The Foundations of the Sabbath in the Word of God

by B.B. Warfield

Benjamin B. Warfield (1851-1921), the last of the great Princeton theologians, was professor of theology at Princeton from 1887 until his death.

Genres: Theology

16 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 19, 2014

About the author

Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield (usually known as B. B. Warfield) was professor of theology at Princeton Seminary from 1887 to 1921. Some conservative Presbyterians consider him to be the last of the great Princeton theologians before the split in 1929 that formed Westminster Seminary and the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.

(Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Jordan Carl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Awesome little book on the universalising of the Sabbath as a creation ordinance, the Son of Man as Lord of the Sabbath, the perpetuity of the Christian Sabbath, the shift from the last to the first Day as the Lord’s Day, and ultimately the call for love to be the springboard by which we fulfill both tables of the law in our duty to God and man. This is a nice place to start if you’ve ever wondered about the Fourth commandment and how it relates to new covenant believers.

[Patrick Trester · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this particular work to be a concise and well defense to application of the decalogue (the Ten Commandments) with particular attention to the sabbath day itself. Warfield goes through the New Testament and shows where Jesus and the Apostles taught from and assumed authority of the decalogue, as well as the affirmation of the whole Law by Jesus, James, and Paul.

While overall it was a tremendous help, there are a few exegetical errors that consist in the English translation that Warfield was using (or moreso to his interpretation of the English translation). For instance, Warfield writes "All allusion to Canaan, the land which Jehovah, Israel's God had promised to Israel, is eliminated, and with it all that gives the promise or the commandment to which it is annexed any appearance of exclusive application to Israel" (Kindle Loc. 236). But the problem is that Warfield is referring to Ephesians 6:3 where Paul quotes the decalogue saying "You shall live long in the earth." Well the Greek word for land is the same for Earth. In fact if we look at Exodus 20 in the LXX (Septuagint: Greek Old Testament), it uses the same word. He further argues from that misapplication that God has decentralized Israel from the decalogue, but not only is he using faulty translation, he also overlooks the fact that the Sabbath of creation was not associated with Canaan, but was still on the seventh day.

This brings me to my final critique, while I am reformed inside and out, I find it a false equivocation to compare the resurrection, meetings, and collections of funds with the Sabbath day. None of these things have any emphasis (as none were pertinent to the Sabbath of creation) in the celebration of the sabbath. So to equivocate them is false. Just because we practice the Sabbath and the Lord's day, does not mean they are the same things. If we argue that they met together on the Lord's day, well they (Jew and Gentile Christians) also met together 4 times as often on the Sabbath in the book of Acts. Warfield argues from the assumption of equivocation without at all defending the equivocations he presupposes.

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Particularly good on highlighting the significance of Christ's resurrection in the renewal of the Sabbath for the New Testament age. #FourthCommandmentDeniers, however, will continue to ignore the obvious evidence against their Antinomianism.