History of the Sabbath and first day of the week

by John Nevins Andrews

“Till the great Council of Nice [A. D. 325] backed by the authority of as great an emperor [Constantine] settled it better than before; none but some scattered schismatics, now and then appearing, that durst oppose the resolution of that famous synod.”[574]

Constantine, by whose powerful influence the Council of Nice was induced to decide this question in favor of the Roman bishop, that is, to fix the passover upon Sunday, urged the following strong reason for the measure:—

“Let us then have nothing in common with the most hostile rabble of the Jews.”[575]

This sentence is worthy of notice. A determination to have nothing in common with the Jews had very much to do with the suppression of the Sabbath in the Christian church. Those who rejected the Sabbath of the Lord and chose in its stead the more popular and more convenient Sunday festival of the heathen, were so infatuated with the idea of having nothing in common with the Jews, that they never even questioned the propriety of a festival in common with the heathen.

This festival was not weekly, but annual; but the removal of it from the fourteenth of the first month to the Sunday following Good Friday was the first legislation attempted in honor of Sunday as a Christian festival; and as Heylyn quaintly expresses it, “The Lord’s day found it no small matter to obtain the victory.”[576] In a brief period after the Council of Nice, by the laws of Theodosius, capital punishment was inflicted upon those who should celebrate the feast of the passover upon any other day than Sunday.[577] The Britons of Wales were long able to maintain their ground against this favorite project of the Roman church, and as late as the sixth century “obstinately resisted the imperious mandates of the Roman pontiffs.”[578]

Four years after the commencement of the struggle just narrated, bring us to the testimony of Tertullian, the oldest of the Latin fathers, who wrote about A. D. 200. Dr. Clarke tells us that the fathers “blow hot and cold.” Tertullian is a fair example of this. He places the origin of the Sabbath at the creation, but elsewhere says that the patriarchs did not keep it. He says that Joshua broke the Sabbath at Jericho, and afterward shows that he did not break it. He says that Christ broke the Sabbath, and in another place proves that he did not. He represents the eighth day as more honorable than the seventh, and elsewhere states the reverse. He states that the law is abolished, and in other places teaches its perpetuity and authority. He declares that the Sabbath was abrogated by Christ, and afterward asserts that “Christ did not at all rescind the Sabbath,” but imparted “an additional sanctity” to “the Sabbath day itself, which from the beginning had been consecrated by the benediction of the Father.” And he goes on to say that Christ “furnished to this day divine safeguards—a course which his adversary would have pursued for some other days, to avoid honoring the Creator’s Sabbath.”

This last statement is very remarkable. The Saviour furnished additional safeguards to the Creator’s Sabbath. But “his adversary” would have done this to some other days. Now it is plain, first, that Tertullian did not believe that Christ sanctified some other day to take the place of the Sabbath; and second, that he believed the consecration of another day to be the work of the adversary of God! When he wrote these words he certainly did not believe in the sanctification of Sunday by Christ. But Tertullian and his brethren found themselves observing as a festival that day on which the sun was worshiped, and they were, in consequence, taunted with being worshipers of the sun. Tertullian denies the charge, though he acknowledges that there was some appearance of truth to it. He says:—

“Others, again, certainly with more information and greater verisimilitude, believe that the sun is our God. We shall be counted Persians, perhaps, though we do not worship the orb of day painted on a piece of linen cloth, having himself everywhere in his own disk. The idea, no doubt, has originated from our being known to turn to the east in prayer. But you, many of you, also, under pretense sometimes of worshiping the heavenly bodies, move your lips in the direction of the sunrise. In the same way, if we devote Sunday to rejoicing, from a far different reason than sun-worship, we have some resemblance to those of you who devote the day of Saturn to ease and luxury, though they, too, go far away from Jewish ways, of which they are ignorant.”[579]

Tertullian pleads no divine command nor apostolic example for this practice. In fact, he offers no reason for the practice, though he intimates that he had one to offer. But he finds it necessary in another work to repel this same charge of sun-worship, because of Sunday observance. In this second answer to this charge he states the ground of defense more distinctly, and here we shall find his best reason. These are his words:—

“Others, with greater regard to good manners, it must be confessed, suppose that the sun is the god of the Christians, because it is a well-known fact that we pray toward the east, or because we make Sunday a day of festivity. What then? Do you do less than this? Do not many among you, with an affectation of sometimes worshiping the heavenly bodies likewise, move your lips in the direction of the sunrise? It is you, at all events, who have even admitted the sun into the calendar of the week; and you have selected its day [Sunday], in preference to the preceding day, as the most suitable in the week for either an entire abstinence from the bath, or for its postponement until the evening, or for taking rest, and for banqueting. By resorting to these customs, you deliberately deviate from your own religious rites to those of strangers.”[580]