The institution of the Sabbath lies back in the mists of pre‑history. We do not know when it originated. It may have been with Adam in Eden. If its observance is a fundamental requirement of human nature it probably did originate in Eden, and was observed more or less sincerely in the centuries following. The earliest knowledge we have of its national observance dates back several centuries before Abraham, and even then its institution is accredited to God. The Israelites were Sabbath‑keepers when they came out of Egypt, and had doubtless inherited the ordinance from their ancestors. At Sinai, the rule was elaborated into a code with minute details of its application to the affairs of Israel's national life.

Briefly stated, the Mosaic laws provided for:-

(a) A weekly sabbath observance for man and beast (Ex.23.12‑13; 31.12‑17; 35.2‑3).

(b) Special additional Sabbaths on the occasion of the great feasts (Lev. 23.23‑32; 24.15‑21; 16.30‑31).

(c) A seven yearly sabbath for the land (Ex. 23. 10‑11; Lev. 25.1‑7).

(d) A special Sabbath for man, for beast and for the land on the fiftieth year, the year of Jubilee (Lev.25.6‑12).

In all these observances the close connection between rest and worship is noticeable. The "feast" Sabbaths were "holy convocations" to the Lord, when all the people forsook their tents and their occupations and gathered in companies for praise and worship. These feasts were closely connected with the first fruits and the harvest (see Ex.34), and were designed to lead the minds of men to reflect upon the vital relation between the labours of their own hands and the beneficence of God, who had made those labours both possible and productive. The promise of God was that their observance of the Sabbath would enrich and not impoverish their lives. The ground would bring forth enough in the sixth year to last them through the seventh; and enough in the forty eighth year to last them through the sabbath year and the Jubilee year as well. So sweeping in its scope was this promise of God that it even assured them there would be a surplus of old provisions to be cast forth when the fruits of the next "first" year became available (Lev. 26.10). There is no possible danger of lack if the Divine law is observed!

So the Sabbath became firmly established. Its observance was still a long way from the Divine ideal; still far short of what the Sabbath can be and will be when restored humanity has fully accepted the Kingdom of God upon earth, and the nations are walking in the light of the New Jerusalem. From those days in the desert when Israel cried: "All that the Lord hath spoken we will do, and be obedient," men had, and still have, a long way to travel. But the story of the sabbath has unrolled a little more since then, and shown us a fair vision of what will be, when not only the Church of Christ, but all men, have fully entered into the "rest that remaineth for the people of God."

There is remarkably little said about the Sabbath in Israel's early years. Apart from a few casual allusions the word is not so much as mentioned until the times of the later Kings. This very silence is eloquent; it seems to indicate that as an institution the sabbath system was a normal custom calling for no special mention for quite a few centuries after the entrance to Canaan. We read in Num. 15.32‑36 of the man who was found gathering sticks on the Sabbath day, and of his fate; but that was in the wilderness. Thence forward throughout the time of the Judges and until the days of David there is no intimation whatever of the manner in which the sabbath was observed. After this, however, there are one or two allusions that go to show that it was regarded as a settled institution.

1 Chron. 23. 31 mentions the Sabbaths in connection with David's ordering of the priestly courses, whilst 2 Chron.2.4 and 8.13 give evidence of the same in Solomon's time. The exquisite picture of the Shunamite woman in 2 Kings 4. 23‑26 reveals a sincere sabbath keeping, the woman's husband puzzled at his wife's sudden decision to go to the man of God, seeing that it was "neither new moon, nor sabbath." Evidently the Shunamite was a faithful adherent to the law of Moses, and probably many in Israel shared her faithfulness. At much the same time the sabbath was a sufficiently marked day to become the occasion for periodical changing of the Temple guard (2 Kings 11.4‑11 and 2 Chron.23.4‑11).

During this period, a span of about six hundred years from the Exodus, there is no mention of violation of the Sabbath. Israel until the days of Solomon was an agricultural and pastoral people. Industry and trade, and the consequent intercourse with other peoples, had not touched them. It almost seems as if the simple pastoral life is especially conducive to the keeping of God's sabbath rest. Even in England in the twentieth century Sunday was observed more faithfully and sincerely in country districts and among agricultural populations than in the cities and towns and industrial areas. In harmony with this, it is worthy of notice that it was only after Israel began to lose its pastoral simplicity, and entered into intercourse with other nations, joining in their trade and industry, that the prophets found it necessary to denounce their sabbath faithlessness.

