IN DEFENSE OF THE FAITH
The
Truth About Seventh-day Adventists
A
REPLY TO CANRIGHT
by
William
H. Branson
5. WHEN AND TO WHOM WAS THE
SABBATH GIVEN?
MR. CANRIGHT the
Baptist bitterly attacks the seventh-day Sabbath, which is kept by
Seventh-day
Adventists. He says:
The Sabbath is not
mentioned by name in the book of Genesis, nor till the time of Moses.
Seventh-day
Adventism Renounced, p.
249.
The Sabbath was
given to the Jews. Ibid., p. 258.
'Thou came down
also upon Mt. Sinai.... and made known unto them Thy holy Sabbath.' Neh.
9:13, 14.
This implies that it
was not known before. Ibid., p. 255.
Now, these bold
statements were made by Mr. Canright after he had repudiated the Ten
Commandments and had
become an advocate of that no-law doctrine which has brought upon the
religious
world an era of
lawlessness and revolt against God.
While Mr. Canright was
still in the Adventist faith, and, like David of old, still delighted
in the
law of the Lord. He
wrote profusely on the subject of the Sabbath as well as on the law, and
it may be of
interest to the reader
to compare his arguments of that time on the Sabbath question with those
set forth in
his book in which he
attempts to refute his former teachings. Fortunately these former
writings of his are
available for
reference. We will therefore draw largely from these earlier
publications by Mr. Canright, in
replying to his later
refutation of them, thus permitting the reader to observe how completely
his former
arguments devour his
subsequent denials of them.
In a pamphlet entitled
The Morality of the Sabbath, written by him in 1875, fourteen years
before
he renounced
Seventh-day Adventism, Mr. Canright said:
The principle of
every moral precept existed before the fall, and would have existed if
man had never
fallen. This is true of
the Sabbath. But all ceremonial precepts were introduced after the fall,
to shadow
forth redemption.
Here again we find that
true of the Sabbath which is true of all moral commandments, viz., that
it was a
primary institution
existing before the fall of man. But this is not true of any ceremonial
statute. Idolatry,
image worship,
profanity, lying, stealing, etc., would all have been as morally wrong
if committed before
the fall as after.
Hence, moral duties may be defined as those resting upon primary
principles, or those
which did exist before
man fell, or before any remedial system was instituted.
Ceremonial
precepts are
those which came in
consequence of the fall, and which would never have existed but for sin.
They grew
out of the creature's
action as a sinner, and shadowed forth his coming redemption. This is a
plainly marked
and undeniable
distinction between moral and ceremonial precepts. Now we only have to
ask to which of
these two classes the
Sabbath belongs, in order to determine whether it is a moral or a
ceremonial precept.
Only one answer can
be given to this. Every fact and principle upon which the Sabbath ever
was
based did exist before
Adam sinned. Creation's work was ended, and the Lord's rest upon the
seventh day
was in the past. God
had placed His blessing upon the seventh day and had set it apart to a
sacred use. Thus
the record reads: 'Thus
the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And
on the
seventh day God ended
His work which He had made; and He rested on the seventh day from all
His work
which He had made. And
God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it; because that in it He
had rested
from all His work which
God created and made.' Gen. 2:13.
This is a plain,
chronological narration of what occurred in Eden. God worked six days,
rested the seventh
day, blessed it, and
then sanctified it. 'Sanctify' is thus defined by Webster: 'To separate,
set apart, or
appoint, to a holy or
religious use.' Then the Lord did set apart to a holy use the seventh
day in Eden. Every
reference afterward to
the origin of the Sabbath points back to Eden. (See Ex. 16:23; 20:8-11;
31:17; Mark
2:27.) The Sabbath is a
memorial of creation.... and hence became necessary as soon as creation
week was
ended. But for what
were types, and shadows, and ceremonies? To point to redemption through
Christ who
was to come. Col. 2:17;
Heb. 10:1. But these were not given until man needed redemption; and he
did not
need redemption till
after he had sinned. But the Sabbath was given before man sinned, and
hence was not
a typical or ceremonial
institution. So we find that the Sabbath is a primary institution, all
the reasons for
which, like those for
every moral precept, existed before the fall. Pages 9-11.
The Sabbath precept,
like all moral precepts, applies equally well to all nations, in all
countries, and at all
times.
