Facts of Faith

The Sabbath An Edenic Institution

God the Father has always worked through His Son, both in creation and in redemption. (Genesis 1:26; Hebrews 1:1, 2, 8-10; John 3:16) Therefore it was Christ who created the world in six days and rested on the seventh day. “All things were made by Him - and without Him was not any thing made that was made.... He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not.” John 1:3, 10. (Compare Colossians 1:14-18) It is a great comfort to a poor, weak sinner to know that our Saviour is “the Mighty God” (Isaiah 9:6) who spoke the worlds into existence (Psalm 33:6, 9), and who is “upholding all things by the word of His power” (Hebrews 1:3). His word has creative power, and if we receive it by faith, it will change our hearts and lives, and give us victory over sin. (John 1:12; Genesis 1:3; 2 Corinthians 4:5, 6; Matthew 5:16; Isaiah 60:1) FAFA 70.2

As the crowning act on the sixth day, the Lord made man in His own image, and then He “rested on the seventh day” from a “finished” work.. (Genesis 1:27, 31; 2:1-3) Thus the seventh day stood as a memorial and reminder of a finished work in Christ. And when man lost the image of God through sin, Christ came to restore in man that divine image by a new creation. (Colossians 3:10; Ephesians 4:24; 2:10; 2 Corinthians 5:17.) On the cross He cried out: “It is finished.” John 19:30. (See Hebrews 10:14.) This was on Friday evening, and He rested the Sabbath day from the work of redemption, just as He had originally rested on it from the work of creation. (Luke 23:52-56.) Thus the seventh-day Sabbath is Christ’s memorial of redemption as well as of the creation. (Ezekiel 20:12; Hebrews 13:8. See The Great Controversy, 769.) And both events were for the whole human race, and not for the Jews only. FAFA 70.3

Christ says: ” The Sabbath was made for man.” Mark 2:27. And therefore it was made when man was created. “So God created man in His own image .... And the evening and the morning were the sixth day .... And He rested on the seventh day.... And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it.” Genesis 1:27, 31; 2:2, 3. This was two thousand years before Abraham (the first Jew) was born, therefore the Sabbath could not be Jewish. But, as Christ says, it was,” made for man,” and the term “man” is not confined to any one race, but embraces all mankind. FAFA 71.1

We are not alone in believing that the Sabbath was instituted at creation, as the following quotations from leading men in different denominations show: FAFA 71.2

F. C. Cook, M. A., Canon of Exeter, says: FAFA 71.3

” ‘And God blessed the seventh day.’ The natural interpretation of these words is that the blessing of the Sabbath was immediately consequent on the first creation of man, for whom the Sabbath was made (Mark 2:27). It has been urged from the silence concerning its observance by the patriarchs, that no Sabbatic ordinance was really given until the promulgation of the law, and that this passage in Genesis is not historical but anticipatory. There are several objections, which seem fatal to this theory.” — “The Holy Bible, with an Explanatory and Critical Commentary by Bishops and Clergy of the Anglican Church,” Vol. I, p. 37. New York: 1875.

Thomas Hamilton, D. D., in his Five-Hundred-Dollar Prize Essay, meets this objection to the historicity of Genesis in the following forceful way: FAFA 71.4

“Palcy ... says: ‘The words [of Genesis 2:1-3] do not assert that God then blessed and sanctified the seventh day.’ ... But such an interpretation really amounts to an interpolation. It alters the passage.... Once admit such a mode of dealing with Scripture, or of dealing with any other book, and we may bid farewell to certainty regarding any author’s meaning.... No history could stand if subjected to such treatment. The plainest and most unvarnished statements might be so twisted and distorted as to bear a meaning the exact contrary to that intended by its author.... FAFA 72.1

“It is not only said God ‘rested,’ but He ‘blessed,’ the day and ‘sanctified’ it.... If all this do [sic.] not amount to the institution of a weekly Sabbath for man in all time coming.... we fail to see what intelligible meaning or purpose is to be extracted from the narrative.” — “Our Rest Day,” pp. 10-15, New edition. Edinburgh: 1888. FAFA 72.2

Dr. Martin Luther says on this text: FAFA 72.3

“God blessed the Sabbath and sanctified it to Himself. It is moreover to be remarked that God did this to no other creature. God did not sanctify to Himself the heaven nor the earth nor any other creature. But God did sanctify to Himself the seventh day. This was especially designed of God, to cause us to understand that the ‘seventh day’ is to be especially devoted to divine worship.... FAFA 72.4

