Where did the Sabbath go?

Indeed, the Body of Messiah is universal, or “catholic”. So Protestants should not be anti-Catholic anymore than we should be anti-Semitic as were the “church fathers”. From both sides of the equasion we should not throw the baby out with the bathwater. But let us not also hang on to any of the dirty water of either of these positions (Hellenizers and Judaizers, or even the “church fathers” or the popes).
sabbath

In “The Faith of Our Fathers”, written in 1876, it is clearly stated by archbishop Gibbons who writes, “Third–A rule of faith, or a competent guide to heave, must be able to instruct in all the truths necessary for salvation. Now the Scriptures alone do not contain all the truths which a Christian is bound to believe, nor do they explicitly enjoin all the duties which he is obliged to practice. Not to mention other examples, 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.”

Also, “We often hear the shibboleth: “The Bible, and the Bible only, must be your guide.” Why, then, do you go to the useless expense of building fine churches and Sabbath-schools? What is the use of your preaching sermons and catechizing the young, if the Bible at home is a sufficient guide for your people? The fact is, you reverend gentlemen contradict in practice what you so vehemently advance in theory. Do not tell me that the Bible is all-sufficient; or, if you believe it is self-sufficient, cease your instructions. Stand not between the people and the Scriptures.”

See here http://www.cathcorn.org/foof/8.html

He also said “About the year 190 the question regarding the proper day for celebrating Easter was agitated in the East, and referred to Pope St. Victor I. The Eastern Church generally celebrated Easter on the day on which the Jews kept the Passover, while in the West it was observed then, as it is now, on the first Sunday after the full moon of the vernal equinox. St. Victor directs the Eastern churches, for the sake of uniformity, to conform to the practice of the West, and his instructions are universally followed.”

“The first General Council was held in Nicea, in 325; the second, in Constantinople, 381; the third, in Ephesus, in 431; the fourth, in Chalcedon, in 451; the fifth, in Constantinople, in 553; the sixth in the same city, in 680; the seventh, in Nicea, in 787, and the eighth, in Constantinople, in 869.”

“But the Priest, like Moses, stands before God to intercede for His people, and before the people to advocate the cause of God. He not only ascends daily the altar to plead for the people and to cry out with the prophet, “Spare, O Lord, spare Thy people, and give not Thy inheritance to reproach;” but every Sunday he mounts the pulpit to vindicate the claims which God has on His subjects”

See http://www.cathcorn.org/foof/29.html

Of course from the Bible we see this is a false idea to say that priests now sit in the seat of Moses. We read in Acts that the straight line went from Moses to Yeshua:

Ac 7:37 This is that Moses, which said unto the children of Israel, A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren, like unto me; him shall ye hear.

And it is definitely not easy to find any information from the cardinals and bishops stating themselves that they indeed changed the day to Sunday, Although you can find plenty of hearsay on the matter. One such documentable place is the Catholic Virginian, October 3, 1947, p. 9, article “To Tell You the Truth” which states,

“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 [Roman Catholic] church outside the Bible.”

Another is on February 6, 1890 from Father Enright in the American Sentinal who said,

“It was the holy Catholic Church that changed the day of rest to Sunday, the first day of the week. And it not only compelled all to keep Sunday, but at the Council of Láodicea, A. D. 364, anathematized those who kept the Sabbath and urged all persons to labor on the seventh day under the penalty of anathema.”

See the article here

Father Enright Quote, 1889
Father Enright Quote, 1889

Indeed there is also a letter from Peter Tramer, Editor of the Catholic Extension magazine in 1934, which you can see here:

1934 admission
1934 admission

Consider the writing of The Quartodeciman Schism  by Eusebius Pamphilus around the year 314, Bishop of Cæsarea in Palestine which says regarding Sabbath and Passover (the word easter is NOT in the Bible), “We observe the exact day; neither adding, nor taking away. For in Asia also great lights have fallen asleep, which shall rise again on the day of the Lord’s coming, when he shall come with glory from heaven, and shall seek out all the saints. Among these are Philip, one of the twelve apostles, who fell asleep in Hierapolis; and his two aged virgin daughters, and another daughter, who lived in the Holy Spirit and now rests at Ephesus; and, moreover, John,who was both a witness and a teacher, who reclined upon the bosom of the Lord, and, being a priest, wore the sacerdotal plate.  ”

“Among them was Irenæus, who, sending letters in the name of the brethren in Gaul over whom he presided, maintained that the mystery of the resurrection of the Lord should be observed only on the Lord’s day. He fittingly admonishes Victor that he should not cut off whole churches of God which observed the tradition of an ancient custom and after many other words he proceeds as follows: “For the controversy is not only concerning the day, but also concerning the very manner of the fast. For some think that they should fast one day, others two, yet others more; some, moreover, count their day as consisting of forty hours day and night. [Alternate translation: For some think that they should fast one day, others two, yet others more, and some forty; and they count the hours of the day and night together as their day.] “

