THE JEWS SABBATH ANTIQUATED AND THE LORDS DAY INSTITUTED By DIVINE AUTHORITY OR The Change of the Sabbath from the Last to the First Day of the Week asserted and maintained by Scripture-Arguments and Testimonies of the Best Antiquity with a Refutation of sundry Objections raised against it The Sum of all Comprized in Seven Positions By EDM. WARREN Minister of the Gospel in COLCHESTER REV. 1.10 I was in the Spirit on the Lords Day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Athanasius in Hom. de sement ad init Imprimatur EDM. CALAMY LONDON Printed by David Maxwel for W. Weekly of Ipswich and are to be sold by John Rothwel at the Fountain in Cheapside and also by Nath. Web and Will. Grantham at the Black Bear in Pauls Church-yard 1659. To the Right Worshipful JOHN GVRDON Esq Justice of Peace in the County of SUFFOLK HONOURED SIR THe design of this Dedication is not so much to shelter the ensuing Treatise under the protection of your name let it stand or fall at the bar of Scripture and right reason as to shew my real and unfeigned gratitude for the many and much-obliging favours you have been been pleased to heap upon me both while I lived under your roof and since my removal to a more publike station I thought thus with my self It is the first and likely to be the last time of my appearing in Print therefore the best and fittest season to signifie my due resentment of your love and friendship which from first to last since my acquaintance with you I have experienced so firm and constant as also to shew the precions esteem I still have of you and your pious Family which as I found so I left most religiously devoted to the practise of the truth here pleaded for the keeping holy of the Lords day the undoubted Christian Sabbath it is verily no small joy to me in these days of liberty and loosness to find any especially of your rank walking in this truth of Christ Go on dear Sir in this good old way of truth and holiness be you still a friend to this good day the Lords Day and the Lord will be a friend to you in in an evil day yea in that great day of his appearing Concerning which as Paul prayed for Onesiphorus and his houshold the Lord grant that he may find mercy of the Lord in that day so prays for you and yours The Unworthiest of Christs Ministers EDM. WARREN A Word by way of Preface to the Courteous Reader With a Word of Advice to my Christian Friends and Hearers in and about the Town of Colchester Good Reader I Shall not tire thy patience with any tedious Prefatory Discourse only hint a Word or two concerning the occasion of this Treatise with the Method observed in the composure of it about a year and half since or something more amidst that African brood of Erroneous Books which the lawless liberty of the Press has Midwiv'd into the world came forth a Treatise swelling as with a Timpany of vain glorious confidence for the Jews Saturday-Sabbath so no less opprobious contempt of the Lords day our Christian Sabbath The Author of it Mr. Tho. Tillam by Name by Profession an Anabaptist was pleased in Print to found a challenge and provoke me to the combat in answering of it It was some time before I was fully resolved what to do the sense of my own Insufficiency bespake my silence and willed me rather to sit still in obscurity than venture abroad to the view of a captious and quarrelsom World Besides my Pastoral charge and Preaching-work would scarce afford me that leisure which others of more natural promptness and dexterous parts and gifts might well enough spare for such an Imployment But on the other hand the spreading of this Jewish Leaven together with the pressing Importunity of some Christian Friends perswaded me to undertake this work which accordingly I did and after I had spent much time and written many sheets in answering this Author Page by Page I found his Method so confused his excursions so many his eructations of putrid choler and calumny so bitter that I had not the patience to follow him any longer in that wildgoose-chase but laid all aside and resolved upon a new Method namely to assert the Truth thetically in distinct Positions and answer his most material Arguments as Objections against it He would fain perswade silly people That Antichrist changed the Sabbath and goes about to prove it from Dan. 7. where we read of a little horn that thought to change Times and Laws and with this little horn he makes a loud noise up and down his Book But who told him that this horn was Antichrist Our best Expositors take it to be meant of Antiochus Epiphanes and indeed Dan. 8. cleerly proves it But what desperate insolency is this to take the crown of Christ and set it upon the head of Antichrist Is not the change of the Jewish Law attributed to Christ Hebr. 7.12 and did he not also change their times and seasons of worship was their weekly Sabbath exempted I pray where or how not by the fourth Commandement for we have proved that the seventh day from the Creation was never the substance of that precept nor by any clause in the New Testament for there it is rather repealed 'T is true the Moral duty of rest remains still in a holy day of weekly recourse according to the Commandment but the old Sabbath being of a shadowy nature in the after observation if not in the first Institution of it is certainly done away by Christ the substance of all Legal shadows yet not simply but in way of exchange for a new day of the same number though not of the same shadowy nature What I have argued for the change of the day is sufficiently authorized by the Scriptures the Fathers and our own judicious Divines My Arguments are but few in number more might have been added but for oppressing the Reader 's either purse or patience Mr. Cawdrey and Mr. Palmer have largely handled what I have but briefly touched If what I have written be answered with scurrilous gibes and railing Rhetorick as Mr. Jenisons Book was My next answer shall be nothing but silence and contempt which I the rather hint because the Adversary has threatned a Reply before he read my Book right or wrong it seems he is resolved to have the last word for which I purpose never to contend If I know my own heart 't is truth not triumph that I seek and thirst after truth I say grounded upon the Scriptures sealed with the blood of Martyrs attested by the Primitive Fathers and maintained by the pens of the most Reformed Writers such is the truth here asserted and I shall own nothing as an Answer to it but that which fully answers all these Now my Christian Friends and Brethren I beseech you love and live this truth stand to it stand for it and stand in it
substance of the law I do not say they are abrogable as ceremonies but alterable as circumstances they may be changed for better things and not a tittle of the law annulled but rather fulfilled by it according to that of our Saviour till heaven and earth pass one jot Mat. 5.18 or one tittle shall not pass from the law till all be fulfilled I say the law is not destroyed but rather fulfilled by the varying of some circumstances as by changing their typical deliverance from Egypt into our spiritual deliverance from sin and the land of Canaan meant in the fifth Commandment into England where we dwell And because the fourth Commandment and the fifth are neer neighbours methinks the one may fairly expound the other It cannot be denyed Ephes 6.3 The Apostle in repeating that promise leaves out the words which the Lord thy God giveth thee because they were more appropriate to the Jews and to us the argument is entire without them See Weems Chris Syn. that the promised land intended occasionally in the fifth Commandment was the land of Canaan neither do I deny that the day on which God is said to rest in the fourth Commandment was the seventh day from Creation yet all will grant that the argument or inducement of the fifth Commandment is not to be restrained to that land only for then it were no argument at all to us Now I would ask any rational man why the argument of this fourth Commandment should be limited to that particular day from Creation more then the argument of the fifth Commandment to that particular land of Canaan since both the one and the other are but occasionally insinuated And to limit the inducement of a moral law to an occasional circumstance is the ready way to evacuate and make void the whole law But we shall put it out of all doubt that Gods example here propounded is only for one day in seven directly substantially and properly for the old seventh only consequentially indirectly or occasionally and that by a double consideration 1. Because it is here urged as a reason of what went before 2. Because the reason of this reason is chiefly for one day in seven 1. This example of God in six dayes the Lord made heaven and earth and rested the seventh day is alleged as a reason of the forementioned clause six dayss shalt thou labour but the seventh is the Sabbath so much is clearly implyed in the connexive or causal particle For six dayes shalt thou labour and rest a seventh For so did Jehovah thy God Now the reason annexed to any rule must if there be any amiguity in it be expounded by the rule the rule must not be interpreted by the reason for the rule is not brought for the reason but that for the rule Therefore as the former receives strength by the latter so the latter must receive light from the fotmer Now the standing rule for the weekly Sabbath is this Six dayes shalt thou labour but a seventh is the Sabbath Here the term seventh is general 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Indifferently signifies a seventh or the seventh a and the being particles proper to the English tongue are defective in the Hebrew and Latine To supply which defect the schooles distinguish of Diet septimus formaliter and Dies septimus materialiter as was noted before 'T is not said this or that seventh but leftat large And where God has left a latitude we may not dare to put a limitation that were to enclose Gods Common and intrench upon his Royalty Well then the Rule being only express for a seventh day in general the reason or argument here brought to perswade to the observation of such a general seventh is taken from Gods example who also rested a seventh day which although it were the last of seven yet being only alledged as a reason of the forementioned rule it can signifie no more then the rule it self of which it is a reason And so it is clear that the sense of this latter clause in six dayes the Lord made heaven and earth and rested the seventh must be only according to the sense of the former clause six dayes shalt thou labour but a seventh is the Sabbath that is a seventh in proportion directly And thus the first day of the week is as much the Sabbath of the fourth Commandment to Christians as ever the last of the week was to the Jewes being one day in seven as well as that To dispute for the same day on which God rested and infer a necessity of observing that day because we must observe that proportion is to argue à dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter a well known fallacy For the argument is only direct for such a proportion six for labour and a seventh every week for rest not this or that seventh from any prefixed period 2. Let us look into the reason of this reason and then the case will be yet more clear the reason or equity of any law is the life and strength of the law And it is the design of Gods wisdome in imposing laws upon his creatures to propose such reasons in those lawes as shall make them appear congruous and suitable to those common principles of right and equity Psalm 119.18 Rom. 7.12 Deus ideò leges suas judicia vocat quod aequiffima sunt quae praescribit impressed upon the creature And hence Gods lawes are so often styled Judgments because in all things they are just and equal and certainly that sense of the argument which doth most shew the equity of the Commandment is the best and truest sense Now let us consider the equity that Gods example carryes with it in reference to the aforesaid proportion of six dayes for labour and one in seven for rest As thus if the great God who needs not a moment of time either for work or rest as being neither subject to weakness nor weariness if he I say were pleased when he had work to do even a world to make to take six dayes for his work and one in seven for rest how much more should we men still hold to this proportion who by reason of corporal weakness and spiritual wants need such a competency of time both for secular imployments and soul refreshments Thus there is convincing strength of reason and equity in it But now to argue for the particular day God wrought first six dayes and then rested the last of seven therefore we must first work and then rest has no such argumentative force in it especially to us Christians who living under a Covenant of pure grace do rather work by rest then rest by works and therefoe the Sabbath being suitable to the Covenant we may rather judg it equitable to begin the week with a day of rest and work the six dayes after then to work the six first dayes and then rest the last seventh Even dim-eyed nature judges it most
equal to a A Jove principium begin with God b Supervacua necessariis post-ponenda sunt Senec. ep 49. and give the precedency to things most necessary and grace both not gain-say it but rather approve it for is it not most reasonable that I should serve my gracious Lord in the duties of his worship because I serve my self in the works of my calling But the truth is Gods example is neither directly for first or last of seven but for one in seven perpetually The force of Gods argument lies in this that we should dedicate one day in seven to rest for six working dayes indulged to our selves And herein we imitate Gods example in labouring six dayes and resting one in seven weekly For farther satisfaction in this argument let the ingenuous Reader consult Mr. Cawdrey and Mr. White of Dorch two burning and shining Lights who have gone before me if any little spark be here added let the Father of lights have all the glory 4. And lastly let us come to that which for memories-sake I call the benedictive part of the Commandment wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day c. observe the phrase not seventh day but Sabbath day or day of rest is blessed The Commandment both opens and shuts begins and ends with the term Sabbath day not seventh day Certainly if the foregoing argument drawn from Gods example had intended only the seventh day from Creation this conclusion flowing from that argument had fallen upon that day also but we see the term is evidently changed that we may not mistake Gods meaning by a supposed strictness in the term seventh day see how the Lord condescends to our weakness writing Sabbath day or day of rest instead of seventh day The Word Abbath like a finger points both forward and backward directiug us how to expound the whole precept in a large and not in a limited sense Doubtless if the Lord God had intended to tye up his Church in all ages to the seventh day from the Creation he would have fixed the command upon that day only especially in the conclusion of it why should not that precise day be mentioned here as well as in the Institution Gen. 2. There he is said to bless and sanctifie the seventh day here only the Sabbath day a more probable reason to me is not imaginable then this the Commandment is of a larger extent then the Institution And besides the Institution of the old day Gen. 2. was but temporary and mutable whereas the precept it self is more and perpetual see then how wisely the Lord our Law-giver has contrived it that it should not be restrained to that particular seventh day To conclude with this conclusion the whole weight and stress of the Commandment you see leans upon large and general terms the Preceptive part is for a day of rest in general the Benedictive part is of the same latitude and although the seventh day be placed in the middle betwixt both yet it is not fixed upon one day more then another unless it be occasionally which indeed is no fixure at all what hinders therefore but the whole substance of the precept may stand in the fall of the day since it was never incorporated into the moral substance of this or any other command It is I must needs say a truth to me as evident as the light it self that the fourth Commandment in all the substantials of it makes as much for the Lords day being one in seven of Gods appointment as ever it did for the old Sabbath And here I cannot sufficiently admire and adore the depth of Divine wisdome that the ever glorious God foreseeing and foreappointing the change of the day took care to contrive and pen the commandment in such expressions as might aptly suite the old day while it lasted and as equally sort with the new now it is substituted in the roome of the old That the Jewes upon the discovery of so happy a change might not loath their old Sabbath the precept was occasionally and circumstantially fitted to that and that we Christians having a new might not be limited to the old it is substantially adapted to this I shall need add no more if men did not wilfully wink I should thinke here were light enough in this Lamp of the Law to convince them As for the adversaries objections scattered here and there in his book they vanish like so many vapours before the Sun being brought forth and tryed by the evidence of this truth To assert the whole Lawes morality T.T. Obj. 1. p. 14. Answ and yet plead the Sabbaths mutability scarce savours of rationality These are fine words but feeble arguments and indeed his book is full of them But to answer his Jingle if by Sabbath he mean the seventh day from Creation what irrationality is it to plead the mutability of that day and yet hold the morality of the Law Since that day was never a tittle of the Lawes morality Neither can he affirm it without gross absurdity prove it I am sure he cannot by all his sophistry If God by a positive moral law bind all men in all ages to such a particular day as himself appointed Obj. 2 p. 119. then either they must prove that God hath made his moral law mutable by appointing some other day or else restore the seventh day-Sabbath What pitiful chopt Logick is this Ans Why can the particular day be no where appointed but in the moral law his not he himself often affirmed that it was instituted elsewhere And must the moral law needs go to wrack when a new day is appointed Let him first prove that the old day was any essential part of the moral law till I see that I may safely affirm that in the change of the day as an occasional circumstance the substance of the law remains unchangeable as a man may change his old clothes for new yea and alter his temperament too and yet be still the same man as long as for substance he has the same soul and body Some do assert but not for want of ignorance that t is not that special seventh day Obj. 3 pa. 47. but a seventh day that is injoyned whereas we have not only the pattern in the mount namely the precise time of Gods rest to point out the day but to end all cavil he points twice in the Commandment to that very day on which he rested by the Emphatical demonstrative particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so that 't is not a seventh but Hashebigni the seventh day therefore they had need make sure of a very clear word for the change of the day for fear of being left speechless at the day of Judgment And so he runs on to th end of the page spinning a large web but when all comes to all it is but a cobweb we shall sweep it down by degrees And If by the assertours of the forementioned truth Answ 1 he mean
the Law is abrogated I look upon them as words ' of course which in a Controversie weigh no more then a feather yea as beggerly fallacies for they all along begge the question taking that for granted which hath been soundly whipt with a denyal by sundry learned pens viz. that the seventh day from the Creation was ever an express tittle of the Commandment a seventh day in a week indeed is more then a tittle of the Law and this number is still continued in the observation of the Lords day all the Christian world over And I doubt not but it shall continue to the end of the world although the old day be changed as in the celebration of the Passeover the precise order of time was sometimes altered for whereas the fourteenth day of the first moneth was the time appointed at first Exod. 12.18 yet Hezekiahs great passeover was kept on the fourteenth day of the second moneth 2 Chron. 30.5 Where you see the precise individual day altered upon occasion yet the number the fourteenth day still observed See this illustration further cleared by Mr. G. Abbot p. 37. and Mr. Walker p. 49. So upon a greater and better occasion the Sabbath is altered as to the day yet the seventh day in number still kept intire in this as the fourteenth in the other And so the Sabbath now as well as the Passeover then for substance preserved notwithstanding the circumstantial and occasional change of the day And thus through the conduct of my gracious Guide leading me by Scripture light and the foot-steps of my dear companions in the cause of Christ I have safely passed the pikes of opposition and vindicated this royal law from the false glosses and erroneous discants of the adversary carrying this conclusion all along before me as a truth triumphing over all contradiction That the old seventh day was never propounded as the substance or special subject of any moral law I shall but touch upon the second 2. That it seems to be pointed at as a sign under the ceremonial law yea it does more then seem so if the text be impartially viewed Exod. 31. from v. 13. to v. 18. where we find a special charge imposed upon the Jews to observe the Sabbath and that upon sundry considerations 1. From the end of it Verily my Sabbath ye shall keep for it a sign between me and you V. 13. throughout your generations to know that I am Jehovah that sanctifieth you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for so the words run in the Hebrew And this is farther explicated v. V. 14. 14. ye shall keep the Sabbath therefore for it is holy or holiness to you thereby expounding what was meant by his sanctifying of them in the verse before 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As if the Lord had said the keeping of my Sabbaths shall be a distinctive badge and cognisance of your Covenant-holiness Sabbathum est signum quod Deus Israclem sanctificat ut Sabbathum sanctifionvit scil segregando eosex Gentibns profanls in peculiarem sibi popnlum Lavat in Exek Hom. 26. a sign that I do sanctifie you and separate you to my self above all the people of the earth for an holy and peculiar people for as the Lord is said to sanctifie the Sabbath so also to sanctifie Israel that is by separating it from all other dayes and them from all other nations to be holiness to himfelf And this is the first special reason why they should keep the Sabbath throughout their generations as a sign or mark of distinction to difference them from the rest of the profane world 2. From the perill of profaning it v. 14.15 Every one that defileth it shall surely be put to death for whosoever doth any work therein that soul shall be cut off from amongst his people c. A law shortly after executed in the letter of it by stoning to death one that gathered sticks on the Sabbath day Numb 15.36 which rigour for ought I can find to the contrary lasted no longer then the Israelites peregrination in the wilderness where as one sayes an extraordinary strict rest was imposed upon them because they were extraordinarily accommodated for it Being as the Saints in heaven are immediately at Gods finding having Mannah without means daily provided for them and hence it is said Numb 15.32 While the children of Israel were in the wilderness they found a man that gathered sticks on the Sabbath day and stoned him to death Note the Phrase while they wore in the wilderness not elsewhere for when they were out of the wilderness we never read of the like punishment inflicted It seems then that this strict kind of rest and rigour was restrained to that time and place only 3. Another argument to inforce their observation of the Sabbath is taken from the moral equity of it verse 15. Six dayes may work be done but the seventhis the Sabbath As if the Lord had said ye may well afford me one day in seven since I have given you six in seven And this again is reinforced by Gods example in the latter part of v. 17. For in six dayes the Lord made heaven and earth and rested the seventh day Now it concerns us to inquire in this context what was proper to the Jews and what common with them to us What is moral and perpetual what judicial or ceremonial and temporary For that morals and judicials are here mingled together none can deny and the difficulty will be how to sever the one from the other and to shew in what sense the Sabbath was made a sign what the significancy of it was and especially what kind of sign whether a permanent sign as the Rain bow or a transient sign as the cloudly pillar in the wilderness There are sundry sorts of signs spoken of in Scripture I shall onely instance in those that are of prime note and pertinency to resolve the case in hand 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Josh 4.6 7. So also the Passeover was and the Lords supper is a sign being both memorative Exod. 12.26 Mat. 26.26 1 Cor. 11.24 There are remembrancing signs as the twelve stones taken out of Jordan for every tribe one were set up as a sign to after-ages for a memorial to the childen of Israel that the waters of Jordan were cut off before the ark And such a kind of sign it is commonly thought the Sabbath was a memorial of the Creation But that it is so propounded or intended here cannot easily be proved since the Lord does not say I have given you my Sabbaths as a sign that I created the world but for a sign that I the Lord do sanctifie you And although it be added v. 17. It is a sign betwixt me and the Children of Israel for ever Ainach majoris distinctionis pausae est accentus Buxtorf Thes Gram. for in six dayes the Lord made heaven and earth c. Yet it
