Bible Readings — Bible Questions Answered

Sunday Observance

How did Sunday observance originate? BR-ASI9 305.5

As a voluntary celebration of the resurrection, a custom without pretense of divine authority. BR-ASI9 305.6

Note.—“Opposition to Judaism introduced the particular festival of Sunday very early, indeed, into the place of the Sabbath. . . . The festival of Sunday, like all other festivals, was always only a human ordinance, and it was far from the intentions of the apostles to establish a Divine command in this respect, far from them, and from the early apostolic Church, to transfer the laws of the Sabbath to Sunday. Perhaps, at the end of the second century a false application of this kind had begun to take place; for men appear by that time to have considered labouring on Sunday as a sin.”—Augustus Neander, The History of the Christian Religion and Church, Rose’s translation, p. 186. BR-ASI9 305.7

“The observance of the Sunday was at first supplemental to that of the Sabbath, but in proportion as the gulf between the Church and the Synagogue widened, the Sabbath became less and less important and ended at length in being entirely neglected.”—L. Duchesne, Christian Worship: Its Origin and Evolution (tr. from the 4th French ed. by M. L. McClure, London, 1910), p. 47. BR-ASI9 305.8

Who first enjoined Sundaykeeping by law? BR-ASI9 306.1

Constantine the Great. BR-ASI9 306.2

Note.—“(1) That the Sunday was in the beginning not looked on as a day of bodily repose; nor was an analogy drawn between the Jewish Sabbath and the Christian Sunday, except as days of worship. . . . BR-ASI9 306.3

“(3) The keeping of the Sunday rest arose from the custom of the people and the constitution of the Church. . . . BR-ASI9 306.4

“(5) Tertullian was probably the first to refer to a cessation of worldly affairs on the Sunday; the Council of Laodicea issued the first conciliar legislation for that day; Constantine I issued the first civil legislation; St. Martin of Braga was probably the first to use the term ‘servile work’ in its present theological sense.”—Vincent J. Kelly, Forbidden Sunday and Feast-Day Occupations, p. 203. BR-ASI9 306.5

“The earliest recognition of the observance of Sunday as a legal duty is a constitution of Constantine in 321 A.D., enacting that all courts of justice, inhabitants of towns, and workshops were to be at rest on Sunday (venerabili die solis), with an exception in favor of those engaged in agricultural labor.”—Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th ed., art. “Sunday.” (See page 216.) BR-ASI9 306.6

This edict, issued by Constantine, who first opened the way for the union of church and state in the Roman Empire, in a manner supplied the lack of a divine command for Sunday observance. It was one of the important steps in bringing about and establishing the change of the Sabbath. BR-ASI9 306.7

What testimony does Eusebius bear on this subject? BR-ASI9 306.8

“All things whatsoever that it was duty to do on the Sabbath, these we [the church] have transferred to the Lord’s day.”—Commentary on the Psalms, in Migne, Patrologia Graeca, vol. 23, col. 1171. BR-ASI9 306.9

Note.—The change of the Sabbath was the result of the combined efforts of church and state, and it took centuries to accomplish it. Eusebius of Caesarea (270-338) was a noted bishop of the church, biographer and flatterer of Constantine, and the reputed father of ecclesiastical history. BR-ASI9 306.10

By what church council was the observance of the seventh day forbidden, and Sunday observance enjoined? BR-ASI9 307.1

The Council of Laodicea, in Asia Minor, fourth century. BR-ASI9 307.2

Note.—Canon 29 reads: “Christians shall not Judaize and be idle on Saturday [sabbato, the Sabbath], but shall work on that day; but the Lord’s day they shall especially honour, and, as being Christians, shall, if possible, do no work on that day. If, however, they are found Judaizing, they shall be shut out from Christ.”—Charles Joseph Hefele, A History of the Councils of the Church, vol. 2 (1896 English ed.), p. 316. BR-ASI9 307.3

The Puritan William Prynne said (1655) that “the Council of Laodicea . . . first set[t]led the observation of the Lords-day, and prohibited . . . the keeping of the Jewish Sabbath under an Anathema.”—A Briefe Polemicall Dissertation Concerning . . . the Lordsday-Sabbath, p. 44. Also, Geiermann’s Catholic catechism says that “the Catholic church, in the Council of Laodicea,” made the change. (The Convert’s Catechism of Catholic Doctrine [1937 ed.], p. 50.) BR-ASI9 307.4

What was done at the Council of Laodicea was but one of the steps by which the change of the Sabbath was effected. It was looked back upon as the first church council to forbid Sabbath observance and enjoin Sunday rest as far as possible, but it was not so strict as later decrees. Different writers give conflicting dates for this council of Laodicea. The exact date is unknown, but may be placed “generally somewhere between the years 343 and 381.” (Hefele, vol. 2, p. 298.) BR-ASI9 307.5

What do Catholics say of Protestant Sundaykeepers? BR-ASI9 307.6

They are obeying the authority of the Catholic Church. BR-ASI9 307.7

Note.—“For ages all Christian nations looked to the Catholic Church, and, as we have seen, the various states enforced by law her ordinances as to worship and cessation of Labor on Sunday. Protestantism, in discarding the authority of the church, has no good reason for its Sunday theory, and ought logically, to keep Saturday as the Sabbath.” BR-ASI9 307.8

“The State, in passing laws for the due Sanctification of Sunday, is unwittingly acknowledging the authority of the Catholic Church, and carrying out more or less faithfully its prescriptions. BR-ASI9 307.9

“The Sunday, as a day of the week set apart for the obligatory public worship of Almighty God, to be sanctified by a suspension of all servile labor, trade, and worldly avocations and by exercises of devotion, is purely a creation of the Catholic Church.”—The American Catholic Quarterly Review, January, 1883, pp. 152, 139. BR-ASI9 307.10

“If protestants would follow the Bible, they should worship God on the Sabbath Day. In keeping the Sunday they are following a law of the Catholic Church.”—Albert Smith, Chancellor of the Archdiocese of Baltimore, replying for the Cardinal in a letter of Feb. 10, 1920. (See also the quotation from Monsignor Segur on page 200.) BR-ASI9 308.1