See http://www.voskrese.info/spl/HE5_23.html

And take this into consideration, “The week consists of seven days,   and the eighth day is the same as the first, to which it returns, and of which the week begins again. The gentiles gave to these [days]   names from the planets, believing  that from the sun they themselves had a spirit, from the moon a body, from Mars blood, from Mercury mind and speech,from Jupiter moderation, from Venus sensual desire, latin] from Saturn slowness [of movement]. But the holy Sylvester ordered that they be called feriae (calling the first “Lord’s day”), imitating the Hebrews, who [named them] the “first from the Sabbath,” the “second from the Sabbath,” and SO the rest by number.”

We can SAY we don’t understand or agree with this information, but it does not erase it from existence simply because any of us (including 99% of American church leadership) are ignorant of it. That is not an arrogant or mean statement. It is simply fact. The fact that some don’t know about it has zero effect on the veracity of the information. Neither does our availability or desire to search out Truth define Truth. It is absolute.

We read from the catholics themselves why they changed Sunday:

“The Church commands us to keep the Sunday holy instead of the Sabbath because on Sunday Christ rose from the dead, and on Sunday He sent the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles. We keep Sunday instead of Saturday also to teach that the Old Law is not now binding upon us, but that we must keep the New Law, which takes its place.

See here, number 353 http://catholic.net/index.php?option=dedestaca&id=3413&grupo=Church%20Teaching%20QA&canal=Catholicism%20101

Let us also look at a copy of “The Convert’s Catechism”:

Catholic Catechism
Catholic Catechism

Take for example the book “Sabbath and Sunday” written in 1977.

http://biblelight.net/Sabbath%20and%20Sunday%20-%20Odom.pdf

Take also a book written I believe in 1893 called “Rome’s Challenge” which states: “Most Christians assume that Sunday ¡s the biblically approved day of worship. The Roman Catholic Church protests that ¡t transferred Christian worship from the biblical Sabbath (Saturday) to Sunday, and that to try to argue that the change was made in the Bible is both dishonest and a denial of Catholic authority, If Protestantism wants to base its teachings only on the Bible, ¡t should worship on Saturday.”

See here https://books.google.com/books…

Concerning the councils of Trent and Nicea, notice this peculiar piece of info:

“Aside from the decrees, which were published almost immediately, virtually all the background materials — records of the debates in the council, diaries, correspondence, etc. — were inaccessible until 1880 when the Vatican archives were opened. Even so, it took scholars from 1901 until 2001, a full century, to piece them together, edit them and finally begin publishing them.” See here http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…/the-council-of-trent-450-ye…

Those who had been brought up in the ancient order of things [i.e., converted Jews] have come to the possession of a new hope, no longer observing the Sabbath but living in observance of the Lord’s day. (Magnesians 9, c. A.D. 110)

Entire books have been written trying to propagate that it was Constantine who changed the Sabbath to Sunday, but anyone familiar with early Christian history knows that there is abundant and unanimous testimony that Christians met on Sunday, not Saturday, and that they did not require physical rest on any day. But that contradicts the Bible. Just because there were Judaizers and Hellenizers in the first century doesn’t mean that God or Jesus or Apostles ever changed anything about the Sabbath. We know that because the Bible teaches to the contrary.

Also, Constantine’s officially changing of days of worship is WELL documented. Many falsely teach that everyone before Constantine was worshipping correctly on the Sabbath and Passover but we see even in the ministry days of Apostles false teachers crept in from the very beginning.

See  http://www.ccel.org/s/schaff/history/About.htm

Current Catholic law says the following about Holy days:

2175  Sunday is expressly distinguished from the sabbath which it follows chronologically every week; for Christians its ceremonial observance replaces that of the sabbath. In Christ’s Passover, Sunday fulfills the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath and announces man’s eternal rest in God. For worship under the Law prepared for the mystery of Christ, and what was done there prefigured some aspects of Christ:

In addition to Sunday, the days to be observed as holy days of obligation in the Latin Rite dioceses of the United States of America, in conformity with canon 1246, are as follows:

January 1, the solemnity of Mary, Mother of God Thursday of the Sixth Week of Easter, the solemnity of the Ascension August 15, the solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary November 1, the solemnity of All Saints December 8, the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception December 25, the solemnity of the Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ

See http://www.usccb.org/…/c…/complementary-norms/canon-1246.cfm

Also http://www.usccb.org/…/catechism-of-the-cat…/epub/index.cfm…

We read in the pronta biblioteca that the papacy insists that it has the authority to change God’s laws, see here:

the-papacy-insists-that-it-has-the-authority-to-change-gods-laws

You can read it for yourself here, if you can read Latin https://books.google.com/books?id=2vM1AQAAMAAJ&dq=editions:M811TRsYrqsC&pg=PT907&hl=en#v=onepage&q&f=false