is not said it shall be a sign that in six dayes the Lord made heaven and earth For there is a notable pause in the middle which divides the sentence and the sense also The seventeenth verse containes two distinct arguments or reasons why they should keep the Sabbath 1. Because it was a sign 2. Because it was set apart upon the occasion of Gods work and rest in the beginning 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Joh. 2.3 1 Joh. 3.18 There are indicating or evidencing signes such are the Characters of saving grace But neither can this be the sense of the word sign in this place It is a sign that I the Lord do sanctifie you What savingly why then all were Israel that were of Israel for the Sabbath was given to all neither was it so much their keeping the Sabbath as Gods giving them a Sabbath to keep which is here made a sign Witness Ezekiel Moses his interpretor I have given them my Sabbath for a sign Ezek. 20.13 to know that I the Lord do sanctifie them Therefore 3. There are distinguishing or differencing signs 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such as do visibly mark out a people for Gods peculiar select and sanctified ones above all other people of the earth And in this sense the Sabbath is here given the Jews as a sign a sign of his sanctifying them that is in one word as Calvin speaks a sign of his segregating and singling them out from the rest of the nations as his peculiar people Siquis un◠verbo reddere vellet sanctificare est segregare Cal. Praelec in Ezek. 20. Ita Simler in Exo Levit. 21.8 ch 2.32 So also Simlerus and to the same effect is that of Lavater aforementioned The Sabbath was a sign of Gods sanctifying them as the Sabbath it self was sanctified that is separated from other common dayes and set a part for holy ends and uses And so the Word sanctifie is usually if not only taken in Scripture when it is applyed to the whole bulk or body of a people as here it is Well the Sabbath was given to the people of Israel as a sign of Gods sanctifying them but how long throughout their generations That is during the Oeconomy of the Law as long as the people of Israel should be the only peculiar people of God Exod. 12.14 The very same Phrase is used concerning the Passeover ye shall keep it a feast to the Lord throughout your generations by an ordinance or ever which clearly speaks it a temporary ordinance But Secondly We must distinguish of Sabbaths as well as of signes very briefly the Word Sabbath signifies one of these three things either 1. The moral duty holy rest or 2. The penal rigour of that rest or 3. The precise day of rest Now 1. It cannot be meant of the moral duty simply considered since that extends beyond their generations for there remaineth a rest Heb. 4.9 10. or keeping of a Sabbath to the people of God still neither 2. Can itwell be understood of that penal rigour resting from all work upon pain of corporal death for this in all likelihood lasted not out half their generations being calculated chiefly for their wilderness estate as was saidbefore Therefore 3. It must be the precise day of rest the old seventh-day-Sabbath or nothing which is here set as a sign throughout their generations and this I take to be the true intent of the Holy-Ghost both here and Ezek. 20. The case seems clearly to me to be stated in this wise The old seventh day was at first given to Adam and his posterity as the only true Sabbath during the pre-eminency of the Creation and Christ in the promise and that it was conscientiously kept by the holy Patriarchs for some ages after I doubt not though some of the Ancients seem to deny it but to be sure in tract of time the sinful race of Adam forsaking the true God did also forget the true Sabbath Now when it pleased God out of that degenerate lump of mankind to form Israel or the seed of Abraham a peculiar people to himself he gave them his old Sabbath again in a new Edition That among other ends it might be a visible sign to distinguish them from the rest of the world Other nations no doubt had their Sabbaths as well as their gods but as Israel must serve the only true God so they must also observe the then only true Sabbath Ezod 31.13 So much is implyed in the text Verily my Sabbath ye shall keep saith the Lord. The Word my is Emphatical 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it points at the precise day of Gods appointment the seventh and last day of the week therefore this and mainly this was made a sign of Gods sanctifying the Jews throughout their generations which being so how evidently doth it follow that the day was design'd for change and that now it is certainly changed by the will and appointment of God For if the Jews generation be extinct and they that were once the people of God have now a Lo-ammi written upon them Ho. 11.20 1 Thes 2.15 16. Ye are none of my people how shall that day any longer stand as a Sabbath wich was given them as a sign of their being the peculiar people of God and that for a season only till their generations were expired Maledic domine Nazarais Lord curse the Christians is one of their daily imprecations vid Trapp in Hosea Either let the adversay say the blaspheming Jews who powre out daily curses instead of prayers are still the Covenant-people of God in so much as still they retain that Saturday-Sabbath And then he shall speak like a true Jew indeed or let him confess their saturday-Sabbath which was once the crown of their glory is now no better then the badge of their blasphemy whereby they would make the world believe that they are still the sanctified people of God though they trample underfoot the blood of his Son whereby they should be sanctified I speak not this as insulting over the misery of the Jews but as lamenting the sin of apostate Christians who take up that day as a badge of their Saintship which the infidel Jews wear as a badge of their blasphemy and enmity against Christ and Christians Indeed it was once an illustrious sign of their sanctification but it was limited to their generations as the Passeover was and therefore if the one be expired so is the other upon the same account And in this respect I dare boldly affirm and I doubt not to maintain it that it is every whit as lawful for a Christian to celebrate that old Sacrament the Passeover as to observe the old Sabbath For the one was as well a sign as the other and the one was ordained for a season as well as the other There are a few feeble objections to face this argument but the bare repetion with the premises will be
enough is said to shew the discharge of the old seventh day from obligation under the new Testament We shall only remove some of the Adversaries chief objections and then lay down our grounds for the Christian Sabbath He objects Obj. 1 The Fathers institution of the seventh day which makes it as perpetual as the Ordinance of marriage But This is fully answered in the first Position Answ where we have proved that the Fathers institution of the old seventh day was upon such grounds as exposed it to alteration Thither I referr the Reader and shall follow the objector to his next Argument From the Sons confirmation of the seventh day Obj. 2 Christ has confirmed it sayes he 1. T. T. p. 72. to p. 79. By his words 2. By his works By his words more generally among the rest of his royal Lawes which he hath ratified even to a point or Tittle Math. 5.18 Teaching his Apostles to do the like Rom 3. James 2.10 More particularly by proclaiming himself Lord of the Sabbath day Mark 2.28 As if he had said the Sabbath is mine I am Lord of it I made it for Man and having given him a precept and pattern to sanctifie it I shall not make my self a president to profane it Now that which Christ layes claim to as Lord must needs be confessed his Therefore do we celebrate the holy Supper because t is the Lords Supper Again Math. 24.20 He instructs his disciples to pray that their flight might not be on the Sabbath day namely forty years after his death at what time all Ceremonies were abolished by Apostolical proclamation And as thus he has owned the seventh day Sabbath by his words so he has also crowned it by his workt c. This is the main strength and force of his Argument But alas it is to feeble to fetch life into a dead Sabbath that has lain sixteen hundred years in the grave we shall discuss every particular in it and return several answers to it We grant indeed that the Lord our Lawgiver has ratified his royal Moral Law even to a point or a tittle Answ 1 inasmuch as he came to fulfil the Law not to dissolve and destroy it But how is every tittle to be taken Not strictly and graphically for every vowel point and prick of a letter in the Law but for the substance and least matter of it the least Commandment in it so our Saviour expounds himself Matth. 5.19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least Commandments and teach men so shall be least in the Kingdome of God teaching us that by jot or tittle of the Law verse 18. he meant the least Commandment of the Moral Law v. 19. Thus also St. James ch 2.10 He that shall offend in one point is guilty of all By one point he means any one precept or Commandment in the Decalogue He explains himself by the reason rendred verse 11. For he that said Do not commit adultery said also Do not kill As if he had said the same God that gave one Commandment gave all therefore when any one point or precept is violated the contempt reflects upon the whole Law the least sin being an affront to Gods soveraignty So then the sense of both places is the same the least point or precept of the Moral Law is in force under the Gospel and if the least much more the fourth Commandment which indeed is none of the least But what of all this The fourth Commandment is established by Christ therefore the seventh day in weekly succession from the Creation the Consequence is infirm For that day was never directly stated in the Commandment the fourth Commmandement sayes not Thou shalt keep holy the last day of the week and not the first but a seventh day Sabbath or one in seven the old seventh day may be and is repealed and yet the Commandement ratyfied to a tittle in the matter yea in the very letter of it evangelically considered to wit as it is explained by Christ according to the will of God though not the carnal reasonings of men But of this formerly That Text Mark 2.28 rightly interpreted makes nothing for the old Sabbath but much against it For these words The Son of man is Lord also of the Sabbath day do speak Christs power to alter and change it not his purpose to establish confirm it under the Gospel 't is a title much like that Math. 21. where he stiles himself Lord of the vineyard as having power to let and lease it out to other Husbandmen Mark 12.9 Dominus rectè dicitur alicujus rei qui in illam jua potestatem habet extollendi immutandi Aretius in Luc. 6. Christ was Lord of the Sabbath that is had power to change the day Engl. Annot. in Mar. 2. Luke 20.15.16 And thus he was Lord of the Sabbath having authority to alter and adjourn it to another day the Sabbath was the vineyards Land-mark or the Churches distinctive limit he that had power to transplant the vineyard had no less power to transpose the Sabbath He was Lord of the vineyard and Lord of the Sabbath in a like notion Suppose it spake as the objector speaks I am Lord of the Sabbath the Sabbath is mine yet still the same sense recurres is it not lawful for me to do what I will with my own As our Lord speaks in another case Math. 20.15 The Temple was his as well as the Sabbath Mal. 3.1 and styled his a Ps 132.14 rest forever and his b Isai 56.7 house of prayer for all people more then I remember was ever said of the seventh day Sabbath yet the Temple is destroyed and as Christ never meant to tye up his Gospel worshippers to that typical place of worship so neither to that typical time of worship He was Lord of both while they lasted that he might dissolve both when their season was expired that he might legally and ex officio give his people a discharge from both As for the Authors crafty collation of these two expressions Lord of the Sabbath day and Lords Supper whereby he would insinuate the equall authority and perpetuity of that Legal Sabbath with this Evangelical Sacrament it savours of more sophistry then solidity of Argumentation let the unlearned know that as the terms are different in the Greek so the phrase in our English Dialect imports different things 't is one thing to call Christ Lord of this or that another thing to say t is the Lords to say he was Lord of the Sabbath and that before his death is nothing so much as to to say this is the Lords Supper and that after his resurrection The former imports the office or authority of Christ the latter implyes his Ordinance And let the objector know that this Epithet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is never used but twice in the new Testament namely for the Lords Supper the Lords day Rev. 1.10 The Holy Ghost
never vouchsafed to honour the Saturday Sabbath with this Evangelical title But of that in convenient time and place we are now discussing Mark 2. where Christ while the old seventh day was in force professes himself Lord of it which plainly intimated his Lordship Dominion and soveraignty over it that he had authority to displace it and dispose of it as himself thought good the Coherence carries it clearly this way The disciples through the Pharisaical carping and misprision of their adversaries were condemned for Sabbath-breaking because they had pluck'd a few eares of corne and dressed them for their dinner on the Sabbath day which was a work of mercy and pure necessity hunger and emptiness constraining them to it and so no breach of the Sabbath Hospin de orig Fest cap. de Sab. But the malicious Pharisees whose traditions had taught them that to crop an herb to pill an onyon to rost an apple to kill a flea Metens vel tantillum reus est vellere spicas est species Messionis Maim Ichabb vide Lightf Horae Hebraic in Math. 12. much more to pluck ears of corn and rub them in their hand which they look'd upon as a kind of reaping threshing were unlawfull and sinful actions on the Sabbath day presently take occasion to condemn the disciples for Sabbath-violation Well our Saviour justifies his disciples and wipes off the charge of their accusers by this argument ver 27. The Sabbath was made for man that is miserable fallen man not man for the Sabbath Therefore the Son of man the Messiah is also Lord of the Sabbath day as if he had said Cùm post lapsum institutum fuit Sabbaturn lege conditione quae Christum jam promissum hominisque lapsum respexerit non potuit Sabbatum non sub potestate domini filii hominis id est seminis promiss◠subjici ab co ordinandum disponendum prout ip si visum ac provisum fuerit Idm. Ibid. 't is your error to think that all workes of mercy and necessity are unlawfull on the Sabbath day for the Sabbath was made and instituted at first for man subject to necessity and misery namely by such a law as related to the fall of man and the promise of the Messiah therefore the Son of man is also Lord of the Sabbath day That is it falls under my dominion and disposal as the Son of man The phrase is observable he sayes not The Son of David but The Son of man the Mediator pointed out in the promise made to Adam the first man even he is Lord of the Sabbath day or has dominion over it being at first the foundation of it This is the most probable interpretation if we take the Son of man here for Christ But very many Learned Writers take it for man or mankind in general as it is sometimes used Filliue hominis i.e. homo Zanch in praec 4. Psal 8.5 Isai 65.2 And then the meaning may be this that in case of urgent and pungent necessity as extreme hunger perill of life health or the like every or any son of man is Lord of the Sabbath day having liberty to dress or prepare food to take physick to refresh and repaire nature Filliue hominis tam de Christo quà m de quovis Christiuno homine intelligi potest Gualter in Loc. item Ravanel in verb. dominus necessity as we use to say knowes no law that is no positive Law provided it be not a necessity contracted by idleness or improvidence This is the exposition of some very learned and godly and it seemes to suit well with the case of the disciples as also the context v. 27. The Sabbath was made for man not man for the Sabbath Therefore viz. in case of pure necessity the Son of man or mankind is Lord of the Sabbath day Take it in which sense we will it makes nothing for the Saturday Sabbath The objectors notion is altogether incoherent both with the sense of the Text and scope of the context but to proceed Touching that Text Math. 24.20 Ans 3 Pray that your flight be not in the Winter nor on the Sabbath day I have two things to answer 1. By way of supposition supposing it were meant of the Jewes Sabbath it would signifie no more but this that it would be superstitiously kept among the unbeleeving Jewes forty yeares after our Saviours death as it is to this day and therefore pray that your flight may not be either in the winter when it will be doleful dirty or on the Sabbath when it will be dangerous travelling through the coasts of Judea and bring you into peril of persecution by your own countrey-men which was one of Pauls perils 2 Cor. 11.26 For although by that time the disciples were sufficiently instructed in their Christian liberty that their flight was as lawfull on that day as another and therefore they could not flye with scruple of conscience yet the superstitious Jewes to whom such flight might be offensive in all reason would Shimei-like barke at such harmless passengers if not bite and snap them And whereas it is objected T.T. p. 78. That it cannot be rationally conceived that the Jewes instead of securing themselves should trifle away their time in persecuting the Christians This objection is answered by himself in the very next words almost For sayes he the Jewes were so superstitious that they durst not fight for their life Then I may well inferre that t is most likely they were also so zealous that they would persecute any who should flye for their life if they themselves would rather dye then flye or fight for their lives as he suggests much more would they hinder the flight of others So that if the old Sabbath were intended by our Saviour it was rather with a note of dislike then approbation as foreseeing that through the superstition of the Jewes it would be an occasion of persecution to his servants as it had often been to himself Supposing I say for I grant it not that the Jewes Sabbath was here meant it must be construed in such a sense namely that they are counselled to deprecate their flight on that day for the better avoiding of bodily calamities for in reference to that day we cannot so much as suppose any soule distress incident to the disciples by reason of such flight we cannot conceive how they should be straightned in conscience out of any religious respect to that day at the siege or sacking of Jerusalem since the adversary himself confesses That all ceremonies were then abolished by Apostolical proclamation For which he cites Colos 2.16 17. Which Text does irrefragably prove the repeale of the old Sabbath as was said before And thus he is caught in his own trap But 2. By way of affirmation I assert That these words of our blessed Saviour pray that your flight be not on the Sabbath are to be understood of our Christian Sabbath
a day in the world till this day dawned at the rising of the Sun of righteousnesse never such a day T is worthy to be noted what a wonderful concurrence of remarkable periods of time met together at our Saviours resurrection both in respect of the year and the day Is 61.2 ch 63.34 John 4.34 35. Heb. 2.14 15. 1. The year was a Sabbatical year the year of Jubilee as may be gathered from scripture which if it make nothing for the Christian Sabbath yet it makes much against the Jewes Sabbath themselves being witnesses For the Hebrew Doctors have spoken rarely to this purpose even to the admiration of considerate Christians The Divine Majesty say they will be to Israel in a Jubilee Freedom Redemption and finisher of Sabbaths H. Broughtons Sinai-sight 2. The day of our Lords Resurrection was a remarkable day in many respects As 1. It was the eighth day in a continued reckoning of dayes and eight was a number of greater prefection then seven in some respect witness Circumcision which was so strictly tyed to the eighth day John 7.22 Sacramentum hoc suit diei illius octavi quo dominus resurrexit ad justificationem nostram Ep. ad Fid. ita Aug. de Gelebr Pasch that if it had fallen on the weekly Sabbath it must not be omitted for the Sabbaths sake The antients insist much on this Circumcision on the eighth day was a type of that eighth day on which our Lord rose again for our justification sayes Cyprian 2. Christs resurrection was also on the third day after his passion which himself foretold as the day of his perfection For so some expound that saying of his The third day I shall be perfected Luke 13.32 Besides this third day was a day of * Ho. 6.2 Lu. 24.46 note in the Law and the Prophets a day appointed and appropriated to the Messiah signally markt out in the Kalendar of the Prophets and figured by many famous Types as that of Isaac who was virtually a James 2.21 offered and restored again the b Gen. 22.4 third day as it may be computed and that in a kind of c Heb. 11.19 figure as the Apostle intimates So also Hezskiah who was in account a dead man and on the d 2 Kings 20.5 third day miraculously revived again So e Jonah 2.10 Math. 12 40. See Ainsw in Gen. 22. Jonah and others from which instances the Rabbins it serms could conclude Christs Resurrection on the third day There be many a three dayes say they in Scripture of which one is the Resurrection of the Messiah 3. Christs Resurrection was on the first day of the week as the Evangelists unanimously testifie Which although it be termed by the blaspemous Jewes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Nazarens day in a way of reproach yet in Scripture-account it is a day of greatest renown being the first in order in the Creation and the first in dignity by our Saviours resurrection The first-fruits of time and the first-born of dayes and accordingly the only day in which our Lord became the f 1 Cor. 15.20 first-fruits of them that slept and the g Col. 1.18 first born from the dead that in all things he might have the preheminence 4. To all these may be added what some have probably argued that this first day of the week was our blessed Redeemers Birth-day as well as his Resurrection day yea the day of his Ascension into Heaven as well as the mission of his Spirit but this I leave to Mr. Aspinwal to make good Only thus much I dare assert that the day of our Saviours resurrection the first day of the week is the fittest for the commemoration of his Nativitie Passion Ascension and all other blessed transactions in the work of our Salvation For the Resurrection of Christ implyes all the rest but is not necessarily of them And if the Lord Jesus had not risen from the dead what benefit had we had either by his birth life death or burial or being dead and buryed how had he ascended and the Spirit the Comforter descended unless he had first bin raised from the dead Besides his Resurrection and Ascension are computed h Luke 24.26 Eph. 4.8 9 10. See Dr. Twisse p. 117. Sect. 5. 1 John 20.17 in Scripture as one compleat motion As his dying and continuing under the power of death for a time were but one entire work of Redemption For however after his resurrection he stayed a sew dayes here upon earth to confirm the faith of his followers and settle the affairs of his Kingdom yet he was no sooner risen but presently he speaks of his ascending and indeed his rising was in reference to his ascending partly if not a part of it It was the first step of his triumphant passage into his kingdom and glory So that in a right sense very Lords day is our christmass-Christmass-day easter-Easter-day ascension-Ascension-day Whitsunday and all my meaning that in a right celebration of our Christian Sabbath we solemnize the memorial of all these blessed ingredients in the work of our Redemption We need not contend for an annual Solemnization of our Saviours birth-day resurrection-resurrection-day ascension-day neither need we fear oblivion of these gracious and glorious mysteries if the Lords day were duly observed We cannot better keep alive the memory of these mercies than by keeping a day in commemoration of them once a week and no day so fit as the Lords day in which we have the sum of all A day that brought forth the greatest good to faln man of any day even a compleat Redeemer who on this day redeemed us with triumph from the tyranny of Satan the dominion of death and hell and k John 10.25 ch 14. 19. restored us to life and Salvation yea assured it unto us Therefore I conclude with that renowned father the Lords day was declared by the Lords Resurrection to be the Christians day Dies Dominicus Christi resurrectione declaratus est ex illo caepit habere festivitatem suam August Ep. 119. ad Jan. item de Civitate Dei lib. 22. cap. ult Serm. 15. de verb. Apost and from that very time it began to be celebrated as the Christian mans Festival or rather with that of the Psalmist This is the day which the Lord hath made 'T is no day of mans making if the God of truth may be beleeved 'T is a plant of the Lords own planting therefore the Divel and all his instruments shall never be able to pluck it up Neither can all the men nor all the Churches in the world alter it to another day And how remarkable is it that the Church for sixteen hundred years should no where offer or attempt to alter it but in all places and all ages observe it What does this speak but the Divine authority of it by which mens Spirits have been awed and their hands tied from such presumptuous undertakings the truth is
