The history of how Sunday worship came about.

[Ragdoll]

I think its safe to day that once you get past the first 1000 years of Christianity you begin to see Christianity dumb down and become not so smart. Yes, sure, there are a few reformers who took a stand for genuine Christianity and their efforts were well hidden by the Puritans who not only oppose the Roman Catholics of the time, but also stood in stark opposition to Luther and Tyndale, accusing them of not going far enough. So the Puritans wanted to take it as far as they could and here we are today living in a land full of apostate Christians who left their Puritan denomination and joined Satan. They did not reason in their minds that maybe they have been dumbed down by deceiving doctrines. They did not reason in their minds that maybe their denomination is not true orthodoxy? They just said goodbye to Jesus Christ and began worshiping Satan without even realizing they left Christ for Satan.

I've seen this patteran for many many years now and its not easy to see so many people apostate from the faith when there are simple solutions for their problems. True Christianity is found in the Holy Bible from the most trusted Bible translations. True Christianity can be best understood through ancient Christian traidition (i.e., the early church fathers). Heresy never produced strong churches.

I would like to drop one last thing into this conversation. I'm a former Catholic who is now a Lutheran. And no, Martin Luther was not a prophet nor did he claim to be a prophet. Luther was a theologian and that's all he was. We Lutherans do not prop him up to be without sin or the most perfect man who ever lived. We know Luther wasn't perfect. He is the founder of a church that he really did not want to be the founder of. Luther merely wanted to reform the church....not to destroy it like the Puritans desired.

In order to know what Catholics belief you absolutely have to have been a Catholic who had taken the catechsim and been confirmed. Any person who has not done these things will not understand a single doctrine of the Catholic church. Not one. The language used in the Catholic system is not the language used by Protestants or Puritans. So you absolutely have to have been a confirmed Catholic in order to speak for or against the Catholic church. How many SDAs or other anti-catholics have ever actually been Catholics before? Not very many. Not very many at all.
So if you want to know all the good, the bad and the ugly about the Catholic system you should just ask people like me and I will give you an honest and accurate assessment of the Catholic system as it is today. But you will not ever get me to say bad things about the ancient Catholic Church. For I know now that there is a major difference between the Catholic system today and the ancient Catholics (*Note: I use the phrase "Catholic system" to account for both Roman and Anglican Catholics). Even in the 15th and 16th centuries the Catholic system was not lost. In some parts of the world the Catholics were very strong in faith and had genuine leaders who led in holiness and not out of their human lust for power). I think the only thing I will agree with SDAs and other anti-Catholics on is that the modern Catholic system is corrupt. But our reasons for agreeing will be completely different in how we view the details. Even now I am not an anti-Catholic. I do not delight or rejoice in the fall of the Catholic system. Like Luther, I would rather reform it or hit the reset button and start over. This means to stop following all modern Churches and go back to the early church.

Though I will and often do make exceptions for creationism since that comes from many denominations and usually taught in a non-denominational manner. Funny thing, once I studied creationism from the early church I actually saw their approach as stronger than modern creationists overall. The early church didn't mess around with silliness. Its good to be open but not good to stray from the ancient church. Whatever it is we do differently today from the early church, must still be in line with what the early church would have wanted for those changes. The writings of the early church are there to keep us from heresy.

 

[JSRG]

Gnostics do not share in Christian honesty and in the Gnostic realm lying is part of the faith. A mission statement by a Gnostic means nothing. Its a lure and thst's it. Neither of those groups are Christian. What you posted is just a lure on the surface of their information to get you to join. I've been a cult before so I have nothing to do with unorthodox sects.

I think we should clarify things a little here. You are correct, as you said in your post, that the Albigenses had some really weird beliefs that would to most disqualify them as Christians--while I suppose different people have different definitions of "Christian", if we need an objective standard, anyone holding their beliefs would certainly be disqualified from posting in the Christian-only sections of this forum.