All moral laws are
of universal application. They are not restricted to one nation or to
one country, nor do
they change with
circumstances; but, on the other hand, merely ceremonial precepts are,
from their very
nature, restricted in
their application to certain persons, times, and places. Here, again, we
find evidence of
the morality of the
Sabbath. As we have shown already, God instituted the Sabbath at
creation in Eden
before the fall. From
this fact several important conclusions necessarily follow:
1. It is not a type.
Types were given after the fall to shadow forth redemption; but the
Sabbath points back
to creation, not
forward to redemption. (See Ex. 20:11.)
2. The fact that the
Sabbath was given in the Edenic state indicates that it was designed to
be a perpetual
institution. Hence we
read that when the curse shall be removed from this old earth, and the
new earth state
shall he brought in,
then the Sabbath will still be observed, and that forever. Isa. 66:22,
23.
3. It is not a
Jewish Sabbath. The simple fact that it was given at creation,
twenty-three hundred years
before such a
distinction existed proves this.
"4. A Jew is a
descendant of Judah, one of the twelve tribes. But Judah himself was not
born till nearly
twenty three hundred
years after creation. Hence it is absurd to call it a Jewish
institution. It is never so
called in the Bible,
but it is ever designated as God's holy Sabbath.
5. The Sabbath was
given to Adam, who was the representative head of the whole human race,
the father
of all men and all
nations. Acts 17:26. In giving it to him, God thereby gave it to man as
a race; hence
Christ says truly, 'The
Sabbath was made for man.' Mark 2:27. He does not say it was made for
the Jew
man, nor for the
Gentile man, nor for the Christian man; nor does He limit it in any
manner; but He puts it
on the broad basis that
it was made for man. It is a rule in grammar that a noun unlimited by an
adjective is
to be taken in its
broadest sense, as, 'Man is mortal,' meaning all men, the race. So in
this case; Christ does
not limit it to one
class of men, but says that it was made for 'man,' that is, the race.
5. In this language,
he points us back to the time when the Sabbath was made, and says that
it was made
for man. When was the
Sabbath made? It was made at creation. God rested on the seventh day,
blessed it,
and sanctified it. This
is how and when it was made. For whom was it made? Christ's language is
definite.
It 'was made for man.'
Being given to Adam, the father of the Gentiles as well as of the Jews,
it was thus
given to all nations;
for Paul says that God 'hath made of one blood all nations of men for to
dwell on all
the face of the earth.'
Acts 17:26. Ibid., pp. 43-45.
Thus in Mr. Canright's
former publication he points out very clearly that the Sabbath as well
as every moral
precept existed in Eden
before the fall. That it was instituted at the close of creation week,
that it was set
apart to a holy and
religious use, and that it was given as a memorial of creation, was
blessed and sanctified
of God, and given to
Adam to be kept. He shows that every reference to the Sabbath after that
time clearly
points back to Eden. He
buttresses all these facts by a Thus says the Lord from Scripture. He
clearly points
out the fact that the
Sabbath is not a type; that it is a perpetual institution;
that it is not Jewish; that it
was made for man; and
that in giving it to Adam, who was the representative head of the entire
human race,
it was thus given
through him to all humanity.
Strange that fourteen
years later, when Mr. Canright leaves the Seventh-day Adventist Church,
he
should so completely
forget all this evidence of the existence of the Sabbath from the time
of creation, and
should boldly declare
that the Sabbath was not known until Sinai. How, we ask, is it possible
for a man
who is truly led by the
Spirit of God, so evidently to turn away from the clear teachings of the
Word of God
inspired by His Spirit?
Does the Spirit thus teach one thing through inspiration and another
through Mr.
Canright? Is God thus
divided against Himself? Or is this additional evidence that Mr.
Canright had
wandered into the
darkness, turning away from the Word which David declared to be a lamp
unto his feet
and a light unto his
path?
From Mr. Canright's
pamphlet The Morality of the Sabbath, written before he repudiated the
moral law and while he
was still an Adventist, we quote:
SABBATH COMMAND APPLIES TO ALL AGES
A careful
examination of the commandment will show that it is equally applicable
to all nations in all
ages. Read it
carefully. 'Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.'
Cannot Gentiles do that
as well as the Jews? Can we not do it as well in America as in Asia?
'Six days shall
thou labor, and do all thy work.' Is not that enough for any man to work
in any country or
in any nation? Can the
Gentiles endure to work more days than the Jews? ...
'But the seventh day
is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.' Is not the seventh day God's rest
day now as truly
as it, was then? Does
it not remain a fact now that God did rest upon the seventh day? And as
long as this
continues to be a fact,
will it not be true that the seventh day is God's rest day? Certainly.
