sat-bak’-tha-ne.

See ELI, ELI, LAMA, SABACHTHANI.

sab’-a-ko, sab’-a-kon.

See SO.

sa-be’-anz (shebha’im (Joe 3:8 the King James Version), cebha’-im; Sabaeim, Sebaeim (Isa 45:14); read cabha’im, but rendered as though from cabha’," to imbibe," hence, "drunkards"; oinomenoi, "wine-drunken" (Eze 23:42 the King James Version)):

1. Forms of the Word:

"Sabaeans" is also the translation of the name of the country itself (shebha’) in Job 1:15; 6:19. This last, which is the root of shebha’im, is regarded by Arabists as coming from that root with the meaning of "to take captive," though seba’a, "he raided" (compare Job 1:15), has also been suggested.

2. Two Different Races:

As Sheba is said in Ge 10:7; 10:28; and 25:3 respectively to have been

(1) a son of Raamah, the 4th son of Cush;

(2) the 10th son of Joktan, son of Eber;

(3) the 1st son of Jokshan, 2nd son of Abraham and Keturah, at least two nationalities of this name are implied. The former were identified by Josephus (Ant., II, x, 2) with the tall people of Saba in Upper Egypt, described by him as a city of Ethiopia, which Moses, when in the service of the Egyptians, besieged and captured.

3. Semitic Sabeans and Their Commerce:

It is the Semitic Sabeans, however, who are the best known, and the two genealogies attributed to them (Joktan-Eber and Jokshan-Abraham) seem to imply two settlements in the land regarded as that of their origin. As Ezekiel (27:23) mentions Haran (Hirran), Canneh (Kannah), and Eden (Aden) as being connected with Sheba, and these three places are known to have been in Southern Arabia, their Semitic parentage is undoubted. The Sabeans are described as being exporters of gold (Isa 60:6; Ps 72:15), precious stones (Eze 27:23), perfumes (Jer 6:20; Isaiah and Ezekiel), and if the rendering "Sabaeans" for Joe 3 (4):8 be correct, the Sebaim, "a nation far off," dealt in slaves.

See SEBA; SHEBA; TABLE OF NATIONS.

T. G. Pinches

sab-a-ne’-us (Codex Vaticanus Sabannaious; Codex Alexandrinus Bannaious; the King James Version Bannaia, following the Aldine): One of the sons of Asom who had married strange wives (1 Esdras 9:33) =" Zabad" in Ezr 10:33.

sa-ban’-nus (Sabannos; the King James Version Sabban): The father of Moeth, one of the Levites to whom the silver and gold were delivered (1 Esdras 8:63). "Moeth the son of Sabannus" stands in the position of "Noadiah the son of Binnui," in Ezr 8:33.

sab’-a-oth, sa-ba’-oth.

See GOD, NAMES OF, III, 8; LORD OF HOSTS.

sa’-bat: the King James Version = the Revised Version (British and American) SAPHAT, (2) (which see).

sab-a-te’-us (Codex Alexandrinus Sabbataias; Codex Vaticanus Abtaios; the King James Version Sabateas): One of the Levites who "taught the law of the Lord" to the multitude (1 Esdras 9:48) =" Shabbethai" in Ne 8:7.

sab’-a-thus (Sabathos; the King James Version Sabatus): An Israelite who put away his "strange wife" (1 Esdras 9:28) =" Zabad" in Ezr 10:27.

sab’-a-tus: the King James Version = the Revised Version (British and American) SABATHUS (which see).

sab’-an: the King James Version = the Revised Version (British and American) SABANNUS (which see).

sab’-ath (shabbath, shabbathon; sabbaton, ta sabbata; the root shabhath in Hebrew means "to desist," "cease," "rest"):

I. ORIGIN OF THE SABBATH

1. The Biblical Account

2. Critical Theories

II. HISTORY OF THE SABBATH AFTER MOSES

1. In the Old Testament

2. In the Inter-Testamental Period

3. Jesus and the Sabbath

4. Paul and the Sabbath

LITERATURE

The Sabbath was the day on which man was to leave off his secular labors and keep a day holy to Yahweh.

