The Doctrine of the Sabbath, &c.
THere is nothing more dangerous (and yet more common) among Professors, then Zeal without Knowledge, for by this, men have many times run headlong, against the power of godliness, pretending the Form, and against the Truth and Spirit of the Word, pretending the Letter of it, yea through this they have killed the Prophets and Apostles, and Christ himself, thinking thereby they did God good service: And even godly men themselves, having in some things more Zeal then Knowledge, have grosly erred and mistaken in very weighty matters; Peter of a good mind (as they say) rebuked Christ, for saying he must go to Jerusalem, and there suffer death; and the sons of Zebedee, out of the like blind zeal; would have had fire to have come from Heaven to destroy the Samaritans, &c. And I doubt not but the Parliament, out of a great Zeal are providing for the strict Observation of the Lords Day.
Wherefore that they may take Knowledge along with their Zeal, or rather in the head of it, as its guide and Leader, I have thought good to admonish them, that they search the Word of God in this matter, and that without the Word they presume to do nothing, though it seem never so glorious, seeing whatever is done without the Word, though it seem never so holy and good, yet is nothing else but plain Idolatry. And because none should say that I had perverted the Word, and given a false sense of it, and am come forth to trouble the Church with new Light and Notions, I have therefore produced in this matter only the Testimonies of Others, yet such, whose names are pretious in the Church for their Wisdom and spirituall understanding in the Word, as well as for their Faith and Love, who though dead, yet speak to this matter in these following Quotations.
Testimonies gathered together by that pretious Martyr, Doctor Barnes, which are extant in his Works to be read pag. 367.
That the true Observation of the Sabbath consisteth not only in abstaining from bodily labors; And that to a Christian man every day is the Sabbath, and not only the Seventh day.
HIerome saith, Super Gal. cap. 4. Therefore be certain dayes assigned, that we should come together; not that that day in the which we come together is holyer then another, but all dayes be alike and equall. And Christ is not alonely crucified in Parasceden, and risen only on the Sonday, but the day of Resurrection is alwayes, and alwayes may we eat of the Lords Flesh, &c.
Augustine saith, Epist. 19. We must observe the Sabbath day, not that we should reckon our selves not to labor, but that all things that we do work well, must have an intention to the everlasting rest. Wherefore we must observe the holy day, not by corporall idleness, and unto the Letter, but spiritually must we rest from vices and concupiscences. Wherefore among all the ten Commandements, that of the Sabbath day is alonely commanded to be figuratively observed, &c.
Tertullian saith, Adversus Judaeos. The carnall Circumcision is put away, and extincted at his time. So likewise the observation of the Sabbath day is declared to be for a time, for we must keep the Sabbath day, not alonely the Seventh day, but at all times, as Isai. saith, &c.
Augustine saith, De Consec. Dist. 3 cap. pervenit. It is come unto me, that certain men, which be of an evill mind, have sowen certain evill things among you, and contrary to the holy Faith, so that they do forbid that men should work on the Sabbath day. The which men, what other thing shall we call them, but the Preachers of Antichrist, the which Antichrist shall make the Sabbath day and the Sonday be kept from all manner of work, &c.
Testimonies proving the same Article, Translated out of his Book De Doctorum Sententiis.
AND it shall come to pass from Moon to his Moon, Isa. 66. 23. and from Sabbath to Sabbath, all Flesh shall come to worship before me, saith the Lord.
For the Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath. Mat. 12.
Let no man therefore judge you in meat or in drink, or in part of an holy day, Col. 2. 16. or of the new Moon, or of the Sabbath dayes, which are a shadow of things to come, but the body is of Christ.
After ye have known God, Gal. 4 9. or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly Elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage? Ye observe Dayes, and Moneths, and Times, and Years; I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain.
The Jews were commanded to celebrate the holy Sabbath one day in the week, Ambrose ad Irenae. Epist. 77. that they should be subject to no burden: but they being loosed from worldly business, I would they had so passed, that they had carryed with them no burden of grievous sins unto the everlasting Sabbath of the world to come. Let the Synagogue of the Jews observe the day, let the Church observe it to Immortality. In the Law therefore was a portion, in the Gospel is the perfection, &c.
