Sunday is NOT the Sabbath!
(continued)
Yeshua(Jesus) and the Sabbath
Day.
Ask most any Christian what
day of the week Yeshua (Jesus) rose from the grave and they would answer that it
was a Sunday. For nearly 20 centuries the resurrection of Yeshua (Jesus) has
been celebrated on Sunday. How do they come up with the idea that resurrection
day was Sunday?
Mat 28:1 In the end of
the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary
Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulchre.
Mark 16:2 And very
early in the morning the first day of the week, they came to the sepulchre
at the rising of the sun.
Luke 24:1 Now upon the
first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came to the
sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared, and certain others
with them. Luke 24:2 And they found the stone rolled away from the
sepulchre.
Yeshua (Jesus) lay in the
tomb on the Sabbath, and the Sabbath ended at sundown, (as does every day
according to the Bible).
The women came to the tomb at dawn the day following
(or "the first day of the week") and discovered that the tomb was already empty.
Look at most calendars. Sunday is normally shown as the first day of the week,
and Saturday as the last day of the week. (Recently some business calendars are
being printed with Monday as the first day, confusing the issue somewhat.)
Virtually any dictionary will confirm Sunday is the first day of the
week.
So Sunday keepers seem to
have no problem precisely identifying the day of the week the resurrection
occurred on,** but when it comes to the seventh-day Sabbath, suddenly there is
doubt??? (Sounds more to me like we have a large body of folk just
following what they've been taught without doing what Scripture says to
do: Prove all things 1Th
5:21)
**(Webmaster's NOTE: Christ actually rose from death and the grave at the end of the Sabbath day... See three days and three nights!),
Yeshua knew exactly
which day was the genuine seventh-day Sabbath -
Luke 4:16 And he came
to Nazareth, where he had been brought up: and, as his custom was, he went
into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up for to
read.
Yeshua (Jesus) Himself was a
keeper of the seventh-day Sabbath. Now, if the Jews had somehow lost track of
the Sabbath day since the time of Moses, Jesus would have corrected them, but
this was not necessary, since they were already observing the right day. As this
establishes a firm reference point in history, it remains for the skeptic to try
and prove that the Jews and the rest of the world somehow collectively lost
track of the day in the 2000 years since the time of Christ, a period which is
very well documented.
The Gregorian Calendar Reform
Sometimes people will say
the calendar reform in the Middle Ages must have altered the weekdays as we know
them, so we cannot be sure which day is the seventh day. Again people that
think this have not researched the issue.
The calendar reform of 1582
was established by Pope Gregory XIII because the previous method for calculating
leap years had moved the date of the vernal equinox from March 21 in 325 A.D. to
March 11 in 1582. (The Julian calendar commenced the 1st of January of the 46th
year before the birth of Christ, and the 708th from the foundation of Rome).
This was important to the Catholic church because Easter (Webmaster-also a wrong day of worship) was observed by
Catholics on the first Sunday after the first full moon occurring after the
vernal equinox. So Easter was gradually creeping further and further (earlier
and earlier) away from the time of year set by the Council of Nicea in 325
A.D.
To correct this
perceived problem Pope Gregory XIII decreed that Thursday October 4, 1582
would be followed not by the 5th but by Friday October 15, 1582. He jumped
the calendar 10 days numerically, but did not change the weekly cycle. So
that this correction would be maintained, he then decreed that leap years
would occur whenever the year was divisible by four, and centennial years
would be leap years that were divisible by 400. During a leap year, one
day is added to the month of February, as a correction. This method of
calendar keeping was gradually adopted across Europe, and the world, and
is nearly universal today.
Cardinal Gibbons on
Sunday
"... is not every Christian obliged to sanctify
Sunday and to abstain on that day from unnecessary servile work? Is not
the observance of this law among the most prominent of our sacred duties?
But, you may read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and you will
not find a single line authorizing the sanctification of Sunday. The
Scriptures enforce the religious observance of Saturday, a day which we
never sanctify."