I. Origin of the Sabbath.

1. The Biblical Account:

The sketch of creation in Ge 1:1-2:3 closes with an impressive account of the hallowing of the 7th day, because on it God rested from all the work which He had made creatively. The word "Sabbath" does not occur in the story; but it is recognized by critics of every school that the author (P) means to describe the Sabbath as primeval. In Ex 20:8-11 (ascribed to JE) the reason assigned for keeping the 7th day as a holy Sabbath is the fact that Yahweh rested after the six days of creative activity. Ex 31:17 employs a bold figure, and describes Yahweh as refreshing Himself ("catching His breath") after six days of work. The statement that God set apart the 7th day for holy purposes in honor of His own rest after six days of creative activity is boldly challenged by many modern scholars as merely the pious figment of a priestly imagination of the exile. There are so few hints of a weekly Sabbath before Moses, who is comparatively a modern character, that argumentation is almost excluded, and each student will approach the question with the bias of his whole intellectual and spiritual history. There is no distinct mention of the Sabbath in Gen, though a 7-day period is referred to several times (Ge 7:4,10; 8:10,12; 29:27 f). The first express mention of the Sabbath is found in Ex 16:21-30, in connection with the giving of the manna. Yahweh taught the people in the wilderness to observe the 7th day as a Sabbath of rest by sending no manna on that day, a double supply being given on the 6th day of the week. Here we have to do with a weekly Sabbath as a day of rest from ordinary secular labor. A little later the Ten Words (Commands) were spoken by Yahweh from Sinai in the hearing of all the people, and were afterward written on the two tables of stone (Ex 20:1-17; 34:1-5,27 f). The Fourth Commandment enjoins upon Israel the observance of the 7th day of the week as a holy day on which no work shall be done by man or beast. Children and servants are to desist from all work, and even the stranger within the gates is required to keep the day holy. The reason assigned is that Yahweh rested on the 7th day and blessed it and hallowed it. There is no hint that the restrictions were meant to guard against the wrath of a jealous and angry deity. The Sabbath was meant to be a blessing to man and not a burden. After the sin in connection with the golden call Yahweh rehearses the chief duties required of Israel, and again announces the law of the Sabbath (Ex 34:21, ascribed to J). In the Levitical legislation there is frequent mention of the Sabbath (Ex 31:13-16; 35:2 f; Le 19:3,10; 23:3,18). A willful Sabbath-breaker was put to death (Nu 15:32-36). In the Deuteronomic legislation there is equal recognition of the importance and value of the Sabbath (De 5:12-15). Here the reason assigned for the observance of the Sabbath philanthropic and humanitarian: "that thy man-servant and thy maid-servant may rest as well as thou." It is thus manifest that all the Pentateuchal codes, whether proceeding from Moses alone or from many hands in widely different centuries, equally recognize the Sabbath as one of the characteristic institutions of Israel’s religious and social life. If we cannot point to any observance of the weekly Sabbath prior to Moses, we can at least be sure that this was one of the institutions which he gave to Israel. From the days of Moses until now the holy Sabbath has been kept by devout Israelites.