1 since that was the * Exod. 12.11 Luke 22.20 Lords Supper in the old Testament as much as the seventh day was the Lords Sabbath Christ never declared the seventh day to be the Lords day Ans 2 although he declared himself to be Lord of the sabbath-Sabbath-day My meaning is that he never owned the seventh day as the Author and institutor of it in a strict Evangelical sense neither could he for it was instituted long before Heb. 4.4 therefore let it be well considered the Lords day Rev. 1.10 for this very reason cannot possibly be understood of the Jewes Sabbath because it is such a Lords day as relates peculiarly to the Lord Christ not as the Lord our Creator but the Lord our Redeemer to Christ actually exalted to be Lord over all relates to him I say as the Lords Supper does not only as his by possession but his by institution for these two and these only the Supper and the day are called the Lords in Scripture The Greek word is used but twice in all the new Testament only these two have the honour to be matcht in this glorious appellation and we must interpret the one by the other therefore if the Lords Supper be a Gospel-ordinance and institution of Jesus Christ so is the Lords day This paralel will pinch the adversary he cannot so much as pretend that the seventh day nor indeed any other day but the first of the week was instituted by Christ so as to be equalized in phrase with that pure Evangelicall ordinance the Lords Supper There is a vulgar objection abroad that every day is the Lords day therefore this Text makes as much for an every-day-Sabbath as the weekly Lords day Sabbath But the answer is easie they may as well say every Table is the Lords table and every Supper the Lords Supper and so turn levellers of dayes and duties together Well we have brought it to this issue that there is a day a speciall day under Gospel but not Jewes seventh day which the Lord Jess ha's instituted and owned above all dayes by stamping his own most blessed name upon it as upon his sacred Supper and this we are sure can be no other than the first day of the week The objector fearing belike that the former shift would faile him ha's another evasion to second it Obj. 3 namely that old thread bare Notion of Gomarus I rather think sayes he that the Lords day which S. John spake of was the Lords Judgment-day which the Lord himself calls his day Luke 17. Phil. 1.16 And so he dreams that the day on which S. John dated his Epistles to the seven Churches was the day of Judgment But This as one sayes0 is void of all judgment Answ See Mr. Ley Sund. Sab. For in the readiest construction of the words S. John spake of a day that was in being before the Vision came and so known that the Reader might take notice when it came But the day of Judgment is not yet come unless it be to such dreamers and so utterly unknown to man that our Saviour hath taught us Mat. 24.36 Mark 13.32 Of that day and hour knoweth no man no not the Angels in heaven but my Father only The prooses he alleges are impertinent for although the day of Judgment be stiled the day of the Lord appellatively yet is it never termed the Lords day denominatively as Mr. Cawdrey might have taught him if he had not thought himself too wise to learn of his betters Thus all his cloudy notions are scattered and the Lords day Rev. 1.10 discovered by evidence of Scripture and Antiquity to be the first day of the week Now as the blessed Martyr Ignatius exhorteth Let every one that loves the Lord Jesus Christ keep holy the Lords day Let the zeale of Primitive Christians herein provoke us to holy emulation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ignat. ad Magnes Plinius sub Trajano scripsit Solitos hoc stato die convenire Christianos ante lucem carmenque Christo quasi Deo Communi voce dicere postea Sacramento se obstringere ne scelus aliquid ne furta ne latrocinia ne adulteria committerent Magdeb. Cent. 2. c. 6. Even a Heathen could observe how those precious morning stars used to meet early on this day and sing Hymnes to Christ an not only to sing his praises but to celebrate his holy Supper the Lords Supper upon the Lords day doubtless binding themselves in a holy Covenant to hate and flie sin And 't is known to have been the common question put to Christians by Pagan persecuing Governours Dost thou observe the Lords day the usual answer was I am a Christian I dare not intermit it This was wont to be the distinguishing Shibboleth the cognizance of Christians in the purest times of Christinity O blessed souls because they were Christians they durst not intermit the Lords day no though they lost their dearest lives for keeping of it How ill do they deserve the Name of Christians in these dayes who make no Conscience of this day yea who have the impudence to Preach against it Write against it Work upon it as if it were a common day I remember what the holy Apostle spake in a like case to those that polluted the Lords Table using it as if it were their own table What have ye not houses of your own ot eat and drink in 1 Cor. 11.22 or despise ye the Church of God The like may I say to all prophaners of the Lords day Have ye not dayes enough of your own to work and to play in or despise ye the Lords day Is it a sin a prooking sin to use the Lords Table as if it were your own table to eat Sacramental Bread as if it were common bread and is it no sin to use the Lords day as a common day as if it were your own day Why is it not paralel in phrase with the Lords Supper Is not the Lords Name and Superscrition found upon the one as well as the other I charge thee therefore Reader in the Name of the Lord Jesus so visibly graven upo this day render to Christ the things that are Christs Be assured the Lord will not hold thee guiltless for taking his Name in vain and spending his time in vain his time I mean upon which he has stampt his noble and royal Name This is the fifth Mark or Seal of the day The Inscription of Christs glorious Name upon it 6. The sixth is The Apostles and Apostolical Churches observation of it The holy Apostles were men intimately acquainted with the Secrets of Christ being most of them trained up in his School and personally conversant with him by the space of a Acts 1.3 forty dayes between his Resurrection and Ascension as b Drut 9.11 Moses was forty dayes with god upon the Mount Besides they had immediate Inspiration and authoritative Mission from Christ himself to manage the publick affairs
at his own house in the poores box c. At his own house Answ How then could it be avoided but there must have been gatherings at Pauls coming Which the Text forbiddeth The Apostles care was to have their collections ready i. e. in a publick stock or bank against his coming lest haply they of Macedonid coming along with him to whom it seems he had boasted of the Corinthians forwardness should find them unprepared * 2 Cor. 9.3 4. and so both he and they should be ashamed of his boasting That phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is translated by himself may as well be rendred of himself that is Answ 2 sponte sua of his own accord And so Musculus interprets it when t is said Puta illud in Graco 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 non esse positum pro apud se seponat sed hoc sensu quisque vestrûm suapta sponte i. e. in caetu sacro thesaurizans cui proposito nonsatisfecisset si quisque aqud se domi reposuisset etjusmodi namque reposita tum demum collidenda essent cum ipse ad eos venisset quod vitari volehat Wolph Museul ad Loe. let every one lay by treasuring up in store t is not meant let every one lay by himself apart and privately but at your publick meetings casting it into the publick treasury of the Church and that freely of his own good will That there may be no gatherings when I come whereas if every one had laid by in private onely at his own house there would have been need of gatherings at his coming the thing which he takes special care to prevent it seems the Apostle came but seldom and could not tarry long when he came for he had the care of all the Churches upon him especially the Gentiles the world through 2 Cor. 11.28 His work was to gather and govern Churches he must not therefore spend his time in gathering moneyes or going from house to house to call for every mans weekly contribution this had been a leaving the word of God to serve tables as the other Apostles said in a like case Acts 6.2 The survey the Apostle exhorts every man to take of his own estate that he might give thereafter Obj. 3 does notably overthrow the conceit of a first-day-Sabbath for he orders every man to lay by in store as God hath prospered him that is according as his yearly revenue increaseth or his weekly trade proves more or lesse gainful If the first day had been a Sabbath the Apostle knowing the proneness of our nature to mind earthly things would never have put them upon the consideration of their outward estates That the first day of the week is a Sabbath Ans 1 or day of rest is no conceit but a Scripture-truth as it shall ere long appear to the shame of such reviling adversaries 2. That upon this day they must take a survey of their estates because they must give according to their estates and incomes is a conceit indeed there is no colour of consequence in it for I hope they might take their survey on the Saturday night no necessity of deferring it to the Lords day Suppose a Minister of Christ should urge this Apostolical ordinance still as I am informed Mr. White of Dorchester did pressing his people to contribute and lay up something in a common stock every first day of the week for the releif of the poore and that according as God should blesse and prosper them in their callings the week before Does it follow that therefore when the people are assembled together on the Lords day they must make the Church their Counting-house or before they come there turn over their shop-bookes in stead of their Bibles What a ridiculous inference were this Good huâ—â—ands I should think would end the week and their work together good Christians to be sure will do so and not make the Lords day their counting-day a recounting-day indeed they may and must make it to recount the blessings of providence in a way of praise and thankfulness and this is a Sabbath-day duty as appeares by that * Psalm 92. Psalm for the Sabbath But further to dash this dream of the adversary let him consider that in effect as much is * Ez. 46.5 6. said of the Sabbath in the old Testament as here of the Lords day and it may be t is meant of the Lords day-day-Sabbath T is further objected That Pauls Epistle was read in these Churches on the sabbath-Sabbath-day Saturday he means and then the Apostle exhorted them to Charity and would have it to be their first work the next day while the sweet sense of the Epistle was upon their Spirits c. But This is frivolous For Gal. 4.10 The Apostle had utterly condemned the saturday-Saturday-Sabbath among the rest of those legal dayes and that he should build again the things he had destroyed we are not so much as to suppose Now take the sum of all On the first day of the week our Saviour was raised from the dead on this day he often appeared after his resurrection sent his holy Spirit on this day after his ascension and stampt his own blessed name upon it on this day the Saints assembled the Apostles preached the Sacraments were administred Charities Collected and concerning this day the Holy Prophets prophecyed what day was ever markt out with more shining and illustrious Characters The Best Antiquity for the Change of the day TO this Scripture-evidence for the change of the day we shall now add something by way of Testimony from the Records of Antiquity I may truly say 't is the glory of this truth that besides Scripture authority it ha's the most luculent Testimony in the writings of the Antients of any paralel-truth controverted in these disputeing times we may trace it all along from age to age ever since the Apostles times and with much contentment behold how providentially it hath pleased the Lord to guide the pens of his faithfull Martyrs and Ministers in their witness-bearing to this sacred truth especially in the first five hundred yeares after Christ wherein we shall find enough to silence the vain glorious vapourings of the adversary who affirms That the spotless spouse of Christ in her primitive purity and while she was decked with the Diadem of infallibility T. T. p. 62. and 106. namely during the first three Centuries did constantly observe both the seventh day and the first day of the week yea for the first 400. years if he may be beleeved By the way let the reader take notice of two considerable grants here First That the Church was decked with the Diadem of infallibility as he calls it for the first three hundred years Secondly That the Lords day was constantly observed during this state of the Church's infabllility For both dayes were observed saies he The Lords day was indeed besides his bare word I will bring sufficient witness for it But the
volo comparare Dominicam nostram cum Sabbato Judaeorum Ex divinis namque apparet Scripturis quod in die Dominica primo in terris datum est Manna Sienim ut Scriptura dicit sex diebus continuis collectum est septima autem die quae est Sabbati cessatum est sine dubid initium ejus a die prima quae est dies Dominica fuit quod si ex divinis Scripturis boc constat quod Die Dominica Deus pluit Manna de Coelo in Sabbato non pluit intelligant Judaei jam tunc praelatam esse Dominicam nostram Judaico Sabbato c. I demand saies he when the Manna began to fall from heaven and it is apparent from the Holy scriptures that Manna was first given upon the Lord's day For if as the Scripture says they gathered it six days together and ceased the seventh being the Sabbath day without controversie it began to fall on the first day which is is the Lord's day which being manifest from the Divine Scriptures that upon the Lords day God rained Manna from Heaven and upon the Sabbath none let the Jews understand that even then our Lords day was preferred before the Jewish Sabbath And presently after he adds Vpon our Lords day the Lord always rains Manna from heaven and what he means by Manna he tells them Viz. The heavenly Oracles the Word read and preacht to the people Where note First That he calls the seventh day the Jews Sabbath In nostra enim Dominica die semper pluit Domnius Manua de coelo Caelestia namque sunt eloquia ista c. Orlg. in Exod. 16. Hom. 7. not the the Christians Sabbath Secondly He titles the first day of the week the Lords day and our Lords day Thirdly he testifies that on this day the Church in his time had always Manna from Heaven in the publike Ministry of the Word and all this in opposition to the Jews Sabbath which what else can it signifie but the change of the day I might also allege that 23. Homily upon Humbers where this Antient Father calls the Lords day our Christian Sabbath and that in a literal sense as being a day of rest or cessation ab omnibus secularibus operibus from all secular works 6. Cyptian Hier. Cat. log Nam quia octavus dies i. e. post Sabbatum primus dies futurus erat quo Dominus resurgeret nos vivificaret spiritualem nobis daret circumcisionem hic dies octavus i.e. post Sabbatum primus Dominicus praecessit in imagine Câ—pr ep 59. ad Fid. which could not be meant of an every days Sabbath But I pass on to the next Witness namely Cyprian who flourished about the year of Christ 250 or 54. and received the crown of Martyrdom under Valerianus His words to our purpose are these For because the eighth day that is the first after the Sabbath was to be the day in which the Lord should arise and quicken us and give us the spiritual Circumcision this eighth day that is the first after the Sabbath and the Lords day went before in the shadow c. Where observe That he calls the first day of the week the Lords day and that in reference to Christ's resurrection secretly hinting the change of the day prefigured by Circumcision which was tied to the eighth day upon which the Infant being circumcised was accounted as a new creature as if it were risen again from death to life and this did typifie our first Resurrection from the death of sin to the life of grace by virtue of Christ's Refurrection whose Resurrection-day is called the eighth day John 20.26 Justin Martyr also insists upon this in his Dialogue with Trypho and it was the judgment of the Fathers generally that the change of the Sabbath was lapped up in that Sacrament of Circumcision About the year of our Lord 326. Anhanasius shone like a star in the eastern Church And his Testimony is clear as the light p 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Homil de Sement ad init Of old saies he the Sabbath was in great esteem among the anients but the Lord hath changed the Sabbath-day into the Lord's day The Lord himself did it sayes Athanasius And again Not we by our authority haue slighted the old Sabbath but in regard it did belong to the Pedagogy of the Law when Christ the great master came in place it became useless 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the candle is put out when the Sun shines What can be more plain T is true he seems to intimate that they did then occasionally meet upon the Jewes Sabbath but he gives a good account of it q 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Not saies he as if we were infected with Judaism but therefore we meet upon the Sabbath that we may worship the Lord of the Sabbath not out of any religious respect to that false Sabbath as he calls it but meerly in Devotion to Christ whereas on the contrary they celebrated the Lord's day with an honourable esteem of the day as it followes r 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ibid. p. 839. Therefore we honony the Lord's day because of the Lord's Resurrection Thus far famous Athanasius whose next neighbour was Hilary a French divine who livedi n the year 355. Hilarius 8. and left a most memorable record behind him of the Church's practice in his time r Nos ectava die quae ipsa prima est per fecti Sabbati festivi tate laetamur plolog in Isalm explan p. 335. Vpon the eighth day saith he which also is the first day we rejoyce in the Festivity of a perfect Sabbath Where we have enough to answer the imputation of Novelty for calling the Lord's day Sabbath however it was called it seem it was kept as a Sabbath in Hilarie's time yea long before t is true he calls it the 8th day also though it have a weekly return in the number of seven because counting on beyond the Jewish tale of weekly dayes comming next after their seventh it made the eighth See Mr. Ley. Sunday a Sabbath About the year 374. Ambrose 9 Ambrose was Bishop of Millain and he also ha's set his hand and seal to this sacred truth in sundry of his writings in his commentary upon the Colossians Or 377. acord to Chytraeus Chronol he expounds Ch. 2.17 Of the weekly Sabbath of the Jewes and paralels that place with Math. 12. The Son of man is Lord of the Sabbath day And indeed the change of the Sabbath does most powerfully preach Christ's Lordship and dominion over it Again to shew the high esteem that he and other Saints in his time had of the Lords day he Rhetoricates thus upon it Å¿ Dominica nobis ideo venerabilis atque solennis quia in co Salvator velut Sol exoriens discussis infernorum tenebris luce Resurrectionis emicuit de rat Fest Pent. Tom. 5. To us the Lords day is therefore
