Il ruolo dell'ontologia nell'abbandono del sabato da parte dei Padri della Chiesa.docx

8/13/2019 Il ruolo dell'ontologia nell'abbandono del sabato da parte dei Padri della Chiesa.docx

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Andrews University

Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary

THE ROLE OF ONTOLOGY IN THE ABANDONMENT OF THE SABBATH IN THE

WRITINGS OF THE CHURCH FATHERS

A Research Paper

Presented for Consideration by

The Adventist Theological Society

By

Karl Tsatalbasidis

February 1, 2011


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TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS... ...................................................................................................... ii

Chapter

I. INTRODUCTION ...............................................................................................................1

Background to the Problem... ........................................................................................1

Problem. .........................................................................................................................3

Purpose. ..........................................................................................................................3

Methodology. .................................................................................................................4

II. THE ROLE OF ONTOLOGY .............................................................................................5

The Influence of Hellenism... ........................................................................................5

Parmenides... ............................................................................................................5

Plato. ........................................................................................................................6

III. CHURCH FATHERS, THE SABBATH AND GREEK PHILOSOPHY... ........................9

Introduction. ...................................................................................................................9

Tertullian. .................................................................................................................9Barnabas. ................................................................................................................14

Clement of Alexandria... ........................................................................................16Augustine. ..............................................................................................................19

Summary ......................................................................................................................21

IV. CONCLUSION. .................................................................................................................23

BIBLIOGRAPHY ..........................................................................................................................26


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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

ANF The Ante-Nicene Fathers

NPNF Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series

SDABC Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary


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CHAPTER ONE

Introduction

Background to the Problem

As the memorial of creation, the Sabbath helps us to safeguard the distinction

between God and the creation. Also as the culmination of the week of creation in Gen 1,

the Seventh-day Sabbath is inextricably linked with time.1 A phenomenological reading

of the Hebrew Scriptures, which by definition brackets out the influence of other

philosophical systems in general and of Greek philosophy in particular, indicates that

temporality is the ground from which God and His relationship between the cosmos and

humanity are understood. Yet according to Greek philosophy eternity, which is timeless,

is considered the ground. Unlike the day, the month or the year, which are based on the

observation of the earth, the moon and the sun, the weekly cycle, and by implication the

Sabbath, finds its origin in Scripture.2

On the whole, scholarship does not contest the origin, validity and observance of

the Sabbath throughout the time period when the Hebrew Scriptures were written.

However, when it comes to the New Testament the validity of the Sabbath as a day of

1See SDABC 1:51 A careful study of the Hebrew manuscripts reveals that in everyinstance in whichyom[day] is accompanied by a definite number used as an adjective, a day

of 24 hours is indicated.

2Sigve K. Tonstad, The Lost Meaning of the Seventh Day (Berrien Springs, MI:Andrews University Press, 2009), 26-27.


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worship is greatly contested since many scholars believe that the shift from Sabbath to

Sunday occurred on account of the teachings of Christ and His disciples.3

There are several reasons given for the shift from Sabbath to Sunday, embracing

anti-Jewish sentiment, theological, and biblical rationales as causes for the shift. In

addition, there is also debate about when the shift took place. In light of this, church

fathers such as Tertullian, Barnabas, Clement of Alexandria and Augustine all speak of

the Sabbath, yet as a building that is no longer connected to its foundation, their writings

reveal that the Sabbath has been wrenched from its connection with the seventh day.

While previous studies have focused on anti-Jewish sentiment and sun worship as

causes for the shift to Sunday,4comparatively little has been done to explore the impact

of Greek metaphysics on the shift from Sabbath to Sunday.5 In addition, there has not

been a comparative analysis between the Greek metaphysical framework, including its

impact on hermeneutics, and the writings of the aforementioned church fathers so that a

determination can be made as to the influence of Greek metaphysics on their conclusions

3Samuele Bacchiocchi,From Sabbath to Sunday: A Historical Investigation of the

Rise of Sunday Observance in Early Christianity(Rome: Pontifical Gregorian UniversityPress, 1977), 74, 91, 102; F.F. Bruce, Commentary on the Book of Acts (Grand Rapids, MI:Eerdman's, 1954), 407-408; Oscar Cullmann, Early Christian Worship(London: SCM Press,

1953), 10, 88; Jean Danilou, The Bible and Liturgy(South Bend, IN: University of NotreDame Press, 1956), 243; Paul K. Jewett, The Lord's Day; a Theological Guide to the

Christian Day of Worship(Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdman's, 1971), 57; Archibald Robertsonand Alfred Plummer,A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the First Epistle of St. Paul

to the Corinthians(Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1911), 384; Anthony C. Thiselton, The First

Epistle to the Corinthians : A Commentary on the Greek Text(Grand Rapids, MI:Eerdman's, 2000), 1321.