Things seem different for the Waldenses. In the present day, they're pretty much a standard Reformed denomination (they joined up with Reformed/Calvinist churches in the 16th century). Granted, some dislike Calvinism strongly enough to consider it heretical, but again if we go by the standards of this forum, they'd have no issues posting in the Christian-only sections, as is the case for any Calvinist. Their positions prior to the 16th century are more arguable, but they don't seem to have gone anywhere near the extremes of the Albigenses.

Despite being different groups, the two have often been conflated (often this was done to either try to "clean up" the image of the Albigenses by comparing them to the more orthodox Waldenses, or to try to attack the Waldenses by trying to associate them with the more blatantly heretical Albigenses). Scholarship has largely moved on from that, but it was definitely an idea pushed in the past. For example, that Ten Commandments commentary that has been discussed is something Gary K took from an appendix of a 1829 book, and that book titled it as "An Exposition of the Waldenses and Abligenses on the Ten Commandments of the Law of God". But it seems to have had nothing to at all to do with the Albigenses at all as far as I can tell, and was entirely Waldensian. The older work I pointed to in my previous post that provided it in French simply said it was from a Waldensian work and made no mention of the Albigenses that I can see (admittedly, my French isn't all that great). I believe that someone at a later point who wanted to connect the two groups simply gave it that title on their assumption they were more related than they actually were. Actually, given that the Albigenses generally took a dim view of the Old Testament, it'd be rather weird for them to write up a positive commentary of the Ten Commandments.

 

[Ragdoll]

I think we should clarify things a little here. You are correct, as you said in your post, that the Albigenses had some really weird beliefs that would to most disqualify them as Christians--while I suppose different people have different definitions of "Christian", if we need an objective standard, anyone holding their beliefs would certainly be disqualified from posting in the Christian-only sections of this forum.

Things seem different for the Waldenses. In the present day, they're pretty much a standard Reformed denomination (they joined up with Reformed/Calvinist churches in the 16th century). Granted, some dislike Calvinism strongly enough to consider it heretical, but again if we go by the standards of this forum, they'd have no issues posting in the Christian-only sections, as is the case for any Calvinist. Their positions prior to the 16th century are more arguable, but they don't seem to have gone anywhere near the extremes of the Albigenses.

Despite being different groups, the two have often been conflated (often this was done to either try to "clean up" the image of the Albigenses by comparing them to the more orthodox Waldenses, or to try to attack the Waldenses by trying to associate them with the more blatantly heretical Albigenses). Scholarship has largely moved on from that, but it was definitely an idea pushed in the past. For example, that Ten Commandments commentary that has been discussed is something Gary K took from an appendix of a 1829 book, and that book titled it as "An Exposition of the Waldenses and Abligenses on the Ten Commandments of the Law of God". But it seems to have had nothing to at all to do with the Albigenses at all as far as I can tell, and was entirely Waldensian. The older work I pointed to in my previous post that provided it in French simply said it was from a Waldensian work and made no mention of the Albigenses that I can see (admittedly, my French isn't all that great). I believe that someone at a later point who wanted to connect the two groups simply gave it that title on their assumption they were more related than they actually were. Actually, given that the Albigenses generally took a dim view of the Old Testament, it'd be rather weird for them to write up a positive commentary of the Ten Commandments.

