the natural calendar, has become sensibly
inconvenient. They must have transactions in the na-
ture of rents or business credits involving close calcula-
tion of the time for settlement. Or they must have a
central authority which, for some purpose connected with
its religious ritual, or for some administrative end, such
as taxation or conscription, desires that its years should
begin always with the same phase of the sun, and so be
as nearly as possible equal. Moreover, there must be
such progress in astronomy and mathematics that a tol-
erably correct solar year has been calculated ; and there
must be so much governmental vigor that the new calen-
dar is made known and enforced throughout the commu-
nity. For the new calendar is artificial. It may fairly cor-
respond to the sun's course, but for this purpose it must
disregard the moon. There is no new sun, like the new
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY. 85
moon, to mark an initial day ; therefore the day of this
artificial new year must be fixed arbitrarily. And since
for the year's sake the moons are more or less disre-
garded, the day of each month's beginning must also be
fixed by law and enforced by the state. Our own calen-
dar is so fixed now, as that of every advanced nation has
always been. We have no evidence that these conditions
existed in Noah's day. No trace appears of any organ-
ization such as could fairly be called a state. It is doubt-
ful whether there was the skill, as yet, to contrive and
adjust an artificial calendar if it were wanted. It is ex-
ceedingly improbable that there could be such a social
development as would care for any other than nature's
calendar marked on the sky for every man, and indepen-
dent of the attention or the will of any man.
There is a second fact. This natural calendar is that of
the Mosaic legislation and of the Hebrew nation, compare!
Every month for them began with a new moon, fo^wuh Ps.
Their year began with the new moon of the ^^ • '^^■
autumnal equinox. Thus the Sabbatic years and the Ju-
bilee were proclaimed at the time of the nation-
^ . Lev. 25 : 9.
al atonement. Iheir months, however, were
counted from the new moon, about the time of the vernal
equinox, when the Passover opened the grand
yearly ritual. But it is not to be supposed
that there was any scientific determination of equinoxes.
If the spring were sufficiently advanced so that some ripe
barleys would be found within a fortnight in the warm
Jordan valley, then the new moon would open the first
month. If the spring were late, this would be the inter-
calary month, the double Adar. If there were any room
for doubt, the high priest could decide, and the travel-
ing Levites speedily disseminate the notice. But it is dif-
ficult to see how any doubt could arise. Certainly we
have no indication of any confusion. Probably they kept
86 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
up the fixed custom of repeating their Adar, the twelfth
month, every third year.
The Israelites did not learn this calendar in Egypt.
There, in Moses' time, the year in common use probably
consisted of twelve months having thirty days each, with
five intercalary days. Perhaps the Hebrews, while they
were Egyptian subjects, were compelled to conform to
this calendar. If so, they still kept note of the sun and
moon, and fell back to the older habit the moment they
contemplated escape. No trace of the Egyptian year ap-
pears in the history. The great Lawgiver of Israel incor-
porated the story of Noah in his books, that it might be
read by Israel and Israel's posterit3% But to these noth-
ing could have been suggested by the word month, except
the moon's time, with which they were familiar. This
is what Moses certainly meant when he wrote " month "
elsewhere. Can it be believed that in this story he used
the word, without notice, in a different sense, so as at
once to be inconsistent with himself and infallibly to mis-
lead his people?
There is a third fact. This natural, Mosaic, Israelitish
calendar, when applied to the incidents of the narrative,
reveals an adequate reason for the specification of the
different dates. It shows that the divine communications
and interpositions, and the significant acts of Noah as a
man of faith, all took place on the same sacred day of
regular and successive weeks. This fact is exhibited by
the following table : —
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY.
87
ASSUMED
CALENDAI
I OF THE ARK STOR
Y.
Year of
Noah, 600.
Month.
Sacred Day.
I.
(30 days)
5
12
19
26
II.
(29 days)
3
10
Notice to embark, chap. 7 : 4.
17
Shut in, chap. 7 : 11. "] .c ;;^
24
^ ^r
III.
(30 days)
2
'7^ T!
9
S't-
16
23
III. mo. 27 day. J ^o
30
IV.
(29 days)
7
14
21
28
V.
(30 days)
6
13
20
27
VI.
(29 days)
4
11
18
•
25
VII.
(30 days)
3
10
17
Grounding of ark, chap. 8 : 4.
24
VIII.
(29 days)
1
8
15
22
29
IX.
(30 days)
7
14
21
28
First mountain tops,
-\-Zl
X.
(29 days)
5
12
19
26
chap. 8 : 5.
(M OO 'rt 6
II d.?' 3
XI.
(30 days)
4
-^ ^ °
11
Raven, chap. 8:7.
O -h" II "S
18
Dove 1st, chap. 8: 8.
1
25
Dove 2d, chap. 8 : 10.
EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
Month.
Sacred Day.
XII.
(29 days)
2
9
16
23
Dove 3d, chap. 8:
12.
Year of Noah, 601.
! I-
(30 days)
1
8
15
22
29
Uncovering, cliap.
8: 13,
II.
(29 days)
6
13
20
27
Exit and sacrifice,
chap.
From the day of shutting in to the day of exit, 52 weeks. Preva-
lence of waters, 150 days indefinite time. Chaps. 7: 24; 8 : 3.
In this calendar the first month has been taken as of
thirty days and the second of twenty-nine days. The
order might have been reversed, for there is no rule in
nature that the second new moon of each year shall
appear thirty days rather than twenty-nine days after
the first. It is not to be supposed that Noah"s family
counted the days. At least they have never told us how
many they counted. Our science has told us that there
would ordinarily be this alternation. When we find that
by taking the first month at thirty days all the events
of the story fit into their proper places, we cannot doubt
that our hypothesis is true.
On the tenth of month second Noah received a divine
communication. The occasion was solemn. It was the
announcement of the immediate approach of dire calam-
ity. Yet the imminent storm of retribution was pierced
with the golden light of an explicit and benign prom-
ise. It was like the gospel-preaching of the acceptable
year and the day of vengeance. Was not the
Is 61 • 2 .
day when God spake this word to Noah a sacred
day?
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY. 89
Seven days later there was another divine intervention
still more solemn. What kind of human beings would
those eight be if, in the dusk and closing gloom of that
awful day, in their strange habitation and stranger com-
panionship, they did not thrill with overwhelming emotion
when, — buried from the living world of men, ushered
upon a momentous voyage through the unknown, and
aware that they must not expect to return to those whom
they were leaving, — the Lord shut them in ! Was not
this, too, a sacred day ? If now the succession of sev-
enth days is noted, the twenty-first after the flood began
is found to be that day when, after five months of
weary heaving on the waters, the great structure at last
grounded. This circumstance, if part of the experience
of an ordinary shipwreck, would have been no more than
an interesting incident. But this ark history is no ordi-
nary human experience. Leaving out any typical or
symbolic character, it is the record of a man of faith who,
in obedience to God and in reliance on the promise of
God, intrusted himself and his family to the care of
God, under conditions in which he himself was able
neither to exercise any influence over the direction of
affairs, nor even to know day by day their state. He
was " shut in " the ark. He was helpless in the ark.
He knew not the developments outside the ark, and could
not hope to learn. He knew when the rain fell and
when the sun shone. The monotone of the wash against
his vessel's sides doubtless became tediously familiar.
But whither the ark was going, what sign there might
be of release, or whether by any means a better course
might be taken so as to hasten the release, — he could
not tell. He was solely in the care of God. Under
these conditions the touch of the ark upon a shoulder of
Ararat was a ratification of the promise. It evinced the
Lord's protection through the past five stormy months.
90 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
It assui'ed the validity of his word to carry them safely
through and out of the trial. The quivering of the
mighty ark as it met the solid hill awoke in eight hearts
an answering flutter of hope, a thrill of courage. The
solid ground was the solid covenant of God beneath
them. Is it not fit that the day, fraught with this expe-
rience of the divine interposition, should appear in the
list of sacred days ?
The next incident recorded was the discovery of bare
hill-tops on the first day of the tenth month. This was
gratefully recorded. But it was not a personal experi-
ence like the last. It did not come home to their very
selves like the shock which told them, perhaps while
offering worship, that they were actually resting no more
on water but on safe unmoving land. This first sight of
land was not an act or word of God with respect to them,
nor of theirs with respect to God. It did not, in fact,
occur on a sacred day but three days after.
The fortieth day, including this or the thirty-nlntk
day after this, was the sixteenth sacred day after the
grounding, the thirty-seventh after the shutting in. Nine
new moons had appeared in their turns. Four had shone
since the grounding. During nearly four months the
eight had known that they were safe. They were on
land. But they were in prison, though prisoners of hope.
How intense was their craving for some intelligence of
the lost world, for some news of the shore invisible to
them, if yet there was a shore outside their walls. At
last an experiment was made. A raven was allowed to
fly away, and afterward a dove. The man of exemplary
faith and patience sent them out. But the creatures in
the ark had been put, by the Lord, under his care. Did
he then recklessly expose to destruction one of the crea-
tui'es intrusted to him? After nine months of patient
submissive waiting did his curiosity and impatience tempt
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY. 91
him to overstep the bounds of duty ? Or did he ask
and receive permission from the Owner and Source of all
the lives in his charge? The day chosen for this act
was the same day of the week whose association with
divine revelation and interposition had been already
noted. Did he not ask and receive divine permission on
this sacred day ?
The first essay resulted in nothing. The patriarch
■waited for the next sacred day. He waited again for
the next, and if the raven went out a week before the
other he waited yet again. The repetition of Noah's act
after each sacred interval plainly lifts the act to the level
of faith. There is an evident relation between the act
and the day. For not only did he wait seven days, or,
as we would say, until the seventh day after each essay,
but much more, he waited for the return of that one day
of the seven which all through this story is the hallowed
day.
The patience of the patriarch was farther tested. From
the twig brought by the dove he learned that verdure
was springing up. Yet he made no effort to catch a
sight of it. He had reason to believe that both the dove
and the raven had found their customary home and food.
He might reasonably expect that there was also a resting-
place and food for man. But he waited four weeks until
this same sacred day had returned the fourth time. Then
on no other day than this he removed the roofing and
saw the land. Did he break away from his magnificent
patience and willfully remove the ark's covering ? Or
did he take this day for another act of faith in obedience
to a divine permission or command ? He is not por-
trayed as a man of perfect character. But this narrative
limns a serenity and simplicity of faith which stands as
clear as a statue in marble. The mind which cannot see
on this day, preceded and followed by weeks of immov-
92 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
able calm, the act of reverent confiding obedience, surely
has no conception of the ideal attitude of a child of God.
Whatever moved Noah, he uncovered the ark on the
sacred day.
For the first time he saw the landscape. Apparently
the surface was dry. But there was no haste. He did
not act upon what he saw, but upon what he was bidden.
For eight more long weeks lie did not appropriate the
promise, thougli it lay before his eyes, and at his feet.
His patience had its perfect work. It was truly sublime.
At last came the divine command " Go forth." The
twenty-seventh day of the second month of the second
year of the flood was precisely fifty-two weeks after the
embarkation. On that same day of the week on which
the Lord had commanded liis servant to enter, and after-
ward had shut him in ; and, still later, had guided his un-
wieldy vessel to a favorable spot on the supporting hill,
— He now released him. And this man, who had en-
tered the ark on such a day, had once and again sent out
a winged messenger on such a day, and on such a day
had unroofed the ark, — now, on this same day of the
week, went out at God's word and offered a grateful sac-
rifice.
The facts speak for themselves. Here we find the
week and the sacred day of the week in actual succes-
sion. The narrative may not be given in order to record
circumstances relating to the week and its sacred day.
But there they are, the web of which the story is woven.
Why then did not the writer plainly designate each of
these sacred says as a Sabbath ? The answer cannot be
uncertain. They were not Sabbaths, in the sense that
word carried after Moses' day. They were not Sabbaths
in respect to the obligation of rest. Nor were they Sab-
baths in respect of association with a system of obser-
vances. At Sinai the cessation of work was made prom-
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY. 93
inent. The labor of unroofing the ark would have seemed
a sin to pious Jews, if it had been done on the Sabbath.
Priests and Levites, of course, did much work on that
day about the sacred precincts. But the analogy between
their work and Noah's is not plain. There is, however,
no duplicity in the Scriptures. The special emphasis put
upon rest, as a mark or feature of Israel's Sabbath, was
not felt in the time of Noah. Neither could the patri-
arch have comprehended the series of related Sabbaths
and Sabbatisms, introduced under jMoses to illustrate the
seventh day. But it does not follow that, because rest-
ing was not made the marked characteristic of the early
sacred day, therefore no cessation or diminution of labor
was customary. Likewise it does not follow that, be-
cause the impressive Sabbatic System was not in exist-
ence, therefore no definable religious significance attached
to the day. It was not Mosaic. It was not Jewish. But
it was sacred.
Through fifteen Israelitish centuries, the meaning of
Israel's Sabbath was taught by an extended course of ob-
ject lessons. Can we now exclude these lessons from our
imaginations, in order to discover, if possible, what ideas
were before Israel's time the possession of believing men,
and therefore our inheritance ? In order to assist in this,
the observance has been called simply the sacred day.
Three questions now arise. The first is : In what was
this day observed ; or, how could it have been distin-
guished from other days? The second is: What was the
object or intention of those who observed the day ? The
last is : What did this day mean or suggest to those who
observed it ?
Taking up the first question, how was the day observed
or distinguished, we are certified at the outset that in
some way it was distinguished. Here is the record of its
regular succession. The facts are stated incidentally, but
94 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
so much the more unequivocall3\ If these days had
been observed only while Noah was in the ark, or if
he had then begun to observe them, it is inconceivable
that such a fact should not be stated. They are men-
tioned incidentally, because taken for granted. They are
taken for granted, because to the minds of Noah's fam-
ily, from some of whom the story must have been derived,
the succession of these sacred days was a perfectly famil-
iar matter, as familiar as the succession of months and
years, like that succession continuing from an indefinite
past, and, as little as that, to be accounted for or ex-
plained. But it is incredible, impossible, that Noah, or
others of his age, could keep the tally of these days by
computation, unless there was something to distinguish
each as it came. A featureless sacred day would be a
coi-pse turned to mould. And the narrative certifies that
the features of the day were religious. That is, the cir-
cumstances which distinguished the day did so by bring-
ing to men's attention the tie between themselves and
See study Grod. This is neccssarily inferred from the na-
■^"" ture of the week, and confirmed by the story of
the ark. For in this story the sacred days are all marked
by one of two sets of actions. On the one hand are divine
communications and interpositions. On the other hand
is seen a man executing specific commands of God, and
appealing to Him. So far then as any details concerning
it appear on the face of the record, this is the day when
the loyal among men were made sensible of the favora-
ble regard of God, and when they expressed their loyalty
by appropriate acts of obedience and hope. Whatever
may be the meaning of the statement that in
the time of Enos men began " to call on the
name of the Lord," it is plain that the actual fact of ap-
peal was not unfamiliar. Without it the mission of the
birds is incomprehensible. To presume that Noah sent
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY. 95
them out in willful, reckless curiosity, and by chance, or
superstitiously, on the sacred day, — or to suppose that
he so acted in any other mood than that of reverent, fil-
ial appeal to the Providence of One known and trusted,
— is to misread not merely the religious feeling, but also
the human sense of the story.
The details of daily life in the ark were exceptional.
So the experiences of these sacred days were exceptional.
Never before or after in their lives could any of the eight
voyagers have received just such tokens of God's regard,
or have been able to obey Him or appeal to Him by just
such acts. We have just one glimpse of a sacred day
on the land, and just one record of an act which, from
its nature, might ordinarily distinguish every sacred day.
On that day when Noah left the ark, the fifty-second
sacred day after the flood began, he " builded an altar
to the Lord," and " offered burnt-offerings on the altar."
But this was not the first sacrifice, as it was not the first
sacred day. It is, however, the only passage in which
the sacrifice is actually associated with such a day. This
association proves that the offering and the day were
suitable each to the other ; and God's accept-
ance is affirmed. But the force of this associa-
tion will be more strongly felt when the origin and the
factors of sacrifice are considered. Sacrifice is the slay-
ing of a living creature for the purpose of affecting God.
When inanimate substances are laid on the altar, it is
properly an offering or gift (in the Hebrew " minchah "),
not a sacrifice. But since in any case the offerer devotes
to God something which might be kept for himself, both
acts are called in Genesis " offerings." In the ^ ...
o _ Gen. 4 : 3-5.
Epistle to the Hebrews both are called sacri-
fices. But in the Book of Leviticus they are
clearly distinguished. The offering of Abel was in the
proper sense a sacrifice. As such it was accepted of
96 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
God. As such, moreover, it was an act of faith. But if
Abel was not in some way taught by God him-
Ileb. 11: 4. . J O J
self to do this act, then the statement that it
was an act of faith would be nonsense. If he did not
have a divine warrant, then he simply presumed or
guessed that a living victim, slaughtered, would please
the Creator better than an offering of fruits. To sup-
pose that one guess of Abel's rather than another guess
of Cain's could be specially accepted of God, and quoted
in later Scripture after many thousand years as an act of
faith, is to trifle with the Word of God. It is taken for
granted in the Book of Genesis that sacrifice was ordained
of God.
Now the idea of a sacrifice contains these four factors :
the time, the place, the person, the victim. When, there-
fore, sacrifice was ordained, it was ordained in terms cor-
respondhig to these four factors. That is, men were
taught authoritatively when, where, by whom, and of
what God ordained the offering. There is some evidence
indicating that each one of these factors was definitely
fixed. It is repugnant to the whole tenor of this history,
and of Scripture, to believe that any of them were left
free to chance or to caprice. In regard to the victim it
is certain that instruction was given. For Abel's choice
of a victim met the divine approval, and therefore he
must have been provided with capacity to know what
God would approve. In regard to the persons who
should sacrifice, there is a suggestion of some personal
privilege existing by divine warrant, when Melchizedek
is entitled " priest of the most high God."
Since Abel sacrificed as an act of faith, he sacri-
ficed as an appointed priest. It is not improbable that
he was divinely appointed the priest for his father's fam-
ily. Certainly he was authorized to take the office, and
took it " by faith." In regard to place, doubtless an
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY. 97
altar of rongli stones or lieaped-up earth was prescribed.
There was, moreover, one locality where some
visible display of the divine majesty, during 25; Deiit! '
all the centuries before the flood, barring the
entrance to Eden, may have been accessible for this ser-
vice. In regard to time, the margin of our Bible tells us
that Abel's offering was made "at the end of
daj's." If such offerings continued to be made,
we may safely infer that each was likewise made " at the
end of days " appointed. In the only case in which the
precise time of a sacrifice is noted it took place on the
sacred day. The first sacrifice noted took place " at the
end of days." We are forced to believe that if that
sacrifice was repeated it was always at the end of set
periods, corresponding to "the end of days." Bat such
periods ivere kept, and the day at the end of each ivas
marked by something. What was this something if not
a sacrifice ?
It is possible that here may be found a reason for the
silence of the Book of Genesis concerning the name of
the sacred day. It is possible that the sacrifice was so
prominent a feature of the day as to stand in the general
thought for the day. In the Israelitish age sacrifice was
disconnected with the Sabbath, and the feature of sus-
pended work became its characteristic. If in the patri-
archal age it was preeminently the day for a sacrifice,
but afterwards the day specially dissociated with sacri-
fice, then the patriarchal stories which mention sacrifices
but do not describe the sacred day by any other charac-
teristic, though they show incidentally that it was main-
tained in regular sequence, and somehow distinguished
religiously, would be precisely accurate. More than
that : Granting these premises, then the statements of
Genesis would present the facts accurately not only as
viewed contemporaneously, but also when minutely stud-
98 EIGHT STUDIES OE THE LORD'S DAY.
ied in later times. And, granting these same premises,
it is difficult to see in what other form the precise facts
could be accurately recorded for all time.
Another mark or feature of the sacred day is suggested
by the transmission of these histories. How did Moses
obtain them ? Either he learned them directly through
revelation from God ; or, having received them in the
ordinary way, the divine guidance merely availed to ena-
ble him to record so much of them in such language as
God approved. But, on the one hand, if he had learned
these things by direct revelation, he certainly would have
put that fact on record. No oi>€ could be more careful
than he to bring forward the divine authority. His one
Num. 20: f^^^li^^i's to do SO was indeed accounted a grave
''~^^- offense. If these most ancient stories had come
to him in that way, he would assuredly have prepared
them with, " The Lord spake unto Moses," or, " Thus
saitli the Lord." On the other hand, the archaic lan-
guage of these stories, and their simplicity of thought,
plainly imply that they are fragments much older than
the narrative of Moses' own times. And if these were
ancient stories in Moses' day, reaching him not by reve-
lation but by ordinary human means, something is inev-
itabl}' to be inferred w'hich bears upon the present ques-
tion. It is not important whether they were written or
not. If written they wei'e read, if oral they were told
over and over, again and again, down all through the
long vista. The fact that they were not forgotten is
proof that they were not unreiterated.^ Moreover, they
were not corrupted. They did not swell with childish
^ In this age it might be supposed that a document long buried
and forgotten might be discovered and proven authentic history.
But it is preposterous to suppose that Moses or anybody in his age
could have accepted such a document without a divine warrant which
would necessarily have been added to this text. Of course there is
an argument from the existence of Mesopotamian records not brought
forward because not needed.
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY. 99
details. They did not ran into any morass of contradic-
tions. Tiiey did not become foul witli any taint of poly-
theism or idolatry or deification of sun, moon, or stars.
Wlien they are compared with any other primeval tradi-
tions which have reached us, we must conclude not only
that they were reiterated, but also that they were re-
iterated in circumstances which kept men in mind of
their own tie to the one only God. The solemn sacrifice
ordinarily occurring every seventh day would afford such
circumstances. If their rehearsal was through these ages
a feature of the sacrificial day to those who continued
loyal to their Creator, then the preservation of these
stories is accounted for, and not otherwise can it with
our present knowledge be explained.
It may not be amiss, therefore, to attempt a provisional
delineation of what the sacred day may have been in the
actual customs of the patriarchs. The sketch may be
taken for what the reader thinks it is worth. It is pre-
sumed that the typical occupation Avas pastoral. Of
course there was some agriculture and some handicraft,
but, relatively, little. Society was organized, among the
faithful at least, by families. If there were any germs of
civil life, they seem to have developed in the line rather of
Cain than of Seth. The loyal line from Abel to Jacob
were apparently occupied with their flocks and herds, other
work being subordinate and transient. When
the sacred day came round, tillage and handiwork
doubtless stopped, not by an}'^ law, but from interest and
employment in the day's special functions. Care of the
animals necessarily went on ; but all who could possibly
be spared from this duty would spontaneously gather
with their chief in some central part of the village or
encampment. Here would be piled up the earth or
stones serving for an altar. Here all would be busy in
preparation. Wood and water must be supplied. Thin
cakes ofi coarse flour and other food must be made ready.
100 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
The victim must be chosen, slain, dressed, and properly
severed. At length the offering would be made. As
the flames rose from the altar, solemn though simple
prayer would be addressed to God. Perhaps also, now
Jude 14: ^^ later, words of prophecy or of exhortation
2^pet. 2:5. would be heard. Possibl}^, on some grand oc-
casion, a divine monition might in some way be
given to some ministrant. Meanwhile the altar would
not have received the whole of the victim. Part of the
sacrifice would have been cooked for the sacrificial feast,
of which all would partake. This might be the only occa-
sion when flesh would ordinarily be eaten. It would, in
that case, be a feast to which full justice would be done.
When all had been fed, the patriarch, or some one at his
bidding, would rise and rehearse the sacred stories that
had been handed down : the creation, the sin, the exile,
the murder, the divided families, and much, perhaps, be-
side that which has been pi'eserved to us. Such a day
would be full of enjoyment from dawn to dusk. There
would be no compulsion, but only a privilege, in partici-
pation. No conception of being debarred from work and
forced to rest could be formed in any mind. The assem-
blage, the sacrifice, the calling upon God, the feast, the
rehearsal, — these would be the only circumstances to
mark the day upon men's thoughts.
Why should they maintain such a sacred day ? This
is the second question. Whatever their observance was,
why should they have it, not at any time they pleased, but
every seventh day, keeping count of the weeks ? There
can be only one answer. The weeks rested on nothing
but divine prescription. Their observance by the patri-
archs could have implied nothing less than an acknowl-
edgment of the bond between themselves and God. It
was the patriarch's profession of loyalty.
But can any typical meaning be found in such an ob-
servance of such a day ? This is the third question.
THE PRIMEVAL SACRED DAY. 101
What, if anything, did it mean to tliese worshipers?
What did it teach them? Wliat conceptions of God's
character and of his purposes did it tend to form in
them ?
The great lesson of the antedikivian age was clearly
punishment. Whatever may have been the material
elements of the flaming sword at the gate of Eden, it
flashed, plainly enough, wrath tigainst disobedience to
God. Punishment was the burden of Enoch's jude, 14,
prophetic utterances, and of Noah's. It found 2Pet. 2:5.
its climax in the flood. It therefore must have obc^rent,^'^i
been the first conception of the meaning of sac- ^'^'' ^' ^^'
rifice. The idea of deliverance from retribution by a
substitute was hardly learned after ages had passed. To
Cain and to Abel alike it may have seemed merely that
God's just wrath required the offering of that which was
valuable for human use. The heathen (with some ex-
ceptions ^) have never got beyond this idea. And if this
were all that sacrifice meant, it is difficult to understand
why Cain's offering should not be as acceptable as his
brother's. It was Abel's obedient faith that slew a liv-
ing creature. It was not that he knew why the living
creature was required rather than the inanimate, but
that he believed the word of God, and obeyed Hira. In
due time, as soon as men were ready and able to receive
it, the doctrine of substitution was fully set forth. But
already, and from the first, certain associations with the
sacrifice would evidently develop the ideas of God's be-
nevolence and of human fellowship. The feast was, of
course, a material rather than a spiritual blessing. But
tliey would feel that it was a real blessing from Him
whose wrath and judgment were so dreadful. They
would also feel that this blessing was a bond of union
among all who sat as it were at God's table. And they
^ A few, like Socrates, seem to have grasped the idea of substitu
tion, and with it to have shown something like a vital faith.
102 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
would feel that the blessing and the fellowship were real-
ized through the victim and the altar fire.
Logically, the idea of punishment awaiting the apos-
tate involved the complementaiy idea of favor to the
faithful. But we cannot suppose that logical inferences
would be drawn out by primeval simplicity. Its imag-
ination must have been limited by the field of its experi-
ence. Thei'efore the more would a weekly recital of di-
vine interpositions and promises crystallize into broad
conceptions of God's relations to them, present and fu-
ture. We do not know how much more there was to
repeat beside the fragments which introduce our Scrip-
tures. But these recitals would have made them familiar
with many ideas beside God's anger against sin. He
would be felt to be interested in all human affairs and in
all individual conduct. And, vague as the first promise
seems to us, it would assuredly form in their imaginations
a Hero to come to them, of them, and a victorious conflict
with the author of evil. Thus the earliest, perhaps un-
written, Scriptures would teach men at once to look up-
ward and to look forward to God. Unconsciously, grad-
ually, slowly, but surely, the sacrifice and the stories, the
object lessons repeated every seventh day, would enable
men to formulate these elementary religious ideas : The
Fatherhood of God ; the brotherhood of the faithful ; the
sacrifice 1 as the medium of both; the benevolence of
the divine providence ; and the Coming Hero, Victor
over the evil one, who had brought in death.
1 The sacrificial feast was a traditional practice in all parts of the
world. It was an essential element of the Passover, which was at
once a link between the Aaronic and the earlier sacrifices, and also
the complete and re])i'esentative sacrifice of the Aaronic system. In
that system all the other sacrifices explained or analyzed the Pass-
over. Our Lord, to whom all the sacrifices referred, was preemi-
nently the paschal Lamb. The fellowship of the sacrificial feast has
thus been preserved, not only through the Jewish Passover, but on-
ward through the Lord's Supper of the Church.
STUDY V.
THE MOSAIC SABBATH.
" A delight, the holy of the Lord, honorable." — Is. Iviii. 13.
The value of the national customs and fundamental
laws of any people can be fairly judged, in most cases, by
the moral development which that people, after the lapse
of a considerable time, have attained. But the judgment
is fair, so far only as these customs and laws have been
operative. It cannot be rigorously applied to such as
have been wholly or partially in abeyance, and perhaps
known only or chiefly by books and tradition. On this
general basis, how^ever, an instructive comparison of moral
results might be drawn, between the fifteen hundred
years of Israel from Moses to the Herods and the slightly
shorter period of Rome from her foundation to her fall.
But the true estimate of Israel's constitution must be
based upon what it was plainly designed to effect. It
did not have a proper trial. It was never for any long
time full}' observed. Indeed it does not certainly ap-
pear that it was ever enforced in all its details or in all
its principles. Probably its details were most accurately
carried out during the latter years of Joshua or in the
reign of Solomon. Doubtless its principles were most
practically expounded by the great prophets in the time
of Hezekiah and his immediate successors. But the law,
in its entirety, could not be observed during periods of
internal commotion, or after the division into two king-
doms, or under foreign domination. On the other hand,
104 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
however, if tlie law bad not been willfully neglected
2Chron. 36: fi^'st, the Calamities, which subsequently made
Jeremiah ^^^ tliorougli woi'king impracticable, would not
34:13,14. liave occuiTed. For these calamities had been
threatened as a punishment of disobedience, and com-
plete exemption from them had been promised as a re-
ward of faithfulness. National (and not merely individ-
ual) disobedience began in fact before the settlement of
the nation in their own territory gave opportunity for
putting their whole system in operation. In order to re-
j)air the moral damage caused by national transgression,
and to fill up the educational void caused by national
neglect, a long series of special agents, such as judges
and prophets, were raised up. In the long run, the di-
vine purpose was wisely and successfully worked out, de-
spite Israel's unfaithfulness, which wrecked their national
career. But the law cannot be made wholly responsible
for the nation's final condition, either in respect to their
conceptions of religious truths or to their general morals.
The law had, indeed, a great influence. But so also had
the institution of royalty, and their intercourse with
foreign nations, and especially the grand array of the
prophets. What the law alone would have done for the
people, had it been kept, must be learned from itself.
Moreover, in view of the unity of both the whole divine
revelation and also of the whole divine plan of redemp-
tion, this law, tlie organizing instrument of the nation,
the introduction to the entire development of the organic
body of the Church, must be expected to contain the germ
and nucleus of every later revelation, and of every later
experience or function of God's people.
The law, that is the Mosaic system, could not be es»-
tablished before Moses' day, because it was a national
system, and required the existence of a nation to receive
it. National existence, again, implies two things : a race
and a territory. Therefore, in the unfolding of divine
THE MOSAIC SABBATH. 105
providence, these two things were provided. During four
centuries, by natural descent, and by accretion,^ a race
sprung up who were bound together by ancestral tradi-
tions, and peculiarly separated from other families of
men. During theee centuries, also, there was preserved
the expectation of a certain territory, assured to them for
an inheritance, through a repeated promise of God to their
ancestors. They had been taught to think of Canaan
as their land, generations before they entered it. They
were kept in tutelage in Egypt during their national
minority. But the land was theirs by the divine decree,
and when they reached the full age of national indepen-
dence they were authorized and bidden to take possession
of their own. Thus it was their land of promise. He
gave them the land, who had chosen and fostered their
race. So He gave them the legislation which He adapted
to their race and to their land. No other race had a part
in it. It could not be extended over other lands. The
soil, the climate, the distances, the terrain of Palestine
were involved in Israel's constitution. The genealogical
relations of the nation's clans were by it inseparably
joined to the various districts of the land. And this
whole body of law contemplated a nation of farmers.
These preliminary statements may be summed up
thus : The thoughts or designs of God in the Mosaic
legislation must be learned from the legislation itself,
according to the record of it sanctioned by inspiration,
1 " Accretion." Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob each in turn possessed
a large retinue. See Gen. xiv. 14, xx. 14, xxvi. 14, 19, xxx. 43,
xxxviii. 12. Abraham's three hundred and eighteen fighting men
implied a camp of fifteen hundred or more. Jacob and his male de-
scendants numbered, on entering Egypt, seventy souls. But the
■whole number of their tribe as it may properly be called, even 'hen
must have been thousands. Many joined them at the Exodus. See
Ex. xiii. 38. See also an article in the N. Y. Observer of October
5, 1882, entitled " Pharoah and Joseph."
106 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
and not according to the practices of an nnfaitliful peo-
ple. And the legishition must be regarded as adapted
to the territory of Canaan only, and its inhabitants as
chiefly engaged in agriculture. Sufficient illustrations of
these statements will appear in the progress of these
studies.
The Mosaic religions system of institutions was dual.
On one side it proposed an elaborate scheme of sacrifices.
On the other side was an equally elaborate schedule of
sacred times. The original sacrifice, and the original
sacred day, which perhaps was known onl}'^ as the time
of sacrifice, were eidarged, and as it were illuminated, so
as to present all the details of their symbolic meaning
and all the varieties of their practical effect on the con-
duct of life. Thus the whole sj^stem while a starting-
point was also a development. The organic individuality
of the Church began there in the same sense that the
organic individuality of a fruit begins in a blossom. But
the blossom grows as a part of the tree. Botanists say
that it consists of specialized leaves. In the inchoate
period blossom and leaves are indistinguishable. They
all appear only as leaves. In the period of development
they manifest their difference of form and of function.
When the function of the leaf is fulfilled its form vanishes.
But the function of the blossom has no end, and though
its form ma}"^ change to that of the fruit its life is per-
sistent. The Scriptures compare the kingdom of God to
this tree life. The root of all, the active beginning of
the whole economy of redemption, of the whole plan of
God's mercy to man, is a promise. It has been all
through, and is still in this day, the administration of a
promise. Hence the mental and spiritual attitude toward
God, of devout men in all ages, is properly described as
" faith." This promise is twofold, like the main tap
root and the fibrous roots of the plant. " He will come "
THE MOSAIC SABBATH. 107
is tlie one root of all. The first promise relates to what
He will do and suffer. The second spreads out to all
nations. The original promise, however, involved a dual
conception, first of suffering^ b}^ a typical man, and then
of an expected time when this man should conquer by
his suffering. Very likely the first men thought of crea-
tion 2 and of punitive death as the only noticeable asser-
tions of divine majesty. But however vague and general
were their ideas at the first, the germs of all were con-
tained in them. Step by step all would be learned. At
length the posterity of Adam would be able to think of
atonement and to hope for eternal life in the City of
God.