4Bacchiocchi, 213-269.

5Fernando Canale,Basic Elements of Christian Theology: Scripture Replacing

Tradition(Berrien Springs, MI: Andrews University Lithotech, 2005), 50; Tonstad, 315-328. These two authors are an exception, yet neither provides a comparative analysis

between Greek metaphysics and the church fathers .


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about the Sabbath.

Problem

According to some scholars, the change from Sabbath to Sunday came as a result

of i) the teachings of Jesus and the apostles, ii) anti-Jewish sentiment, and iii) sun

worship. Moreover it may be assumed that the church fathers mentioned earlier simply

built their understanding of the Sabbath, how it should be observed and its relationship to

Sunday upon the foundation already laid down by Christ and His apostles and upon anti-

Jewish sentiment.

However the following statements from the church fathers, which will be studied

in greater detail later, seem to point to Greek metaphysics as the motivation for the shift.

For instance, according to Tertullian, the Seventh-day is temporary and human and is

referred to in the Scriptures as your Sabbaths whereas the eternal Sabbath is referred to

as My Sabbaths. Tertullian also stated that Jesus kept the Sabbath on the one hand

while on the other hand he abolished it. Furthermore, Augustine concluded that creation

did not take place in six literal days but rather it took place instantaneously.

Hence, in light of some the church fathers statements, was the theological

motivation for how they viewed the Sabbath and its relationship to Sunday based upon

the teachings of Christ and His apostles, anti-Jewish sentiment and sun worship or upon

Greek metaphysics?

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to analyze how the Greek philosophical view of

ontology affected the early churchs understanding of the Sabbath commandment.


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Methodology

The second chapter will begin by looking at ontology and how Greek

philosophers from Parmenides to Plato have interpreted it. After defining and

interpreting ontology, it will also be important to see how ontology is related to

cosmology since the Sabbath itself is inextricably linked to time.

The third chapter will examine certain statements by Tertullian, Barnabas,

Clement of Alexandria, and Augustine in light of the Greek metaphysical framework in

order to examine the extent to which these church fathers were theologically motivated

by Greek thought.

The fourth and final chapter will provide the conclusion to the study.


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CHAPTER TWO

The Role of Ontology

The Influence of Hellenism

Hellenism had already posed a formidable philosophical challenge around the

time when Christianity came into existence. Greek concepts constituted the air which

people breathed and the ground upon which they walked. They also formed the

conceptual framework in which they did their thinking.6 The most influential

philosopher who made the greatest impact on early Christianity was Plato. John Dillon

outlines how his two-tiered cosmology was not only preserved and modified, but also

how leading Christian theologians appropriated it.7

Parmenides

Notwithstanding, Plato had assumed and built upon a very powerful idea that

began with the Milesian philosopher Parmenides. It was Parmenides who first began to

clearly articulate about ontology, which is concerned with the proper understanding of

reality. Parmenides (540-470 B.C.) seems to be the first philosopher to examine the

6Tonstad, 316.

7John M. Dillon, The Middle Platonists 80 B.C. To A.D. 220, Rev ed. (Ithaca, NY:Cornell University Press, 1996).


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nature of being.8Parmenides begins with what he takes to be a self-evident truth: IT IS.

This is not an empirical claimnot one derived from observationrather it is a truth of

Reason. It cannot be denied without self-contradiction. If you say, IT IS NOT (i.e.,

nothing exists), then youve proved that IT IS; for if nothing exists, its not nothing,

rather it is something.9

Being or reality has been interpreted by Parmenides as timelessness. However,

although the word timelessness does not seem to appear in Parmenides writings, there

is evidence that ultimate being is timeless.10

In philosophical and theological discussion

the idea of timelessness takes on a technical meaning: it is the conception that reality in

general and God in particular are essentially and necessarily voided of, and incompatible

with, time and space. Consequently, a timeless conception of reality necessarily

eliminates from the realm of genuine reality anything that may be considered as historical

or analogical to what we call history.11

Plato

Parmenides idea of being had a profound effect on both Plato and Aristotle who

built their systems on that concept. As a matter of fact, Platos two-world theory is a

development of Parmenides idea of being. Plato decided that reality as a whole is made

up of two tiers or worlds, one heavenly and the other earthly. Realities in the heavenly

8

Norman R. Gulley, Systematic Theology: Prolegomena(Berrien Springs, MI:Andrews University Press, 2003), 4.

9Donald Palmer,Looking at Philosophy, 2nd ed. (Mountain View, CA: MayfieldPublishing Company, 1994), 25.

10Gulley, 4.

11Fernando Canale,Back to Revelation - Inspiration(New York: University Press ofAmerica, 2001), 37.


