Sabbath

Biblical Texts

• Genesis 2:2-3: Having finished the work of creation in six days, God rested on the seventh day, and He blessed that day and sanctified it. The word "sabbath" itself, however, first appears in Exodus 16:23, in the passage where the Israelites in the wilderness were instructed to gather a double portion of manna on the sixth day and none on the seventh.
• Exodus 20:8-11: One of the Ten Commandments, this commandment is grounded in God's rest at creation.
• Deuteronomy 5:12-15: The same commandment is explained on the basis of Israel's deliverance from bondage in Egypt. It directs that servants, strangers, and even livestock be allowed to rest.
• Exodus 31:13-17: The Sabbath is established as a sign of the covenant between God and Israel.
• Isaiah 58:13-14, Jeremiah 17:21-27, Nehemiah 13:15-22: The prophets and Nehemiah urge the keeping of the Sabbath and rebuke those who conduct trade on that day.

Background

The Hebrew word shabbat is related to a verb meaning "to cease" or "to rest." Because the day in Israel began at sundown, the Sabbath was likewise observed from evening to evening. The principle of rest was extended to the sabbatical year, in which the land was left to rest every seventh year, and to the Jubilee, which came every fifty years. After the Exile, the Sabbath became the center of synagogue gatherings. The Mishnah, a later rabbinic work, classified the labors forbidden on the Sabbath into thirty-nine categories; this is an interpretive tradition rather than part of the biblical text itself.

In the New Testament

Jesus taught in the synagogue on the Sabbath (Luke 4:16). He disputed with the Pharisees over His healing of the sick on the Sabbath and declared that "the sabbath was made for man" and that the Son of man is "Lord also of the sabbath" (Mark 2:27-28).

The early church also gathered on the first day of the week, distinct from the Sabbath (Acts 20:7; 1 Corinthians 16:2). Revelation 1:10 calls this day "the Lord's day." Paul describes the Sabbath as "a shadow of things to come" (Colossians 2:16-17) and urges believers not to judge one another over the observance of days (Romans 14:5-6). Hebrews 4:9-11 speaks of a rest that still remains for the people of God.

Interpretations and Debates

• Presbyterian and Reformed churches: Following chapter 21 of the Westminster Confession of Faith, they hold that the Sabbath commandment is a perpetual moral law and that, after the resurrection of Christ, it was changed to the first day of the week, becoming "the Christian Sabbath." This understanding gave rise to the strict Sunday observance of the Puritan tradition.
• Lutheran and various other traditions: They regard the requirement to keep a particular day of the week as largely ceremonial in character and fulfilled in Christ. Sunday is understood as the day on which believers gather for worship in commemoration of the resurrection.
• Seventh-day Adventist Church: It maintains that the Sabbath commandment of the Decalogue remains literally binding today and that Saturday must therefore be kept.
• The claim of a change to Sunday: It is commonly said that "the Emperor Constantine changed the Sabbath to Sunday." It is true that Constantine legally established Sunday as a day of rest in 321. Those who observe Sunday worship, however, counter that Sunday gatherings already appear in the New Testament and in Justin Martyr's First Apology in the second century.

The debate is treated in detail in the article Sabbath and the Lord's Day.

In the Korean Church

In the Korean church, the Lord's Day is often taught in connection with the Sabbath commandment under the term juil seongsu ("keeping the Lord's Day holy"). In the past, the custom of refraining from buying and selling or eating out on Sundays was widespread, and conflicts sometimes arose when examinations or work schedules fell on Sunday. Today the degree of observance varies among churches and individual believers. The name of the sabbatical system, which grants pastors a period of rest, also derives from the biblical sabbatical year.