2. Critical Theories:

"The older theories of the origin of the Jewish Sabbath (connecting it with Egypt, with the day of Saturn, or in general with the seven planets) have now been almost entirely abandoned (see ASTRONOMY, sec. I, 5). The disposition at present is to regard the day as originally a lunar festival, similar to a Bablonian custom (Schrader, Stud. u. Krit., 1874), the rather as the cuneiform documents appear to contain a term sabattu or sabattum, identical in form and meaning with the Hebrew word sabbathon." Thus wrote Professor C. H. Toy in 1899 (JBL, XVIII, 190). In a syllabary (II R, 32, 16a, b) sabattum is said to be equivalent to um nuh libbi, the natural translation of which seemed to be "day of rest of the heart." Schrader, Sayce and others so understood the phrase, and naturally looked upon sabattum as equivalent to the Hebrew Sabbath. But Jensen and others have shown that the phrase should be rendered "day of the appeasement of the mind" (of an offended deity). The reference is to a day of atonement or pacification rather than a day of rest, a day in which one must be careful not to arouse the anger of the god who was supposed to preside over that particular day. Now the term sabattum has been found only 5 or 6 times in the Babylonian inscriptions and in none of them is it connected with the 7th day of a week. There was, however, a sort of institution among the superstitious Babylonians that has been compared with the Hebrew Sabbath. In certain months of the year (Elul, Marcheshvan) the 7th, 14th, 19th, 21st and 28th days were set down as favorable days, or unfavorable days, that is, as days in which the king, the priest and the physician must be careful not to stir up the anger of the deity. On these days the king was not to eat food prepared by fire, not to put on royal dress, not to ride in his chariot, etc. As to the 19th day, it is thought that it was included among the unlucky days because it was the 49th (7 times 7) from the 1st of the preceding month. As there were 30 days in the month, it is evident that we are not dealing with a recurring 7th day in the week, as is the case with the Hebrew Sabbath. Moreover, no proof has been adduced that the term sabattum was ever applied to these dies nefasti or unlucky days. Hence, the assertions of some Assyriologists with regard to the Babylonian origin of the Sabbath must be taken with several grams of salt. Notice must be taken of an ingenious and able paper by Professor M. Jastrow, which was read before the Eleventh International Congress of Orientalists in Paris in 1897, in which the learned author attempts to show that the Hebrew Sabbath was originally a day of propitiation like the Babylonian sabattum (AJT, II, 312-52). He argues that the restrictive measures in the Hebrew laws for the observance of the Sabbath arose from the original conception of the Sabbath as an unfavorable day, a day in which the anger of Yahweh might flash forth against men. Although Jastrow has supported his thesis with many arguments that are cogent, yet the reverent student of the Scriptures will find it difficult to resist the impression that the Old Testament writers without exception thought of the Sabbath not as an unfavorable or unlucky day but rather as a day set apart for the benefit of man. Whatever may have been the attitude of the early Hebrews toward the day which was to become a characteristic institution of Judaism in all ages and in all lands, the organs of revelation throughout the Old Testament enforce the observance of the Sabbath by arguments which lay emphasis upon its beneficent and humanitarian aspects.

We must call attention to Meinhold’s ingenious hypothesis as to the origin of the Sabbath. In 1894 Theophilus G. Pinches discovered a tablet in which the term shapattu is applied to the 15th day of the month. Meinhold argues that shabattu in Babylonian denotes the day of the full moon. Dr. Skinner thus describes Meinhold’s theory: "He points to the close association of new-moon and Sabbath in nearly all the pre-exilic references (Am 8:5; Ho 2:11; Isa 1:13; 2Ki 4:23 f); and concludes that in early Israel, as in Babylonia, the Sabbath was the full-moon festival and nothing else. The institution of the weekly Sabbath he traces to a desire to compensate for the loss of the old lunar festivals, when these were abrogated by the Deuteronomic reformation. This innovation he attributes to Ezekiel; but steps toward it are found in the introduction of a weekly day of rest during harvest only (on the ground of De 16:8 f; compare Ex 34:21), and in the establishment of the sabbatical year (Le 25), which he considers to be older than the weekly Sabbath" (ICC on Gen, p. 39). Dr. Skinner well says that Meinhold’s theory involves great improbabilities. It is not certain that the Babylonians applied the term sabattu to the 15th day of the month because it was the day of the full moon; and it is by no means certain that the early prophets in Israel identified Sabbath with the festival of the full moon.

