Philip said:
I read the link. Almost all of the citations from the 2nd century on are from secondary sources. Why not use primary sources?
History of the Sabbath
This is a brief summation from historical sources of many groups who have kept the seventh-day Sabbath down through history.
Before the Jews kept the Sabbath, it was known in Babylon: "The Sabbath rest was a Babylonian, as well as a Hebrew, institution. Its origin went back to pre-Semitic days. . .In the cuneiform tablets the Sabbatu is described as 'a day of rest for the soul,' . . .it was derived by the Assyrian scribes from two Sumerian, or pre-Semitic words, sa and bat, which meant respectively 'heart' and 'ceasing'. . .The rest enjoined on the Sabbath was thus as complete as it was among the Jews." Higher Criticism and the Monuments, p. 74-75.
"According to the Assyrian-Babylonian conception, the particular stress lay necessarily upon the number seven. . . .The whole week pointed prominently toward the seventh day, the feast day, the rest day, in this day it collected, in this it also consummated. 'Sabbath' is derived from both 'rest' and 'seven.' With the Egyptians, it was the reverse. . . .For them, on the contrary, the sun god was the beginning and origin of all things. The day of the sun, Sunday, therefore, became necessarily for them the feast day. . . .The holiday was transferred from the last to the first day of the week." Truels Lund, Daglige Liv I Norden, V. 13, pp. 54-55.
That the seven-day week, and the seventh-day Sabbath were prehistoric in origin is shown by the fact that they are known in many different cultures around the world. Most cultures have always observed the seven-day week. And though most of them no longer rest on the seventh day, yet in a great many of the world's languages, the name of the seventh day is still "sabbath" or "rest day."
Although there is no Biblical command to keep Sunday in the New Testament, yet the custom of celebrating the resurrection of Christ on that day came into the church quite early.
It probably was influenced by the fact that Sunday was the weekly celebration of the sun god, Mithra, whose worship was very popular in the Roman Empire at that time. So, all around the Christians, the Sunday was a holiday. And it seemed reasonable to them to make it a day of celebration of the resurrection.
But for many years nearly all Christians also kept the seventh-day Sabbath, according to the commandment
This is shown by a statement of the church historian, Socrates, written about 400 A.D.:
"For although almost all the churches throughout the world celebrate the sacred mysteries on the Sabbath of every week, yet the Christians of Alexandria and at Rome, on account of some ancient tradition, have ceased to do this." Ecclesiastical History, book 5, chapter 22. Found in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers.
Also about 400 A.D. Sozomen, another church historian, wrote:
"The people of Constantinople, and almost everywhere, assemble together on the Sabbath, as well as on the first day of the week, which custom is never observed at Rome or at Alexandria." Sozomen, Ecclesiatical History, book 7, chapter 19. Ibid.
There were several reasons the church at Rome stopped keeping the Sabbath. For one thing, the Jews were being persecuted, and they didn't want to be identified with them.
Emperor Constantine decided that he wished to unite all his empire under one religion. He chose Christianity, but, to make the move more acceptable to his pagan subjects, he encouraged the blending of the religion of Christ, and the religion of Mithra. He made the first Sunday law, and the keeping of Sabbath was discouraged. This came at the same time as many other changes came into the church from paganism, including images in the churches, etc..
At the Synod of Laodicea (365 A.D.) the council passed a decree: "Christians must not Judaize by resting on the Sabbath, but must work on that day." Council of Laodicea, Canon 29, found in Scribner's Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 2nd series, vol 14, p. 148.
The Church at Rome took several steps to persuade or force Christians to stop resting on the Sabbath. They labeled it "Judaizing," and commanded that the Sabbath be a fast day, while the Sunday was to be a festival.
Persecution was launched again and again against those who did not yield in this and other things, to the dictation of the Roman Church. Many fled.
Still, even the popes found it hard to stamp this practice out of the area they ruled, and impossible in those churches beyond their reach.
In 602, Pope Gregory issued a bull in which he branded those Christians who believed in keeping the seventh day as "Judaizers" and "antichrist." See Epistles of Gregory I, collection 13, ep 1, found in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, second series, vol. 13.
Many churches beyond the reach of Rome continued to rest and worship on the seventh day. Here is a record of some of them.