Yes. I understand the standards of this forum. But the denominations here do not agree even if they don't admit that. I do not hate Calvinists at all. But I'm no fan of the Puritan movement from which Calvinism came from. The Puritans were not Protestants. Anyone who studied the reformation will discover many things that will turn them off Puritanism. The Puritans opposed Luther and Tyndale for not taking it far enough. So the Puritans all made up their own denominations with no formal training in theology and, if you ask me, misled the nations with their overly defiant view on Catholicism to such a degree as to completely stray from our own Christian history. The average denomination, for example, can only trace their ecclesiastical lineage back to the 16th century. This is not the case with either Catholics or Lutherans. And even as a Luthern now, I do not agree with my Pastor (as good a man and leader as he is) about how Constantine did something very wrong? There is no historical evidence anywhere for all the accusations against Constantine. He became a Christian and put an end to the persecution of Christians by the Romans. That is a good thing! At least I think its a good.
Then there is this hatred for Catholicism that goes to such an extreme as to hate anything Rome. This Rome hatred then takes another extreme and becomes fuel for very malicious conspiracy theories that no Christian should ever take part in. What I've taken away from all this anti-Catholic conspiracy theories is that no Roman can ever come to Christ and be saved. But that is not what Scripture teaches at all! Cornelius was the first Roman mentioned in Acts to come to Christ. Who was he? Not much is said about him other than being a Roman. Maybe he was one of the guards at Jesus' tomb. Who knows. But he did come to Christ and so did other Romans. All this happened after the resurrection of Christ. So maybe what is not written deals with those Roman guards eventually breaking the silence about what they saw that night when Jesus rose. I may be guessing here but you get the point, Romans came to Christ and all this happened in a world that was very Roman controlled. Judea at the time was part of Rome. But people today seem to forget that. People today seem to think that only the city of Rome made up the entire Roman empire. But Christianity came in a time when Rome occupied almost every footstep a Christian would walk. Christianity would soon become accepted in Rome and it would not be long and the prophecy in Isaiah would be fulfilled

Isaiah 60:3​

​

"The Gentiles shall come to your light,​

And kings to the brightness of your rising."​

Now many would rightly say that this prophecy began its fulfillment at the time the wisemen visited Jesus. This is true. But this prophecy did not fulfill until roughly 800 A.D with the crowning of king Charlemagne. But Constantine is the first real gentile king to come to Christ. Now any king living in 700 B.C., when Isaiah penned this would have laughed at him. Who knew that through the body and blood of Jesus the entire world would come to the Jewish Messiah?

It is said that God works in mysterious ways. We cannot undermine what God has planned. And we absolutely should not be placing in contempt those early Christians who died for their faith. Yet many claim those early Christians corrupted the faith and began to serve pagan Rome. But this is true. It was Rome who came to Christ.

So however we may feel about the Roman Catholic Church today should never reflect on how we view the ancient church, or let those feeling influence our theology. For when conspiracy theory (i.e., false history) becomes theology, then we have bad churches. This is why I do not allow myself to get involved in modern denominations. I've already been through the mill with all of this. My life is so easy now. If there is something I do not understand about a fundamental issue in theology, I consult the early church and you would be shocked and surprised what they can solve for us modern people today! We can all avoid heretical sects just by consulting the church fathers on doctrines in question. While the early church did not have all the answers, and they admitted this, they provided enough solid backbone that we should not be led astray by false doctrines meant to mangle our minds.

 

[Gary K]

The rest seems fairly irrelevant once it is clearly established from the beginning it refers to Sunday. Again:

"They that will keep and observe the Sabbath of Christians, that is to say, to sanctify the day of the Lord, must be careful of four things."

This is not the verbiage one would use if they were referring to Saturday; there would not be a need to differentiate it from the Jewish Sabbath nor would they say "day of the Lord" (a phrase used for Sunday). In regards to the parts you bolded, none of that contradicts the point I made. Yes, parts are quoted from the Old Testament referring to the Sabbath as the seventh day, but that does not mean they considered it to apply to Saturday in the present. Why bother with the specification of "Sabbath of Christians" and "day of the Lord" if it was just the same day as the Jews?

However, if that is still not enough to persuade someone, the ultimate clincher is in the French. The explanation of the Ten Commandments you've been quoting from is, after all, an English translation of a French document. What does the original say? It took a bit of work to find, but I managed to hunt it down. It is found in the first volume of the 17th century work "Histoire generale des eglises evangeliques des vallees de Piemont" by Jean Leger, and one can see it here. It has been reproduced in some subsequent works, but that is as far as I can tell the earliest one.

The text provided that corresponds to the above sentence is:

"Ceux qui veulent garder & observer le Sabath des Chrêtiens, c’est à dire, Sanctifier le jour du Dimanche, ont besoin de prendre garde à quatre choses."

The bolding corresponds to the bolding above. Now, this is French from centuries ago so some things are spelled or capitalized a little differently, but it's still recognizable. And here we see waht seems like it eliminates all doubt: The text for "day of the Lord" says "le jour du Dimanche."