In the idea of punishment for sin, so forcibly impressed
on the primeval ages, was logically involved the idea of
blessing for faithfulness. In the promise to Abraham
the blessing with its completeness through the coming
one was exclusively mentioned. Thus the earlier promise
to Eve was rounded out to full logical symmetry. The
utterance of the second promise was the starting-point of
the Hebrew nation, as the appearance of that promised
seed was the nation's terminus and goal. This promise
was repeated with the utmost emphasis to Isaac and to
Jacob, and is recorded five times in the book of ^p^ 12 : 3 ;
Genesis. It furnished the key to the Mosaic \f:^2i^\\
law. For, as the Apostle Paul argues to the ^® • •^*-
1 " Suffering." Both the seed and the serpent would be bruised,
but the serpent Avas not of our race like the seed.
'^ " Creation." The creative week represented a tinie'when God's
will was the only energy throughout all nature. The old sacred day
referred to that time until men could be educated to think of the
coming day when God's will shall again be supreme. As we shall
see, it provided for that education. Meanwhile it is strangely for-
gotten sometimes that the old Sabbath should be taken as referring
not so much to the material as to the spiritual aspect of creation ;
that is, not so much to the generation of the Kosmos as to the har-
monious supremacy of the will of God.
108 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
Galatians, the law, which was also of God, could not be
out of harmony with the promise of God. It
was designed to effect the fulfillment of that
promise. But the nation chosen to be its instrument,
though holy as compared with the heathen, were yet
transgressors. Being what they were, the prob-
lem was to effect through them the blessing to
all nations. This problem contained two members, the
end and the means. That is, it was necessary to develop
in the minds of men proper ideas of what the state of
blessedness should be, and at the same time to place
before them and around them the means and influences
by which they might become capable and fit for that
state. Hence the duality of the law. The state of recon-
ciliation to God was symbolized by its Sabbatic system ; ^
the means of reconciliation by its sacrificial system.^ The
sapling now became a tree. It had been able heretofore
to produce leaves only. Potential blossoms indeed they
were as well as leaves, but the blossoms were not indi-
vidually manifest. Now they are distinguished forever,
and can never again, even by the ignorant, be confounded.
So the sacrifice, in which the primeval sacred day seems
to have been blended, was now forever separated. The
duality became manifest. The two systems were made
entirely independent of each other. They met in very few
points. In many respects they were strongly contrasted.
Sacrifice was an act. The Sabbath was a state. Sacrifice
1 By " Sabbatic system " is meant bere the whole legishition con-
cerning the observance of various periods called Sabbaths. By
" sacrificial system " is meant the whole legislation relating to sacri-
fices, priesthood, tabernacle, etc., dealt with here only incidentally.
By " symbolize " is meant to set forth as an object lesson, or a type,
intended through actual and continued experience to develop either
certain spiritual ideas not originally entertained in the consciousness,
or, at !east, to develop the capacity for comprehending such ideas
when presented.
THE MOSAIC SABBATH. 109
involved suffering. The Sabbath was unconnected with
suffering. Sacrifice was related to the ordinary circum-
stances of life. It answered to its occupations, its con-
tingencies, its joj'-, its contrition, its pomp. The heathen
also had it. It belonged to this world of sin. The Sab-
bath was no part of ordinary life. It was not the product
of any of its experiences. The heathen and the apostate
had never any part in it. In no feature did it suggest
sin or penalty. It was expressly designated the sign of
union between God and men. But the great festivals of
spring and autumn were fixed with no regard for the
occurrence of a Sabbath. Pentecost came on the day
after. No sacrifices were peculiar to the Sabbath. No
special manifestations or revelations from God were as-
signed to it. The Urim and Thummim answered no
more readily than on other days. The sin-offering, or
burnt-offering, or peace-offering of individual piety had
no encouragement on this day. Apparently they were
inhibited by the Sabbatic regulations. Perhaps the most
effectual means of all for depriving the Sabbath of all
association with sacrifice was the prohibition of all sacri-
fices in any other place than the tabernacle pre- pg,,^ ^i ■.
cincts. Thus the great mass of the people, if ^'■'^'•
the nation were perfectly obedient, could see a sacrifice
only three times a year during their attendance at the
festivals. They could never slay the victim with their
own hands at their own homes. But to their own homes,
bringing rest for their own hands, the Sabbaths came,
vacant of any dependence on the bloody rite. At the
festivals, moreover, the appointed offerings went on in
due routine, no matter when in their course the Sabbath
occurred. Its arrival may have restrained private offer-
ings, but did not in any way affect those that were
public. There was one exception only, and it empha-
sized this rule. For the one lamb which was sacrificed
110 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAT.
every morning and every afternoon, tvs^o lambs ^ were
offered each morning, and the same each afternoon of
the Sabbath. By all this contrast there was set before
Israel this truth, a grand truth for that age, that the
state of blessedness promised was entirely distinct from
the means by which Abraham's Seed should achieve it
for men.
While thus on the one hand so sharply separated ^ from
the sacrifice, on the other hand the Sabbath received two
new features, the enforced rest and the connected Sab-
batic times. As already noticed, it is not to be presumed
that there was no cessation of labor on the patriarchal
day. There certainly was not such a cessation as marked
the Mosaic Sabbath. The difference lay in the enforce-
ment of rest, and this enforcement had two sides. It
was a function of the civic or national avithorit}^, and it
was appointed as the sign of national or public loyalty
to God. Such a Sabbath could not exist until the nation
had become self-maintaining. For herein the nation was
treated as an organic unit. It stood, in respect of this
ordinance, between God and the individual. It enforced
universal cessation of labor, as God's agent. And then
as the commonwealth, the agent of each citizen, it pre-
sented their separate and yet united homage to God.
1 " Two lambs," Num. xxviii. 9, 10. The seventh month was cor-
respondhigly distinguished. The first day of each month had a
special monthly offering of two bullocks, one ram, seven lambs, with
flour, etc. On the first day of the seventh month this was nearly-
doubled, one bullock, one ram, and seven lambs being added. See
Num. xxviii. 11-15, and xxix. 1-6.
2 " Separated." Probably the blending, in the first age, of the
two institutions, the sacred day and sacrifice, was the means em-
ployed for evolving the idea of sacredness as attached to each. The
sacrifice was kept from becoming a mere feast, much less an orgy, as
often among the heathen (1 Cor. x. 7). The time of worship was
kept from iudifterent desultoriness, likely to issue in godless desue-
tude.
THE MOSAIC SABBATH. Ill
He -wlio broke the Sabbatli not only disobeyed God, but
also defied bis nation and outlawed himself
Ex. 31 : 14.
from citizenship. The renegade was executed,
not by the hands of priests or Levites, nor on their sen-
tence, tut by the whole congregation of the Num.15:
laity. Therefore the Sabbath became a visible ^'^'^^
token of national coherence. From that day onward it
distinguished the Israelite from all other men, and united
him to all of his own community. No other nation kept
it. No Jew could keep it secretly. None could fail by
it to make known his race and his faith, and to discover
liis loyal fellows.
No means could be more efficient to produce a national
self-consciousness. Everything else pertaining to their
national administration corresponded to something which
the heathen had as well as they. Sacrifices, priesthood,
oracles of some kind, were found everywhere. Even cir-
cumcision ^ may have been quite widely known. They
shared blood and language with other tribes. But their
Sabbath, the weekly day of rest enforced by public au-
thority, was their very own. Nothing like it, nothing
to compare with it, was to be found anywhere else. It
embodied their national separateness and their national
unity. Moreover, it supplied the lack of that personal
chieftainship about which nations usually crystallized.
Returning so frequently, with its rigid absoluteness and
its grave sanctions, it brought the executive authority of
their Divine King to their perceptions more impressively
and more continuously than the rule of an ordinary king
could be brought home to his subjects. The circum-
stance that the Divine King was unseen was of very
slight importance. In ancient as in modern times, kings
^ Circumcision was a personal rather than a national rite. It was
made the sign and seal of the covenant before the nation was organ-
ized.
112 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
have been known to the most of their subjects by their
trappings ratlier than by their persons. If a messenger
from the monarch, or an officer of the hiw armed with a
writ of the chief magistrate, should hiy his hand upon a
citizen every weelv of his hfe, what a vivid sense that
citizen might gain of the authority of his monarch or
magistrate. How vivid then the impression of a Su-
preme Ruler, when, every week, the activity of a whole
nation was arrested by his command !
The designation of the Sabbath as the sign of national
loyalty to God was made during the stay of Moses on
Ex. 31: 12- Sinai, immediately after the uttering of the Dec-
^'' alogue. " Verily my Sabbaths ye shall keep:
for it is a sign between me and you, throughout your
generations : that ye may know that I am the Lord that
doth sanctify you." ..." Wherefore the children of
Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath
throughout their generations for a perpetual covenant.
It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for-
ever." To this passage there is a reference
Ezek. 20 : 12. , ^ . . . , f ° , ^ ,
by Jiizekiel. " Moreover, also, 1 gave them
my Sabbaths to be a sign between me and them, that
they might know that I am the Lord that sanctify
them." Thus the Sabbath expressed clearly the two
ideas of God's personal government and of national loy-
alty. But the study of the day's features must certainly
demonstrate that they were adapted to make these two
ideas, not unconscious or latent beliefs merely, but most
familiar and energizing thoughts.
The circumstance dwelt upon in the phraseology of the
legislation is rest from ordinary toil. "What employ-
ments were contemplated appears only incidentally.
They form no part of the commandment. It is not un-
usual to find in the Scrijjture history, that first the bare
negative side of some truth is given, and afterward its
THE MOSAIC SABBATH. 113
complement, the positive side, is set forth with full illus-
trations. Thus almost the whole Decalogue consists of
mere restrictions. The Sermon on the Mount and other
New Testament teachings give positive applications. So
the promise to Eve was a blank prophecy of braising.
The promise to Abraham revealed its logical complement,
— the coming blessing. So the Fourth Commandment
enacts only rest. The New Testament enjoins, not the
rest, but its employments, — the assembly, the com-
munion with our risen Lord, the Scripture exposition, the
exhortation, the hymns, the alms, the breaking of bread.
Down to the captivity Israel continued to be agricul-
tural. But the land was full not of farm-houses but of
villages and hamlets. There is no indication of scattered
residences each in the midst of the owners' fields. For
certain purposes, especially for preserving outlying fields
from ravage, a tower or shelter of some kind was often
built, so that some one might keep guard when the crop
was exposed to danger. But the farmer's home was
then, as it has always been, and, throughout the same
region, is now, in the village. The typical Mosaic Sab-
bath was therefore the Sabbath of a farming village.
The work suspended was chiefly farm work, ploughing,
sowing, harvesting, wine-making, and the like. The care
of animals could not be omitted, however, and there is
no injunction bearing on purely pastoral employments.
Those whose place it was to watch over the herds would
be obliged to leave their homes as usual with their
charges. But of course only the smallest number requi-
site would be dispatched on this duty. For all the rest,
the Sabbath was preeminently the social day. Daring
other days the cultivators were scattered over their fields.
Sometimes the women of the household worked with
them. If not, they were busy enough with household
work and the endless spinning and weaving, each in her
114 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
own cottnge. The Sabbath brought leisure to them all.
No fires were allowed for cooking. Hence sira-
Ex. 35 : 3. , i <• j- • .
pie meals of fruit and bread required very lit-
tle of the housewife's time. Thus every facility was
afforded for social intercourse both of families and of
neighbors. And because they were a village of farmers,
this would be at once peculiarly precious and jDeculiarly
easy. If the population had consisted chiefly of artisans,
whose occupations threw them largely together every
day, and seldom carried them away from the village
centre, the social opportunities of the Sabbath would not
have been so valuable. These opportunities could not,
on the other hand, have been freely enjoyed, if the peo-
ple had been scattered in isolated farmsteads. In that
case, moreover, it would not have been so easy for the
civil authorities to enforce the Sabbath law. But in the
village, Sabbath eve brought all the farmers' households
together, and Sabbath dawn found them all together,
prepared to avail themselves of social privileges of which
the working days had been destitute.
An observing stranger visiting in Israel's land, and
finding himself, on Sabbath morning, in one of these vil-
lages, would never have thought of the closing of shops
or mills, or the silence of industry's usual hum. The
Phoenician peddler might be missed from his seat under
the village oak ; the blacksmith's forge might be quiet
beside his door. The peddler, perhaps, came to stay but
a day or two, and the blacksmith swung his hammer only
in the intervals of his work in his own corn-fields. Such
incidents, insignificant in themselves, would not be in
any way characteristic of the Sabbath. What the visitor
would notice would be the unusual number of people in
the street and about the house doors ; the leisurely con-
verse of parents with children, and of neighbors with
neighbors, in groups ever dissolving and reforming ; the
THE MOSAIC SABBATH. 115
cheerful vivacity of youths and servants ; the complete
solitude of the surrounding fields compared with
the throngs in the village. . e . . .
If this day were given up to idleness, it would be mor-
ally certain that (men being what they are the world
over) it would be degraded to folly, revelry, and license,
making it a nuisance and a curse rather than a joy and a
blessing. Sometimes it was so degraded.^ But
when the right use was made of it, every hour
was elevating and profitable. In regard to the use of the
day, a very important principle may be discerned, which
accounts for the form of the statute. Its restriction was
maintained by the sword of the magistrate. The state
provided for every one freedom ^ in the proper use of the
day, and (an equally important matter) it compelled
every one to abstain from anything that could possibly
hinder the proper use of the day by another, whether a
dependant or not. But it did not compel the proper use.
That was left to conscience and to the general influence
of a public sentiment of loyalty. No precise and explicit
rules are given, and of course no penalty for disobedi-
ence. Nevertheless, the will of God was plainly mani-
fest through certain arrangements, which, though not all
verbally associated with the Sabbath, did, in the nature
of the case, find on it their special opportunity, and give
to it all of its positive features.
One of these arrangements was the convocation. The
^ The bearing of the first chapter of Isaiah is against outrageous
licentiousness coexistent with a nominal observance of the Sabbaths
and other festivals. Compare Ezek. xxii. and xxiii., where the
same charge is made, the Sabbath being specifically referred to in
xxii. 8, 16, 24, 26 ; xxiii. 38. Idolatrous festivals were always apt
to take this character. Compare 1 Cor. x. 7.
^ Cases of necessity, as the feeding of the flocks, were of course
excepted, and so were deeds of mercy. See Matt. xii. 11 ; Luke
116 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
law for holding it on the Sabbath is recorded in the
Lev. 23: twentj-tliivd chapter of Leviticus. "And the
^"^" Lord spake unto Moses, saying : ' Speak unto
the children of Israel, and say unto them, concerning the
feasts of the Lord which ye shall proclaim to be holy
convocations, even these are my feasts. Six daj^s shall
work be done, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of rest,
an holy convocation ; ye shall do no work therein ; it is
the Sabbath of the Lord in all your dwellings.' " In
the remainder of the chapter other seasons of convocation
were appointed, being seven in all. At three ^ of these
all the men of the nation would be expected to attend,
but they were not absolutely required to do so. At a
fourth, that of the first day of unleavened bread, a large
part, certainly, of those who assembled to eat the Pass-
over in the previous afternoon ought to be found. Some
might start early in the morning for their homes, but
many would remain through all the ceremonies of the
week, and attend the convocation on the closing day.
The two other annual convocations occurred on the first
and tenth days of the seventh month, the festival of
Lev. 23: truuipets and the Day of Atonement. On both
^*' ^'' these days the people were at their homes. All
the days for which convocations were appointed were
described as Sabbaths. But they were not all alike. On
1 Three times in the year every male must appear before tlie tab-
ernacle, or the place which God would choose (Deut. xvi. IG), each
one bringing a gift {Ex. xxiii. 15; xxxiv. 20). Pentecost lasted
one day. So also the Passover. It seems that it was permitted to
spend the days of unleavened bread at home, if they chose (Ex. xii.
20). But the feast of Tabernacles lasted eight days (Lev. xxiii.
34-3G). On Pentecost, therefore, and the first and eighth days of
the feast of Tabernacles, every male would be at the place where the
tabernacle stood, and would naturally attend the convocation. On
the first and last days of unleavened bread many would attend, but a
large 2>art would be at home.
THE MOSAIC SABBATH. 117
the Day of Atonement no work whatever was albnved ;
apparently not even a fire could be kindled. It was to be
kept as strictly as the seventh day of the week. 1,6^.33:
The law for the otlier six days was different. ^'"^^"
Only " servile work," ^ that is farm work, was forbidden.
At Pentecost there was a special injunction for the hospi-
table entertainment of all the dependent and unprovided
classes, involving the not little labor of getting ready a
feast as bountiful as the family could afford. Deut. 16:
Thus it would seem that the application of the ^^' ^^"
name Sabbath to these seven days was not suggested by
the absolute suspension of all work, for that was true
only of one. The name^ is evidentl}^ suggested by these
two facts : the stoppage of the bread-winners' ordinary
business, and the general assembly. Evidently these two
facts are related. They are the complements of each
other. Business was stopped that the assembly might
be attended. The assembly, on the other hand, became
possible because men were at leisure to attend it.
In the wilderness there seems to have been one place
of gathering for the whole body of adult Israelites, both
men and women. It was appointed that God should
meet them at the door of the tabernacle. It is ex. 29: 42,
mentioned that at various times ^ they did as-
semble there. The hour * for meeting seems to have been
^ Note the permission to prepare food on tlie first and seventli
days of unleavened bread (Ex. xii.: 16) This was enlarged to
feasting at Pentecost and Tabernacles.
2 "Convocation," " do no work," associated in every case. See
Ex. xii. 16; Lev. xxiii. 3, 7, 8, 21, 24, 25, 27, 35, 36; Num. xxviii.
18, 25, 26; xxix. 1, 7, 12, 35.
8 "Various times." Lev. viii. 3, 4, Aaron's consecration. Num.
X. 3, at the call of the trumpets. Num. xxi. 19, with Korah. Num.
XXV. 6, repenting for the Baal Peor sin. Ex. xxxviii. the women
(margin, " assembling by troops ").
* "The hour." Ex. xxix. 42, 43, couples the assembly with the
sacrifice. See 1 Kings xviii. 29, 36; Ps. cxli. 2.
118 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
that of the morning or evening sacrifice. So hirge a num-
ber as might assemble there could not organize for common
participation in the exercises according to modern fashions.
But they could all see the symbolic cloak above and the
smoke of the altar below. Doubtless each tribe and
subdivision of a tribe would gather around its chief or
elder, and so a fair organization would be effected. But
it is impossible to conceive of voluble Semites as all silent
throughout the time of meeting. Much of the ceremo-
nial was addressed to their eyes. But Moses and Aaron
also spoke to them. A sentence or two^ was probably ut-
tered, and immediatel}'^ i-epeated verbatim by those near-
est the speaker, then taken up by others, and so passed
on to the most distant ears. After a pause for the first
wave of repetition to subside, another sentence or two would
be spoken, and in turn repeated during the succeeding
pause. Thus every word of the speaker might be carried
to every person in an assembly of any size, even though
numbered by hundreds of thousands. But it is not neces-
sary to suppose that nothing was done except listening
to Moses or Aaron's words and repeating them. There
were the old narratives preserved already by incessant
recitation through many centuries. Perhaps the great
leader had already edited (as we may say) the inspired
selection which constitutes now the first book ascribed to
him. If that were so, yet very few copies could have been
made. The new selection, like the original mass, must
have been dependent, not on the eyes, but on the mouths
and ears of the people, for its survival. There also were
all the laws and statutes ordained through Moses himself.
■i
* The writer heard this process described as one familiar to Orien-
tals at a meeting in the chapel of the Y. M. C. A. of New York, by
Dr. William Thomson, a missionary's son, born in Syria, who was
giving a series of lectures there, about the year 1877. This refer-
ence is from memory only. See Ex. xxiv. 1-8.
THE MOSAIC SABBATH. 119
It was commanded that the people should be taught these
thoroughly. May we not, then, believe that in every
tribelet or hundred some one was emploj'^ed, during the
hour of convocation, in reciting before each small section
of the great gathering these things which God designed
to have fixed in the people's memories, accurately ? ^
But the full working of the law could not be had in
the wilderness. It contemplated the settled life of the
villages in the promised land. The farmer folk of these
villages would, however, be largely guided, as to the ex-
ercises of the Sabbath convocation, by the traditionary
customs which descended all the way from that wilder-
ness. Though the village had no altar, yet the gather-
ing would naturally form at that hour when the morning
lamb was offered "before the Lord." The same recita-
tions would also be given. But the meeting might seem
narrow in the absence of the great national brotherhood,
and tame in the void of the national ritual. Therefore,
an institution was inaugurated in the desert, not enter-
ing, however, upon full activity till afterward, which rep-
resented well to these villages both the grand brotherhood
and the grand ritual of the nation as a whole. This
was the institution of the Levites. They had no inher-
itance or place among the tribes, but they stood in place
of the first-born of every tribe. They were not priests,
but in everything except the mediatorial office the}^ stood
on God's behalf before the people.^
Unquestionably there is a certain analogy between the
Levite as he may be seen in the Pentateuch and a mod-
ern Christian minister. But the differences are also con-
^ " Accurately." See Deut. iv. 2. Compare Rev. xxii. 18, 19,
and note on page 123. This does not imply that Ezra or others>
at various times, under divine authority, may not have reedited
Moses' work, and have added some verses here and there.
' See Deut. xxvii. 14.
120 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
siderahle, notably as to the development of tlie function
of preaching and of active propagandist service.^ The
resemblances, and also the relation of the Levites to the
exercises of the Sabbath and to the convocation, may best
be shown by a little review of certain characteristics of
their order.
First. They formed a class who might properly be
termed learned in theology. It was their business to un-
derstand all that was revealed concerning man and God,
whether as a system of true philosophy, a scheme of mor-
als, a religious history, a bod}^ of law, or the details of
ritual. They were, therefore, to be the expounders of
these matters, and the instructors of the people.^ In later
times they had no monopoly of the prophetic office,
though from Samuel down many of them held it. But
the prophets came in great measure to make up for the
subversion of the law. If the law had been faithfully
observed, Levite and prophet might possibly have been
synonymous.
Niim 16:9 Sccond. They were not priests. Their ex-
iO;i8:i-<. elusion from the mediatorial office was very
Num. 3:12 emphatic. They were, however, representa-
39-ui. tives of the people, standing for the heads or
heirs of every famil}^ Thus the}'^ were allied to the older
^ The " ixaOrjTevtTarf k.t.a." of Miitt. xxviii. 19 would hardly apply to
tliem. Israel was regarded as already professing faith. The Levite
was not expected to win over idolaters as any jiart of his oflicial
duty.
2 Both priests and Levites were to be the instructors of the peo-
ple, but practically, of course, the duty must, for the most part, fall
upon the Levites as the more numerous. It would naturally fall into
their hands also on account of their familiarity with all the minutiae
of the ritual, and on account of their dispersion among all the people.
In Deut. xxvii. 9 the priests and also the Levites are mentioned to-
gether with Moses as expounders and enforcers of the law. But the
Levites ajipear as the active agents in verse 14. In other passages
their activity is implied. See, also, the blessing Deut. xxxiii. 10.
THE MOSAIC SABBATH. 121
priesthood, sncli as Melchizedek's, and such as Christians
share, not with their suffering Saviour, but with their
risen Lord.
Third. They were particularly charged with caring
for the support and maintenance both of the ritual ^ and
of the legal administration. Under the monarchy, at
least in pious reigns, they seem to have furnished the
officers of the central authority in all non-military affairs.
The Mosaic constitution, however, did not apparently
contemplate their being invested with executive author-
ity. It was rather implied that they would act as coun-
selors, amici cu7'ice, so to say, of the elders,^ who would
administer each village almost independently.
Fourth. The income of both priests and Levites w^as
to be drawn chiefly from agricultural tithes. These the
Levites were to collect or receive. But there was no or-
dinance authorizing distraint. Reliance was placed on
personal influence, and on faithfulness to the duty of keep-
ing the people in mind of their loyal obligation to God
their Sovereign, and of the particulars of his requirements.
Fifth. The Levites were warmly recommended to the
cordial, generous, and hospitable regard of their lay breth.
ren. They ministered to them as well as to God.^ ,„ ^
•^ . Deut. 10 : 8.
Hence the people were reminded that not only
1 The law of the tithes (Num. xviii. 24) implied that the Levites
should collect them. Thus they might easily become an official class.
The business of collecting tithes would furnish a sufficient reason for
their general distribution over the land, which the law evidently
contemplates. Deut. xii. 12, 18. The Levite, who at other times
was " within their gates," must be treated, when at the feasts, as
part of their company.
2 In the case of homicide by unknown hands, the elders were held
respont.ible, and were required to purge themselves before the
priests. Deut. xxi. 1-5.
8 The Levites were probably not authorized to give the benedic-
tion of Num. vi. 24-26.
122 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
had these Levites no hmded possession, but there was a
claim, both as God's appointees and as the people's rep-
resentatives, upon popular support.
The thirty-five villages allotted the Levites sufficed,
of course, for only a part of the tribe, perhaps for those
past service. Members of all the tribal families would
be there, and the adjacent fields would be tilled by the
youths and old men, assisted by the women. The able-
bodied men, between the ages of thirty and fift}'^, would
alternate between duty at the tabernacle (or temple)
and tours through the country, or perhaps a short resi-
dence at various points. Their families might remain in
their family village, or follow their wanderings, or live in
some district where the Levite might have a local charge
when not wanted at the sanctuary. In these tours or
sojourns the Levite would look after the tithes, correct
any deviation from the law, and give information on any
point where light was wanted. He would appear as a
plain Israelite, not a priest but a brother, in virtue of
his tribal substitution for the first-born ; and yet, by the
dignity of his divine calling and appointment, his associa-
tion with the sacred order of priests, his familiarity with
all the typical solemnities of the sanctuary, his learning
in all that was given to men by the word and authority
of God, he would inspire that respect and confidence
which the very word of God impressively and repeatedly
bespoke for him.
In the farming village such a Levite would usually be
found as a guest, abiding for a longer or shorter time.
At the hour of morning sacrifice the villagers would nat-
urally gather about him, as the convocation gathered for-
merly before the door of the tabernacle, in front of the
great altar. Under his leadership some choral might be
intoned as he liad been taught to sing it with the trained
choir of his tribe at the sanctuary. Then some prayers
THE MOSAIC SABBATH. 123
might be offered, having plain reference to the sacrifice
which they all knew to be smoking on the distant altar
they could not see. To these prayers all the people
would say, Amen.^ Then might occur, what is still so
congenial to an Oriental gathering, a recitation, some
portions of the law, — some of the ancient narratives
embodied in the sacred books ; possibly traditions and
histories ^ other than those sealed by divine authority
might furnish the matter of the rehearsal. Perhaps some
villager, perhaps a youth, perhaps more than one, might
be in turn the spokesman, the Levite attesting his accu-
racy ^ or correcting any error. After the recitation there
might be some simple comment or instruction by the
Levite, assisted it may be by the village elders. This
would take the form of question and answer, or of pithy
sentences repeated by the audience. If a priest were
present, the concourse might be dismissed with the stately
blessing ending the sixth chapter of Numbers. Though
probabl}^ not authorized to use this form, the
Levite also was to bless in the name of the Lord.
There is not a word explicitly connecting the instruc-
tion of children with the exercises of the Sabbath. Yet
there is at least some reason for believing that this was
one of the arrangements which were designed andffcdapted
^ "Amen." See Dent, xxvii. 15-26, and Ps. cvi. 48.
^ Tlie Book of Jasher, Iddo, etc. ?
* " Accuracy." In the beginning of the Sabbath year, at the feast
of Tabernacles, the whole law was to be read publicly from the au-
thentic manuscript preserved at the sanctuary. This would insure
the correction of any error that might have crept in. Deut. xxxi.
10, 13. The frequent repetition enjoined Deut. vi. 6-9, might pro-
duce considerable variations. At the Sabbath services these would
be discovered, and the septennial reading would settle any doubt.
For a people without printing, no better way to keep the whole pop-
ulation acquahited with the very Word of God in purity could be
devised.
124 EIGHT STUDIES OE THE LORD'S DAY.
to give character to the (lay. The association of parents
and children, and the tenderness of Jewish fathers, in con-
trast with the prevalent manners of all heathendom, have
often been commented on. All this grew out of their
religious training and hojjes.^ In the mass, it varied as
their piety. Allusions are found to the parents' habit of
answering their children's questions about i-eligious acts
and memorials ; and they were charged to give full and
clear explanations. Such questions ^ would inevitably be
suggested by the Sabbath and its regular incidents. The
explanation required would lead to a complete history of
God's dealings with their ancestors in pursuance of his
promise. The rehearsals at the convocation would fur-
ther stimulate such inquiries. In accordance with east-
ern fashions the youth would be expected to memorize,
verbatim, these very narratives and laws so as to be able,
each in due course, to take part in the recitations. A
strict injunction was laid on parents to teach their chil-
dren these things.^ The leisure of the Sabbath brought
with it an opportunity, and such an opportunity is al-
ways one side of a duty.
The convocation is always styled " holy." The gather-
ing was clothed with reverence and awe. Its business, its.
spirit, its whole purpose, was humble acknowledgment of
the nation's sovereign God. It was the prominent fea-
ture of the village Sabbath. The central figure was, of
course, the Levite. But none would be busier, none would
^ What an apostasy, when an Israelite could sacrifice his child to
Moloch !
2 " Questions." See Ex. xii, 26, 27 ; Deut. vi. 20-25 ; xxxii. 7 ;
Josh. iv. 6, 7. Too much must not be built on these passages; but
they must not be robbed, on the other hand, of their testimony to
common habits. See, also, Ps. xliv. 1 ; Ixxviii. 3,
8 " Teach them diligently." Deut. vi. 7. Note the Sabbatic ring
of the echoing passages. Ps. xxxiv. 11 ; Prov. i. 8; iv. 1; v. 1, 7; viii.
32, etc. Note, also, the reference to delinquence in Malachi iv. 6.
THE MOSAIC SABBATH. 1-0
more heartily enjoy its sunny hours, than the children and
youth, to whom the mysteries of their religion were then
unfolded, and those who led their studies. The back-
ground of the picture was universal genial sociality. The
gladsomeness of all was heightened by the communal as-
semblage ; by the participation of servants, children, and
mothers ; by the presence of one familiar with the capitol,
connected with the national government, and yet not far
above their own rank. But the social glow, favored by
the day's leisure, was yet restrained from any approach
to license by the solemnity of the convocation, by the
official dignity and influence of the visiting Levite, and
by the occupation of explaining or memorizing what we
may call the Scriptures. Thus, while this was a day of
leisure and of rest, it may well have been full of employ-
ment. Every hour had some business with God, or for
God. Thus every mind became accustomed to feel his
personal superintendence and government. The whole
Sabbath spoke of Him, of his authority, of his favor,
especially of his promises ; and so of his personal interest
in each and all of them. His majesty arrested plough
and sickle and press. His minister presided at the reci-
tation of his acts and words. His praise was sung by the
villnge choir, his benevolence was reflected in social fel-
lowship and household relaxation. His promises contin-
ually stimulated to some contemplation of their national
destiny, and would, in time, suggest some dim compari-
son between the future day of blessing to all nations and
the present day of blessing to all the little vilhige world.
And so his covenant, like a banner, waved over the Sab-
bath land.
STUDY VI.
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISEAEL.
" Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ." —
Gal. iii. 24.
The promise to Abraham and tlie promise given to
Adam and Eve ^ make . together one complete whole.
Nothing more conld be made known except as to greater
minuteness of details until the time of fulfillment arrived.
This, like the promise, is in two parts separated by mil-
lenniums of time. The heel of the woman's seed was
bruised on Calvary. The head of his enemy is not yet
crushed.^ The day of blessing to all nations began to
dawn when the " Dayspring from on high visited us."
It is not yet the perfect day of the world's complete
blessedness. The administration of the promise is still
continuing. The means and the end of the promise, the
process of atonement, anff the development of lo3'al devo-
tion, are included still in that administration. In the
process of atonement the divine wrath against sin was
first manifested, then the character and mission of the
Sin-Bearer, lastly the work of the Sin-Remover, the
Sanctifying Spirit. By similar steps the development of
loyalty began with the simple idea of obedience ; then,
by degrees, reached the consciousness of a trust to hold ;
* The first promise was in form addressed to the serpent. But it
was uttered for the benefit of the human race whose progenitors lis-
tened to it.
2 "Not jet." 1 Cor. xv. 25; Heb. ii. 8; Rev. xix. 11; xx. 15.
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 127
and in this last age has been rousing in Christian minds
the perception of a mission to execute. Not all at once,
but in the course of ages, the prophets, who represented
the religious intelligence of Israel, learned the fact, that
not unto themselves, but unto another dispensation were
they ministering. This fact was a fact from iPet. i:io-
the first. Gravitation existed as truly before ^^'
as after men learned to think of it as such. We, at least
in our own day, know each of these things as a fact ;
and in the light of this knowledge we must study the
other facts before us. The Mosaic system, as a whole,
and in all its great departments, was prepai'ative. It
was not intended to endure. It bore within itself the
evidence of its own transitoriness. Israel was allowed
scarcely any initiative. He w^as confined to routine.
The utmost precision in following that routine was his
merit. That routine was his sacred trust. Yet it was
more than dead routine. It was a divine education. It
provided the germs of all those moral or mental states
and operations which are involved in man's first becom-
ing reconciled to God,i and then living as a lo^^al citi-
zen of God's kingdom. It provided, also, for the grad-
ual, and at length the complete, development of those
germs. It contemplated the time when men, having be-
come in their veiy hearts at one with God, and having
become used to all the habits and ideas ciu-rent in the
commonwealth of the godly, might be emancipated from
the trammels of its statutory drill, and ushered into the
exercise of free spontaneity as citizens of that common-
wealth. The coming One who should introduce this new
era was distinctly set forth, as the antitype of the law-
giver who had established the routine.
