Abram Herbert Lewis - Spiritual Sabbathism

SABBATARIANISM 1
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the Lutheran Church, is equally plain in its unqualified
no-sabbathism. Sunday-keeping is made a matter
of mere convenience. It is in no way connected
with the creation concept or that of redemption.
Calvin's expressions are more moderate than
Luther's, and are worked out with greater dialectical
skill. But there is no essential difference of opinion
between the two men. "Some unquiet spirits," says
Calvin, "have been raising noisy contentions concerning
the Lord's day. They complain that
Christians are tinctured with Judaism, because they
retain any observance of days. But I reply that the
Lord's day is not observed by us upon the principles
of Judaism. . . . For we celebrate it not with great
rigor,
as a ceremony which we conceive to be a figure
of some spiritual mystery, but only use it as a
remedy necessary to the preservation of order in
the church." He very properly criticizes the oneday-in-seven
theory. "This is only changing the
day in
contempt of the Jews, while they retain the
same opinion of the holiness of a day."
A remark of Calvin, that "we do not by any
means observe days as though there were any sacredncss
in holy days, and as though it
were not lawful
to labor on them" explains, perhaps, a well-established
tradition concerning the reformer.
At Geneva
there Is a tradition that when John Knox visited