The wealth of learning and ingenuity expended in the search for the origin of the Sabbath has up to the present yielded small returns.

II. History of the Sabbath after Moses.

1. In the Old Testament:

The early prophets and historians occasionally make mention of the Sabbath. It is sometimes named in connection with the festival of the new moon (2Ki 4:23; Am 8:5; Ho 2:11; Isa 1:13; Eze 46:3). The prophets found fault with the worship on the Sabbath, because it was not spiritual nor prompted by love and gratitude. The Sabbath is exalted by the great prophets who faced the crisis of the Babylonian exile as one of the most valuable institutions in Israel’s life. Great promises are attached to faithful observance of the holy day, and confession is made of Israel’s unfaithfulness in profaning the Sabbath (Jer 17:21-27; Isa 56:2,4; 58:13; Eze 20:12-24). In the Persian period Nehemiah struggled earnestly to make the people of Jerusalem observe the law of the Sabbath (Ne 10:31; 13:15-22).

2. In the Inter-Testamental Period:

With the development of the synagogue the Sabbath became a day of worship and of study of the Law, as well as a day of cessation from all secular employment. That the pious in Israel carefully observed the Sabbath is clear from the conduct of the Maccabees and their followers, who at first declined to resist the onslaught made by their enemies on the Sabbath (1 Macc 2:29-38); but necessity drove the faithful to defend themselves against hostile attack on the Sabbath (1 Macc 2:39-41). It was during the period between Ezra and the Christian era that the spirit of Jewish legalism flourished. Innumerable restrictions and rules were formulated for the conduct of life under the Law. Great principles were lost to sight in the mass of petty details. Two entire treatises of the Mishna, Shabbath and ‘Erubhin, are devoted to the details of Sabbath observance. The subject is touched upon in other parts of the Mishna; and in the Gemara there are extended discussions, with citations of the often divergent opinions of the rabbis. In the Mishna (Shahbath, vii.2) there are 39 classes of prohibited actions with regard to the Sabbath, and there is much hair-splitting in working out the details. The beginnings of this elaborate definition of actions permitted and actions forbidden are to be found in the centuries immediately preceding the Christian era. The movement was at flood tide during our Lord’s earthly ministry and continued for centuries afterward, in spite of His frequent and vigorous protests.

3. Jesus and the Sabbath:

Apart from His claim to be the Messiah, there is no subject on which our Lord came into such sharp conflict with the religious leaders of the Jews as in the matter of Sabbath observance. He set Himself squarely against the current rabbinic restrictions as contrary to the spirit of the original law of the Sabbath. The rabbis seemed to think that the Sabbath was an end in itself, an institution to which the pious Israelite must subject all his personal interests; in other words, that man was made for the Sabbath: man might suffer hardship, but the institution must be preserved inviolate. Jesus, on the contrary, taught that the Sabbath was made for man’s benefit. If there should arise a conflict between man’s needs and the letter of the Law, man’s higher interests and needs must take precedence over the law of the Sabbath (Mt 12:1-14; Mr 2:23-3:6; Lu 6:1-11; also Joh 5:1-18; Lu 13:10-17; 14:1-6). There is no reason to think that Jesus meant to discredit the Sabbath as an institution. It was His custom to attend worship in the synagogue on the Sabbath (Lu 4:16). The humane element in the rest day at the end of every week must have appealed to His sympathetic nature. It was the one precept of the Decalogue that was predominantly ceremonial, though it had distinct sociological and moral value. As an institution for the benefit of toiling men and animals, Jesus held the Sabbath in high regard. As the Messiah, He was not subject to its restrictions; He could at any moment assert His lordship over the Sabbath (Mr 2:28). The institution was not on a par with the great moral precepts, which are unchangeable. It is worthy of note that, while Jesus pushed the moral precepts of the Decalogue into the inner realm of thought and desire, thus making the requirement more difficult and the law more exacting, He fought for a more liberal and lenient interpretation of the law of the Sabbath. Rigorous sabbatarians must look elsewhere for a champion of their views.