The weekly Sabbath alone was not sufficient to give
1 Including in this phrase also the reconciliation of God to man,
i. e. the whole atonement.
128 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
the due preparation for tbcit future citizenship. It did
give that which must lie at the foundation of any real
preparation for citizenship, — a strong sense of nation-
ality. But in the development of the national Sabbath
out of the simple sacred day of patriarchal times, there
was involved one contingency of evil. With the perpet-
ual recurrence of the Sabbath the consciousness of na-
tionality must become very vivid. At length the idea
of the nation might become so vivid as to bedim the idea
of its sovereign God. If loyalty were all that the Sab-
bath signified, then loyalty to the nation might take the
place of loyalty to God. God was unseen ; so also the
nation was an unseen abstraction. But it was God's ex-
ecutive, and by its office-bearers stood between the peo-
ple and God. It might absorb all their loyalty, if loyalty
was all they had. The name of God might then be on
the people's lips ; but the desire to do his will because it
was his would not be in their hearts. The Sabbath
would then become nothing more than a national pecul-
iarity,— a Jewish distinction. It would serve no pur-
pose, but to advertise the Jew as one separate from all
other men. Just this did actually come to pass. But it
came to pass only because the sabbatic legislation, as a
whole, was not faithfully enforced ; because the sabbatic
system was not suffered to work out, in a proper wa}',
the proper results of its routine. That system was more
or less disregarded when it might have been executed.
When the day of fanatic legalism came, its execution
was no longer possible. So the Sabbath became barren.
It was leading to no goal. The ideas and feelings which
ought to have been a part of it were replaced by a nar-
row and selfish formalism, through the greater or less
neglect of those provisions which would have given it a
larger meaning. The feeling of Jewishness enveloped it
like a husk.
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 129
The sabbatic system consisted of five members.
These five may be regarded as two groups, one of three
and one of two members. The three members of the
first group were the sacred day, the sacred month, and
the sacred year, — each the last of a series of seven days,
months, and years, respectively. The two members of
the second group were a sacred day and a sacred year,
immediately succeeding seven series of seven days and
seven series of seven years respectively, and, therefore,
each constituting the first in a new series of seven. The
first three closed a week. The latter two began it. The
centre of this system was, of course, the seventh day of
the week. It existed before any of the others. It was
enjoined upon Israel before any of them. It stood upon
a different foundation and with a loftier dignity; for
it bad a place not only in primeval tradition, but also
in tlie solemn magnificence of the uttered Decalogue.
While the title of Sabbath is variously applied, no other
day, no other sabbatic period, is ever confused with tJie
Sabbath.
The seventh month of each year ^ was distinguished by
the most solemn of the national acts of worship, the Day
of Atonement, and by the most joyous of the national
festivals, the Week of Tabernacles. It was further dis-
tinguished by twice as many Sabbaths ^ as an ordinary
^ It is not necessary to refer the intelligent reader to all the spe-
cific passages for the provisions of the law concerning the various
sabbatic seasons. A careful perusal of the four Mosaic books is
absolutely indispensable and sufficient. The principal passages are
Ex. xii., xvi., xxxi., xxxiv. ; Lev. xxiii., xxv. ; Num. xxviii., xxix. ;
Deut. xii., xv., xvi.
^ Of course there would sometimes be five weekly Sabbaths, and
sometimes one or more of the additional Sabbaths would coincide
with a weekly Sabbath. The distinction between Shabbath and
Shabbathon is of no consequence in this study. It is noticed in the
next Study in a note on the Pentecost.
9
130 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
month, — the first, tenth, fifteenth, and twenty-second
being so liept in addition to the foiu' seventh days of the
week which would ordinaril}^ fall within it. So the weekly
Sabbath was dignified by the offering of twice as many
lambs as were sacrificed at the morning and evening of
other days. This seventh month was still further dis-
tinguished by the dignity of its opening or representative
day, which was a special Sabbath, and by the beginning
of the sabbatic and jubilee years which it witnessed.
The seventh year was distinguished by cessation of
agricultural work, and also by the release of debts and
of Hebrew slaves.^ At the feast of Tabernacles, which
occurred at its beginning, the whole law, including prob-
ably all the Mosaic writings, was to be read in public.
The original manuscript, or copies made in the precincts
of the sanctuary, must have been used for this reading.
Perfect accuracy would thus be insured both to the
copies read and to the oral tradition, since thousands of
trained ears would be quick to catch the smallest dis-
crepancy.
Thus, while the sabbatic month normally contained
twice as many Sabbaths as any other month, the sab-
batic year was one whole Sabbath. While the seventh
month represented, more than any other, the unity of
national action in the expression of loyalty, not only to its
political Head, but also (in the Day of Atonement) to its
moral Governor, the Judge of hearts and of consciences,
— the seventh year represented this national action as
even more energetically expressing the loyalty of the peo-
ple, in their conforming to peculiar social conditions im-
posed by that political Head and that moral Director for
the whole year. The restrictions which bound each in-
dividual increased. But the privileges and advantages,
for which these universal restrictions furnished an oppor-
1 Ex, xxiii. 10, 11; Lev. xxv. 2-7 ; Deut. xv. 1-18; xxxi. 10-13.
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 131
tunity, increased much more. These privileges and ad-
vantages were exemphfied, in the highest degree, by the
two other members of the system : the I%ntecost and the
Jubilee. These two were distinguished by their relation
to the week. They preserved its integrity and its suc-
cession, and yet presented in it a different plan and order,
giving that prominence to its beginning which was in
other cases given to its close. Pentecost, moreover, was
distinguished as the only one of the great festivals which
depended at all on the count of weeks for its date. It
was, therefore, the only one connected with the sabbatic
system. It was also the only one exclusively associated
with the land of promise, having in it no reminiscence of
Egypt, like the Passover ; and no formal memory of the
wilderness, like the Tabernacles. The Jubilee was also
distinguished by its peculiar relation to the land, intro-
ducing, as it did, the climax of the land law; the resto-
ration of ancestral estates to the heirs of those who first
received them, at the hands of Joshua, as a direct fief of
the Lord God their Sovereign.
These five members of the sabbatic system were bound
together by three circumstances which applied to them
all. They were called Sabbaths,^ they were constituted
by the succession of sevens, and they were marked by the
cessation of agriculture. Thus the system, as a whole,
served to create and develop ideas and feelings, associa-
tions and expectations, which, while centering in the
weekly Sabbath, spread from it to form a sabbatic ideal,
a conception of a something which was not the actual
Sabbath of ordinary experience, and yet was seen in it,
as in a picture would be seen the reduced image of some-
thing larger and more distant.
^ The seventli month was not called a Sabbath in the Scripture,
and in strictness it was not, as a whole, in the same sense as the sev-
enth year, yet the dignity it received warrants for it a place in the
system.* In some Jewish writings it is called the sabbatic month.
132 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LOIiD'S DAY.
In order to study what sort of an ideal tins system was
intended to create and develop, we must consider its
working in the experience of a village of farmers, one
of the typical villages of Israel's home in Canaan. From
the specific provisions of the law as recorded, we must
judge what its effect would be on such villagers through
the repetitions of many centuries. We need not over-
look all the truths taught in the elaborate system of sacri-
fices, neither can we study them now. We wish to ask
what would these village farmers learn, — unconsciously,
involuntarily, incidentally learn, — to think, to feel, to
say, to do, to plan for, to expect through the continued
recurrence not only of weekly Sabbaths but also of
seventh months and sabbatic years and Pentecosts and
Jubilees, if each and all were kept as God commanded.
Certain answers to such questions lie on the surface, and
may be perceived as soon as the attention is fairly directed
to them. Such only can be considered here. For it may
not be right to rest an argument concerning a matter so
dear as the Lord's Day to every believer, on anj^ state-
ment which a believer of ordinary intelligence cannot
verify for himself from the Word of God.
I. Indefinite enlargement of the idea of the Sabbath.
The first effect to be noticed in this typical village life
is, indefinite enlargement of the popular idea of the mag-
nitude of the Sabbath. In our own time Sunday has
always to be taken somehow into account. Whatever
may be men's views, feelings, prejudices, there it is right
in the way. Willingly or unwillingh^, consciously or
unconsciously, religiously or irreligiously, all must pay
some regard to it. But how much more were these
Hebrew farmers to think, to plan, and to do about it !
The weekly day of abstention from labor was only a
beginning. Beside that, the farmer must look forward
to special annual suspensions of his farm work. And,
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 133
still more, lie must keep in mind the septennial omission
of all tillatre, and the doubled intermission of the Jubilee,
as well as its revision of the holdings of the land. The
iiitrinsic character of each one of these intermissions, and
the relation, of each to the programme of husbandry was
such, that the farmer was compelled to look forward to
each, to prepare for each, and to hold all before his mind
as concerns of indefinitely increasing importance to him-
self and his. Thus Pentecost laid its hand on the mid-
summer. The Passover and the Tabernacles called the
farmer away from home at times sufficiently favorable to
such excursions. After the sowing is done, and again
after the harvest is gathered, farming folk, in all lands,
have been wont to celebrate holiday. But these He-
brews, when they left their yellowing barley for the
passover journey, had to think of the second journey
seven weeks later in raid-harvest. It was taken out of
their busiest time in the wheat -fields, and must be
planned for. So, at the close of harvest, the farmers were
not free to work steadily at their ingathering up to the
appointed day for the festival of the booths. Two extra
days, in the beginning of this important month, must be
given up to religious use. And one extra day is added
to the week of the feast. All summer through, the re-
strictions, as well as the privileges, of the seventh month
must likewise be planned for.
Then the seventh month must necessarily bi'ing sharply
to mind the sabbatic year, which always began in that
month. The celebration of the first day of this month
(the feast of Trumpets) may have been specially in-
tended to direct the villagers' attention to the coming
year of release and benevolence. This day, like Pen-
tecost, seems to have closed ^ with a feast. Probably
^ It is not impossible that in some cases tliese feasts may liave been
called (popularly) sacrifices, though not ofiered on an altar. Both
134 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
sheep or beeves, provided by the elders, would be roasted
or boiled. The villagers, sitting round the coals, might
regale themselves, as thoughtless of grease as of plates
or forks. Some would carry steaming joints to their
cottages. The elders and dignitaries would be served
under cover,^ and with a slight inclination toward dain-
tiness. Thus would be conveyed a hint of the good time
coming to all.
Likewise the feast of weeks, Pentecost, another day
not only for worship, but also for liberal hospitality,
would hardly fail to suggest the Jubilee which crowned
the seven weeks of years. Bat the sabbatic 3'ear and
the Jubilee were not merely suggested by the seventh
month and the fiftieth day. They were forced upon
every one's attention. The whole of their tillage must
be planned with reference to the seventh year when the
ground would lie fallow. And every bargain in the vil-
lage, every sale and purchase, every loan, every lease,
every obligation or acquisition of service, building and
repairing, all losses and gains ; indeed, every business
transaction involved a reference^ to the coming 3'ear of
sabbatic release, or the still grander year of Jubilee re-
vision. Both these periods, moreover, would occupy the
imagination rather than the memory of most. An old
man would not always have more than one Jubilee to re-
ideas, the altar and the social partaking, are included in the com-
plete idea of a sacrifice ; bnt that word may have been applied
where only the social partaking was realized. For example, in 1
Sam. ix. there is no hint of an aJtar. On the contrary, the cook
is mentioned, v. 23. In all probability the "sacrifice " was simply a
village feast, perhaps the very feast of Trumjiets. See also Prov. vii.
14 ; xvii. 1.
1 Parlor. 1 Sam. ix. 22. The tenement was evidently on the
"high place," vv. 12-14, 19, 25.
2 "Involved a reference." Just as from 18G3-1877 every business
transaction in America involved some reference to the premium on
gold coin.
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 135
member. Those in middle life would have known only
two or three sabbatic years daring their manhood. Be-
fore the great part of our villagers these periods would
loom up as grand expectations, projected out of the
shadowy future and full of majesty, because they irre-
sistibly affected the welfare of all. And the classes who
would be most deeply interested in the advent of these
periods would be those whose imaginations would be most
excitable. They would be not the experienced, the suc-
cessful, the self-satisfied and self-sufficient ; but the young,
the unfortunate, the poor, the bondmen, the humbler, and
also the more numerous part of the village society. To
all such how large in importance these jaeriods would be.
As they approach, how impressive the preparation !
How careful the calculation ! How exciting the expec-
tation ! Some, it is true, might be as reluctant as others
were longing. But none could be unmoved and indif-
ferent.
And so there was borne upon the mind, ever}' weekly
Sabbath, some hint or foreshadowing of a larger Sab-
bath. j\Ien were taught to look forward to weeks,
months, and years by sevens. This was not on account
of any imaginary convenience in counting by sevens, as
we count by tens, for no nation counted that way ; but it
was because every seven led up to something solemn,
instructive, and beneficent ; and every seven times seven
to something yet more solemn, instructive, and benefi-
cent. The future always held before their imagination
not merely a great event, but also the inauguration of a
great period. Through the skillfully prepared perspective
of enlarffino; intervals and more and more absorbinsj con-
ditions, the great coming period towered in the distance,
and every weekly Sabbath was the gateway.
II. Two contrasted administrations of society. The
larger sabbatic periods gave scope for the administration
136 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
of certain principles whose effect could not have been
made perceptible on the scale of a day. These prin-
ciples, associated with the sabbatic system and so with
the Sabbatli, were in sharp contrast with those wliich
regulate the ordinary social activity of mankind. In
regard to the latter, mankind have not changed since
history began. Their ideal of social activity may be
expressed in three words: get. hold, enjoy. Their motto
is, Mine for myself. Three tliousand years ago this was
as much the rule in Israel's land as it is in this nine-
teenth century of America and Europe. There have
been, in all ages, exceptional examples of unselfishness,
but the rule of social life has not changed. Only our
age has obtained from evangelical Christianity some con-
ception of a regime of perfect unselfishness, of unerring
justice, cooperating with complete benevolence. We be-
lievers look for such a rSgime to come. It is distinctly
before our hope and symbolized to us on every Lord's
Day. In his sabbatic system the Hebrew had this same
conception set before him as an object lesson. The study
was made for him as simple as any child could need.
He was not expected to philosophize about the release of
slaves, the canceling of debts, the restoration of houses
and lands, the common sharing of corn and fruit. But
if he kept the law he could not help becoming, at length,
familiar enough with the results of God's interference.
He would see not merely days but years, and not merely
single years but years in regular recurrence and redupli-
cation, forcibly taken away from the influence of those
ordinary motives which inspire men to work and trade,
and which move the social machinery, — forcibly put
under the operation of rules which, as laws of any land,
were otherwise utterly unknown. The world has never
seen institutions like these. No lawgiver ever proposed
the like. Neither Plato nor More suggest them. Cen-
rilE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 137
turies before our villagers could express such a feeling in
the vaguest language, they would feel that here was a
picture, a type, a suggestion of what the uncliallenged
government of men by God, under his covenant of grace,
would be. It was indeed justice with benevolence be-
tween man and man. No oppression, no outwitting !
The covetous restrained ! The keen and ambitious
turned aside ! The drudge awakened to meditation, and
the stupid aroused to hope ! The fallen lifted up to es-
say a new starting ! The unfortunate restored to earlier
comfort ! The whole population made free to consume
the fruit of the land wherever it grew, not as the reward
of toil, but as God's free unearned gift ! At last they
would surely be able to read this legend over all the
land : " Ye and your possessions are not your own."
Doubtless, not every one would be pleased with such
experiments in social science. The more vigorous and
intelligent, as well as the more greedy, might prefer the
usual ways of men uncontravened. The humbler and
less capable might profit more than others by the divine
ordinances ; and the good experienced could not be un-
alloyed or completely satisfactory. The actual blessed-
ness in store for the world's enjoyment when the king-
dom of our Lord shall become supreme could not be
experienced in these Israelitisli villagers. They had to
learn that there was such a kingdom. They had to
realize that the administration of God's realm differed
broadly from the ordinary. The suspension of tillage
by a whole nation at once would not fail to make an im-
pression on every mind. The peculiarity and strange-
ness of this was heightened by the provisions concerning
(^ebts, slaves, and land. Perhaps nothing brought home
to all the sense of living under a different and unusual
administration more powerfully than the permission for
any and every one to consume freely the fruit of any
138 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
and all lands alike without ownership and without labor,
coupled with an interdict against storing one grain away.
It was not communisin. It was brotherhood in the en-
joyment of a Father's bounty.
III. Readjustment of social conditions. While the Is-
raelite would thus be learning to perceive that there was
a sharp contrast between the kingdom of God and ordi-
nary human society, he would also be gradually learning
to notice some distinct features of that kingdom. Prob-
ably the first one of these features distinctly seen would
be a revision and readjustment of men's relations to each
other. Nothing can be more discordant with the theory
that men are all of one blood, than tlie fact that, through-
out all history, one set of men are found so lifted up by
pride above other men. The order of national history, in
this respect, has usually begun with war, migration, or
some other social convulsion, which has brought certain
families into superior position and authority. Tlien has
followed a greater and greater exaltation of the ruling
class, a deeper and deeper depression of the masses. Fi-
nally, a new convulsion throws elements to the top more
or less different, and the process is repeated. Only in
most recent times has society undertaken to make life
easier to the lowlier. Yet the Christian Church has al-
ways been consistent. Her first leaders were men of
humble position. In all times she has received and
blessed the humble, and welcomed them to any of her
offices, even the highest. And at last not only the
Church, but our whole age, is beginning to understand
that superior social position is very unstable. Even in
this life it is no longer a great surprise when Lazarus
comes up and Dives goes down. And our moral sense
appreciates the moral necessity of great readjustments in
the hereafter. But there is a wide gulf between that
readjustment which the ancient Israelite learned to count
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 139
upon, as iiuleed the modern believer still counts upon it,
and the readjustment whose possibility now bewitclies
men's minds and whose eager pursuit sometimes threat-
ens to shake the foundations of the social fabric. Men
covet what is not their own. There are very manj', very
glittering prizes which they may lawfully try to make
their own. There is also a very widespread desire
among men to gain their ends by any means, not scru-
pling about lawfulness, but only looking for a safe oppor-
tunity. Men revolt against what seems to them ine-
quality. They sometimes revolt not only against the
organization of society, but against reason, religion, and
humanity itself. They would degi'ade society to a bestial
herding. They deny the brotherhood of men, for that
means the ruling Fatherhood of God and the subjection
of all the brotherhood, as his common children, to Him.
Very differently was the Israelite, by this sabbatic legis-
lation, taught to feel. He had a possession which was
indelible, inalienable, — a perfect entail. It corresponded
exactly to the rank of nobility in the most aristocratic
kingdoms. It was his birthright. What he was to get
was his very own by the patent of God himself. Noth-
ing whatever could deprive him of his rights. They
were in his blood. Consequently the readjustment,
which took place at the appointed intervals, was always
according to law, and therefore in due and known order.
Every villager would understand who should come into
possession of each house or farm, who would escape the
burden of debt, who would be set free from bondage.
The genealogies ^ were everywhere kept. Probably
^ The very numerous genealogies introduced into the inspired
text are sufficient evidence of the habit of keeping them everywhere.
There are a multitude of expressions, such as " the house of their
fathers" (Josh. xxii. 14), "family of his father's tribe" (Num.
xxxvi. 6, 12), which imply the same.
140 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
written statements of important contracts were likewise
preserved. The direct interest of every member of the
village community would insure a fairly accurate tradi-
tion, which would be a check upon the elders who held
the written documents. Thus the Israelite would learn
to expect a readjustment completely free from disturb-
ance or confusion, completely gauged by rule and record,
completely warranted by the ancestral blood in each
man's veins, — and yet a readjustment which no social
force, influence, or feeling ever has carried out or even
ordained, — which stood by this ordinance of God alone,
and whose certainty and imminence would be assured by
the return of every Sabbath.
IV. Removal of indignities. As Israel would gradu-
ally become able to see that readjustment was according
to the mind of God, he would also begin to see that, since
certain results were always promoted in every readjust-
ment, these results must be particularly pleasing to God,
and particularly appropriate to society under divine ad-
ministration. Thus the sabbatic system was adapted to
teach the nation that dishonor of men by men was ab-
horrent to God, and that the blessing of the Promise in-
cluded the removal of indignities. All that was possible
in this direction was done, and all that was done led in
this one direction. It would not have been rational to'
forbid absolutely any surrender of land, or any market-
ing of personal service, or any incurring of debt which
might lead to loss of land or freedom. But neither folly
nor misfortune were allowed to effect permanent abject-
ness. The sabbatic year was the year of the Lord's re-
lease. It released those who were pressed down below
the condition of free manhood.
In order to comprehend the exti'aordinary character of
these provisions, we must compare them, not with the
ideas now prevalent, but with those of antiquity. Chris-
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 141
tianity has not only inherited from Moses these very
ideas, but through the teaching of her Lord and the
leading of his Spirit, she has developed them. She has
ever cried, " Honor all men.*' She has taught
men at last that slavery is unnatural. All those
hiws which in our day deal mercifully with the debtor
and tlie pauper as well as v^ith the bondman are the re-
sult of her influence, and in perfect harmony with her
original teachings. They are also in perfect harmony
with the sabbatic legislation. Here the Israelite was ena-
bled to realize that the administration of the kingdom
of God included the uplifting of man, and was the anti-
dote for any dishonor that might come upon him.
If slavery has been truly called " the open sore " of
this modern world, it was the universal lepros}^ of the
ancient. It was a contingency which might possibly
befall any and every man. Debt easily led to it. Land-
less poverty drove men to it. War battened on it. One
may read ancient history and easily overlook it amid the
circumstances of the rise and fall of cities and empires,
and the varied interest of political and social struggles.
But the fact was that slavery was a universal bog, sick-
ening and unstable, on which the whole of ancient society
was built. Any man and any family and any neighbor-
hood might sink in it. Men and families and communi-
ties did incessantly sink in it, and its foulness poisoned
all who remained above. A battle, a bad harvest, or
sickness, an error, a fault, inability to pay taxes, or even
sheer force and fraud, might seize any one. The whole
of ancient thought Vv^as pervaded with a sort of tragic
melancholy. Black Fate, whom their heathen imagina-
tion had put in place of God, had suspended over every
man not only death but ruin worse than death ; and
that not only for himself but also for his wife and chil-
dren with him, — a descent to the domination of cruelty,
142 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
lust, and exile, to the condition of a beast and the esti-
mation of a thing. From the throne he might go down
to the depths of this abyss. In every community that
achieved any degree of civilization the great majority
were slaves. Ten to one freeman as at Athens seems to
have been no unusual proportion. Incredible numbers
of human chattels accumulated in Egypt, Assyria, and
Rome, and other great monarcliies. The mind loathes
the contemplation of the festering horrors of their condi-
tion. The Israelite alone was debarred by his constitu-
tion from admitting perpetual slavery. ^
It is a rather favorite dogma of social science that men
are spurred to use their best powers in the struggle for
a livelihood by the sense of possible defeat, and that a
provision against possible defeat tends to unmanliness.
But our age, instructed by Christianity, has interposed in
a thousand ways to prevent utter defeat. The bankrupt
may start again. The ignorant may have free educa-
tion. For all classes of the helpless and suffering and
destitute society provides a measure of relief, as an obli-
gation which is due from the community as a whole to
its weaker members. Precisely this Israel did for the
Israelites at the command of her Sovereign, and as a
symbol of her sovereign's beneficent rule when the Prom-
ise should be fulfilled.
V. Divine Providence. It is true in a certain sense
that a man is the architect of his own fortune, for a
man's real fortune, i. e., the sum of real enjoyment ob-
tained by him in life, is regulated by his own voluntary
choices and actions. But a man's true fortune, in this
sense, is inward. It is independent of his external con-
ditions. The Scriptures of both Testaments everywhere
teach that the external conditions depend upon the sov-
^ The exception recorded Ex. xxi. 5, 6, ■whereby an individual
might make his own slavery perpetual, did not involve his children.
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 143
ereign will of God. In our day believers realize this
fact largely, if not chiefly, through experience of calam-
ity. The age, through its wonderful achievements and
no less through the wonderful development of present
comfort and possible elevation among the masses, has
fostered the opinion that any desired success is possible
to a man. In the day of sorrow he realizes the fact that
he is not master of his own outward and material for-
tune, that the external conditions of greatest value to his
personal happiness are not subject to his will or depend-
ent on his choices or actions. The ideal which Chris-
tianity holds concerning success in life is expressed in
words uttered by the Lord, " Man shall not live by bread
alone, but by every word that proceedeth out ^^ .^ , . ,
of the mouth of God." This great lesson
of Providence was most carefully taught Israel by the
sabbatic legislation. The most careless and the most
stupid could not fail to learn that he did not depend
wholly on the land he tilled for bread. There were two
parts to the lesson. On the one hand he had, forced
upon his attention the fact, that he was only a tenant,
and not the owner of the land. On the other hand,
he was compelled to notice the bounty of the owner
and landlord, which was always larger according to his
straits.
As Israel was strictly agricultural originally, the sab-
batic legislation naturally bore upon land. But more
than this, all in it that was peculiarly JNIosaic, and there-
fore extraneous to the sacred day of earlier times, was
explicitly addressed to farm life. Thus in the Fourth
Commandment rest is ordained for animals that do farm
work, but flocks are not mentioned. Again, the only
work suspended, except on the weekly Sabbath and the
Day of Atonement, was farm work, called in our version
" servile work." And again, the restoration of land in
144 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
the 3'ear of Jubilee applied only to fields, and to houses
in unwalled villages, that is, to farmers' dwellings and
lands.
The double lesson of his own tenancy and of his land-
lord's bounty was impressed through long continued and
reiterated experience of three different sorts, all three the
product of this sabbatic agricultural legislation.
First, of course, in impressiveness was the frequent
arrest of tillage. This was so arranged as to make the
arbitrary authority of God peculiarly sensible. The tra-
ditions of the old sacred day would naturally harmonize
with its development into a day of complete rest, when
agriculture replaced pastoral life. Unquestionably the
exigency of tlie day would be felt as the jjressure of arbi-
trary power, but it would be not so much in the char-
acter of the day as in the stringency with which rest was
enforced. So, too, in regard to the sabbatic year, it
would seem not unnatural that land should have its rest.
It is not uncommon now in Europe for agricultural leases
to stipulate that in certain years the ground should lie
fallow. Such a clause would make the landlord's pve-
rogative felt, and yet W'Ould be so completely warranted
by general opinion that it could not seem oppressive.
Only when the whole estate was to lie fallow at once, or
still more, in the case of Israel, the whole territory of the
nation, would the weight of that prerogative seem heavy.
As before, it was a matter not of essential character, but
of degree. It has been noticed that the spring and
autumn festivals required a journey to the seat of the
tabernacle at times specially convenient to the farmer.
Passover came about the end of seeding. Tabernacles
about the end of harvesting. But in midsummer, in the
midst of wheat-cutting, right athwart the husbandman's
busiest season, came Pentecost. And so in the seventh
month, when every effort would be made to finish the
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 145
harvest before the fifteenth, two extra clays of intermis-
sion were imposed. Then, above all, every seventh fal-
low year was followed by another, and then the man to
■whom Jubilee gave an estate was compelled to acknowl-
edge his sovereign's prerogative by waiting a whole year,
after the land was pronounced his, before entering into
individual possession. Were not all these provisions
adapted to produce in the popular mind a profound sense
of the grasp with which God, their Landlord, held his
land?
A second sort of experience, of an entirely different
kind, would be more slowly realized. It would be impos-
sible, under the working of this legislation, for any man
to become rich in land. It is true that the original allot-
ments were not all equal. The divine prerogative was
exerted in apportioning them. But whatever a man
might get, the jubilee year stript him of all but his
pi'oper share of tliat which his ancestor had received.
Great fortunes were thus discouraged. The law of the
landlord forbade any one man to accumulate many
farms. If the rich young man, who came to our Lord
boasting of his faithfulness to the law, had in- -^^^^^ -^q .
herited or retained his "great possessions" ■^'~^^'
through non-observance of the jubilee statute, the Lord's
answer may well have sent him away downcast. The
Lord's land was for all his people. No one was to have
more than his proper share, in order that no one might
be without. And, therefore, while the prerogative was
so strenuously maintained, the bountiful kindness of God
toward his whole people was bound up with it.
A third sort of experience, quite different, would
impress the same lesson, perhaps yet more distinctly,
on the common mind. For in the regular and ap-
pointed sabbatic succession, not only were the fields
fallow and the farmers turned to other pursuits, but the
10
146 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
whole population — the poor, the stranger, the just
emancipated slave — were all free to all that the untilled
ground would produce. This privilege was not
i,l! ^\- ' limited to the chance growth of the corn-fields.
25 : 2-7. . °
Grapes and olives, whose crops might be only
a little diminished by the abeyance of tillage, were
specially mentioned. Like everything else, they were
free to all. There was only one restriction. No one
should harvest anything.^ No grain could be stacked
away. No olives could be pressed into oil, no grapes into
wine. Nothing should be laid up. But for immediate
wants, every one was absolutely free to take what he
could find. All stood on a perfect equality. Pie who
called himself the owner had no better right than the one
whom he yesterday called his bondman ; no better right
than the peddling Canaanite who was hawking his wares
thi-ough the village, or the runawa}^ slave from Egypt
or Damascus, who had there sought an asylum. By the
Lord's command, and under the landlord's prerogative,
every acre of his land, both pasture and tilth, witli every
ear of corn and nut and berry on it, was free to all his
people and to all who were under his people's protection,
not only the stranger, but their domestic beasts.
As the Aveeks of years rolled on to weeks of jubilees
and weeks of centuries, would not such experiences cre-
ate at length, in the mind of Israel, and develop into
clear outline that double conception, on the one side, of
God's prerogative, on the other side, of his benevolence,
which we call Providence ?
VI. National brotherhood. To this nation of farmers,
in every seventh year, farming was interdicted. What
could they do during these years? They would hardly
1 By comparing Lev. xxv. 2-7 with Ex. xxiii. 10, 11, it will be seen
that the prohibition in Leviticus is only against storing up. Verses
6 and 7 show that immediate consumption was permitted.
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 147
idle their time away in the villages. Women's work was
not suspended during the Sabbath of the fields. Milk
and butter and cheese would still be made, beside the or-
dinary work of the cottage homes. The women would not
spare their reproach and scorn if their husbands found
nothing to do and did nothing the whole year long.
And it is not likely that they could afford it. Nor can it
be believed that the sharp acquisitive instincts of their
race would not lead them to employ this year for profit.
Three pursuits would be open to each one, — trade,
handicraft, stud3^ Each of these pursuits would lead to
travel. Now travel, for its own sake, is a very recent
invention ; but travel for the sake of trafficking, or of
finding employment, or of gaining information, is older
than Moses. So, whichever way the farmer should
turn his steps this year, he would see more of men and
places, he would see more men and more places, than
usual. The mere agriculturist is isolated. He knows,
proverbially, little of the larger affairs of men. He is
proverbially ready to magnify the importance of every-
thing in his personal environment, and to belittle all
else. But by the sabbatic system the Hebrew farmer
was trained to extend his sj'mpathies and to enlarge his
experience of men. The village Sabbath, as has been
noticed, had a very powerful influence to keep active and
to develop his social character. The ter-annual journey
to the national sanctuary, and the commingling there
with crowds of fellow-worshipers, would still further
strengthen and widen the sense of civic intercommunity.
But in all these gatherings he would be only a farmer
who had left his farm for the moment, and would, as soon
as possible, return to it. How much more would be ef-
fected by the years which completely broke up the isola-
tion of husbandry, even the modified isolation of Israel-
itish husbandry, and drove the farmer into continuous
148 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
intercourse with men. For, wliatever the occupations of
these sabbatic years might be, they would not scatter
men over outlying fields, but would draw them together
to bazaars and streets and schools. The exigencies of
trade, craft, or study would lead men to seek one an-
other, to approach non-acquaintances, to join novel associ-
ations. Had the law been faithfully observed, this would
doubtless have been the favorite year for public works
and for national market fairs. It should be remarked,
also, that when numbers of men leave agriculture, for
any reason, their tendency always is not to the smaller
villages and towns, but to the larger.^ There would be
no less a tendency of these Hebrew farmers to flock into
the largest towns, whei*e the greatest amount and great-
est variety of occupations might be found. Most of the
villagers would be in such a large town, or would be
traveling about during a good part of the year. Mod-
ern pleasure travel certainly broadens men's views, al-
though it does not always seem to increase the sense of
fellowship with men of other lands and tongues ; and,
moreover, not many of the tourists are farmers. But the
Israelite villager's year of busy dealing with men of his
own blood and tongue and faith, — a year too short to de-
velop the hardness of the regular trader, yet long enough
to sharpen the blunted sympathies of the regular farmer,
— must make him less of a villager and more of an Isra-
elite. Instead of holdin"; his village and his fellow-villa-
gers for all his world, or of giving to the national shrine
alone a share of his village pride, he would learn that
everywhere his countrymen were Israelites too; he would
1 Note the flocking of negroes into the cities after emancipation in
the Southern States. Also the growth of lar^e towns as compared
with agricultural villages in P^nglantl, and in a less degree, on the
Continent. These villages, however, were very unlike those of Is-
rael.
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 149
have acquaintances in all parts of the land; lie would
Lave national interests and national sympathies, embrac-
ing every citizert, and he would feel himself a member of
a national brotherhood.
Every item of the sabbatic legislation tended in the
same direction. Whatever illustrated the sovereignty of
God illustrated also the communion of God's people. As
in every other case, the practical experience was adapted
to bring out the mental conception, as the experience
was repeated again and again. Thus, starting from the
weekly Sabbath, and on through all the series, Israel had
before him an object lesson of unity and fellowship, —
a lesson of wliat, under God's covenant, human brother-
hood might be among the citizens of the kingdom of
God.