Whosoever observeth that day hitherunto, August. de Spiritu & Lit. cap. 14. as the Letter soundeth, judgeth carnally.
For if Christ hath taken from us that grievous yoke of many Observances, August. ad Bonifac. l. 3. c. 4. cont. 2. Ep. Pelag. that we should not be carnally Circumcised, that we should not offer Sacrifice for our sins, that on the Sabbath of the Seventh day we should not abstain from necessary business, and other such like, if we observe them being spiritually understood, and setting aside all shadows, signifying the true light of those things. Let us take heed whether we shall therefore say that it pertaineth not to us which is written, that whatsoever one findeth of another mans, he restore again to him that lost it: and many other precepts whereby we learn to live well and godly, and especially that Decalogue which is contained in the two Tables of stone, the carnall observation of the Sabbath only excepted, which signifieth a spirituall sanctification and rest, &c.
[Page 5] First, August. in Gal. must a man know that the works of the Law be of two sorts, for they partly consist in Sacraments, and partly in morall precepts. Unto the Sacraments are referred the Circumcision of the flesh, the temporal Sabbath, the new Moon, the Sacrifices, and all such like innumerable observances. Unto moral precepts are referred these, Thou shalt not slay, &c.
The Testimony of others in this matter.
TIndal the Martyr saith, Tindal. p. 274 And to speak of the Sabbath, which was ordained to be their servant & to preach & be a sign unto them, that God through his holy Spirit and Word doth sanctifie them, in that they obeyed his commandments, and believed, and trusted in his promises, and therefore were charged to leave working, and to come on the holy day to hear the Word of God, by which they were sanctified unto it, also they became captive and bound to serve it, saying that they were justified by abstaining from bodily labor (as ours think also) insomuch that though they bestowed not the holy day in vertue, prayer, and hearing the Word of God, in almsdeeds, in visiting the sick, the needy and comfortless, and so forth, but went up and down idle, yet whatsoever need his neighbor had, he would not have helped him on the Sabbath day, as thou mayest see by the Ruler of the Synagogue, who rebuked Christ for healing the people on the holy day, Luk. 13.
Again the same Tindal saith, Tindal. p. 287 And as for the Sabbath, a great matter, we be Lords over the Sabbath, and may yet change it into the Monday, ☞ or any other day, as we see need, or may make every tenth day holyday only, if we see a cause why: We may make two every week if it were expedient, and not enough to teach the people. Neither was there any cause to change it from the Saturday, then to put difference between us and the Jews, and lest we should become servants to the day after their superstition. Neither needed we any holyday at all, if the people might be taught without it.
Bernardine Ochine saith, Ochine in Dialog. cont. Pap. Since Jesus Christ the Sun of Righteousness appeared to the world, we ought to judge all times of grace to be a most holy Sabbath, and to take all the times of our life, without putting diversity between one day and another, to be altogether holy & so spend them altogether in the honor and glory of God. But the [Page 6] Pope commands the contrary, that there shall be a diversity beween dayes and times in holiness.
Luther saith, Luther. The eighth day signifies allegorically the life to come. For Christ rested in the Sepulchre, the Sabbath day or whole seventh day, but he rose in the day following the Sabbath, which is the eighth, and the beginning of a new week, nec numeratur ultra eam alia dies, neither is any day numbred beyond that. For Christ by his death conclusit hebdomadas temporum, hath concluded the weeks of times, and in the eighth day entered into another kinde of life, in which there are no more dayes reckoned, but it is one eternal day without any courses of night.
