Logos (continued) – Lord's Day

Logos (continued)

The contrast between the two writers is much more striking than the resemblance. The distinction is not due merely to the acceptance by the Christian writer of Jesus as the Word, but extends to the whole conception of God and His relation to the world which has made Christianity a new power among men. The Logos of Philo is metaphysical, that of John, religious. Philo moves entirely in the region of abstract thought, his idea of God is pure being; John's thought is concrete and active, moving in a region of life and history. Philo's Logos is intermediate, the instrument which God employs in fashioning the world; John's Logos is not subsidiary but is Himself God, and as such is not a mere instrument, but the prime Agent in creation. According to Philo the Deity is conceived as an architect who forms the world out of already existent matter. According to John the Logos is absolute Creator of all that is, the Source of all being, life and intelligence. In Philo the Logos hovers between personality and impersonality, and if it is sometimes personified it can hardly be said to have the value of an actual person; in John the personality of the Logos is affirmed from the first and it is of the very essence of his doctrine, the ground of His entire creative energy. The idea of an incarnation is alien to the thought of Philo and impossible in his scheme of the universe; the "Word that has become flesh" is the pivot and crown of Johannine teaching. Philo affirms the absolute incomprehensibility of God; but it is the prime object of the evangelist to declare that God is revealed in Christ and that the Logos is the unveiling through the flesh of man of the self-manifesting Deity. Notwithstanding the personal epithets employed by Philo, his Logos remains a pure abstraction or attribute of God, and it is never brought into relation with human history. John's Logos, on the other hand, is instinct with life and energy from the beginning, and it is the very heart of his Gospel to declare as the very center of life and history the great historical event of the incarnation which is to recreate the world and reunite God and man.

From whatever point of view we compare them, we find that Philo and John, while using the same language, give an entirely different value to it. The essential purport of the Johannine Logos is Jesus Christ. The adoption of the term involves its complete transformation. It is baptized with a new spirit and henceforth stands for a new conception. From whatsoever source it was originally derived--from Hebrew tradition or Hellenic speculation--on Christian soil it is a new product. It is neither Greek nor Jewish, it is Christian. The philosophical abstraction has become a religious conception. Hellenism and Hebrewism have been taken up and fused into a higher unity, and Christ as the embodiment of the Logos has become the creative power and the world-wide possession of mankind.

The most probable view is that Philo and John found the same term current in Jewish and Gentilecircles and used it to set forth their respective ideas; Philo, following his predilections for Greek philosophy, to give a Hellenic complexion to his theory of the relation of Divine Reason to the universe; John, true to ,his Hebrew instincts, seeing in the Logos the climax of that revelation of God to man of which the earlier Jewish theophanies were but partial expressions.

There is nothing improbable in the surmise that the teaching of Philo gave a fresh impulse to the study of the Logos as Divine Reason which was already shadowed forth in the Biblical doctrine of Wisdom (Westcott). Nor need we take offense that such an important idea should have come to the Biblical author from an extra-Biblical writer (compare Schmiedel, Johannine Writings), remembering only that the author of the Johannine Gospel was no mechanical borrower, but an entirely independent and original thinker who gave to the Logos and the ideas associated with it a wholly-new worth and interpretation. Thus, as has been said, the treasures of Greece were made contributory to the full unfolding of the Gospel.

V. Patristic Development.

The Johannine Logos became the fruitful source of much speculation in Gnostic circles and among the early Fathers regarding the nature of Christ. The positive truth presented by the Fourth Gospel was once more broken up, and the various elements of which it was the synthesis became the seeds of a number of partial and one-sided theories respecting the relation of the Father and the Son. The influence of Greek ideas, which had already begun in the Apostolic Age, became more pronounced and largely shaped the current of ante-Nicene theology (see Hatch, Hibbert Lectures).

