The Sabbath—For What Purpose Instituted

THE fourth commandment gives the reason for the institution of the Sabbath thus: "For in Six days the Lord made Heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it." Why was the Sabbath blessed and hallowed, or sanctified? The reason is here plainly given. There is no chance for mistaking the reason, except from choice.

But there are those who stoutly contend that the Sabbath of the decalogue was instituted to commemorate the deliverance of Israel from Egyptian bondage; and they quote the following text with much assurance in proof: "And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and a stretched out arm; therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day." Deut. 5:25. This text gives no reason why the Sabbath was blessed and hallowed; the other does. The fourth commandment tells why the Sabbath was instituted; this text only refers to a renewed obligation to keep the commandment of God, namely, their deliverance from servitude; and for this reason they were to allow their servants the same privilege. "That thy man-servant and thy maid-servant may rest as well as thou. And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt." Their deliverance from servitude did not originate the obligation to keep the Sabbath, but by it they were laid under renewed obligation to keep His commandments, who had set them free.

In Deut. 24:17, 18, we have a parallel case. "Thou shalt not pervert the judgment of the

stranger, nor of the fatherless; nor take a widow's raiment to pledge; but thou shalt remember that thou wast a bondman in Egypt, and the Lord thy God redeemed thee thence; therefore I command thee to do this thing." Did their redemption from Egypt originate their obligation to the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow? No sane man will claim this. But it might be claimed with as much propriety, as to claim that the obligation to keep the Sabbath originated thus. The one is as much a memorial of their deliverance from Egypt as the other. We know that the Sabbath had its origin at the creation. The fourth commandment points us back to that event; and we turn back to Gen. 2:2, 3, and we find the the seventh day was blessed and sanctified at the close of the first week of the world's history.