Bible Myths and their Parallels in other Religions Being...

At the spring equinox most nations of antiquity set apart a day to implore the blessings of their god, or gods, on the fruits of the earth. At the autumnal equinox, they offered the fruits of the harvest, and returned thanks. In China, these religious solemnities are called "Festivals of gratitude to Tien."[392:2] The last named corresponds to our "Thanksgiving" celebration.

One of the most considerable festivals held by the ancient Scandinavians was the spring celebration. This was held in honor of Odin, at the beginning of spring, in order to welcome in that pleasant season, and to obtain of their god happy success in their projected expeditions.

Another festival was held toward the autumn equinox, when they were accustomed to kill all their cattle in good condition, and lay in a store of provision for the winter. This festival was also attended with religious ceremonies, when Odin, the supreme god, was thanked for what he had given them, by having his altar loaded with the fruits of their crops, and the choicest products of the earth.[392:3]

There was a grand celebration in Egypt, called the "Feast of Lamps," held at Sais, in honor of the goddess Neith. Those who did not attend the ceremony, as well as those who did, burned lamps before their houses all night, filled with oil and salt: thus all Egypt was illuminated. It was deemed a great irreverence to the goddess for any one to omit this ceremony.[392:4]

The Hindoos also held a festival in honor of the goddesses Lakshmi and Bhavanti, called "The feast of Lamps."[392:5] This festival has been handed down to the present time in what is called "Candlemas day," or the purification of the Virgin Mary.

All the principal nations of antiquity kept the seventh day of the week as a "holy day," just as the ancient Israelites did. This was owing to the fact that they consecrated the days of the week to the Sun, the Moon, and the five planets, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. The seventh day was sacred to Saturn from time immemorial. Homer and Hesiod call it the "Holy Day."[393:1] The people generally visited the temples of the gods, on that day, and offered up their prayers and supplications.[393:2] The Acadians, thousands of years ago, kept holy the 7th, 14th, 21st, and 28th of each month as Salum (rest), on which certain works were forbidden.[393:3] The Arabs anciently worshiped Saturn under the name of Hobal. In his hands he held seven arrows, symbols of the planets that preside over the seven days of the week.[393:4] The Egyptians assigned a day of the week to the sun, moon, and five planets, and the number seven was held there in great reverence.[393:5]

In the old conception, which finds expression in the Decalogue in Deuteronomy (v. 15), the Sabbath has a purely theocratic significance, and is intended to remind the Hebrews of their miraculous deliverance from the land of Egypt and bondage. When the story of Creation was borrowed from the Babylonians, the celebration of the Sabbath was established on entirely new grounds (Ex. xx. 11), for we find it is because the "Creator," after his six days of work, rested on the seventh, that the day should be kept holy.

"In the year 1869, I discovered among other things a curious religious calendar of the Assyrians, in which every month is divided into four weeks, and the seventh days or 'Sabbaths,' are marked out as days on which no work should be undertaken."[393:7]

"If we go back to the founding of the church, we find that the most marked feature of that age, so far as the church itself is concerned, is the grand division between the 'Jewish faction,' as it was called, and the followers of Paul. This division was so deep, so marked, so characteristic, that it has left its traces all through the New Testament itself. It was one of the grand aspects of the time, and the point on which they were divided was simply this: the followers of Peter, those who adhered to the teachings of the central church in Jerusalem, held that all Christians, both converted Jews and Gentiles, were under obligation to keep the Mosaic law, ordinances, and traditions. That is, a Christian, according to their definition, was first a Jew; Christianity was something added to that, not something taking the place of it.

"We find this controversy raging violently all through the early churches, and splitting them into factions, so that they were the occasion of prayer and counsel. Paul took the ground distinctly that Christianity, while it might be spiritually the lineal successor of Judaism, was not Judaism; and that he who became a Christian, whether a converted Jew or Gentile, was under no obligation whatever to keep the Jewish law, so far as it was separate from practical matters of life and character. We find this intimated in the writings of Paul; for we have to go to the New Testament for the origin of that which, we find, existed immediately after the New Testament was written. Paul says: 'One man esteemeth one day above another: another man esteemeth every day alike' (Rom. xiv. 5-9). He leaves it an open question; they can do as they please. Then: 'Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years. I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain' (Gal. iv. 10, 11). And if you will note this Epistle of Paul to the Galatians, you will find that the whole purpose of his writing it was to protest against what he believed to be the viciousness of the Judaizing influences. That is, he says: 'I have come to preach to you the perfect truth, that Christ hath made us free; and you are going back and taking upon yourselves this yoke of bondage. My labor is being thrown away; my efforts have been in vain.'

Then he says, in his celebrated Epistle to the Colossians, that has never yet been explained away or met: 'Let no man therefore judge you any more in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holy day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath days' (Col. ii. 16, 17), distinctly abrogating the binding authority of the Sabbath on the Christian church. So that, if Paul's word anywhere means anything—if his authority is to be taken as of binding force on any point whatever—then Paul is to be regarded as authoritatively and distinctly abrogating the Sabbath, and declaring that it is no longer binding on the Christian church."[395:1]

This breach in the early church, this controversy, resulted at last in Paul's going up to Jerusalem "to meet James and the representatives of the Jerusalem church, to see if they could find any common platform of agreement—if they could come together so that they could work with mutual respect and without any further bickering. What is the platform that they met upon? It was distinctly understood that those who wished to keep up the observance of Judaism should do so; and the church at Jerusalem gave Paul this grand freedom, substantially saying to him: 'Go back to your missionary work, found churches, and teach them that they are perfectly free in regard to all Mosaic and Jewish observances, save only these four: Abstain from pollutions of idols, from fornication, from things strangled, and from blood."[395:2]

The point to which our attention is forcibly drawn is, that the question of Sabbath-keeping is one of those that is left out. The point that Paul had been fighting for was conceded by the central church at Jerusalem, and he was to go out thenceforth free, so far as that was concerned, in his teaching of the churches that he should found.

There is no mention of the Sabbath, or the Lord's day, as binding in the New Testament. What, then, was the actual condition of affairs? What did the churches do in the first three hundred years of their existence? Why, they did just what Paul and the Jerusalem church had agreed upon. Those who wished to keep the Jewish Sabbath did so; and those who did not wish to, did not do so. This is seen from the fact that Justin Martyr, a Christian Father who flourished about A. D. 140, did not observe the day. In his "Dialogue" with Typho, the Jew reproaches the Christians for not keeping the "Sabbath." Justin admits the charge by saying: