Parthenos (2)

part 1 2 3

by Domenico Lembo

Th100:2b-3 (82%) || Mk12:17b (82%); Lk20:25b (82%); Mt22:21c (82%) 8. Give to beggars (Q): Lk6:30a (81%) || Mt5:42a (81%) {also Didache 1:5a} 9. The Samaritan (Lk): Lk10:30-35 (81%) 10. Congrats, hungry! (Q, Th): Lk6:21a (79%) || Mt5:6 (59%); Th69:2 (53%) 11. Congrats, sad! (Q): Lk6:21b (79%) || Mt5:4 (73%) 12. Shrewd manager (Lk): Lk16:1-8a (77%) 13. Vineyard laborers (Mt): Mt20:1-15 (77%) 14. Abba, Father (Q): Mt6:9b (77%) || Lk11:2c (77%) 15. Mustard seed (Th, Mk, Q):
Th20:2-4 (76%) || Mk4:30-32 (74%); Lk13:18-19 (69%); Mt13:31-32 (67%) ---
Red Totals:
Lk: 12 [6:29a (92%); 6:29b (90%); 6:20 (91%); 6:27b (84%); 13:20-21 (83%);
20:25b (82%) 6:30a (81%); 10:30-35 (81%); 6:21a (79%); 6:21b (79%);
16:1-8a (77%); 11:2c (77%)]
Q: 11
Mt: 9 [5:39 (92%); 5:40 (92%); 5:41 (90%); 13:33 (82%); 22:21c (82%);
5:42a (81%); 5:44b (77%); 20:1-15 (77%); 6:9b (77%)] Th: 3 [54 (90%); 100:2b-3 (82%); 20:2-4 (76%)] Mk: 1 [12:17b (82%)]
Quad attestation: 2 [7 Th-Mk-Lk-Mt; 15 Th-Mk-Lk-Mt] Triple attestation: 3 [3 Lk-Th-Mt; 6 Lk-Mt-Th; 10 Lk-Mt-Th] Double attestation: 6 [1 Mt-Lk; 2 Mt-Lk; 5 Lk-Mt; 8 Lk-Mt; 11 Lk-Mt; 14 Mt-Lk] Single attestation: 4 [4 Mt; 9 Lk; 12 Lk; 13 Mt] ---
SV translation notes:
Mk12:13-17 Again Jesus outsmarts those setting out to trap him. Jesus *dumbfounds* them when he avoids sounding like a dangerous revolutionary, by not refusing to pay taxes to the Romans, but also avoids looking like a collaborator, when he points out the coin (which Mark calls by its Latin name, *denarius*), comes from the Roman emperor anyway.
Mt5:41 *Conscription* was a common and oppressive way of raising troops.
Mt13:33 The ancients viewed the process of leaven as corrupting the loaf, like a corpse, causing it to swell up. Therefore leaven is unclean, something to be avoided (16:11). Leaven is the symbol of the unholy (Ex12:15).
Mt20:2 This *silver coin* is a *denarius*, a subsistence wage for a laborer.
Mt20:15 The master accuses the laborers of giving him the "evil eye," an expr- esion for putting a curse on someone, still common in the Mediterranean world.
Lk6:20 *Congratulations* (makarios): traditionally translated as "blessed." "Congratulations" better expresses the performative language of the Beatitudes, which grant the recipient recognition of good fortune.
Lk6:29 The *coat* and *shirt* are the full-length outer & under garments worn in the ancient world. One who lacked both garments would be nearly nude.
Lk10:31-32 Contact with corpses made one unclean, so priests and levites would have good reason to avoid what seemed to be a corpse.
Lk10:32 *Levite*: a layman with special religious duties and privileges in teaching and worship.
Lk10:35 The silver coins are denarii, each worth a day's wages for a laborer.
Lk12:1 *Leaven* was a metaphor for a pervasive evil influence. See Paul's use of it in 1 Cor 5:6-7 and Gal 5:9.
Lk13:21 *leaven*: See the note on 12:1
---
References:
The Complete Gospels, Robert Miller ed., Jesus Seminar (Funk & Crossan),
Polebridge Press, Sonoma, CA, 1992, ISBN:0-944344-30-5 The Five Gospels, Robert Funk, Roy Hoover, Jesus Seminar (Funk & Crossan),
Polebridge Press, Sonoma, CA, 1993, ISBN:0-02-541949-8 ::::::::::::::
sabbath
::::::::::::::
From: Timothy.Poe@lambada.oit.unc.edu (Timothy Poe) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian.bible-study Subject: Sabbath Admissions 1of5
Message-ID:
Date: 10 Apr 93 01:03:46 GMT
References:

The following are a list of Admissions about the Sabbath from various denominations. The list was not compiled by myself, however any errors are probably due to my OCR software so e-mail me and I'll send you the corrected citation.