day of the Lord will be as a day of refreshing to some so a stormy day of tempests and terrors to others and a great part of the tempest of that day will fall upon the thoughts and hearts of men for * Eccles 12. ult God will bring every secret thing into judgement we must be accountable not only for idle words but vain thoughts And thus much of the first thing we must keep the Sabbath as a day of rest but we must not rest in this rest we must not make it a Sabbath of idleness but a Sabbath of holiness we must not so much cease from working as change our work servile work for soul work worldly imployments for spiritual exercises That is the next thing 2. To our holy rest we must join holy work and this is either publike or private something indeed must be done in private before the publike our closet-devotions and Family duties common to other dayes must not he omitted this day but rather augmented their Sacrifices under the Law were * Numb 28.9 doubled upon the Sabbath-day and observe it Exod. 3.7 their first service was the burning of Incense before the Lord. Matth. 28.1 Mark 16.2 John 20.1 Now prayer is our Incense let this be our morning exercise in private Seek the Lord O my soul seek him early do as Mary Magdalen did she was early up to seek him whom her soul loved she was last at the Cross and first at the Sepulchre in the dawning while it was yet dark very early in the morning say the Evangelists Oh that our love to Christ could keep pace with hers Shall we love the world better than Christ if we have a journey to go about worldly concernments we can set out betimes oh that we were as wise for our souls as we are for our bodies let not sleep that devourer of time beguile us of our golden hours in the morning in which we are freshest and fittest for converse with God let the sluggard that sleeps with the Sun-beams in his face remember that saying of Austin If the Sun could speak how roundly might it salute thee with this reproof I laboured more then thou yesterday and yet I am risen before thee to day But this is too low an Argument behold the Sun of righteousness is risen and he rose early this day therefore let us not sleep as do others but say and sing with the Church f Isai 26. â— With my soul have I desired thee in the night yea with my spirit within me will I seek thee early Having performed our morning exercises in private how cheerfully should we repair to the publike Assemblies and draw nigh to God in publike Ordinances on this acceptable day this season of grace when Christ sits in State as one speaks scattering treasures of grace amongst hungry and thirsty Saints that are poor in Spirit and wait for spiritual alms at the Throne of grace g Psal 84.1 2. How amiable are thy Tabernacles O Lord of Hosts My soul longeth yea even fainteth for the courts of the Lord My heart and my flesh cryeth out for the living God And again h Psal 122.1 I was glad when they said unto me let us go into the house of the Lord. For the i Psal 87.2 Lord loveth the gates of Zion more then all the dwellings of Jacob and most sweetly the Prophet Isaiah speaking of Gospel-times k Isai 2 1 2. Many people shall go and say Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord to the house of the God of Jacob and he will teach us of his ways and we will walk in his paths A most lively prediction of our Christian solemn Assemblies the select season of which is signified by t he practice of the Apostles and Primitive Saints to be the first day of the week on this day they met to break bread and Paul preached to them Acts 20.7 on this day they were all together with one accord in prayer Acts 2.1 with chap. 1.2 4. and at these meetings the Scriptures were read by the Apostles command Tertul. Apol. cap. 39. Col. 4.16 1 Thes 5.27 to which may be added singing of Psalms usual at their solemn Assemblies 1 Cor. 14. an Ordinance by which God is much glorified and the souls of his people sweetly cheered and refreshed what greater act of honour can we do to the great God here on earth then publikely to praise him in the great Congregation especially on the Lords day Psal 111.1 when all the Churches of Christ in the world joyn consort with us in this melodious duty Hebr. 10.25 Let us not therefore forsake the assembling of our selves together as the manner of some is while we enjoy publike Liberties and Ordinances let us improve them we know not how soon the songs of the Temple may be turned into howlings and Ichabod may be written upon all our Church-doors the glory is departed from Israel Lam. 1.4 16. the ways of Sion de mourn because none come to her solemn assemblies The Lord forbid that ever we should live to see that woful day wherein we shall desire to see one of the dayes of the Son of man but shall not see it Let not our neglect of the Lords day provoke the Lord to deprive us of it let us conscienciously wait upon God in Sabbath-Assemblies and publick Ordinances lest we be forced for contempt of the publike to seek our bread in secret wandring up and down in caves and dens of the earth destitute afflicted tormented as we read of some better than our selves Heb. 11.38 39. Lastly The publike solemnities of the day being ended what remains but that we return again to our private exercises searching the Scriptures concerning the truths taught in publike as the * Acts 17.11 noble Bereans did to which we may joyn Repetition and Conference to whet the Word upon one anothers hearts let not our souls be weary of Sabbath-work only take heed as of resting in the rest so also in the work of the day for what one truly speaks of duties and actings of grace they are good duties and good graces but bad Christs the like may I say of Sabbaths never so well kept they are good Sabbaths but bad Saviours let our rest and confidence be only in Christ and to such as take him for their rest his work is but recreation and so indeed we should esteem it in a spiritual sense not looking upon it as a sowr task or a rigid exaction but calling the Sabbath a delight we should keep it accordingly even the whole day with the whole man as a day of delights to the Lord being transported beyond flesh and the world and having our conversation in heaven as much as is possible for creatures cloathed with flesh To come to a closure There is a double duty to be performed in private on the Lords day which I seriously advise Christians
no congruity in that passage of T.T. where he reasons thus against reason p. 54. Certainly if Adam were a follower of God as a dear child he must needs keep the Sabbath with his Father With his Father how then could he follow him Certainly God went before if Adam followed him as a dear child I cannot conceive how he could possibly keep a Sabbath that God himself had not first blessed and sanctified to that end I may upon better grounds suppose with a late renowned Champion in this controversie that God alone kept the first Sabbath as Christ alone the first Lord's day that he might afford Adam an example Mr. Cawdrey's Sab. rediv. p. 3. cap. 1. as of working six daies by his being exercised six daies in the work of creation so of resting the seventh in it's next weekly return and so successively week after week But it will be said if Adam were bound to keep the first Sabbath we are bound to believe he did keep it Therefore a word or two of that 2. If he were bound I demand quo jure by what Law By the Law written in his heart why then was he bound to keep a Sabbath before there was a Sabbath to keep for the Law was graven in his heart on the sixth day as a branch of that * Eph. 4.24 Col. 3.10 divine image of God concreated with him Whereas the Sabbath to be sure was not instituted till the seventh day if then Besides the Law written in the table of Adam's heart was the same in this Authors judgment which was afterwards written in Tables of Stone that is the fourth Commandement which if we take his and Mr. Brabournes Comment upon it prescribes six daies for labour before a seventh of rest Now this order Adam could not possibly observe for the first week being created but on the sixth day He must therefore look out some other Law and where he will find it I cannot see unless in Gen. 2.3 and he must be very sharp-sighted to find any thing there that looks like a Law binding our first Parents to observe the first Sabbath For let the words be well pondered And God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it Gen. 2.3 Opened becase in it he had rested from all his works which he had created and made Whence we may clearly gather 'T is not said because he should rest but had rested that God's resting on the seventh day was in order of time before his blessing and sanctifying of the day as those words ver 2. On the seventh day God rested from all his works which he had made See Mr. White of Dorchester Gen. 2. imply the making of the works before God's resting so ver 3. He blessed and sanctified the seventh day because in it he had rested must needs intimate that God's resting on the seventh day went before his sanctifying of the day or setting it apart for a Sabbath Not long before I grant As Chap. 1. where Moses relates God's six daies works as finished by him then followeth the blessing upon them So in the 2. Chap. he makes the blessing to follow upon Gods resting as before upon his working but evidently long enough to discharge our first parents by virtue of those words from any obligation to keep the first Sabbath And whereas T.T. argues that the Sabbath was made for man and if Adam were a man the Sabbath was made for him I grant the whole argument onely with this distinction That although it was made for man yet it follows not that it was made for man as soon as man was made Neither has he alledged any one text of Scripture Valeat quantum valere potest of sufficient evidence to support his grand conclusion That the seventh-day-Sabbath was instituted and observed in pure Paradise Which if it b Yet I grant it not should be granted him yet his feeble cause would receive no invincible strength by it For although it would prove a Sabbath and a weekly Sabbath one day in seven to be moral and perpetual which I deny not and herein I could joyn issue with the contrary-minded yet what is this to the perpetuity and immutability of that old seventh day since in the judgment of all Interpreters both antient and modern except Jews onely one day in seven or a seventh part of weekly time is here perpetually established that old seventh day onely temporarily and during the state of the old world So Chrysostome Here saies he from the beginning God has intimated to us this doctrine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost Hom. 19. in Gen. 2. instructing us to set apart one day in the circle of every week for spiritual exercises Note by the way he saies not it is expresly determined here that is left for the fourth Commandement but it is intimated and implied here And the like saies Junius But to draw to a conclusion I suppose it is more then probably demonstrative If I may so speak without a Soloecism that the old Sabbath was instituted though in the beginning yet after the Fall in man's corrupt estate when he had put off his publick capacity as the representative of mankind and was looked upon as a single person yea a sinful person and one that stood in need of a Redeemer and so the day must needs be alterable as shall be shortly argued and evinced However if we should suppose the date of the Sabbaths institution to be utterly uncertain as the institution of Sacrifices is I see not but this may argue as to the day mutability stamped upon it It is true the solemne worship of God is unalterable as long as there is a God to be worshipped but the old way of worship by Sacrifices was mutable from the very first original of it Thus I grant the time of worship Rom. 12.1 Chrys in Hebr. Hom. 11. Basil in Isai c. 20. the Sabbath it self being an inseparable adjunct of solemne worship is perpetual but the old day the seventh from the Creation was made mutable in the first institution of it Indeed in some sense we have sacrifices still spiritual sacrifices and we have a Sabbath still yea * Mat. 24.20 a literal Sabbath But old Sabbaths and old Sacrifices being twins though both honorable and serviceable in their generations yet like Hippocrates twins they lived together and died together and let both together in God's name be buried in the grave of Christ so as never to rise again 2 Cor. 5.15 17. But let our Gospel-worship and Gospel-Sabbath take life from our Saviour's Resurrection which brought with it a new Creation a new World making all things new as the Apostle speaks 2. That the old seventh day was made alterable in the first institution will further appear if we consider the Law or command by which it was instituted which is no where to be found but in Gen. 2.3 As for the Law written in Adam's breast it is
28.4 Abraham the father of the faithful then to David and others in after-ages till at last it was fully accomplished by the most glorious resurrection of Christ from the dead whereby he trode on the Serpents head and all to-bruised it This consideration will out deep in the adversaries cause and to set the better edge upon it let it be further considered 7. And lastly the Holy Ghost has fully assured us that Christ in the promise was of the same antiquity with the confessed ground of the seventh dayes Sabbath c Heb. 3.3 4. The Apostle confesses that one ground or occasion of singling out that precise seventh day was Gods ending his work evidenced by his entring upon his rest And when this was done the same Apostle in the same place informs us the works sayes he were finished from the foundation of the world Now hear another Apostle guided by the same Spirit speaking of Christ in the same terms not differing in a tittle d Revel 13.8 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Observe the difference between 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the one signifies from the other before Joh. 17.24 Eph. 1.4 Thus he styles him the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world he does not say the Lomb slain before the foundation of the world as if it intended Christ in the eternal purpose of God but from the foundation of the world which clearly speaks Christ in the promise of Godfrom the beginning Now by the foot-steps of these two Texts compared how visibly may we trace the Antiquity of Christ in the promise and find a Saviour promised before a Sabbath instituted The seventh day-Sabbath was instituted upon Gods finishing of his works now as the works were finished from the foundation of the world so Christ was slain from the foundation of the world slain I say in respect of his Fathers promise and his own personal beginning to undertake that work which he was to perform in a way of suffering and dying so that when the Father ended his work of Creation the Son entred upon his work of redemption and thereby added a further perfection to the first work Whereupon God rested the seventh day and blessed it That is appointed it for a day of spiritual blessings upon the account of Christ the promised and blessed seed All which particulars premised it will be a truth of unquestionable evidence that the institution of the old seventh day was founded and bottomed upon Christ in the promise And now a dim eye may easily discern mutability lying at the very foundation of the day and thus it may be demonstrated A day founded upon Christ in the promise must necessarily be changed when the promise shall be fully accomplished Argum. But the old seventh day was founded upon Christ in the promise as appears by the premises Therefore c. The proposition needs no confirmation or if it does take it thus If the greatest duty founded upon Christ in the promise was to vary and change with the promise how much more the day For instance the great duty of believing in the Lord Jesus It cannot be denyed but one and the same Christ was the object of saving faith in all ages before the law under the law and under the Gospel Heb. 13.8 Rev. 1.8 Christ Jesus the same yesterday to day and for ever being he which was and which is and which is to come And so the faith of Gods elect which was and is and is to come looks to the same object But yet according to the different state of the object the eye of faith has had a different and various aspect Old Testament-believers who went before looked to him that should come after we that come after in the New Testament look to him that is gone before As long as Christ was in the promise they believed in the Messiah to come now the promise is fulfilled we believe and know that the Son of God is come And though still we look for his second coming to judge the world 1 Joh. 5.20 yet his first coming to save the world by his blessed Incarnation his bitter Passion and glorious resurrection we no longer expect as to come but look upon as already come and gone Well then you see how this great duty of believing circumstantially varies and changes with the promise and why because it was founded upon Christ in the promise And verily if the old Sabbath had the same foundation as we have proved then it must admit of the same variation As long as Christ continued in the promise the seventh day from the Creation was the Sabbath day but now the promise is accomplished the * Note that well day must be altered for the first foundation upon which it stood is removed And as we cannot now call that true faith which looks upon the Messiah as yet to come in the sense above mentioned so neither can we count that the true Sabbath which leans upon the promise of a Messiah to come Look to it if you keep the old seventh day you must keep Christ still in the old promise and together with the Jews Sabbath profess the Jews faith the twelfth Article of whose cursed Creed is this I believe with perfect faith that the Messiah is yet to come Buxtorf Synag c. 1. p. 4. And thus deluded creatures may see what they have gotten by siding with forlorn infidels against the principles and practises of the Christian world But I must here resolve a scruple or two and then I shall put a period to this first part You will say if the old seventh day were founded upon Christ in the promise Scrup. 1. then it must have been changed as soon as Christ was manifested in the flesh It followes not Resol 1. for the promise was not fully accomplished when Christ was manifested in the flesh but when he was justified in the spirit by his resurrection from the dead then indeed it was completely fulfilled as Paul and Barnabas do plainly testifie to the Jews at Antioch Act. 13.32 33. Acts 13. The promise which was made unto our fathers God hath fulfilled the same unto us their Children 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 adimpleoit Arius Mont. in that he hath raised up Jesus again So that the day of Christs resurrection was infallibly the day of the old Sabbaths expiration for then the promise upon which it was founded was fully accomplished of which more hereafter But will not this argument overthrow the duty as well as the day the Sabbath it self as the old seventh day Scrup. 2 Not in the least Resol for a Sabbath or day of rest in general is moral-natural and so perpetual but the fixing of it on that precise seventh day was meerly positive if not ceremonial Therefore the particular day may be and is cashiered and yet the duty Sabbath or holy rest still retained as the duty of solemn fasting is still
Zech. 4.7 Temple was finished the head-stone was brought forth with shouting crying grace grace thereunto So here when the work of our redemption should be finished and Christ exalted as head and corner-stone of his Church by his triumphant Resurrection the Holy Ghost intimates the solemn gratulation and publick praise that the Church should offer on that day So we are to understand the next words were as c Isal 56.7 Mal. 1.11 usually New Testament-worship is set forth in an old Testament-dress v. 27. God is the Lord which hath she wed us light light indeed when the Sun of righteousness arises he has made it a day of light and gladness to poor self-condemned sinners therefore bind ye the sacrifice with cords to the horns of the altar That is offer to the Lord the sacrifice of publick praise and thanksgiving verse 29. Oh give thanks unto the Lord for he is good his mercy endureth for ever So that t is evident a day of solemn worship is here intended and Christs resurrection day is principally pointed at as a day which the Lord would institute and a day which the Church should celebrate Saying This is the day which the Lord hath made let us be gland and rejoyce therein What a plain Scripture-proof is this of Divine authority of the Lords day So plain that the adversary is forced to grant it page 61. It must needs be meant of Christs resurrection-day saies he and when he wrote his first book he excited Christians to the weekly celebration of it Whereas in a late railing pamphlet since he seekes to smother the light and evidence of this Text by a silly evasion that the Psalmist speaks not of every first day of the week but Easter-day as may be conjectured But I shall easily shake off this slight exception Away with conjectures let us search the Scriptures what day does the Holy Ghost in Scripture call Christs resurrection-day Ask Matthew Mark Luke and John they 'l tell you Math. 28.1 Mark 6.2 Luke 24.1 John 20.1 19. t is the first day of the week the day of the year is never mentioned nor the day of the month on which Christ arose but the day of the week only to teach us doubtless that Christs resurrection-day must be no yearly or monthly but a weekly solemnity Good reason that the work of Redemption should have as frequent a commemoration as the work of Creation had Now ponder this good Reader and the Lord print it upon thy heart the day of the Saviours Resurrection prophetically extolled in the old Testament as the day which the Lord hath made is historically noted down in the New Testament as the first day of the week and now we shall draw an argument which I hope will be an arrow of conviction to the contrary-minded the rather because it comes out of Gods own quiver thus the day of Christs resurrection is the day which he Lord hath made for duties of solemn worship but the first day of the week is the day of Christs Resurrection therefore the first day of the week is the day which the Lord hath made for duties of solemn worship The proposition is warranted by the Testimony of the Psalmist the assumption is confirmed by the harmony of all the four Evangelists the conclusion therefore will stand as long as the world stands namely that the first day of the week is a day of divine institution mark'd out by the finger of God the spirit of Christ for a day of solemn weekly worship under the Gospel For as I hinted before the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy * Acts 1.16 2 Tim. 3.16 1 Pet. 1.11 and ch 3.19 Rom. 15.4 It was by the spirit of our great Prophet that all the Prophets of old did speak Like stars they all borrowed their light from this Sun they were irradiated and inspired by Christ and when a holy Prophet foretels such a thing shall be we may as confidently build upon it as if Christ himself had said I will have it so For indeed it is the voice of Christ that speaks in the old Testament as well as in the new And possibly this may be one reason why the Lord Christ has spoken so little in the Gospel concerning some new Testament-ordinances as the Lords day for one namely because the Prophets had spoken so much before and Christ would not take off his people from the study of the old Testament upon which the authority of the new does so much depend Me thinks as to the controversie of the Christian Sabbath this should abundantly satisfie any sober Christian that the day of Christs resurrection was prophesied of by David and others as a day which the Lord would make and institute and accordingly practised by the inspired Apostles upon the first day of the week and this practice perpetuated by the Church of Christ the Catholick Church in all ages since for above sixteen hundred years What can be objected with any colour of reason against so clear a truth Christ hath not left one syllable for the institution or celebration of this day T.T. p. 120. Answ Not one syllable Why did he not grant before that Psalm 118. compared with Acts 4. Must needs be meant of the resurrection-day and does not the spirit speak expresly Mr. Perkins in his cases of conscience argues for the Christian Sabbath from this text Cyprian Austin and Ambrose and all the ancients who have ever cited or saluted this place Psalm 118. do expound it and understand it of the Lords day See Mr. L. strange This is the day which the Lord hath made Is it a day of the Lords making and will he make nothing of that What else can be made of it but a prediction of a Divine institution which is equivalent to a precept especially when expounded by Apostolical practice as this has been Let it be seriously considered in what other sense can a day made long before in respect of Creation be stiled the day which the Lord hath made than in respect to a divine institution An institution then it is and the occasion of it Christs resurrection which was the concluding act of our Redemption and what an impression of glory does this stamp upon the day above all the dayes that God ever made the seventh day and all As some * years are crowned with Gods goodness above others so dayes also The work crownes the day as I have often said and the greater the work the greater the day now that work in which God is most glorified in all his attributes must needs be the greatest work such is the work of Redemption Quasi hactenus nullus fuerit in orbe dies Mollerus in Loc. therefore the day set apart in commemoration of it must wear away the crown from all other dayes Such is Christs resurrection-day therefore Emphatically stiled The day which the Lord hath made as if there had never been