VII. Incompleteness. Upon the typical village life,
which has been under contemplation, one more effect was
certain to be produced by age-long experience of the sab-
batic system. That system was adapted and intended to
educate Israel to a perception of his essential incomplete-
ness and transientness, and to prepare him for the devel-
opment of another sacred day as different as his Mosaic
institutions were different from those of the patriarchs.
It is indeed strange that the nation, instead of realizing
this, became fanatic in their zeal for the preservation of
their Sabbath as it was. Though they looked for a Mes-
siah who should inaugurate a new administration, they
never seemed to imagine that either the Sabbath or the
sacrifice could be changed by Him. Nor can we realize
that a change was intended from the first, unless we turn
away our regard from that idea of the Sabbath which
represents the hard narrow bigotry of the pharisaic age,
and which evidently aroused the antipathy of our Lord.
The apple blossom is beautiful and fragrant. When the
apple is ripe, a few shriveled and unsightly fragments of
1-50 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
tissue represent the blossom. They also represent the
pharisaic sabbath so far as it was pharisaic. Its vice was
that it refused to accept the whole of GotVs teaching.
It rejected the ripe fruit, but it carefully saved the
wretched shreds of dead petals,^ tricked them out with a
fantastic setting, and made of them a sort of charm, as if
their Sabbath (not the Mosaic) were the central point of
Judaism, the covenant of God's assured favor. Their
Sabbath was not the Mosaic,^ because they separated it
from the sabbatic system ; making much of the one, they
slighted the other. Under the circumstances, this was
natural, and, except by divine imposition, unavoidable.
But they were responsible for those circumstances in
which they had placed themselves by their own act.
Israel had ceased to be an agricultural people. The
greater part of the nation were settled in foreign lands
where their own land laws could not be enforced, and
where their sabbatic system in its integrity could not
operate. This change was a part of the punishment of
the nation by the Babylonian Captivit}^ In a notable
passage, in which the author of the Book of Chronicles
refers to the threats recorded in Leviticus,^ it is asserted
that neglect of the sabbatical years was one of the chief
sins punished by the exile. After the return from Bab-
ylon the old legislation was revived as far as possible.
There is evidence that the sabbatic years were sometimes
observed. Probably some occasional effort was made to
enforce the Jubilee. But the system, as a whole, never
^ "Dead petals," that is, forms without spirit. See Study VII.,
page 190, — the letter of the law observed with no comprehension of
its meaning, no interest in its intended result; and therefore, as in-
evitably happens, miscomprehended, misobserved, misapiilied.
2 " Not the Mosaic ; " that is, it did not have the influence on them,
or the character in their eyes, which was intended by Moses.
s Compare 2 Chron. xxxvi. 21 with Lev. xxvi. 34, 35. See, also,
Jer. xxxiv. 13, 1-k.
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 151
agiiiii existed in its entii'ety and vigor. The nation did
not choose to veoccupy their own land. Asia and Egypt
were ahke under Persian rule, and every Jew in them
was made free to return. They did not choose to do so.
Hence the dispersion could not keep the law, for they
were not in their own land. And for this reason, as well
as on account of foreign suzerainty, it was not possible to
restore family estates ^ according to the old patents. Else
Joseph and Mary would not have been housed in a stable
at Bethlehem, for by the law they should have had some of
the fields which had once been tilled by Boaz and Jesse.
Sometimes well-disposed foreign rulers, like Alexander,
remitted taxes in the seventh year, and thus favored
the law. While the Maccabees ruled, the non-tillage of
that year may have been enforced in districts under their
rule. But there were only a few intervals in all the five
hundred years after the return, when the rulers had the
power and will to enforce it anywhere; and then these
rulers could not enforce it over all the land. Moreover
the nation largely turned away from farming to pursuits
not affected by the sabbatic law. Inevitably, therefore,
that system dwindled in the popular estimation until the
Sabbath alone became noticeable. But God had ordained
to teach them what the Sabbath meant through that
system. They disregarded the illustrations and lost the
full meaning of the text. What they expressed by their
own part of the observance, loyalty, remained clear
enough.^ But what God expressed in his command they
failed to see understandingly, because they did not look
in the direction He bade them.
^ Probably the young ruler who was so anxious to be " perfect,"
Matt. xix. 21,* could not have found the rightful owners of. his lands
if he had sought them. But if the land was not lawfully his, he
could not lawfully keep it. Let the poor have the benefit.
^ " Clear enough," as loyalty, yet, as has been shown, loyalty to
the nation rather than loyalty to God himself.
152 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
These considevations seem necessarj^ in order to make
it clear why the Jews of onr Lord's day did not and
could not see in the Sabbath what they ought to have
seen, what was really there as God ordained it, and what
w^as the centre and seed ^ of the whole. It was a pro-
found lesson to set before simple farmers. But there
was a millennium and a half for the study hour, and each
step was simple enough for a child. There was the
promise of blessing to all nations. Age after age would
bring into view a picture of the condition of blessedness
in more and more distinctness of form and coloring. At
length every sabbath would suggest the details, as we
have studied them, of the rule of God over loyal citizens
in that day of perfect blessing : human brotherhood un-
der the divine covenant ; a divine cure for the festering
sores of society I'emoving every dishonor ; a revision and
readjustment of social conditions by divine authority
and with divine skillfulness ; a divine administration of
society under principles of government in sharp contrast
to those that have prevailed ; a large future approaching,
in which this divine sovereignty will be manifested, ex-
ercised, and acknowledged ; it might well take ages to
spell out all these things from the sabbath alphabet.
But, whether Israel learned them or not, the Spirit of
God who set the object lessons before Israel has at length
made these conceptions of the coming kingdom of our
Lord sufficiently familiar to us, the later heirs of Abra-
ham. We are the witnesses to ourselves of the other
part of the object lesson, the share of "all nations" in
the blessing. If Israel had been faithful, doubtless their
development or absorption into the larger dispensation
^ " Centre and seed." The most important thing in the Sabbath,
its very centre, was that whicli God taught men or revealed to men
by it. And this divine thouglit in it related to the Promise, and
ike a seed waited a future development.
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 153
would have been peaceful, voluntary, and full of honor.
If they had been faithful, even these plain rustics would
have seen in due time that a change was inevitable, would
have become prepared for it, and would have desired it.
For as the ages went by, and the actions and habits
caused by the sabbatic sj'stem, together with the details
of the system itself, became so familiar as no longer to
require an effort of the mind to attend to them, or an
effort of the will to perform them, and therefore the
mind could embody the experiences connected with the
system in such abstract conceptions as we have studied,
making these conceptions continually more and more
definite and distinct, then would it become plain even to
those farmer folk, that others than Israelites must learn
to worship their God without inhabiting their land or
becoming part of their nation ; that the fellowship of the
Promise could not be limited to a tribe or a province ;
that the bounty and the prerogative of the Almighty
were not to be restricted to Hebrew land ; that the rights
He exercised over that land would certainly one day be
enforced on the same principles over land now heathen,
for all the earth was his ; that He, who intervened to
remedy the dishonor of men, would surely one day ob-
literate and prevent every trace of degradation and cor-
ruption ; that the revision and readjustment could not
always be confined to farmers, but must one day embrace
all classes of men ; that it could not be possible for two
diverse and contrasted administrations of society to con-
tinue always side by side; that at length the principles
of the divine administration must cover not one year in
seven but every year ; and yet that this must be some-
how in the spirit and not in the letter, for the letter car-
ried out every year would extinguish agriculture and
take away man's bread ; and that some strange inexplic-
able significance attached to the fact, that when the high-
154 EIGHT STUDIES OF TTIE LOHD'S DAY.
est point in the system was readied, when the climax ar-
rived, which could arrive but once within the ordinary
limits of active life, the crown rested not on the closing
year of the seventh year week, but on the first of a new
year week, so that while the weeks rolled on in uninter-
rupted sevens the highest dignity was strangely diverted
from the seventh to the first !
There are many riddles of Providence which cannot
be solved, except as the Lion of Judah, the Lamb of
God, opens, one by one, the ideals of his book. This is
one. No Israelite could possibly have imagined a way
in which the necessary changes could be accomplished.
No Christian of this day can comprehend how the great
development would have been effected, if Israel had
been joerfectly faithful to his trust. But the truth stands
before every one who candidly and thoroughly studies
their practical working, that the Mosaic institutions did
themselves contemplate and teach such a development
for themselves, — a development in which their external
forms, their very blossom, must die. Under their nor-
mal working these farmers could not have failed in due
time to expect and to desire the fruit more than the
blossom.
The two great systems of sacrifice and sabbatisra
were in this respect perfectly accordant. The sacrificial
system as well as the other testified distinctly to its own
incompleteness. The greatest pains were taken in it to
impress these truths, that God in this ritual did not pun-
ish man but sin ; that men could not placate his wrath
as Cain and the heathen had alwaj's essayed, but that
He would dispense mercy and favor of his own Sovereign
free will ; and yet, that He required an exhibition of
the punishment of sin by perfect innocence submitting
to death, and an exhibition of intercession in the station
of greatest dignity and purity. But the system which
THE SABBATIC SYSTEM OF ISRAEL. 155
showed all this ^ was workable only in a small nation
and a small territory. When the nation shonld increase
to many millions, and enlarge its border " from the Eu-
phrates to the uttermost sea," the system must pg„(. i^.
break down. It was not a human possibility that ^'^'
the sacrifices, according to the strict ritual, by the hands
of the qualified priesthood, at the one single prescribed
locality, could have been duly offered by and for such vast
numbers as might come from so extensive a district. ^ At
some point of time, the nation, if they had been faithful,
would have perceived that this could not continue, and
would have asked with reverent curiosity for the divine
solution of the problem.
The utterances of the prophets do not belong to this
subject, but there was many a word in the books of
Moses himself referring to the consummation. Especially
was then that statement never forgotten that a j^j^^ ^.
Prophet should one day arise like unto him, that ^^'
is, an organizer of a new divine administration. " Him
shall ye hear," was the great leader's parting word.
Judali had a tribal promise of royal preeminence, but it
pointed to that advent of a different, yet an organically
1 A modern Israelite mii;lit travel from New York to Jerusalem in
less time than a subject of King David would have needed to go from
Ourfa to the same city. It would indeed be quite as easy now for all
the Jews in the world to keep the law literally (supposing Jerusalem
given up to them), as it ever could have been for the population of
the largest territory held by ancient Israel, namely, from the Eu-
phrates on the north to the Egyptian border.
2 It seems probable that the enormous number of 250,000 passover
lambs were slain in the last age of Judaism. But in order to accom-
plish so much, a certain amount of accommodation as to the ritual
seems to have been admitted. But the limit of possible accommoda-
tion must have been approached while the limit of faithful ritual was
already past. See Josephus, Wars of the Jews, vi. 9. In the wil-
derness some 20,000 lambs must have been required, — a large work
certainly.
156 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
derived Ruler, " till Sliiloh come." Moreover there was
the great promise to Abraham, the Magna Charta of the
nation, the very point of its origin, first given to the
patriarch when he was " called " to leave Chaldea. It
was thrice uttered by the Almighty in Abraham's time.
It was repeated to Isaac and again to Jacob. No Israel-
ite who remembered that Abraham was his father could
possibly forget that a Seed of Abraham must
Gal. 3 : 16. J o
come to inaugurate the blessing. It is possible
(though a disputed and uncertain point) that the cove-
nant name of God himself conveyed to the minds of the
ancient Hebrews an intimation of his purpose to appear
in some way in alliance with the very flesh and blood
of humanity. That may or may not be true. It is
true that there was a solemn refrain, echoing alike from
the Adamic and Abrahamic promises, caught up in the
dying blessings of Jacob and of Moses, and repeated like
the subtle motive of a fugue through all cadences of the
statutes for sacrifices, festivals, and Sabbaths, — He will
come — the Seed, the Shiloh, the Prophet will come. He
will gather all nations to fellowship with Israel. Israel
shall spread his blessedness over all lands. He will re-
move every curse, and govern the world in righteousness
and love. He will provide a sacrifice suited in cluiracter
and occasion for all the earth and all the nations. And
He will renew the Sabbath so that the land law shall be-
come earth law, and the sign of the covenant with a
petty tribe shall become the sign of the loyalty of all
nations.
STUDY VII.
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT IN THE SAB-
BATIC SYSTEM.
"The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath." —
Mark ii. 27.
Three circumstances of the greatest importance com-
bined, as has been seen, for the education of Israel up to
clear consciousness of this fact, that his system was pre-
parative only, and must eventually pass into some larger
development as yet unknowable. The first of these cir-
cumstances was the form of the grand Abrahamic Prom-
ise. It included " all nations." Israel was one only
among them all. The second was the character of the
legislation. It was limited by the land of Canaan and
its agriculture, and therefore was inadequate to the Prom-
ise. The third was the expectation of a person to appear
in the future for the harmonizing of these incongruities
and for the perfection of all that was incomplete. Not
only was tliere ijrimd facie an incongruity between the
promise and the law, but there was in the law itself a
series of paradoxes. Certain principles were plainly in-
volved in its provisions, and yet these same principles
were traversed in their details by certain other condi-
tions which restrained their full development. We have
now in our hands the key to this paradox. He of whom
Moses prophesied has come. The development has taken
place. Tile principles formerly taught as object lessons
are now familiar theses in the every-day thought of the
158 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
Church. So much of the old system has fallen away that
we are in dangler of overlookins: the lamer and better
part which has become our own inheritance. We are in
danger, indeed, of forgetting that what we have is thus
inherited. It has been our own so long, and has become
associated in our times with so mucli greater than its
ancient glory, that it is hard for us to realize that it was
ever the possession of another before us. Let not, how-
ever, this language confuse the thought. Of our great,
our divine inheritance, we have as yet received
23; coL i! only a foretaste. When our Lord's kingdom
is established we shall have a share in it with
Him. Our inheritance from Israel consists of ideas,
hopes, expectations concerning life in the kingdom of
God. It ought not, therefore, to be hard for us to un-
derstand, both how Israel was given the rudiments of
these ideas, hopes, expectations, and how also their de-
velopment was necessarily to him a riddle. A further
analysis of this riddle ought to enable us to see, in the
terms of its jDaradoxes, the prophecy of our privileges, for
it turned on the extension of the blessing, that is, of the
kingdom or rule of God. In three directions this sabbatic
system exhibited the extending unlimited character of
that blessing, and yet by its own provisions stopped short
of the expansion which it signified and promised. Thus
the riddle or paradox may be considered with reference
to extension in territory, to extension in time, and to ex-
tension in the application of social principles.
I. The territorial riddle. Attention has been already
given ^ to the very important fact, that so marked a con-
trast was made by the Mosaic legislation between the
sacrificial and the sabbatic systems. Perhaps the differ-
ence which would first impress itself upon an Israelite ^
1 See Study V., pp. 108-110.
2 The sacrifice consisted (see Study IV., pp. 101, 102, and note
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 159
would be the limitation of the one compared with the
unlimited extension of the other. For the sacrifice was
central, restricted, mediatorial. It was allowed in only-
one single specified place, with precise, numer- peut. i2:
ous, and invariable rites, and the intervention of ^^'^'*"
a personage of peculiar non-assumable, non-transferable
dignity. But the Sabbath touched every place. It was
as pervasive as the light of its sun. It knew no pre-
scribed rites or forms of worship. ^ It was not dependent
upon jjriest, or Levite, or chief, or any other official repre-
sentative. It was the unincumbered, direct expression
of a man's personal allegiance to the covenant God.
Thus it spread over all the land. But why not over all
the earth ? " All nations " were included in the Prom-
ise. The sacrifice, it is true, could not in its Mosaic
arrangements be adapted to " all nations." But when
the sacrifice should be perfected,^ why could not then
"all nations" make public profession of allegiance to
God, in every land, far and near, to the very ends of the
earth, by keeping the Sabbath, the pervasive, non-ritual,
personal covenant Sabbath ?
s. ].; also note to Study VI., page 133) of two parts, the expiation
by the death of the victim and the social meal in which all partook
of that which was "offered" by their chief. Some of the Aaronie
sacrifices could not be shared by the people, just as some of our
Lord's experiences are beyond us. But the typical saci'ifice for
atonement and for praise was so shared. When the antitype of all
sacrifice was offered in the person of our Lord, the sacrificial meal
was continued by his special enactment. "This is my body"
(Matt. xxvi. 26; Mark xiv. 22; Luke xxii. 19; 1 Cor. xi. 24).
Thus the restriction was eliminated from the sacrifice, and the Lord's
Supper became associated with the Lord's Day very much as the
old sacrifice may have been a feature of the sacred day of the ages
before ]\Ioses.
^ See Study V., pp. 115, seq. "No prescribed rites or forms of
worship.'' Xothing was explicitly prescribed by statute.
2 See Study VL, pp. 154, 155, sacrifice perfected. Also note ,
page 15^.
160 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
But under the Mosaic legislation such an universal
observance of the Mosaic Sabbath was impossible. The
regulations'^ for the weekly Sabbath could not be enforced
in all lands or under all types of civilization. The in-
junction against lighting a fire, even for the purpose of
preparing food, could have been intended only for a land
where neither comfort nor health would be endangered
by it, and where fruit and other uncooked food made a
large part of the people's meals. It would be utterly
preposterous to think of applying these regulations to the
complex interdependence of a nineteenth century com-
monwealth. It is of no consequence if it could be con-
■ ceived that here and there a single family observed this
law, though it is doubtful whether in our busy cities one
family, either Christian or Hebrew, does observe it. The
Mosaic Sabbath was to be observed by the community,
and enforced by the authority of the community on every
individual. It could not have been intended for commu-
nities like ours. It was adapted only to the farming
villages of Israel. Some part of its flavor must be lost
in passing even to their nearest neighbors. There were
the pastoral tribes behind them on the east. It would
scarcely touch the lives of Ishmaelites or Midianites at
all. There were the trading Sidonians at their elbows
on the northwest, and the artisan Philistines face to
face with them on the west. But the social joy and
privilege of these men, if they should adopt the Sabbath,
could never be so great in it, because they were not, like
the farmers of Israel, alone each man in his fiekls during
the rest of the week. Even in Israel's own territory it
did not work evenly. The- pastoral tribes across the
Jordan had slight experience of it. The routine of their
1 " Regulations," see Ex. xvi, 22-30. Verse 29, " Let no man go
out of" his place." " Kindle no fire," Ex. xxxv. 3. Death penalty,
Ex. xxxv. 2; Num. xv. 32-3G.
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 101
lives could have varied very little when the Sabbath
came round. The day with them must have been even
more colorless than with the patriarchs. For the pastoral
Israelites had no sacrifice and no sacrificial feast such as
emphasized the patriarchal day.
But beyond all this stands the fact that the Sabbath
was, by the Mosaic legislation, made part of its sabbatic
system, and that system was not extensible ^ beyond Is-
rael's own land. Thus, while the ideal of the Sabbath
involved universal extension, the law of the Sabbath was
Hebrew law, Palestine law, farm law. It had wings for
widest flight, but it was caged.
II. The riddle of social administration.^ Israel was
taught by the sabbatic system to contrast the ordinary
administration of society with the administration of prin-
ciples ordained by God. The administration of these di-
vinely ordained social principles was extended over a
whole year, in order that their influence might become
thoroughly perceptible. Then the year for this peculiar
social administration was made the seventh, and thus
linked to the weekly Sabbath, in order that its teaching
might become a part of the Sabbath idea which was to
be developed. Thus was afforded a glimpse of society
ruled and permeated by benevolence. But just as surely
as the Israelite became able to think of this ideal, he
must see tliat it was not finished. These principles were
not carried out to their full results. The statute was not
consistent with its fundamental principles or adequate to
their scope. It presented them in illustrations. It did
not attempt to work them out through the whole national
life. It was impossible, indeed, to go further, under the
circumstances, than the law went, for no administrative
statute could be framed which would apply infallible jus-
^ " Th.at system not extensible." As shown in the previous Study.
2 " Social administration." See Study VI. pp. 136, seq.
» 11
162 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
tice and benevolence to every case. Tlius it is possible
that tlie jubilee restoration of land might, once in a while,
bring some worthy family down from a very prominent
to a very humble position among the villagers, and corre-
spondingly exalt some one of little worth. The release
of debt might at some time profit a knave, and sorel}' dis-
tress one who had shown him charity. Some slave might
be set free to be a nuisance to the whole neighborhood
nntil his necessities drove him back to disciplinary bond-
age. The general benevolence of the law was perfectly
manifest ; but evil-minded men might now and then turn
even its benevolence into injur3^ It could force men to
a course of conduct whose general character was admira-
ble, but it could not make every man practice that con-
duct from the heart. Therefore, in practical life, dis-
crepancies must now and then occur.
Moreover, these social principles did not work equally
among all citizens and in every part of the land. Es-
tates were restored only in farm lands and unwalled vil-
lages. Were the palaces of their princes to be excluded
from the ordinances of God's special administration? Only
farm work ceased on the seventh year. Were the suc-
cessors of Bezaleel and Aholiab, upon whom God poured
his Spirit in the wilderness, because they were artisans,
to have no interest in the year long Sabbath ?
Moreover, we can feel, if the Israelite could not, that
the legislation came far short of its ideal of human dig-
nity. It did, indeed, lift Israel to a pinnacle in social
privilege above other ancient nations. It is difficult for
us to conceive how hard life was to most men in that day.
We may take all the several harshnesses that we think of
as attaching to the lot of a Russian monjik, an Indian ryot,
or a Chinese coolie, and add them together, and they
will not equal the harshness of life to the mass of the
people of ancient Assyria or Egypt. And this when \\q
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRA^' STENT. 163
do not take into account tlie awful abyss of slavery whicli
yawned beside every man's daily pathway, ready to en-
gulf not only his own unwary feet, but his wife and chil-
dren with him. By contrast, Israel was exalted heaven
high. That dread abyss did indeed yawn all over his
land, but it was not so deep. Beside there were ladders
and pathways by which every man and woman and child
might escape it. Israel might or might not think that
anything further was necessar3^ But we must ask why,
since it was so plain that God's special time of interven-
tion abhorred slavery, abhorred uncharitableness, ab-
horred every custom and incident which degraded man-
hood and vitiated self-respect, why was this rule extended
over a year or two only out of every seven ? Why was
not every dishonor to manhood abolished for all time ?
Why were men set free to be shackled again, lifted up
to be let fall again ? The answer is indeed read}- . More
than this was as yet impossible. For it was an essential
part of the sj^stem that the two s'orts of social administra-
tion should be set in contrast. By contrast alone could
the character of each be realized. The time must come
when men shall feel it their duty to try not only to al-
leviate, but also to remove and to prevent, the shame of
their brethren.^ But not in Moses' time. The Mosaic
statute, in order to accomplish its work, necessarily lim-
ited itself. But the thought of God which was the liv-
ing germ in it, when, by means of contrast with the com-
mon thought of man concerning what we now call ethics,
this divine thought or germ had grown up in human con-
sciousness to be a distinct, permanent, active factor in
man's thinking, must then develop its essential hostility
* The direct lessons of punishment were not yet ended. Wrath,
even to extermination, was appointed against some of the abomina-
ble barbarians of Canaan, and Israel was commissioned to be the ex-
ecutioner, and then to possess the goods of the dead criminals.
164 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
to the old common human thought, and chiira for itself
exclusive control over human conduct. So far as the
mind can now conceive, and so far as history explains
human nature, men could learn what was God's thought
by seeing it in contrast with the ordinary, and in no other
way. The Mosaic dispensation provided such a contrast.
But these two thoughts, or these two principles of social
administration, are mutually inconsistent. A man who
loves God, when he learns what God's thought or princi-
ple is, and understands it, will abhor its opposite. If
the nation had been faithful, and had thus learned God's
thought, then, with love and loyalty to God in its heart,
it would have abhorred such a condition of society as was
opposed to and contrasted with God's thought. Chris-
tians now have this feeling, not indeed exclusively, but
clearly and dominantly. We do abhor — all believers,
without exception, but in varying intensity, do abhor —
a condition of society where justice is not combined with
mercy and enterprise with benevolence, personal upright-
ness with active sympathy, and where the common broth-
erhood of man is not recognized along with the authority
of God, the common Father. To us, the social atmos-
phere of states Avithout Christianity is everywhere now
repulsive; and that of ancient heathen states would have
been utterly loathsome. The reason is simply that we
have been taught the better and nobler ; the divine
thought, and its existence in us, is aversion to the other.
This was Israel's lesson. He should have learned it. If
he had learned it, he would have come to feel that the
continuance of the two administrations side by side was
impossible. He could not have imagined how the change
should be made; but as surely as God maintains his truth
through the ages, Israel would have come to long for the
perfect reign of the social principles derived from God,
and to look for the change which would inaugurate their
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 165
supremac)^ over eveiy condition and occupation of men,
over every foot of land or ripple of the sea, over every
day and liour of every successive year. And for this
end the letter of the Mosaic institutions must somewhere
give way that their spirit may live unconstrained.
III. The riddle of sacred times. The idea of a sa-
cred time regularly recurring may have been very slowly
brought into men's consciousness. But it is certain that
long before ]\Ioses' birth such an idea existed. It is also
certain that in this idea the sacred time was the seventh
day of the week. The sacredness, however, may have
been very vague, perhaps meaning little more than the
sign of a bond between God and man.
In order to obtain a distinct perception of the contents
of these two thoughts, it may be well to look at them
separately.
1st. There is evidence, both from Scripture and else-
where, that in the ante-Mosaic age the last of seven days
was regarded as in some sense sacred. In the Scripture
we have (a) the statement that after the creation God
sanctified the seventh day ; (6) the record of sacred days
in the ark narrative ; and (c) the reference to the Sab-
bath by Moses, and its observance by Israel before the
Decalogue was uttered. Outside of Scripture a great va-
riety of historical testimony proves that even among idol-
aters there was an extensive tradition of a sacredness in
some sense pertaining to the last of seven days.
2d. The sacredness attributed to this day must be
stripped of all but its simplest elements, as must, indeed,
all ideas attributed to the primeval age. Truth is, of
course, the same in all ages, and all special truths likewise.
But men very slowly learn to present before their minds
ideas or abstract conceptions of truth. They act accord-
ing to truths which they do not think of, and could not
understand. Thus a child who has never studied arith-
1G6 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
metic muy practice in his piny, unconsciously, a variety
of arithmetical processes. He may add, subtract, multi-
ply, and divide. Yet that child will learn to understand
these processes and to make them his tools, for the re-
sponsible work of maturity, only by protracted and labo-
rious study. Thus the primeval sacred day served, as we
have seen, for the exercise of various religious emotions.
But though men truly felt these things it does not follow
that they thought about them, or would have understood
if some one had spoken of them. Cannot a baby love
before it learns to say " I love? " The learning to ex-
press what the soul feels is the hardest and the longest
study pursued by man. So in the earliest days men felt
divine love and human fellowship in faith and gratitude,
and the hope of an Advent and of an overthrow of evil.
We think of all this and call it heaven. The Christian
child of our day possesses a throng of authorized and re-
vealed ideas concerning the blessed future. But when
Enoch " walked with God " in exalted and blissful play
of holy emotion, and when he preached of his coming in
judgment, did his thoughts busy themselves at all with
heaven ? What a less than childish must have been then
his conception of it ? Suppose an archangel could have
shown him what John has described in the seventh,
twenty-first, and twenty-second chapters of the Apoca-
lypse,— the kingdom, the city, the bride, the martyrs,
the sealed ones, the redeemed host, the songs, the rain-
bow, the elders, and, above all, the Lamb ! Needless to
say that these things would be as incomprehensible to
him as the working of steam and electricity.
Besides it is possible that in the earliest age there was
something to unlearn as well as much to learn. It has
been renuirked that the first lesson set before man in the
broad page of history was punishment. The separation
from God was a hard lesson. It seems likely that it was
TtlE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 107
not till after the catastrophe at Babel that men accepted
the fact that they must propitiate God.^ Not only the
inspired story, but all ethnic tradition as well, breathes
of an original familiarity between the Creator and his
created image. It must have been handed down with
peculiar emphasis, in order to make so very durable an
impression on the mass of common human ideas. Man
had, therefore, to learn that the approach to the presence
of God was, for sinners, a privilege ; and, except as God
graciously provided, an unattainable privilege. Thus
Cain seems to have no sense that bis bloody hands ought
to debar him from that Presence, but cries out, appar-
ently, against his exclusion as an undeserved and per-
haps an unintended addition to his punishment.
He could not have been hurt by any spiritual
experience of the aversion of God's face from his soul.
An apostate could have no such experience. If he had
ever had the spiritual vision of God, he would have been
a child of God, and his sin, like David's, would have
brought him back humbled and repentant to his Father's
feet begging forgiveness. If he was the malefactor he has
been deemed by all the ages, it does not seem possible
that he could have referred to anything else than the aw-
ful symbols or beings at the gate of Eden as God's face.
He could then have little association of sacredness with
that spot. Sacred, as used in these pages, has been de-
fined " relating to the bond between God and men." But
there could be no conception of this bond until there was
some perception of the separation which made occasion
for such a bond. Currents of liquid mixing freely need
no bond. Beings who are consciously apart, and no
others, can perceive the bond which unites them.
^ This seems to have been the meaning of Cain's sacrifice. The
heathen have never got beyond this idea, to offer the sacrifice of obe-
dience and devotion.
168 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
Now, it is no business of onrs to ask wlietlier the sev-
enth day would have been kept, and for what end, if man
had not fallen. We can plainly see, and it is all that
coucerns this Study, how fallen man needed to perceive
two things. First, the fact that he was cut off, separated,
radically repelled, by God, his maker ; and second, that
certain things w^ere signs of his maker's surviving re-
gard. Every word concerning the gateway of Eden sug-
gests repulsion. Man was " driven " out and a flaming
sword was brandished after him. Yet he found an at-
traction somehow or at some times in the presence of
that terror, and clung to it. At what times, then, might
man approach this Presence ? The record says, " in proc-
ess of time," or, as in the margin, " after days." This
" time," or " day," was either stated and regular or ir-
regular and optional with man, which latter alternative
is contrary to the whole tenor of Scripture. But the
family of Adam knew that God had sanctified the sev-
enth day ; for the story of Genesis i. must have been
handed down from them. And thei*e we find his descend-
ants in the tenth generation, born before the flood had
carried away the barriers of Eden, noting and enjoying
that seventh day which God had blessed at the first.
Now, something possessing irresistible impressiv^ness,
and not a slightly or moderately striking circumstance,
must have served to keep worshipers in mind of the true
count of the sacred days during the fifteen hundred years
before the ark. For the effect produced, not only in
preserving the tale of these days down to the flood, but
also in establishing a tradition which endured for a thou-
sand years after the flood, spreading like a circling ripple
on a lake bosom, so that a trace at least of its undulation
can be found among the furthest and darkest nooks of
heathenism, — for this great effect which was produced,
it would not be too great a producing cause if we believe
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 169
tlint, clowji to the flood, access to tluit Presence where
the cherubim stood was permitted only on the sacred sev-
enth day.
It cannot be positively asserted that all this is true.
But wdiether true or not, does it not represent the utmost
that can be thought of as originally shaping the idea of
sacredness in connection with that day? If this was not
the fact, then the fact was something less potent and im-
pressive, though sufficient for its purpose. The utmost,
therefore, which, before Moses' day, could have consti-
tuted man's idea of sacredness, specially as applied to
time, was this, namely: that on certain days God's re-
pulsion toward him was so far modified as to permit the
manifestation of certain outward signs of his regard, and
thus men could address Him, or await such manifesta-
tions from Him, with a certain sense of privilege on these
days.
After the flood, whatever local or visible manifestation
from God was associated with the day ceased. But the
fellowship of the sacrificial feasts and the interest of the
rehearsal of sacred tradition may well have become estab-
lished as its outward features. Then, as time went on, it
would be but natural if the idea of sacredness should cen-
tre rather in the sacrifice and the story than in the day, so
that men should think the day sacred, if saci'ed at all, be-
cause the sacrifice took place on it,^ — rather tlian regard
the sacrifice as peculiarly appropriate to men, peculiarly
acceptable to God, and therefore peculiarly sacred, signi-
fying and sealing as no other meal could do a bond with
God, because offered and eaten on this day.
^ Just as the Lord's Supper is more appropriate and more sacred
on the Lord's Day, ordinarily. Noah's sacrifice seems to liave been
offered on the day of leaving the ark, wliicli was a sacred day. This
is the only occasion when a sacrifice on the sacred day is recorded.
But it is enough, for the whole narrative shows such patience in waiting
170 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
But when the tribe of Israel was reduced to bond-
age in Eg3^pt, sacrifice seems to have been interdicted.
Moses asked permission to take a three days' journey into
the desert in order to oflPer it, on account of the Egyp-
tian prejudice.^ Thus, for a century at least, there may
Lave been absolutely nothing to mark the sacred ness of
the returning sacred day, except a possible gathering
for prayer and for recital of old narratives. While such
gatherings may have survived here and there, it is
scarcely a question that if the count by weeks was pre-
served at all, it was barely preserved. The account in
Exodus xvi. of the first Sabbath after the manna fall be-
gan, implies that the idea of a sacred seventh day was
not at all strange to the people, though it might be
known only as one of their ancestral traditions. Per-
haps, also, they were surprised that God did not mark
the day for them by a double share of his gift rather
than by withholding it. So Moses was obliged to ex-
plain this new feature. What was done on previous
Sabbaths is not stated. At least four must have passed.
If the manna began to fall on the day of starting from
Elim, the fifteenth of month two, then the host may
have rested at Elim on the fourteenth. In that case the
first Sabbath may have been spent at Pi Hahirath, on
the sixteenth of the first month. And each seventh day
might have been utilized for general assemblies, to whom
Moses would have weighty and lengthened instructions
to give.
for divine authority to act, and such explicit obedience, that we must
believe this act, also, authorized. Probably every reader is aware
that the dynasty under whom Joseph flourished were foreign con-
querors of E;4ypt, barely tolerant of the national polytliLUsui, appar-
ently inclined to the worship of one God. These so-called shepherd
kings were expelled by a native sovereign, who may have been the
great-grandfather of the Pharaoh of the Exodus. Any commentary
will atibrd an account of all this.