I. Part One - Protestant Admissions

METHODIST

"It is true, there is no positive command for infant baptism,...nor is there any for keeping holy the first day of the week." Amos Binney. Methodist Episcopal Theological Commend, p. 103

"If we believe that the Sabbath came as a revelation from God to man we are standing firmly on the teachings of the Bible. There are no Biblical grounds for keeping the first day of the week as the Sabbath. Certain it is that Jesus, His disciples and the early Church were Sabbath-keepers." Ismar J. Peritz, lecture at Syracuse University

"There is not on record any Divine command issued to the apostles to change the Sabbath from the day on which it was held by the Jews to the first day of the week." Richard Watson, Biblical and Theological Dictionary, p. 907

"The Sabbath, instituted in the beginning, and confirmed, again and again, by Moses and the prophets, has never been abrogated. A part of the moral law, not a jot or tittle of its sanctity has been taken away." Methodist pastoral letter, New York Herald, Dee. 27, 1874

" 'Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy', is a command of perpetual obligation, and can never be superseded but by the final termination of time. As a type of that rest which remains for the people of God, of an eternity of bliss, it must continue in full force till that eternity arrive." Adam Clarke, Commentary, on Colossians 2

"It must be confessed that there is no law in the New Testament concerning the first day." Charles Buck, A Theological Dictionary , p. 403

"Take the matter of Sunday...There is no passage telling Christians to keep that day, or to transfer the Jewish Sabbath to that day." Harris Franklin Rail, Christian Advocate, July 8, 1942

"The Sabbath was made for man not for the Hebrews, but for all men." E. O. Haven, Pillars of Truth, p. 88

"The reason we observe the first day instead of the seventh is based on no positive command. One will search the Scriptures in vain for authority for changing from the seventh day to the first. Our Christian Sabbath, therefore, is not a matter of positive command." Cloves G. Chappell, Ten Rules for Living, p. 61

"Constantine...made Sun-day the Christian Sabbath, because of the blessings of light and heat which came from the sun, So our Sunday is a sun-day, isn't it?" Sunday School Advocate, Dec. 31, 1921

LUTHERAN

"The festival of Sunday, like all other festivals, was always only a human ordinance, and far was far from the intention 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." Augustus Meander, History of the Christian Religion and Church, p. 186

"Scripture has in no way ordained the first day of the week in place of the Sabbath. There is simply no law in the New Testament to that effect." John Theodore Mueller, Sabbath or Sunday, pp. 15-16

"The observance of the Lord's Day (Sunday) is founded not on any command of God, but on the authority of the church." Augsburg Confession, part 2, chapter lO section 10

"For they that fudge that by the authority of the Church the observance of Sunday instead of the Sabbath was ordained as a thing necessary, do greatly err...it appears that the Church did appoint Sunday, which day pleased them rather than the Sabbath day." Augsburg Confession, Article 28

"They (the Catholics) allege the Sabbath changed into Sunday, the Lord's Day, contrary to the decalogue, as it appears, neither is there any more example boasted of than the changing of the Sabbath day. Great, say they, is the power and authority of the church, since it dispensed with one of the Ten Commandments." Augsburg Confession, Article 28, par. 9

"The taking over of Sunday by the early Christians is, to my mind, an exceedingly important Symptom that the early Church was directly influenced by a spirit which does not originate in the gospel, nor in the Old Testament, but in a religious system foreign to it." H. Gunkel, Zum reliqionsgosh. Verstaendnis des. N.T., p. 76

PRESBYTERIAN

"The Sabbath was founded on a specfic and divine commandment. It is not so with Sunday. One cannot find in the New Testament a positive rule about keeping the first day. One cannot appeal to Christ in the matter. We must not suppose that Jesus set aside the Sabbath day." John Alexander Hayes, The Ten Commandments

"No one who wants an itemized scheme of Sunday-keeping can obtain any such thing either from Paul or the Lord. Why not then, revert to the Old Testament, and be contented simply to found a sermon on Sunday-keeping upon the basis of the fourth commandment? Because that would get us into more difficulties than it would get us out of...The fourth commandment does not cover the Christian Sabbath...We do not keep the fourth commandment by hallowing one day in seven, unless it is the seventh day that we hallow." Charles H. Parkhurst, Sermon, Christian Union, Jan. 24, 1886

"The observance of the seventh day Sabbath did not cease till it was abolished after the empire became Christian." American Presbyterian Board of Publication, Tract No. 118

"The Sabbath is a part of the decalogue -- the Ten Commandments. This alone forever settles the question as to the perpetuity of the institution...
Until, therefore, it can be shown that the whole moral law has been repealed, the Sabbath will stand...The teaching of Christ confirms the perpetuity of the Sabbath." T. C. Blake, Theology Condensed, pp. 474-475

"There is no record, no express command, authorizing this change" (from Sabbath to Sunday). N. W. Rice, The Christian Sabbath

"Some have tried to build the observance of Sunday upon apostolic command, whereas the apostles gave no command on the matter at all...The truth is, as soon as we appeal to the literal writing of the Bible, the Sabbatarians have the best of the argument...While the Sabbath and Sabbath rest are woven into the warp and woof of Scripture, it is now seen, as it is admitted, that we must go to later than apostolic times for the establishment of Sunday observance. " The Christian at Work, April 19, 1883, and January, 1884

"No precept for it (Sunday) is found in the New Testament." Albert Barnes

"God instituted the Sabbath at the creation of man, setting apart the seventh day for that purpose, and imposed its observance as a universal and perpetual moral obligation upon the race." Archibald Hedge, Tract No. 175, pp. 3-4

"For the permanency of the Sabbath, however. we might argue its place in the decalogue, where it stands enshrined among the moralities of a rectitude that is immutable and everlasting."
Thomas Chalmers, Sermons, Vol. I, pp. 51-52