“it follows therefore from this passage, that if Adam had stood in his innocence and had not fallen he would yet have observed the ‘seventh day’ as sanctified, holy and sacred.... Nay, even after the fall he held the ‘seventh day’ sacred; that is, he taught on that day his own family. This is testified by the offerings made by his two sons, Cain and Abel. The Sabbath therefore has, from the beginning of the world, been set apart for the worship of God.... For all these things are implied and signified in the expression ‘sanctified.’ FAFA 72.5

“Although therefore man lost the knowledge of God by sin, yet God willed that this command concerning the sanctifying of the Sabbath should remain. He willed that on the seventh day both the word should be preached, and also those other parts of His worship performed which He Himself instituted.” — “Commentary on Genesis,” Vol. I, pp. 138-140, translation by Professor J. N. Lenker, D. D., Minneapolis: 1901; and also “Copious Explanation of Genesis,” Vol. I, pp. 62, 68. Christiania: 1863. FAFA 72.6

The following words from a distinguished Hebrew scholar are worthy of note here: FAFA 73.1

“‘Finished.’ To finish a work, in Hebrew conception, is to cease from it, to have done with it. On the seventh day. The seventh day is distinguished from all the preceding days by being itself the subject of the narrative. In the absence of any work on this day, the Eternal is occupied with the day itself, and does four things in reference to it. First, He ceased from His work which He had made. Secondly, He rested.... Thirdly, He blessed the seventh day.... In the fourth place, He hallowed it or set it apart to a holy rest....

“The present record is a sufficient proof that the original institution was never forgotten by man.... FAFA 73.2

“Incidental traces of the keeping of the Sabbath are found in the record of the Deluge, when the sacred writer has occasion to notice short intervals of time. The measurement of time by weeks then appears (Genesis 8:10, 12). The same division of time again comes up in the history of Jacob (Genesis 29:27, 28). This unit of measure is traceable to nothing but the institution of the seventh-day rest. “A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Book of Genesis with a New Translation,” J. G. Murphy, D. D., T. C. D. (Professor of Hebrew, Belfast), pp. 70,71. Andover: 1866. FAFA 73.3

Dr. J. P. Lange says: “The expression, He hallowed it, must be for man, for all men who were to be on the earth. FAFA 73.4

“If we had no other passage than this of Genesis 2:3 there would be no difficulty in deducing from it a precept for the universal observance of a Sabbath, or the seventh day, to be devoted to God, as holy time, by all of that race for whom the earth and its nature were especially prepared. The first man must have known it. The words ‘He hallowed it,’ can have no meaning otherwise. They would be a blank unless in reference to some who were required to keep it holy.” — Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, John Peter Lange, D. D., Vol. I, pp. 196, 197. New York: 1884. FAFA 73.5

Dr. M. W. Jacobus, Professor George Bush, and C. O. Rosenius, and others forcefully emphasize the same facts. The preceding statements taken from leading men in different denominations need no comment. They state the plain facts of the Bible narrative in their most natural setting. FAFA 74.1

Another remarkable thing in this connection is the fact that the heathen nations for centuries after the days of Noah retained the seventh-day Sabbath. The learned Dr. John Kitto says: FAFA 74.2

“We find from time immemorial the knowledge of a week of seven days among all nations - Egyptians, Arabians, Indians - in a word, all the nations of the East, have in all ages made use of this week of seven days, for which it is difficult to account without admitting that this knowledge was derived from the common ancestors of the human race.” — Encyclopedia of Biblical Literature, Vol. II, art. “Sabbath,” p. 655. FAFA 74.3

Professor A. H. Sayce declares: FAFA 74.4

“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 Sabattu 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,” pp. 74, 75.

During their servitude in Egypt, the majority of the Jews evidently worked on the Sabbath, just as the rank and file of the Jews do today, but the knowledge of it was retained then as now, and it was kept holy by a faithful few. Besides other evidences, we see this is from the fact that, thirty days after they left Egypt, and more than two weeks before the law was given on Sinai, God tested the people on Sabbath-keeping (Exodus 16:4, 27, 28), which He certainly could not have done, if the Sabbath had not been known among them till the law was given on Sinai. Then, too, God speaks of it as a familiar institution. (Compare Exodus 16:28 with Genesis 26:5 and 2:3) The fourth commandment itself points back to creation and commands us to “remember the Sabbath day” on which He rested at the close of creation week. (Exodus 20:8, 11) No human logic can therefore explain away the historical facts that the Sabbath was set apart for man at creation. FAFA 74.5