Hi auggy (and other participants)
*warning: long post ahead (nearly 2,500 words )
** parentheses () generally denote material I consider interesting, but perhaps of less central importance to the discussion…
INTRO…
Discussions confusing? and frustrating? Sure: though perhaps in different ways for each of us.
As for focusing only on the issue of killing Sabbath breakers, that seems to me quite an unnatural division; not at all the way my mind approaches the issue… Seems it’s all intimately related.
Oh well.
I’ll try here to be a bit more disciplined and organized in listing various areas of difference between us.
THE TROUBLE WITH LABELS…
Yes, we need to be able to name and identify differences, but a label like “literal” is more meaningless and useless than I think you’ve allowed. You’ve tried to place it on me, but the way you’ve used it (because I keep the Seventh day Sabbath) means that the label also applies to you given that you too “keep” all the surrounding brother and sister commands listed with the Sabbath one. So a label that applies to all of us (which of course it does to varied degrees) becomes quite meaningless…
One Solution:
It’s important to note that the position of Kelly, and my position, are very very different. I argue for the continued importance and relevance of the Sabbath command given it’s place in the “great 10” which no one that I know of actually intends to “do away with.” (Recalling that “doing away” with the law is simply another way of saying “internalizing” the law… Just as destroying sin need not mean destroying the sinner but rather the effect is the same when the sinner is transformed/healed into one who does not sin… that sort of thing…)
ANOTHER UNHELPFUL LABEL…
And that is legalism, or legalistic. Perhaps marginally more useful than the label “literal” (ie everybody expects some things to be literal…). To be called legalistic implies, to me, that one believes his salvation rests upon his keeping of the law; moral, ceremonial, or both. To expect me to accept the term because I keep the Sabbath but not apply the term to yourself (or ones-self) because you (they) don’t lie, kill, commit adultery etc is simply a double standard and therefore easily disregarded…
WHICH LAW??
Unfortunately the term “Law” is a rather elastic one (perhaps like the term “evolution”) and it’s varied meanings and expressions are often badly conflated. For me, the key distinction is, as various people have hinted, boiled down to the Moral Law and the Ceremonial Law, (or perhaps the Mosaic Law). I would argue that the 10 describe, or can be thought of as, the embodiment of the Moral Law, while everything else can be thought of as the Ceremonial Law. I hear Kelly, while she perhaps accepts this distinction, holding that all “Law” remains in effect. I am not part of that thinking.
*(Can one find sensible advice among the hundreds of “laws” contained outside the 10 that seem reasonable to follow today? Of course. While the command to refrain from having sex with animals seems so intuitive as to be unnecessary to actually order, the command to not harvest the corners of ones field also makes some sense given God’s great interest in providing for the needs of the poor. How that command might translate into today’s world should make for fascinating discussion.
And some of the commands sound downright enjoyable!!! For example
But to equate not eating pork with keeping the Sabbath grossly and unnecessarily conflates the two Laws… … I must note however that the notion of following the Ceremonial Law is a more interesting proposition than most Christians allow.)*
TO THE BIG DIFFERENCE BETWEEN US: IS THE SABBATH COMMAND MORAL? OR CEREMONIAL?
To my insistent demands asking you (auggy; and others) why you feel so empowered to wrest the 4th commandment from the 10, your answer condenses into reasons like these:
– it does not appear to have the moral weight or implications of the others;
– it appears arbitrary in that there is no obvious reason (to you) for this particular day to be so honored;
– it must belong to the ceremonial category given that Paul appears to say it’s observance is optional – something he clearly would not say about the other nine;
– it must be Ceremonial because Jesus appears to underline all the rest - but not this one.
I hope that’s a fair summary of your responses to my question…??… The Sabbath command is of course different from the rest it appears at first glance: and perhaps delightfully so. And maybe that’s the point! (read on!)
Allow me to make some comments on why I believe it’s both reasonable and compelling to place the Sabbath command not in the Ceremonial category, but the Moral…
**1) THE SABBATH’S PRESENCE IN THE MORAL CODE WAS INTENTIONAL; TO MARK IT AS A MORAL IMPERATIVE. **
The Sabbath belongs in the Moral Code, was placed there deliberately by God, because that’s exactly the emphasis He intended to give it. A command so obviously not up to the vital importance of the rest of the commands should, it seems to me, demand consideration that the impression of it’s minimal moral importance is mistaken.