What does Dimanche mean? Sunday. And yes, just to be sure there wasn't a shift in meaning or anything, I looked at a 17th century French dictionary (see here) and it confirms it means Sunday (it explicitly says "premier jour de la semaine", meaning first day of the week) Translating it as "day of the lord" as it does in English isn't quite unwarranted, because Dimanche (as with other Romance languages) actually derives from the word for lord, as it was so commonly called the Lord's day. Still, Dimanche corresponds to the day we in English call Sunday.

And so, it is clear that they held Sunday as sacred and considered the Fourth Commandment to apply to that day.

Dimanche is also used for the later "day of the lord" references in it. Namely:

"and therefore saith Saint Augustine; "It is better to labour and to dig the earth on the Lord's day, than to be drunk, or to commit any other sins; for sin is a servile work, by which a man serves the devil."
Again, he says, that it is better to labour with profit, than to roam abroad in idleness; for the day of the Lord was not ordained to the end that a man should cease from earthly good works, and give himself unto sin"

The French that this is translated from reads, as best as I can make it out:

"Et pourtant S. Augustin dit: qu'il vandroit meieux labourer ou fossoyer la terre le Dimanche, que de s'enyurer ou commettre d'autres pechés; car le peché est une oeuvre servile, en laquelle on sert au Diablo. Item, il dit: qui il vaut mieux labourer avec utilité que de vagabonder en oysiveté: Car le jour du Dimanche n'a point été ordonné afin que l'homme cesse des bonnes oeuvres terriennes, & s addonne à peché."

Again we see Dimanche. It is very clear that they viewed Sunday (Dimanche) as the sacred day.


The issue is that you're apparently pointing to this as evidence they kept the Sabbath on Saturday even though it says they did so on Sunday. That's the problem.

Also, the Ten Commandment commentary was unlikely to have been written a thousand years ago, for it makes clear references to the chapters of the Bible. For example, in its description of the Third Commandment, it says "In this commandment we are forbidden to swear falsely, vainly, and by custom, as it is written, Leviticus xix." But the chapter numbering system for chapters we use was first devised in the 13th century, and obviously took a while to get popular enough that someone could just drop it as it done in a commentary and assume the reader would understand it.

Oh well.

I gave you the evidence. It's your choice to accept or reject it. A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still.

Why Was the Bible Divided into Chapters and Verses?

In the original text of the Bible, there were no chapter or verse divisions. This sometimes proved difficult when believers wanted to cite particular passages, so chapter headings and verses were added for ease of reference and communication.

www.christianity.com

 

[brakelite]

To whom it may concern, which is many...

KJV Hebrews 8:6-8

6 But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises.

7 For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second.

8 For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah:

8 For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah:

9 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord.

10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:

11 And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest.

12 For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more.

13 In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.

I have some questions, based on the texts above, and based on the premise believed by many that the ten commandments are the old covenant that was done away with, needing to be replaced with a new one.

First question. Please show me what is faulty with the ten commandments. Paul said that God's Commandments were holy, just, and good. Where's the fault? How can the law of God be holy and faulty at the same time?


Second question. Please find me within the ten commandments promises that need improvement. Apparently, this old covenant, whatever it is, incorporated some poor promises. Where are they in the ten commandments? In the ten commandments we have this...

KJV Ephesians 6:1-3

1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right.

2 Honour thy father and mother; (which is the first commandment with promise

3 That it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth.

I would really like summertime to tell me what is faulty with the above promise.


Third question. We are told that whatever it is, the old covenant was to be abolished. Now of the ten commandments were to be abolished, people need to explain why Paul would be so contradictory to say...

KJV Romans 3:31

31 Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.

Was Paul saying, as so many Christians believe, "Do we make void the old covenant by faith? God forbid, we establish the old covenant". Anytime make sense of that? Because if you think the ten commandments law is the old covenant, then that last statement is what you would have us believe.


KJV Hebrews 8:6-8

6 But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises.

7 For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second.

8 For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah:

8 For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah:

9 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord.

