Sabbath

šabbāṯ

What was instituted as the Sabbath (šabbāṯ, 7676) in the Mosaic Law continues to be a misunderstood concept in our day. Some well-meaning Christians, in fact, insist on worshipping on the Sabbath (Saturday) instead of the Lord’s Day (Sunday).

The root of šabbāt is the verb šaḇaṯ (7673), which means “to cease or rest.” It first occurs in Genesis 2:2, where God “rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.” That, of course, set the precedent that God desires His people to cease work (implying rest), but how they do so has not been the same in all ages.

Based on šaḇat in Genesis, some teachers conclude that the Sabbath day (šabbāt) is perpetual and the same in every age, but Scripture simply does not say that. Yes, šabbāt occurs in Genesis in reference to God, but not a single time to indicate a prescribed Sabbath day for man. There is, in fact, not even an implication that man was required to observe (or ever did observe) the Sabbath day until the Mosaic Law was given after Israel came out of Egypt (Exod. 16:23–29; 20:8–11). None of the patriarchs of Genesis, for example, is said to have observed the Sabbath.

Job is another crucial example. Several factors date the events of Job as occurring sometime after Babel but before, or perhaps contemporaneously, with Abraham. In other words, Job lived before the Mosaic Law was given. It is, therefore, significant, as one theologian puts it, that while “Job discloses the religious life and experiences of the patriarchs, and though their various responsibilities to God are therein discussed, there is never a reference to a Sabbath-day obligation.”81 In dramatic contrast, it is clearly and distinctly stated that the Sabbath was given to racial Israel through Moses (Exod. 16:29; 20:8–10; Neh. 9:13, 14; Ezek. 20:11–13). The remainder of the OT is permeated with references to the Sabbath, the word appearing some seventy-seven times (in the other four books of the Pentateuch, 2 Kings, 1 and 2 Chronicles, Nehemiah, Psalms, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Amos). So complete was such cessation from any labor to be (Exod. 20:10) that the people couldn’t even gather sticks for a fire (Num. 15:32–36) or light a fire in their homes (Exod. 35:3).

So, since God desires His people not to labor on the seventh day, does the Christian have “a day off” in this age?

Scriptures for Study: What else was the Sabbath for, according to Numbers 28:9, 10, Leviticus 23:3, and Deuteronomy 5:15?

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