'In it thou shall
not do any work.' We need a day of rest and worship now as much as then,
the Gentiles as
much as the Jews.
Thou, nor thy son,
nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle,
nor thy stranger
that is within thy
gates.' Do not all these relations exist now among 01 nations? Do they
not all have sons
and daughters,
servants, and cattle? And do not all these need the rest of the Sabbath?
Certainly.
'For in six days the
Lord made heaven, and earth, the sea, and all that in them is.' Is it
not just as true now
as it was then that God
created all things in six days and rested the seventh day? Does not this
remain a fact
now?
'Wherefore [that is,
for this reason] the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.' Why
did the Lord
bless he Sabbath day
and hallow it? Because that in it He had rested from all His work.
As we have shown,
the Lord set apart the seventh day s a memorial of creation. Who should
observe that
memorial? All who are
interested in creation. Verily, are not the gentiles as much interested
in the work of
creation as the Jews
ever were? As Paul significantly asks, 'Is He the God of the Jews only?
Is He not also
of the Gentiles? Yes,
of the Gentiles also.' Rom. 3:29. Was it not, then, true that God
created the Gentiles as
well as the Jews; and
did not the Gentiles inhabit the earth which He there created? Are they
not constantly
enjoying the blessings
which He there made for man? Certainly. Then why should they not be as
much
interested to
commemorate this great work as were the Jews?
In short, there is
not a single idea in the fourth commandment but applies equally well to
all nations, in all
countries, and at all
times. Did the Jews need a day of rest? So do the Gentiles. Did the Jews
need a day for
religious worship? So
do the Gentiles. The Jews kept the seventh day to commemorate creation;
so should
the Gentiles. Pages
45-47.
RELIGIOUS LEADERS AGREE
Although most of the
Protestant world still clings to the custom of Sunday keeping, yet it is
a surprising
fact that leaders of
religious thought in all the great Protestant bodies agree in teaching
the eternal
perpetuity and the
binding obligation of the law of God . And this they do in spite of
their continued
observance of the first
day of the week. Note the following clear declarations from some of them
in support
of the fact that the
seventh-day Sabbath existed from creation, and was not a new institution
when given to
the Jews at Sinai:
'And sanctified
it.' Hebrew kadash. It is by this term that positive appointment of the
Sabbath as a day of
rest to man is
expressed. God's sanctifying the day is equivalent to His commandment to
men to sanctify it.
As at the close of
creation the seventh day was thus set apart by the Most High for such
purposes, without
limitation to age or
country, the observance of it is obligatory upon the whole human race,
to whom, in the
wisdom of Providence,
it may be communicated. This further appears from the reason why God
blessed
and sanctified it,
viz., 'because that in it He had rested,' etc., which is a reason of
equal force at all times and
equally applying to all
the posterity of Adam. And if it formed a just ground for sanctifying
the first day
which dawned upon the
finished system of the universe, it must be equally so for sanctifying
every seventh
day to the end of time.
The observance of the day is moreover enjoined in the Ten Commandments,
which
was not abolished with
the peculiar polity of the Jews, but remains unalterably binding upon
Christians in
every age of the world.
. . . The sanctification of the seventh day in the present case can only
be understood
of its being set apart
to the special worship and service of God. GEORGE BUSH
(Presbyterian), professor
of Hebrew and Oriental
literature, New York City University, Notes, Critical and Practical, on
the Book of
Genesis, vol. 1, pp.
48, 49.
By this [Sabbath] is
meant, the appointed of God at the close of creation, to be observed by
man as a day
of rest from all
secular employment, because that in it God Himself had rested from His
work. Gen. 2:1-3.
Not that God's rest was
necessitated by fatigue (Isa. 40:28); but He rested, that is, ceased to
work, on the
seventh day as an
example to man; hence assigned it as a reason why men should rest on
that day. Ex.
20:11; 31:17. God's
blessing and sanctifying the day, meant that He separated it from a
common to a
religious use. To be a
perpetual memorial or sign that all who thus observed it would show
themselves to
be the worshippers of
that God who made the world in six days and rested on the seventh. Ex.
20:8-11 ;
31:16,17; Isa.
56:6,7. Amos BINNEY (Methodist), Theological Compend, p. 169.
When it is therefore
said by the inspired historian that God 'sanctified the seventh day,' I
must
understand him to say,
that God set it apart (from the other six days of labor), to be
religiously employed by
man.-REV. J. NEWTON
BROWN (Baptist), The Obligation of the Sabbath, p. 48.