Gnosticism in particular was an attempt to reconcile Christianity with philosophy; but in Gnostic systems the term "Logos" is only sparingly employed. According to Basilides the "Logos" was an emanation from the nous as personified Wisdom, which again was directly derived from the Father. Valentinus, in whose teaching Gnosticism culminated, taught that Wisdom was the last of a series of Eons which emanated from the Primal Being, and the Logos was an emanation of the first two principles which issued from God--Reason, Faith. Justin Martyr, the first of the sub-apostolic Fathers, sought to unite the Scriptural idea of the Logos as Word with the Hellenic idea of Reason. According to him God produced in His own nature a rational power which was His agent in creation and took the form in history of the Divine Man. Christ is the organ of all revelations, and as the logos spermatikos, He sows the seeds of virtue and truth among the heathen. All that is true and beautiful in the pagan world is to be traced to the activity of the Logos before His incarnation. Tatian and Theophilus taught essentially the same doctrine; though in Tatian there is a marked leaning toward Gnosticism, and consequently a tendency to separate the ideal from the historical Christ. Athenagoras, who ascribes to the Logos the creation of all things, regarding it in the double sense of the Reason of God and the creative energy of the world, has a firm grasp of the Biblical doctrine, which was still more clearly expressed by Irenaeus, who held that the Son was the essential Word, eternally begotten of the Father and at once the interpreter of God and the Creator of the world.

The Alexandrian school was shaped by the threefold influence of Plato, Philo and the Johannine Gospel. Clement of Alexandria views the Son as the Logos of the Father, the Fountain of all intelligence, the Revealer of the Divine Being and the Creator and Illuminator of mankind. He repudiates the idea of the inferiority of the Son, and regards the Logos not as the spoken but as the creative word. Origen seeks to reconcile the two ideas of the eternity and the subordination of the Logos, and is in this sense a mediator between the Arian and more orthodox parties and was appealed to by both. According to him the Son is equal in substance with the Father, but there is a difference in essence. While the Father is "the God" (ho theos) and "God Himself" (autotheos), the Logos is "a second God" (deuteros theos). In the Nicene Age, under the shaping influence of the powerful mind of Athanasius, and, to a lesser degree, of Basil and the two Gregories, the Logos-doctrine attained its final form in the triumphant statement of the Nicene Creed which declared the essential unity, but, at the same time, the personal distinction of the Father and Son. The Council of Nicea practically gathered up the divergent views of the past and established the teaching of the Fourth Gospel as the doctrine of the church.

LITERATURE.

(1) On Greek Logos:

Schleiermacher, Herakleitos der Dunkle; Histories of Philosophy, Zeller, Ueberweg, Hitter; Heinze, Die Lehre yore Logos in der Greek Phil. (1872); Aall, Gesch. d. Logosidee in d. Greek Phil. (1896).

(2) On Jewish Doctrine:

Oehler, O T Theol. (1873); Schurer, Lehrbuch d. New Testament Zeitgesch; Schultz, Old Testament Theol.

(3) On Alexandrian Doctrine:

Gfrorer, Philo u. die alex. Theosophie (1831); Dahne, Gesch. Darstell. der jud-alex. Religions-Philosophic (1843); Keferstein, Philos Lehre yon den gottlichen Mittelwesen (1846); Dorner, Entwicklungsgesch. der Lehre v. d. Person Christi; Siegfried, Philo v. Alex. (1875); Drummond, Philo Judaeus (1888); Reville, La doctrine du Logos; Huber, Die Philosophic der Kirchenvater; Grossmann, Questiones Philoneae (1841); Watson, Philos. Basis of Religion (1907).

(4) On Johannine Gospel:

Relative comma. of Meyer, Godet, Westcote, Luthardt, E. Scott (1907); Liddon, Divinity of our Lord ("Bampton Lectures," 1866); Watkins, Modern Criticism on the Fourth Gospel ("Bampton Lectures," 1890); Gloag, Introduction to Johannine Writing, (1891); Stevens, Johannine Theol. (1894); Drummond, Gospel of John; Bertling, Der Johan. Logos (1907); Schmiedel, The Johannine Writings (1908); Weizsacker, Apostolic Age, V, ii; Beyschlag and Weiss, Biblical Theol. of New Testament; Drummond, Via, Veritas, Vita (1894); Hatch, Greek Ideas and Usages, Their Influence upon the Christian Church (Hibbert Lectures, 1888).