4. Paul and the Sabbath:

The early Christians kept the 7th day as a Sabbath, much after the fashion of other Jews. Gradually the 1st day of the week came to be recognized as the day on which the followers of Jesus would meet for worship. The resurrection of our Lord on that day made it for Christians the most joyous day of all the week. When Gentiles were admitted into the church, the question at once arose whether they should be required to keep the Law of Moses. It is the glory of Paul that he fought for and won freedom for his Gentile fellow-Christians. It is significant of the attitude of the apostles that the decrees of the Council at Jerusalem made no mention of Sabbath observance in the requirements laid upon Gentile Christians (Ac 15:28 f). Paul boldly contended that believers in Jesus, whether Jew or Gentile, were set free from the burdens of the Mosaic Law. Even circumcision counted for nothing, now that men were saved by believing in Jesus (Ga 5:6). Christian liberty as proclaimed by Paul included all days and seasons. A man could observe special days or not, just as his own judgment and conscience might dictate (Ro 14:5 f); but in all such matters one ought to be careful not to put a stumblingblock in a brother’s way (Ro 14:13 ). That Paul contended for personal freedom in respect of the Sabbath is made quite clear in Col 2:16 f, where he groups together dietary laws, feast days, new moons and sabbaths. The early Christians brought over into their mode of observing the Lord’s Day the best elements of the Jewish Sabbath, without its onerous restrictions.)

See further LORD’S DAY; ETHICS OF JESUS, I, 3, (1).

LITERATURE. J. A. Hessey, Sunday, Its Origin, History, and Present Obligation (Bampton Lectures for 1860); Zahn, Geschichte des Sonntags, 1878; Davis, Genesis and Semitic Tradition, 1894, 23-35; Jastrow, "The Original Character of the Heb Sabbath," AJT, II, 1898, 312-52; Toy, "The Earliest Form of the Sabbath," JBL, XVIII. 1899, 190-94; W. Lotz, Questionum de historia Sabbati libri duo, 1883; Nowack, Hebr. Arch., II, 1894, 140 ff; Driver, HDB, IV, 1902, 317-23; ICC, on "Gen," 1911, 35-39; Dillmann, Ex u. Lev3, 1897, 212-16; Edersheim, Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, II, 1883, 51-62, 777-87; Broadus, Commentary on Mt, 256-61; EB, IV, 1903, 4173-80; Gunkel, Gen3, 1910, 114-16; Meinhold, Sabbat u. Woche im Altes Testament, 1905; Beer, Schabbath, 1908.

John Richard Samphey

III. SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTIST POSITION

The views entertained by Seventh-Day Adventists concerning the nature and obligation of the Sabbath may conveniently be presented under three general divisions: (1) what the Bible says concerning the Sabbath; (2) what history says concerning the Sabbath; (3) the significance of the Sabbath.

1. What the Bible Says concerning the Sabbath:

(1) Old Testament Teaching.

In their views concerning the institution and primal obligation of the Sabbath, Seventh-Day Adventists are in harmony with the views held by the early representatives of nearly all the evangelical denominations. The Sabbath is coeval with the finishing of creation, and the main facts connected with establishing it are recorded in Ge 2:2,3. The blessing here placed upon the seventh day distinguishes it from the other days of the week, and the day thus blessed was "sanctified" (King James Version, Revised Version "hallowed") and set apart for man.

That the Sabbath thus instituted was well known throughout the Patriarchal age is clearly established both by direct evidence and by necessary inference.

"If we had no other passage than this of Ge 2:3, there would be no difficulty in deducing from it a precept for the universal observance of a Sabbath, or seventh day, to be devoted to God as holy time by all of that race for whom the earth and all things therein were specially prepared. The first men must have known it. The words, ‘He hallowed it,’ can have no meaning otherwise. They would be a blank unless in reference to some who were required to keep it holy" (Lange’s Commentary on Ge 2:3, I, 197).