BAPTIST

"The moment that the Son of man -- even the Lawgiver greater than Moses -- speaks, saying, 'The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath,' we feel that He speaks, not as a Jew to Jews, but as the Divine Man to men, instantly raising the Sabbath from a Jewish ordinance to a human necessity.
Indeed, if we base the Sabbath on the Decalogue, I do not see but that we are bound to keep Saturday."
George Dana Board man, University Lectures on the Ten Commandments, p. 130

"Some Baptists are fond of demanding a 'Thus said the Lord' for everything and profess to accept nothing for which explicit authority cannot be produced from the Word of God. Probably not a reader of this paragraph would be willing to follow this principle to its legitimate conclusion. It would involve the immediate return to Sabbath worship, the abolition of Sunday schools." The Baptist Examiner, January 4, 1894

"There was never any formal or authoritae from the Jewish seventh- day Sabbath to the Christian first-day observance." William Owen Carver, The Lord's Day in Our Day, p. 49

"The Sabbath was established originally (long before Moses) in no special connection with the Hebrews, but as an institution for all mankind, in commemoration for God's rest after the six days of creation. It was designed for all the descendants of Adam." Adult Quarterly, Southern Baptist Convention series, Aug. 15, 1937

"There was and is a commandment to keep holy the Sabbath day, but that Sabbath day was not Sunday. It will be said, however...that the Sabbath was transferred from the seventh to the first day of the week, with all its duties, privileges, and sanctions....I ask, where can the record of such a transaction be found? Not in the New Testament, absolutely not.
There is no Scriptural evidence to the change of the Sabbath institution from the seventh to the first day of the week. To me it seems unaccountable that Jesus, during three years' intercourse with His disciples, often con- versing with them upon the Sabbath question...never alluded to any trans- ference of the day: also, that during forty days of His resurrection life, no such thing was intimated...Of course, I quite well know that Sunday did come into use in early Christian history as a religious day...But what a pity that it comes branded with the mark of paganism, and christened with the name of the sun god."
Edward T. Hiscox, a lecture before Baptist ministers, No. 13, 1893 reported in the New York Examiner, Nov. 16, 1893.

"One thing may be accepted as settled, taking the New Testament as our guide -- and we have no other -- there is no Scriptural authority for a change of the Sabbath from the seventh to the first day of the week. If Sunday is to be regarded as the Sabbath instead of Saturday, it must be justified on other grounds."
Edward T. Hiscox, Introduction to Tests of Faith, by Henry B. Master

"The Scripture nowhere calls the first day of the week the Sabbath...There is no Scriptural authority for so doing, nor, of course, any Scriptural obligation." The Watchman

"The law proclaimed from Sinai recognized the primitive order and universal obligation of the Sabbath....It will never cease to be binding till revoked by the sovereignty which established it." W. W. Evarts, The Sabbath: Its Defense, p. 16

EPISCOPAL

"There is no word, no hint, in the New Testament, about abstaining from work on Sunday. Into the rest of Sunday no divine law enters." Eyton, The Ten Commandments, pp. 62-63

"Not any ecclesiastical writer of the first three centuries attributed the origin of Sunday observance either to Christ or His disciples...Centuries of the Christian era passed away before Sunday was observed by the Christian church is the Sabbath. It is certain that our Lord when on earth did observe Saturday, and rift not observe Sunday. If they are consistent they must keep Saturday, not Sunday, as a day of rest." Sir William Domville, Examination of the Six Texts

From: Timothy.Poe@lambada.oit.unc.edu (Timothy Poe) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian.bible-study Subject: Sabbath Admissions 2of5
Message-ID:
Date: 10 Apr 93 01:03:49 GMT

"We cannot take this commandment of the Sabbath as an obligation to us to keep the first day of the week. For if we are to keep the day as binding on us...the substitution of the first (day) is unwarrantable." E. A. Washburn, The Social Law of God

"Is there any command in the New Testament to change the day of weekly rest from Saturday to Sunday? None."
Manual of Christian Doctrine, p. 127

"The seventh day, the commandment says, is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.
No kind of arithmetic, no kind of almanac can make seven equal to one or the seventh mean the first, nor Saturday mean Sunday...The fact is that we are all Sabbath-breakers, every one of us." George Hodges, Pittsburg Dispatch

"No regulations for its (Sunday's) observance are laid down in the New Testament, nor, indeed, is its observance even enjoined." Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, art. "Sunday"

"The Lord's day did not succeed in the place of the Sabbath. The Lord's day was merely an ecclesiastical institution. The primitive Christians did all manner of work on the Lord's Day, even in times of persecution, when they are the strictest observers of all the divine commandments: but in this they knew there was none."
Jeremy Taylor, Ductor Dubitantium, vol. ix, pp. 458, 464

"The Bible commandment says on the seventh day thou shalt rest. That is Saturday. Nowhere in the Bible is it left down that worship should be done on Sunday." Philip Carrington, Toronto Daily Star, October 26, 1949

"We have made the change from the-seventh day to the first day, from Saturday to Sunday, on the authority of the one holy Catholic Church." Seymour, Why We Keep Sunday

