A church dictionary

by Walter Farquhar Hook

RUTH, THE BOOK OF. A canonical book of the Old Testament.

This book is a kind of appendix to the Book of Judges, and an introduction to the Books of Samuel, and is therefore properly placed between them. It has its title from the person whose story is here principally related. The Jews make but one book of this and the Book of Judges, and probably the same person was the author of both. It was certainly written at a time when the government by judges had ceased, since the author of it begins with observing, that the fact came to pass in the days when the judges ruled: and he ends his book with a genealogy, which he carries down to David. Probably it was composed in that king’s time, before he was advanced to the throne.

The history recorded in this book, is that of Ruth, a Moabitish woman, who, coming to Bethlehem, and being married to Boaz her kinsman, bare to him Obed, who was the grandfather of David. In this story are observable the ancient rights of kindred and redemption, and the manner of buying the inheritance of the deceased; with other particulars of great note and antiquity.

It is difficult to determine under what judge the history of Ruth happened. Some place it in the government of Ehud or Shamgar; and others about the beginning of the time when Eli judged Israel.

SABAOTH. A Hebrew word, signifying hosts or armies. Jehovah Sabaoth is the Lord of Hosts. “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth.”

SABBATARIANS, are so called from their keeping the seventh day of the week as the sabbath; whilst Christians in general keep the first day of the week, or Sunday, in memory of our Saviour’s having risen that day from the dead. On the continent they are generally, but improperly, called Israelites. It is uncertain when they first made their appearance; but we learn from Fuller that there were Sabbatarians in 1633.

They object to the reasons which are generally alleged for keeping the first day; and they insist that the change of the sabbath from the seventh to the first day of the week, did not take place till the beginning of the fourth century, when it was effected by the emperor Constantine, on his conversion to Christianity. A summary of their principles, as to this article of the sabbath, by which they stand distinguished, is contained in the three following propositions:—1. That God has required the observance of the seventh, or last, day of every week, to be observed by mankind universally for the weekly sabbath. 2. That this command of God is perpetually binding on man till time shall be no more. And 3. That this sacred rest of the seventh day sabbath, is not changed by Divine authority, from the seventh and last to the first day of the week; or, that the Scripture nowhere requires the observance of any other day of the week for the weekly sabbath, but the seventh day only, which is still kept by the Jews, to whom the law on this subject was given. These are much more consistent in their rejection of all the subsidiary helps of antiquity in interpreting the Scriptures, than those Protestants who observe the first day of the week with Judaical strictness.

SABBATH, REST. Sabbath day, the day of rest. The sabbath day, strictly speaking, is Saturday, the observance of which is not considered obligatory by Christians. But the term is sometimes applied to the Lord’s day, which is regarded as a feast by the Church universal. (See Lord’s Day.)

SABELLIANS, were so called from Sabellius, a presbyter, or, according to others, a bishop of Libya, who was the founder of the sect.

Sabellius flourished early in the third century, and his doctrine seems to have had many followers for a short time. Its growth, however, was soon checked by the opposition made to it by Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria, and the sentence of condemnation pronounced upon its author by Pope Dionysius, in a council held at Rome, A. D. 263.