Source: The Faith
of Our Fathers, by James Cardinal Gibbons, Archbishop of Baltimore,
originally published in 1876, republished and Copyright 1980 by TAN Books
and Publishers, Inc., pages 72-73. |
|
Summa Theologica
In the New Law the
observance of the Lord's day (Sunday) took the place of the observance of the
Sabbath (Saturday), not by virtue of the precept (of God) but by the
institution of the Church and the custom (Tradition) of Christian
people.
Source: Thomas Aquainas
SMT SS Q[122] A[4] R.O. 4 Para.
Convert's Catechism
"Ques. - Which is the
Sabbath day?
"Ans. - Saturday is the
Sabbath day.
"Ques. - Why do we
observe Sunday instead of Saturday?
"Ans. - We observe Sunday
instead of Saturday because the Catholic Church, in the Council of Laodicea
(A.D. 336), transferred the solemnity from Saturday to
Sunday."
Source: The Convert's
Catechism of Catholic Doctrine, written by Reverend Peter Geiermann,
C.S.R., and blessed by Pope Pius X on the 25th of January 1910, Second
edition, page 50.
The Council of Laodicea
The Council of
Laodicea in Phrygia Pacatiana, (343-381)
was a local, Eastern, Greek-speaking synod, and the canons referring to the
Sabbath or Sunday/Lord's day are listed here:
LAODICEA, CANON
16. - The Gospels are to be read on
Sabbath, with the other Scriptures [apparently at Communion services; see
canon 49, below].
LAODICEA, CANON
29. - Christians
must not judaize by resting on the Sabbath, but must work on that day, rather
honoring the Lord's Day; and, if they can, resting then as Christians. But if
any shall be found to be judaizers, let them be anathema from
Christ.
LAODICEA, CANON
49. - During
Lent, the Bread must not be offered except on the Sabbath Day and on
the Lord's Day only.
LAODICEA, CANON 51. -
The nativities of Martyrs [actually, the death days, on which martyrs were
considered to have been born to eternal life] are not to be celebrated in Lent,
but commemorations of the holy Martyrs are to be made on the Sabbaths and
Lord's days. (Note: the Torah specifically forbids mourning and
fasting on Sabbath)
CATECHISM OF POPE PIUS X
The Third
Commandment
1 Q. What does the
Third Commandment: Remember you keep holy the Sabbath day, command us to
do?
A. The Third
Commandment: Remember you keep holy the Sabbath day, commands us to honour
God by acts of worship on festivals.
2 Q. What are
festivals?
A. In the Old Law they
were Saturdays and certain other days regarded as specially solemn by the
Jews; in the New Law they are Sundays and other festivals instituted by the
Church.
3 Q. Why is Sunday
sanctified instead of Saturday in the New Law?
A. Sunday, which means
the Lord's Day, was substituted for Saturday, because it was on that
day that our Lord rose from the dead.
Note: Sun day does
NOT mean Lord's Day. Sun Day is the holiday of the Roman sun-god "Sol
Inviticus.
Doctrinal Catechism
Q. Have you any other way of proving that the church has power
to institute festivals of precept?
A. Had she not such
power, she could not have done that in which all modern religionists agree
with her - she could not have substituted the observance of Sunday the first
day of the week, for the observance of Saturday the seventh day, a change
for which there is no Scriptural authority.
Source: A Doctrinal Catechism,
by Rev. Stephen Keenan, Imprimatur by John Cardinal McCloskey, Archbishop of
New York, Copyright 1876 by T. W. Strong, page 174.
Anglican Archbishop Declares Tradition as Sunday's
Origin |
TORONTO, Oct. 27 (BUP).-Rev.
Philip Carrington, Anglican Archbishop of Quebec, sent local clergymen into a
huddle today by saying outright that there was nothing to support Sunday
being kept holy. Carrington defiantly told a church meeting in this city of
straight-laced protestantism that tradition, not the Bible, had made Sunday
the day of worship. He quoted the biblical commandment which said the
seventh day should be one of rest, and then stated: "That is Saturday."