(5) Patristic Period:

Harnack, Dogmen-Gesch.; Baur, Kirchen-Gesch.; Dorner, System d. chr. Glaubenslehre; Loofs, Leitfaden fur seine Vorlesungen uber Dogmengeschichte; Atzbergen, Die Logoslehre d. heiligen Athanasius (1880).

B.D. Alexander

Loins

loinz (chalats, Aramaic charats, mothen, kecel, yarekh; osphus): This variety of Hebrew synonyms seems to be used rather promiscuously for the loins, though there is no little difference in the secondary meanings of these words. They represent various modes of expressing the loins as the seat of strength and vigor (Job 40:16, Hebrew mothen, here used of Behemoth), the center of procreative power, the portion of the body which is girded about, and is considered as specially needful of covering, even under primitive conditions of life (Job 31:20), and where painful disease most effectually unfits a man for work and warfare.

Jacob receives the Divine promise that "kings shall come out of (his) loins" (chalats, Genesis 35:11), and we read of 66 souls "that came out of his loins" (yarekh) which went into Egypt (Genesis 46:26). The Epistle to the Hebrews speaks of the Levites as having come out of the loins of Abraham (Hebrews 7:5).

As the seat of strength (compare LEG; THIGH), the loins are girded with belts of leather (2 Kings 1:8; Matthew 3:4), or cloth, often beautifully embroidered (Exodus 28:39), or of costly material (Exodus 39:29; Jeremiah 13:1 f). Girded loins are a sign of readiness for service or endeavor (Exodus 12:11; 1 Kings 18:46; 2 Kings 4:29; Job 38:3; Proverbs 31:17; Luke 12:35; 1 Peter 1:13). Of God it is said that "he looseth the bond of kings, and bindeth their loins with a girdle," i.e. strengthens them (Job 12:18). On the loins the sword is worn (2 Samuel 20:8). It is a sign of mourning to gird the loins with sackcloth (1 Kings 20:32; Isaiah 32:11; Jeremiah 48:37; Amos 8:10; see also the First Papyrus of Elephantine, l. 20). A man whose strength is in his attachment to truth, in other words is faithful, is spoken of as having his loins girt about with truth (Ephesians 6:14). Thus, the Messiah is described: "Righteousness shall be the girdle of his waist, and faithfulness the girdle of his loins" (Isaiah 11:5). One of the most primitive modes of clothing consisted of a fleece tied around the loins (Job 31:20).

The condition of unfitness for service is described in that the loins (kecel) are filled with a burning (Psalms 38:7, the King James Version "loathsome disease"), or that "a sore burden" is laid upon the "loins" (mothen, Psalms 66:11). Thus the loins are made "continually to shake" (Psalms 69:23), "the joints of (the) loins" (charats) are loosed (Daniel 5:6), the "loins are filled with anguish" (Isaiah 21:3). It is very likely that originally a disabling lumbago or the painful affections of the gall or the bladder (calculus, etc.) are meant, but very soon the expression becomes merely metaphorical to express personal helplessness, especially that which can but rely upon assistance and help from God.

H. L. E. Luering

Lois

lo'-is (Lois (2 Timothy 1:5)): The grandmother of Timothy, and evidently the mother of Eunice, Timothy's mother. The family lived at Lystra (Acts 16:1). It was on the occasion of Paul's first missionary journey (Acts 14:1–28) that Eunice and Timothy were converted to Christ, and it was, in all likelihood, on the same occasion that Lois also became a Christian. Paul speaks of the unfeigned faith that there was in Timothy, and he adds that this faith dwelt at the first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice. This is the only passage where Lois is mentioned; but by comparing 2 Timothy 1:5 with 2 Timothy 3:15 (the King James Version), where Paul refers to Timothy's having "from a child known the holy scriptures," it would appear that Lois was associated with Eunice, both in a reverent faith in God and in the careful instruction in the Old Testament which was given to Timothy.

See EUNICE; TIMOTHY.