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world are uncreated, and therefore timeless and eternal, whereas realities in the earthly

world are created, and are therefore temporal and transient. The relationship between the

heavenly and earthly tiers is one of duplication.12

In other words, things in the earthly

tier are merely a duplication of what exists in the heavenly timeless tier. Everything

within the earthly tier is limited, transitory, subject to decay, evil and sinful where as the

heavenly tier is eternal, timeless, pure and good.

Platos influence has been so enormous that the eminent British-American

philosopher Alfred North Whitehead once said that the history of philosophy is merely a

series of footnotes to Plato.

13

As we shall see this influence shaped Judaism as well as

Christianity.

Through a process that took several centuries, Platos two-worlds theory came to

shape how Christian theology understood nature and supernature. The two-worlds

interpretation influenced not only Christianity, but also Judaism. Jewish theologian Philo

of Alexandria adopted this view and used it as a hermeneutical tool to interpret the Old

Testament and to develop his own teachings. By the time of Augustine, Christian

theology had claimed for itself the basic outline of Platos cosmology.14

At this point, it should be noted that the acceptance of these theories formulates

an overall system which then sets the groundwork for reinterpreting everything else

including the Sabbath. Since the Sabbath is associated with time, which is viewed as part

of the earthly tier, it can no longer be the ground upon which worship is based since the

12Fernando Canale, The Cognitive Principle of Christian Theology (Berrien Springs,

MI: Andrews University Lithotech, 2005), 91.

13Palmer, 67.

14Canale, The Cognitive Principle of Christian Theology, 92.


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earthly tier is grounded in, and duplicates the heavenly tier. Also, since time and

timelessness cannot co-exist in the heavenly tier and since the earthly duplicates the

heavenly eternal timeless tier, the end result is that the Sabbath has been replaced as the

ground for worshipby Platos two-worlds theory.

According to Tonstad, this Platonic framework is so far reaching that it becomes

part of the fabric of Christianity to the extent that not until the twentieth century, if then,

would theologians appreciate the Churchs accommodation of Platonism as an

irreconcilable difference.15

Furthermore, with respect to the Sabbath, Hellenism does

not only represent a challenge but also, at least in the non-Jewish context, an

irreconcilable difference.16

This framework forms the basic understanding of some of the statements of the

church fathers regarding the Sabbath, its validity, its observance and the justification for

Sunday. A comprehensive overview of the church fathers would go well beyond the

scope of this paper; hence this study will look at some of their statements with this Greek

philosophical framework in mind.

15Tonstad, 322.

16Ibid., 316.


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CHAPTER THREE

Church Fathers, the Sabbath and Greek Philosophy

Introduction

The Sabbath has always been the ground upon which worship is based because it

helps to keep in mind the great distinction between the Creator and the creation. Within

such a system there is no qualitative difference between eternity and time. However, the

interpretation of ontology as timeless poses a very serious threat to the grounding role of

the Sabbath precisely because of the unbridgeable chasm between eternity and time. In

this Platonic system time is the reduplication of eternity, and the result is that the Sabbath

loses its grounding role.

Before analyzing the specific statements of the church fathers mentioned above,

an examination of their attitude toward philosophy will prove helpful in ascertaining how

far reaching the effects of Greek philosophy proved to be, even to those who rejected it

for use in apologetics.

Tertullian

The church fathers in this study do not always share the same attitude about the

relationship between philosophy and theology. Tertullian (145-220) was a brilliant


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lawyer who along with Augustine had a great influence on the Latin Church.17

Tertullian

was actually appalled at the extent to which some of his contemporaries were using

Greek philosophies such as Platonism and Stoicism to explain Christian ideas to pagan

audiences.18

In hisPrescription Against Heretics, he rhetorically asks, What indeed

has Athens to do with Jerusalem? What concord is there between the Academy and the

Church?19

Nevertheless, in spite of his negative attitude about the use of Greek concepts in

apologetics, he ends up assuming them in his description of the Trinity against Praxeas,

which proved to be one of his most important theological contributions.

20

In his

discussion about the Sabbath, Tertullian distinguishes between the seventh-day Sabbath,

which he interprets as temporal and the eternal Sabbath, which is interpreted as divine.

The Sabbath issue and its relation to Greek philosophy can easily be seen in Tertullians

distinction between the eternal versus the temporal Sabbath. He states,

We (Christians) understand that westill more ought to observe a Sabbath from all

servile work always, and not only every seventh day, but through all time. Andthrough this arises the question for us, whatSabbath God willed us to keep? For the

Scriptures point to a Sabbath eternal and a Sabbath temporal. For Isaiah the prophet

says, YourSabbaths my soul hateth; andin another place he says, MySabbaths ye

17ANF 3:3

18Roger E. Olson, The Story of Christian Theology: Twenty Centuries of Traditionand Reform(Downer's Grove, IL: Inter Varsity Press Academic, 1999), 54.