"There is no authority in the whole of the New Testament to Christians to change the Sabbath into Sunday."
D. Morse-Boycott, London Daily Herald, February 26, 1931

"The Christian church made no formal, but a gradual and almost unconscious transference of the one day to the other " F. W. Ferrer, The Voice from Sinai p. 167

"Take which you will, either of the Fathers, or the Moderns, and we shall find no Lord's day instituted by an Apostolical Mandate, no Sabbath set on foot by them upon the first day of the week." Peter Heylyn, History cry of the sabbath, pi. 2, ch. 1, p. 28

"Where are we told in Scripture that we are to keep the first day at all?
We are commanded to keep the seventh; but we are nowhere commanded to keep the first day. The reason why we keep the first day of the week holy instead of the seventh is ... not because the Bible, but the church has enjoined it. We therefore conclude, that no doubt, with respect to the Fourth Commandment also, (Christ) will require it to be observed far more strictly and more carefully fulfilled by us... than ever it was done in the rightuousness of the Scribes and Pharisees." Isaac Williams, Plain Sermons on the Catechism, Vol. 1,pp. 334-336

"The day is now changed from the Seventh to the First day... but as we meet with no scriptural direction for the change, we may conclude it was done by the authority of the Church." Explanation of Catechism

Congregationalist

"The Christian Sabbath (Sunday) is not in the Scripture, and was not by the primitive church called the Sabbath" Timothy Dwight, Theology, Sermon 107, Vol. 4, p.49

"It is quite clear that, however, ridgidly or devoutly we may spend Sunday, we are not keeping the Sabbath... the Sabbath was founded on a specific, divine command. We can plead no such command for the obligation to observe Sunday... There is not a single sentance in the New Testament to suggest that we incur any penalty by violating the supposed sanctity of Sunday." Robert W. Dale, The Ten Commandments, pp. 127-129

"Much has been made of the attitude of Christ in speech and deed toward the Sabbath. Some have imagined that by words He uttered and by deeds He did He relaxed the binding nature of the old command. This view, however, is to absolutely misunderstand and misinterpret the doing and the teaching of Jesus" G. Campell Morgan, The Ten Commandments, p.50

"So far from abrogating the Sabbath law, Christ prophesied that disciples would observe it long years after his death should rend the temple veil and the ceremonial law. He said in His prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem, 'Pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the Sabbath Day' (Matt. 24:20)." Wilbur F. Crafts, The Sabbath for Man, p. 372

"There is no command in the Bible requiring us to observe the first day of the week as the Christian Sabbath."
Oscar Fowler, Mode and Subjects of Baptism

" The current notion that Christ and His apostles authoritatively substituted the first day for the seventh, is absolutely without any authority in the New Testament." Lyman Abbott, Christian Union, January 19, 1882

"A further argument for the perpetuity of the Sabbath we have in Matthew 24:20, ...the final destruction of Jerusalem was after the dissolution of the Jewish constitution, and after the Christian dispensation was fully set up. is plainly implied in these words of the Lord, that even then Christians were bound to a strict observation of the Sabbath." The Works of President Edwards, vol. IV, pp. 621-622

DISCIPLES OF CHRIST

"There is no direct Scriptural authority for designating the first day the Lord's day." - D. H. Lucas, Christian Oracle, January 23, 1890

"The first day of the week is commonly called the Sabbath. This is a mistake.
The Sabbath of the Bible was the day just preceding the first day of the week.
The first day of the week is never called the Sabbath anywhere in the entire Scriptures. It is also an error to talk about the change of the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday. There is not in any place in the Bible any intimation of such a change." First-Day Observance, pp. 17, 19

"There is no law in the New Testament prescribing the first day of the week as the 'Sabbath."' Alexander Campbell, Memoirs, vol. 1, p. 526

"I do not believe that the Lord's day came in the room of the Jewish Sabbath, or that the Sabbath was changed from the seventh to the first day, for this plain reason, that where there is no authority, there can be no faith. Now there is no testimony in all the oracles of heaven that the Sabbath was changed, or that the Lord's day came in the room of it...
There is no divine testimony that the Sabbath was changed, or that the Lord's day came in the room of it: therefore, there can be no divine faith that the Sabbath was changed or that the Lord's day came in the room of it." Alexander Campbell, Washington (Pa.) Reporter, Oct. 8, 1821

MORMON

"The acceptance of the Latter-day Saints of what is usually called the 'Christian Sabbath' or 'Lord's Day'; as the proper day of special service and worship of the Lord is sometimes challenged...It must still be confessed that (the evidence for Sunday) falls somewhat short of being conclusive. It cannot be made out clearly and positively that Jesus or the apostles by direct, official action authorized the observance of the first day of the week as a day of public worship, dedicated to the service of God, and designed to take the place of the Jewish Sabbath. The most that can be claimed for the evidence here adduced -- and it is the strongest if not all that can be marshaled in support of the proposition -- is that it is probable that such a change was instituted." Brigham H. Roberts, The Lord's Day, pp. 3, 10-11

MISCELLANEOUS

"The Lordian supper was instituted by the Savior, whereas the Lordian day (Sunday) was not." A. M. Weston, The Evolution of a Shadow, p. 188

"The law of the fourth commandment given by the Lord to Moses was the law of the Sabbath that was made for man. This is the Sabbath law of Christ- endom today." George Guirey, The Hallowed Day, p. 4