John Rutherfurd

Longevity

lon-jev'-i-ti: In the part of Genesis ascribed to the Priestly Code (P), the names and genealogies of the patriarchs are given (Genesis 5:1–32; Genesis 11:1–32). In the three versions which are our chief sources, Massoretic Text, Septuagint and Sam, the age-numbers given for these patriarchs are hopelessly at variance. It is in accord with what we find in the earliest legend of most races that in these chapters a great length of life is ascribed to these; thus Berosus attributes to the first 10 kings of Babylonia a span of 430,000 years, and Hesiod (Works and Days, 129) says that in the Silver Age childhood lasted 100 years, during which a boy was reared and grew up beside his mother. On the other hand the evidence of prehistoric archaeology shows that the rate of development of the individual in the early Stone Age differed very little from that of humanity at the present day. It is possible that, in the case of the Hebrew record, the names of certain pre-Abrahamic patriarchs were derived from an ancient tradition, and that in the desire to fill up the chronology of the period before the call of Abraham, these names were inserted and the time which was supposed to have elapsed was divided among them; on the basis of some such hypothesis as that which is said to have existed among the Jews, that the Messiah should come 4,000 years after Adam.

We know from the archaeological evidence that the antiquity of primitive man extends to a date very much farther back than 4,000 years. Indeed, we can prove that before 4000 BC there were settled nationalities both in the valley of the Nile and that of the Euphrates, and that among these the duration of individual life was much the same as at the present day. The first three dynasties in Egypt, starting at or about 4400 BC, consisted of 25 consecutive kings, the average length of whose several reigns was about 30 years. The biographic sketches of Biblical persons other than those in Genesis showed that their longevity did not exceed that of our contemporaries. Eli was blind and feeble at 98. At 70 David was bedridden and frail. Manasseh, the king of Judah whose reign was longest, died at 67; Uzziah died at 68. The statement in Psalms 90:10 attributed to Moses is a correct estimate of what has been the expectation of life at all time.

At the present day among Palestinian fellahin very old men are uncommon. I have never seen anyone among them who could prove that he was 80 years of age; the rate of infant mortality is appallingly high. Maturity is earlier, and signs of senility appear among them sooner than among the same class in Great Britain.

Alexander Macalister

Longsuffering

long-suf'-er-ing ('erekh 'appayim; makrothumia): The words 'erekh 'appayim, translated longsuffering, mean literally, "long of nose" (or "breathing"), and, as anger was indicated by rapid, violent breathing through the nostrils, "long of anger," or "slow to wrath." The adjective is applied to God (Exodus 34:6 the King James Version, in the name of Yahweh as proclaimed to Moses; Nu 14:18 the King James Version; Ps 86:15 the King James Version; the Revised Version (British and American) "slow to anger," which is also the translation in other places; the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American) Nehemiah 9:17; Psalms 103:8; Psalms 145:8; Proverbs 15:18; Proverbs 16:32; Joel 2:13; Jonah 4:2; Nahum 1:3); it is associated with "great kindness" and "plenteous in mercy." The substantive occurs in Jeremiah 15:15: "Take me not away in thy longsuffering." In Ecclesiastes 7:8, we have 'erekh ruach, the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American) "patient in spirit."

The word in the New Testament rendered "longsuffering," makrothumia (once makrothumeo, "to be longsuffering"), which is the rendering of 'erekh 'appayim in the Septuagint, is literally, "long of mind or soul" (regarded as the seat of the emotions), opposed to shortness of mind or soul, irascibility, impatience, intolerance. It is attributed to God (Romans 2:4; Romans 9:22; 2 Peter 3:9), of His bearing long with sinners and slowness to execute judgment on them. It is, therefore, one of "the fruits of the Spirit" in man (Galatians 5:22) which Christians are frequently exhorted to cherish and show one toward the other (Ephesians 4:2; Colossians 1:11; Colossians 3:12, etc.); it belongs, Paul says, to the love, without which all else is nothing: "Love suffereth long (makrothumei), and is kind" (1 Corinthians 13:4); The verb makrothumeo is sometimes translated by "patience" (Matthew 18:26,Matthew 18:29, "Have patience with me"). Luke 18:7 has been variously rendered; the King James Version has "And shall not God avenge his own elect .... though he bear long with them"; the Revised Version (British and American) "and yet he is longsuffering over them," the American Revised Version margin "and is he slow to punish on their behalf?" Weymouth (New Testament in Modern Speech) has "although he seems slow in taking action on their behalf," which most probably gives the sense of the passage; in James 5:7,James 5:8 the verb occurs thrice, the King James Version "be patient," "hath long patience"; the Revised Version (British and American) also translates by "patient"; this, however, as in Matthew 18:26,Matthew 18:29, seems to lose the full force of the Greek word. According to Trench (Synonyms of the New Testament, 189), the difference between hupomone ("patience") and makrothumia is that the latter word expresses patience in respect to persons, and the former in respect to things; hence, hupomone is never ascribed to God; where He is called "the God of patience," it is as He gives it to His servants and saints. But in James 5:7 it is used with reference to things, and in Colossians 1:11 it is associated with patience (compare Hebrews 6:12,Hebrews 6:15), suggesting patient endurance of trials and sufferings. In Colossians 1:11 it is also associated with "joy," indicating that it is not a mere submissiveness, but a joyful acceptance of the will of God, whatever it may be. In The Wisdom of Solomon 15:1; Ecclesiasticus 5:4, we have "longsuffering" (makrothumos) ascribed to God; also in Ecclesiasticus 2:11, the Revised Version (British and American) "mercy."