1 Exodus v. 1, 3, compared with viii. 26.
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 171
In all this provisional sketch the effort has been to pre-
sent every circumstance which could have made up the
sacredness of the pre -Mosaic sacred day. The sketch
may or may not be accurate ; if it is not accurate, it must
contain too much. There was not more sacredness per-
ceived than is here described. There may have been less.
Turning now to the Mosaic legislation, it will be seen,
first, that very much was added to the ideas hitherto ex-
isting ; and tlien, that this addition was itself a pi-oblem ;
and finally, that, since it differed from the original idea,
and contained factors incongruous with each other, there
must be j^et another development in order to demonstrate
the underlying harmony of all the earlier arrangements,
and to manifest the activity of the gracious Spirit of God
superintending in all things pertaining to the bond with
men.
Although the traditional association of sacrifice and
sacred time could not have been forgotten, the desuetude
of sacrifice had lasted long enough to facilitate its com-
plete separation from the Sabbath. The day, however,
was not to be left bare, featureless, and devoid of inter-
est. The various influences allied to the convocation, to-
gether with the leisure enforced by the state, would suf-
fice to mark the place of tlie day among all the institu-
tions of society. The associated sabbatic times were so
arranged as to develop and illustrate a great system of
ideas concerning the promised blessedness. And with
all this, the ordinal of time, in itself insignificant, and
through the ages past attracting only incidental attention,
^ " Incidental attention." In several passages in Genesis the num-
ber seven occurs in words attributed to God or dreams inspired by
Him, but Avith a very faint association of sacredness, as in the judg-
ment of Cain (iv, 15), and Pharaoh's dream of the kine and ears (xli-
18-30). Yet the preservation of these numbers shows that they were
impressed deeply. Lamech's reference to Cain (iv. 24) is still stronger
evidence that the precise number mentioned had fixed itself in men's
172 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
was made tlie index of so much repetition and redupli-
cation that attention was necessarily fastened upon it,
and a large part of tlie sacredness increasingly attributed
to the Sabbath was unavoidably, perhaps intentionally,
transferred to it. Thus sacred time came to mean sev-
enth time, and the ideas sacred and seventh were bound
together, so that whatever time was numbered by sevens
seemed to have some religious significance, and whatever
had such significance seemed to fit somehow into that
number. Not only in the law, but also in all the inspired
writings published through Israel, this general statement
is iUustrated. It was distinctl}'^ and unmistakably set
forth that God's time in dealing with men under his cov-
enant went by sevens.^
But now in these very Mosaic institutions by which
such intense emphasis was put upon the sacredness of
minds. There is a larger sense of sacredness, that is, a larger sense
of immediate relation to God, in the use of this number for an oath by
Abraham and Isaac (xxi. 28-31; xxvi. 26-33). The literal meaning
of the word for oath is the sevenfold word. The tliought of Abime-
lech and his friends would be accurateb'^ represented in English
thus : " Let there be now a word seven times repeated betwixt us."
The latent premise would be that God specially noticed the number
seven, and the inference that He would be specially offended at the
breach of a sevenfold promise.
^ " By sevens." It is certainly unnecessary, and rather savoring
of superstition, to attribute religious significance to every mention of
seven or its multiples. For instance, the notices of Ahab's seventy
sons (2 Kings x. 1) ; of Ahasuerus' seventh year (Eslh. ii. IG) ; of
Athaliah's (2 Kings xi. 1) ; of Jehu's (2 Kings xii. 1); and of the
seventh of the captivity (Ezek. xx. 1); of the seventy sons of Gid-
eon (Judges viii. 30, seq.) ; of the seventy kings mutilated by Adoni-
bezek (Judges i. 7) ; of the seventy bullocks brought forward by
various persons for the people's thank-offering under Hezekiah (2
Chron. xxix. 32); of Solomon's seventy thousand porters (1 Kings
v. 15) ; and of his seven hundred wives (1 Kings xi. 3) ; with many
others, are simply statements of fact, the number seven in them hav-
ing no more sacredness than six or eight in other passages.
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 173
sevens in time reckoning, there was embodied a strange
paradox, a marked incongruity, elements wliicli seemed
to contradict each other's significance, the riddle of sa-
cred time. This riddle was twofold. There was, first, a
seeming inconsistency in the succession of weeks; and,
second, a seeming inconsistency in the ordinal of the
week's peculiar significance.
The steady, solemn march of the weeks, never hasten-
ing, never tarrying, regarding neither sun nor moon, re-
iterated the unchanging covenant of God with his people.
From the remotest age their step was unbroken, and
now in this age of special instruction God had made them
still more significant of his authority by obliging the
people to count the years as well as the days by them.
And then when all this was so strenuously pressed upon
the people, an anomalous week was appointed for each of
the seasons of special religious observance. The great
spring and fall festivals, the feast of Unleavened Bread,
and the feast of Tabernacles, lasted each for one week.
But instead of conforming to the sacred week, — the
week which God had established and maintained and en-
larged to the measure of years, as the sjmibol of man's
loyalty, — these festivals had each a peculiar week of its
own. They followed the moons ^ and not the Sabbaths,
— the ordinary calendar of all men, and not the special
and divinely appointed calendar of God's loyal people.
But the solution of this first part of the riddle is very
clear in the light of our day, and might have been dis-
covered in the older age. For it is plain that this was a
part of that separation between the sacrificial and sab-
batic systems, by which the distinction between the
means and the end of the promise was made patent.
^ *' Followed the moons." Each began with the full moon, the
fifteenth day of the first and seventh months resjiectively. See Lev.
xxiii. 6, 30, etc.
174 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
Passover and Tabernacles were perpetual living pictures
of redemption and providence, of the escape from Egypt
and the leading through the wilderness, of the blood
which stayed judgment and of the bread which came
down from heaven, of the evil leaven wliich grew and
spread in all earthly relations, and of the transient enjoy-
ment of all earthly possessions. Thus, these two festi-
vals belonged to that great and complicated ritual by
which were set forth the atonement for sinful men and
the conditions of their reconciliation to God. They do
not, therefore, have to do it with the Sabbath ideals of
life, as not going toivards, but m, God's kingdom. More-
over, as spring and fall festivals, they had something in
common with the heathen all over the world, and there-
fore were distinct from the Sabbath, the like of which
the heathen never knew.
But the second part of the riddle belonged to the Sab-
bath system alone. It turned upon the plan of the
week. It showed on the one side a week ending with
the sacred day, and on the other side a week beginning
with the sacred day. On the first week plan, in which
the seventh was the chief, was laid great stress, by plac-
ing beside the ordinary week the week of months, and
the week of years each with its seventh peculiarl}' sa-
cred. On the second week plan even greater emphasis
was put, by making its first day the point of greatest
dignity and of profoundest significance, the climax and
crown of the whole system, the entrance to a week
whose end is not defined in relation to it, and the suc-
cessor of a completed series of weeks on the first plan.
In order to obtain a just comparison of these diverse
week plans, two ])reliniinai'y facts must be stated. One
is the utter insignificance of the number seven as a num-
ber merely. Number is a ratio, that is a form of com-
parison. It is certain that, with many persons of all
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 175
ages, it is impossible to conceive of abstract number.
They cannot think of seven or of seventy without think-
ing of seven or seventy things of some sort. Children
always begin thus. But there is nothing in nature and
there is nothing in the Bible to suggest that seven has
any sacredness of its own. Three, five, ten, twelve, and
other numbers might claim something of the same dis-
tinction if there were anything in it but a superstition
incapable of definition, and analytically unthinkable. If
there is any sacred suggestion in seven, it is not at all in
the abstract number or ratio, but in the siiG:o:estion of
certain things associated with that number or ratio.^
The other fact to be noticed in this place, as already in
another connection, is the entire newness of the Mosaic
system of sevens. The simple seven in connection with
the week was well known. Traces of it are found the
world over. But the system of sevens was not heard of
before Moses. There is not a previous hint of it in the
Bible ; there is not a previous trace of it in history. It
was an innovation.
In this new system there was a remarkable symmetry
and a remarkable progression. All the three natural
units of time, the day, the month, and the year were
grouped in sevens, and to correspond with the seventh
day, the seventh month, and the seventh year was made
the sacred member of each group. Then the group of
seven days and the group of seven years were each car-
ried to its quadrate, a week of weeks of days, and a
week of weeks of years. In all this progression, sevens
by sevens, until seven times seven was reached, the
seventh of every group was sacred.^
^ There may be a traditional sacredness when the facts originally
suggested are lost. It then becomes superstitious. Such are all
heathen traditions concerning seven and other numbers.
2 There are a great number of minor correspondences to this syni-
176 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
It is obvious that the effect of tins symmetry and pro-
gression of sacred sevenths was to fix attention upon that
ordinal. This could not be a chance effect. Certainly
the God of Israel must have designed to fix the people's
attention upon the seventh. Certainly He must have
designed, to fix in their minds the fact that their Sabbath
v^^as not merely one day in seven, but the seventh day of
the seven.
But He who through Moses so strongly emphasized and
so variously illustrated the place of tlie Sabbath at tlie
end of the week, by Moses also placed a gi^eater Sabbath
and a more significant day at the week's beginning. In
the two discrepant weeks already noticed their seventh
days were not specially prominent. In the week of Un-
leavened Bread,! the first day and the seventh were
equally sacred, and each a Sabbath. In the Tabernacle ^
week the seventh day was ignored. Its first day was its
Sabbath, and the octave of that day was made another
Sabbath instead of the seventh. These feasts, it is true,
formed no part of the sabbatic system. Their weeks
were not members of the week series of the ages. But
they were associated with the grand solemnities which
the individuals of the nation celebrated, as also they in-
dividually kept the Sabbath. And it would be strange
if at some time pious worshipers did not wonder why
these so solemn weeks should not only be separate from
metry in various details of the ritual -which it is impossible to con-
sider in this treatise and which are not necessary to its argument.
1 "Unleavened bread." See Lev. xxiii. 7, 8; Num. xxviii. 18,
25. Also John xix. 31, " That Sabbath-day was an high day."
2 « Tabernacles." See Lev. xxiii. 35, 36, 39; Num. xxix. 12, 35.
Zeeh. xiv. 19, certainly suggests that the feast of Tabernacles signi-
fies something larger than Judaism, something which warrants for it
— spiritually, if not literally — a place in the universal Messianic
kingdom. Its first and eighth day Sabbaths are in harmony with
this.
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. Ill
the -week series, but also have a different sacred day.
And why in one of these peculiar weeks were the first
and seventh days made of equal dignity, while in the
other the first day alone was sacred.
These circumstances are not trifling or accidental.
The variations were introduced for a purpose. But as
they do not wholly belong to the sabbatic system, it is
not necessary to inquire into their purpose. They would
be of no consequence to this present Study, and would not
have been mentioned, except as they correspond with
similar variations in the most prominent places of the
system itself. These occur in the day of Pentecost and
the year of Jubilee.
The three annual festivals were made equally binding
on Israel, were always treated with equal dignity in the
Scriptures, and seem to have held always an equal place
in popular esteem. But the second was specially distin-
guished from the first and last. They had their own dis-
tinctive proper names.^ This had none. They were the
1 Passover and feast of Unleavened Bread were both proper
names. Unleavened Bread and Tabernacles were pi'oper names of
the two feasts. These names were descriptive, appropriate, author-
ized, and exclusive. Pentecost may be regarded now as a proper
name of the second feast, and is so used in this Study ; but when it
was vernacular, it simply meant "fiftieth," and might be applied to
any fiftieth day. Sabbath is a proper name ; so are Sunday, Mon-
day, etc. But first day, seventh day, etc., are not proper names.
In Ex. xxiii. IG, it is called " the feast of harvest, the first-fruits of
thy labors, which thou hast sown in thy field," contrasted with the
feast of ingathering, etc. This is a description not of the feast but
of the season in which it occurred, when the last of the first-fruits
were being gathered. It is only a general description. The statute
first-fruits were offered seven weeks before. The statute harvest
was four months later. There was no interdict on gathering any
first-fruits before this time. But before the Unleavened Bread began
the taking of a single stalk or berry was pi-ohibited. Finally, as the
phrase " feast of harvest," etc., is not used again, it could not have
12
178 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
appointed memorials ^ of very grand events in the na-
tion's history. To this none were referred. They were
solemnized with peculiar restrictions. ^ Tq this none
been intended for a name. At the early period when these -words
were used, only general statements concerning tlie three festivals
■were made.
In Num. xxviii. 26, it is described as a day of first-fruits, but not
the day when the very _;?/'S<-fruits were offered, — " The day of the
first-fruits, when ye bring a new meat-offering unto the Lord, after
your weeks be out." It is inaccurate and it is unwarranted to take
a few words out of these long descriptions, for names. They would
be pseudonyms. In Ex. xxxiv. 22, it is called " the feast of weeks
of the first-fruits of wheat harvest," and in Deut. xvi. 10, the "feast
of weeKs " simply. "Weeks," like "Pentecost" or "Fiftieth,"
could not be taken in the vernacular for a proper name. It is com-
mon and convenient for Americans to speak of the Fourth of July.
The proper name of that anniversary is Independence Day.
The proper names of men and things sometimes go so long unused
as to be forgotten. Indeed, both men and things may never receive
a proper name. A description or a title is a different thing.
1 " ]\Iemorials." Of deliverance out of the destruction of all first-
born in Egypt, see Ex. xii. 25-27. The name Feast of the Passover
often stood for both the Passover proper and the seven days suc-
ceeding, as Deut. xvi. i. But " the days of unleavened bread " cele-
brated especially the escape from Egypt, as see Deut. xvi. 3. The
death of the first-born was really the release of the Israelites and
the beginning of the Exodus. Thus there was no error in speaking
of the Passover and the Unleavened Bread as practically one observ-
ance, celebrating one event, although in it, nevertheless, the sacri-
fice might be distinguished from the feast, as in Num. xxviii. 16, 17.
Compare verse 16 with Ex. xii. 27. Of God's watch and care in
the wilderness. Lev. xxiii. 43.
2 " Restrictions." In the one case from ordinary food, and in the
other from ordinary habitations. At Pentecost leavened broad was
offered. It was not, of course, burned on the altar, but solemnly
waved before it and then given to the priests. Lev. xxiii. 17, 20.
In Deut. xvi. 11, 14, Pentecost and Tabernacles are each the oc-
casion for an exhortation to unbounded hospitality. As the enter-
tainment which might be spread over seven days at Tabernacles was
concentrated into one day at Pentecost, this latter would probably
call out the most extensive feast which could be provided. Doubt-
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 179
such were applied. It was described by a reference to
the time of its celebration. It was enacted arbitrarily
by the divine prerogative, without the assignment of any
reason or occasion for its institution. At it no one was
restrained from his ordinary habitation,^ as during the
Tabernacles; or from his ordinary food, as during the
week of unleavened bread following the Passover. Its
contrast with the latter was very strongly marked by
the presentation of leavened loaves to be waved before
the Lord with the sacrificial lambs ^ of the peace-offering.
The peculiar liberty of the midsummer festival was made
still more prominent by comparison with the weekly
Sabbath. For the weekly Sabbath presented the type
of all the restrictions of the law. It barred the people
from the whole round of their ordinary occupations. It
forbade alike hand-work and hearth-fire. That another
so difi'erent Sabbath should immediately follow it served
and must have been intended to call attention to the dif-
ference. In two particulars they were alike. On both
days the great national industry of agriculture was
wholly suspended. On both days a convocation was
held Avith all its various exercises and adjuncts. But on
the feast day the restraint of the Sabbath was dissolved.
Any work appropriate and useful for the ends of the day
was lawful. Especially lawful, and indeed especially
less the cooking would be done in the city, and thus greater conven-
ience be afforded. Note that only "servile work," or farm work,
was prohibited at Pentecost.
^ " Habitation " and " food." See Lev. xxiii. 17. It is notice-
able, at least, though not necessary to our argument, that the leav-
ened loaves are prescribed as an offering from the homes of the land.
The word in the Hebrew is Moshab, meaning permanent dwelling, the
opposite of a temporary abode, such as the booths. It is difficult to
avoid the thought that it was used in part to heighten this contrast.
2 " The sacrificial lambs," Lev. xxiii. 19, 20. These were the peace-
offering, and, with the bread, went to the priest's support, Lev. iii.
180 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
prescribed, was the preparation of a hospitable meal.
Hospitality was equally enjoined for the autumn festival.
But since the entertainment which, at that season, con-
tinued for a week, was on this occasion concentrated into
one day, it is probable that the feast provided would on
this day be as abundant as each family could afford. In
any case, while the one day would be filled with calm
refreshment, instructions, and promises, the next day ^
1 " The next day." I have assumed here, as elsewhere, that Pen-
tecost was appointed to succeed a weekly Sabbath. If that were
not true, then the contrast with the weekly Sabbath would be less
evident, because the two would only occasionally occur together.
In regard to this question the practice of the Jews in our Lord's
time is not conclusive evidence, though valuable. But it seems that
they had fallen into some uncertainty about it, and it is said that
the custom of observing a whole week instead of one day was due to
this uncertainty. The nation had neglected the accurate observance
of the sabbatic system, and had failed to learn the meaning of its
parts.
The question turns on the words of Lev. xxiii. 11, " the morrow
after the Sabbath." Did "the Sabbath" here mean the weekly
Sabbath, occurring during the seven days of unleavened bread? Or
did it mean the first day of unleavened bread, which was a day of
convocation and of rest from farm work, and called in our version a
Sabbath, though in Hebrew a slightly different word is used, " Sab-
bathon."
The assumption that the latter is the fact is without any scriptu-
ral support. There is not one word in its favor in the Bible.
It is directly contradicted by the use of the word Sabbath, which
is never applied to the first day of unleavened bread. This is not
accidental; for in this very chapter the discrimination between the
two words Sabbath and Sabbathon is carefully maintained. Here,
indeed, as elsewhere, the seventh day of the week is called some-
times Sabbath Sabbathon, or "Sabbath of rest" (A. V.), as well
as Sabbath. (Ex. xxxi. 15; xxxv. 2; Lev. xxiii. 3. The same
words trans])osed, Ex. xv. 23.) But it is not called " Sabbathon,"
nor are any of the other days of convocation called Sabbaths, except
the Day of Atonement. Thus in Lev. xxiii. 24, the feast of Trumpets
is called " Sabbathon." Again in verse 39 the first and eighth days
of Tabernacles are each called a Sabbathon. But in verse 32 (Lev.
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 181
would bring no less refreshment and promise with the
addition of positive material enjoyment. JNIoreover, the
xvi. 31 ; xxiii. 32) the Day of Atonement is called Sabbath and Sab-
bath Sabbathon, and the reason for using these names is given in
verses 27-32. The Day of Atonement was to be kept precisely like
the seventh day of the week. (In Lev. xxv. 4, the seventh year is
called "a Sabbath of rest unto the land.^' Not as in the other
cases "unto you." The distinction is plain enough.) The other
days, namely, the first and seventh of unleavened bread, the feast of
Weeks, the feast of Trumpets, and the first and eighth of Taber-
nacles, were not to be so kept. Therefore they were not so called.
They are Sabbathons. The assumption that Sabbath in verses 11 and
15 means Sabbathon is one that no reasonable student of Scripture
ought to tolerate for a moment. If the whole nation of the Jews in
our Lord's time thought differently, that fact would not cancel or
contradict a plain statement of the written Word. They had dis-
obeyed their law for fifteen hundred years, and their later usages are
in no point whatever to be taken as explanations of their law with-
out more or less reserve. As to tlie sabbatic system of their law,
they had completely gone astray. Their eyes were blinded to the
meaning of the Sabbath day, and more than in any other part of
their institutions were their conceptions about it, both i-itual and
spiritual, incorrect.
But there is no proof that they did not understand this passage
properly. The most that can be asserted is that a doubt or question
may have existed among them. The possibility, or even the cer-
tainty, that there was some doubt among these later Jews should not
affect our reception of a clear biblical statement. We can under-
stand the bearing and signification of all parts of their system as
they did not and could not. One more consideration will suffice for
argument.
In Leviticus xxiii. 15 it is said that from "the morrow after the
Sabbath . . . seven Sabbaths shall be complete," " sheba, sab-
bathoth tmimoth." This word, tmimoth, is well rendered by our
word complete. It expresses not merely external completion of the
specified time, but also complete observance. {Perfectce atque inie-
gne.)
If, then, " the morrow after the Sabbath " is supposed to mean
*' the morrow after the Sabbathon," of course the " seven Sab-
baths " to be completed must be seven weeks. That is, we must
understand that Sabbath here is put for week, " Sliabbath " for
182 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
contrast between these two days was tlie contrast be-
tween the Mosaic and the more ancient sacred day.
Pentecost was the one day in the year which the whole
nation were allowed and commanded to observe as Noah
and Abraham ma}-^ have observed their seventh day. It
was the one day whose two features were the convoca-
tion and the sacrificial meal. Taking the Sabbath pre-
ceding with it, the former must have seemed compara-
tively bare. Human nature must have looked forward
with great eagerness to the enjoyment of the succeeding
day. The first must have seemed imperfect and expec-
" Sheba." This would be of no consequence if the weeks were nor-
mal weeks, ending with a Sabbath. But in the supposed case they
are not. The Sabbathon, the first day of unleavened bread, niinht
occur on any day of the week. If that is the true starting- point,
then these seven weeks following would each end on the same day>
whichever of the seven it might be. Let any one acquainted with
Hebrew ask how a series of such abnoi-mal weeks could possibly be
described as *' Shabbathoth t'minioth," completed Sabbaths?
It was perfectly natural that the name of the seventh day, which
marked and made the week, should be put for the week as we find it
in the New Testament. But that it should be put for any group of
seven days to which the Sabbath day has no special relation is an
assumption which no one has a right to make. There is no evidence
of such usage. The word sheba is always used in such cases as in
Gen. xxix. 27, 28.
For plain readers of the Scriptures there can be no question about
the meaning of this passage. And such may be assured that the
Hebrew, even more distinctly than the English, fixes the day for
Pentecost on the first day of the week.
There would never have been a question on this subject, it may
safely be asserted, if it were not so common for scholars and com-
mentators, though true believers, to try to fit the Scripture to all the
scraps that have come down from the ancient world to us, instead
rather of trying every uninspired statement, whether of Jew or Gen-
tile, by the infallible word of Inspiration, and holding the unin-
spired carefully at no more than its proper value. The argument of
this " Study " will not be without force even to those who hold to
the view opposed in this note.
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 183
tant as compared with the freedom and material enjoy-
ment of the second.
If this peculiarity of Pentecost, its liberty, its sim-
plicity, its naturalness, its homeliness one may say, was
so strongly brought to view by its contrast with its two
coordinate festivals, and with the weekly Sabbath, a
second peculiarity was even more marked and striking.
For, while not a single historic reason for its institution
is mentioned, and while it was enacted on the bare au-
thority of God, in a sense in which neither of the other
festivals, nor even the weekly Sabbath, was ordained,
there was an event of the grandest majesty which it
might have commemorated, whose anniversary was prob-
abl}^ identical with it, — which, nevertheless, is not asso-
ciated with it in a single Scripture sentence. The fact
is and always has been surprising, and without the New
Testament it would be inexplainable. The Passover was
based on an historic event, the great escape from bond-
age, and from the angel of death. Tabernacles also was
based on historic fact, the long abode in temporary habi-
tations and the supply of food and water through imme-
diate divine intervention. The Sabbath also was based
upon recorded events, — the cessation of the creative ac-
tivity after six successive periods of exercise. Pentecost,
on the contrary, was enacted arbitrarily. No reason for
it was given. No event is said to be brought to remem-
brance by it. No purpose within the range of the teach-
ing of the Pentateuch can be assigned to it. And yet
this day was probably the very day on which God spake
the ten words from Sinai. It fell in the third month,^
on a day between the sixth and the twelfth. In Exodus
xix. 1, it is stated that on this third month, and appar-
^ " In tbe third month, on a day between the sixth and twelfth,"
i. e., fifty days after some day from the fifteenth to twenty-first of
Nisan, the first month.
184 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
ently on the first day of the month,i the Israelites or
their vanguard reached Sinai. The proclamation of the
law seems to have occurred not many days Liter. Tlie
narrative is perfectly harmonious with the supposition
that the august transaction took place somewhere be-
tween the sixth day and the twelfth day, that is, at the
time on which Pentecost was afterward appointed. But
we do not know this. The record shows that the law
was proclaimed at or about this time. It necessarily
suggests the possibility of a coincidence in time. It
neither asserts nor denies it. Whatever might be the
fact it was suppi-essed from the record. The suppression
could not be accidental. But there may be one sufficient
explanation. It may be that although Pentecost neces-
sarily suggested the anniversary of the day of the law,
Israel was not allowed to refer it to that day, because it
was held, as it were, in reserve, to be associated in the
future with a greater day. Transcendent as was that
day when the ten words, born of the Spirit of God, en-
tered the ears of a tribe, secluded and separated from
their kind by the reverberating mountains, as they were
afterwards to be kept separate by the ordinances pub-
lished among those mountains, — it may be, that in the
estimation of Heaven that first day was trauscended by
another Avhen the Spirit of God put his energ}^ into hu-
man hearts, and spoke his words through human lips, not
merel}' into human ears, but into human hearts of all
races, climes, and tongues. If this be so, the occasion
for this festival was not mentioned, because it was fifteen
centuries deep in the future ; and silence was observed
1 " First dfiy of the month." The precise force of the expression
translated " the same day " is uncertain. Possibly it may mean,
"on that day of the month on which they started," i. e., the four-
teenth. But the general impression seems to be that it means the
first day of the month.
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 185
concerning the day of Sinai, so evidently suggested by
tlie time of tlie year, because the future day, while so
closely and intimately related to that Sinai day in the
association of fire and blast with the inauguration of a
new dispensation, it surpassed that other, not indeed in
material splendor and impressiveness, but in spiritual
power. And if this be so, then tlie freedom of the festi-
val, so strongly contrasted with the restraints of the other
festivals and of the Sabbath, was to be a type of the
freedom, the spontaneity of religious life, the all-embrac-
ing joyfulness and enjoyment of that coming day, which
in later Scripture the prophets described with glowing
■words, "After those days, saith the Lord, T Jer.3i:33;
will put my law in their inward parts, and I'o, 2b;36:
26 27 • Ps.
write it in their hearts." 40:8'.
And if all this be so, then the same explanation
throws light on the descriptive title which served as
the name of this nameless festival. Was it not to be
expected that, at some time, Israel would begin to ask
why this mysterious and peculiar festival was called
*' the feast of weeks " or " the feast of the fiftieth day ? "
There could be only one answer. This title served to
fix attention upon the series of weeks just closed, and
especially upon the fact that this was a full and complete
series, a week of weeks, a week of Sabbaths, each week
crowned by the Sabbath at its close. Plainly this insti-
tution, ordained of God, more arbitrarily ordained than
either of the other feasts, was adapted to fix in the peo-
ple's mind the idea of a full and complete and finished
series of Sabbaths. It would be easy and natural to
think of the Sabbaths going on indefinitel3^ Here, on
the contrary, is a picture of a complete but limited suc-
cession. This picture is embodied in one of the three
equally solemn anniversaries appointed by God himself,
and in that one of the three which, while it suggested
18G EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
the day when God more than at any other time^ mani-
fested his personal presence, seemed to have its signifi-
cance reserved, as if it were not so much the memorial
of a past, as the forecast of a future greater manifesta-
tion of that personal contact with men. But why did
not this complete series of Sabbaths lead up to a greater
Sabbath ? Why was the festival which crowned the
week of Sabbaths a different Sabbath ? Either day serves
to divide tlie weeks and to preserve their series unbroken,
and no day of the seven except the seventh or the first
would serve. But the seventh day Avas made the pecul-
iar seal^ of the national institutions ordained by God.
Why, then, along with the picture of a limited and com-
pleted series of these Sabbaths, was the other picture
drawn of a greater and more highly honored Sabbath
succeeding the completed series, and occupying the boun-
dary day of the week, coordinate in the week series with
the other, but set above it symbolically? There is noth-
ing in the Pentateuch by which we can suppose that
Israel would ever be able to solve this riddle. The most
that can be assumed is, that the presentation of tliese
pictures everj'- year would, at length, cause the people to
notice the riddle in them and to desire and look for its
solution.
Once in an ordinary lifetime the same riddle was to be
presented ^ on a larger scale in the year of Jubilee.
Here was the most prominent religious observance ever
recorded or described. Every nation has had its saci'i-
^ " More than at any other time." Because, by his words, a per-
son not seen may give a perfect impression of his personal presence
in a degree that is not possible through the exhibition of energy not
visibly traced to the person.
2 " The seal." See Ex. xxxi. 12-1 7.
8 " Was to be presented." It has been doubted whether the Jubi-
lee was ever observed. Joshua died, aged one hundred and ten,
about twenty-five years after the allotment of the land, when he was
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 187
fices, its ritual, and its festivals. But no other nation ever
maintained a festival like the Sabbath. Many agricul-
tural nations have been wont to let their land lie fallow
after so many years' tillage. But no other nation kept
their whole arable land fallow the same year. Nothing
like the sabbatic year was known elsewhere. Now it is
true that no institution given to Israel surpassed the
weekly Sabbath in its dignit}'^ as a symbol,^ or in its in-
fluence for education and devotion. But certainly the
year long Sabbath would impress the popular mind more
deeply than that which lasted only a day. Both to the
national imao-ination and to the view of foreig-ners it was
a larger fact. It presented the Sabbath magnified.^ And
it must not be overlooked, that to great numbers it
brought material consequences of the highest personal
importance, — the release from debt and from bondage.
Moreover, in regard to purely religious duties, in one
ver}-^ weighty particular it presented the standard and
norm. The chief feature of tlie weekly Sabbath was the
convocation. The most striking feature of the convoca-
tions must have been the recitations of the law and of
the sacred stories. Certainly if these statutes had been
eighty-five (45 -)- 40). Conip. Jo&b. xxiv. 29 with xiv. 7, 10. If the
first Jubilee came round twenty-five years after his death, there was
already a great declension. If it was counted from the giving of the
law, then it would have occurred about five years after the allotment.
In this case it was doubtless duly observed. The post exilic Jubilee,
of which there is some rather dubious trace, could have been only a
very partial observance, a mere shadow of the statute at the best.
1 " Surpassed in its dignity as a symbol." This is to be asserted
with reverent care, that it be not misunderstood. The whole sacrificial
system was typical of the atonement of our Lord. He was the aiiti-
typic Lamb slain from the beginning of the redemption of the world.
But in order to be the Redeemer He humbled himself. Sacrifice sym-
bolizes his humiliation. Surely the Sabbath, which is the symbol of
his exaltation and reign over his people, can have no inferior dignity.
2 See Study VI., page 135.
188 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
faithfully observed, all devout Israelites would have looked
forward with special interest to the opening of the Sab-
bath year, when the official reading ^ of the Scripture at
the feast of Tabernacles, from a standard copy kept in the
sacred precincts, would have tested the accuracy of the
exercises of all the Sabbaths. But since the sabbatic year
was so remarkable, so prominent, what a profound impres-
sion would have been made by the doubling of this year !
And since the whole body of the Mosaic institutions rested
upon the agriculture of Israel's land, what a grave inter-
est would have attached to tbe period when every man's
title to his farm was subjected to revision ? And among
a nation of farmers, what institution could have compared,
in material importance, with the absolute and universal
cessation of tillage through a second year ? Evidently
this institution was designed to be the apex of the sab-
batic system. As something which should seize their im-
agination, as something which should affect their material
interest, as something embodying and teaching most pre-
cious religious truth, it was preeminent. It reflected
measureless dignity upon the weekly Sabbath, whose
transient brevity held in perspective so great a period of
corresponding character. It prolonged the administration
of the divine ideas in human affairs. It carried the re-
adjustment of social conditions not only in the personal
sphere, assuring freedom from bondage, nor yet only fur-
ther in the inter-social sphere, giving release from debt,
but also beyond all this to the very limit of men's funda-
mental relation to the state, confirming to each man his
birthright ^ in its soil. In this readjustment it not only
delivered every Israelite from the dishonor of debt and
1 " Official reading." Deut. xxxi. 9-13. See also page 130.
2 " Birlluigbt." See pages 138-140 of Study VI., specially page
139.
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 189
of slavery but from the helplessness of pauperism. ^ It
barred the possibility of a proletariat, the curse and ter-
ror of every state at this day. It brought home to every
citizen the active divine authority not only over personal
conditions and obligations but also over the land itself.
And it united this extreme assertion of the divine pre-
rogative with a very remarkable experience ^ of the di-
vine bounty, and a coordinate experience of their ow^n
brotherhood ^ under God's Fatherhood. But the position
of this most sacred * year, the most prominent, the most
critical, the most pregnant member of the sabbatic sys-
tem, is a paradox. Every week closed with its seventh
a sacred day. In every year the seventh was a sacred
month. Every week of years closed with its seventh a
sacred year. And now the climax of the system is made
not the closing seventh of the week but the first of a
week. The lesson of Pentecost is repeated, and by the
repetition confirmed. On the very largest scale within
1 " From pauperism." By giving every man a portion of the ara-
ble land.
2 " Remarkable experience." See Lev. xxv. 20-22. In the wil-
derness a double supply of manna was given every sixth day, so that
the observance of the Sabbath brought no lack of food. If the sab-
batic years had been observed, this promise would have been liter-
ally fulfilled. The sabbatic years and the Jubilees would have been
years of plenty. Moreover it is to be inferred that the spontaneous
product would be large ; as verse 6, " The sabbath of the land shall be
meat for you." The prohibition in verses 4, 5, relates to acts of owner-
ship. No man should take away anything as his own. In Ex. xxiii.
11, permissFon is given for every one to enjoy the fruit of the earth
in common. See Study VI., page 137, and especially page 145.
8 " Brotherhood." See Study VI., pages 137 and 148.
