SECT. 17, 18.] OF THE ORIGINAL OF THE SABBATH. 313
Epunveberas ECOowdc, by an error common to many of the ancients, who could not distinguish between 3Y and Y2Y. It is also to this pur- pose observed by Rivet and Selden, from Salmasius, out of Georgius Syncellus, in his Chronology, that the patriarchs reckoned the times or distinguished them xaé’ i€douddas, by weeks only. This, there- fore, is to me no small evidence of the institution and observation of the Sabbath from the foundation of the world; for hence did this periodical revolution of time prevail amongst the nations, even those which had not the least converse with or knowledge of the Jews or their customs, after the command and observation of it was renewed amongst them. Not that this evidence is of itself a sufficient testi- mony unto its original institution, nor that going before, but that the piety of the patriarchs and traditions of the apostate Gentiles do confirm the time of that institution, which is-so expressly re- corded.
17. It remaineth that we take a view of the opinion advanced by many learned men in opposition unto what we have been pleading for ; and this is, that the command concerning the Sabbath was peculiar to the Jews alone, and that it was given unto them in the wilderness, and not at all before. Many of the Jews, as was declared, are of this judgment, and thence call the Sabbath the “bride of their nation,” that which God gave to them, as he did Eve to Adam, and to no other. Abulensis contends for this opinion in his comment on Exod. xvi.; who is followed by some expositors of the Roman church, and opposed by others, as Cornelius 4 Lapide, etc. The same difter- ence in judgment is found amongst the protestant divines. The dissertations of Rivet and Gomarus on this subject are well known. The controversy being of late renewed, especially among some of the Belgic divines, I shall take under consideration the arguments of one of them, who hath last of all defended this cause, and weigh of what importance they are, separating as much as we can between the matter of our present dispute, which is the original of the Sab- bath, and that of the causes of it, which we shall nextly inquire into.
18. The design is to prove that the Sabbath was first given to the Jews, and that in the wilderness. And to this purpose, after having repeated the words of the fourth commandment, he adds: “Quis vero dicere audebit, verba hec convenire nm hominem ab initio creationis, sicut hic statuitur?” (that is, by his adversary) “an illi incumbebat opus et quidem servile, idque per sex dies? an ipst erant servi et ancillz? an jumenta requictis indigentia? an peregrini inter portas ejus? quis non videt ad solum Israelitarum statum in toto illo praecepto respici? Ita Calvinus in Gen. ii. Postea in lege novum de Sabbato preceptum datum est, quod Judzis et quidem
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314 OF THE ORIGINAL OF THE SABBATH. [EXERC. II.
ad tempus peculiare foret; fuit enim legalis ceremonia, spiritualem quietem adumbrans, cujus in Christo apparuit veritas. Quo nihil efficacius dici poterat. Hance vero preecepti mentem esse patet ex aliis testimoniis Scripture apertissime, in quibus Judeis tantum datum esse Sabbatum constanter docetur: Exod, xvi. 29, ‘ Videte, quod Jehovah dedit vobis illud Sabbatum, idcirco dat vobis cibum bidui’” Et Ezech. xx. 12, ‘Sabbata dedi eis, ut essent signum inter me et ipsos, ad sciendum me Jehovam sanctificare ipsos.’ Denique Neh. ix. 14, ‘Sabbatum quoque sanctum notum fecisti eis; quum preecepta, statutaque, et leges, preeciperes eis per Mosem servum tuum.’ In quibus locis uniformiter docetur tanta cum emphasi, per Mosem Deum dedisse Judzis Sabbatum, non ergo aliis gentibus datum fuit ; aut ipsis etiam per majores ipsorum ante illud tempus ab origine mundi,” Disquisit. cap. u. p. 50.
Ans. (1.) It is by all confessed that the command of the Sabbath, in the renewal of it in the wilderness, was accommodated unto the pedagogical state of the church of the Israelites. There were also such additions made unto it, in the manner of tts observance and the sanction of zt, as might adapt its observation unto their civil and political estate, or that theocratical government which was then erected amongst them. So was it to bear a part in that ceremonial instruction which God in all his dealings with them intended. To this end also the manner of the delivery of the whole law and the preservation of its tables in the ark were designed. And divers ex- pressions in the explicatory parts of the decalogue have the same reason and foundation. For there is mention of fathers and children to the third and fourth generation, and of their sins, in the second commandment; of the land given to the people of God, in the fifth; of servants and handmaids, in the tenth. Shall we therefore say that the moral law was not before given unto mankind, because it had a peculiar delivery, for special ends and purposes, unto the Jews? It is no argument, therefore, that this command was not, for the substance of it, given before to mankind in general, because it hath some modifications added in the decalogue, to accommodate it to the present church and civil state of the Hebrews, as likewise had the fifth commandment in particular.