The testimony of Novatian which has been given relative to the sacredness and authority of the decalogue plainly implies the existence of the Sabbath in the patriarchal ages, and its observance by those holy men of old. It was given to Israel that they might “return to those virtuous manners which, although they had received them from their fathers, they had corrupted in Egypt.” And he adds, “Those ten commandments on the tables teach nothing new, but remind them of what had been obliterated.”[679] He did not, therefore, believe the Sabbath to have originated at the fall of the manna, but counted it one of those things which were practiced by their fathers before Jacob went down to Egypt.
Lactantius places the origin of the Sabbath at creation:—
“God completed the world and this admirable work of nature in the space of six days (as is contained in the secrets of holy Scripture) and consecrated the seventh day on which he had rested from his works. But this is the Sabbath day, which, in the language of the Hebrews, received its name from the number, whence the seventh is the legitimate and complete number.”[680]
In a poem on Genesis written about the time of Lactantius, but by an unknown author, we have an explicit testimony to the divine appointment of the seventh day to a holy use while man was yet in Eden, the garden of God:—
“The seventh came, when God
At his work’s end did rest, decreeing it
Sacred unto the coming age’s joys.”[681]
The Apostolical Constitutions, while teaching the present obligation of the Sabbath, plainly indicate its origin to have been at creation:—
“O Lord Almighty, thou hast created the world by Christ, and hast appointed the Sabbath in memory thereof, because that on that day thou hast made us rest from our works, for the meditation upon thy laws.”[682]