19

ANF 3:26920ANF 3:633-634; Olson, 95. Olson states, After all his fussing against

philosophical speculation in theology, Tertullian ended up assuming a very Greekphilosophical notion of divine beingvery much like Clement of Alexandrias! In fact,their basic concepts of Gods nature as simple, immutable and impassible are strikingly

similar and derived more from Greek culture and philosophical theology than from Hebrewor apostolic teachings about God. [Thus] some of Tertullians assumptions and argumentsseem to have been based more on Greek philosophy than on divine revelation. P g 97-98


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have profaned.21

Whence we discern that the temporal Sabbath is human, and the

eternal Sabbath is accounted divine. Thus, therefore, before this temporal Sabbath,

there was withal an eternal Sabbath foreshown and foretold; just as before the carnalcircumcision there was withal a spiritual circumcision foreshown. Manifest

accordingly it is, that the precept was not eternal nor spiritual, but temporary,22

which

would one day cease. Whence it is manifest that the force of such precepts wastemporary, and respected the necessity of present circumstances; and that it was not

with a view to its observance in perpetuity that God formerly gave them such a law.23

When viewed under the influence of Platos two-worlds theory there is a

difference between the eternal and the temporal in Tertullians observation about the

Sabbath. Platoused the word aion[eternity] in the technical philosophical sense of

timelessness.24

Thus the divine Sabbath, referred to as my Sabbaths is regarded as

eternal and spiritual which is interpreted in a timeless sense while the seventh-day

Sabbath under the same philosophical system is viewed as i) temporal, because it would

one day cease and was not perpetual and ii) as belonging to the Jews because its your

Sabbaths.

This philosophical system blinded Tertullian from distinguishing between the

perpetuity of the seventh-day Sabbath and the ceremonial Sabbaths in Lev 23:37-38 as

the basis for the Scriptures that spoke of my Sabbaths and your Sabbaths. The same

system also leads Tertullian to justify his division between the human and divine Sabbath

by looking to circumcision which according to even the Old Testament Scriptures pointed

forward to a spiritual circumcision of the heart (Deut 30:6) that would fulfilled by the

death of Christ on the cross (Col 2:11). While this works for circumcision, there is no

21This is not said by Isaiah; it is found in substance in Ezek 22:8

22Or, temporal.

23ANF 3:155, 156

24Canale,Basic Elements of Christian Theology: Scripture Replacing Tradition, 58.


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place that one can point to in the Bible to justify the kind of distinction between the

eternal and temporal Sabbath that Tertullian has referred to under the influence of Greek

philosophy. The Sabbath that God instituted at creation, which is kept today, and the

Sabbaths that will be kept in eternity assume the biblical notion of time and not the Greek

notion of timelessness. The acceptance Platos system always leads to an ontological

separation between the heavenly and the earthly, and between eternity and time. This

presuppositional structure is what is revealed in Tertullians sharp distinction between the

eternal and the temporal Sabbath.

Under this same system, the impact on the ethical aspects of Sabbath keeping is

clear. The human seventh-day Sabbath need not be kept according to a day because its

temporary. Thus, the necessity of present circumstances is a determining factor regarding

how one keeps the human Sabbath.

Perhaps Platos two-worlds theory may also explain why Tertullian on the one

hand states that Jesus did not rescind the Sabbath but rather kept it while on the other

hand he states that God did destroy the very institution He set up. He says, thus Christ

did not at all rescind the Sabbath: He kept the law thereof, and both in the former case did

a work which was beneficial to the life of His disciples, for He indulged them with the

relief of food when they were hungry, and in the present instance cured the withered

hand; in each case intimating by facts, I came not to destroy, the law, but to fulfill it.25

This seems clear, but the same man also said this:

Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years the Sabbaths, I suppose,

and the preparations,and the fasts, and the high days.For the cessation of even these,25ANF 3:363-364


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no less than of circumcision, was appointed by the Creators decrees, who had said by

Isaiah, Your new moons, and your Sabbaths, and your high days I cannot bear; your

fasting, and feasts, and ceremonies my soul hateth; also by Amos, I hate, I despise

your feast-days, and I will not smell in your solemn assemblies; and again by Hosea, I

will cause to cease all her mirth, and her feast-days, and her Sabbaths, and her new

moons, and all her solemn assemblies.The institutions which He set up Himself, you

ask, did He then destroy? Yes, rather than any other.26

J.N. Andrews may be correct by stating, Tertullian was a double minded man.27

However if one analyzes these statements within the prevailing Platonic system described

earlier, then theres a strange kind of harmony because as was stated before, there is a

heavenly Sabbath understood on timeless principles which would be the one that Jesus

kept, while the earthly temporal Sabbath is the one that He destroyed. Furthermore,

when Tertullian stated that Jesus did not rescind the Sabbath, he did not state that His

reason for doing so was that the Sabbath was grounded in the biblical notion of time but

rather Jesus kept the eternal, heavenly Sabbath by relieving the hungry and curing

those who had diseases. His emphasis seems more on what Jesus did rather than on the

day that He did it, which would make sense if one has adopted Platonic philosophy as the

main hermeneutical system.