* " ]\Iost sacred," as signifying and sealing on the largest scale
the bond between God and his people. " Most critical," as bring-
ing with it the crisis or determining point of the most important con-
ditions of social life. " Most pregnant," as holding and developing
the profoundest lessons of truth to be brought eventually to the fa-
miliar actjuaintance of the people.
190 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
the measure of human life, there is shown as in the feast
of Weeks, a picture of the series of weeks marked by the
sacred seventh as a completed, definite closed series, fol-
lowed by new arrangement wherein greater, indeed the
greatest, dignity rests not on the seventh but on the
first, while the succession of the weeks is unbroken.
The reader must not forget the essential condition under
which this instruction, like all divine instruction, must be
given to man. Our minds must first become thoroughly
familiar with the details of the objects or ideas presented,
and then, but not till then, can they advance to a consid-
eration of the underlying relations of those objects or
ideas. It may be reverently but fearlessly asserted, that
it was not intended, as it was not possible without a mir-
acle, to impress the lessons of the sabbatic system on the
people immediately. They were commanded to obey.
Obedience is the coi'ner-stone of education. Israel's edu-
cation was to continue through centuries. By obedience,
he would have been educated to perceive the problems
which his own law presented. Seeing them, he would
have looked for their solution. The more devout and
loyal he might be, the more anxiously would he long for
that solution, as believers now long that the incompre-
hensible problem of sin and suffering may be solved. But
not until the new Prophet and Lawgiver should appear
could the solution be found. We have the key. Before
the Christ came no mortal could unlock the mystery.
It can be imagined that in some country the industry
of extracting perfumes from blossoms was practiced in all
the orchards. The workmen for years and for genera-
tions had gathered and treated all the blossoms of all the
fruit-trees known to them, and had never seen the fruit
formed on any one. By lifelong attention to this work
they became perfectly familiar with all the minutiie of
blossom sti'ucture. Any of them could describe each and
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 191
every part to its smallest feature more accurately than
the most learned botanists of other lands. They clearly
understood that each blossom was an organism, and its
parts related to one another. They had long since dis-
covered the adaptation of certain parts for the production
of results having appreciable value, such as color, fra-
grance, and flavor. They had perceived a certain coor-
dination in these results. Tlie^^ had also perceived a
certain harmony in the combination of the structural
parts, and especially the very evident arithmetical sym-
metry in the numerical coefficients of these parts. But
they had also noticed some strange exceptions to this
harmony and symmetry. The bitter pollen, for example,
was in strange contrast to the general sweetness. And
then the number five, so often repeated in other parts, so
characteristic of the whole structure of the tree, was re-
placed b}' an unconformable number for the pistils. The
workmen never could learn or guess the use of these ex-
ceptional parts. But those among them who knew that
the blossom (and the whole tree) was the creation of In-
finite Wisdom, felt sure that the peculiarities of pollen
and pistils must have some sufficient reason, though they
could not imagine one.
Then it may be further supposed that, after centuries
of dealing exclusively with blossoms, some commercial
crisis turned the attention of all these workmen exclu-
sively to the fruit. To their astonishment they saw it
develop and mature into something fair, savory, and nu-
tritious, more grateful and useful to man than the blos-
som had been. They began to prepare it in various
ways, and in their work they gradually became aware of
its organic structure and of its organic relation to the
blossom. They saw that in respect to color and fra-
grance and flavor it preserved the subtle harmonies of
the blossom. They discovered in its centre and core the
192 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
characteristic number five. They also learned — and ifc
surprised and pleased them most of all — that the pollen
and the pistils, those exceptional parts of the blossom,
whose pecidiarities they could not account for, were the
parts most directly related to the fruit.
Israel worked for ages with the blossom. It was his
business to become familiar with every smallest item,
every jot and tittle of its organism. He could not know
what the fruit would be. He could not conceive of the
fruit, and therefore was not explicitly told how it would
differ from the blossom. He was told, however, that
somehow and at some time a blessing to all nations was
to come, and that it was to come somehow through and
by and out of this blossom. Then, when he came to
know thoroughly all the several parts and organs of the
blossom, and found that some were exceptional, and that
their peculiarities contributed no appreciable component
to the functions of the blossom as a blossom merely, fur-
nishing no harmonious constituent to its color or flavor
or fragrance, and vai'ying from its radical number, and
yet too prominent to be put down as accidents, he might
have said : " This blossom is not the perfect counterpart
of the promise. In some respects it is a contrast. Some-
how it must be changed in order to correspond with that
promise. These organic parts, which seem out of pro-
portion and harmony in the blossom as it is, must be
placed there to serve in some way that which is to be.
The seventh of the week and the first of the week must
have their connection explained by some event yet in the
future." But the riddle would stand unsolved.
To us, the principles involved in this solution have
been made very clear by the Apostle Paul.
•^ "^ ^ Gal. 3: 17.
" And this I say, that the covenant tliat was
confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which was
four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul."
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 193
That is, whatever in the law was inconsistent with
the promise or inadequate to its scope, must be changed.
The fact that anything in the hiw was inconsistent or
inadequate is perfect proof that the Allwise put it tliere
for a temporary purpose, with a view to an ultimate
modification.
Therefore, also, the terms of the promise enable us
certainly to distinguish the conditions under which any
part of the law must be maintained or modified.
I. Whatever should last must be extensible. It must
be capable of blessing all nations and all the families of
the earth.
II. Whatever should last must be a positive and unal-
loyed blessing.
III. AVhatever should last must be directly related to
that Promised Seed throug-h whom the blessing must
come.
By the application of these principles certain features
of the sabbatic system, established under Moses, may con-
fidently be pronounced permanent and sure to continue
on through the Sabbath of the New Dispensation. Among
these are : —
I. Decentralization. That new Sabbath must be an
institution which men can observe in any place and under
any conditions, — alone, but " in the Spirit,"
like John at Patmos, — or, breaking bread
with the whole congregation, like Paul at Acts 20:7.;
Troas.
II. Sociality. It must be observed by customs which
bring believers together as believers, by families and
communities or congregations, and by customs which ef-
face all hindrances to such assemblage and communion.
III. Covenant. Its observance must carry on its face
the profession of attachment to the covenant by which
God's personal acceptance is promised, and the public
13
194 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
avowal of loyalty to our Lord, the Seed of Abraham and
the Author of tlie world-wide blessing. Certain other
features of that old system must, under application of the
same rules, be pronounced transitional. The ideas which
they present concerning God's administration of his plan
of redemption cannot be altered one jot or tittle. But
the forms must perish in order to preserve those ideas, as
the petals must die for the sake of the fruit. Among
these are : —
I. All that relates to land divisions and titles and till-
age, and hence is limited to Palestine.
II. All that relates to civil jurisdiction over acts of
personal homage to God. No national organization can
stand, henceforth, between the individual soul and God.^
III. All that relates to sabbatic numeration ; that is,
all the parts and features of the system which give
sacredness to the seventh successive period of time,
whether day, month, or year.
The week is not in question. It is taken for granted,
and nowhere ordained by Moses. It existed before his
day, and has, in fact, outlived the system which he intro-
duced. That system was only an episode in the history
of the week. But, as shown in a previous Stud}^, the
week depends upon a sacred day for its boundar}^ and
count.^ If the seventh day ceases to be a Sabbath, the
first day onl}^ can take its place as a boundary and start-
ing-point.
The inconsistency and inadequacy of the Mosaic sev-
^ Study III., page 73.
2 So far as the national entity is concerned, our Lord is himself
the antitype of Israel. Thus Matt. ii. 15, or Hosea xi. 1, " Out of
Egypt have I called my Son." Compare, also, the pi-ophecies of
Isaiah concerning the " Servant of the Lord," where the nation and
the Messiah are blended. Under the Mosaic constitution the na-
tional authority was, in many respects, a mediator. Now there is
none but Christ.
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 195
entli day Sabbath^ as a permanent institution may be
examined by the application of the tbree principles al-
ready stated : —
A. It could not be extended as -wide as the Promise.
B. It could not be experienced as a positive, unalloyed
blessing.
C. It could not express the relation of those blessed
among all nations to the Promised Seed who redeems
them.
A. The Mosaic Sabbath was not extensible.
Of course the sabbatic system could not be extended.
It was essentially local and limited. Therefore the ques-
tion rises whether the Mosaic Sabbath could be pre-
served apart from that system, and there is a further
question whether, if isolated from its system, it could be
extended to all nations.
The possibility of separating the Sabbath from the
rest of the sabbatic system seems to be established by
the fact that the Sabbath existed before that system was
promulgated. But that ancient Sabbath was not the
Mosaic.^ It was not divested of the sacrifice, and it was
not maintained by civil authority, and it was not observed
by the cessation of ALL labor, whether in cottage, tent,
or field ; although, as a day of assembly and sacrifice, —
a festival day as well as a religious day, — it was a day
^ The " Mosaic Sabbath." This phrase is only used for distinc-
tion. It was ordained by God, not by Moses. Under Moses, by
the command ot" God, the emphasis was hiid upon the seventh day.
That emphasis, therefore, had to be eliminated for the new disj^en-
sation. But it was impossible to remove that emphasis, under the
circumstances, except by changing the day. Hence, in referring to
the Israelitish Sabbath, the terms "Mosaic" and "seventh day
Sabbath " may be used interchangeably.
* Noah sacrificed on this day, and unroofed the ark on this day.
Apparently, also, he completed his embarkation on this day. The
uses of the day made it a day of rest, not a statute.
196 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LOBD'S DAY.
of rest. Above all, that early Sabbath did not have the
lai'ge illustration which the Mosaic system contained, and
it did not receive that emphasis as the seventh day which,
by the enforcement of so many sevenths and reduplica-
tions of sevenths, that system laid upon the Sabbath of
Israel. It is certain, therefore, that a Sabbath might
remain after the sabbatic system had disappeared, but
it is not certain that it could remain as the INlosaic
Sabbath.
But how could the Mosaic system be abolished ? Only
by the act of that Lawgiver whom Moses foretold. If,
then. He should take the Sabbath out of its system, and
ordain that all the features and characteristics given to it
by Moses should remain, except the observance of the
associated sabbatic times, then it would stand by his
word. But without his word it could not stand. It
could not be necessary for Him to enact that some Sab-
bath, some sacred day in the week, should remain. Such
an institution, being older than Moses, was independent
of Moses, and needed, if anything at all, no more than
evidence that He observed it. This evidence our Lord
gave in coming to his disciples on the resurrection day,
and then, next, on the next first day. He did not ordain
that any of those characteristics which made the Sabbath
INlosaic should be preserved. Therefore they must share
in the development of the whole system. Since in fact
He did not sejiarate it, no other might or could.
Moreover, there is an historical example showing what
the Mosaic Sabbath, divorced from the system to which
God married it, would become. In the last period of the
Jewish polity the Sabbath was, to a very great extent,
isolated. The larger part of the nation lived in foreign
lands. INIuch of their own land was not in their own
hands. The nation, as a whole, was no longer agricul-
tural. Both in the Israel at home and the greater Israel
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 197
abroad tliere was very little and very imperfect practical
experience of anything but the Sabbath. The great body
of tlie nation could in no way be affected by the sabbatic
year or Jubilee, if they should try to keep them ; neither
could they have occasion, except for the form's sake, to
count the weeks to Pentecost, or the months to the feast
of Trumpets. To craftsmen and traders living in every
city of Europe, Asia, and Africa, these observances, for-
mei'ly engrossing realities to the farmers in Palestine,
were only an exhibition or a legend. The seventh day
of the week alone remained as a practical reality. This
was as much a reality as the rest was a dream. It
marked them as a peculiar people among all their neigh-
bors. It brought them ridicule and persecution. Their
whole law seemed concentrated in it, both in the eyes of
the heathen and of themselves.
The result was a Sabbath whose peculiarities, as limned
here and there in the New Testament, are often repulsive.
It has not the expression, the aroma, of the Pentateuch.
With its isolation, or because of its isolation, it lost both
attractiveness and spiritual force. The import of various
New Testament references may be gathered into a few
particulars.
It had become to the Jews an oj!?ms operatum, a duty
to be done for form's sake, independent of morality or
faitli.^ " Keeping the Sabbath " was not inconsistent in
their eyes with cruelty and deceit. It is difficult to de-
tect any moral quality in it, except what is associated
with the synagogue.
It had become destitute of religious significance as well
as of religious influence. It did not seem in any way to
suggest the kingdom of God. Doubtless, if a Pharisee
had heard it explained as an image and foretaste of God's
administration of the social organization of his people in
^ In general. There were exceptions, of course ; possibly many.
198 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
its perfect development, he would liave stared in bewil-
derment.
And, final]}^ it Lad become the expression of loyalty
to the nation rather than of personal devotion to God.
There was pithy suggestiveness in the phraseology nsed
in describing the friendly centurion by the elders of Ca-
pernaum: "He loveth our nation and hath built ns a
sjMiagogue." This was not a cliance or singular wording.
The nation had come to stand between men and God.
God was indeed their nation's God, but they belonged to
God only because they belonged to the nation. This
was the historical outcome of the Mosaic Sabbath isolated
from the ordinances with which God encircled it ; an ob-
servance lacking moral force, lacking spiritual instruc-
tiveness, lacking personal communion with God.
Still the question remains, whether, if in any way it had
been possible to preserve the Mosaic Sabbath apart from
its system, that Sabbath could not have been adapted to
the new conditions? If Israel had been faithful up to
the advent of the Messiah, might not their Sabbath in
that case have endured unchanged ? Might not those
prophecies of a change which were embodied in institu-
tions like the Pentecost and the Jubilee have been de-
ferred, say, until Messiah's second coming ? Might not
the superintending Spirit of God have preserved the
Church both from losing the spiritual power and instruc-
tiveness which the associated observances gave to the
Sabbath, and equally from attempting to replant those
observances in lands where they could not live and where
God did not sow them ? To these questions, so far as they
relate to moral possibilities, the only answer must be, that
in fact God has not preserved that Sabbath. Further, no
one can know.
But a physical obstacle to universal expansion of the
seventh day, the Mosaic Sabbath, is insuperable. Its
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 199
time was defined by the statute. It was the seventh day
in the land of Israel. It began and ended with the sun-
set. The fact that it was the strictly defined day of a
small territory forbade that it should be the day of all
the earth. For that service a day was required that
should be free from the limitations of a local statute,
free to be adapted to the circumstances of man in all
nations. When the blessing of the Promise should be
carried to tribes in the far north, where the sun dur-
ino; some summer nicrhts never sets and during some
winter days never rises, how could the faithful there
keep the JNIosaic day ? ^
Or suppose that the blessing of the Promise had spread
eastward, and all the nations had with it received the
Judean Seventh, and that it had passed beyond Asia,
and from island to island of the sea, until it had reached
America, so that over more than a hemisphere eastward
from Jerusalem one day was kept ! As the observance
spread always eastward, the Sabbath would begin earlier
in each newly gained region, until in America it might
be sixteen hours in advance of Jerusalem. The even
fall then beginning in America would mark the opening
of the Sabbath all the way across that continent, and
across the Pacific, and across broad Asia, until after six-
teen hours its shadow veiled Mount Zion. All this would
be one Sabbath day.
And now suppose that the blessing and the Sabbath
were carried in the opposite direction, that the nations in
Europe and Africa received it, and that a tide of emigra-
tion carried whole nations of these believers across the
Atlantic, bringincj the same Sabbath with them. Then
the sunset which beoan the Sabbath in America, and
^ The legal beginning and ending of a day is described as " at
even " in Ex. xii. 18. In the passage refening to the paschal lamb,
the expression is literally "between the evenings."
-00 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
after some sixteen hours brought it to Jerusalem, and
then for about eight hours more carried it onwards over
Europe and the Athmtic, would bring it back to its start-
ing-point, and henceforth the dwellers in America might
have two Sabbaths in succession, each the identical day
of Judea. And this confusion could not be avoided.
For the day of the world ^ is as unending as the sunshine
which jDasses round and round it. The local day only is
limited to twenty-four hours. To tie down the whole
world to the local day of a minute district would be to
harass the devotion of all nations with incessant per-
plexities and contradictions. Perhaps when knowledge
advanced men would insist upon keeping the identical
hours, and might telegraph round the world the Jerusa-
lem sunset, so that at that precise minute the Sabbath of
the world might begin its dead and senseless literalism.
No ; for all nations a Sabbath was needed adjustable to
the conditions of men in all lands. The exercise of rev-
erent common sense in its adjustment must not be ham-
pered b}^ uncertainties, nor by scruples arising from the
etymology, the usage, or the translation of a word. In
our age Christian common sense has drawn a line in
the western Pacific,^ and agreed that every day shall be
counted as beginning and ending at that line. Under
the Mosaic Sabbath such an agreement would not be
lawful. The exercise of discretion^ was forbidden. Ac-
^ Those who insist upon a literal use of the word " day " in Gen-
esis i. should remember that in that sense it could be applied only
to the world-day, which is age-long, beginning when no light falls
on this planet, and ending when by any cause the light is again
withdrawn from it.
2 In point of fact the line is not straight. In the main it is the
180 meridian of Greenwich. But there are defiections.
8 No discretion. See Deut. xxvii. 26, as quoted Gal. iii. 10.
Also, Ex. XXV. 40 quoted Heb. viii. 5. It is true that the later Jews
allowed themselves discretion in many things, but it was not lawful.
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 201
curate obedience was required. And with exact obedi-
ence to the statute, the Mosaic Sabbath could not become
the Sabbath for all nations enjoying the blessings of the
Promise.
B. The Mosaic Sabbath, as peculiarly Mosaic, was not
a positive and unalloyed blessing. The day did indeed
bring blessings with it. But through the ages before
Moses it had brought these blessings: the consciousness
of reconciliation with God through sacrifice ; of hope
through meditation, on the story of his dealing with man
and on the words of his promise; of fellowship in the tie
of religion that bound them to Him, with all others who
prayed to Him, — masters and servants, young and old,
all together on a day that brought relaxation and social
enjoyment sanctified by worship. In the changes intro-
duced by the Mosaic statutes there were also great bless-
ings. They were real blessings, but they did not equal
the measure of the promise. They were not positive in
their form, and they were not unalloyed in their prac-
tical working. Like the law, as a whole they
. . . . , Qeb. 10 : 1.
were only disciplinary and preparative, — " the
shadows of good things to come."
The form of all the new regulations was restrictive.
The key-note in all their parts was, " refrain," " thou
shall not." The day, indeed, was not empty. It had
useful and enjoyable employments.-^ But these were
rather instituted than commanded. Cessation of labor
in field, bazaar, and kitchen, — this was the specific
command. This was the feature of the day on the face
The circumstances which forced them to modify their conformity
were the result and punishment of voluntaiy disrobed ience. It is
to-day an experience common enough that one wliohas viohxted duty,
when able to perform it, soon finds himself entangled in circum-
stances which render it impossible to perform it faithfully if he
would.
1 Study v., page 115.
202 EIGHT STUDIES UF THE LORD'S DAY.
of the statute. This was the one feature of the clay
which the zealots of the age of degenevacy magnified.
They did not, indeed, neglect the convocation and other
adjuncts of the day. In no period could the true and
faithful have overlooked these. The Pharisees thought
it behooved every one to attend the synagogue and read
or listen to the Scriptures. Probabl}^ they would have
blamed, certainly they would have despised, a neglecter
of these duties. But it is doubtful whether the greatest
neglect of the synagogue would have stirred them to
serious anger, or led to any prosecution of the offender.
Matt. 12: 14 ; ^^^'^"' however, our Lord on the Sabbath
Mark 3: 6. ]jealed a withered arm, the Pharisees were
roused to bitterest malignity. And the common mob,
when they learned that He had bidden the restored
paralytic carry his pallet on the Sabbath from Bethesda
to his home, tried to wreak their fury on Hira at once.
The restriction of the Sabbath had been broken through,
as they deemed, and in their eyes the whole Sabbath
consisted of this restriction. Verbally and literally they
were right. But they could not see that the restriction
was enacted in order to secure for every one, even the
humblest, a share in the day's privileges. This object
was not stated, because it was one of the things to be
learned by use. Because it was not stated they disre-
garded it, and asserted, practically, that the restriction
was for its own petty sake alone. Thus they really set
the Sabbath in comparison with the forbidden fruit of
Eden, with the restriction of that tree by which man
fell, instead of the fruit of that other tree of Calvary by
whose free gift man rose to life.
If, then, the INlosaic day should have gone down into
the Christian centuries instead of the Lord's Day, it
would have been as a restriction. And since it would
have been isolated from its coordinate system, and re-
garded as a thing apart, separated from all else in the
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 203
law, it would have been only a restriction. And this
restriction could not have been applied to " all nations."
Those exposed to the rigors of a northern winter would
have found it an infliction rather than a blessing if it
exposed them to the rigors of fireless ^ chill. Some proc-
esses in the arts cannot be suspended on one day in
seven. Police duty cannot be intermitted, neither can
the labor of providing gas, and lighting up a modern
city. There is very much in the complex activity of
modern civilization which cannot be pressed down to rigid
compliance with the Mosaic law. Civilization would be
set at variance with the divine law, or else hampered
and distorted, and no man would think of that law as a
positive blessing.
But suppose the doctrine of necessity and mercy were
brought forward, and, on that ground, the day were
released from restriction to any extent which anybody
might think appropriate. Even then, if anything were
left of the old Sabbath law, whatever was left would
remain a mere restriction as before. The old Sabbath
might be in danger of perishing at the demands of mod-
ern society, but if it survived its character, as found in
the old statutes, could not be changed.
But if the conditions of modern life could be changed
so that all the nations could share in sabbatic rest, ac-
cording to the Mosaic law, that would not suffice for the
promised blessing. Rest, indeed, is not an unmeaning
word. In its place it is a real and a great good. The
sabbatic rest brought great advantages to the people of
Israel. So evident now are the benefits to an^^ common-
wealth of a weekly day of rest that political economists
plead for the civil Sabbath, so-called, on purely secular
grounds. But rest is one thing. Positive blessedness is
another and a very different thing. Perfect blessedness
^ " Fireless." See Ex. xxxv. 3, compared with Ex. xii. 16.
204 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
needs no rest^ for it knows no exhaustion. The blessinsr
of the Promise must be something wliich sliall not only
relieve the \ve;uy from the pressure of toil, but fill tlieir
souls with refreshment and stimulating hope ; something
which shall not merely represent the covenant of God,
but surround the soul with palpable and irresistible
manifestations of his unmeasured love ; something which
shall not only suggest the " beauty of holiness," the order
and benevolence of God's rule, but in its historic occa-
sion, in its associations, in what is breathed in its air,
shall bring to the soul the seal and assurance and fore-
taste of the Avhole sura of good that man may hope to
receive from God.
While thus on the one hand the form of the ordinances
which commanded sabbath rest failed to guarantee posi-
tive blessedness, so on the other hand the practical oper-
ation of these ordinances, being wholly in the sphere of
obligation, could not afford an experience of unalloyed
blessedness. Perfect love casteth out fear. Perfect loy-
alty scorns compulsion. The old Sabbath was enforced
by the sword. It was discipline, drill, dictation. It
might be love and loyalty also, but it could not be love
and loyalty alone. In this it was inadequate to repre-
sent the blessedness of the Promise. As surely as a new
dispensation must come, so must a new Sabbath come
with it.
Moses did not prophesy directly of that new dispensa-
tion. He spoke only of the advent of the New Law-
giver to whom the people should liearken. He left them
to learn by degrees from the practical woi'king of their
institutions, and from comparing them with their an-
cestral Promise, that a great change must occur when
jer. 31: t^^^t Lawgiver should appear. In later daj^s
pp"m,il?.) Jeremiah described the new dispensation. His
Ueb. 8: 8-12. ■words are quoted in the Epistle to the Hebrews,
1 " No rest." Kev. iv. 8; vii. 15.
THE PERMANENT AND THE TRANSIENT. 205
and accurately express the spirit of the new covenant.
The law of God shall be written by Hira in his people's
hearts. He will inspire his Church with the desire to
please Him. That Church shall be a willing witness to
the world for Hira. She will not merely testify to the
abstract worth of morality by her consistent scrupulous-
ness. She will aim at the purest living to please Him.
She will not merely exemplif}' what all men, even in-
fidels and heathen, approve, the beauty of compassion,
nnselfishness, benevolence. She will imitate his tran-
scendent charity, yet not for abstract charity's sake, but
to please Him. And above all else she will witness to
the world and call the world to witness, that He is more
than holy and compassionate. He is the Lord, — the
Lord of all, and her Lord.
This should have been Israel's testimony expressed in
keeping his Sabbath, for that was appointed to be the
public profession of loyalty to his covenant God. But it
was also a civic regulation, a strictly defined statute, an
ordinance maintained by the sword. Whether it came
from the heart or not, obedience was enforced under the
supreme penalty. The covenant was put on them, not
freely taken by them. The husbandman thrust the seeds
of heart religion into the unsoliciting, if not reluctant,
soil. Under the new covenant they sprang up in vigor-
ous, spontaneous growth. Before a new campaign the
soldiers of ancient Rome marched into the Forum to take
again their military oath. But it was no matter of choice
with them. It was death to refuse. So with the Israel-
ite. He had no choice. God imposed on him the
statute. Not so with the Church. Her Lord left her so
that she must show to the world what she has made evi-
dent to this day, that she kept his day because she could
not help it ; because she loved Him ; because she chose,
and could not help choosing, to show her loyalty to
Him. *
206 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
C. Finally, the Mosaic Sabbath expressed no relation
between those blessed among " all nations " and the
promised " Seed " who blessed thera. The seventh day
received under Moses new and marked characteristics.
These changes were authorized by God, but were intro-
duced, nevertheless, by Moses, so that the day is named
with propriety after him. It is the Mosaic Sabbath.
Could the Son, in whose Father's house Moses was but
a servant, — could the Prophet, to whom Moses himself
referred Israel, take for his day one that was character-
ized by his predecessor and inferior? Could the fulfill-
ment of the promise, before which the Mosaic legislation,
according to its own principles, shriveled and fell like pet-
als from the swelling fruit, — could that realized promise
be symbolized by a day which already symbolized the de-
funct statute ?
How that former day pales in the effulgence of the
resurrection morning ! Where, in all that is known of
the histor}^ of man, where in all that is known of God, is
there an event at once so great in its own elements, so
important as a manifestation of the Divine to man, so
transcendent in its relation to man's happiness and hope !
How could it be possible that Christ's redeemed should
live in slavery to the day He spent in the tomb and
neglect the day of his rising I That would have proved
them less than men as well as less than Christians. That
some for a time should have carried the old chain was
not strange. But they carried it as a chain which they
did not love but did not quite dare to drop. Their joy,
their hope, their heart, was in tiie next day, the first day,
the Lord's Day, which they and all the Church kept from
the Resurrection. The seventh day, whatever it repre-
sented, gradually faded and was forgotten. The day of
the Lord's rising was the one day for the hopes of man.
It and no other could possibly be the Lord's Day.
STUDY VIIT.
THE FOURTH C0MMA:SDMENT.
" The word of the Lord endureth forever." — 1 Pet. i. 2.5 ; Isaiah xl. 8.
Moses died. For fifteeen centuries bis laws were par-
tially and defectively observed. But over all tbe way-
wardness of tbe cbosen race brooded tbe Provi-
Aets4:2S.
dence of God, to accomplisb wbatsoever bis
band and bis counsel determined before. Of all tbose
laws not a jot or a tittle was lost. In tbe fullness of time
came tbe Promised Seed, tbe antitypic Lawgiver, tbe
Messiab, Cbrist, anointed witb tbe Spirit, tbrougb wbom
He establisbed tbe new covenant in tbe bearts of bis peo-
ple. Tbe object lessons of tbe old discipline became tbe
intuitive principles and perceptions of tbe new vocation.
All tbose specifications of statute, forms of ritual, func-
tions of duty, about to vanisb like fading petals, left be-
hind tbem ripening fruit in which, their vitality survived.
Not only was tbe fruit organically derived from tbe blos-
som ; its life was identical witb tbe life of tbe blossom.
That life was tbe thought of God ; and this thought was
given to man in definite words from Sinai. In tbe fore-
going Studies, tbe preparation for tbe Christian sacred
day, and the prophecy, obscure then, but evident now,
of its relation to tbe older day, of its place in the week,
and of its practical featui'es, have been examined as they
appear in the Mosaic legislation. A leaf, as such, serves
only the ends of leaf structure, ripens and dies a leaf.
By the power of God modifications are wrought in tbe
208 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
leaf and it becomes a petal. By the same power other
petals are grouped around it and a blossom is formed.
By the same power other modifications of the leaf be-
come stamens, pistils, and other parts of the blossom. By
the same power fruit is prepared and prophesied through
the blossom organism, and when the fruit develops the
blossom dies. But the fruit matures along with the
original leaves, the iinchanged expression of the life of
the tree, the medium by which the bond is formed be-
tween the earth-bound roots where the sap is elaborated
and the air and the sunlight of heaven thi-ougli whicli it
receives power to bear fruit. The perennial week, defined
and constituted by its sacred da}^, is God's appointed
clothing for the many-branched tree of human faith.
While jNloses was the gardener, the modifications were
introduced by which plain leaves became a blossom, and
the old sacred day became the Mosaic Sabbath with its
sabbatic system. Then in due time came the garden-
er's Lord ; in his day the fruit appeared. Then the blos-
soms withered. The Mosaic modifications disappeared.
Only the perennial week remained, like leafage embos-
oming the Lord's fruit, — the Lord'.s Day. The rest or-
dained under Moses now ceased to be enforced by the
state's authority. The great s^^stem of associated Sab-
baths arranged under him now ceased to be regarded.
The divorce then effected between the Sabbath and
the Sacrifice ^ was now annulled, and their everlasting
marriage proclaimed. But the vitality, the Divine
thought inspiring each one of the Mosaic innovations,
survived and passed on to their fruit. Tiie sabbath rest
provided for the Sabbatic convocation out of which grew
the synagogue. Its fruit is the social worship of the
Lord's Day. The sabbatic system provided for an ex-
1 The sacrificial feast has a place in the Lord's kingdom. See
Rev. xix. t).
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 209
perience of the ideal administration of society under di-
vine rule, as contrasted with all godless administrations.^
Its fruit is tliat fundamental conception of what Christian
society ought to be which is now the common property
of all believers and ^ of many unbelievers. The sab-
batic separation from sacrifice provided for a clear percep-
tion of the distinction between the means of reconcilia-
tion to God and the state of reconciliation and blessedness
under his holy sway. Its fruit is the grateful remem-
brance of our Lord's sacrifice pervading all the believers'
joy fulness, and finding most tender, most spiritual expres-
sion on the Lord's Day in the sacrificial meal instituted
by our Lord, wherein we partake of his sacrifice, in the
Lord's Supper.
But the Lord's Day is t\\Q first day of the week and the
original ^ sacred day was the seventh day of the week.
So there was a threefold preparation and prophecy in the
Mosaic statutes, in order that men, though they could not
foresee the change, might realize, after the Lord came,
that God had purposed and proposed to make the first
day the greater day, and its period the grandest age.
The first item of the threefold preparation was the lay-
ing a great emphasis on the seventh day. The seventh
month and the seventh year echoed and reechoed that
emphasis. Instead of being known as the day when ac-
cess to the dread locality of the visible symbols of Deity,
the so - called face of God, was permitted, — or, as the
day on which his special dealings with man might be ex-
pected, whether by direct communication of his will, or
by gracious interposition of his power, or by authorizing
some action in his name, — or, as the day for the sacri-
1 This fruit has been very slow to ripen, but it is mellow at last.
2 The fruit of the sabbatic year was free to every one, even to
strangers and foreigners in the land. Lev. xxv. 6.
8 "Original." Gen ii. 3.
210 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
fice with its concomitants, — now it was to be known,
apart from all such adjuncts, simply as the seventh day of
the week. And since it was no longer to be the special
day of privileged address to God, nor the special day of
God's manifestation, nor the day for sacrifice, a feature en-
tirely subordinate previously was now made preeminent.
This was the rest winch gave the day the title of Sab-
bath. Previously the exercises of the day, whatever they
were, involved more or less suspension of ordinary busi-
ness. Now, these exercises having been all abandoned,
and the old occasions for suspending labor having ceased,
the rest was dignified in being enforced both by a divine
command and a civil law. Thus an opportunity was
afforded for the convocation to develop, until it should in
its turn become the great feature of the da}^ to which the
sabbatic rest would be subordinate and merely instru-
mental.
The second part of the Mosaic preparation for the first
day of the week, as the Lord's Day, consisted in the ex-
hibitioii of the series of seventh days as a limited, closed,
completed series. Once in every year, and once on the
largest possible scale within every full lifetime, the seven-
fold repetition of the seventh day was most solemnly em-
phasized as the end of the series. This emphasis was
heightened by repi'esenting the series as beginning with
the anniversary of the nation's birth, the Passover. All
the peculiarities of their national Sabbatha were intro-
duced immediately after that great event. Sacrifice had
Ex. 5:1-3- 'dready been forced into desuetude. INIoses did
^ ■ ^' • not allow it to be reestablished. He asked per-
mission of Pharaoh to go into the wilderness in order to
offer it, but we read of no altar-smoke until the separate
sacrificial system, distinct from the Sabbath, had been or-
dained. We do find, however, that at the earliest oppor-
tunity and before the plain in front of Sinai was reached,
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 211
he did enforce the sabbatic rest. Thus every year the
IsraeUte was reminded that the series of seventh days,
begun at the beginning of his nation, was to run on for
a fixed and certain period and stop. The object lesson
thus given was on the scale of days, and it was repeated
on the scale of years. They, like the days, were to be
measured by weeks, and each seventh in order was to be
a Sabbath. But they did not run in indefinite continu-
ance. They were counted in definite closed series, all of
the same length. The Israelite might not be able to fore-
see what could explain this riddle. But the Christian
should not fail to thank his Heavenly Father for this evi-
dence of the unity of his plans.