this last book of the Bible to the praise of him who is our Alpha and Omega the very name speaks Christ the Author of it if not his Resurrection whereby he was declared both Lord and Christ the occasion of it The antients had it in singular esteem for the very name sake 't is an elegant and pious poem which I find written upon it by Sedlius an antient Christian Poet who was but a few years * Vid. Sixti Senesis Biblioth sanct p. 308. Jerome's Junior Caeperat intereà post tristia Sabbata felix Irradiare dies Libr. 5. Carm. Culmen qui nominis alti A domino dominante trahit primusque videri Promeruit nasci mundum atque resurgere Christum In English thus After sad Sabbaths th' happy day'gan dawn Whose lofty name from Lord of Lords is drawn A blessed day that first was grac'd to see Christs Rising and the worlds Nativity But we have more antient Records than this appropriating the title of Lords day to our Christian Sabbath Omnes ferè sacrae Scripturae interp etes tam veteres quam Recentiores de primo dïe hebdomadis intelligunt Wallaeus dissert de 4. prae cap. 6. p 150. Ignatius who lived in St. Johns time makes it a weekly holy day of the Christians observed in the room of the Jewes Sabbath So Tertullian Atharasius Hierom Austin who not By this title we may trace it down from the Apostles times through the Ocean of the Fathers Councills Schoolmen to this present age wherein we live And to come to Scripture there seemes to be much in that which Beza observes out of an antient Greek manu-script wherein that first day of the week 1 Cor. 16.2 is expresly called the Lords day and the Syriack translation tells us * Institut Theol loc 48. de cana Dom. that the Christians meeting together to receive the Lords Supper 1 Cor. 11.20 was upon the Lords day And Bucanus saith this Sacrament is called the Lords Supper as in respect of the institutor and the end of it I had rather interpret the Lords day by the Lords Supper than as Bucan does the Lords Supper by the Lords day so also in respect of the day on which it was wont to be administ viz. The Lords day citeing that Text Acts 20.7 and hence also the antients stiled it Dies panis the day of bread because the Churches of Christ ever used to break bread on this day But to end all disputes if Scripture may be safely interpreted by Scripture and dark places by plain ones then let us expound the Lords day Rev. 1.10 by the Lords Supper 1 Cor. 11.20 Here let the reader take notice that the blessed Spirit of God who had his choice of words and never spake any thing but upon admirable reason never vouchsafed this title of honour in the new Testament but only to the Supper and the day the Lords Supper and the Lords day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Cor. 11.20 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rev. 1.10 Neither can any third Text be produced where this Epithet is applyed to any thing else Now the phrase being the same and thus singular the sense must needs be the same Look therefore in what notion the Supper is the Lords Supper in the same sense is the day stiled the Lords day The supper is the Lords because the Lord Christ instituted it yea and substituted it in the room of the Passeover and why not the day His * So Mr. Perkins in his cases of conscience because he instituted and substituted it in the room of the old Sabbath T is evidently a day of Christs institution a day of the Lords own making and with reference to his Resurrection he made it such a day of the week not such a day of the year as we proved before in a word let any other day be set up in constitution with the first day of the week for the title of Lords day and we shall easily non-suit it Our Saviours birth-day bids fair for it Obj. 1 T.T. Answ Then it must be a day of divine institution which I hope he will not say But I answer further if the day of Christs nativity or any other day besides the first day of the week had been devoted to Christ and intended by John in this place he had spoken very obscurely to say I was in the spirit on the Lords day he would rather have said I was in the spirit on one of the Lords dayes Annot. ad loc But to put this fancy to flight observe the day here dignified with this magnificet title must needs be some noted day the circumstances of time place and person are set down as Beza observes the better to conciliate credit to the truth of these heavenly visions therefore all but that of the place have an eminent badge of cognizance upon them John was a known person and the Lords day with an emphatical Article 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a well-known day doubtless he that relates to others such a thing done such a day presupposes the day sufficiently and certainly known for a doubtfull circumstance darkens a story and drawes a curtain in stead of opening a casement to give light to the matter now let us put it to the question what day was more eminently and unquestionably known in all the Churches of Christ than the first day of the week Which the Secretaries of Christ all the four Evangelists had so exactly noted and the Psalmist so prophetically extolled as a day of the Lords making St. John could not but know that these seven Churches knew the first day of the week to be Christs Resurrection-day and neither he nor they could be ignorant that Christs Resurrection-day was the day which the Lord had made and what 's that but the Lords day As for our Saviours Birth-day although it were a day of wonderful mercy yet it is left in great obscurity not one of the Evangelists marking it out by name neither can it be so clearly resolved either what day of the * Unless the adversary will grant Mr. A. that it was the first day of the week week or what day of the month or what month of the year nor hardly what year of the world our Saviour was born in but it may be matter of controversie See divers disputes about it in Dr. Willets Hexapl. on Dan. chapter 11. If John intends any single day t is most likely to be the seventh day which was antiently stiled the Lords holy day Obj. 2 Isai 57.6 and is declared by Christ to be his day Mark 2. last and no other day throughout the Gospel does he declare to be his This he and Mr. Braburn in contradiction to the whole Christian world would fain perswade us that the Lords day which St. John speaks was the old Sabbath But He may as well say that the Lords Supper which St. Paul speakes of was the old Passeover Ans
to make Conscience of namely the spiritual duty of meditation and the celestial duty of praise First how seasonable it is on the Sabbath to meditate not only on the Word but the Works of God appears from Psal 92. which is a Psalm for the Sabbath-day How does the Psalmist there search and dive into the wonderful works of God Vers 5. How great are thy works O Lord and thy thoughts are very deep Here we have a large field works of Creation and works of Providence here our souls may wander from sea to land See Mr. Baxter Saints ever-lasting Rest from earth to Heaven from time to eternity yea walk upon the Sun Moon and Stars and enter into Heaven it self the Paradise of God How manifold are thy works O Lord in wisdome hast thou made them all Every creature of God that we cast our eyes upon this day should be as a flower to feed our Meditations I speak of cursory Meditation or that which is occasional one special use whereof is to feed our graces by our senses and as we are Christians to conduct us to Christ by the view of all creatures and actions when we look upon the Sun it bids us look up to Christ the Sun of righteousness every star may mind us of that star of Jacob that bright and morning star if we look upon our houses Christ is the door if upon our bodies he is the head if upon our clothes he is the garment of salvation if upon our friends and relations he is our husband our friend our Lord our Law-giver our King if we walk he is the way if we read he is the word if we eat and drink he is our food if we live Christ is our life that is a holy heart may make this spiritual use of all earthly objects and occasions to contemplate Christ in them and if we improve not our senses this way 't is all one as if we were blind or brutish But besides this there is a more distinct deliberate solemn and set meditation required on the Lords day and the work of Redemption being the occasion of the day how should our hearts work upon this blessed subject Come Christian call in thy thoughts from all worldly concernments and contemplate this rare contrivance of thy Redemption by Jesus Christ ponder it deeply get lively and strong apprehensions of it that it may leave deep and lasting impressions upon thy soul view over the several passages and transactions in this Master-piece of all Gods works view it first in the platform how gloriously was this laid in the eternal projects and a Ephes 1.4 purposes of Gods love yea in that eternal promise past between the Father and the Son b Titus 1.2 In hopes of eternal life which God that cannot lie promised before the world began Mark it here was a promise a promise of eternal life made by God by God that cannot lie and that before there was a world or man in the world Oh the everlastingness infiniteness unsearchableness of this love of God! that the everlasting God the Majesty of heaven and earth should take care of me before the world was that he should busie himself and his Son about a worthless wretched worm born out of due time the least of Saints the greatest of sinners O my soul admire adore this first love this free love of God and Christ Next see the early discovery and shining forth of this mystery in the very morning of the world no sooner is man fallen but God reaches out a c Gen. 3.15 promise to him and after many ages sends his blessed Son out of his bosome to fulfil it in the d Gal. 4.4 fulness of time Christ comes we could not come up to him lo he comes down to us O see the King of glory stooping bowing the Heavens to come down and dwell in a dungeon to lodge amongst prisoners and pitch his tent in the rebels camp Think O my soul how did the holy Angels wonder to see the King of Heaven stepping down from his throne to sit on his footstool yea putting off to the view the robes of a prince to put on the livery of a e Phil. 2.7 8. servant and that after treason had been stampt upon it taking our nature I mean after it had been up in arms against God not that he took the sin of our nature he that could make our nature without sin could also and did take it without sin but the shame of it he took in that he took it when it was under a cloud under a blot before God and Angels How does this express the love of Christ a heart full of love to lost sinners q. d. poor soult I cannot keep from you I love your very nature and will joyn it to my self and so I may save you from sin and wrath I care not if I become one with you and dwell in your very flesh My glory shall not hinder I will rather veil it for a while and take the form of a servant and become of no reputation than you shall perish for ever Again how does this speak the unspeakable love of God See Mr. Ambrose looking to Jesus p. 342. as one sweetly observes God did so love the very nature of his elect that though for the present he had them not all with him in heaven yet he must have their picture in his Son to see them in and love them in O meditate much on this admirable strein of love till it melt thy heart and make it burn within thee From the Incarnation of our blessed Saviour we may trace him through the several passages of his life to his death and passion and here with an eye of faith look upon him whom thou hast pierced behold the man as he said even that man of sorrows suffering bleeding dying on that tree of shame and ignominy dwell upon the death of Christ till it put life into thy dead heart then follow thy crucified Lord from the cross to the Sepulchre and by the way ponder deeply the severity of Gods justice the sinfulness of sin the love of Christ and the worth of souls which are not redeemed with corruptible things as silver and gold but with the precious blood of Jesus Christ 1 Pet. 1.18 19. as a lamb without blemish and without spot Why did the Primitive Saints sacramentally shew forth the Lords death on the Lords day Acts 20.7 but to signifie to us that to contemplate and commemorate the death of Christ is a special duty of the day So also his Resurrection which was the great transaction of the day therefore a proper subject for serious meditation It is Christ that died yea rather that is risen again and become the first-fruits of them that slept Consider O my souls the holy triumph of thy Redeemer this day when he trod on the serpents head took from death its sting from hell its standard Suppose thou hadst
every puny in Logick is able to resolve for why might not Gods approbation be given forth in the morning or forenoon of the sixth day and time enough left before night for sin to creep into the world To clear this let it be noted See Dr. Willets Hexapla in Exod. 31. That although God was pleased to parcel out his work into six distinct dayes yet he measured not every dayes work by the hour-glass of time as we creatures do but what he did on each day was done in an instant He did but speak the word and it was done he commanded and it was created Psal 33.9 Psa 146.5 This is evident from principles of reason as well as from the forementioned places of Scripture for creation is the production of something out of nothing or that which is as much as nothing Now betwixt the being of something and nothing there can be no intermediate state and consequently no imaginable space of time but an imperceptible moment Hence that received maxime that Creation is in an instant Now to accommodate this to the work of the sixth day consisting of man and beasts certainly the forming of these creatures being momentaneous in the sense above mentioned took up but little of the day I can see no colour of reason to the contrary but our first Parents might be created and the whole creation compleated in the fore part of the sixth day And doubtless as soon as the creation was ended the divine approbatiom was added And God saw that it was good For surely as soon as the creature was the Creator saw what it was and he saw it to be good for he made it good And although the conclusion of the day be presently added yet 't is without dispute that many other things were transacted though not expressed in the first Chapter before the close of the sixth day as the naming of the creatures the joyning of our first parents together in marriage and disposing of them in the garden yea the giving of the Law and in all likelyhood the breaking of it too And so the first knot is untied Whereas he adds Answer 2 That as soon as the sixth day ended and the seventh began God rested and sanctified the Sabbath I answer This Assertion is built upon a very uncertain if not a false supposition viz. That the order of the words and Chapters is exactly answerable to the order of the things done Whereas in the judgment of the learned here is a manifest dislocation or misplacing of the sacred story as to the order of things for if we regard the exact order of things done the second chapter of Genesis would begin at the fourth verse as learned Junius affirms And the second and third verses would come in at the end of the third Chapter Junij Praelect in Gen. 2. and so the mention of the Sabbaths institution would follow the description of Adam's sin as an acute * De. Lightfoot's Harmony of the Old Testa and he gives this solid reason why the words stand as they do and why the mention of the Sabbath is set down before Adams fall viz. because the Holy Ghost would dispatch the general history of the first seven daies together without the interposition of any particular story Writer of our own hath observed But because the adversary will say these are but humane fancies let us see whether they have not sure footing in the Word it self To this purpose let the Reader turn to Genes 2. and view the texture and composure of the whole Chapter In the three first verses you have an account of God's finishing the heavens and the earth as also his resting on the seventh day From the third to the eighth verse you have the creation of Vegetables herbs and plants which was the work of the third day From ver 8. to ver 15. you have the planting of the garden and adorning of it with trees and rivers which if it were a work of creation was done before the seventh day though it be not mentioned till after it Again ver 7. you have the forming of the man and from ver 18. to 22. the framing of the woman as a also the creating of birds and beasts and the naming of the creatures which you see are all mentioned after the seventh day yet all or most of them done on the sixth So that should we strictly cleave to the letter In Scriptura non est prius posterius The order of time is not alwaies kept in Scripture but sometimes that is placed first which was done last contrà and believe that all things were done in the same order as they are here set down we must believe that herbs and plants birds and beasts man and woman were all created after the creation was ended and God had rested the seventh day Yea if the literal and historical order of the words must be maintained how will T.T. make good his Mount-paradise-notion For according to the order of the words Paradise was not planted till after the Sabbath How then could Adam keep his first Sabbath in Paradise Viderit ipse Hitherto therefore he must of necessity yield a transposition that is that although these things be mentioned after the seventh day yet they were done before it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Haec est un◠de regulis ad intelligendam Scripturam sanctam necessariis Luth. loc com p. 75. and here set down by way of Postscript Now let us see what may be said for that which follows ver 16.17 compared with the three last verses you have the woman given in marriage to the man and the Creators Law touching the forbidden fruit given in charge to both and that all this was done on the sixth day will be readily granted Well then Chap. 3. you have the story of the Serpents temptation the transgression of our first parents their conviction in the cool of the day and lastly their expulsion out of Paradise and the juncture of all this lying so close to the story of the sixth day Chap. 2. that unless you purposely loosen the connexion you may rationally look upon it as one and the same daies work And verily methinks the Serpents first on-set sounds as if there were very little distance of time between God's giving the Law and Satan's tempting the woman to break it Gen. 3.1 Yea hath God said ye shall not eat of every tree in the garden a very abrupt motion if it had not been made immediately upon the giving of the Law The words are as one observes a form of speech used by one who standing aloof and over-hearing what was forbidden Mr. Walker Doctrine of the Sabbath doth presently step in and ask if it were not so as he took it to be and besides the woman's answer as was hinted before being in the future tense we may or shall eat hereafter implies that they had scarce eaten as yet So that all
circumstances considered it more then probable that this third Chapter is nothing but an history of what was done on the sixth day And so the mention of the Sabbath in the beginning of the second Chapter may well enough in order of things take place at the end of the third and then it will roundly follow That the first sin went before the first Sabbath As to that which is further alledged Exod. 31.17 Ans 3 That on the seventh day God rested and was refreshed I answer It is onely a Metaphorical expression for we may not think that the everlasting God the Lord the Creator of the ends of the earth fainted or was weary in the works of the Creation or that he needed any rest or respiration But when the Holy Ghost speaks to us men he delights to speak after the manner of men respecting more the weakness of our capacity than the exactness and propriety of the Phrase In a word suppose God's resting and being refreshed on the seventh day intimate some delightful satisfaction like that which men take in things that refresh their souls yet it follows not that this satisfaction was taken in the creatures but rather in Christ who had now undertaken God's satisfaction for man's transgression And this indeed is a sweet refreshing as to a guilty creature so to an angry God and in this sense the Scriptures do sweetly harmonize Isai 42.1 Mat. 3.17 Mat. 12.18 unanimously testifying that our blessed Redeemer is the person in whom the eternal God delighteth in whom the Father is well-pleased As for the other Scriptures which T.T. crouds in for company-sake in his Margin as Job 38.7 Luke 2.13 the one speaking of the Angels song at the Creation of the earth the other of their joyful Hymne at the birth of Christ I wonder how they make for his purpose to prove that man had not sinned before the Sabbath But impertinent quotations are no rarities in his book he would make a glorious shew of Scripture to dazle the eies of the simple when the Scriptures he cites are neither in sense nor sound applicable to his purpose which if it be not packing sophistry let the world judg Well his first tripartite argument is weighed and found to light And hitherto for ought appears to the contrary the first Sabbath was not before sin I proceed to the second 2. T. T s Argum. Some time sayes he must be allowed for the sin of Angels and after that for the parley with the woman and it was no little space wherein Adam gave significant names to the creatures For the Angels sin Ans 1 to guesse precisely at the time of it is neither easie nor necessary And in disputes of this nature we must be wise to sobriety not to curiosity a 1 Tim. 3.6 pride was a principal ingredient in their sin and b Job 4.18 God charged them with folly for their pride how much more folly shall sinful man be found guilty of who in the pride of his foolish heart shall presume to be wise above that which is written Some think that place Luke 10.28 may refer to the first fall of the Angels being mentioned as a check to the disciples ready to be lifted up with pride at the success of their ministry Ne factis miraculis superbirent discipuli adduxit Domiuus exemplum Satanae c. Stella in loc However it is most consentaneous to Scripture and Reason to conceive that the Angels being spiritual substances must in their actings whether good or evil be proportionable to their beings And sin being a spiritual evil how quick a progresse it might make in such creatures let any man judg who can but compare things spiritual with spiritual To me it is no great difficulty to apprehend that in a very few moments by an aspiring thought legions of Angels might become legions of Divels Especially being for ought I know linked together in a conjoyned apostasie For Adam's naming the creatures this also might soon be dispatched Answ 2 considering that not every individual creature as T.T. would have it but onely the birds and beasts were made to pass before Adam of which there are not many kinds Primi parentes insignes Philosophi Luther in Gâ—n Cap. 1. and not many of a kind created at first And doubtless it cost Adam no study to impose significant names upon them He had natural Philosophy enough concreated with him to know the properties and qualities of the creaures 1 Kin. 4.33 34 and he needed no dictionary to find out suitable names for them If Solomon after the Fall were so well read in the book of the creatures that he could write a complete Commentary upon it from the Cedar to the Hysop what shall we think of Adam before the Fall But to put all out of doubt Dr. Twisse moral of the Sabbath p. 51. that the naming of the Creatures took up no long time is evident for they were all named before Eve was formed Gen. 2.19 20. So as all this might be done before noon and time enough left before night for the acting of that fatal tragedy the Fall of Man as a judicious Writer concludes For the parley betwixt the Woman and the Serpent Answ 3 we have no reason to judge that long when the Scripture cuts it so short Questionless the Serpent was not onely a subtile but a nimble disputant and it was his policy to be as quick as he could that the woman might be conquered before she had time to recollect her self Besides in the judgment of most Interpreters she began to stagger and give ground at the first assault So that all this Authors conjectures laid together are too weak to bear the weight of that confident conclusion Nothing is more certain then that the Highest himself did both sanctifie and celebrate the first Sabbath and that before sin p. 11. I may well say nothing is more uncertain I have given some Scripture-arguments already to make it more then probable I shall add more in the third branch to make it little less then infallible that man fell on the sixth day For the present I shall onely cast in one Argument against the supposed institution of the Sabbath in Paradise If the Sabbath was instituted in Paradise Argu. then Adam did observe and was bound to observe the first Sabbath in Paradise But neither of these can be proved from Scripture Therefore c. 1. That Adam did unquestionably observe the first Sabbath in Paradise cannot be demonstratively proved from Scripture This is undeniable that whenever or where-ever he kept his first Sabbath he did it in imitation of God's example Now how could he rest a whole day by God's example till God had fully completed the first seventh dayes rest for his example Eph. 5.1 Imitation of God being a subsequent not a concomitant act a following of him as dear children not a fellow-acting with him I can therefore see