In as much as the Sabbath is also inextricably linked with liturgical practices, the

severing of the Sabbath from the seventh-day also led to such liturgical changes as the

celebration of Sunday as a day of festivity. One of those changes was that kneeling was

26ANF 3:436

27J.N. Andrews,History of the Sabbath and First Day of the Week, 3rd, revised ed.(Battle Creek, MI: Review and Herald, 1887), 308-309.


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prohibited on the Lords day. Tertullian states, We count fasting or kneeling in worship

on the Lords day to be unlawful. We rejoice in the same privilege also from Easter to

Whitsunday.28

Peter of Alexandria also says something similar. But the Lords day we

celebrate as a day of joy, because on it He rose again, on which day we have received it

for a custom not even to bow the knee.29

In addition to this, Sunday was also to be regarded as a day of festivity. Tertullian

states, we make Sunday a day of festivity. What then? Do you do less than this?30

Regarding this question, J.N. Andrews states, His language is very extraordinary when it

is considered that he was addressing heathen. It seems that Sunday as a Christian festival

was so similar to the festival which these heathen observed that he challenged them to

show wherein the Christians went further than did these heathen whom he here

addressed.31

Besides Tertullian, Andrews mentions, The Epistle of Barnabas, Justin

Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, Origin, Cyprian, Peter of Alexandria, and the writer of

the Syriac Documents concerning Edessa as stating the festive nature of the Lords day.32

Barnabas

In contrast to Tertullians attitude aboutthe use of philosophy in apologetics, the

Epistle of Barnabaswritten in Alexandria around 100 AD33

represents the first document

of the young Alexandrine school of theology which has been characterized by Neo-

28

ANF 3:9429

ANF 6:278

30ANF 3:123

31Andrews, 289.

32Ibid., 284-295.

33ANF 1:133


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Platonism. Furthermore, the epistles allegorical interpretation of the Old Testament is

based upon the Jewish Alexandrine philosopher Philo,34

who stated that a six day

creation, or creation in a space of time at all, is really quite foolish.35

In the following paragraph, when the words pure and sanctify are viewed

from the same Platonic presuppositions, the negative implications for Sabbath observance

become clear. In actuality, the authors main objective in the 15th

chapter of the epistle

was to void the Sabbath.36

Moreover, He says, Thou shalt sanctify it [the Sabbath] with pure hands and a pure

heart. If, therefore, anyone can now sanctify the day which God hath sanctified,

except he is pure in heart in all things, we are deceived. Behold, therefore: certainlythen one properly resting sanctifies it, when we ourselves, having received the

promise, wickedness no longer existing, and all things having been made new by the

Lord, shall be able to work righteousness. Then we shall be able to sanctify it, having

been first sanctified ourselves. Further, He says to them, Your new moons and yourSabbath I cannot endure. Ye perceive how He speaks: Your present Sabbaths are

not acceptable to Me, but that is which I have made, [namely this,] when, giving rest

to all things, I shall make a beginning of the eighth day, that is, a beginning of anotherworld. Wherefore, also, we keep the eighth day with joyfulness, the day also on

which Jesus rose again from the dead. And when He had manifested Himself, He

ascended into the heavens.37

When viewed from Platos two-worlds theory, purity and holiness are

characteristics that are not compatible with the present age in which we live because

purity and holiness exist in the timeless tier while we exist in the temporal tier. Its clear

that it is only at the second coming of Christ that we are going to be made pure and holy

34

Justo Gonzlez,From the Beginnings to the Council of Chalcedon,A History ofChristian Thought, vol. 1 (Nashville, TN: Abindgon Press, 1987), 94.

35H.A. Wolfson,Philo; Foundations of Religious Philosophy in Judaism,Christianity, and Islam, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1948), 1:120.

36William H. Shea, "The Sabbath in the Epistle of Barnabas," Andrews UniversitySeminary Studies4 (1966): 172.