So, to the question “Why is the 4th even there - if it’s moral weight is so nebulous?” the most obvious answer should be “because it’s moral weight is not nebulous; it’s presence underlines it’s moral importance.”
*(Auggy: this is perhaps where I should note the gross irrelevance of comparing the fact of the 4ths presence in the 10 with the methods of Aaron37; he reads scripture as if his interpretation and God’s are identical. All I’m doing is pointing to the obvious; and thereby reminding you you’ve not dealt with why God might place such a ceremonial command right in the midst of the Moral…) *
I view the conclusion that the 4th commandment is ceremonial as a serious mistake; one which should only be undertaken unless for overwhelmingly good reasons. Barring that, (and I don’t believe such reasons rise to the occasion) the task should not be to determine why a ceremonial law slipped in amongst the moral, (something you’ve not tackled yet) but rather, is there a blessing to be experienced in considering the 4th with the same moral importance as the others?
I’m frankly baffled that more people don’t demand better reasons to ignore a command right there in the middle of the Moral Law.
2) COULD THE SABBATH BE INTENDED AS BRIDGE BETWEEN LAW AND GRACE??
Full disclosure: the main reason that I am not so bothered by the fact that most of you all do not see the importance of the Sabbath is because of this:
There is a unanimous agreement here (and in most Christian circles) the law’s purpose was to bring us to Christ; that what God really wants - and wanted all along - was for hearts (this is as true in the OT as it is in the NT) to be transformed; that the law, when internalized can be seen as Love (to God and man); that the keeping of the Law (moral) does not save us, but instead is a reflection of a heart upon which the dawn of the Son has broken! We are saved by, and in, and through God’s gift of the Christ. His goal is to rebuild us in His image where we do the right because it is right – not because we fear punishment if we don’t.
(Also the fact that no one has tried to argue that the importance of the Sabbath has been “transferred” to Sunday I see as a real positive…)
Further, there is general agreement that the journey in Christ is a progressive one; our awareness of the magnitude of His love, grace, and mercy, and how that impacts our lives with Him only deepens with time spent with Him.
Many here have noted (including auggy) the growing awareness, as they grow in Christ, that the following of a mere law is only the beginning. For there is much more depth to that law, when motivated in and by love, than the mere following of that law. Thus to “keep” the 7th means even mental adultery; to keep the the 6th means not even to wish ill on another. And so on.
Recall Paul’s sober, wistful contemplation of the effect the command not to envy had on him: he realized that only he could know that he was guilty – for envy happens deep in the soul. And thus his very heart needed to be transformed if he hoped to keep that commandment…
I suspect that, in God’s inclusion of the Sabbath command with the Moral, He intended something similar…
3) THE INTENTIONAL “VAGUENESS” OF THE SABBATH COMMAND IS A BRILLIANT INVITATION TO FOREVER CONTEMPLATE THE EVER DEEPER UNION WITH CHRIST THAT GOD HAS PROMISED…
That’s a real mouthful, but consider: God command’s a day of rest, as a memorial of creation (Exodus 20) and redemption (Deuteronomy 5) and tells us to keep it “Holy”. But He doesn’t tell us HOW to do that. My assertion is that this deliberate vagueness was intended to force us (though better to say “invite” us…) to enter into deep and lifelong contemplation of the mysteries of His person, His presence, His power, and what all that has to do with us. Sadly - and the stories are well recorded - this mindset was corrupted by those who, in their eagerness perhaps to comply, insisted on specifics. Lists; rules; tangible actions which they could measure. This of course lead not to, but away from God’s real purpose which has always been to change hearts – not just behaviors…
Could one protest that “I’m fully capable of learning and discerning those deeper aspects of God’s character without the Sabbath!”?? Well of course one could: but the mind boggles as to why such a path would even be considered - much less desired…
4) JESUS’ OBSERVANCE OF THE SABBATH EMPHASIZES THE “CHANGED HEART” ASPECTS OF HIS COMMANDMENTS AND OF HIS MISSION; NOT HIS DISMISSAL OF IT’S MORAL SIGNIFICANCE…
My belief in the moral significance of the Sabbath commandment (albeit “moral” in a less obvious and direct sense than one might prefer; see above) allows me to interpret Jesus’ treatment of the Sabbath as wresting it away from the legalistic Jewish rulers and thereby returning it to it’s originally intended moral high ground. I simply cannot see Jesus’ Sabbath observance as intending to minimize it’s importance; quite the contrary. He was doing with the Sabbath command much the same as He did with the commands not to kill, or commit adultery: return them to the original depth of meaning that God all along intended.
