Objection 35
Noted astronomers have discovered that
our world is twenty-four hours behind the rest of the universe in point
of time. The Bible record of Joshua's long day—twenty-three hours and
twenty minutes—and of the turning back of the sun forty minutes in
Hezekiah's day, accounts for this twenty-four hours. Hence both Jews and
Seventh-day Adventists are wrong about the time of the Sabbath. Our
blessed Lord brought the Sabbath and the first day of the week together,
merging them into the glorious day on which He arose from the dead, the
day we celebrate as the Sabbath.
Briefly, the answer to this remarkable
objection is as follows:
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It proves
too much, which is the most fatal weakness of any piece of
reasoning. According to it the Sabbath and Sunday were merged long
before the resurrection. They were virtually merged at the time of
Joshua, with a forty-minute refinement at the time of Hezekiah. That
is all other way of saying that the Jews actually kept Sunday. And
if that be so, then certainly most Christians today are not keeping
either the Sabbath or Sunday, for they are keeping the day that
follows immediately after the day held sacred by Jews.
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Is it
reasonable to believe that God would answer the prayer of His
servant Joshua in such a manner as to confuse tile reckoning of time
so that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to give obedience
to the Sabbath law? Sundaykeepers today ring the changes on what
they describe as the legalistic quality of the Jewish dispensation,
declaring that everything was governed then by rigid law in contrast
to our present period of grace. And they never fail to remind us
that the Sabbath law was so exacting in those times that a man could
be put to death for breaking that law.
But now, behold, we are asked to conclude that Moses had scarcely
gone to his rest before the Lord worked a miracle through Joshua
that broke the cycle of time and certainly gave to the Sabbath an
elasticity that has never revealed itself in the Christian Era. At
least no one has ever claimed that the sun has been made to stand
still in the Christian age.
We read of Nehemiah's holy jealousy for God's day that led him to
close the gates of Jerusalem as it began to grow dark on the eve of
the Sabbath. What a fine opportunity that would have been for his
opponents to remind him that only a short while before, in the days
of Hezekiah, there was a difference of forty minutes in the arrival
of the Sabbath, and that therefore it was quite an elastic affair
anyway, and no one should be exercised about the matter. But we find
no record of anything like this occurring in the dispute between
Nehemiah and those who were breaking the Sahbath. We do find
references there and elsewhere throughout the Old Testament that
discuss the divine obligation of the Sabbath and the penalties that
would descend upon the disobedient. Neither Nehemiah nor any other
of the inspired writers were aware of shifting time. Their messages
all breathe the conviction that the Sabbath is a fixed day, the
reckoning of which can be easily computed, so definite indeed that
the guilty have no excuse, and should justly suffer dire punishment.
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The
closing verses of the twenty-third chapter of Luke and the opening
verse of the twenty-fourth chapter forever settle the question of
the relationship of a certain day to the Sabbath command. Christians
generally are in agreement that Christ was crucified on Friday, and
that He rose on Sunday. The day in between is described as "the
sabbath day according to the commandment." The language is
simple and explicit. Anyone who reads the Sabbath commandment and
wishes to free himself from all uncertainties of the logical
discussion has only to read this passage in Luke.
We need not be astronomers, we need not have a knowledge of all past
time, or be able to settle all the dark questions about chronology,
in order to be clear concerning the Sabbath commandment. Luke, who
along with the other Gospel writers gave us the inspired record of
the Saviour on which our Christian religion depends, informs us that
there is a certain day which is "the sabbath day according to
the commandment.'' It is the day following this that Sundaykeepers
revere. Luke knew nothing about a merging of days because of Joshua
and Hezekiah. The day that Christ lay in the grave is the sabbath
day according to the commandment," and the next day is
described simply as "the first day of the week."
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However,
someone may inquire at this point, "But what are you going to
do about the Bible record concerning Joshua and Hezekiah?" We
don't believe we need to do anything about the record. We are very
willing to let it stand, and we believe it. We insist only that all
the rest of the record in the Bible also be permitted to stand, such
as the references that have been cited. The Bible is always its own
best interpreter. If, despite amazing and baffling miracles, we
still find God's prophets commanding obedience to a definite holy
day, and Luke informing us that the seventh day of the week is the
Sabbath day according to the commandment, then we are in no darkness
whatever as to how to give explicit obedience to God's command. The
shadow on Hezekiah's sundial was never intended to cast a shadow on
the Sabbath, nor did God work a bright miracle to help an ancient
warrior in fighting the battles of the Lord so that modern warriors
might find weapons to aid them in their fight against God's Sabbath
command. What an irony if the additional light given on that
eventful day of battle long ago should throw darkness ever afterward
on the Sabbath, indeed, should give us neither a definitely defined
Sabbath day nor a clear-cut Sunday, but something that was forty
minutes from being either until Hezekiah's day.
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It is
always a favorite strategy in debate to claim that eminent
scientists are on your side. Perhaps some astronomer has worked out
certain cycles back through the millenniums that lead him to
conclude there is a difference of twenty-four hours in time between
our world and the rest of the universe. We say "perhaps,"
for we have never heard of such a discovery. But what of it? We do
not have to travel into interstellar space to find a difference in
reckoning. We can cross the Pacific and find a difference of
twenty-four hours. Yet no matter on what side of the Pacific a man
lives, there seems to be no difficulty in keeping the accurate
reckoning of time down through the centuries. In fact, Sundaykeepers
in Australia are just as certain that they are keeping the correct
first day of the week in cycles of seven from the resurrection day
as are those in the mother country, England. Indeed, in both
countries the certainty is so great that Sunday laws have been
enacted to enforce observance of the day. It is bad enough for
Sabbath opponents to attempt to lose the seventh-day Sabbath by
traveling around the world, though they never lose Sunday, but what
is to be said for the man who seeks to carry us into the uncharted
reaches of interstellar space in order to lose God's holy day?
However, we would say right here that for anyone to make a sweeping
claim as to the exact relationship in time of our solar system to
all the rest of the universe is to make a claim that cannot be
substantiated.
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Finally,
it should be remembered that the Bible way of reckoning days is from
sunset to sunset. Therefore, the lengthening out of the day in some
miraculous way in Joshua's time would not break the cycle of seven
in counting days according to Bible reckoning. After all, we are
dealing with a Bible institution and not with a question of
chronometers or stop watches or even astronomers. We need not
explore the mystery of the long day in Joshua's time in order to be
sure that we keep the correct time in relation to God's holy Sabbath
day.
For a
scientific, astronometric account of the "lost day," see
our page at this link. |