"Nowhere in the Bible is it laid down that worship should be done on
Sunday," the Archbishop told a hushed, still audience. Local parsons read
his comments today with set, determined looks. They refused comment.
Source: News Item,
Albertan (Calgary, Alberta, Canada), Oct. 28,
1949.
The Catholic Christian
Instructed. |
[p. 202] Q. What are
the days which the Church commands to be kept holy?
A. 1st, The Sunday, or the
Lord's day, which we observe by apostolical tradition, instead of the Sabbath.
(Ed.
note: reading the next four questions and answers, it should be a source
of amazement to you how people will believe a lie if it's repeated enough
times; even when the truth is obvious and available. Acts 15 clearly shows
that the "Apostolic tradition" was for the Apostles and believers in
Yeshua to meet on Sabbath in the synagogues.
) |
Q. What warrant have
you for keeping the Sunday, preferable to the ancient Sabbath, which was the
Saturday?
A. We have for it the
authority of the Catholic Church, and apostolical tradition.
Q. Does the scripture
any where command the Sunday to be kept for the Sabbath?
A. The scripture commands
us to hear the Church, St. Matt. xviii. 17. St. Luke x. 16, and to hold fast
the traditions of the Apostles, 2 Thess. ii. 15, but the scripture does not in
particular mention this change of the Sabbath.
[p. 204] Q. What was
the reason why the weekly Sabbath was changed from the Saturday to the
Sunday?
A. Because our Lord fully
accomplished the work of our redemption by rising from the dead on a Sunday,
and by sending down the Holy Ghost on a Sunday: as therefore the work of our
redemption was a greater work than that of our creation, the primitive Church
thought the day, in which this work was completely finished,
was more worthy [of]
her religious observation than that in which God rested from the creation, and
should be properly called the Lord's day.
So let's make sure
we've got this right now. GOD blessed and sanctified the Sabbath and told us to
remember it and keep it holy but this bunch of HIS created beings is saying
...."No, we'll tell YOU how it's going to be..." and all the world followed
after them.....
Q. But has the
Church a power to make any alterations in the commandments of
God?
A. The
commandments of God, as far as they contain his eternal law, are unalterable
and indispensable; but as to whatever was only ceremonial, they cease to
oblige, since the Mosaic law was abrogated by Christ's death.
Even the
Catholic Church admits that the Word does NOT say that the law was not abrogated
(replaced) at the cross but then they turn right around and say it was???? And
then they say that the commandment obliges us to set aside some part of our
time, but that's NOT what the commandment says as you just read.
Hence, as far as the commandment
obliges us to set aside some part of our time for the worship and service of
our Creator, it is an unalterable and unchangeable precept of the eternal law,
in which the Church cannot dispense: but for as
much as it prescribes the seventh day in particular for this purpose, it is
no more than a ceremonial precept of the old law, which obliges not
Christians. And therefore, instead
of the seventh day, and other festivals appointed in the old law, the
Church has prescribed the Sundays and Holy Days to be set apart for God's
worship; and these we are now obliged to keep in consequence of God's
commandment, instead of the ancient Sabbath.
Source: The Catholic
Christian Instructed in the Sacraments, Sacrifice, Ceremonies, and Observances
of the Church, by the Right Rev. Dr. Richard Challoner,
published in Baltimore in 1852 by John Murphy & Co., pp. 202,
204.
Rebuilding A Lost Faith Protestants often deride the authority of Church
tradition, and claimed to be directed by the Bible only; yet they, too, have
been guided by customs of the ancient Church, which find no warrant in the
Bible, but rest on Church tradition only!
A striking instance of this
is the following:-The first positive command in the Decalogue is to "Remember
the Sabbath Day to keep it holy," and this precept was enforced by the Jews for
thousands of years. But the Sabbath Day, the observance of which God commanded,
was our Saturday. Yet who among either Catholics or Protestants, except a sect
or two, like the "Seventh Day Baptists," ever keep that commandment now? None.