were given before the fall and should undoubtedly have bound Adam and all his posterity if he had not fallen Gen. 2.17 yet now it binds none neither should it if the tree were known So also that positive law of keeping and dressing the Garden Mr. â—â— Strange which to Adam was a binding precept yet now it is wholly abrogated in the letter of it or else as one sayes we must all tag and rag turn gardeners True there was something moral and of the law of nature in that precept Yates Model of Divin Haec lex naturalis est conjunctam habens designationem diei ceremonialem quia verò partim naturalis partimque ut loquuntur Scholae positiva est Propterea discrimen oportet in eo ordine adhiberi quod enim naturale est puta diem septimum quemque Deo sacrum esse illud permanet quod positivum nempe illum diem qui septimus est creationis esse Diem Sabbathi hoc mutatum est Juni prae'ec in Gen. 2. p. 27. man must alwayes be exercised and imployed the earth his store-house must also be his work-house Idleness and happiness could never consist together But that his imployment must be limited to the culture of a Garden that was meerly positive The like may be said for the Law of the Sabbath supposing not granting it had been given in paradise that man should celebrate a Sabbath was moral and perpetual but that it must be on the seventh day from the Creation was meerly positive temporary and alterable at the law-givers pleasure And this may serve as a proper Engine to undermine that grand argument founded on the institution of marriage P. 155. The Sabbath is a precept saith he as ancient as Vniversal as marriage both were instituted in paradise for Adam and all his posterity Ans We grant that the institution of marriage was made in pure paradise which ever since has made it honorable amongst all men Heb. 13.4 And thus far we also grant the first institution is a perpetual obligation viz. That one man is bound to one woman yet I hope no man is tyed by that first institution to make choice of this or that particular woman but he is at liberty to marry whom he lists provided it be in the Lord so also admitting the Sabbath to be instituted in paradise yet I can see no reason why it should limit us to that particular day but that notwithstanding we may observe any other day that shall appear to be of the Lords appointment as the first day of the week infallibly is and therefore it bears the Lords name being styled the Lords Day by way of eminency Indeed now the day is fixed and we cannot chuse another nor change it to another Psa 118.29 Rev. 1.10 for reasons hereafter to be rendered But enough is said to prove the command whatever it was whereby the old Sabbath was instituted to be but temporary though it had been given in Innocency A positive precept given in innocency might suffer much alteration by mans apostasie Mr. Sheph. Thes 17.19 For to borrow the words of a reverend Author the sin of man made the Lord repent that ever he had made man and consequently that ever he made the world for man which might be a sufficient ground of the Law-givers pleasure to alter and change the day stated upon the worlds Creation to another day stated upon the worlds Redemption of which the Lord will never repent Now if a precept or institution given before the fall might be mutable at the Law givers pleasure how much more this of the seventh day which was rather imposed since the fall as the institution of Sacrifices the prohibition of blood c. Gen. 9.4 3. That the old seventh day was made alterable in the first institution of the Sabbath is most of all evident from the ground or occasion upon which it was instituted and this is hinted unto us in those words Gen. 2.2 See Ainsworth annot in Gen. 2.2 On the seventh day God ended his works which he had made and rested the seventh day wherefore he blessed and sanctified it Now it much concerns us to enquire in what sense the Lord is said to have ended his works on the seventh day since we must not imagine with Hierome and Catharinus that God made any new creatures on the seventh day for doubtless the creation was finished on the sixth day How then it is said on the seventh day God ended his works Why without resting and torturing the words as some do we may understand it in one or both of these two respects either 1. In respect of Providence or 2. In respect of the Promise 1. In respect of Providence So judicious Mr. White in Gen. 2. and why may not this be the meaning of the holy Ghost That on the seventh day God was pleased by a signal hand of Providence to perfect his works of Creations either by establishing them to continue as they do this day or at least by manifesting their accomplishment in his rest and cessation from Creating-work Take the word Ended in this sense and so it informs us that the ground of Gods sanctifying the seventh day was not simply his rest upon that day but also the reason of that rest Heb. 4. v. 3.4 namely the finishing of his works witnessed by his resting as the Author to the Hebrews plainly intimates And not only that but also the result and consequent of both namely the dignifying and honouring of that day above all other dayes for the time being by crowning it with the accomplishment of the greatest work then made or manifested to be made perfect Isa 58.3 Hence the seventh day was styled The Honorable of the Lord not that in it self one day is more honorable and observable then another but that which differences the one from the other and dignifies one above another is Gods casting honour upon it by some memorable work of Providence either begun or finished upon that day Upon which account most of the Jewes Festivals were instituted as their Passeover in the 14th of Abib Lev. 23.5 Esth 9.21 the Feast of Purim on the 14th of Adar like our Gunpowder-treason-day on the 5. of November because the noble acts of God have been done upon these dayes And this was a main ground of their weekly Sabbath upon the seventh day being a day crowned with the greatest work then visible a work manifested to be finished on the seventh day by Gods resting on that day Yet this must be noted that the finishing of Gods work did not make the day more honorable then others by any natural necessity but only by positive right and equity There was no necessary and natural cause why the seventh day on which the work was declaratively ended should be more honorable then the sixth day on which it was really ended and finished only it was Gods will and pleasure to have
the seventh for me not naming which seventh must he necessarily intend one seventh more then another I should rather think no but any one of the seven being left to his own liberty to chuse which he pleases Or thus Suppose a liberal Master who has seven pounds to dispose of indent thus with his Servant I freely give or lend thee six of them provided thou improve the seventh for me What must he needs intend this or that special seventh supposing some piece of gold among the rest Certainly no every man may know his meaning by the seventh pound he intends one pound of seven The accommodation is easie and apposite the bountiful and blessed God freely bestows six dayes in the week upon his creature man reserving the seventh to himself that is one in seven at his own choice and appointment This is the direct and principal intendment of the Law Though I deny not that the old seventh day was indirectly and occasionally here pointed at as a seventh day then under Divine sanction and the Jewes were bound by this Commandment to keep that day as by the fifth commandment they were bound to honour their particular parents then living yet both these being but occasional circumstances might be and were altered without any impeachment to the morality of these Commands The altering of a mutable circumstance either of time place or person is far from abolishing the substance of a law indeed if the Sabbath had been changed as I said before either to the sixth day or the tenth day the whole frame of the Commandment had been broken and shattered but in the change of one seventh day to another upon a sufficient ground and by a sufficient authority the substance of the Law suffers not at all the substance of it is for one day in seven directly and no more the seventh day is the Sabbath To those forementioned vulgar cases I will adde some Scripture-instances for the further clearing of it As thus why may not the seventh part of mans time and the tenth part of his temporals be understood in a parallel sense Levit. 27.30 Deut. 18.21 Now one part of ten is principally intended in the Law of tithes surely when God commandeth the tenth any man will think he hath more respect to the number then the order such a proportion then such a particular in it Although indeed as judicious Mr. Cawdrey notes in one particular there was a law to restrain it to the last of ten of all their Cattel the tenth that came under the rod was holy to the Lord which law as he sayes well Levit. 27.23 need not have been added if the general law for tithes had intended the last of ten And this is the very case here one day in seven is chiefly and directly intended in this law of the Sabbath The seventh day in every week Christ hath now limited by his Apostles to the Lords day Mr. Perkins in Gal. 4.10 neither can any more be well gathered from it unless some other law be produced to restrain it to the last of seven as once it was or to the first of seven as now it is restrained some other law I say for there is no such particular restriction in theh fourth Commandment For I pray observe this the Commandment doth not point out the day by way of institution but only prescribe the observation of it supposing it either as already instituted or to be instituted elsewhere either in the Old Testament or the New Again to that which others have gathered to my hand let me adde one Scripture-instance more why may not that tribute of time which God calls for and that tribute of their lands which Joseph compacted for with the Egyptians be taken in a like sense since the things themselves are not much unlike Gen. 47.24 You shall give the fifth part of your increase to Pharaoh and four parts shall be your own V. 27. And Joseph made it a law over the land of Egypt unto this day that Pharaoh should have the fifth part that is such a part in proportion one part in five The Gram matical construction of the Commandment will bear this sense and inforce no more then a seventh in proportion and if other arguments must sway the sense what better arguments then the analogy of other Scriptures and the received Principles of religion both which carry it for a seventh day in proportion not the old seventh day Irenaeus Phil. you shall have four and Pharaoh shall have one And truely varying but the circumstances me thinks the Lord speaks much to the same effect in this fourth Commandment Six dayes shalt thou labour but a seventh or the seventh is the Sabbath that is dividing the week into seven parts thou shalt have six of them for thy common work and I will have one in seven for my solemn worship He does not say the seventh day from Creation that was ordered elsewhere Gen. 2. But a seventh in proportion directly this or that seventh indirectly and by consequence only Yea to proceed to demonstration that this is unquestionably the mind of God may be thus made out This proportion is no where directly stated by a perpetual precept unless it be in this fourth Commandment Therefore it must be so determined here That it must be somewhere determined is evident because it is substantially profitable to Religion the glory of God and the good of souls as Mr. Cawdrey has invincibly argued for if men were left to their own liberty to chuse their own proportion in all probability Religion would be substantially prejudiced and damnified by it either it would be starved with too little or surfetted with too much Sabbath-time either Popery would create almost every day in the week a holy day or profaneness would be content with one day in a moneth Let sinful man have liberty to pluck up Gods bounds and alter his proportion either one way or other and experience will soon shew the inconvenience of it Let it be altered from one of seven to one of ten or twenty and what a deadly blow to Religion would that be Yea let the alteration be on the other hand from one of seven to two of seven may we not justly suspect more prejudice then profit by such an alteration Would not one sabbath be able to justle out another and one day disturb the holy rest of another Truly as our Saviour speaks in another case Luke 19.30 No man can serve two masters but either he will have the one and love the other or hold to the one and dispise the other So we may probably think in this case no man can ordinarily observe two Sabbaths in a week but either he will slight the one to keep the other or it may be in a little time slight both and keep neither Whether the Sabbath should be kept once a week or once a moneth cannot be gathered from any plain
correspondent to the change of the Covenant it self and accordingly such a change of the Sabbath I do here assert not in respect of the substance or duty holy rest but the circumstance of time the day upon which that duty was formerly fixed and stated And that such a change of the Covenant there is and such a change of the Sabbath by one and the same Christ i Hebr. 12.24 mediator of the Covenant and k Mark 2.28 Lord of the Sabbath and both these occasioned by the exhibition of a new and a better Covenant upon his glorious resurrection from the dead we come now to demonstrate To this purpose we shall reflect upon the old Covenant in a threefold Covenant-expressue of it and shew what a visible change Christ has made in it and how inseparably the change of the Sabbath is interwoven with it 1. In the mandatory part of it I mean the Decalogue or law of the ten Commandments that this was a l Jep 31.31.32 Deut. 5.2 ch 29.1 1 Kings 8 9.21 2 Chron. 6.11 Psalm 105.11 piece of the old Covenant promulgated upon Mount Sinai I suppose none will question And that even this has undergone not only mitigation but some kind of mutation by our glorious Gospel-law-giver none need to question only we must state it warily and soberly not affirming with the blundring Antinomians hand over head that the law of Moses is out-lawed and abrogated without any distinction This were to coyn a lye to confirm the truth of God for it is certain that those lively m Acts 7.38 Oracles n Ex. 20.1 propounded by God himself upon Mount Sinai and afterwards expounded by Moses and the Prophets in the Old Testament by o Mat. 5.21 to the end Christ and his p Rom. 7.12 14 ch 13.8 9 10. Ephes 6.1 2 3. James 2.8 9 10 12. 1 John 2.9 10 Apostles in the New are still in force under the Gospel not onely as declarative of the law of nature but as positively preceptive also in the matter and substance of them yea as perpetually directive as a rule of life and obedience both in respect of duties to be performed and sins to be avoided As to have the only true God and no other to be our God to worship this only true God with his own prescribed worship and no other to use his holy name most reverently and religiously to sanctifie his holy Sabbath to honour Father and Mother to avoid Idolatry Blasphemy Murder Adultery Theft c. These are as much duties and sins under the Gospel as ever they were under the Law and in this sense the Moral law is q Rom. 3.31 1 Cor. 9.21 established by Christ and r Mat 5.17 18. Christus finisest legis Rom. 10.4 sed finis persiciens non intersiciens August in John tract 55. Tom. 9. ratified even to a tittle You will ask me then wherein les the change I answer not in the substance but in some circumstantials peculiar to those times and appropriate to that people the Church of the Jewes for as I hinted before almost all Scripture had some circumstantial peculiarity and propriety to those times and that people to whom it was immediately given and so had the Decalogue 'T is true in the substance and morality of it it was equally calculated both for Jewes and Christians yet some particulars in it in regard of circumstance either direct or indirect were proper to the Jewes onely as the preface to the first Commandment I am the Lord which brought thee out of the land of Egypt which in the letter of it concerns not us for literally and properly we were never in Egypt not in bondage there so also the promise annexed to the fifth commandment which in the particularity of it belonged to the Jewes only pointing at the land of Canaan The like may be said for the positive part of the second Commandment touching Gods worship as then by ceremonial observances as also the positive part of the fourth Commandment which occasionally and indirectly prescribed the celebration of the Jews seventh day and that with this additional circumstance within thy gates all these were adjuncts of the old Covenant and appropriate to the Jews Now the new Covenant taking in ſ Isai 2.3 See Mr. Roberts on the Covenant and Mr. Abbot against Broad Gentiles as well as Jewes must necessarily vary these circumstantials in the moral law by construing them in a new Covenant-sense to accommodate it to these new confederates as thus by changing their temporal deliverance from Egypts thraldom into out spiritual deliverance from the thraldom of sin and Satan the land of Canaan into any other part of the earth where the heirs of the promise shall dwell their legal worship into our Gospel-worship their gates into our jurisdictions in a word their seventh day into our seventh day which analogically at least is as much intended by seventh day in the fourth Commandment as England by Canaan in the fifth Commandment If it be demanded when and by whom this change was introduced I answer by the blessed Mediator of the new Covenant and that immediately upon his resurrection from the dead for then he was given both for a t Isal 42.6 light and a Covenant to the Gentiles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mas. 28 19 20. Mark 16.15 Luke 24.47 John 20.23 then was the Churches Charter formerly confined among the Jews graciously extended to the Gentiles then it was that our Lord was pleased to issue forth that high commission as one calls it for the discipling of all the Gentiles by Baptisme and so bringing them into Covenant requiring his Apostles to tender the whole Covenant to them both in the promises and the precepts of it and the fore as the Prophet Jonah shortly after his resurrection went to Nineveh so Jesus Christ after his to Galilee where according to fore-appointment he gave his disciples a solemn meeting and laid a solemn charge upon them to teach the Gentiles to observe whatsoever he had commanded them Now if the precept of the Sabbath were included among the rest of those commands as 't is like it was it must be in such a sense as would comport with their new Covenant-state which must needs exclude the old seventh day since that was a branch of the old Covenant peculiar to the Jews and urged upon them by such a reason or inforcement as in the letter of it concerned not the Gentiles at all viz. their deliverance out of Egypt Deut. 5.15 Mystically indeed it concerned us as well as them as implying out Redemption by Christ but in that sense it quite carries away the Sabbath from their old seventh day in as much as the accomplishment of our Redemption fell upon the first day of the week viz. by the glorious resurrection of our Saviour but for which we had remained still in the Egypt of our u 1 Cor. 15.17 sins as the Apostle witnesseth
Man cannot make perfecter distributions of time then God himself hath made since therefore there must be a time or season of solemn worship it must of necessity be taken out of one of these it must be either a day out of a week or a day or week out of a moneth or a moneth out of a year less then a day out of a week I cannot yield since I cannot so much as pretend that lest is sufficient for God and my soul when more may conveniently be had Again a week out of a moneth or a moneth out of a year I cannot subscribe unto as either convenient or equal See Iren. philal uâ—â— plur since experience tells me that the necessities both of civil and soul-affaires require a mutual interchange of speedier dispatches and quicker returns therefore I must conclude Gods proportion is most just and equal when all is done viz. one day of seven and but one of seven ordinarily two dayes in a week or out day in two weeks I find no rule for in the written word Gods first division of time was into dayes and his first multiplication of dayes into weeks and ever since his select portion has been one day in the circle of every week This was the constant tribute paid him under the Old Testament on the last day and under the New Testament on the first day of the week this therefore is moral and perpetual being of Gods own assignation of the Churches constant observation and in it self the most exact proportion consequently the Commandment in this respect must needs be moral the rather because in all this there can beno ceremony the number of seven is generally taken for a number of perfection but who ere fancied it to be of a ceremonlous signification What type or ceremony can there be imagined in seven more then in six to make types of meer figures is such a kind of Cabalism as I suppose never came into any sober mind But here I must resolve a scruple or two The Jews seventh day was ceremonious Scrup. 1. See Dr. Willes on Exod. â—o Dr. Twiss p. 74. as the learned generally assert and if so why not one day in seven also If the particular day were shadowy why not the proportion also It followes not at all unless you will say Resol that those particular Sacraments under the law Circumcision and the Passeover being ceremonial make the like number of Sacraments under the Gospel viz. Baptism and the Lords Supper ceremonial too the reason is alike in both for the Ceremony stood not in the proportion or number but in the particularity or nature of that day and those duties But you have formerly granted Scrup. 2. that the fourth Commandment did point at that particular seventh day under the term seventh day therefore the fourth Commandment was in that respect ceremonial I have indeed granted Res that the Commandment did indirectly and occasionally point at that precise seventh day but not particularly only within the general scope of it or as a general rule equally communicable to that day as being elswhere appointed of God while it stood and to our day now it is substituted in the room of that by the same Divine appointment And if this were heedfully observed the scruple were soon answered But here lies the mistake men would fain scrue in the seventh day from that presixed period of creation into the heart of the Commandment and make that seventh day and a seventh day of equal dimensions which can never be unless they will render the Commandment ceremonial whereas to affirm as I do that the Commandment indirectly pointed at that day as being then under Divine Sanction does no more place a ceremony in the fourth Commandment then it does in the fifth to say that by Father and Mother were meant not only natural but civil and Ecclesiastical parents and occasionally such as were Typical as not only the Priests and Levites but Moses and Aaron also who were to be honoured by vertue of the fifth Commandment and that as Fathers in a figutative sense From which instance thus much is manifest that a moral precept may occasionally point at something ceremonial and yet retaine its own morality So that neither a Sabbath nor a weekly Sabbath were ever shadowes of things to come But Secondly That Sabbath and particular seventh day which the Jewes observed was certainly of a shadowy nature Dr. Tailour observes in his Christ revealed p. 4. 1. That as the body is the cause of the shadow so was Christ of the ceremonies 2. As the shadow represents the shape motions and actions of the body so did the legall shadows resemble Christ in his actions and passions and I add why may not both these be affirmed of the old Sabbath For 1. It was occasioned at first by Christ as the shadow is by the body B. Christ I say in the promise 2. It shadowed out something of Christ and the ancients generally understood it as a shadow of his rest that day in the grave being instituted at first with reference to Christ as all other shadowes were and having an accessory type afterwards affixed to it And of this we may safely expound that forementioned Text Colos 2.16 Let no man judge you in meat or in drink or in respect of an holy day or now moon or Sabbaths which were shadown of things to come but the body is of Christ The only question is whether their weekly Sabbath were here intended Some are jealous lest in pressing it so farr it should prove prejudicial to our weekly Christian Sabbath but this is meet causless jealously For let us but ponder the scope of the place and it will appear that the Apostles design is not to level Christian dayes and duties but such as the Jewes observed and would have intruded together with circumcision and other legal rites into the Church of Christ This is evident for he writes both against distinctions of meats and dayes Now under that clause of meats and drink shall we say he condemns all distinctions of meats and drinks in matters of religion What of bread and Wine in the Lords Supper too or in disputing against the Jewes Sacraments especially circumcumcision does Paul strike at all Sacraments what baptism and all no 't is aparent that in all those three Texts usually alledged Rom. 10.5 6 Gal. 4.10 Colos 2.16 He cryes down the Ordinances of the Law or old Testament not the institutions of the Gospel Look what the Jewish fals-teachers cryed up St. Paul cryes down i. e. their Sabbaths and their Sacraments 'T is not likely that they ever pleaded for the Christian Sabbath the first day of the week and therefore t is most improbable that the Apostle in opposing them should implead that In a word Dies Dominicus non est umbrae rerum futurarum sed rei praeterita viz. gloriosae Christi resurrectionis grata Recordatio Brochmand Syst Theol.