"It is plain that law does not originate with Moses, for the fourth commandment refers to an existing institution with the word 'Remember.' As the distinction of clean and unclean does not begin with the law of Moses, but is found in the days of Noah, so the injunction touching the Sabbath is based upon practices earlier than the leading of the Hebrews out of Egypt." John Wakefort, Plain Sermons on Sunday Observances, p. 80

"If there were found in the New Testament any text-explicitly requiring the observance of the first day of the week, for example, as a holy day, that text would be in such manifest and glaring contrast with the whole spirit of the remaining contents of the New Testament, that its spuriousness would be prima facts probable." George B. Bacon, The Sabbath Question, p. 96

"Sunday is an invention of the Christian Churches. " Arthur Bushman McGiffort, Jr., The Christian Century, June 29, 1942

"The seventh-day Sabbath was...solemnized by Christ, the apostles, and the primitive Christians, till the Laodicean Council rift in a manner quite abolish the observance of ft. The council of Laodicea (A.D. 364)...first settled the observance of Sunday."
William Pryne, Dissertation on the Lord's Day, pp. 33-34

"The sabbath then, is not an invention of man's, but a creation of God's.
It is in the power of no man to unmake the Sabbath, or to remake it. It is true enough that we have no record of our Lord's requiring a change in the day of the observance of the Sabbath. Neither has any of the Apostles to whom He committed the task of founding His church given us such a commandment."
The New York Sabbath Committee, Sunday, The World's Rest Day, pp. 64-6

"There is no direct command on the subject (of Sunday-observance). The only obligation resting upon us to observe Sunday is that which comes up through our nature." Henry Ward Beeches, Bible Studies, p. 242

"We have abundant evidence both in the New Testament and in the early history of the Church to prove that gradually Sunday came to be observed instead of the Jewish Sabbath, apart from any specific commandment." Norman C. Beck, Moody Monthly, November, 1936

From: Timothy.Poe@lambada.oit.unc.edu (Timothy Poe) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian.bible-study Subject: Sabbath Admissions 3of5
Message-ID:
Date: 10 Apr 93 01:03:52 GMT

"The Sabbath was binding in Eden, and it has been in force ever since.
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 honestly believe that this commandment is just as binding today as it ever was. I have talked with men who have said that it has been abrogated, but they have never been able to point to any place in the Bible where God repealed it.
When Christ was on earth, He did nothing to set it aside." Dwight L. Moody, Weighed and Wanting, pp. 46-47

"The Sabbath is commanded to be kept on the seventh day. It would not be kept on any other day. To observe the first day of the week or the fourth is not to observe the Sabbath...It was the last day of the week, after six days of work, that was to be kept holy. The observance of no other day would fulfill the law."
H.J.. Flowers The Permanent Value of the Ten Commandments, p. 131

"With all (the) weight of Scripture authority for keeping the Sabbath or seventh day holy, Protestants of all denominations make this a profane day and transfer the obligation of it to the first day of the week, or the Sunday. Now what authority have they for doing this? None at all but the unwritten word, or tradition of the Catholic Church." John Milner, The End of Religious Controversy, p. 71

"It is commonly believed that the Jewish Sabbath was changed into the Lord's day by Christian emperors, and they know little who do not know that the ancient Sabbath rift remain and was observed by the eastern churches three hundred years after our Savior's passion." Edward Brerewood, A Learned Treatise of the Sabbath, p. 77

"The Sabbath is of perpetual obligation as God's appointed memorial of His creating activity. The Sabbath requisition antedates the decalogue and forms a part of the moral law. Made at the creation, it applies to man as man, everywhere and always...Neither our Lord nor His apostles abrogated the Sabbath of the decalogue. The new dispensation...declares its observance to be of divine origin and to be a necessity of human nature." Augustus H. Strong, Systematic Theology, pp. 408-409

"The change from Sabbath to Sunday was the result of a long historic process...When Christianity was predominantly Jewish, the Sabbath was the official Christian day of rest and worship." Abraham E. Mailgram, The Sabbath, p. 364 (Jewish)

"The Jews have the Word of God for their Saturday, since it is the seventh day solemn. And we have not the word of God for us but rather against us: for we keep not the seventh...but the first, which is not commanded by God's Law. " Frith, Works, p. 198

"The seventh day of the week has been deposed from its title to obligatory Religious observance, and its prerogative has been carried over to the first under no direct precept of Scripture." William E. Gladstone, Later Gleaninqs, p. 342

"That began, however, as a pagan ordinance, ended as a Christian regulation." Hunter Webster, Rest Days, p. 270

"Now, there is no commandment in the New Testament to observe Sunday as a day of rest." Orval Eland Keller, Seventh-Dayism X-rayed, p. 98

"The observance of the Sabbath is enforced in...the Decalogue and throughout the Old Testament. On the other hand, there is not a single specific command to observe Sunday in the New Testament. The Sabbath can be legitimately observed only on the seventh day." F. H. Charles, The Decalogue, p. 153

"Why Sunday? What does that prove? Nothing in the Bible says go to Church on Sunday. What do you prove if you go'" Will Oursler, address reported in the Indianapolis Star , March 5, 1969