Why is this? The Bible, which Protestants claim to obey exclusively,
gives no authorization for the substitution of the first day of the week for
the seventh. On what authority, therefore, have they done so? Plainly on the
authority of that very Catholic Church which they abandoned, and whose
traditions they condemn.
Source: John L. Stoddard,
Rebuilding a Lost Faith By An American Agnostic (New York: P. J.
Kenedy and Sons, 1826), p. 80.
The Observance of Sunday and Civil Laws for its
Enforcement |
[pg. 139] Strange
as it may seem, the State, in passing laws for the due sanctification of Sunday,
is unwittingly acknowledging the authority of the Catholic Church, and carrying
out more or less faithfully its prescriptions.
The Sunday, as a day of the
week set apart for the obligatory public worship of Almighty God, to be
sanctified by a suspension of all servile labor, trade, and worldly avocations
and by exercises of devotion, is purely a creation of the Catholic
Church.
It is not the
Jewish Sabbath; it is, in fact, entirely distinct from it, and not
governed by the enactments of the Mosaic law. It is part and parcel of the
system of the Catholic Church, as absolutely as Christian marriage is or
any other her sacraments, her festivals and fasts, her days of joy and
mourning, her indulgences and her
jubilees. |
[pg. 149] The
Catholic Church created the Sunday and made the very regulations which have come
down on the statue-books, and she still constantly, from her pulpits, her
catechists' chairs, and the confessional, calls on her faithful to obey them, to
sanctify the day, and refrain from all that desecrates it.
[pg. 152] For
ages all Christian nations looked to the Catholic Church, and, as we have
seen, the various states enforced by law her ordinances as to worship and
cessation of labor on Sunday. Protestantism, in discarding the authority of the
Church, has no good reason for its Sunday theory, and ought logically, to
keep Saturday as the Sabbath, with the Jews and the Seventh-Day Baptists.
For their present practice Protestants in general have no authority but that of
a Church which they disown, and there cannot be a greater inconsistency than
theirs in asking the state to enforce the Sunday laws.
Source: The American
Catholic Quarterly Review, January 1883, The Observance of Sunday and
Civil Laws for its Enforcement, published in Philadelphia by Hardy and Mahony
Publishers and Proprietors, pages 139, 149, 152.
To Tell You the Truth.
All of us believe many
things in regard to religion that we do not find in the Bible. For example, nowhere in the Bible do we
find that Christ or the Apostles ordered that the Sabbath be changed from
Saturday to Sunday. We have the commandment of God given to Moses to keep
holy the Sabbath Day, that is the 7th day of the week, Saturday.
Today most Christians keep Sunday
because it has been revealed to us by the Church outside the
Bible.
Source: "To Tell You The
Truth," The Catholic Virginian, Vol. 22, No. 49 (Oct. 3,
1947).
Things Catholics Are Asked About
Some non-Catholics object to
Purgatory because there is no specific mention of it in Scripture. There is no
specific mention of the word Sunday in Scripture. The Sabbath is mentioned, but
Sabbath means Saturday. Yet Christians of almost all denominations worship on
Sunday, not Saturday. The Jews observe Saturday. Nowhere in the Bible is it stated that worship should be
changed from Saturday to Sunday... The Church made
the Bible, the Bible did not make the Church. Now the Church which gave us
the Bible, instituted, by God's authority, Sunday as the day of worship. This
same Church, by the same divine authority, taught the doctrine of Purgatory long
before the Bible was made. We
have, therefore, the same authority for Purgatory as we have for
Sunday.
Source: Martin J. Scott,
S.J., Litt.D., Things Catholics Are
Asked About, p. 136, Copyright 1927 by P. J. Kenedy & Sons, New
York.