The Waldenses:
Many Christians fled to the Alps. They were called, among other things, the Waldenses, or people of the valleys.
"Now this district, on the eastern side of the Cottian Alps, is the precise country of the Vallenses (Waldenses). Hither their ancestors retired, during the persecutions of the second and third and fourth centuries here providentially secluded from the world, they retained the precise doctrines and practices of the primitive church, endeared to them by suffering and exile while the wealthy inhabitants of cities and fertile plains, corrupted by a now opulent and gorgeous and powerful clergy, were daily sinking deeper and deeper into that apostasy which has been so graphically foretold by the great apostle."Faber, The Ancient Vallenses and Albigenses, pp. 293-4.
"The Walsenses took the Bible as their only rule of faith, abhorred the idolatry of the papal church, and rejected their traditions, holidays, and even Sunday, but kept the seventh day Sabbath, and used the apostolic mode of baptism." Facts of Faith, p. 121, by Christian Edwardson.
For centuries evangelical bodies, especially the Waldenses, were called "Insabbati," or "Ensavates," or "Insabbatati," because they kept the Sabbath. See Ussher, Gravissimae Quaestionis de Christianarum Ecclesiarum Successione, chapter 8, par. 4.
In the 1200's a Waldensian prisoner testified before the Inquisition as follows: "Barbara von Thies testified... that on the last Saint Michael's day concerning confession as it is administered by the priests she has nothing to do with it. As to that which has to do with the Virgin Mary, on that she has nothing to answer. Concerning Sunday and the feast days she says, 'The Lord God commanded us to rest on the seventh day and with that I let it be, with God's help and His grace, we all would stand by and die in the faith, for it is the right faith and the right way to Christ.' " Der Blutige Schau-Plats, Oder Martyrer Spiegel der Taufs Gesinnien, book 2, pp. 30-31.
When the reformers and the Waldenses met, there were a few who were still keeping the Sabbath.
Ethiopia:
For more than 1700 years the Christian Churches of Abyssinia (now Ethiopia) continued to keep the seventh day.
In A.D. 1534 the Abyssinian Ambassador appealed to Portugal for protection from the Mohammedans. When asked why they kept the seventh day, he answered:
"On the Sabbath day, because God, after He had finished the creation of the world, rested thereon which day, as God would have it called the Holy of Holies, so the not celebrating thereof with great honor and devotion seems to be plainly contrary to God's will and precept, Who will suffer heaven and earth to pass away sooner than His Word and that especially since Christ came not to dissolve the law, but to fulfil it. It is not therefore in imitation of the Jews, but in obedience to Christ and His holy Apostles that we observe that day. . . We do observe the Lord's day after the manner of all other Christians, in memory of Christ's resurrection." Geddis, The Church History of Ethiopia. pp. 87, 88.
Milan:
Ambrose, the celebrated bishop of Milan said that when he was in Milan, he observed Saturday, but when in Rome, he fasted on Saturday and observed Sunday. This gave rise to the proverb, "When in Rome, do as the Romans do." See Heylyn, The History of the Sabbath, 1612, p. 416.
Belgium
"As to the charge that certain churches were Judaizing, the minutes of the synod at Liftinne (the modern Estinnes), Belgium, 743 A.D., give more particular information. Dr. Karl Jo von Hefele writes, 'The third allocation of this council warns against the observance of the Sabbath, referring to the decree of the Council of Laodicea.' (Hefele, Concilliengeschicte, Vol. 3, p. 512.) B.G. Wilkinson, Truth Triumphant, p. 196.
The Celts in Brittain:
"The Celts used a Latin Bible unlike the Vulgate, and kept Saturday as a day of rest, with special religious services on Sunday." A.C. Flick (historian), The Rise of the Medieval Church, p. 237.
"It seems to have been customary in the Celtic churches of early times, in Ireland as well as Scotland, to keep Saturday the Jewish sabbath, as a day of rest from labor. They obeyed the fourth commandment literally upon the seventh day of the week." Andrew Lang, A History of Scotland, Vol. 1, p. 96.
It is recorded of (Saint) Columba, an Irishman, born in 521 A.D., who was a great missionary and religious leader of Scotland--when he lay dying: "Having continued his labors in Scotland thirty four years, he clearly and openly foretold his death, and on Saturday, the ninth of June, said to his disciple Diermit: 'This day is called the Sabbath, that is, the day of rest, and such it will truly be to me for it will put an end to my labors.' " Butler, Lives of the Saints, Vol. 6, p.139.