W. L. Walker

Look

look:

(1) The uses of the simple verb in English Versions of the Bible are nearly all good modern English. In Isaiah 5:2, however, "He looked that it should bring forth grapes"--"look" is used in the sense of "expect." Compare the King James Version of Sirach 20:14; Acts 28:6, "They looked when he should have swollen" (the Revised Version (British and American) "They expected that he would have swollen"). In 1 Macc 4:54, the King James Version has inserted "look" (omitted in the Revised Version (British and American)) as a simple interjection, without a corresponding word in the Greek

(2) "Look upon" means "fix one's attention on," and is often so used in English Versions of the Bible without further significance (Ecclesiastes 2:11; Luke 22:56, etc.); but in 2 Chronicles 24:22 the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American), "Yahweh look upon it" means "remember." However, continual attention given to an object usually denotes that pleasure is found in it, and from this fact such uses as those of Proverbs 23:31, "Look not thou upon the wine when it is red," are derived. In particular, God's "looking upon" a person becomes a synonym for "showing favor unto," as in Deuteronomy 26:7 the King James Version; Psalms 84:9 the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American); Psalms 119:132 the King James Version; Luke 1:48 the Revised Version (British and American) only, etc. (the Revised Version (British and American) usually, re-words, in such passages). On the other hand, "look on" may be weakened, as in such phrases as "fair to look unon" (Genesis 12:11 etc.), where it means only "fair to the sight." Or as in modern English, "look on" may describe the attitude of the passive spectator, even when applied to God. So Psalms 35:17, "Lord, how long wilt thou look on?"

(3) "Look to" usually means "pay attention to," as in Proverbs 14:15; Jeremiah 39:12; 2 John 1:8, etc., and the Revised Version (British and American) occasionally uses this phrase in place of AV's "look upon" (Philippians 2:4). The reverse change is made in the King James Version's 1 Samuel 16:12, "goodly to look to"; Ezekiel 23:15, "all of them princes to look to," but in the latter verse a more drastic revision was needed, for the meaning is "all of them in appearance as princes." "Look out" may mean "search for" (Genesis 41:33; Acts 6:3), but may also be used literally, (Genesis 26:8, etc.). The King James Version's "looking after those things" in Luke 21:26 has been changed by the Revised Version (British and American) into "expectation of the things." "Look one another in the face" in 2 Kings 14:8,2 Kings 14:11 means "meet in battle."

Burton Scott Easton

Looking-Glass

look'-ing-glas (Exodus 38:8 the King James Version margin "brasen glasses").

See GLASS; MIRROR.

Loom

loom.

See WEAVING.

Loop

loop (in plural lula'oth (Exodus 26:4,Exodus 26:10; Exodus 36:11,Exodus 36:17)): A ring or fold made of blue thread to fasten into the corresponding golden clasps, or taches upon the curtains of the tabernacle, joining them in sets, or pairs.

See TABERNACLE.