Where we really begin to start having issues is the fact that “the Lord’s day ” Biblically is NOT on Sunday, because Jesus was raised up by the Father on the true sabbath. Another piece here that is incorrect is the mistranslation “first day of the week”. The Textus Receptus says, “mia sabbaton” which is literally “the first Sabbath”, meaning the first Sabbath after Passover Just like the Pentateuch/ Torah commands us to observe. Showing us once again like always that Paul observed every Sabbath and every feast, festival and sacrifice. See Lu 6 to understand how Sabbaths were counted:

“And it came to pass on the second sabbath after the first, that he went through the corn fields; and his disciples plucked the ears of corn, and did eat, rubbing them in their hands.”

We find ourselves caught between the Judaizers and Hellenizers in the search for Truth. Both took the Lord’s name in vain and heaped up doctrines of their own ideas, CONTRARY to the Word of God, as far as the east is from the west; as far as the first day is from the seventh.

Because it is not only the Sabbath that was tainted but all of the feasts of the Lord were replaced with Easter and Christmas. It was for this reason and many other “christians” protested the catholic church in what we call the “Protestant Reformation”.

See the following article at WND, the oldest Christian news outlet.

“Despite the assumptions of many, Christmas was not a widespread holiday in much of colonial America,” says Kovacs. “Shocking as it sounds, followers of Jesus Christ in both America and England helped pass laws making it illegal to observe Christmas.” Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2008/11/81144/#FwoCyGjYiFiI7jIl.99

It is a well-documented fact that Christians did not observe Christmas in America until 1820 because they were and still are Pagan holidays. They therefore made it illegal.

In England, the ban on the holiday was lifted in 1660, when Charles II took over the throne. However, the Puritan presence remained in New England and Christmas did not become a legal holiday there until 1856. Even then, some schools continued to hold classes on December 25 until 1870.

One thing in all of this is absolutely certain and without question; namely that nowhere in the Bible is there ANY mention that we should stop observing the Lord’s Sabbaths (including the weekly Sabbath), or that we should begin to observe Easter (named for the goddess Ishtar), Christmas (which is actually the adversaries birthday) or any other holiday whether catholic or protestant.

Judaizers in no way were out to get rid of the first 5 books of the Bible, they were trying to keep the Oral Traditions of Judaism alive, just as Christianity today has become inundated with oral traditions of men. The enemy wasted no time trying to make up for the surprise attack on him.

It is important to note that the Greek word for week is missing from the entire “new testament”. The idea of “week” for the Jews of the time was a “between the weekly Sabbath” or “until the next Sabbath”. Which is why the word in every instance is “sabbatwn“. For example. In Acts 13:42 we read about the crowd wanting to have the Apostles stay with them for a week when they said “μεταξὺ σάββατον”, or “between Sabbaths”. The gentiles would not be expecting to come “back to” the Synagogue on the next Shabbat. Why wouldn’t the Greek word for “week” be used? ebdomé (ebdomh) =  week. See also:

  • ebdomaios (ebdomaioV) = 7th day
  • ebdomos (ebdomoV)= 7th
  • epta (epta)= 7

None of these words are used, because every instance in the scripture in this regard is referring to a Shabbat of some sort. In conclusion, even if every single piece of evidence I provided for the Shabbat being ignored and instead worshipping/ gathering on SUNday, it does not alter the fact that those of us who believe in the Bible only, there is NO other day that we are to set apart other than that which has ALWAYS been commanded to set apart.

Concerning the AntiChrist, Daniel prophesied the following about him:

Da 7:25 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. I would think twice about following the changing of times and laws concerning the Bible.

Take notice that John Wesley, one of the great reformers wrote in his Explanitory notes on the New Testament wrote regarding Revelation 17:5, “This very word (MYSTERY) was inscribed on the front of the Pope’s mitre, till some of the Reformers took public notice of it”

See here: https://books.google.com/books?id=LVgHAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA429&lpg=PA429&dq=%22This+very+word+was+inscribed+on+the+front+of+the+Pope’s+mitre,+till+some+of+the+Reformers+took+public+notice+of+it%22&source=bl&ots=76Eqi1qumB&sig=zVM54H2k07CoY6szYU2qc0Pt4po&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CCQQ6AEwAWoVChMIsYngl4fRxgIVC1uICh0hLg1s#v=onepage&q=%22This%20very%20word%20was%20inscribed%20on%20the%20front%20of%20the%20Pope’s%20mitre%2C%20till%20some%20of%20the%20Reformers%20took%20public%20notice%20of%20it%22&f=false

It is easy to see that the Roman Catholic Church will not allow anyone to promote the Sabbath, at ALL cost http://www.reformation.org/oath.html

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