King Malcolm III of Scotland, about the year 1058 A.D., married an English princess named Margaret. As queen, she brought the Roman Church to Scotland. She brought about a Sunday law.
"The queen further protested against the prevailing abuse of Sunday desecration. 'Let us,' she said, 'venerate the Lord's day, inasmuch as upon it our Saviour rose from the dead. Let us do no servile work on that day.' . . . The Scots, in this matter, had no doubt kept up the traditional practice of the ancient manastic Church of Ireland (Patrick's church), which observed Saturday rather than Sunday as a day of rest." Bellesheim, History of the Catholic Church of Scotland. Vol. I, pp. 249, 250.
"There is much evidence that the Sabbath prevailed in Wales universally until A.D. 1115, when the first Roman bishop was seated at St. David's. The old Welsh Sabbath-keeping churches did not even then altogether bow the knee to Rome, but fled to their hiding places where the ordinances of the gospel to this day have been administered in their primitive mode without being adulterated by the corrupt Church of Rome." Lewis, Seventh Day Baptists in Europe and America, Vol. I, p. 29.
Early Greek Orthodox
"The observance of Saturday is, as everyone knows, the subject of a bitter dispute between the Greeks and Latins (Rome)." John Mason Neale, A History of the Holy Eastern Church, General Introduction, Vol. I, p. 731.
In A.D. 1054 the pope sent three legates to Constantinople. Among others, the following charge was made: "Because you observe the Sabbath with the Jews and the Lord's Day with us, you seem to imitate with such observances the sect of Nazarenes who in this manner accept Christianity in order that they be not obliged to leave Judaism." Migne, Patrologia Latina, Vol. 145, p. 506.
Eastern churches--the Orient
Speaking of the Nestorians in Kurdistan: "The Nestorian fasts are very numerous, meat being forbidden on 152 days. They eat no pork, and keep both the Sabbath and Sunday. They believe in neither auricular confession nor purgatory, and permit their priests to marry." Schaff-Herzog, The New Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, article "Nestorians."
Josephus Abudacnus, in the 1700's, in his history of the Jacobites, writes, "Our author states that the Jacobites assembled on the Sabbath day, before the Dommical day (Sunday), in the temple, and kept that day, as also the Abyssinians as we have seen from the confession of their faith by the Ethiopian king Claudius. . . From this it appears that the Jacobites have kept the Sabbath as well as the Dommical day, and still continue to keep it." Historia Jacobitarum, p. 118-119.
Thomas Yeates, who traveled largely in the Orient, writing of many Christians in the East, said that Saturday "amongst them is a festival day agreeable to the ancient practice of the church." Yeates, East India Church History." p. 72.
In the time of the reformation
"All the counsellors and great lords of the court, who were already fallen in with the doctrines of Wittenburg, of Ausburg, Geneva, and Zurich, as petrowitz, Jasper Cornis, Christopher Famigali, John Gerendi, head of the Sabbatarians, a people who did not keep Sunday, but Saturday, and whose disciples took the names of Genoldists. All these, and others, declared for the opinions of Blandrat." Lamy, The History of Socinianism, p. 60.
Erasmus testifies that even as late as about 1500 many Bohemians not only kept the seventh day scrupulously, but also were called Sabbatarians. See Cox, The Literature of the Sabbath Question, Vol. II, pp. 201-202.
After the time of the reformation, the Seventh Day Baptists formed their denomination, which is still in existence. The first record I have found of sabbath-keeping in America was when Stephan Mumford from London, a Seventh Day Baptist, settled in Rhode Island in 1664.
Samuel Ward, also a Seventh Day Baptist, was governor of Rhode Island in 1765. He was a delegate to the Continental Congress in 1774, and, had he not died, would probably have been a signer of the Declaration of Independence.
It was from the Seventh Day Baptists that some Adventists learned of the seventh-day Sabbath, and the Seventh-day Adventist Church was organized in 1863.
The Seventh-day Adventist Church is now a world-wide Church, and the keeping of the seventh day has gone everywhere with them.
danceforjoy