37ANF 1:146-147


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because then we will have entered into the timeless realm. The writer of the epistle

assumes that there is a divine Sabbath and an earthly Sabbath and anyone attempting to

keep the earthly temporal Sabbath is doing something that God will not accept. First, the

seventh-day Sabbath is earthly and temporal, and second we are sinful and unholy and we

must wait until we enter into eternity so that we can become sanctified and thus keep the

divine Sabbath.38

Thus Greek philosophys timeless ontology affects not only the Sabbath in this

epistle but it also has an effect on our interpretations of purity and holiness which are

inextricably linked with the doctrine of man. By this time Clement of Rome had already

declared that Peter and Paul had entered into glory,39

which means that the immortality of

the soul was assumed. This doctrine declares that while the soul is immaterial and

timeless, the body is temporal, sinful and subject to decay. Thus the only way that the

Sabbath can be kept is by the soul being released from the body either at death or at the

Second Coming of Jesus.

Clement of Alexandria

Clement was originally a pagan philosopher. The date of his birth is unknown. It

is also uncertain whether Alexandria or Athens was his birthplace.He is supposed to

have died about A.D. 220.40

If Tertullian represented those who decried the spoiling of

the Egyptians by using Greek philosophy in order to explain the gospel, then Clement

represents those who saw the best of Greek thought, such as the philosophies of Socrates

38S. Lowy, "The Confutation of Judaism in the Epistle of Barnabas," in Early

Christianity and Judaism, ed. Everett Ferguson(New York: Garland Publishing, 1993), 323.

39ANF 1:6

40ANF 2:166-167


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and Plato, as preparation for the gospel and as a useful tool in the hands of skillful

Christian thinkers.41

In the following passage, Clement links the Lords day to Plato.

And the Lords day Plato prophetically speaks of in the tenth book of theRepublic,inthese words: And when seven days have passed to each of them in the meadow, on

the eighth they are to set out and arrive in four days.By the meadow is to be

understood the fixed sphere, as being a mild and genial spot, and the locality of thepious; and by the seven days each motion of the seven planets, and the whole

practical art which speeds to the end of rest. But after the wandering orbs the journey

leads to heaven, that is, to the eighth motion and day. And he says that souls are gone

on the fourth day, pointing out the passage through the four elements. But the seventhday is recognized as sacred, not by the Hebrews only, but also by the Greeks;

according to which the whole world of all animals and plants revolve.42

J.N. Andrews' analysis of this passage demonstrates how Greek philosophical

concepts governed the early church fathersunderstanding of not only the Sabbath but

also of the Lords day by stating that these were not literal days.

Though Clement says that Plato speaks of the Lords day, it is certain that he does not

understand him to speak of literal days nor of a literal meadow. On the contrary, he

interprets the meadow to represent the fixed sphere, as being a mild and genial spot,

and the locality of the pious; which must refer to the future inheritance. The sevendays are not so many literal days, but they represent each motion of the seven

planets, and the whole practical art which speeds to the end of rest. This seems to

represent the present period of labor which is to end in the rest of the saints; for headds: but after the wandering orbs [represented by Platos seven days] the journey

leads to heaven, that is, to the eighthmotion and day. The seven days, therefore, do

here represent the period of the Christians pilgrimage, and the eighth day of which

Clement here speaks is not Sunday, but heaven itself! Here is the first instance ofLords day as a name for the eighth day, but this eighth day is a mystical one and

means, heaven!43

Once the Platonic system is adopted, the interpreter begins with the heavenly tier

because everything is grounded there. With this understanding in mind it becomes easier

41Olson, 84.

42ANF 2:469

43Andrews, 221.


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to grasp how the church fathers like Clement can place a mystical construction upon

passages that should be interpreted in a literal sense because meaning does not arise from

the earthly, the literal or the temporal but rather from the eternal, the mystical and the

spiritual.

Clement also believed that the Lords day should be kept by abstaining from evil

practices rather than meeting on a specific day and at a specific place. He, in fulfillment

of the precept, according to the Gospel, keeps the Lords day,when he abandons an evil

disposition, and assumes that of the Gnostic, glorifying the Lords resurrection in

himself.

44

The acceptance of Platonic presuppositions has replaced the Sabbath as the

ground of worship by switching to the Lords day. However as J.N. Andrews points out,

the Lords day at this time does not point to any one day of the week.

From this statement [referring to Clement] we learn, not merely his idea of fasting,

but also that of celebrating the Lords day, and glorifying the resurrection of Christ.This, according to Clement, does not consist in paying special honors to Sunday, but

in abandoning an evil disposition, and in assuming that of the Gnostic, a Christian

sect to which he belonged. Now it is plain that this kind of Lords day observance

pertains to no one day of the week, but embraces the entire life of the Christian.Clements Lords day was not aliteral, but a mystical day, embracing, according to

this, his second use of the term, the entire regenerate life of the Christian; and

according to his first use of the term, embracing also the future life in heaven.45

Furthermore, worship need not occur at any specific place or time. Regarding

Gnostic worship Clement says that they do not worship on special days, as some others,

but doing this continually in our whole life, and in every way. Certainly the elect race

justified by the precept says, Seventimes a day have I praised Thee.Whence not in a

specified place, or selected temple, or at certain festivals and on appointed days, but

44ANF 2:545

45Andrews, 222.