1. To make holy, to
sanctify, to hallow. 2. To pronounce holy, to sanctify, e. g., the
Sabbath (Gen. 2:3); a
people (Lev. 20:8,
21:8). Also to institute any holy thing, to appoint. EDWARD ROBINSON,
Gesenius,
Hebrew and English
Lexicon, p. 924.
Where is the example
in Scripture of any instituted commemoration not beginning from the time
of its
appointment ? . . . Did
circumcision under the Old Testament, or baptism and the Lord's supper
under the
New, remain in abeyance
for centuries before they were acted upon? And shall the commemoration
of the glories
of creation be thought
to be suspended for more than two thousand years after the occasion on
which it was appointed
had taken place? And especially as the reason for the celebration
existed from the
beginning, related to
the whole race of mankind more than to the Jews, and was indeed most
cogent
immediately after the
creation? 'DANIEL WILSON, The Divine Authority and Perpetual Obligation
of the
Lord's Day, pp. 46, 47.
MARTIN LUTHER ON THE SABBATH
God blessed and
sanctified the Sabbath. This He has not done with any other creature.
For heaven and
earth or any other
creature has He not sanctified to Himself; but only the seventh day. The
significance of
this is especially that
we should learn from it to understand that the seventh day is
particularly suited for
and ought to be used
for divine worship. For that is called sanctified, which is separated
from all other
creatures and dedicated
to God. To sanctify is to select to holy use or divine worship, an
expression often
used by Moses, for
instance when he speaks of holy vessels.
It is evident from
this text, that even though Adam had stood the test and had remained in
his innocency,
he would still have
kept the seventh day.
And, even though man
by sin has lost the perception of God, yet God has willed that the
commandment to
keep holy the Sabbath
should remain, and has willed that man on the seventh day should
practice and
inculcate the word and
worship of God. Dr. Martin Luther's Copious Exposition on Genesis,
translated
according to the German
Text in Walch's Edition by F. W. Bugge, vol. 1, pp. 62, 63.
From these facts I
think we may conclude that the Sabbath was originally given to the whole
human race,
and that it was
observed by the Hebrews previously to the giving of the law; and that in
early ages, this
observance was probably
universal. FRANCIS WAYLAND (Baptist), Elements of Moral Science, p.
91.
The Sabbath was made
for all men, and was designed to be a universal and perpetual blessing.
It was not
made for any particular
class or race of men, but for man, the generic man, the whole human
family.' A. E.
WAFFLE, The Lord's Day
(Prize Essay), p. 163.
The use of
'remember,' in connection with the fourth commandment, 'implies that the
weekly rest day was
not a new institution.'
It was observed before Sinai was reached. 'The Sabbath was a recognized
institution
long before the days of
Moses. Traces of its strict observance in the ancestral home of Abraham
are
disclosed in the
Assyrian records unearthed in these later days.' (H. Clay Trumbull.)
HENRY T.
SCHOLL, D.D., in New
York Christian Observer (Presbyterian), Dec. 24, 1913.
This was the most
ancient institution, God calls them to remember it; as if He had said,
Do not forget that
when I had finished My
creation I instituted the Sabbath, and remember why I did so, and for
what
purposes. ADAM
CLARKE, A Commentary and Critical Notes, vol. 1, p. 402.
The seventh day was
observed from Abraham's time, nay, from creation. The Jews identified
their own
history with the
institution of the Sabbath day. They loved and venerated it as a
patriarchal usage.' The
Evidences of
Christianity, a Debate Between Robert Owen and Alexander Campbell, p.
302.
In his wonderful volume
Weighed and Wanting, Dwight L. Moody adds, the following ringing
testimony on
this important subject:
The Sabbath was
binding in Eden, and it has been in force ever since. This fourth
commandment begins
with the word
'remember,' showing that the Sabbath already existed hen God wrote this
law on the tables of
stone at Sinai. How can
men claim that this one commandment has been done away with when they
will
admit that the other
nine are still binding?
I believe that the
Sabbath question today is a vital one for the whole country. It is the
burning question of
the present time. If
you give up the Sabbath, the church goes; if you give up the church, the
home goes; and
if the home goes, the
nation goes. That is the direction in which we are travelling.
The church of God is
losing its power on account of so many people giving up the Sabbath, and
using it to
promote selfishness.
Page 47.
|