ATHEISTS

"Since the establishment of the Christian religion, the day (the Sabbath) has been changed, and Christians do not regard the day as holy upon which God actually rested, and which He sanctified...It is not easy to see where Christians got the right to disregard the direct command of God...The Sabbath of God is Saturday. and if any day is to be kept holy, that is the one, and not the Sunday of the Christians." Robert G. Ingersoll, Some Mistakes of Moses, p. 106

"I challenge any priest or minister of the Christian religion, to show me that slightest authority for the religious observance of Sunday. The claim that Sunday takes the place of Saturday...is so utterly absurd as to be hardly worth considering." Henry M. Taber, faith or sect, pp. 114, 116

REFERENCE WORKS

"In the Middle Ages Sabbath meant only Saturday. First used in England for Sunday in 1554." American Encyclopedia, art. "Sabbath"

"In the Christian church the first day of the week has been substituted for the last. There is no explicit command on the subject." Philip Chaff, A Dictionary of the Bible, art. "Sabbath"

"By none of the Fathers before the fourth century is it (Sunday) identified with the Sabbath, nor is the duty of observing it grounded by them, either on the fourth commandment, or on the precept of Christ or his apostles " Chambers Encyclopedia, art. "Sabbath"

"The notion of a formal substitution by apostolic authority of the Lord's Day (Sunday) for the Jewish Sabbath...and the transference to it...of the sabbatical obligation established by the promulgation of the Fourth Commandment, has no basis whatsoever, either in Holy Scripture or in Christian antiquity." Smith and Cheethan, A Dictionary of Christian Antiquities, art. "Sabbath," p. 1823

"It must be confessed that there is no law in the New Testament concerning the first day."
McClintock and Strong, Cyclopedia, of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature, Vol. 9, p. 196

"The church itself by provincial constitutions and other means declared the sanctity of the day (Sunday) and was strong enough to visit with its own censures those who failed to observe Sunday." Encyclopedia Britannica, vol. xxii, p. 655

"It (the Catholic Church) has reversed the fourth commandment, doing away with the Sabbath of God's Word, and instituting Sunday as a holy day." N. Summerbell, History of the Christians, p. 418

"No positive command authorizes the universal usage with regard to the Christian Sabbath day: that the change is authorized must be settled by a weighing of evidence." James Ore, International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Vol. 1, art. "Baptism", p 391

"In the celebration of Sunday as it was introduced by Constantine and still continues on the whole continent of Europe, the cultus of the old Sun-god Apollo mingles with the remembrance of the resurrection of Christ." Philip Chaff. Church History, p. 375

"Gradually the seventh day Sabbath was abandoned and the first day adopted, though without any Biblical authority, as the rest day." Webster's Encyclopedic Dictionary , p. 416

We have now seen the frank, unblushing admissions of Sunday-keeping writers and theologians of several Protestant denominations. We have seen how reference works and even atheists can see the truth that the Bible never commands that Sunday should be observed as the day of Christian worship.
Next let us see what Catholic writers have to say about the possibility of a change from Saturday to Sunday. Do they believe the Bible authorizes it?

II. Part Two - Catholic Admissions

"But you may read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and you will not find a single line authorizing the sanctfication of Sunday. The Scriptures enforce the religious observance of Saturday, a day which we never sanctify." James Cardinal Gibbons. Faith of Our Fathers. p. 89

"Nowhere in the bible is it stated that worship should be changed from Saturday to Sunday."
Martin J. Scott, Things Catholics are as Asked About. p 136

"But-the Protestant says- How can I receive the teachings of an apostate Church? How, we ask, have you managed to receive her teachings all your life, in direct opposition to your recognized teacher, the Bible, on the Sabbath questions?" The Christian Sabbath, 1893, pp 29-30

"Nowhere in the Bible do we find that Christ or the Apostles order that the Sabbath be changed from Saturday to Sunday." Catholic Virginian, October 3, 1947

"From beginning to end of Scripture there is not a single passage that warrants the transfer of weekly public worship from the last day of the week to the first." Sydney (Australia) Catholic Press, Augusth, 26, 1900

"Every instructed man knows that there is no New Testament authority for the Change of the day of rest from the seventh to the first day of the week." John Snyder, St Louis Globe-Democrat Ed , April 3, 1887

"Does the Scripture anywhere command the Sunday to be kept for the Sabbath?
;...the Scriptures do not in particular mention this change of the Sabbath." Richard Challonor, The Catholic Christian Instructed, p. 202

"If you follow the Bible alone there can be no question that you are obliged to keep Saturday holy, since that is the day especially prescribed by Almighty God to be kept holy to the Lord." F. G. Lentz, The Question Box, p. 98

"...it cannot be said that Sunday observance is a New Testament institution in any sense of its having been an obligation binding upon Christians." L. Rumble, Churches of Christ and the disciples

"If we would consult the Bible only, without Tradition, we ought, for instance, still to keep Holy Saturday with the Jews, instead of Sunday." Joseph Deharbe, A Complete Catechism of the Catholic Religion, p. 82

"The Word of God commandeth the seventh day to be the Sabbath of the Lord, and to be kept holy. You (Protestants), without any precept of Scripture, change it to the first day of the week, only authorized by our traditions ...where is it decreed that the observance of the first day should abrogate or abolish the sanctifying of the seventh day, which God commanded ever- lastingly to keep holy?" Treatise of Thirty Controversies