Luther saith, The Sabbath was commanded to the Jews in a figure, as the Apostle expresly signifies, Col. 2. which is a shadow of future things, but the body is of Christ. The Sabbath signifies, that very spiritual time which Christ the Sun of Righteousness hath illuminated, which hath no night, whence Isaiah saith Ch. 66. moneth shall be from moneth, and Sabbath from Sabbath: and the Apostle reproves the Galatians, that they observed days, and moneths, and times, and yeers, according to the Jewish rite, that is only outwardly; therefore that precept (yea all) is ceased to perfect Christians, for the Law is not given to a righteous man. Notwithstanding the Church hath retained Feasts, because of the necessity of the word of God, for their sakes who are unperfect, for a true righteous man is so like to God, that as God is indifferent to all days, to all places, to all persons, so is he; every day to him is holyday. But to the weak, who are not yet mortified according to the old man, it is needful that they should be occupied in watchings, fastings, labors, prayers, disciplines, &c. in the use of which, they may attain to the profit of the inner man; but when the body is chastened & brought into servitude, and the passions of it mortified, then they by degrees may cease, and be so much abated, as the inner man is profited, in such sort, that if he should be perfect, these things ought altogether to cease. This is that the Apostle saith, The Law is our School-master to bring us unto Christ, for the Law made nothing perfect, Luth. tom. 1. f. 116.
Luther on Isa. 66. Sabbath shall be from Sabbath, that is saith he, I will change the rites and Feasts of the Jewish Priesthood, and there shall not be in the Church, the distinction of the Sabbath sed perpetua Sabbata erunt, but there shall be perpetual Sabboths; but these are in the Spirit and in faith. For because of this flesh of ours, there [Page 7] is need of certain days, wherein we must meet together, for the handling of the word and the Sacraments.
Calvin saith, Ad Colos. ca. 2. v. 16. Such a division of dayes belonged to the Jews, that they should devoutly observe the dayes commanded, by severing them from others: but amongst Christians such a division is ceased. But some will say, we do yet retain some observation of days. I answer, we in no way keep dayes, as if there were any religion in holy dayes, aut quasi fas non sit tunc laborare, or as if it were not lawfull to labor then, but only respect is had of politie and order, not of dayes. And a little after, on these words, The body is of Christ, he saith, That the substance of those things which the Ceremonies heretofore did figure, is set before our eyes in Christ, because he conteines in himself what ever they did foretel should be. And therefore he that recals the Ceremonies into use, either overwhelms the manifestation of Christ, or spoils Christ of his vertue and makes him void. And therefore if any mortal man shall usurp to himself the office of a Judge in this matter, Let us not obey, seeing Christ the lawful Judge absolves us.
Again Calvin, on Gal. 4. 10. saith, when therefore proper holiness is attributed to dayes by themselves, when one day is distinguished from another for Religions sake, when holydays are reckoned part of the worship of God, then dayes are observed amiss. We now, who have a difference of dayes, do not impose the snare of necessity on mens consciences, we do not distinguish between days, as if one day were more holy then another, we do not place therein Religion and the worship of God, but we only provide for order and concord. And so the observation with us is free and pure from all superstition.
Zuinglius saith, Articul. 20. Fides docet, operante Deo omnia bona fieri, & hoc est Sabbatum nostrum. Faith teaches us that all good things are done by Gods working in us, and this is our Sabbath.
The same Zuinglius saith, [...]bel. ad Valentin, Comparem. Now here my Valentine how the Sabboth is rendred ceremonial. If we would have the Lords Day so bound to time, that it shall be wickedness in aliud tempus transferre, to transfer it to another time, in which resting from our labors equally as in that, we may hear the word of God, if necessity haply shall so require: this day so sollicitously observed, would obtrude upon us a Ceremonie. For we are no way bound to time, but time ought so to serve us, that it is lawful, and permitted to each [Page 8] Church, when necessity urges (as is usual to be done, especially at Harvest time) to transfer the Solemnity and rest of the Lords Day or Sabbath, to some other day; or on the Lords it self, after the finishing of the holy things, to follow their labor, though not without great necessity. Ad Valent. Compar. p. 254.
Picus Mirandula saith, Christus finis legis, est nostrum Sabbatum. Christ the end of the Law, is our Sabbath.
And Paul, Heb. 4. Heb. 4. 3. We which have believed do enter into rest, and he that is entred into rest ceaseth from his own works, as God did from his.
These testimonies presently came to my hand, to which many more might have been added, if time would have suffered, but these are sufficient to hint thus much to men, That the Christian Sabbath is something more, and else, then the world commonly doth esteem it, And therefore it concerns the Parliament, to take heed that they do not impose Jewish superstition on the Common-wealth, under pretence of Gospel-Reformation.
1 Cor. 2. 15. The spiritual man judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.