Basic Catholic Catechism
Third Commandment: "Remember
to keep holy the Lord's day."
1. Sundays and Holy Days:
Mass Obligation
In Old Testament times, this
commandment required keeping the Sabbath (Saturday), holy and a day of rest.
The day was moved to Sunday by the authority Christ gave to His Church,
to commemorate the Resurrection of Our Lord and Pentecost Sunday, when the Holy
Spirit came upon the Apostles.
Basic Catholic
Catechism, By Fr. William G. Most, Copyright
1990
Catholicism and Fundamentalism
After all, fundamentalists
meet for worship on Sunday, yet there is no evidence in the Bible that corporate
worship was to be made on Sundays. The Jewish Sabbath, or day of rest, was, of course,
Saturday. It was the Catholic Church that decided Sunday should be the day of
worship for Christians, in
honor of the Resurrection.
Source: Catholicism and
Fundamentalism, by Karl Keating, copyright 1988 by Ignatius Press, San
Francisco, bearing the Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur of the Catholic Church,
page 38.
So dear reader, you should no longer
have any doubt that not only is Sunday is the first day of week, and that
nowhere in the Bible is Sunday blessed, sanctified or commanded by God as a day
of weekly worship. The Catholic Church itself has told you that it was THE ROMAN
CATHOLIC CHURCH who has "done away with" the keeping of all the Biblical Sabbaths
as God has commanded. If you
claim to be Protestant, and acknowledge that the Bible, not the Roman Catholic
Church is your only ruler of truth, then on what basis will you continue to
worship on Sunday?
It was no coincidence
that you were led to read this webpage. You need to make your decision about
what you are going to do about the "Sunday Issue," HERE, NOW,
TODAY!
14 Now therefore fear the
Lord, and serve him in sincerity and in truth: and put away the gods which your
fathers served on the other side of the flood, and in Egypt; and serve you the
Lord. 15 And if it seem evil to you to serve the Lord,
choose you this day
whom ye will serve;
whether the gods which
your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the
Amorites, in whose land you dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the
Lord. (Jos 24:14,15 KJV)
You have seen from the
Catholic Church's own records and words that they took onto themselves, the
right to change God's laws with regard to times of worship.
25 And he shall speak
great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most
High, and think to change times and
laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times
and the dividing of time. 26 But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take
away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it to the end. (Dan
7:25) 19 And Joshua
said to the people, you cannot serve the Lord: for he is an holy God; he is a
jealous God; he will not forgive your transgressions nor your sins. 20 If
you forsake the Lord, and serve strange gods, then he will turn and do you
hurt, and consume you, after that he hath done you good. (Jos
24:19-20)
The choice is yours and you must make
it. If you cast aside the only day the Bible sanctifies in perpetuity by the
Word of God and replace it with a day authorized ONLY by the word of Roman
Catholic Tradition, if you keep the "Beast-Days" and not the other Biblical
Shabbats (Feast-Days), then in spite of your claim of Protestantism, you are
essentially following after the image of the Beast and are a Roman Catholic on
this matter.
So which authority do you
acknowledge, the Word of God that commands Sabbath worship or the tradition of
the Catholic Church which commands Sunday, first day and "Holy Days of
Obligation" (easter, xmas etc.) worship? On that final day, YOU will be the one
that stands before the Giver of the Law; not your pastor or your parents or your
priest....just YOU. What will HE say to you?
Notice who will enter into
the Kingdom...
21 Not every one that
says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he
that does the will of my Father which is in heaven (Mat 7:21
KJV)
Will you do HIS will or the
will of the Popes of the Roman Catholic Church? Will He say to you:
22 Many will say to me
in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name? and in your name
have cast out devils? and in your name done many wonderful works? 23 And
then will I profess to them, I never knew you: depart from me, you that work
iniquity. (Mat 7:22-23 KJV)
choose you this day
whom you will serve; (Jos 24:15 KJV)
End of Unknown Author's Article
Sunday vs Sabbath continued...
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