Aurel Gheorghe Supporter

The Sabbath originated at the end of creation week (Gen 2:1-3). Some have questioned whether God’s 7th day Sabbath was observed before He gave the Ten Commandments on Mt. Sinai - citing that the Sabbath observance was never mentioned in Genesis. That is not entirely true. 

Cain was cautioned that disobeying God’s commands and being angry with Abel was a sin (Gen 4:6,7). In Genesis 5:22, 6:9 we read about Methuselah, Enoch and Noah being righteous and blameless - they walked with God hundreds of years, they spent time with God, talked with God worshiped God. It’s inconceivable to think that God never told them that idolatry, killing, adultery, lying, or stealing was a sin. How about the Sabbath? 

We can safely assume that the Ten Commandments existed in Noah’s day because the Bible says, "But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord" NIV (Gen 6:8; Heb 11:7). Where there is no law, there is no condemnation and need for grace. God destroyed the word with water because of men wickedness (Gen 6:5). We can be sure that there was idolatry going on, stealing, murder, adultery, lying and disregard for God’s holy Sabbath. While the first six chapters of Genesis are silent about specific sins, the antediluvians did offend God and cause Him to drown them. God destroyed them for the same reason Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed. 

Some would argue that at Mt. Sinai God expressed His will for humanity by giving Moses the Ten Commandments; but only the Sabbath commandment (not any other commandment) was exclusively for Jews and doesn’t apply to Christians today. However, the language of the Fourth Commandment (Ex 20:11) makes directly reference to Creation (Gen 2:1-3). 

In addition, Exodus 20:1-3 points directly to Israel Egypt bondage but no one ever suggested that the First Commandment apply only to Jews. 

Furthermore, in Exodus 5:5 the Pharaoh complains to Moses and Aaron “You make them rest from their labor” (You make them sabbath from their labor) a direct reference to the Sabbath rest and this takes place while they were still in Egypt and before Sinai.

An even more concrete proof of the Sabbath before Mt. Sinai is found in Exodus 16, when God provided manna in the wilderness (Ex 16:23-30). Notice Exodus 16:28, “How long do you refuse to keep My commandments and My laws?” This passage begs the question: What Laws and Commandments? If the Sabbath Commandant wasn't in place prior to Mt. Sinai why would God admonish them for not observing the Sabbath? The only logical conclusion one can draw is that the Ten Commandments themselves obviously weren’t something new. 

In the creation narrative God blesses the seventh day. As implied in Exodus 20:11, through the Sabbath, God blesses the person who keeps it. Why would anyone reject a blessing that God gracious is willing to bestow upon His children, and why would anyone consider “works” a day or rest and communion with God. 

The blessing pronounced on the seventh day is not intended for God personal benefit or pleasure but for those who would take the time to enjoy fellowship with Him within the fraction of time called seventh day Sabbath.

March 25 2019 • 0 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report

Tim Maas Supporter Retired Quality Assurance Specialist with the U.S. Army

Despite the reference in Genesis 2:3 to God blessing and hallowing the seventh day, there is no Biblical record (as far as I am aware) of the seventh-day Sabbath being kept or observed (before or after the calling of Abraham) prior to the exodus of Israel from Egypt, and the giving of the Law to Moses. Moses' indication to Israel in Deuteronomy 5:15 that God had commanded observance of the seventh-day Sabbath as a memorial of Israel being delivered from its prior slavery in Egypt would seem to indicate that it had not been observed prior to that time.

March 25 2019 • 0 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report

Ulrike Unruh Supporter

Was God's 7th day holy Sabbath in effect prior to Mt Sinai?

I would answer yes! Genesis is a book of beginnings. And from the very start, God shares His desire to have a relationship with people. So we see Him preparing a place. In five days, a dark, lifeless planet becomes a beautiful place. On the sixth day, after the animals are created, God is ready to make human beings.

He makes mankind in His own image, after His likeness. He makes them because He wants a relationship with them.

Genesis 1:27-28: God created human beings in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. And God blessed the
Ps. 149:4	For the LORD takes pleasure in his people:

Now comes the question: why do we have Genesis 2:2-3 in which God blesses, and sanctifies (sets apart for holy purpose) and rests on the seventh day? He is not tired. 

Would God now simply return to heaven and rest and leave His newly created paradise to do its own thing? Or would He end His creation by setting apart special time to be with the people He had created in His own image, to fellowship with them? To spend the first Sabbath with the newly created humans, created in his own image. 

I believe it was the latter. I also believe God blessed and sanctified the 7th day to have a relationship with us, when we put aside the pressures and stresses of ordinary life and delight ourselves in Him!

So did Abraham keep the sabbath? We know he worshipped God, setting up altars everywhere he went. (Gen 12:7-8) Where did he learn to do that? There are no commands to do that in Genesis. But he wanted to worship God.

Then in Genesis 26:5 we read that, "Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws."

Prior to this verse, we have not seen any of God’s commandments, statutes, or laws given as a code of commands. Some have argued that the text means God spoke to Abraham, and Abraham obeyed. That’s true enough, but this text mentions laws and statutes and commandments. It indicates that God’s moral law and statutes were known prior to Sinai. 

Being that Genesis is a book of beginnings, not a book of commands, for me, Genesis 2:1-3 was written there to show the beginning of the Sabbath day plan.

For me, the question is more -- why won't a man who obeyed God's commands, statutes, and laws willingly and joyfully remember the holiness of the 7th day?

And when we do have the command to remember the Sabbath day, in Exodus 20:8-11, it takes us right back to creation and asks us to remember:
"For [in] six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them [is], and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it" (made it holy). 

If this was a new command, God would not start it with the word "remember" and then take us back to an earlier event.

The seventh day Sabbath is a memorial to creation, a time to rejoice and remember our Creator without the interruptions of our daily grind. It's a day we remember not only that He is our Creator, but also that it is He Who sanctifies us -- makes us holy. 

Eze. 20:12:...sabbaths, to be a sign between Him and us, that we might know that it is the LORD that sanctifies us.

20 hours ago • 0 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report