Lord Of Hosts

A name or title of God frequently used in the Old Testament, always translated "Yahweh of Hosts" (Yahweh tsebha'oth) in the American Standard Revised Version, since Yahweh, never 'Adhonay, is used in this phrase. Evidently the meaning of the title is that all created agencies and forces are under the leadership or dominion of Yahweh, who made and maintains them (Genesis 2:1; Isaiah 45:12). It is used to express Yahweh's great power.

See GOD, NAMES OF, III, 8.

Lord's Day

(he kuriake hemera):

1. Linguistic:

Formerly it was supposed that the adjective kuriakos (translated "the Lord's") was a purely Christian word, but recent discoveries have proved that it was in fairly common use in the Roman Empire before Christian influence had been felt. In secular use it signified "imperial," "belonging to the lord"--the emperor--and so its adoption by Christianity in the sense "belonging to the Lord"--to Christ--was perfectly easy. Indeed, there is reason to suppose that in the days of Domitian, when the issue had been sharply defined as "Who is Lord? Caesar or Christ?" the use of the adjective by the church was a part of the protest against Caesar-worship (see LORD). And it is even possible that the full phrase, "the Lord's day," was coined as a contrast to the phrase, "the Augustean day" he sebaste hemera), a term that seems to have been used in some parts of the Empire to denote days especially dedicated in honor of Caesar-worship.

2. Post-Apostolic:

"Lord's day" in the New Testament occurs only in Revelation 1:10, but in the post-apostolic literature we have the following references: Ignatius, Ad Mag., ix.1, "No longer keeping the Sabbath but living according to the Lord's day, on which also our Light arose"; Ev. Pet., verse 35, "The Lord's day began to dawn" (compare Matthew 28:1); verse 50, "early on the Lord's day" (compare Luke 24:1); Barn 15 9, "We keep the eighth day with gladness," on which Jesus arose from the dead." I.e. Sunday, as the day of Christ's resurrection, was kept as a Christian feast and called "the Lord's day," a title fixed so definitely as to be introduced by the author of Ev. Pet. into phrases from the canonical Gospels. Its appropriateness in Revelation 1:10 is obvious, as John received his vision of the exalted Lord when all Christians had their minds directed toward His entrance into glory through the resurrection.

3. In the New Testament:

This "first day of the week" appears again in Acts 20:7 as the day on which the worship of the "breaking of bread" took place, and the impression given by the context is that Paul and his companions prolonged their visit to Troas so as to join in the service. Again, 1 Corinthians 16:2 contains the command, "Upon the first day of the week let each one of you lay by him in store," where the force of the form of the imperative used (the present for repeated action) would be better represented in English by "lay by on the successive Sundays." Worship is here not explicitly mentioned (the Greek of "by him" is the usual phrase for "at home"), but that the appropriateness of the day for Christian acts involves an appropriateness for Christian worship is not to be doubted. Indeed, since the seven-day week was unknown to Greek thought, some regular observance of a hebdomadal cycle must have been settled at Corinth before Paul could write his command. Finally, the phrase, "first day in the week" is found elsewhere in the New Testament only in Matthew 28:1; Mark 16:2; Luke 24:1; John 20:1,John 20:19. The word in all passages for "first" is poor Greek (mia, "one," for prote, a Hebraism), and the coincidence of the form of the phrase in Acts 20:7 and 1 Corinthians 16:2 with the form used by all four evangelists for the Resurrection Day 'is certainly not accidental; it was the fixed Christian base, just as "Lord's day" was to the writer of Ev. Pet.

4. Origin:

The hebdomadal observance of Sunday points back of Corinth to Jewish-Christian soil, but it is impossible to say when the custom first began. Not, apparently, in the earliest days, for Acts 2:46 represents the special worship as daily. But this could not have continued very long, for waning of the first enthusiasm, necessity of pursuing ordinary avocations, and increasing numbers of converts must soon have made general daily gatherings impracticable. A choice of a special day must have become necessary, and this day would, of course, have been Sunday. Doubtless, however, certain individuals and communities continued the daily gatherings to a much later date, and the appearance of Sunday as the one distinctive day for worship was almost certainly gradual.