10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:

11 And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest.

12 For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more.

13 In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.

I have some questions, based on the texts above, and based on the premise believed by many that the ten commandments are the old covenant that was done away with, needing to be replaced with a new one.

First question. Please show me what is faulty with the ten commandments. Paul said that God's Commandments were holy, just, and good. Where's the fault? How can the law of God be holy and faulty at the same time?


Second question. Please find me within the ten commandments promises that need improvement. Apparently, this old covenant, whatever it is, incorporated some poor promises. Where are they in the ten commandments? In the ten commandments we have this...

KJV Ephesians 6:1-3

1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right.

2 Honour thy father and mother; (which is the first commandment with promise

3 That it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth.

I would really like summertime to tell me what is faulty with the above promise.


Third question. We are told that whatever it is, the old covenant was to be abolished. Now of the ten commandments were to be abolished, people need to explain why Paul would be so contradictory to say...

KJV Romans 3:31

31 Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.

Was Paul saying, as so many Christians believe, "Do we make void the old covenant by faith? God forbid, we establish the old covenant". Anytime make sense of that? Because if you think the ten commandments law is the old covenant, then that last statement is what you would have us believe

 

[BobRyan]

The rest seems fairly irrelevant once it is clearly established from the beginning it refers to Sunday. Again:

"They that will keep and observe the Sabbath of Christians, that is to say, to sanctify the day of the Lord, must be careful of four things."

This is not the verbiage one would use if they were referring to Saturday;

So then... not a text of scripture at all?

Is the point here that if we ignore the Bible we can find other sources that will lay out an argument for Calling Sunday (week day 1) the Lord's Day, or for saying that weekly worship services are to be held on "Week day 1" or that "Sunday is the Christian Sabbath"?

If that is the point then... "Agreed"

 

[JSRG]

So then... not a text of scripture at all?

Is the point here that if we ignore the Bible we can find other sources that will lay out an argument for Calling Sunday (week day 1) the Lord's Day, or for saying that weekly worship services are to be held on "Week day 1" or that "Sunday is the Christian Sabbath"?

If that is the point then... "Agreed"

The context is that someone was claiming that a particular group believed in the Saturday Sabbath, and as an attempt at evidence they cited a commentary said group wrote on the Ten Commandments. I pointed out that the text rather indicates they viewed Sunday as being the Sabbath, especially if one consults the original French, as it explicitly used the French word for Sunday, Dimanche ("le jour du Dimanche" was what the French said). The English translation that was being appealed to rendered it into the more ambiguous "the day of the Lord", but looking at the original French it's clear that Sunday is being referred to, on the simple grounds that... well, it uses the word for Sunday.

The assertion made was that this document showed observance of the Sabbath on Saturday by this group, but the very document being appealed to as evidence actually demonstrates Sunday observance instead. That was the entire point of my post.

 

[BobRyan]

The context is that someone was claiming that a particular group believed in the Saturday Sabbath

hmm so that would be
All Sabbath keeping Christians today
All of God's people in the OT
Almost all Christian denominations on Earth today that admit that the Sabbath as given by God in the Ten Commandments was Saturday - the seventh day and that Christ was raised from the dead on Sunday - called "week day 1" in the Bible.

I pointed out that the text rather indicates they viewed Sunday as being the Sabbath

I agree that texts can be found where the author does view Sunday as the Sabbath but often those same authors will say that it was Saturday as given by God in the Ten Commandments - the moral law of God.

, especially if one consults the original French, as it explicitly used the French word for Sunday, Dimanche ("le jour du Dimanche" was what the French said).

Samedi – Saturday. Samedi Meaning (Day of the Sabbath): “Samedi,” French for “Saturday” in English, is from the Latin “Dies Sambati,” meaning “day of the Sabbath.” It’s named after the Jewish Sabbath, a day of rest and worship. Saturday has not always been known as “Samedi” in French

In any case I agree that it is a widespread practice to either say there is no Sabbath or that Sabbath has been changed/edited to point to week-day-1 instead of "the seventh day"