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during his whole life.46

Later on Sunday was recognized as the Lords day but it was

not kept like the Sabbath.

Augustine

Augustine of Hippo (354-430) is without a doubt, one of the greatest Christian

thinkers of all time. According to Justo Gonzlez, Augustine is the end of one era as

well as the beginning of another. He is the last of the ancient Christian writers, and the

forerunner of medieval theology. The main currents of ancient theology converged in

him, and from him flow the rivers, not only of medieval scholasticism, but also of

sixteenth-century Protestant theology.47 His relationship with philosophy is more like

that of Clement rather than Tertullian. He freely drew on Platonic thought in his

argumentation against Manichaeism.48

The quotation below delineates his view of

creation.

And I looked attentively to find whether seven or eight times Thou sawest that Thy

works were good, when they were pleasing unto Thee; but in Thy seeing I found notimes, by which I might understand that thou sawest so often what Thou madest. And

I said, O Lord,! Is not this Thy Scripture true, since Thou art true, and being Truth

hast set it forth? Why, then, dost Thou say unto me that in thy seeing there are notimes, while this Thy Scripture telleth me that what Thou madest each day, Thou

sawest to be good; and when I counted them I found how often? Unto these things

Thou repliest unto me, for Thou art my God, and with strong voice tellest unto Thyservant in his inner ear, bursting through my deafness, and crying, O man, that

which My Scripture saith, I say; and yet doth that speak in time; but time has no

reference to My Word, because My Word existeth in equal eternity with Myself. Thus

those things which ye see through My Spirit, I see, just as those things which ye

46ANF 2:532

47Justo Gonzlez,From Augustine to the Eve of the Reformation,A History ofChristian Thought, vol. 2 (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1987), 15.

48Olson, 263.


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speak through My Spirit, I speak. And so when ye see those things in time, I see them

not in time; as when ye speak them in time, I speak them not in time.49

For Augustine its clear that creation did not take place in seven literal days,

where God did something on the first day and then proceeded to go on from there. This

is clear in Canales analysis of Augustines theology: Augustine was convinced that God

cannot act in the future-present-past sequence of time as Scripture presents all divine

activities. Instead he followed Parmenides, Plato, and Aristotles imaginative

construction of a God whose reality is necessarily timeless and spaceless.50

With this in

mind we can look at how Augustine understood the creation Sabbath.

O Lord God, grant Thy peace unto us, for Thou hast supplied us with all things,the

peace of rest, the peace of the Sabbath, which hath no evening. For all this most

beautiful order of things, very good (all their courses being finished), is to passaway, for in them there was morning and evening. But the seventh day is without any

evening, nor hath it any setting, because Thou hast sanctified it to an everlasting

continuance that that which Thou didst after Thy works, which were very good,resting on the seventh day, although in unbroken rest Thou madest them that the

voice of Thy Book may speak beforehand unto us, that we also after our works

(therefore very good, because Thou hast given them unto us) may repose in Thee also

in the Sabbath of eternal life.51

When the Platonic system is in control, it acts as a hermeneutical guide, which

means that according to Augustine the creation Sabbath does not refer to a day, since it

hath no evening. It only has meaning within the context of eternal life, which is

understood to be in harmony with timeless concepts. Furthermore, Augustine states that

the seventh day Sabbath should not be kept by any Christian,52

and elsewhere he states

49NPNF 1:205

50Canale, Basic Elements of Christian Theology: Scripture Replacing Tradition, 49.

51NPNF 1:207

52NPNF 5:136


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that it should be observed spiritually by abstaining from sin.53

This system was also

assumed by Thomas Aquinas, and became the hermeneutical key that led him to make a

distinction between the moral and the ceremonial aspects of the Sabbath.

Aquinas states that the precept of the Sabbath observance is moral in one respect,

in so far as it commands man to give some time to the things of God, according to Ps.

45:11: Be still and see that I am God. In this respect it is placed among the precepts of

the Decalogue: but not as to the fixing of the time, in which respect it is a ceremonial

precept.54

Thus for Augustine and Aquinas, the Sabbath is not grounded in the day but

in the Platonic understanding of reality which then becomes the hermeneutical key for

dividing the moral from the ceremonial aspect of the Sabbath. This division becomes

non-existent when the Sabbath is grounded upon time.

Summary

It should be kept in mind that the purpose of this chapter was to demonstrate the

cause and effect results of Platos two-worlds theory regarding how the early church

fathers viewed the Sabbath, the Lords day, and the changes that occurred in liturgical

practices. Since the heavenly tier of Platos theory is timeless, eternal, good and pure, it

becomes the overarching system which guides the early church fathers to ultimately

abandon the seventh-day Sabbath which according to that system belonged to the earthly,

temporal, sinful tier.