The third part of this preparation and prophecy set
before Israel, but less perhaps for himself than for us,
was the representation of the inauguration of a new pe-
riod, after the closed sei-ies of seventh days, by a greater
Sabbath on the first day of the succeeding week. All
the men of the nation were strenuously commanded to
attend the feast of Weeks. As the feast fell on the first
day of the week, all were obliged to be in attendance on
the sixth day of the previous week, so as to rest over the
Sabbath. Thus the whole nation were brought together
every year to observe the last of the closed series of
seventh days Sabbaths, and a contrasted Sabbath on the
first day of the week succeeding it. Both Sabbaths were
arbitrarily ordained by the fiat of God, not suggested or
occasioned by any event in the history of the people.
But the Sabbath of the limited period was coupled with
the revealed statement of God's originating Fatherhood.
The first day Sabbath opening the week after the limited
period pointed to some event in the future. All refer-
ence in it to the giving of the ten Sinaitic words was
suppressed, though the time corresponded. It was al-
lowed to be known only as a token of the completion of
212 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
the full series of the Mosaic seven days, evidently signi-
fying, that when that dispensation was really completed,
its antitype would be found in a divine manifestation
greater than that of Sinai, — the day of a better cove-
nant. But while, on the one hand, Pentecost was thus
the greater Sabbath, as being more completely and abso-
lutely a personal command of God than the weekly Sab-
bath, standing simply upon his word of arbitrary author-
ity, without any reason or occasion for it being unfolded
from his omniscient wisdom and made known as yet to
men, — so, on the other hand, in the practical experience
of men it was the greater day. It was the festival day.
For it the tribes had gathered at the sanctuary. The
previous Sabbath found them there simply because it
preceded the festival. On that Sabbath every one looked
forward to the festival. The festival day also was a
Sabbath. But it was a Sabbath without the restriction
of the seventh day. Both Sabbaths were celebrated by
convocations. But the festival Sabbath added to the
convocation the sacrificial feast.
The perspective in the sabbatic system also entered
into this part of the preparation. There was a continual
enlargement in his view as the Israelite looked upon his
Sabbaths. Step by step they grew, until, instead of
reaching from week to week, the largest step touched
the land but once in a lifetime. When upon the scale of
years, as upon the scale of days, the series of seventh day
Sabbaths appeared as finished, closed, and limited, then
the greatest Sabbath of all, the greatest institution of
all, opened the new series on the first day of the new
week.
In the practical features of the sabbatic system, — the
ordinary experience of men under it as a part of their na-
tional constitution, — there was a similar preparation and
prophecy in regard to the practical experience of the
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 213
Lord's cliscijjles on the Lord's Day. That practical expe-
rience under the old system may be described in a con-
densed form as an experience in regard to land, an expe-
rience in regard to prescribed repetition and routine, and
an experience as to direct profession of loyalty to God.
The whole system rested upon the limited national
territory and bore upon its tillage. But its practical ef-
fect was to foster the strongest feeling of national
brotherhood. It eliminated from the farmer's life the
narrowness, the local bigotry, the stolidity which isola-
tion is wont to produce. One day in seven was secured
to every village for social intercourse. To the humblest
slave, as much as to the village elders, that day was ab-
solutely free and genial. The ter-annual journeys to the
festivals added something, though perhaps not much,
since the village parties would be apt to keep together
all through the trip. But the sabbatic year broke up
the farmer's seclusion altogether. In other lands the
peasantry were never loosened from the soil except for
military sei-vice or for slavery. The military service was
an alternation of privation and debauch. Slavery filled
the great cities of antiquity with monuments that amaze
even the nineteenth century. But it raised those monu-
ments out of a weltering mass of human misery, bestial-
ity, and blood so horrible that this nineteenth century
loathes to consider it. The Israelite went out among his
brethren a free man. He was even released from debt.
His labor was available for all the industries of city life,
or for any great national undertaking. But it was free
labor. He naturally sought the larger cities and towns,
where the greatest variety of occupation could be found.
There, in bazaars and streets and schools, he might be-
come much more than a farmer, a villager, or even a
tribesman, — an Israelite. All his Sabbath law was land
law, and as land law it fostered the sense of common
brotherhood, joint tenants in their Father's land.
214 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
As the old Sabbath law was limited to the Israelite ter-
ritory, so its brotherhood was limited to the Israelite na-
tion. Bat as the certificate of God's will concerning his
children it reached to all who might become his children
even by adoption. Tlierefore, when the old land-bound
Sabbath passed into the world-wide Lord's Day, it girdled
the earth with universal brotherhood in the Lord. In
whatever strange land, of whatever strange tongue, the
believer now joins in that day's w^orshiping assembly,
the sense of brotherhood glows within him. Over all
the world, from the western skirts of the Pacific around
with the sun to its starting-point, that day, dotting the
whole globe with gatherings in the name of our Lord,
busied alike in prayer and praise and promise in his
name, makes a testimony to the unity and brotherhood
of Christian faith which no man, without willfulness, can
gainsay.
A second practical experience, under the old sabbatic
system, was incessant repetition and routine. It was in
many respects a drill. It was educational. It was an
apprenticeship. The people w^ere exercised so as to be-
come perfectly versed and familiar with all its details.
But, although there was a certain immediate benefit in
all this exercise, the aim was something vastly more.
Routine and repetition are useful so long as thej^ are pi*e-
parative, and no longer. There is an unflagging interest
in the drill so long as facility is being acquired. After
that the drill becomes a dead, tedious monotony. Edu-
cation and training must necessarily precede discretion.
When the fitness for free and responsible volition is ac-
quired, the education and training are ended. Plainly
enough to our retrospect, the education and training and
drill under the old dispensation were designed to fit be-
lieving men for voluntary action under the new. The
proper expectations had to be awakened ; the proper as-
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 215
sociations had to be fonned ; the proper sense of respon-
sibility had to be established. The law compelled faith-
ful Israelites to practice that which should cause them
to associate the Sabbath with God's ideal administration
of society ; to expect that administration, organized on
an unlimited scale, and continuing for an unmeasured
time in the future; to expect with it the subjection of
all men to God's law, the entire renovation of society,
and the removal of every indignity, taint, and curse
from God's people, and to feel themselves allied, and
more than allied, — combined with all other members of
his people in the execution of his plans. But they had
no initiative, no propaganda. The whole of their polity
was a trust, which they were simply to preserve. It was
a lesson which they were not to go beyond, but to learn
thoroughly, word by word and thought by thought. But
their successors were to carry forward a great enterprise.
Much of its conduct was left to their discretion. They
were emancipated from the routine to test their training
in a great struggle. Confident that the kingdom of their
Lord would be triumphant, and knowing what that king-
dom meant for man, they were put under responsibility,
each one in connection with every other one, with every
division of the Church, and with the whole Church, to
take an intelligent, energetic, personal, and cooperative
part in the achievement of that kingdom.
A third practical experience under the old system was
the direct profession of loyalty to God. For this the
weekly Sabbath was made the seal.^ But all through
the system the authority of God was directly felt and di-
rectly acknowledged. That authority rested in so many
points upon both the tillage and the tenure of land, that
no one, it would seem, could possibly obey the law as a
^ Lack of personal presence of royalty supplied by Sabbath, Study
v., page 111.
216 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
matter of custom and routine without having brought
home to himself a vivid sense of God's personal prerog-
ative. And yet obedience was perfunctory^ and external.
No one could escape the pressure of the demand for alle-
giance. Willingness or unwillingness was not considered.
The drafted conscript, who refuses to take the military-
oath, is punished like the traitor of the battle-field. The
volunteer stands on a higher plane. He is doubly conse-
crated, not only by the soldier's sacrament, but also by
his own free-will devotion. The old system did not pro-
vide for volunteers. Every one was called. He who did
not respond, who did not testify his loyalty by the due
sabbatic observance, was condemned to death. Doing it
ever so grudgingly, he was accepted if he did it strictly.
Grudgingly or heartily, do it he must, or the very sub-
stance of the altar of sacrifice turned against him in an
avalanche of avenging stones.
And yet in every part of the system birthright was
exalted. Israel was not a slave. He was God's
Gal. 4 : 1.
son. If he was subjected like a servant to
strict discipline, it was because he was immature. He
was a child. As such he could not comprehend the
Father's plans and purposes, and therefore he could not
share them. When the age of discipline was passed,
when the capacity to share in the Father's confidence
was attained, then the son's duty would have been cari-
ca,tured if he had rendered no more than blind obedience,
if he did not render voluntary and instinctive coopera-
tion.i God required from his people what they were
capable of giving Him : in the earlier time, strict and
John 4: 23, Painstaking obcdieuce ; in the after age, obedi-
^^' ence in spirit and in truth. So the new day
became, in a far higher sense than the old, a seal of loy-
al'^^v Without one recorded word of specific command
" Cooperation." 1 Cor. iii. 9 ; 2 Cor. vi. 1.
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 217
for its observance, — without one item of prescribed ritual
for its exercises, — without one term of definition for its
limits, — it was the free spontaneous homage of a loyalty
that went beyond obedience, that clothed obedience with
intelligent cooperation, and crowned devotion with an-
ticipation of a triumph. The Church felt in her heart
what was due to her Lord. She had inherited from her
mother in Judea the preparation for his day and its
prophecy. When her Lord, by his resurrection, by his
manifestation and abstention, and by the descent of the
Holy Spirit, according to his promise, signified his as-
sumption of the first day of the week for his day, the
Church at once and forever adopted it. As she did not
wait for command, so likewise she did not stop to reason
out analogies. Through the teaching of her Lord, and
of the holy Spirit whom He sent, she received the truth
in her heart, and acted upon it. She did not immedi-
ately grasp it with her intellect. To that end the Spirit
was to lead her through the ages. But what she did not
at once fully understand, she distinctly felt. Without,
perhaps, any thought of a comparison, she set the Lord's
Day beside the old Sabbath, so much as was left of it.
Beside the constrained and distorted ^ profession, on that
day, of a loyalty that was in nature servile and in prac-
tice a homage to Judaism rather than to God, — was set
on this day the free, intuitive outburst of a loyalty that
by its nature, and by all the circumstances of its mani-
festation, came, and could come only from the heart, and
that was addressed without division or deviation to the
risen Redeemer, the divine Lord. The vitality of the
day which had sealed the old covenant passed over into
the day which sealed the new.
That vital principle, that thought of God which un-
derlay the possibility of union between God and man,
1 " Distorted." See Study VIL, pp. 196-198.
218 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
was not given to the world by any human mediation.
Not even to Moses was this office confided :
" God spake all these words."
It is plain enough that there is a wide difference be-
tween the Decalogue and the whole bod}^ of Mosaic legis-
lation. The Decalogue is unique. There is nothing like
it in the history of man. Nothing that can be compai'ed
to it has ever been imagined by man. The external cir-
cumstances, that which we may call the framing of the
Decalogue, were themselves unique. Such were the phys-
ical isolation of the whole nation from all other peoples,
as they were gathered into the large yet limited amphi-
theatre, walled by towering granite, facing Sinai ; the un-
exampled display of natural phenomena,^ such as in their
ordinary occurrence have always appalled the human
mind ; the three days' preparation, special, personal, pro-
longed ; and the utterance of words which it strained
human endurance to hear, as they rose above the trum-
peting of the whirlwind, out of the central invisibility
whose burning "2 retinue overwhelmed all consciousness of
mortal potency, and excluded all impressions except that
of the presence and personal address of God.
The explicitness of these words was no less unique.
^ J'robably the elders (priests as yet) established a patrol round
the base of the mountain, perhaps with something like a fence or
barrier. The thick darkness seems to liave enveloped the congre-
gation, while the mountain glowed and quivered with flame, and the
dense smoke above it shut out the liglit of day. The inspii-ed state-
ments hardly warrant the assumption of volcanic action, or the ex-
perience of an earthquake shock on the plain where the people stood.
They saw the mountain shake, but that appearance was rather an
incident to the fact that it was enveloped in flame. Ex. xix. 10-25 ;
XX. 18, 19 ; Deut. iv. 11, 12, 15 ; v. 4, 5, 22-26; Heb. xii. 18-21.
2 "Burning." Comp. Ps. civ. 4; Ileb. i. 7; Acts vii. 53. Also
" seraph," aliunde, Heb. ii. 2, cannot refer to the Decalogue, but
only to God's use of messengers to report and rehearse his mes-
sa<res.
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 219
God's thought may be read in all nature, and equally in
his moral government, but only a little at a time. It is
as if each letter "were composed of innumerable strokes,
and each word of numberless letters, so that while the
scroll stretched from dawn to dusk, the whole of a sen-
tence was never in view at once. We catch glimpses of
the meaning, but we cannot grasp it entirely. These
words are ten. They are as simple as short.
God's thought may likewise be read in all the insti-
tutions which He, through his servant Moses, ordained,
but only very partially and imperfectly in these alone.
Their meaning depends upon that which is before and
after them. By themselves they present a great com-
plex enigma, insoluble until the antecedent promise to
Abraham was fulfilled in Christ. These ten words are
complete and independent. For their comprehension,^
be it most reverently said, neither Abraham nor Christ
was needed. No man does or can fail to understand who
hears them. From beginning to end, each separate one
of the ten addresses something in the consciousness of
all sorts and conditions of men of every age, and every
clime, and Qv&vy grade.
The treatment of these words was equally singular.
Engraved by the special exertion of Omnipo- ex. 3i:i8;
tence on slabs of rock, they were designed to 32 '-. I6 ; '
be imperishable. Placed by divine command 1-4. '
in the centre of the most sacred of all symbolic f,^?,^^^^"
-' _ 21 ; Deut.
objects, in the most reverend and awful situa- 10 : 5.
tion, within the purview of divine worship, beneath the
mercy-seat, within the ark, in the Holy of Holies, they
were thus certified by God, through his ritual and sym-
bolism and object lessons, as the very centre and founda-
^ " Comprehension." That is, for a clear and adequate compre-
hension. Our Lord unfolded larger apjilication, and there are depths
of meaning for believers even to fathom.
220 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
tion of all that relates to the bond between man and his
Maker, which we call religion.
In the light of all these facts, the titles given to the
Decalogue by God, in the various passages in which ref-
erence is made to it in the general legislation, are very
important. Taken together they also are unique. Noth-
ing else in all the circle of symbol, or service, or prophecy,
bears these two titles. They are "covenant" and "tes-
timony." 1 Both words are not uncommon. But to only
one thing are both applied in common. The Decalogue
alone is both covenant and testimony.^
^ It is true that there is some question among scholars as to the
best translation of " 'eduth," rendered in our version "testimony."
But the matter in dispute is really insignificant. There is no ques-
tion that the word means something strongly repeated, earnestly
affirmed, call it precept, protest, testimony, or declaration. Deut.
xxxi. 26, 27, harmonizes with- the translation "testimony," but does
not necessarily confirm it, because there was a difference between
the offices of the "Book of the Law" (the Pentateuch probably)
and the two tables. But for every scholar who is content to inter-
pret Scripture by Scripture, the question is settled in Rev. xv. 5.
The word naprvpiov there used is the very word used by the Septu-
agint to translate 'eduth when referring to the Ten Commandments.
2 Ex. xix. 5, the people were commanded to prepare for the " cov-
enant " to be given on the third day. Ex. xxxiv. 27, 28, and Deut.
iv. 13, the " ten words " are specifically described as " the covenant."
In the first passage a reason is given. Deut. ix. 9, 11, the two
tables of stone are described as the covenant. Numb. x. 33 ; Deut.
x. 8 ; xxxi. 7, 25, 26, the ark is " the ark of the covenant."
Ex. XXV. 16, 21, command to put "the testimony" into the ark ;
neither the ark nor the stone tables were yet in existence. In view
of this purpose the ai-k was called then (xxv. 22) " the ai-k of the
testimony." The same again, before its construction, in Ex. xxxi. 7.
Exod xxxi. 18, xxxii. 15, tlie tables first given to Moses are called
the " tables of testimony; " and xxxiv. 29, the second set are called
the same. Ex. xxxviii. 21; Numb. i. 50, 53, the tabernacle is called
the tabernacle of testimony.
Heb. ix. 4. " The ark of the covenant overlaid round about with
gold, wherein was the golden pot that had manna, and Aaron's rod
that budded, and the tables of the covenant."
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 221
Scripture is always to be compared with Scripture.
There is nothing accidental in the Word of God. These
two names for the Decalogue must be taken to illustrate
aud explain each other. The testimony was a declara-
tion from God of something on which his covenant must
rest. ■ The covenant was an assurance from God to that
■which answered his testimony. The substance or matter
of the Decalogue, as between God and mankind, was
God's testimony — his most emphatic, solemn, and unique
declaration. As between God and those who reciprocate
his declaration and conform to its substance,^ it was his
covenant. What, then, does the testimony testify? What
does the covenant pledge? It testifies the divine ideal
of perfect human living. It pledges divine communion
with such an ideal in practice. " I am the Lord thy
God." •
The administrative and ritual law was added because
of transgression. There were none among man-
kind who answered to that ideal. Hence, the
testimony, by itself, cut o£E every man from the covenant.
Rev. XV. 5. " And after that I looked, and, behold, the temple of
the tabernacle of the testimony in heaven was opened." 'O vabs rijs
ffKTivrjs Tov fiaprvplov, is most naturally the shrine, the Holy of Holies.
Acts vii. 44, " Tabernacle of witness ; " literally the same, 'H (TKr)v^
TOV fxaprvpiov. Rev. xi. 19, "Ark of his testament," should be "Ark
of his covenant." The same Greek words as in Heb. ix. 4, ttjs
^ " Substance." The form of the Decalogue is negative. Our
Lord supplied the positive complement (Mark xii. 28-31; Matt.
xxii. 26-29 ; Luke x. 28) known before (Deut. vi. 5 ; Lev. xix. 18 ;
Luke X. 27), but first clothed with adequate authority by himself.
This is in accordance with the order of Scriptural development. The
promise to Adam and Eve was negative; to Abraham positive. The
blessing in the Mosaic sabbatic system was negative ; in the Lord's
Day, positive. The whole Mosaic ritual was negative, only types
and shadows; Christ, the substance, positive (Col. ii. 17; Heb.
viii. 5 ; ix. 1-14). Evening comes before morning in the Scriptural
day.
222 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
Imperfect men — transgressors — had to be dealt with.
Therefore, the ritual and statute hxw was ordained as a
schoolmaster, to teach a sinful people both to
expect the advent of a Perfect One, and to
comprehend how He would help them, transgressors as
they were, to reach God's ideal, to obtain his eternal
adoption. Israel knew that those two stone tables lay
immediately under the mercy-seat. The Church also
knows that her justification is through the " righteous-
ness" and "obedience," as well as through the sacrificial
" blood,^ " of the perfect One, Jesus Christ.
But, unlike that ritual and administrative law, the Dec-
alogue corresponded perfectly with the Promise. It was
adapted to all nations. Not a tribe of men is known who
have not been able to understand the broad terms of its
testimony, and to' apply it to themselves. As a covenant,
it pledges positive and absolute blessedness to those who
conform to it. And it relates directly to the Holy One,
who did no sin,^ through whom the blessedness of sancti-
fication and adoption are brought to all nations. The
symbolic stones of the two tables were a type of its per-
petuity. But the first set were broken^ by the leader, in
indignation over his nation's hasty apostasy. The sec-
ond set survived one captivity,^ but vanislied with an-
other. Nevertheless, the covenant and testimony of
God are eternal. He keeps them safe in his heaven,
though his wayward children lose the copy He has given
them to keep on earth. In the vision given to John, as
scene after scene of the Church's development was un-
folded, twice we are told of the heavenly original. After
1 "Righteousness," Rom. v. 18; "obedience," Rom. v. 19;
"blood," Rom. V, 9 ; Heb. v. 9; x. 14.
2 "No sin," 1 Pet. ii. 22,
8 " Broken," Ex. xxxii. 19,
4 "Captivity," 1 Sam. iv. 11; 2 Chron. xxxvi. 18.
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 223
the seventh trumpet had sounded, the temple in heaven
was opened, and a glunpse was given of " the ark of his
covenant.''^ ^ And then, after the redeemed multitudes
had gathered on the sea of crystal fire, to sing the song
of jNIoses and of the Lamb, and just before the seven an-
gels went forth with vials of wrath, the Holy of Holies,
the temple or shrine (ya6<;'), of the tabernacle of testi-
mony was opened. From the shrine of the testimony ^ the
executioners of judgment against sin went forth. Both
as covenant and as testimony, therefore, the Scripture
teaches us that the thought of God lives on unchanged.^
The Church in all ages had conformed to these pro-
phetic Scriptures, in that she has always read the Deca-
logue in her worship, not as an inspired utterance, not as
a Mosaic institution, but as something different from all
inspired utterances, different from all the legislation of
Moses' time, as something universal in its application,
absolute in its prerogative, — the immediate Word of
^ "Covenant," K.ev. xi. 19. So, in the revision, the authorized
version has testament, Greek Sta^Tj/crj.
^ " Testimony," Rev. xv. 5. See note page 221.
8 " Unchanged." There has been a good deal of well-meant but
loosely expressed statement about the reenactment of more or less of
the Decalogue in the New Testament. For instance, a prominent
pastor, studious and devout (^Sunday School Times, of Philadelphia,
January 14, 1882), says of the fourth: " It happens to be the only
one of the ten which is not repeated nor reenacted in set terms in
the New Testament." Now repetition is one thing, reenactment is
another. There are plain enough reasons why the fourth was not
repeated. But when were any of them reenacted V Reenactment
means an explicit, formal restatement of the binding authority of a
law as such. Our Lord never made such a statement. He and his
hearers alike took it for granted that every one of the ten was a living
law. He expanded and applied them. He never professed to add
to their authority. He never rehearsed them as a whole, He never
catalogued them. He never repeated nine, omitting one. There is
not one line in the New Testament which implies that the Decalogue
is not a unit, whole, inseparable.
224 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
God. It is true that various opinions concerning it have
been expressed by some Christian scholars. But that
fact is of very slight importance compared with the great
controlling fact that the Church has attested it. Unique
and alone in the external circumstances of its utterance,
in the explicitness of its language, in the manner and
place of its record, in the significance of its twofold title,
and in its correspondence to the Promise, the Decalogue
is equally alone among all the words of the Pentateuch,
or even of the Old Testament, in its use h^ the Church.
What, then, has the Church meant by her solemn
repetition of the Fourth Commandment through all
these centuries ? or rather since the Holy Spirit, during
all these centuries, has influenced and educated the
Church, — what has He intended to effect by this age-
long rehearsal of " Remember the Sabbath day ? " Has
He intended that believers should be admonished by these
words to keep the old Mosaic Sabbath, with or without
the great sabbatic system? That the Church should main-
tain a perpetual mockery, a command to do that which
has become impossible, and has ceased to be remembered,
a return to the slavery of old ordinances incompatible
with the blessedness of the Promise and of the liberty of
Christ ? It is historically certain that such is not the
effect on the minds of the great mass of believers. There
could be and there has been but one impression made on
the common mind by the majestic reiteration of this
" Remember." That is, an impression that both sanc-
tity and obligation pertain in some sense to that one day
in seven which the Church dedicates to her Lord. If this
impression has been made, however vaguely or even
dimly, on the mass of true believers under the adminis-
tration of the Spirit and in consonance with the voice of
all Scripture, it cannot be unwarranted to assert that it
must be the impression which He who superintends the
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 225
Church has intended. Before the great body of Chris-
tians there has been no contrast between the seventh day
and the first. They have no thought at all of the sev-
enth day as a sabbath, and tlierefore have never com-
pared a seventh day sabbath with the Lord's Day. To
thera, the words of the Fourth Commandment, " seventh
day," do not in the least suggest a distinction between
" the last one of seven days " and simply " one of seven
days." In a word, that commandment refers to the
Lord's Day or it refers to nothing.
It is impossible to escape this alternative. But to the
Christian who is simply content to bow to the supreme
authority of the Scriptures, there is no alternative. The
Scriptures speak of the covenant and the testimony as
enduring. With all the diversities of interpretation which
believers have applied to the Book of Revelation, there
are none^ who do not see in it a representation of the
whole or a part of the Christian dispensation. It begins
with the Lamb who unseals the Book of God. Down
into the Christian dispensation, therefore, the old cove-
nant and testimony go, according to this Scripture. It
would seem, perhaps, to be implied that through this de-
velopment the relation of the covenant to the ark, and
of the testimony to its temple, would become more and
more manifest to the inhabitants of heaven itself. The
other passages, which refer to the whole or a part of the
Decalogue, take for granted that its authority remains.
This is especially noticeable in the passages where our
Lord declares its complement or summary,^ and where
the Apostle Paul refers^ to his utterance. If the law
were not a living law, neither of these passages could
have any meaning. Therefore the Church has gone on
^ " None." With insignificant exceptions.
2 "Summary." Matt. xxii. 26-29; Mark xii. 28-31.
3 " Refers." Rom. xiii. 10.
» 15
226 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
from age to age, applying, though invohintarily or un-
consciousl}', the living word of the Fourth Command-
ment to the Lord's Day, whether she could or could not
logically express their relation.
For there are two points in the verbal form of the
commandment which have seemed out of harmony with
the Lord's Day. These are the description of the Sab-
bath as the seventh day, and the strictness of the injunc-
tion to do no work therein.
" The seventh day is the Sabbath." Seventh may
mean the last of seven, or one out of seven. If
the first day of each week is a Sabbath, it is the
seventh day with reference to the six other days, whether
preceding or following, although with reference to the
primeval unchanging week it is the first day. The Chris-
tian week, like the Mosaic and patriarchal week, is com-
posed of six days and one sacred day. With reference to
those six days the sacred day is seventh. The week is
not mentioned in the wording of the commandment.
Logically and literally the Lord's Day fills its require-
ment.
But when joined to the sabbatic system these words
did mean more. In that system the emphasis was again
and again laid upon seventh, the last one of seven. And
all of the emphasis was there. There the Israelite learned
to fix his thoughts upon the last day of the week. There
he ought to have learned, but through his truancy he did
not learn, that the first day of the week was a greater
Sabbath. Emphasis is necessarily a contrast and an epi-
sode. We ought to see clearly enough in our Christian
light, that the emphasis on seventh was in contrast to
first, and that the emphasis was on a limited, fixed, and
completed series of seventh days ; an episode succeeded
by an unlimited series of first days. The nation of Israel
itself destroyed that sabbatic system, if in no other way,
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 227
at least by refusing to return from captivity and rees-
tablish farming in their ancestral territor3^ With a frag-
ment of the nation in Palestine, Mosaic sabbathism could
not but wither and die. That system dead, the Scriptural
emphasis on the seventh day vanished. The first day ^
of the ■week, apart from that system, meets logically,
literally, perfectly the requirements of the Fourth Com-
mandment.
" In it thou shalt not do any work." What is meant
by " not any work ? " Is " not any work " the end or
the means to an end ? If " not any work " is the means
to an end, what is the end sought ?
The Mosaic illustrations of the command represent two
degrees of meaning as to "not any work." In one, a
hard, grim abstention was enforced under a dreadful
penalty by the power of the state. In the other, an in-
junction to rest from labor was given, but no penalty
was affixed. In the former class were the seventh day
of the week and the Day of Atonement. All the other
Sabbaths belonged to the second class. They were dis-
tinguished by a slightly different form of the Hebrew
word, Shabbathon instead of Shabbath. The larger Sab-
baths, the seventh year, and the Jubilee belong to the
same class, because the farm work, which was forbidden
to them, was regarded as the national occupation, the
general pi'oductive industry, answering to the sum of
diversified industry and business interlaced in the web of
our own civilization.
^ Might not any day of the seven answer for a sacred day ? The
Mohammedans take Friday. Would not Friday be as good a day
for Christians if they should agree to celebrate on that day all that
they now celebrate on Sunday ? No. For that would bring con-
fusion into the order of the weeks. Their invariable succession is a
witness to God's unchangeableness, just as their arbitrary period is
a witness to his sovereignty. Either the seventh day or the first day
serves to bound the week. Either, therefore, is adapted to be the
sacred day of the week, but no other day can have this character.
228 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LOED'S DAY.
By " not any work,'' in the lowest defrree, is therefore
clearly meant the intermission of ordinarj^ activity', occu-
pation, and business, precisely of the work of the " bread-
winner." According to the light thrown on the Fourth
Commandment by its Scriptural illustrations, nothing
less than this will meet its requirements.
Does this degree of intermission meet those require-
ments fully ? Three circumstances must be considered
in the decision of this question. ^ First : In the pa-
triarchal age there is not a trace of the strictness im-
posed on Israel. The old association of sacrifice and
its social feast with the sacred day, is in contrast with
the Mosaic interdict of a fire for household cookery. The
various acts of Noah on such days could not be reconciled
with the later rigidity. Second : The Mosaic Sabbath
was to be observed by Israel as a national organization.
The nation, as such, was charged with its maintenance.
Strictness in the enforcement of the national statutes
was like strictness in allotting a nation's taxes, — an offi-
cial duty. If the stringency of the statutes themselves
plainly served some national purpose, then it may not be
an essential constituent of tlie universal •' word " of God.
Third : Neither the Christian Church as a whole, nor any
considerable part of her membership, have attempted a
rigid conformity to the utmost limit of the Mosaic strin-
gency. If, therefore, that stringency had an evident pur-
pose of its own, — national, subordinate to, yet distinct
from, the general purpose of the Sabbath, — it cannot be
an essential element in God's eternal command, but is in
its nature, as it is in historj-, an episode in the progress of
the weeks unknown to their earlier or later sacred days.
And the purpose is perfectly manifest. It was adapted
to secure uniformity and universality. Nothing what-
ever was left to the catalogue of expediencies. The
1 See Study IV., pp. 93-99.
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 229
national law grasped everything which could in anywise
be called work. There could be no primd facie excep-
tion. If there should be any exception, its unqualified
necessity or indispensable mercy must be absolutely evi-
dent. And then every member of the community was
reached. The humblest household drudge and farm-hand
bad a full share of the Sabbath secured to them. Every
soul in Israel had to learn that the Sabbath was a uni-
versal duty and a universal privilege. As these were
divine principles established by divine authority, they
are as true in the Christian Church as they were in the
Hebrew nation. But the Church learns and teaches them
in a different way, and since the national organization
has dissolved, the national statutes have lost with it their
legal, though not their moral, force.
But, whatever may be the practical meaning of " not
any work," a deeper question arises. Was this an end in
itself, or a means to an end beyond itself ? If the Scrip-
ture gave no hint of the purpose of God, the human
mind could not be satisfied with" the presumption that
sabbatic rest was the end desired. Rest is good, but it
is a negative good. It is not good enough to be the sole
or the chief, or more than a subordinate end of such a
" word " of God as the Fourth Commandment. The law-
ful occupation open for this day of " not any work," must
be the end for which " not any work " was ordained. So
the Scripture sets it forth. " It is an holy convocation,
ye shall do no servile work therein." Seventeen times
this is repeated. Before there was any legislation con-
cerning the weekly Sabbath, before Israel had fled from
Egypt, this law was promulgated ^ in reference to the
first and seventh days of the Passover Week.^ Twice the
1 "Promulgated." Ex. xii. 16.
^ As to the weekly Sabbath, Lev. xxiii. 3 ; Deut. xvi. 8. As to the
seven annual Sabbaths, Lev. xxiii. 7, 8, 21, 24, 25, 27, 28, 35, 36 ;
Num. 3»cviii. 18, 25, 26 ; xxix. 1, 7, 12, 35.
230 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
law was stated as applying to the weekly Sabbath, and
twice as applying to each of the seven annual Sabbaths.
The conclusion is unavoidable. The convocation,^ and
that which clustered around it, was the substance of the
Sabbath. " Not any work" was only the void space to
be filled by that substance.
But for an authoritative statement of the end of Sab-
bath keeping, not in view of the local and temporary cir-
cumstances of the nation of Israel alone, but in respect to
the whole sweep of human conditions, the words of the
commandment are precise and sufficient : " to keep it
holy.2 The core and essence of the command is in its
first eisht words. All the rest is of the nature of com-
ment and emphasis. But the Mosaic legislation (the
Decalogue was immediate, not Mosaic) supplies the il-
lustrations which are the divine explanation for " keep
holy." According, then, to the authoritative commen-
tary, the Sabbath may be kept holy as to its sentiment,
as to its exercises, and as to its typical significance.
The holiness in all these respects is represented as tlie
substance of a bond between God and his people. Its
sentiment is the profession and seal of loyalty.^ Its ex-
ercises* are social address to Him and concerning Him.
Its typical significance ^ is a great unmeasured day when
human society shall be brought into a state of positive
1 See Study V.
2 " Holy." The Hebrew word is a form of Qodesh, which corre-
sponds to sacer, lfp6s, etc., meaning "in special relation to God."
That relation may be one of blessing or curse. But the underlying
idea is conformity to the divine character manifested. Hence — the
experience of divine communion, or if non-conformity is manifested
— experience of divine repulsion, and consequently of utter destruc-
tion.
8 " Loyalty." Study V., page 112.
* " Exercises." Study V., page 124.
6 " Significance." Study VI., page 152.
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 231
blessedness under his unchallenged government. The
Israelitish national forms of loyal profession, of social
functions and exercises, and of the representation of the
nature of the kingdom of God, may have vanislied as to
forms. But God's thoughts do not change. That which
kept the day holy as observance, a festival and an" insti-
tution, still keeps it holy. And as before, so now, the
suspension of the bread-winner's ordinary toil and the
release of all obligation to ordinary toil, is not the keep-
ing holy, but the necessary provision to enable the whole
body of the faithful to obey this command.
