Testimony of Victorinus, Bishop of Petau

This person wrote about A. D. 300. His bishopric was in Germany. Of his work on the “Creation of the World.” only a fragment is now preserved. In the first section he speaks thus of the sanctification of the seventh day:-TFTC 100.2

“God produced that entire mass for the adornment of his majesty in six days; on the seventh to which he consecrated it [some words are here lost out of the text] with a blessing. For this reason, therefore, because in the septenary number of days both heavenly and earthly things are ordered, in place of the beginning. I will consider of this seventh day after the principle of all matters pertaining to the number seven.”TFTC 100.3

Victorinus, like some other of the fathers, held that the “true and just Sabbath should be observed in the seventh millenary.” He believed that the Sabbath was abolished by the Saviour. He was in sympathy with the act of the church of Rome in turning the Sabbath into a fast. He held to a two days weekly fast, as his words necessarily imply. He would have men fast on the sixth day to commemorate Christ’s death, and on the seventh, lest they should seem to keep the Sabbath with the Jews, but on the so-called Lord’s day they were to go forth to their bread with giving of thanks. Thus he reasons:-TFTC 101.1

“On this day [the sixth] also, on account of the passion of the Lord Jesus Christ, we make either a station to God, or a fast. On the seventh day he rested from all his works, and blessed it, and sanctified it. On the former day [the sixth] we are accustomed to fast rigorously, that on the Lord’s day we may go forth to our bread with giving of thanks. And let the parasceve [the sixth day] become a rigorous fast, lest we should appear to observe any Sabbath with the Jews, which Christ himself, the Lord of the Sabbath, says by his prophets that ‘his soul hateth;’ which Sabbath he in his body abolished, although, however, he had formerly himself commanded Moses that circumcision should not pass over the eighth day, which day very frequently happens on the Sabbath, as we read written in the gospel. Moses, foreseeing the hardness of that people, on the Sabbath raised up his hands, therefore, and thus fastened himself to a cross. And in the battle they were sought for by the foreigners on the Sabbath day, that they might be taken captive, and as if by the very strictness of the law, might be fashioned to the avoidance of its teachings.” Section 4.TFTC 101.2

These statements are in general of little consequence, but some of them deserve notice. First, we have one of the grand elements which contributed to the abandonment of the Sabbath of the Lord, viz., hatred toward the Jews for their conduct toward Christ. Those who acted thus forgot that Christ himself was the Lord of the Sabbath, and that it was his institution and not that of the Jews to which they were doing despite. Second, it was the church of Rome that turned the Sabbath into a fast one hundred years before this in order to suppress its observance, and Victorinus was acting under its instructions. Third, we have a reference to the so-called Lord’s day, as a day of thanksgiving, but no connection between it and the Sabbath is indicated; for in his time the change of the Sabbath had not been thought of. He has other reasons for neglecting the seventh day which here follows:-TFTC 101.3

“And thus in the sixth psalm for the eighth day, David asks the Lord that he would not rebuke him in his anger, nor judge him in his fury; for this is indeed the eighth day of that future judgment, which will pass beyond the order of the sevenfold arrangement. Jesus also, the son of Nave, the successor of Moses, himself broke the Sabbath day; for on the Sabbath day he commanded the children of Israel to go round the walls of the city of Jericho with trumpets, and declare war against the aliens. Matthias also, prince of Judah, broke the Sabbath; for he slew the prefect of Antiochus the king of Syria on the Sabbath, and subdued the foreigners by pursuing them. And in Matthew we read, that it is written Isaiah also and the rest of his colleagues broke the Sabbath - that that true and just Sabbath should be observed in the seventh millenary of years. Wherefore to those seven days the Lord attributed to each a thousand years; for thus went the warning: ‘In thine eyes, O Lord, a thousand years are as one day.’ Therefore in the eyes of the Lord each thousand of years is ordained, for I find that the Lord’s eyes are seven. Wherefore, as I have narrated, that true Sabbath will be in the seventh millenary of years, when Christ with his elect shall reign.” Section 5.TFTC 102.1

This completes the testimony of Victorinus. He evidently held that the Sabbath originated at the sanctification of the seventh day, but for the reasons here given, the most of which are trivial, and all of which are false, he held that it was abolished by Christ. His argument from the sixth psalm, and from Isaiah’s violation of the Sabbath, is something extraordinary. He had an excellent opportunity to say that though the seventh-day Sabbath was abolished, yet we have the Christian Sabbath on the Lord’s day to take its place. But he shows positively that he knew of no such institution; for he says, “That true and just Sabbath” will be “in the seventh millenary of years.”TFTC 102.2