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    SUNDAY-KEEPING OF HEATHEN ORIGIN

    The respect which the Gentiles had for the first day, or Sunday, while they were Pagans, contributed much to render its introduction easy, and its weekly celebration popular, among such materials as composed the body of the church of Rome in the second, third and fourth centuries. The observance of the first day of the week, as a festival of the Sun, was very general in those nations from which the Gentile church received her converts. That an idolatrous worship was paid to the Sun and other heavenly bodies by the Gentiles, the Old Testament abundantly testifies; and this kind of adoration paid to the Sun in later times, is so plainly a matter of historical record. Thomas Bampfield, an English writer of the seventeenth century, quoting Verstegan’s Antiquities, page 68, says: “Our ancestors in England, before the light of the Gospel came among them, went very far in this idolatry, and dedicated the first day of the week to the adoration of the idol of the Sun, and gave it the name of Sunday. This idol they placed in a temple, and there sacrificed to it.” He further states, that from his historical reading, he finds that a great part of the world, and particularly those parts of it which have since embraced Christianity, did anciently adore the Sun upon Sunday. It is also stated by Dr. Chambers, in his Cyclopedia, “that Sunday was so called by our idolatrous ancestors, because set apart for the worship of the Sun.” The Greeks and Latins also gave the same name to the first day of the week. Dr. Brownlee, as quoted by Kingsbury, on the Sabbath, page 223, also says: “When the descendants of Adam apostatized from the worship of the true God, they substituted in his place the Sun, that luminary, which, more than all others, strikes the minds of savage people with religious awe; and which, therefore, all heathens worship.” Attachment to particular days of religious celebration, from habit merely, is well known, even in our own day, to be very strong, and powerful convictions of duty are often required to produce a change. This was no doubt well understood by the teachers of Christianity in those times. Dr. Mosheim, when treating on that age, says: “That the leaders imagined that the nations would the more readily receive Christianity when they saw the rites and ceremonies to which they had been accustomed, established in the churches, and the same worship paid to Jesus Christ and his martyrs which they had formerly offered to their idol deities. Hence it happened, that in those times, the religion of the Greeks and Romans differed but little in its external appearance from that of Christians.”RCSK 21.1

    Prejudice against the Jews was another influence against the Sabbath, and in favor of the first day. This was very strong, and directly calculated to lead the Gentile Christians to fix a stigma upon every religious custom of the Jews, and to brand as Judaism whatever they supposed had any connection with the Mosaic religion. Hence it was that in those times, as often occurs in our own, to produce disaffection and disgust to the seventh day as the Sabbath, they spoke of it and reproached its observance as Judaizing. This feeling in relation to Judaism led Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, in Egypt, in the fourth century, who with his people then observed the Sabbath, to say, in his Interpretation of the Psalms, “We assemble on Saturday, not that we are infected with Judaism, but to worship Jesus the Lord of the Sabbath.” In a community of Christians whose religion was formal, and whose celebrations were designed more to act upon their passions and senses than to improve their hearts or to conform them to divine requirements, a more powerful argument could scarcely be used against the Sabbath day, or one that would more effectually promote the observance of the first day, which was raised up as its rival. Dr. Neander says distinctly, “Opposition to Judaism introduced the particular festival of Sunday very early.”RCSK 22.1

    The observance of the Passover, or Easter, by the early Christians, aided the introduction of the first day as a religious festival in the church, if it was not indeed the direct cause of it.—This feast was held by the Asiatic Christians, who began it at the same time the Jews began their Passover, and ended it in like manner, without regard to the particular day of the week. The church of Rome does not appear to have observed it until the latter part of the second century, when in the time of Victor, bishop of Rome, it seems that it was observed by the Roman and western churches. Victor insisted upon the fast being closed on the first day of the week, on whatever day it might commence; and he claimed the right, as bishop of Rome, to control all the churches in this matter. “Hence,” says Eusebius, “there were synods and convocations of the bishops on this question, and all (i.e., the western bishops) unanimously drew up an ecclesiastical decree, which they communicated to all the churches in all places, that the mystery of the Lord’s resurrection should be celebrated on no other day than the Lord’s day; and that on this day alone we should observe the close of the paschal feasts.” The bishops of Asia, however, persisted for a considerable time in observing the custom handed down to them by apostolic tradition, until, either by threats of excommunication which were made, or by a desire for peace, they were induced partially to adopt the custom of the western churches. This change was made, as we are told, “partly in honor of the day, and partly to express some difference between Jews and Christians.”RCSK 22.2

    But the question does not appear to have been fully settled, for we find Constantine, in an epistle to the churches, urging them to uniformity in the day of the celebration, wherein, after a strong invective against the practice of the Jews, he says, “For we have learned another way from our Saviour, which we may follow. It is indeed most absurd that they should have occasion of insolent boasting on account of our not being able to observe these things in any manner unless by the aid of their instruction.” “Wherefore, let us having nothing in common with that most odious brood of the Jews.”RCSK 23.1

    By this contest an important point was gained for the first day, although it was but an annual celebration. The Sabbath, however, does not appear to have been laid aside in any place, but continued to be the principal day of religious worship throughout the whole Christian church.RCSK 23.2

    At what time the first day began to be observed weekly, we have no particular account; but from the favor it received from the bishops of Rome and some of the Christian fathers at the close of the third and beginning of the fourth century, we suppose it had then become a practice in Rome and some of the western churches.RCSK 23.3

    This brings us near to the close of the third century. And here it ought to be noted, that the Lord’s day, or Sunday, was not the only holy-day of the Church during these three centuries. Origen, (as quoted by Dr. Peter Heylyn in his History of the Sabbath,) names the Good Friday as we call it now, the Parasceve as he calls it there; the feasts of Easter and of Pentecost. And anciently, not only the day which is now called Whitsunday or Pentecost, but all the fifty days from Easter forward, were accounted holy, and solemnized with no less observance than the Sundays were. Of the day of the Ascension or Holy Thursday, it may likewise be said, that soon after, it came to be more highly esteemed than all the rest. Such was the estimation in which the Lord’s day was held. It was on a level with those other holy days which are now disregarded by the body of Protestant Church. It is to be remembered, farther, that the term Sabbath was applied exclusively to the seventh day of the week, or Saturday. Indeed, wherever, for a thousand years and upwards, we meet the word Sabbatum in any writer, of what name so ever, it must be understood of no day but Saturday.RCSK 23.4

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