separation was the old Sabbath whereby the Jewish Nation was distinguished from all other people in the world as we shewed before out of Exod. 31. Now the Lord Jesus came to take down this separation wall and to make up a Union betwixt Jew and Gentile and this he did partly by his death blotting out the hand writing of Ordinances or law of Commandments contained in Ordinances and partly by his e Acts 4.11 Ephes 2.20 resurrection where he was made the corner-stone of his Fathers house to unite both parts of he building together that all might be d Gal. 3.28 one in Christ Jesus This I take to be the sense of the place But the Prelates have perverted the Text Obj. 3 T. T. for unto the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which only signifies Sabbaths they have deceitfully added dayes as though there were no Sabbathe but Sabbath dayes they have destroyed the Apostles scope by their addition of dayes The pious and judicious Translatours have rightly rendered it Sabbath-dayes for so the word is used in all those other texts above mentioned p. 136. Answ yea when there is no 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 joyned with it and the like I have observed in e Dialogue with Trypho Justine Martyr f Hom. de semente Athanasius and other expert Grecians who do generally dispute against the Jews weekly Sabbath under the term which is here used therefore this Author does most unworthily and wrongfully charge those worthy instruments who made the Scriputres speak true English with fraud and deceit God will one day require an account of these hard speeches yea scoffs and impious slanders But he has not done yet Whereas by this bold and absurd addition some would cast off the seventh day as Ceremonial Obj. 4 who yet plead strongly for the morality of the Sabbath it is very considerable that this Text toucheth not the day at al but the duty that is the Sabbath for the Apostle mentions not the day or time as a shadow but Sabbaths None but a bold and absurd Anabaptist would call this an absurd addition Answ 1 for it is the usual and proper Translation of the word elsewhere and if he should read it thus let no man judg you in meat or drink or in respect of a festival day or a new Moon or the Sabbath day it were no wrong to the Text for so we read the same word Mat. 12.1 Understanding it of the old Sabbath day Answ 2 The duty of holy rest in general is not here intended at all for that is usually intimated in a word of the singular number and stands firm in the fourth Commandment as also g 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mat. 24.20 'T is only the particular day or the respective limitation of the duty to that day that is here reckoned among the shadows of things to come look how their festival dayes are called shadowes so is their Sabbath not the moral duties required on those dayes as solemn h 2 Chron. 30 21 22. Neh. 8.6 worship praise and thanksgiving for then it were a sin to keep a day of thanksgiving but the set dayes together with the ceremonial duties which they were accustomed to a re here discharged and the like I may say of their weekly Sabbath And therefore his conclusion will not hold That we may as warrantably reject the moral law upon that expression of the law being changed as the seventh day upon this word of Sabbaths being a shadow The distinction of moral and ceremonial may as well be applied to Sabbaths as lawes and till he can prove that the old seventh day is excepted from these shadowy Sabbaths as we can prove the moral law to be from that which was mutable he must confess it was but a shadow and so either abrogated or altered or both as the ceremonial i H. br 7.12 law and the priest-hoods were and if so let him judg whether the Apostles rule ought not to be regarded Let no man judg you in respect of shadowy Sabbaths and let T. T. timely bethink himself how he will answer the breach of this rule at the Barre of Christ when his own book shall without repentance be brought in as a bill of indictment against him for judging censuring condemning not only faithful Ministers and Christian-people but Magistrates Princes Parliaments charging them with little less then the sin against the Holy-Ghost because forsooth they disown the brat of his brain p. 50. and reject the Saturday-Sabbath let this unjust judg take heed he be not judged with a witness I shall ere long read him a sharp sentence out of Justin Martyr But first I shall endeavour to convince him by two or three Arguments more That the Sabbath is certainly changed from the last to the first of the week and that by Divine Authority Christ ending his work Arg. 3 ad hominem and entring into his rest layes the foundation of a new Sabbath upon the day of his rest But he ended his work and entred into his rest upon the first day of the week by his resurrection from the dead Therefore then and thereby he laid the foundation of a new Sabbath upon that day of his rest Both feet of this argument stand upon Scriputre-ground or the grant of the adversary as shall appear in the prosecution of it First That our blessed Redeemers ending his work and entring into his rest laid the foundation of a new Sabbath seemes to be the Apostles conclusion Hebr. 4.9.10 There remaineth therefore the keeping of a Sabbath as the Tranlators render it in the Margin to the people of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for he that hath entred into his rest that is Christ hath ceafed from his workes as God did from his own workes That it is spoken of Christ T. T. plainly grants p. 141. yea peremptorily determines in these words It is Christ only whose intrance into rest is here intended and therefore there remaineth the keeping of the Sabbath to the people of God A Sabbath I should rather say I may lawfully proceed upon his own grant and so wound him with his own weapon For however he wrests this Scripture and uses it as a sheild to defend his Saturday-Sabbath I believe upon trial it will be found a sword to destroy it Which will the better appear if we look into the contents of the third and fourth Chapters and withall have an eye to the scope of the whole Epistle which will be an excellent key to unlock this intricate Text. Breifly to touch upon the general scope it is very probable that these Christian Hebrews were about casting off the Ordinances and worship of the New Testament and revolting from Christ to Moses for the prevention and cure of which Apostacy St. * For if the cloth may be known by the lâ—st as M. Ward was wont to say the Epistle is most likely to be his the phrase and
ch 37.25 David who dyed many hundred years before Christ cannot be the same David who is promised to be a Prince amongst Christians So here the day or rest of which David speaks being to come and not then entred into could not be the rest of the old seventh day since that was entred into long before even from the foundation of the world This is the true and genuine sense of those words although and again Although is a discretive term * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a note of distinction importing thus much that albeit there is mention made of a day of rest in the beginning of the world yet it is as another distinct day and rest that is here intended So also this Adverb again is to be taken of another rest-day then that which is mentioned in the former verse for although the old seveuth day were spoken of by Moses as the first and most famons rest in the beginning yet now again so many thousand years after that David speaks of another rest if not another rest-day and if any Sabbath or day of rest be here intended either by David or Paul it will certainly prove fatal to the old Sabbath for I would humbly propose this quere to the consideration of the learned Whether the Psalmists intimation that there should be a day of solemn worship under the Gospel and the Apostles assumption that it could not be meant of the old seventh day will not amount to this conclusion that the old seventh-day-Sabbath is to be no day of rest or solemn worship under the Gospel If T.T. quarrel at this conclusion let him thank himself for the premises one of them at least for he grants a moral rest or Sabbath to be here meant and I will thank the Holy-Ghost and S. Paul for the other for they have assured me that the seventh day from the Creation could not be meant by David no nor Secondly The rest of Canaan neither in the sense above mentioned for although that be sometimes termed the * Deut. 12.9 Josh 1.15 rest which God gave Israel under the conduct of Jesus or Joshua yet sayes the Apostle v. 8. If Jesus had given them rest that is if he had given them the rest of which David here speaks then would he not afterward have spoken of another day where note by the way t is a day of rest which the Psalmist seems to scope at else why should the Apostle thus interweave the one with the other If Joshuah or Jesus had given them rest then would he not afterwards have spoken of another day Note again the same Argument is here used against the supposed place of rest that was urged before against their conceived time of rest the old seventh day both these were entred into long before Davids time whereas he spake by the spirit of prophecy concerning things to come a long time after and hereupon the Apostle concludes There remaineth therefore a rest or the keeping of a Sabbath to the people of God distinct and different from the old Sabbath yet not much unlike it in respect of the ground of it for he that hath entred into his rest hath ceased from his works as God did from his own works And this is spoken only of Christ sayes T.T. Be it so then I hope our proposition will not offend him that when our blessed Lord Jesus ended his work and entred into his rest he laid the foundation of a new Sabbath on that day of his rest only t is like this word new Sabbath will stick in his stomach yet it needs not for we cannot put the old Sabbath into the Apostles conclusion because he himself puts it out of the premises But we shall not wrangle about words by new Sabbath I mean only a new Sabbath-day and for peace-sake I am content the proposition should pass in these terms The day on which Christ ended his works and entred into his rest must be our Christian Sabbath day The assumption followes Secondly That Christ ended his work and entred into his rest by his resurrection from the dead on the first day of the week for proof whereof we may proceed upon another of the Adversaries Principles for thus he argue Christs entring into his rest on the seventh day T.T. p. 144 145. Our dear Redeemers soul was no sooner separated from his body but his better part immediately entred into glory and soon after his blessed body was laid to rest in the grave Where although I cannot but mind him of his gross mistake about the cricumstance of time for t is evident that as our blessed Redeemers soul entred into Paradise on the sixth day the same day that he dyed witness his words to the dying theef this day thou shalt be with me in Paradise so also his sacred body was interr'd the same day even a Mark 16.42 Luke 23.53 54. the day before the Sabbath not on the seventh day as this sophister would make silly people believ e yet I shall take him at his word in the main of his argument namely that when our Saviour entred into his glory he entred into his rest But I assume By his resurrection from the dead on the first day of the week our Lord entred into his glory and for this I have his own word more then once or twice in the 24 of Luke he overtakes the two Disciples going to Emmaus and as they were talking together with sad hearts about the sufferings and the death of Christ and also relating what they had heard but could hardly believe concerning his resurrection he takes them up with a sharp rebuke b Luke 24.25 26. O fools and slow of heart to believe all that the Prophets have spoken Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his glory to enter into his glory you will say that is to be understood of his ascention into Heaven nay verily he spake it of his resurrection from the dead where their chief doubt lay and so himself expounds it for the same day at night he appears to the rest of his Disciples and these among them preaching the same Doctrine and saying c V. 46. Thus it is written and thus it behoved Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day this was that he had so often inculcated before his death d Math. 16.21 ch 17. 23. Mark 9.31 ch 10. 34. Luke 9.22 ch 18. 31 32 33. That he must go up to Jerusalem and suffer and die that all things which were written in the prophets concerning him should be accomplished that he should be delivered up to the gentiles that they should crucifie and kill him and that the third day he should rise again according to the Scriptures so that what one Text speaks of his suffering and entring into glory others interpret of his dying and rising again the third day and that Christ by his resurrection entred into his glory
Oracles of God Observation does imply obligation And how can this stand with the soveraignty of God But I suppose his meaning is that God rested the seventh day what then Therefore it was no rudiment had nothing Typical or ceremonial in it It followes not Psam 132.8 2 Chron. 6 41. How often is God said to rest in Types of Christ is not the Tabernacle stiled Gods rest And the Temple and the Temple Worship are not t Gen. 8.21 Exod. 29.18 Numb 15.3 Sacrifices and oblations called a Savour of rest unto God not that Gods soul rested in any of these rests properly nor the people of God neither But he rested in Christ and so did they in these things only as Types or prefigurations of Christ to come And thus he is said to rest on the seventh day We have proved before that man sinned and fell the sixth day and that Christ was promised and actually invested in the office of Mediatorship before the Sabbath was instituted And hereupon God rested the seventh day not only from the work of Creation but from the weight and burthen of Adams sin For God complains of sin as a heavy u Isai 1.14 Amos 5.2.13 burthen and as the sins of the old world are said to * Gen. 6.6 grieve him at his heart so no doubt did the sin of Adam But Christ interposing to make reconcilation God rested the seventh day and was refreshed Exod. 31.17 That the old Sabbath was instituted after the fall besides what has bin formerly alledged appears plainly from that of our Saviour x Mark 2.28 The Sabbath was made for man not man for the Sabbath For man that is for man in misery not man in innocency for the context speaks of necessitous indigent man man subject to hunger and thirst and want T is spoken upon the occasion of the hungry disciples plucking the ears of Corn and eating out of pure necessity on the Sabbath day The Pharisees presently censure them as Sabbath breakers Therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the Sabbath day having power to dispose of it at his pleasure but sayes the Lord of the Sabbath you quarrel without cause For the Sabbath was made for man not man for the Sabbath That is the Sabbath was made for the good and benefit of man in misery Principally for the good of his sick and sinfull soul but partly for the support of his weak and frail body also that it might rest and be refreshed with convenient food Physick and the like which clearly argues that the Sabbath was made ordained and instituted after man was in necessity and misery namely after Adams fall and therefore t is said That God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it Gen. 2.3 Blessed it how not with natural blessings that the Sun should shine brighter or the weather be fairer that day then another No the blessings of the Sabbath were of another nature spiritual blessings such as were suitable to the state of fain man such as God has pronounced Fallen man blessed withall otherwise the institution had never concerned any one man since the fall How could it if the blessings contained in it had bin nothing but Paradise blessings But we shall not inculcate former arguments only add one consideration more to make it further manifest that Gods rest on the seventh day was partly if not chiefly in relation to Christ the promised Messiah T is a saying of the Hebrew Doctors and it agrees well with the a Heb. 2.10 Rev. 5.11 12 13. Scriptures that the world it self had not bin made but for the Messiah For all things were made by him and for him and he is the b Heb. 1.2 heir of all things and that as Mediatour and we have reason to think that Gods heart were more set upon Christ when he set up this visible frame of Heaven and earth then upon all the world besides How unlikely therefore is it that the glorious Creator should set apart a day of rest till the grand design upon which his thoughts had run from all eternity and which was chiefly in his eye when he made the world the glorifying of himself in his Son by investing him with the government of the world and putting him as heir of all things into actuall possession of his hereditary Dominions had some actual inchoate existence 'T is cleare that God did not rest from his other works of Creation till he had made man because till then he had not attained his subordinate end of making the rest of his creatures and t is credible that he would not rest after he had made man till he had made Christ Mediatour and put the government of all upon his shoulders because till then he had not attained his ultimate end for which he made man and all the rest of the world besides Certain it is that the Creation was made but mutably perfect at first and therefore it cannot be conceived how God could keep a setled rest the seventh day till he had setled and established the Creation on Christ the rock c Deut. 32.4 whose work is perfect And this I conceive to be the true and undoubted sense of that saying Gen. 22. On the seventh day God ended Finished or perfected his work namely by establishing it upon Christ that sure foundation 1 Peter 4.18 hence he is styled a faithfull Creator in that he did not leave his work of Creation in a mutable estate as Masons and Carpenters when they have built their houses leave them without any further care what becomes of them but as a faithful Creator * God was not the author or approver of mans falbut only the orderer and over ruler of it to bring good out of evill he over ruled the Fall of Adam for a greater good namely for the establishment of his mutable work by bringing in Christ the right heir setting him as e Ps 8.6 He. 2.8 1 Cor. 15.24 Lord over all the works of his hands puting all things under his feet making him f Josh 3.11 Neb. 9.6 Dan. 10.14 15. Acts 10.36 Lord of the whole world and of all things therein to whom doth appertain the Dominion of the Heavens and the Heaven of Heavens the earth and all that is therein Thus on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made or perfected his work which he had made That which he had made perfect at first with mutable perfection he now perfected again by a further degree of supperadded perfection namely by the promise of Christ and his personall undertaking as Mediatour by whom all things g Col. 1.16 consist And accordingly God rested the seventh day not in the changeable Creature but in Christ the rock and so the Sabbath was stated on the seventh day upon the account of Christ in the promise upon the performance of which promise the seventh day ceases to be any longer a day of rest But
other arguments as prophetical prediction Psalm 118. and Apostolical practice Acts 20. allege this as one proof of our Christian Sabbath That Christ Jesus our Lord was often seen upon it seen in assemblies of his Saints seen in his royal robes in his state of immortality and not only seen but heard preaching peace to poor sinners opening Scriptures cheering quickening warming cold dead sad hearts for when the disciples saw him they were * Luke 24.32 John 20.21 glad and their hearts did burn within them while he opened the Scriptures to them and all this on the first day of the week T is true after this double apparition our Saviour appeared on a working day as the disciples were a fishing and that was the third time of shewing himself or the third day of his appearing John 21.3.14 But what of this The disciples were sufficiently confirmed in the authority and solemnity of the Lords day by the two former apparitions therefore well might Christ appear the third time upon a working day and countenance worki-day-business by his presence to teach his disciples and us that every day is not a Sabbath day But this fishing-day is not named it might as well be on the Jewes Sabbath as any other day of the week for ought appeares to the contrary in the Text yet I do not say it was I will not speak where the Scripture is silent How often the first day of the week was celebrated by our Saviour between his Resurrection and ascension is not punctually set down in Scripture Junius is confident for every week But there is good evidence for the two first and none against the three last Much may be said for that famous apparition on a Mountaine in Galilee which learned Lightfoot Math. 28.16 17 19 20. Fenner and others conclude without doubt to have been on the first day of the week Mar. 16.15 16. Now the ascension-day drawes on and Christ withdrawes his Corporal presence from his disciples but on the day of Pentecost he visits them again by his spiritual presence Acts 2. And that this also was on the first day of the week shall be fully clear'd when we come to the fourth mark Lastly Rev. 1.10 Some years after all these it pleased the Lord Jesus to appear again on this day Namely to his servant John in the Isle of Patmos little paradise we may call it for the presence of Christ makes a wilderness a paradise especially so much of his presence as this blessed Apostle now enjoyed more than ever was vouchsafed to any man upon earth since Christ went up to Heaven I was in the spirit sayes he upon the Lords day what then Why v. 12. I saw seven Golden Candle-sticks and v. 13. In the midst of them one like the son of man So like him that indeed it was the son of man the man Christ Jesus on the Lords day then John saw Jesus Christ in the midst of his Churches filling them with his blessed presence that day above all others and holding the stars in his right hand that is holding forth Heavenly light by the Ministry of the word on that day especially this John saw and this he is commanded to set down in writing verse 19. and accordingly written it is and written for our learning upon whom the ends of the world are come And what may we learn from it Surely this at first view viz. That in St. Johns time the Golden Churches of Christ were wont to meet Gospel-Ministers to preach and Christ himself to be present with them by his spirit on the Lords day And this is written for a pattern to after-ages and there is a * Verse 3. blessing pronounced on those that read and keep the things that are written in this book Blessed be Christ for this blessed book here we have another glorious appearance of Christ on the Lords day not to one man only or one Church only but seven Churches in which no doubt there were more then seven thousand soules and that this Lords day was also the first day of the week none but peevish spirits ever question'd Ignatius who was trained up in the School of this great Apostle and in all reason was most likely to know his terms * Epist ad Magnes clearly makes it a weekly holy-day observed by Christians in the room of the abrogated Sabbath of the Jewes Yea the Lords day was never taken for other than the first day of the week by any Christian writer in any age since the dayes of St. John till this last age of liberty and lyes that ever I could see or learn Fathers Councils Schoolmen ancient modern writers two or three of this generation excepted do constantly understand it of Christs resurrection-Resurrection-day the first day of the week and one would think the constant Dialect of the Church of Christ a sufficient Dictionary to interpret a word or phrase in Scripture especially in such a sense as does not cross but correspond with Scripture So does this for how agreeable to Scripture is it to take the Lords day for that day which the Lord hath made Besides 't is observable that this same beloved disciple who was so exact in penning the first apparition John 20. is a spectator of the last Rev. 1. and just as he had related that he sees this the circumstances are remarkable John 26.19 26. Christ appears in the midst of the disciples and Rev. 1.13 in the midst of the Candle-sticks or Churches John 20.19 he appears upon the Resurrection-day arguing his Resurrection and Rev. 1.18 repeating the same argument Saying I am he that liveth and was dead and have the keyes of death and hell To say no more John 20. he appeared on the first day of the week and here again upon the day under a new name the Lords day because it appeared by his Resurrection and former apparitions to be the day which the Lord had owned above other dayes yea the day which the Lord had made and instituted Thus we see how Christs often appearing on this day tends to the further marking out of the day But this mark is sorely shot at objections come thick but short answers will serve when nothing is objected but what has been answered by others or nothing to any purpose He is not ashamed to say T. T. Obj. 1. p. 121. I beleeve it will be found upon inquiry that Christ never appeared to any assembly no not any one first day for it is most certain that the day upon the Scripture-account begins with the evening Now upon the Resurrection-day we find Christ at the village seven miles from Jerusalem when it was towards evening and the day far spent Luke 24.29 30. after which he supped with the two which took up some time then they returned that seven miles and a half to Jerusalem on foot so that by that time they came there the day must be quite spent and though t is