Perfect harmony necessarily reigns through all the
Word as through all the world of God. The New Testa-
ment is embosomed in the Old. And the Eternal Spirit
who superintends the development of the Church, having
himself inspired both New and Old, has led on that
Church first into practical experience of revealed truths
and then into more and more adequate expression of
their order and relation. He has led the Church inces-
santly to repeat the Fourth Commandment, and to apply
it, though perhaps without distinct logical perception of
its bearing, to the Lord's Day. When the command-
ment is studied, not with the glass of Jewish recusancy,^
but in the light of illustrations, inspired and authorita-
tive, and set beside it in the legislation which was in-
tended to develop through the nation a counterpart to
the covenant and testimony of God ; then its application
to the Lord's Day becomes as clear and intelligible as it
is apt and precise. Israel of old could not realize in the
weekly Sabbath the full meaning of the word, " keep it
^ "Recusancy." There is a sad pathos in our Lord's word (John
■vii. 19), " and yet none of you keepeth the law." They wanted to
kill Hioi for not conforming to their notion of the Sabbath (vv. 22,
23), — their garbled, clipped, distorted Sabbath. They frustrated
the commandment of God that they might keep their own tradition,
Mark vii. 9, margin, comp. Acts xv. 10.
232 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
hol3\" A great system was devised to enable the nation to
make that realization their own. Through disobedience
they failed to obtain that which was intended for them.
But the Church has received it through Christ her Lord.
She can and does keep holy her Lord's Day with a full-
ness and accuracy of conformity to the command, such
as no mere Israelite, ancient or modern, ever did or could
experience in the old Sabbath. To the believer, but not
to the Israelite, the sacred day of his week manifests, in
its every aspect, holiness,^ the common ground, the basis
of union between God and his redeemed.
As an institution the Lord's Day is a perpetual wit-
ness of the organized, equipped, and militant realm of
holiness, the kingdom of our Lord. Its existence is a
testimony to the whole world that Christ is ruling.
What though men and devils rage ! Each week it pro-
claims Him Lord before their faces, — ruling in right-
eousness absolute, — and it warns to be reconciled, lest
they perish from the way when his wrath is
kindled. Every state which recognizes this
institution acknowledges Christ. Every other institu-
tion of society which the law recognizes and in regard to
which the law defines any duties, privileges, restraints,
or regulations, is common to mankind. Heathen of all
sorts, Moslems, or whatever else they may be, men who
have made laws or proposed ethical codes have been
wont to consider such topics as rights and duties in rela-
tion to God and to whatever represented Him, in regard
to the family, in regard to property, and in regard to the
community. Laws of states, called Christian, may be
better in their forms, but they are not different in their
subjects, except wherein they refer to this one daj^
This legal recognition of the Lord's Day is not merely
an acknowledgment of Almighty God, the one God, the
1 " Holiness." Lev. xi. 45 ; 1 Pet. i. 15, IG.
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 233
Creator. The use of tlie week is sucli an acknowledg-
ment. The week is an invariable, perpetual, arbitrary
division of time, having no natural boundary and no re-
lation to natural phenomena, but established and main-
tained solely out of respect for the prerogative of God.^
But Jews and Moslems, who acknowledge the same God
and keep their time by weeks, have no part in Christ,
and therefore no Lord's Day. None but those which,
by recognizing the Lord's Day, acknowledge the para-
mount ^ authority of the Lord Jesus Christ can be prop-
erly styled Christian states.
1 The spurious character of the Mohammedan sacred day is shown
by its position in the week on the sixth day. The week is marked
or constituted by the recurrence of the sacred day that bounds it.
Both the seventh day and the first day have a logical relation to it.
But the sixth day is an illogical intrusion, a clumsy forgery, a self-
evident misconception.
2 " Paramount." This carries with it the whole Decalogue. It
does not imply that the Decalogue should be the basis of modern
statute law. That is historically descended from various sources.
But it does imply the principle that whatever is contrary to the Dec-
alogue is contrary to the public interest. Consequently no such
thing ought to be fostered by law, — heathen-worship, infidel teach-
ing, blasphemous display, and the like. How far government should
undertake to suppress these things is a different question. But if it
favor them at all while recognizing the Lord's Day, it is a state
divided against itself, poisoning its own moral consciousness. The
state's duty, in upholding the Lord's Day, is logically evident. It
has nothing to do with individual worship. It does not appear that
the Mosaic law made attendance on the convocation compulsory.
But the duty of the Christian state is threefold: —
1st. In its own provinces, in every department of its administra-
tion and legislation, it should pay official respect to the day, in or-
der that, so far as any action of the state is concerned, every citizen
may have no hindrance to the use of the day in loyalty to the Lord
Jesus Christ.
2d. So far as is reasonable, it must protect all who thus use the
day from social hindrances, such as the claims of employers, the
emergencies of commerce, the pressure of competition, and the like.
234 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
But to those who love their Lord's appearing, the in-
stitution is something more than a testimony or
"an acknowledgment. It is a promise. It typi-
fies and foreshadows the Millennial Day, the age-long
reign of holiness. It is as full of living hopes as the old
system was of routine and drill. Its approaching anti-
type will be large, exceeding past experience. The con-
trast and discord between opposing social principles will
cease, and selfishness will be eliminated, leaving all the
Lord's citizens in the unison of purity and love. The
whole organization of society will be remodeled, and
every one, in taking the place assigned him by his Lord,
will joyfully perceive that his is the lot of greatest hap-
piness and greatest usefulness. There will be no shame,
no dishonor, but perpetual exaltation, so that the hum-
Rev. 1:6- blest will be like kings and priests. There will
^^■^- be no liability to mistake, no contingency of
harm, no exposure to neglect, neither hunger nor thirst,
nor pain nor any ill, for the providence of God
will be immediate and manifest. There will
be no isolation, for the whole realm will be like a city ;
but the sympathy, the clear intelligence, the
perfect confidence of each citizen in every other
will be so pervasive, that every motion of the whole
John 17: ^^^^ ^^ ^'^^ ^ motioH of a single body, — a per-
^^' feet brotherhood, — all one. And tiiere will be
no incompleteness or inadequacy in that realm, but the
blessedness will be universal and positive and deep in
each soul as its love to the Lord of all.
In discerning these her glorious hopes and promises, —
in sustaining the legal recognition, by the state, of the
3d. In its discretion it must also repress anything which, to an ex-
tent warranting its interference, mars tlie character of the day as a
public celebration of homage to the Lord. But necessity and mercy
and also common sense are to be duly regarded.
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 235
day which typifies them, — and in proclaiming to all men
the imminence of their fulfillment, and inviting all quickly
to be reconciled to Him, who will surely come to destroy
ever}^ enemy and to suppress every vestige of unholiness,
— the Church, in a larger and deeper sense than did
Israel, does remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy, —
her own Sabbath, the institution of the Lord's Day.
In another aspect of the Lord's Day, the Church sets
forth holiness as the essential basis of union between
God and his redeemed, when she celebrates it as her
festival. Herein also she is far in advance of ancient
Israel. The punishment of the first sin took
the material torm of a curse upon the ground.
Man was sentenced to wrest from the soil the means of
preserving life, with the disheartening doom of failure,
in spite of all the soil could do for him. Israel was
taught, in the repeated lessons of his Sabbath and sab-
batic system, that God could and would support his peo-
ple without that tantalizing struggle. But in order to
learn that they had the privilege, as God's people, of sus-
pending agricultural toil without detriment, they were
compelled to suspend it. And yet their lesson stopped
short. It could only hint or typify the complete removal
of the curse. Jesus, our Lord, has brought life
. , , ° 2 Tim. 1 : 10.
and immortality to light. His Day is not only
a promise but also a foretaste of perfect restoration. It
brings to the Church not only an intermission of the
bread-winner's toil, that which belongs to the present
temporary earthly condition, but also an energizing and
quickening of the believer's spiritual activity, that which
belongs alike to her present and future condition as
united to her Lord. Hence her Sabbath, the Lord's Day,
much more ^ than Israel's, is both a festival and a holy
festival. It is richer in social enjoyment, privilege, and
1 " Mucli more." See " better," Heb. xi. 40 ; vii. 19, 22 ; viii. 6.
236 EIGHT STUDIES OE THE LORD'S DAY.
encouragement, and it affords these through simpler and
more spiritual communion with God. Because her Lord
has risen on this da}^ from the dead, the Church I'ejoices.
Because He loved her unto death and died for her, she
dares to find in the memorials of his death the pledge of
her union to Him, and so of her adoption as the very
family of God. Because, though He has ascended to
heaven, He has sent his Holy Spirit to be her comforter
and guide, she expects and she realizes on each Lord's
Day an enkindling of gratitude and courage. Like the
old, the new Sabbath is a social ^ day. It brings to-
gether parents and children, friends and neighbors. But
it opens its arms, as Israel could not, with free and
hearty invitation to them that ai'e without. Like the
old, it is a day of mental exercise, when the thoughts of
children and sires are busied upon God's dealings with
men. But it apprehends, as Israel could not, the whole
sweep of those dealings which, from the beginning to the
1 " Social." The Lord's Day belongs to the Church or Brother-
hood of Faith in its entirety, just as much as to the individual Chris-
tian. Its " rest" provides for social intercourse as well as for social
worship. Our Lord would seem to have desired that his followers
should be as perfectly in unison with one another as with Him. In
ordinary circumstances Christians, like other men, cannot express
their loyalty without sociality. But the day of loyalty to the Lord
should not be a day for promiscuous sociality. It is the day for the
communion of believers, — not of common men. It may be impos-
sible or inexpedient to lay down any rules for limiting the social
character of the day. Christian feeling ought to be the best guide.
Two things are, however, certain. To attempt, by extraneous and
incongruous accessories, to give a sort of religious flavor to that
which would be otherwise non-religious (not necessarily irreligious)
sociality, is cant, and must be offensive to the Lord. And no be-
liever may, without sin, offend the clear convictions of the brother-
hood. Beyond this, Christians must be free to their own consciences*
How the use of the Lord's Day for travel, business, or personal
pleasure (apart from necessity and mercy), can comport with loyalty
to the Lord, it is difficult to see.
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 237
consummation, are made known in God's completed reve-
lation. Like the old, it is a day of rest. From the
urgency of bread-winning, and the often more coercive
spur of ambition, it is a respite, a vacation. But it
speaks, as Israel could not, with a plain and positive
utterance, of a better rest, — a perpetual release from all
urgenc}^ and spurring, and from every wearing or wea-
rying infliction whatsoever, — an epoch of holy, blessed,
and perfectly free activity, — the rest, much more than
rest, the unbroken ease, busj^, loyal, joyous ease, that
shall pervade the Messianic kingdom of the Lord.
By her sociality, pure and beneficent, springing spon-
taneously from the feeling of common relationship to her
redeeming Lord, — by her instruction, sound, comforting,
and stimulating, having as its premise that man lives by
and through and for God, and edifying and building up
the minds of believers through meditation on the whole
Word of God, — by her leisure, detached from merely
earthly and personal affairs, busy with the activity of
holy love, and inspired to private prayer and jjublic wor-
ship, and every Christian word and work through love to
the Lord, and to them who love the Lord, and to them
for whom the Lord died: — thus the Church, in a wider
and happier sense than did Israel, does remember the
Sabbath day to keep it holy, — her own Sabbath, the holy
festival of the Lord's Day.
But while the Church, through her institution, the
Lord's Day, testifies to all, both within and without her
bounds, of the organized realm of holiness, — and while
she, through her festival, the Lord's Day, celebrates with
all her membership the social bond of holiness, — in an-
other aspect, which has been called here her observance
of the Lord's Day, the Church most profoundly keeps it
holy and makes it a Sabbath, when she professes to her
Lord himself her consecration to Him, — when she pre-
238 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
sents herself before Him in full assembly, as a company
of those who desire and expect to become perfectly holy
through communion and union with Him. In this is the
very essence and substance of the observance. Concern-
ing abstract holiness neither Israel of old nor Christen-
dom now, can realize any adequate conception ; for an
adequate conception would be the measure of the Infinite
Perfection in the terms of mortal philosophy, and we can-
not comprehend our Creator. As Israel had his types of
Christ, so the Church has to apprehend Christ himself
through the exercise of intellect, affection, and volition to-
ward Him, and his immediate exercise of spiritual influ-
ence on believing minds and hearts. Perceiving in Him
both the perfect type and consummate flower of human-
ity, the complete ideal of all that the imagination can
admire and honor and love in manhood, and also the rev-
erend majesty of Eternal Deity, the Church looks upon
Him as the centre of her thought, the centre of her hope,
the ultimate reason and cause of her being in existence
and of her being what she is, the guaranty of her future,
the satisfaction of all her desire, — her absolute, perfect,
transcendent Lord, and her very own Lord, — her own
by a tie inseparable as his own person. Whatever holi-
ness may be, it is his nature, and the Church shall share
it with Him. It is not abstract. It is not philosophical.
It is personal.
As therefore the Mosaic Sabbath ^ was the seal and the
sacrament of Israel's loyalty to Jehovah, so precisely is
1 Let not the reader forget that the commandment does not
specify the seventh day of the week but only the seventh day. The
ordinances which made the seventh day of the -week so emiihatic
were Mosaic, and so of divine authority, but they were not, like the
Fourth Commandment, immediately from God. And while they em-
phasized the seventh day of the week they also showed that empha-
sis as transient and set forth a Sabbath day which should be the first
day of the week in the future.
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 239
the observance of the Lord's Day the seal and sacrament
of the Church's loyalty to her Lord Jesus Christ. After
living six days in the performance of duties, and in the
enjoyment of blessings as private citizens of the Lord's
kintrdom, and too conscious of the strength of surround-
ing forces and influences hostile to that kingdom, believ-
ers come on the seventh day, the first day of each new
week, the Lord's Day, to a public duty to their King, and
to an experience not merely of private religion, but of
the public beauty and harmony and security and capacity
of their King's realm, the empire of Christianity. They
come on the day that bounds a week, because the week
is a divine institution, whose terminal day has been kept
from the beginning by men who worshiped God, — and
their Lord is God. They come on the first — not the
last 1 — day of the week, because, as Moses prophesied,
this has become the sacred day of the new dispensa-
tion, for which Moses' institutions showed themselves
preparative ; and because their Lord has made it his day,
not only by the fact of his resurrection but also by his
absence for the ensuing six days and by making his sec
ond visit on the first day of the next week. They come
to perform a public duty to their Lord, — a duty which
never fell upon patriarch or Israelite, — a duty which is
peculiarly Christian, as distinguished from all other ^
^ To repudiate the Lord's Day is practically to refuse public hom-
age to our Lord's divinity. The whole Christian age is not one long
Sabbath, any more than it is one long heaven — or one prolonged
epoch of millennial felicity. It is true that the sunlight of the resur-
rection has ever since circled round and round the planet continuing
one world-day. But the sunlight did not see the rising. Before the
sun appeared, He rose. The Lord's Day is like other days. It be-
gins in the night and ends the following night. Before man there
may have been age-long world days. But for man the day is the
alternation of darkness and light.
2 "All other." It is historically true that no other religious
preachinw has ever rested on the principles laid down by our Lord.
240 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
moral or religious duties, acknowledged among all other
ages, races, or faiths, — a duty not only laid upon his fol-
lowers most solemnly by the Lord, but put as a perpetual
fire within their hearts and tongues, on that day when
the voice of God speaking to men from lonely Sinai was
supplemented by the voice of God speaking through men
in crowded city streets, — when the covenant and the
testimony formerly hidden beneath the mercy-seat in the
typical ark began to be published to the world as living
and effective for reunion to God, through the veritable
and actual person of Christ. The tongue of the Chui'ch
is this day given to her Lord. She tells his story, she
declares his purposes, she confesses her faith on Him, she
expresses her loyalty.
And believers come this day not only to a public duty
but also to an imperial experience. Theirs is no local
fellowship, no loose association, no limited community.
It girdles the round globe. It enfolds . every beating
heart wherein the Holy Ghost has created new life. It
swells and towers and broadens far beyond all the mate-
rial progress of the age. Nothing is so comprehensive,
nothing so strong, nothing so permanent. All the good
and profit of humanity, all the interests of person and
property, of the family and society, of art and educa-
tion, of mechanical progress, of material and of moral
improvement, are absolutely safe, are absolutely secure,
under the sway of Christianity, — and nowhere else.
The Lord is good to all. His tender mercies are over all
bis works. His empire is pure and positive blessing.
Many others have zealously attempted prosel}- tism. So far Chris-
tianity stands with them, for the Church aims to disciple all nations.
But the Church alone, and no other propaganda known to history,
has had the burden of testimony. Whether men hear or forbear, it is
her duty to bear witness to them of the truth. Her great commission
is to preach to every one — to win all if possible, but whether win-
ning them to the covenant or not to give her testimony of Christ.
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 241
And it is already an empire — vast, diverse, composite.
Each believer has an imperial duty. The empire is not
to be managed by him nor by all his brethren without
the Lord — neither is it managed by the Lord without
them and him. For all that the Church is, for all she
may do and for all she may become, each member has
his own responsibility and his own free spontaneity.
Whatever he does counts as his heart moves him. So on
this day he lays his heart against the million-fold heart
of the Church to feel her vast, deep, triumphant life. He
rises on the wave of psalms that have surged westward
from the Pacific shores with this day's tide of sunlight,
and still roll onward to complete their circuit. He sees
with the mental eye, as the framing and the background
of all the instruction, comfort, and encouragement which
precept and promise and prophecy afford, a view of the
thronged city of God, of the splendid capital and man-
sions of the redeemed, of the magnificent harmony and
busy ease and consummate civilization of the Lord's
kingdom. He breathes, while lifted up, the fragrance of
many voiced prayer that on this day enwraps the earth,
as a film of the resonant air of heaven ; and in this brac-
ing atmosphere his veins tingle with consciousness of
unlimited desire and capacity and destiny, his own, and
the Church's own, when the Lord shall come.
And so — on the day that marks God's authority over
human times, — on the day our Lord has honored as his
official day before his Church, — on the day which the
Holy Ghost has sealed as the epoch of the new covenant
(the New Testament), — on this day believers come to-
gether as a public body to give their public testimony of
loyalty ; they come together as an official body clothed
each one with responsibility and with authority to share
in administering the Lord's earthly empire ; and they
come together, that they may together commune with
1 IG
/
242 EIGHT STUDIES OF THE LORD'S DAY.
the Lord. While enthused before the mystery of his
person, wherein the brotherhood of man blends with di-
vine sonship, — while absorbed in the w^onder of his love,
which, stronger than death, by the intensity of its sacrifice,
transmutes ^ the universal curse into a universal privilege,
— while transfigured with the beauty of his nature re-
flected somewhat within each one, and diffused over the
spiritual aspect of the world-circling commemoration, —
a tender awe falls upon the assembly : the Lord is there.
Then, like the earlier patriarchs, and like Israel at Pen-
tecost, the feast of Weeks, the Church partakes together of
the sacrificial meal.^ Each one realizes that it is the Lord
^ " Transmutes." He that findeth liis life shall lose it ; and he
that losetli his life for my sake shall find it. Matt. x. 39; xvii. 35;
Mark viii. 35; Luke ix. 24; xvii. 33; John xii. 25, a remarkable repe-
tition.
2 Public worship and the Lord's Supper have always differed in
respect to the persons particiiiating. To the former all have been
welcomed who would receive instruction, or would in any degree ac-
knowledge the Lord. To the latter none have been admitted who
were not fully acknowledged by the Church as members. Conse-
quently the Eucharist is in this respect the Church's ^jru-fl^e worship.
Its administration, therefore, has of course been arranged according
to the varying conditions of expediency as determined by the Church;
not restricted to Sundays alone, nor appointed necessarily for every
Sunday, and yet ordinarily occurring on Sunday as its most fit time.
In this it cannot be denied that the Holy Spirit has guided the
Church. She is to show forth the Lord's death not by a public cele-
bration of the supper (for, as a matter of history, the Holy Spirit has
not led her to a celebration that may properly be called public), but
by a Kara-yyeAfa, 1 Cor. xi. 26, as distinguished perhaps from a irapay-
yeKla (for example, Acts v. 28), that is, a declaration which has its
force on the spot where it is made (koto), and does not depend for
that effect upon its passing over (irapd) to some separate party. She
shows it forth to herself, to her own members, and to her own Lord.
Public worship is not limited to the Lord's Day, but it is historically,
and by its essential character, a necessary feature of the day. The
Lord's Supper is a duty of the Church to herself and to her Lord.
Public worship is a duty to the Lord, to herself, and to the whole
THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 243
■who died for him a sinner; who redeemed, reconciled,
saved him by giving his own body to be bruised for him,
his own blood to be sprinkled on the soil for him. Each
one perceives that the whole aggregate of like-minded
souls, who commune thus with their Lord, are inseparably
joined together by this communion in one body, and this
body is the Lord's own body, living, growing, the organ
of his spirit, the eternal and tiie holy temple of his own
divine humanity. And each one apprehends that the
Lord of all is the man Jesus, Him whose quivering body
was torn, whose warm blood was shed, who rested in
Joseph's tomb, and awoke in immortal humanity, and
rose above man's observation or comprehension, before
the apostles' eyes, and dwells now in occupation that we
can only most dimly conceive as we lift our uneducated
eyes with loving awe and dependent reverence toward his
Majesty, — Jesus, the very man, our brother, — Jesus en-
throned at the right hand of God, himself incomprehen-
sibly transfigured with the outshining of his -^^^ ^3 . g
own divinity, — but himself, — the Lamb slain Eph. i: 22,
through the ages, himself, — the Head over his coi. 1 : is.
own body, the Church, — himself, the same Acts i: 11.
Jesus who ascended from Olivet, who will come 1 cor. 15 :
24, 25.
again in his own day, (who knows how soon ?)
to put down all enmity, to establish all au- j,^^^ .
thority, to reign in righteousness over his neve's ^lo^^'
Church, and with his Church over the universe ! 20 : 4,6.
Even so. Lord Jesus, come quickly. We wait thy day.
world. The distinction in the Greek words above referred to is
not always accurately observed.
INDEX OF SCRIPTURES REFERRED TO.
[The figures on the left of the column refer to the chapter and Terse of the book cited ;
those on the right to the Study and the page of this work.]
GENESIS.
I vii. 200
2. 3 iii. 56
2. 3 Yiii. 209
3. 17 viii. 2o5
4. 3-5 iv. 95, 97
4. 14 vii. 167
4. 15 vii. 171
4. 24 vii. 171
4. 26 iv.94
7. 1,16 iv. 77
7. 1 iv. 79
7.4 iv. 79, 98
7. 10 iv. 79, 83
7. 11 iv. 79, 98
7. 13 iv. 80
7. 16 iv. 80
7.20 iv. 82
7. 24 iv. 81
8.3 iv. 81
8. 4 iv. 80
8. 5-7 iv. 80
8.8-12 iv. 80
8. 21 iv.95
12. 2 iv. 85
12. 3 V. 107
14. 14 V. 105
14. 18 iv. 96
18. 18 V. 107
20. 14 V. 105
21. 28-31 vii. 172
22. 18 V. 107
26. 4 V. 107
26. 12 iv. 99
26. 14, 19 V. 105
26. 26-23 vii. 172
28. 14 V. 107
29.27, 28 vii. 182
30. 43 V. 105
38. 12 V. 105
41. 18-30 vii. 171
EXODUS.
5. 1, 3 vii. 170
5. 1-3 viii. 210
8. 26.
8. 27.
2. 2..
2.16.
2. 16.
2. 16.
2. 18.
2. 20.
. Vll.
.viii.
170
240
. .Vll.
.viii.
23'
26, 27 V.
25,27 vii.
27 vii.
38 V.
23 vii.
22-30 iv
22-30 vii.
5 viii.
10-25 viii.
1 viii.
10 viii.
18,19 viii.
24, 25 iv
5,6
10.
11...
11...
15...
16...
1-18.
130,
.vi. 130,
vii.
16-21 viii. 219,
40 vii.
42, 43 V.
7 viii.
12-17 V.
12-17 vii.
14 V.
15 vii.
18 viii. 219,
15 viii.
viii.
viii.
viii.
16...
19...
1-28.
20.,
22...
27,28 viii.
29 viii.
2 vii.
2 vii
117
203
229
199
116
124
178
178
105
180
. 79
160
220
218
218
226
218
.97
142
140
146
189
116
177
118
146
220
200
117
220
112
186
111
180
220
220
219
222
219
116
178
220
220
160
180
246 INDEX OF SCRIPTUnES REFERRED TO.
35.3 V. 114
35. 3 vii. 100
35. 3 vii. 203
38 V. 117
38. 21 viii. 220
LEVITICUS.
8. 3, 4 V. 117
II. 45 viii. 232
16. 31 vii. 181
19. 18 viii. 221
23. 1-3 v. IIG
23. 3 vii. 180
23. 3 viii. 229
23.3 V. 117
2^. 6 vii. 173
23.7 v. 117
23. 7 viii. 229
23. 7,8 vii. 170
23. 8 V. 117
23. 8 viii. 229
23. 11 vii. 180
23. l.'j vii. 181
23. 17 vii. 179
23. 17, 20 vii. 178
23. 19, 20 vii. 179
23. 21 V. 117
23. 21 viii. 227
23. 24, 27 V. 116
23. 24 vii. 180
23. 24 V. 117
23. 24, 25 viii. 229
23. 25 V. 117
23. 27 V. 117
23.27-32 V. 117
23. 27, 28 viii. 229
23. 27-32 vii. 181
23. 32 vii. 180
23. 32 vii. 181
23. 34-36 V. 116
23. 35 V. 117
22- 35 viii. 229
23. 35 vii. 176
23. 36 V. 117
23. .36 vii. 176
23. .36 viii. 229
23. 39 vii. 174
23. 39 vii. 180
23. 43 vii. 178
25. 2-7 vi. 130, 146
25. 4 vii. 181
25. 9 iv. 85
25. 11 vii. 181
25. 15 vii. 181
25. 6 viii. 209
25. 20-22 vii. 189
26. 34 vi. 150
26. 35 vi. 150
NUMBERS.
I. 50, .53 viii. 2-30
3. 12, 39-51 V. 120
6. 24-26 V. 121
10. 3 V. 117
iq. 10 iv. 85
10. 33 viii. 220
15. 32-30 v. Ill; vii. 160
16. 9, 10 v. 120
18. 1-7 V. 120
18. 24 V. 121
20. 7-12 iv. 98
21. 19 V. 117
25.6 V.117
28. 9, 10 V. 110
28. 11-15 V. 110
28. 16,17 vii. 178
28. 18 V. 117
28. 18 vii. 176
28. 18 viii. 229
28. 25 vii. 176
28. 25, 26 V. 117
28. 26 vii. 178
28. 25 viii. 229
28. 26 viii. 229
29. 1 viii. 229
29. 1-6 V. 110
29. 1, 7, 12, 35 V. 117
29. 7 viii. 229
29. 12 vii. 176
29. 12 viii. 229
29. 35 vii. 176
29. .35 viii. 229
36. 6,12 vi. 139
DEUTERONOMY.
4. 2 v. 119
4. 11, 12, 15 viii. 218
4. 13 viii. 220
5. 14 V. 115
5. 4, 5,22-26 ; viii. 218
6. 5 viii. 221
6. 6-9 V. 123
6. 7 V. 124
6.20-25 V. 124
9. 9, 11 viii. 220
10. 8 v. 121
10. 1-4 viii. 219
10. 5 viii. 219
10. 8 viii. 220
II. 24 vi. 155
12. 5-27 V. 109
12. 11-14 vii. 159
12. 12-18 V. 121
15. 1-18 vi. 130
16. 1 vii. 178
16.3 vii. 178
INDEX OF SCRIPTURES REFERRED TO. 247
i6. n, U vii. 178
i6. 8 viii. 229
i6. 10 vii. 178
i6. 10, 11 V. 117
i6. IB V. 116
21. 1-5 V. 121
27. 5 iv. 97
27. 9, 14 V. 120
27. 14 V. 119
27. 1.5-26 V. 123
27. 26 vii. 200
31. 7,2.5, 26 viii. 220
31.9-13 vii. 188
31. 10, 13 v. 123
31. 10-13 vi. 130
31. 26, 27 viii. 220
32. 7 V. 124
33-10 V.120
JOSHUA.
4. 6, 7 V. 124
14. 7, 10 vii. 187
22. 14 vi. 139
24. 29 vii. 187
JUDGES.
I. 7 v..ii. 172
8. 30,39 vii. 172
FIRST SAMUEL.
4. 11 viii. 222
9.23 vi. 134
9. 12-14 vi. 134
9. 19, 25 vi. 1.34
9. 22 vi. 134
FIRST KINGS.
5. 15 vii. 172
II. 3 vii. 172
18. 29, 36 v. 117
SECOND KINGS.
10. 1 vii. 172
11. 1 vii. 172
12. 1 vii. 172
SECOND CHRONICLES
29. 32 vii. 172
36. 18 viii. 222
36. 21 V. 104
36. 21 vi. 150
ESTHER.
2. 16 vii. 172
PSALMS.
34.11 V. 124
40-. 8 vii. 185
44. 1 v. 124
78.3 V. 12-t
81. 3 iv. 85
104. 4 viii. 218
106. 48 V. 123
141. 2 V. 117
PROVERBS.
I. 8 V. 124
4. 1 V. 124
5. 1-7 V. 124
7. 14 vi. 1.34
S. 32 V. 124
17. 1 vi. 134
ISAIAH.
I. 14 V. 115
32. 1 viii. 243
40. 8 viii. 207
58. 13 V. 103
61. 2 iv. 88
JEREMIAH.
31.33 vii. 185
31. 31-34 vii. 204
34. 13, 14 V. 104
34. 13, 14 vi. 150
EZEKIEL.
II. 16,20 vii. 185
20. 1 vii. 172
20. 12 V. 112
22. 8, 16, 24, 26 V. 115
23. .38 V. 115
36.26, 27 vii. 185
HOSEA.
II. 1 vii. 194
248 INDEX OF SCRIPTURES REFERRED TO.
ZECIIARIAH.
14- 19 vii. 176
MA LAC III.
4-6 - V. 124
IMATTHEW.
2. 15 vii. 194
5-17 iii. 57
10. 39 viii. 242
12. 11 V. 115
12. 14 vii. -202
17- 3.5 viii. ^42
19- 21 vi. 151
22. 20-29 viii. 221, 225
26. 26 vii. 159
27- 16 ii. 47
28. 1 ii. 30
28.10 ii. 48
28. 17 ii. 44
28. 19 v. 120
MARK.
2. 27 vii. 157
3-6 vii. 202
7- 9 viii. 231
8. 35 viii. 242
9- 9 ii. 42
10. 17-22 vi. 145
10. 27 viii. 221
12. 28-31 viii. 221. 225
14-22 . .vii. 159
16. 14 ii. 43
16. 2, 9 ii. 30
LUKE.
9-24 .-.viii. 242
10. 28 viii. 221
14-5 V. 115
17- 33 vii. 242
22. 19 vii. 159
24. 1 ii. 30
24-13-35 ii. 41
24. 21 ;..ii. 41
24. 19 ii. 41
24. 38 ii. 43
24. 41 ii. 43
JOHN.
1. 21 vi. 155
4-23, 24 viii. 216
7- 1" viii. 231
7- 22, 23 viii 231
12. 25 viii. 242
17- 11 viii. 234
19- 31 vii. 176
19- 39 ii. 50
20. 1, 19 ii. 30
20. 19, 26 ii. 40
20. 20 ii. 43
20. 28 ii. 47
21.1-14 ii. 47,48
ACTS.
I. 11 viii. 243
I. 35 ii. 50
1. 1-t ii. 50
2. 1 ii. 50
4- 28 viii. -207
5- 28 viii. 242
7-44 viii. -201
7- 53 viii. 218
11.26 ii. .36
15- 10 viii. 231
16. 11, 12 ii. 53
20. 0 ii. 53
20. 7 vii. 193
20. Ifi ii. 54
26. 28 ii. 36
ROMANS.
1-4 ii..37
3- 21, 22 iii. 57
5- 9 viii. 222
5- 18 viii. 2-22
5. 19 viii. 222
8. 17 vii. 1.58
8. 17 viii. 243
II. 17, 24 iii. 57
II. 24 vii. 159
22. 10 viii. 225
FIRST CORINTHIANS.
3- 9 viii. 216
10. 7 V. 110, 115
11. 20 viii. 242
15. 5-7 ii. 38, 47
IS- 24, 25 viii. 243
15- 25 vi. 126
16. 17 ii. 52, 53
16.1, 2 ii. 52
SECOND CORINTHIANS.
6. 1 viii. 216
9-C ii. 53
GALATIANS.
3- T-9 iii. 57
3- 10 vii. 200
3- 1« vi. 156
3. 19 V.108
INDEX OF SCRIPTURES REFERRED TO. 249
3. 19 viii. 218, 221
3. 21 V. 108
3. 24 vi. 120
3. 24 viii. 222
4. 1 viii. 21G
EPHESIANS.
1. 22, 23 viii. 243
2. 20 iii. 57
COLOSSIANS.
I. 12 vii.158
1. 18 viii. 243
2. 17 viii. 221
3-H i-1
SECOND TIMOTHY.
1. 10 viii. 235
2.12 viii. 243
4. 8 viii. 234
HEBREWS.
1.7 viii. 218
2. 2 viii. 218
2. 8 vi. 12G
5. 9 viii. 222
7.19, 22 viii. 235
8. 5 vii. 200
8. 6 viii. 235
8.8-12 vii. 204
8.5 viii. 221
9. 1-14 viii. 221
9.4 viii. 220,221
10. 1 vii. 201
10. 14 viii. 222
II. 4 iv. 95, 9G
11. 40 viii. 235
12. 18-21 viii. 218
FIRST PETER.
I. 10-12 iv.l27
1. 15, 16 viii. 232
1.25 viii. 207
2. 17 vi. 141
2. 22 viii. 222
3. 20 iv.lOl
4.6 ii. 3G
SECOND PETER.
2. 5.. iv. 100, 101
JUDE.
14.15 iv. 100, 101
REVELATION.
I. 6 viii. 2.34
1. 10 ii. .34
I. 10 vii. 193
4. 8 vii. 204
5. 10 viii. 243
7. 15 vii. 204
II. 19 viii. 221, 223
13. 8 viii. 243
15. 5 viii. 220, 221, 223
19. 9 viii. 223
19. 11 vi. 126
20. 4 viii. 243
20. 6 viii. 234, 243
20. 15 vi. 126
21. 4 viii. 234
21 viii. 234
22. 18,19 V. 119
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