"I...challenge...Protestants...to prove, by plain texts of Scripture, these questions concerning the obligation of the Christian Sabbath. 1. That Christians may work on Saturday, the old seventh day. 2. That they are bound to keep holy the first day, namely, Sunday. 3. That they are not bound to keep holy the seventh day also." W. Lockhart, Toronto (Catholic) Mirror

From: Timothy.Poe@lambada.oit.unc.edu (Timothy Poe) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian.bible-study Subject: Sabbath Admissions 4of5
Message-ID:
Date: 10 Apr 93 01:03:56 GMT

"...the Redeemer, during His mortal life, never kept any other day than Saturday. The Gospels plainly evince. this fact whilst, in the pages of the Acts of the Apostles, the Epistles and the Apocalypse, not the vestige of an act canceling the Saturday arrangement can be found." The Catholic Mirrors September 2, 1893

"It is impossible to find in the New Testament the slightest interference by the Savior, or His apostles, with the original Sabbath." The Catholic Mirror. September 9, 1893

"Reason and common sense demand the acceptance of one or the other of these alternatives: either Protestantism and the keeping holy of Saturday, or Catholicity and the keeping of Sunday. Compromise is impossible." James Cardinal Gibbons. Catholic Mirror, Dec. 23, 1893

So the Catholic Church admits there is no Scriptural authority for Sunday- keeping. Why, then, do they observe Sunday? And where do Protestants get authority for their Sunday-keeping? The Catholic Church freely admits she introduced Sunday-keeping and tries to say she has changed the day of worship.
As far as effect is concerned, she has changed the day of worship Since most churches follow her lead and keep Sunday, Certainly in fact and in truth no man can change God's Law. But the fact is and remains that Protestants got Sunday from the Catholics who got it from paganism. Sunday is a legacy the Protestants took with them when they broke off from Rome in the Reform- ation. The following Catholic quotations will show without any doubt the origin of Sunday-keeping in modern Christianity.

III. Part Three - Catholic Claims

"Sunday is a Catholic institution, and its claims to observance can be defended only on Catholic principles "
Sydney (Australia) Catholic Press, August 26, 1900

"But no authority for an obligation to observe that day (Sunday) can be found apart from the Catholic Church, the earliest legislation on the matter dating from the fourth century."
L. Rumble, Churches of Christ and the Disciples

"The Catholic Church for over one thousand years before the existence of a Protestant, by virtue of her divine mission, changed the day from Saturday to Sunday...The Christian Sabbath (Sunday) is, therefore, to this day, the acknowledged offspring of the Catholic Church...".
James Cardinal Gibbons, Catholic Mirror, Sept. 23, 1893

"We Catholics, then have precisely the same authority for keeping Sunday holy, instead of Saturday, as we have for every other article of our creed namely. the authority of 'the Church of the Living God'." Clifton Tracts, Vol iv, p. 15

"The observance of Sunday thus comes to be an ecclesiastical law entirely distinct from the divine law of the Sabbath observance...The author of the Sunday law is the only one who has a right to interpret that law and that author is the Catholic Church. They (Protestants) deem it their duty to keep the Sunday holy. Why? Because the Catholic Church tells them to do so. They have no other reason."
Walter Drum, The Ecclesiastical Review, Feb., 1914, pp. 230, 232, 236

"You (Protestants) will tell me that Saturday was the Jewish Sabbath, but that the Christian Sabbath has been changed to Sunday. Changed! But by whom? Who has the authority to change an express comandment of Almighty God? You go against the plain letter of the Bible, and put another day in the place of that day which the Bible has commanded." Burns and Oates, The Library of Christian Doctrine, , Pp. 3-4

"Have you any other way of proving that the church has power to institute festivals of precept? Had she not such power, she could not have done that in which all modern religionists agree with her. She could not have substituted the observance of Sunday the first day of the week, for the observance of Saturday the seventh day, a change for which there is no Scriptural authority." Stephen Keenan, A Doctrinal Catechism. p. 174

"By whom was it (the Sabbath) changed? By the governors of the church.
How prove you that the church has the power to command feasts and holy days?
By the very act of changing the Sabbath into Sunday which Protestants allow of...How prove you this? Because by keeping Sunday they acknowledge the church's power to ordain feasts. ." Henry Tuberville. Abridgement of Christian Doctrine , p. so

"Who changed the Sabbath? The holy Catholic Church...The Protestants are following the custom introduced by the holy Catholic church." C. F. Thomas letter for James Cardinal Gibbons, Feb. 25, 1892.