in the notation of it for John 20.1 having spoken of the first day of the week verse 19. he reduplicates it most emphatically saying the same day then in the evening that day being the first day of the week as if he would be loth to be mistaken in that point of time and though for the present the Apostles might be ignorant of their own practise what it tended to as Mary was when she poured the box of ointment on our Saviours head that she did it for his burying yet afterwards by Christs second apparition that day seven-night they were better instructed witness their after-assembling on that day Acts 2. and Acts 20. to conclude this why our blessed Saviour should neglect the Jewes Sabbath and afford his-glorious presence in Christian assemblies on the first day of the week thus often and thus eminently but to establish the day for sacred assemblies and to teach us on what day especially we may expect his presence and blessing I confess I am to seek And although this mark may seem obscure to persons possest with prejudice yet the objectors attempts to deface it are utterly invalid he ha's indeed trampled upon it with the Prelates old shoes for his objections are the very same which the Prelatical party so much defied by himself urged long ago but he cannot tread out the divine impression which Christ ha's stampt upon it The apparitions of Christ on this day do further tend to mark out the day especially in a joynt consideration with the next scripture-mark viz. 3. The gracious speeches actions and transactions of Christ at his several appearings tending partly to prove his Resurrection the ground of our hope and the hinge of the day to this purpose we may observe how sweetly our gracious Redeemer condescended to his poor doubting staggering disciples manifesting himself even to all their senses to their hearing by his heavenly voice to their seeing by his visible presence yea to their feeling by offering his sacred body to be touched and handled by them and partly to dignify his Resurrection-day distinguishing it from all other dayes by Sabbath-exercises As 1. By his heavenly instructions opening the Scriptures Luke 24.46 and preaching peace to his disciples and to us as well as them having slain the enmity by his Cross Eph. 2.16 17. he came and preached peace and this day he came with his Olive branch in his mouth saying peace be unto you 2. By giving forth commissions to his Apostles John 20 19. As my father hath sent me so send I you whose sins ye remit they are remitted c. And then breathing upon them the Holy Ghost 3. By convincing demonstrations of his Resurrection to strengthen the faith of Thomas John 20.26 to which some add 4. His celebration of the sacred supper according to that promise I will no more drink of the fruit of the vine Mark 14.25 untill that day I drink it new in the kingdom of God That is after I rise from the dead which therefore t is like that then he did Yea then he brake bread and was known of the disciples in breaking of bread as he sate with them Luke 24.30 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not at meat as we read it the word only implyes his gesture of siting However his first and second apparition together with the forementioned great transactions of instructing inspiring blessing sending his Apostles on this day and performing most of these at their solemn meetings do argue more for this day than any other that it is the day which Christ ha's selected and sealed for the religious assemblies and Sabbath-exercises of his Church in all future ages to the end of the world But I must contract 4 Another indeleble mark of honour fix'd upon the first day of the week is The mission of the Holy Ghost or sending the promise of the father as a princely largess or royal gift of Christ upon his Coronation-day Luke 24.40 John 15.26 Acts 1.4 ch 2. 33. such a gift as was never given before but when God gave his Son Jesus Christ God so loved the world that he gave his son and Christ so loved the world that he gave his spirit And as Christ was given according to the fulness of the promise upon the day of his Resurrection so was the blessed spirit of promise upon the day of Pentecost And the same wonderful providence that ordered the Resurrection of Christ to fall upon the first day of the week did also take order for the sending of the spirit on the same day For that the day of Pentecost Acts 2.1 was the first day of the week as it is generally taken for granted by Christian writers so it may be evidently proved by the Scriptures I shall not puzle the Reader with perplexing intricacies nor lead men into labyrinths to find out the truth Let plain Scripture determin the matter look to the statute-lawes of Moses concerning the feast of Pentecost Exod. 34.21 22. Six dayes shalt thou work but on the seventh day thou shalt rest both in earing-time and in barvest and thou shalt observe the feast of weekes of the first-fruits of Wheat-harvest Levit. 23.10 11 12 15 16. When ye be come into the land which I give you and shall reap the harvest thereof then ye shall bring a sheaf of your first-fruits of your harvest unto the Priest and he shall wave it together with the offering of a lamb without blemish on the morrow after the Sabbath he shall wave it and ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the Sabbath from the day that yee brought the sheaf seven Sabbaths shall be complete even unto the morrow after the seventh Sabbath ye shall number fifty dayes So Numb 28.26 and more fully Deut. 16.9 Seven weekes shalt thou number unto thee begin to number the seven weeks from such time as thou beginnest to put the sickle to the Corn. From the harmony of which four texts it appeares that this feast had three significant names which were all made good at that solemn Pentecost Acts. 2. 1. Deut. 16.10 It was called the feast of weekes or of sevens because from the waving of the sheaf thehy reckoned as many weekes to this feast as there be dayes in the week namely seven weekes Which evidently shadowed out some weekly Festival under the Gospel the day whereof was denoted by that dya of Pentecost Acts 2. 2. Exod. 23.16 Levit. 23.10 It was called the feast of first-fruits and of harvest because as they began their harvest upon the first of the fifty dayes when they offered the sheaf of first-fruits so they had ended it upon the fiftieth day which was properly the Feast-day upon which they offered the wave-loaves and indeed these fiftie dayes or seven weekes Levit. 23.17 were the appointed weekes of their harvest by the offering of the sheaf at the beginning of their harvest there after fruits were sanctified and the
the dead For on the day before Saturday they crucified him and on the day following Saturday which is Sunday appearing to his Apostles and Disciples he taught these things Here we have both the Doctrine and practice of the Lord's day in the purest times attested by this holy Man and Martyr First he informs us how they kept the day and secondly why they kept it namely because it was the first day Christs Resur rection-day and the day of his apparition to his Disciples whom he taught and instructed so to do it seems the holy Martyrs in the Primitive times were satisfied with these Scripture-Arguments for the Lords day which now the wrangling wits and lusts of men do nothing but storm against But here it may be objected t is true here is plain and positive testimony for the observation of the Lords day but here is nothing for the Negative nothing against the old Sabbath Why mightn ot both dayes be kept in Justin Martyrs time does he ever deny that the Churches of Christ then kept the Saturday-Sabbath I answer yes his Testimony is as full against the Jews Sabbath as for the Lords day witness his Dialogue or dispute with Trypho that obstinate Jew I shall recite a few passages of it verypregnant to this purpose Trypho's grand Objection was this a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 175. num 30. That the Christians did neither observe the Festival days nor Sabbaths nor Circumcision and mereover that they placed their hope in a crucified man Now see how the blessed Martyr answers him partly by granting his Objection For he tels him b 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 182. n. 10. we also should verily observe your Circumcision and Sabbaths and all your Festival dayes did we not know the reason for which these things were imposed upon you And again c 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If saies he we patiently endure the most horrible torments that men and divels can devise to inflict upon us why is it that we do not also observe your carnal Circumcision and Sabbaths and Holydays which hurt us not In which words he freely grants that the Christians in his time did not observe the Jews Sabbath and although the Jews condemned them for it yet he justifies them in it and uses many Arguments to vindicate their non-observance of it As 1. Because since the coming of Christ there is no need of it no need of the shadow when the substance is come yea there is no place left for it 't is done away by Christ for in this sense I take it the Father here speaks that d 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Sabbath together with Sacrifices Oblations and Festival dayes began with Moses he means I suppose in the second Edition not the first Institution of them so they were appointed by the Council of God the Father to cease and end with Christ Where by the way observe he useth the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the singular number to shew that it was the old seventh day Sabbath which he chiefly contested against and indeed this was the string that Trypho chiefly harp't upon perswading Justin and his fellow Christians thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 first to be circumcised then to keep the Sabbath and so he might obtain mercy still it must be restrained to the Jewish Saturday-Sabbath matcht with Circumcision and orher Legal Ordinances the Christian Sabbath is not the subject of this dispute this then is his first Argument the Christians neither did nor could observe that old Sabbath because it ended with Christ And 2. e 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 187. Because now there is a new Covenant and a new Law gone out of Zion 3. f 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 118. Because the beleeving Gentiles may attain Gods heavenly inheritance without the observation of it After the proposeal of these and sundry other Arguments Trypho moves a Captious Query viz. whether if a man that knew Christ and beleeved in him still observed these legal customes he could be saved To which our zealous and pious Martyr returns this Christable yet for midable answer g 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In my Judgment O Tripho such a one shall or may be saved provided he do not industriously labour to perswade others especially those among the Gentiles that are converted to Christ to observe the same things with himself telling them that otherwise they cannot be saved For such it seems he had but little Charity Now to sum up all however the opinion and judgment of this antient and eminent Father may be despised by scorners Yet I hope his Testimony will be embraced by all soberminded Christians And this we have both fully and faithfully transcribed The conclusion is this that the Churches of Christ in Justin Martyr's time had renounced the Saturday-Sabbath and celebrated the Sunday or Lords day for the day of weekly solemn worship and this was long before Anti-Christ came to his throne Which I the rather note as a seasonable check to that blasphemous sacrilegious position of the adversary viz. that the change of the Sabbath was an invention of Anti-Christ Oh impudence Was Justin Martyr who shed his blood for Christ a limb of Anti-Christ Did he plead for Baal in asserting the observation of the Lords day and rejection of the Jewes Sabbath by all the Churches of Christ Were the precious Saints and glorious Martyrs in those early dayes devoted to the inventions of Anti-Christ Yea in those bloody dayes when for Christs sake they were killed all the day long and led like sheep to the slaughter Yea in those extraordinary apostolical dayes while the Spirit of prophecy was yet breathing and the power of miracles yet working in the Churches of Christ witness Justin Martyr himself who testifies h 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dial. cum Trypho 191. See Mr. Baxter Spirits witness to the truth of Christianity p. 21. That even in his time the Divels did tremble at the name of Christ and that being adjured by that sacred name they became subject unto them Yea for some years after t his for Tertullian and after him Cyprian made publick challenges to the Pagan persecuting rulers to bring their possessed with Divels into the Christian assemblies and if they did not cast them out and make them confess themselves to be Divels and Christ to be the Son of God they were content to suffer Which may conciliate credit to the testimony at least of these renowned antients well the change of the Sabbath is confirmed by the practice of the Church in Justin Martyrs time And now we are upon the year of our Lord 160. Dionysius 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Euseb l. 4. c. 22. or thereabout And here we meet with another testimony Of Dionysius Bishop of Corinth who in an Epistle of his Soter Bishop of Rome writes thus we have spent or passed through to the end of it the Lords day to
sufficient refutation of them 1. The seventh day being a sign makes it not a ceremony T.T. Obj. 1. p. 18. for Christ was a sign Isai 7.14 Luk. 2.34 the Saints are set for signs Isai 8.18 So is the holy Spirit 1 Joh. 4.13 yea for the same sign as the Sabbath is c. He might have added that circumcision Answ Exod. 13.9 Rom. 4.11 and the Passe over also were signs but then he had spoiled his argument for it is certain that both these were ceremonial yet doubtlesss it had been more proper and pertinent to have compared the old Sabbath with other old Ordinances then to have thus equalized it with Christ and his blessed spirit But to answer his instances Christ was propounded as a sign of Confirmation Isai 7. as a sign of Contradiction or a sign to be spoken against Luke 2. The Saints were set for signs of Wonder Isai 8. The holy spirit for a Witness and not properly a sign now what cognation and alliance is there betwixt these and the old Sabbath which as to the day was a distinguishing sign and that for a season only therefore temporary I will not say ceremonial The Sabbath is set for a sign of things past as the worlds Creation not of good things to come Obj. 2 as the ceremonial Sabbaths So also are the annual Sabbaths Answ Deut. 16.1 c. Passeover and Pentecost ordained in memorial of things past as their deliverance from Egypt and the giving of the Law on Mount Sinai yet both are abolished although I grant the Sabbath was never abolished or abrogated as to the substance of it only altered in respect of the circumstance If the morality of the Sabbath cease by being a sign Obj. 3 upon the same account must the whole law cease to be moral since Gods spirit hath set it also for such a sign Deut. 8.6 Thou shalt bind it as a sign upon thine hand But This is frivolous for every child can distinguish between the book and the binding of it Answ Numb 15.38 39 40. The law it self was not a sign but the binding it on their hands and that for a remembrancing sign only the proper use of their fringes and Phylacteries By the way if I mistake not here is a plain contradiction for a little before he had argued that the Sabbath was such a sign as the holy spirit is and now he makes it such a sign as the wearing of the law upon their hands was If one of these be true the other must needs be false for the one is internal the other was external and visible only And this is the Goliahs sward he talks of wherewith He fights with his own fancy Answ 2 for who of sound judgment ever affirmed that the morality of the Sabbath must cease as a sign still he runs upon his ol mistake that the old seventh day was the morality of the Sabbath which we have constantly denyed and disproved The term seventh day is not set for a sign but the term Obj. 4 p. 19. Sabbath The Word Sabbath is very often Answ Levit. 19.3 Isai 1.13 Lam. 1.7 Mat. 12.5.11 Mark 1.21 Luk. 4.31 Acts 13.14 Chap. 17.2 though not alwayes put for the old seventh day especially when it is used in the plural number as here it is Therefore I conclude as before that the day and not the duty is hee set for a temporary sign the duty no otherwise then as it is peculiarly related to the day T is not a Sabbath in general much less the Commandment concerning a weekly Sabbath but the old Sabbath then in use which was given the Jews as a sign and so designed for change for change I mean in respect of the time not of the thing according to that of Augustine who writing against Faustus the Manichee who sought to overthrow the faith of Christians by maintaining that Moses and Christ were opposite in their Doctrines alledging among other things that there was one tradition of Moses another of Christ concerning the Sabbath answers him thus Their doctrine was not divers Non diversa doctrina sed diversum tempus August contra Faust Man lib. 16. cap. 28. only the time or day was different intimating that Moses and Christ were both for a weekly Sabbath but Moses for the last Christ for the first day of the week And thus we have made good the second Position That the old Sabbath being made alterable in the first Institution was further manifested to be alterable in the second Edition of the Sabbath A few words shall suffice for the third POSITION III. That the Old Sabbath was yet further evidenced to be alterable and changeable in the after Observation of it FOr proof whereof I shall only cite the practise of our blessed Saviour in which the Adversary glories most as if it made only for him T is his ground argument for the perpetuity of the old seventh day that Christ did most of his cures and famous miracles on that day Now learned Chemnitius takes the same argument and turns the edge of it against him thus De abrogatione Sabbathi Mosaici dictis docuit Christus libertatem factis sapiuo testatam fecit cum Sabbathis sanaret c. Chemn Examen Concil Trident. cap. de Festis ubiplura The Lord Jesus both by word and deed hath taught us that the Mosaical Sabbath was to be abrogated not only in that he proclaimed himself Lord of the Sabbath but in that he often witnessed his liberty and power over it by sundry of his cures performed on that day Some instance in the cure of the man born blind John 9.6 7 14. Others in the miraculous cure of that cripple or impotent man John 5 whereas Dr. Lightfoot learnedly observes there was the most apparent sign towards the shaking and alteration of the Sabbath as to the day that we meet withall in the New Testament till the alteration it self came To this purpose let the context be duly considered and we shall find two things observable in it 1. What our Saviour did on the Sabbath day he healed a long languishing malady a disease of 38. years standing 2 What he sayed upon this occasion and that 1. To the man his patient 2. To the Jewes his persecutors who call him in question about it To the man he said Take up thy bed and walk Now the question is why our Lord should enjoyn this man to carry his bed on the Sabbath day the expresse letter of the law prohibiting the bearing of any burthens on that day T. T. Supposes that it was either for the confirmation of the miracle to shew the perfectness of the cure Jerem. 17.21 p. 21. or for the publication of Gods glory but it is answerd that both these might have been done as well by his walking upon his feet and leaping as in the like case wee read elsewhere or at least by bearing his bed the next day
Act. 3.8 so ch 14 10. There was therefore certainly more in this Command then what did barely refer either to the confirmation of the miracle or the publication of Gods glory in that sense supposed and what it was the above mentioned Author does thus resolve us namely that it was See Dr. Lightf Harm of the 4 Evang. p. 3. in John 5. Partly in respect of the man Partly in respect of the day In respect of the man it was to trye his faith and obedience whether upon the bare word of Christ he would venture upon so hazardous an action In respect of the day it was to shew Christs power and authority over the old Sabbath that as elsewhere in restoring the man sick of the Palsy he not onely shewed his power over the disease in healing it but also over sin in forgiving it So it pleased him here at one and the same time to shew his Divine power over the distemper in curing it and his soveraignty over the Sabbath in dispensing with it and disposing of it as he thought good 'T is objected against this by T. T. whose usuall trick it is to clamour where he cannot answer That in argueing thus we joyn with the blasphemous Pharisees in charging our Saviour as a Sabbath-breakere Obj But we easily cleare opur blessed Saviour and quit our selves of this false and injurious charge affirming That our Lord could be no more taxed for Sabbath breaking in requiring this man to beare his bed on the Sabbath-day then God himself in Commanding Joshuah to march about Jericho seven times on the same day He did not hereby transgress the Law but shewed his soveraignty over the day which will the better appeare if we consider What he sayes to the Jewes in answer to their cavils about it In the sequel of the Chapter where all along we may observe how he justifies his act by asserting his power He tels tehm verse 17 that he had the same authority over the Sabbath that the father had The Father worketh hitherto and I work This answer refers cheifly to that part of the objection which lay against his healing on the Sabbath day and it is continued to verse 20. Then he answers more directly to that other part of their accusation his supposed violation of the Sabbath in giving the man a dispensation to carry his bed verse 20 The father loveth the Son and sheweth him all things that himself doth yea he will shew him greater things then these that ye may mervel Greater workes then these why as the forementioned Authour speakes they were great things that our Saviour had now done in curing a desperate disease and dispensing with the Sabbath but he must do yet greater Workes then these v. 16. namely raise the dead and change the Sabbath that Jewish Spirits might mervel The Jewes persecuted him because he had done these things on the Sabbath day that is healed the man and commanded him to carry his bed So the word judgment is used Psalm 9.11 Psalm 94.15 Isai 28.6 Jerem. 33.15 John 8.16 Now in answer to these two particulars he tels them that the Father would shew him greater workes then these for verse 21. As the Father raiseth the dead so the Son And verse 22. The father judgeth no man but hath committed all Judgment to the Son that is government or Legislative power about the affaires of men and in particular about the disposall of the Sabbath which was now under dispute They carped and cavill'd at his present carriage towards the Sabbath He tels them that he had authority to do what he did yea and more then that came to for all judgement was committed into his hands to do some greater things then barely to dispense with the Sabbath and something at which the Jewes should marvell and for which all should honour the Son as they honour the Father Verse 23 That as the Father was honoured in giving the Law so should the Son be honoured in giving the Gospel and as the Father was honoured in appointing the old Sabbath so should the Son in ordaining a new Sabbath not in confirming the old as T. T. would have it for so the Son is not honoured even as the Father was honoured pa. 145. For the Father was honoured as the institutor of a Sabbath therefore so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even so must the Son be honoured The argument is very ponderous if we consider the scope of our Saviours oration which was to justifie what he had done on the Sabbath-day To this purpose he pleades his designment to do greater things then these and some greater thing in reference to command and disposall over the Sabbath which was the thing in question And this plea he proves by his power to raise the dead and to dispose of all things in a way of judicature or government under the new Testament as the Father had done under the Old and to this intent that all men should honour the Son as they honour the Father which being spoken with reference to the Sabbath and to his present dispensing with it doth plainly speake his intention to alter and change it Again here is one thing more observable namely that Christs power to raise the dead and his power to dispose of the Sabbath are carryed along both together in this discourse And the one is made an argument of the other plainly intimating the change of the day upon the resurrection upon his own resurrection in the first place which is hinted at verse 26. and others with himself at his resurrection according to that ancient prophecy Thy dead men shall live Isai 26.19 Mat. 27.52 53. together with my dead body shall they arise which was fulfilled when our Saviour rose from the dead So that all things considered here is a most pregnant Scripture to prove that it was our Redeemers purpose to alter the Sabbath And therefore as in Preface to such a thing he both gives the man a commission to carry his bed on that day and pleads for what he had done by his divine authority as beginning to shake the day which within two years after was to be unhinged and actually changed for another at least it speaks his power to alter it And he that shall dare deny this must make Christ Jesus the Lord inferiour to David the servant for even David had power to alter a circumstance in the Law of Moses 1 Chron. 23.24 25 26. ordaining that the Levites should officiate at twenty years old Numb 4.3 Numb 8.24 when as Moses had appointed that they should not officiate till 25. or 30. yet when the reason of the Mosaical ordinance ceased and the Ark had rest you see David changes that order And if David who was but a meer man though a King and a Prophet might alter a circumstance about the Priesthood Isai 9.6 Revel 15.3 Mat. 28.18 how much more might the Lord Jesus who is