5. Sunday and the Sabbath:

Sunday, however, was sharply distinguished from the Sabbath. One was the day on which worship was offered in a specifically Christian form, the other was a day of ritual rest to be observed by all who were subject? the Law of Moses through circumcision (Galatians 5:3; compare Acts 21:20). Uncircumcised Gentiles, however, were free from any obligation of Sabbath observance, and it is quite certain that in apostolic times no renewal of any Sabbath rules or transfer of them to Sunday was made for Gentileconverts. No observance of a particular "day of rest" is contained among the "necessary things" of Acts 15:28,Acts 15:29, nor is any such precept found among all the varied moral directions given in the whole epistolary literature. Quite on the contrary, the observance of a given day as a matter of Divine obligation is denounced by Paul as a forsaking of Christ (Galatians 4:10), and Sabbath-keeping is condemned explicitly in Colossians 2:16. As a matter of individual devotion, to be sure, a man might do as he pleased (Romans 14:5,Romans 14:6), but no general rule as necessary for salvation could be compatible with the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. Evidently, then, the fact that the Christian worship was held on Sunday did not sanctify Sunday any more than (say) a regular Wednesday service among us sanctifies Wednesday, noting especially that the apostolic service was held in the evening. For it was felt that Christian enthusiasm would raise every day to the highest religious plane, the decay of that enthusiasm through the long delay of the Parousia not being contemplated.

6. Later History:

The delay occurred, however, and for human beings in the ordinary routine of life there are necessary, not only set periods of worship, but set periods of relaxation from routine to make worship profitable. And the Christian fundamental doctrine of mercy demands that Christianity, where she has the power, shall give to men relief from the drain of continuous toil.

The formulation of general rules to carry these principles into effect, however, belongs to a period outside New Testament times, and so does not come within the scope of this Encyclopedia. It is enough to say that the ecclesiastical rules for Sunday were felt to be quite distinct from the laws for Sabbath observance, and that Alcuin (733?-804) is the first to hold that the church had transferred the Sabbath rules as a whole to Sunday. This principle is still maintained in Roman Catholic theology, but at the Reformation was rejected uncompromisingly by both Lutherans (Augsb. Conf., II, 7) and Calvinists (Helvet. Conf., XXIV, 1-2) in favor of a literally apostolic freedom (Calvin even proposed to adopt Thursday in place of Sunday). The appearance of the opposite extreme of a genuinely "legalistic" Sabbatarianism in the thoroughly Evangelical Scotch and English Puritanism is an anomaly that is explained by reaction from the extreme laxity of the surroundings.

7. Practical:

Sunday was fixed as the day for Christian worship by general apostolic practice, and the academic possibility of an alteration hardly seems worth discussing. If a literal apostolicity is to be insisted upon, however, the "breaking of bread" must be made part of the Sunday service. Rest from labor for the sake of worship, public and private, is intensely desirable, since the regaining of the general apostolic enthusiasm seems unattainable, but the New Testament leaves us quite free as to details. Rest from labor to secure physical and mental renewal rests on a still different basis, and the working out of details involves a knowledge of sociological and industrial conditions, as well as a knowledge of religious principles. It is the task of the pastor to combine the various principles and to apply them to the particular conditions of his people in their locality, in accordance with the rules that his own church has indubitably the right to lay down--very special attention being given, however, to the highly important matter of the peculiar problem offered by children. In all cases the general principles underlying the rules should be made clear, so that they will not appear as arbitrary legalism, and it is probably best not to use the term "Sabbath" for Sunday. Under certain conditions great freedom may be desirable, and such is certainly not inconsistent with our liberty in Christ. But experience, and not least of all the experience of the first churches of the Reformation, has abundantly shown that much general laxness in Sunday rules invariably results disastrously.

See further, ETHICS OF JESUS, I, 3, (1).

LITERATURE. For the linguistic matters, Deissmann, Light from the Ancient East, 1910, 361-66. Hessey's Sunday (ed 1880) ("Bampton Lectures," 1860) contains a good summary of the history of the problems. Zockler's "Sonntagsfeier," PRE, edition 3, XVIII, 1906, 521-29 is the best general survey. In Sch-Herz this article ("Sunday") is harmed by abbreviation, but an exhaustive bibliography is added.

Burton Scott Easton