The earliest of such denunciations in the Old Testament is that of Isaiah, who commenced to prophesy in the reign of Uzziah, about six hundred and fifty years after the Exodus. By this time Solomon had been dead for many years, but the taste for luxury, ease and other fruits of commercialism, introduced by him, had remained, and Israel was well on the way to becoming the nation of traders it has been ever since. Isaiah shows (1. 13) that in his days the Sabbaths had become a mere formality; they were an abomination in the sight of God, and He would no longer accept them. Later on in Isaiah's life (56.2 and 58.13‑14), in greater maturity, he called Israel to come back to their original sincerity and zeal in sabbath‑keeping. "If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight..." etc. At a later time Jeremiah exhorted the people to cease from desecrating the Sabbath (Jer.17.19‑27). Ezekiel felt the same burden, as recorded in the 20th, 22nd and 23rd chapters of his prophecy, whilst Amos, contemporary with Isaiah's early days, has preserved for us a vivid picture of the Israelites chafing under the sabbath law, and mentions the very thing which led to their rejection of the sabbath, their greed for gain. "When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell corn? and the sabbath, that we may set forth wheat, making the ephah small, and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances by deceit" (Amos 8.4‑7), It seems clear that in the days of Amos and Isaiah, when King Uzziah was reigning, the sabbath was still observed, but in a perfunctory, formal manner. Men were impatient for its passing that they might turn again to the buying and selling which was rapidly creating in their midst an economic system of the same kind that has produced such evil results in the world today.

Such evidence as the Old Testament affords, therefore, seems to indicate that Israel observed the sabbath system until the time of the Kings, and that with the entrance of trade and industry and consequent partial abandonment of pastoral pursuits they abandoned the sabbath also. For a few centuries more the nation blundered on from disaster to disaster. All the great invasions and captivities fall within this period of sabbath rejection - until at last there came the greatest catastrophe of all. Nebuchadnezzar's armies razed the Temple and the Holy City to the ground, taking away to Babylon all but a few of the poorest, left to be vine‑dressers and husbandmen. Even these fled into Egypt a few months later, for fear of the Chaldeans. The desolation was complete, to remain so "until the land had enjoyed her sabbaths".

Thus it was realised, the dread prediction given to Moses eight hundred years before the exile. It was a declaration that if the sabbath arrangements were violated and ignored by Israel, the nation would eventually be driven into captivity and the land lie desolate in compensation for the Sabbatical years in which it had not been allowed to rest. "If you will not . . . hearken unto me ... I will scatter you among the heathen (nations), and will draw out a sword after you, and your land shall be desolate and your cities waste. Then shall the land enjoy her Sabbaths as long as it lies desolate, and you be in your enemies' land . . because it did not rest in your Sabbaths, when you dwelt upon it" (Lev.26.27‑43).

After the Babylonian captivity there was a great change. Strong influences were at work to maintain an increasingly rigid observance of the sabbath. When Nehemiah came to Jerusalem he found alien traders in the habit of selling their wares in Jerusalem, and Jews conducting all manner of business, on the sacred day, and he sternly forbade such practices (Neh.13.15‑22). This zeal for the day developed into an extreme fanaticism during the four centuries which elapsed before the First Advent. The records of the Maccabeans, those stalwart patriots of that intervening time, show that many Jews even refused to fight their enemies on the Sabbath, choosing to be slain rather than violate the day by lifting weapons. By the time of our Lord the simple commands of Moses had been overlaid by a vast mass of detailed prohibitions equalled only by those governing the English Sunday in the days of the Puritans. To practise as a physician and accomplish works of healing on the sabbath was forbidden; hence our Lord was accused of breaking the sabbath because some of his works of healing were done on that day (Luke 6.6‑11,13; 11‑17; 14.1‑6, and John 5.1‑16). In like manner it was declared that his disciples, rubbing corn between their hands on the Sabbath (Matt.12.1‑8) were technically guilty of threshing wheat. One wonders to what extent our Lord's injunction, "Pray ye that your flight be not ... on the sabbath day" (Matt.24.20) is not an allusion to the restraining power of "orthodoxy" on those who are "watching for his appearing", remembering that the Rabbis forbad any man to travel more than two thousand paces ‑ about one mile ‑ outside the city on the sabbath!

So was the sabbath desecrated by God's professed people ‑ at first by indifference and hostility, then, secondly, by fanaticism and intolerance. In both cases the results were disastrous, not only for themselves, but for generations yet unborn.

AOH