This system also guided them to accept the eighth day which was also known as

53NPNF 7:136

54Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, trans., The Fathers of the English DominicanProvince, 3 vols. (New York: Benziger Brothers, Inc., 1947), 1:1039.


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the Lords day. It should be kept in mind however that this day was originally kept not

by the observance of a specific day, in a specific location but it was to be kept as

abstaining from sin throughout a persons entire life. Furthermore the absence of

kneeling and fasting on the Lords day was also connected to the resurrection and to the

heathen festivals.

In Canales assessment, the introduction of Greek philosophical concepts that

were assumed by the early church fathers had a role to play in the change from Sabbath

to Sunday.

As Christians began to see God and heaven as spiritual, non-temporal realities,historical realities slowly lost their relevance for the community of faith. By the

beginning of the fourth century, Christian theologians viewed divine, human and

heavenly realities not as material or temporal, but as immaterial and spiritual.

Temporal changes did not affect spiritual ones. This view of reality clearly paved theway for changing the day of worship and rejecting Jewish Christians from the

community of faith. Thus when Constantine faced the fact that religion was dividing

his empire, he found no theological barrier preventing him from changing the day of

worship from Saturday to Sunday.55

55Canale, Basic Elements of Christian Theology: Scripture Replacing Tradition, 50.


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CHAPTER FOUR

Conclusion

Regarding the impact of Greek metaphysics on the loss of the Sabbath, Tonstad

states:

It is in the context of the swirling current of Hellenistic influences that the Sabbath islost. The stream of this influence is subterranean in the sense that it is easier to make

the case for the reality of profound change than to describe its nature. We are left to

map out the course of the stream on the basis of where it appears from the surface towhere it emerges again in broad daylight. Looking at the subject from the vantage

point of portfolios of meaning, the seventh day does not fit into the Platonic negative

perception of the material world.56

The primary cause for the loss of the Sabbath is the timeless interpretation of

ontology within Platos two-tiered cosmology which made up the conceptual

framework from which the church fathers constructed their theology. As with other

doctrines, this framework had a profound effect on the conclusions of the church

fathers on the Sabbath.

Tertullian does not state the effect of the Greek philosophical framework on his

clear distinction between the eternal, timeless Sabbath and the human temporal Sabbath

because he is clearly opposed to using that kind of framework in defending the gospel.

Nevertheless, his conclusions can only be explained by assuming the very framework he

is trying to get others to abandon since that kind of distinction between the eternal

Sabbath and the temporal Sabbath is nowhere to be found in the Scriptures. The Greek

56Tonstad, 323-324.


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framework also helps to explain why Tertullian stated that Jesus kept the Sabbath on the

one hand, while on the other hand God destroyed it as an institution. In this context Jesus

kept the Sabbath relieving the hungry and healing the diseased, not necessarily by resting

between sunset Friday to sunset Saturday.

Barnabas concludes that since keeping the Sabbath holy requires us to be holy, no

one in this present age can actually keep the Sabbath holy because purity of heart and

sanctification ultimately occur in the world made new. As a result we can only keep the

Sabbath in eternity but as for now we ought to keep the eighth day. Thus Barnabas

maintains the distinction between the timeless Sabbath and the temporal Sabbath.

According to Clement, neither the Sabbath nor the Lords day should be

understood as literal days. Furthermore when it comes to liturgical practices, the Lords

day should be divorced from worshipping at specified times and places. Rather, it should

be observed throughout a persons whole life. In addition, those who truly observe the

Lords day are those who abandon an evil disposition.

Augustines distinction between eternity and time ultimately leads him to

conclude that the creation week did not occur in six days followed by the seventh day.

Rather creation was a timeless act since Gods word only has reference to eternity and

not to time, thereby nullifying the Sabbath commandment. Furthermore, since time is

considered to be the reduplication of eternity, the Sabbath as a twenty-four hour time

period can no longer be considered as the ultimate ground of reality and worship because

that ground is provided by the timeless interpretation of reality.

Thus, the Sabbath is i) divorced of its link with time, ii) no longer obligatory and

relevant as a day of worship from sunset Friday to sunset Saturday, and iii) is merely


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associated with ethical issues and not ontological issues. These underlying philosophical

presuppositions provided the Church Fathers in this study with the theological

justification for the shift from Sabbath to Sunday. Since the issue of Sabbath and Sunday

is inextricably linked with ontology, the shift should not be viewed simply as a change of

days but rather as a major theological change, which affects not only the doctrine of the

Sabbath but also anthropology and cosmology.


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