"Of course the Catholic Church claims that the change was her act...and the act is a mark of her ecclesiastical authority in religious things." C. F. Thomas, letter for James Cardinal Gibbons, Nov., 1895

"I write to assure you that you are correct. that Protestants, in observing the Sunday, are following,, not the Bible...but the tradition of the Church...The Catholic Church changed the day of rest from the last to the first day of the week ..They cannot prove their point from Scripture!
Therefore, if sincere, they must acknowledge that they draw their observance of the Sunday from tradition..."
W, A. Reaction, letter for James Cardinal Gibbons, Oct.. 3, 1889

"How do we keep the third commandment? We keep the third comandment by worshipping God in a special way and refraining from unnecessary work on Sunday. Why did the Church change the Lord's Day from the Sabbath to Sunday?
The Church, using the power of binding and loosing Christ gave to the pope, changed the Lord's Day to Sunday because it was on Sunday (the first day of the week) that Christ rose from the dead and that the Holy Spirit descended upon the apostles." James Killgallon and Gerard Weber, Life in Christ, p. 243

"This is, I admit as points of revealed truth what the Church declares the Apostles taught as such, whether clearly or not clearly expressed or not even mentioned in the written Word of God: as, for instance...that Sunday instead of Saturday (called the Sabbath) is to be kept holy." Joseph Fee di Brunt, Catholic Belief, p. 251

"Our Church...took the pagan Sunday and made it the Christian Sunday." Catholic World, March, 1894

"What day is the Sabbath? The seventh day, our Saturday. Do we keep the Sabbath? No, we keep the Lord's Day. Which is that? The first day: Sunday. Who changed it? The Catholic Church." James Bellord, A New Catechism of Christian Doctrine and Practice, pp. 86-87

"What is commanded by the third commandment? To sanctify the Sunday." James Butler, Catechism, p. 34

"But Protestants are consistent in calling their day of rest 'Sabbath ' for they have Scriptural ground for keeping the Sabbath, and none at all for observing Sunday. Sunday is founded, not on scripture but on tradition, and is distinctly a Catholic institution. As there is no Scripture for the transfer of the day of the week of rest from the last to the first day of the week, Protestants ought to keep their Sabbath on Saturday, and thus leave Catholics in full possession of Sunday." Record (Indianapolis, Indiana), September 17, 1891

"Thus the Biblical Christian who conscientiously clings to the Bible as his rule of faith...is sacrificing his own fixed religious principles to follow the command of the Catholic Church which requires the keeping of Sunday, rather than Saturday." Letters of Senex, p. 10

"The present generation of Protestants keep Sunday holy instead of Saturday, because they received it as a part of the Christian religion from the last generation...and so on, backward...until we come to the (so-called) Reformation, when...those who conducted the change of religion in this country left this particular portion of Catholic faith and practice untouched." A Question for All Bible Christians

"The Catholic Church of its own infallible authority created Sunday a holy day to take the place of the Sabbath of the old Law." Kansas City Catholic, February 9, 1893

"Of course the Catholic Church claims that the change (to Sunday) was her act...the act is a mark of her ecclesiastical power in religious matters." William Red way, letter for James Cardinal Gibbons

"What warrant have you for keeping the Sunday preferable to the ancient Sabbath which was Saturday? We have for it the authority of the Catholic Church and apostolic tradition. Does the Scripture anywhere command the Sunday to be kept for the Sabbath? ...the Scripture does not in particular mention this change of the Sabbath...Sundays and holy days all stand upon the same foundation, namely, the ordinance of the church ." Richard Challonor, The Catholic Christian Instructed acted, p. 202

"The Sunday, as a day of the week set apart for the obligatory public worship of Almighty God...is purely a creation of the Catholic Church...The day as one especially set apart had no authority but that of the Catholic Church...
The Catholic Church created the Sunday...Protestantism, in discarding the authority of the (Catholic) Church, has no good reason for its Sunday theory and ought, logically, to keep Saturday as the Sabbath...." James Gil Mary Shae, American Catholic Quarterly Review, Jan., 1883

"Which is the Sabbath day? Saturday is the Sabbath day. Why do we observe Sunday instead of Saturday? We observe Sunday instead of Saturday because the Catholic Church. in the Council of Laodicea (AND. 336), transferred the solemnity from Saturday to Sunday." Peter Geiermann, Convert's Catechism of Catholic Doctrine, p. 50

"It was the Catholic Church which, by the authority of Jesus Christ, has transferred this rest to the Sunday...Thus the observance of Sunday by the Protestants is an homage they pay, in spite of themselves. to the authority of the (Catholic) church."
Louis de Segur, Plain Talk about the Protestantism of Today, p. 213

"If the Bible is the only guide for the Christian, then (Sabbath keepers) are right in observing the Saturday with the Jew...Is it not strange that those who make the Bible their only teacher should inconsistently follow in this matter the tradition of the Catholic Church?" Bertrand L. Conway, The Question-box Answers, p. 254

"Today most Christians keep Sunday because it has been revealed to us by the (Catholic) church outside the Bible." Catholic Virginian, October 3, 1947

"Did the Jewish Church, at the time of Christ, and before that period keep the day of rest from five o'clock on Friday till five on Saturday? Yes, and yet Protestants keep their Sabbath from twelve on Saturday night to twelve on Sunday night, without Any warrant of Scripture. Nay, they oppose the Scripture...When Protestants do profane work upon Saturday...do they follow the Scripture?...On the contrary, they have only the authority of tradition for this practice....Is the observance of Sunday as the day of rest a matter clearly laid down in Scriptures It certainly is not." George Cormack, Controversial Catechism or Protestantism Refuted, p. so

"...if we followed the Bible only, we would keep holy the Saturday. Isn't the Sabbath Sunday? No! Well, did Christ change the day? We have no record that He did, but we have evidence that the Church did..." Knights of Columbus, Father Smith Instructs Jackson, p. 119

part 1 2 3