That the Sabbath was “made for man” and that Jesus urges “pray ye that your flight be not on winter, neither on the Sabbath day” speaks far more of the Sabbaths continued existence and relevance – not it’s anticipated extinction.
**5) THE SABBATH’S MEANING - FROM THE BEGINNING! - AS MEMORIAL OF A)CREATION & B)REDEMPTION FROM SLAVERY DISQUALIFIES IT AS CANDIDATE FOR BEING A “SHADOW” **
In Paul’s Colossians 2 statement many translations make the distinction of sabbath “days.” Which days are those? You can read all about ‘em in Leviticus 23. The fact is that lots of days were given the moniker of “sabbaths” and were to been seen as “holy” but which don’t have the same meaning or pedigree as “THE Sabbath” which predated these ceremonial ones. The conflation of all these days into “sabbaths” is simply not warranted.
6) OUR CODES OF CHRISTIAN LIVING CLEARLY SHOULD HAVE AMPLE ROOM FOR THE SABBATH…
That Christians are comfortable in ascribing great meaning (abstract, metaphorical) to literal actions that may not make intuitive or logical sense to us seems axiomatic.
For example:
– Naaman asked the same thing: why wash in THAT dirty river? and why 7 times? Didn’t make sense, yet we have no trouble seeing it’s intent…
– We practice the new command of Baptism because our Lord did. Yet isn’t Baptism merely a reflection of an inner change and commitment of the heart which we all recognize as important? Who prefers to just skip that action part and go right to the heart change we all KNOW baptism is about? Yet many Christians do just that with the Sabbath!!
– We imagine eating of the Tree of Life someday: but don’t we see that as a highly symbolic act? (I suppose some read the ACTUAL fruit and the ACTUAL leaves as carrying Life instead of seeing that Life as coming from God…) Can we imagine anyone insisting “Life doesn’t come from those leaves and fruits; I’m skipping that part as proof that I know it’s just symbolic…) And yet many chose to “skip” the blessing and meaning of the Sabbath…
As I say, bewildering to me…
Lastly, I’ve never made a secret of my preference to discuss, on this site, things pertaining to Universal Reconciliation. And wouldn’t you know it, I believe that truth of The Sabbath fits perfectly with the truth of UR! A memorial of Creation; reminding us of (and celebrating too!) not only our true identity (as both product AND object of His Love!) but of our common heritage with God as our Father. Herein the foundational reason why God would want to save all. More, The Sabbath is constant reminder of our Redemption from Slavery; the slavery from sin and towards grace.
So then Auggy, blessings upon you my friend – and sorry for the length of this but I hope I’ve stated a bit more clearly how this all works for me and why I have pressed you as I have.
Bobx3
(Oops; almost forgot to answer this… why NOT stone Sabbath breakers? Given the sad reality that the nature of God’s early handling of mankind’s intransigence
involved a lot of violence that we often find puzzling today, I think it’s reasonable to allow that God dealt with different peoples in different ways. And the ways He dealt with them are more a reflection of their immaturity and depravity than of God’s inconsistence. Besides, living in a Theocracy was a far different paradigm from where we are today. But the puzzling violence of the Old Testament need not in any way detract from the ongoing validity of the Sabbath…That I don’t stone sabbath-breakers says nothing of the validity of Sabbath Keeping – just as your refraining from stoning adulterers says nothing of the validity of not committing adultery…)