"And the day arrived when Moses went to Goshen to see his brethren, that he saw the children of Israel in their burdens and hard labor, and Moses was grieved on their account. And Moses returned to Egypt and came to the house of Pharaoh, and came before the king, and Moses bowed down before the king. And Moses said unto Pharaoh, I pray thee, my lord, I have come to seek a small request from thee, turn not away my face empty; and Pharaoh said unto him, Speak. And Moses said unto Pharaoh, Let there be given unto thy servants the children of Israel who are in Goshen, one day to rest therein from their labor. And the king answered Moses and said, Behold I have lifted up thy face in this thing to grant thy request. And Pharaoh ordered a proclamation to be issued throughout Egypt and Goshen, saying, To you, all the children of Israel, thus says the king, for six days you shall do your work and labor, but on the seventh day you shall rest, and shall not perform any work; thus shall you do in all the days, as the king and Moses the son of Bathia have commanded. And Moses rejoiced at this thing which the king had granted to him, and all the children of Israel did as Moses ordered them. For this thing was from the Lord to the children of Israel, for the Lord had begun to remember the children of Israel to save them for the sake of their fathers. And the Lord was with Moses, and his fame went throughout Egypt. And Moses became great in the eyes of all the Egyptians, and in the eyes of all the children of Israel, seeking good for his people Israel, and speaking words of peace regarding them to the king" (Book of Jashar 70 41-51, published by Noah and Gould, New York, 1840).

"Hence, you can see that the Sabbath was before the Law of Moses came, and has existed from the beginning of the world. Especially have the devout, who have preserved the true faith, met together and called upon God on this day" (Luther’s Works, XXXV, p. 330).

"Why should God begin two thousand years after (the creation of the world) to give men a Sabbath upon the reason of His rest from the creation of it, if He had never called man to that commemoration before? And it is certain that the Sabbath was observed at the falling of the manna before the giving of the Law; and let any considering Christian judge ....

(1) whether the not falling of manna, or the rest of God after the creation, was like to be the original reason of the Sabbath;

(2) and whether, if it had been the first, it would not have been said, Remember to keep holy the Sabbath day; for on six days the manna fell, and not on the seventh; rather than for in six days God created heaven and earth, etc., and rested the seventh day.’ And it is casually added, ‘Wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.’ Nay, consider whether this annexed reason intimates not that the day on this ground being hallowed before, therefore it was that God sent not down the manna on that day, and that He prhibited the people from seeking it" (Richard Baxter, Practical Works, III, 774, edition 1707).

That the Sabbath was known to those who came out of Egypt, even before the giving of the Law at Sinai, is shown from the experience with the manna, as recorded in Ex 16:22-30. The double portion on the sixth day, and its preservation, was the constantly recurring miracle which reminded the people of their obligation to observe the Sabbath, and that the Sabbath was a definite day, the seventh day. To the people, first wondering at this remarkable occurrence, Moses said, "This is that which the Lord hath said, To morrow is the rest of the holy sabbath unto the Lord" (Ex 16:23, King James Version). And to some who went out to gather manna on the seventh day, the Lord administered this rebuke: "How long refuse ye to keep my commandments and my laws?" (Ex 16:28). All this shows that the Sabbath law was well understood, and that the failure to observe it rendered the people justly subject to Divine reproof.

At Sinai, the Sabbath which was instituted at creation, and had been observed during the intervening centuries, was embodied in that formal statement of man’s duties usually designated as the "Ten Commandments." It is treated as an institution already well known and the command is, "Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy" (Ex 20:8). In the 4th commandment the basis of the Sabbath is revealed. It is a memorial of the Creator’s rest at the close of those six days in which He made "heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is." For this reason "Yahweh blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it." This blessing was not placed upon the day at Sinai, but in the beginning, when "God blessed the seventh day, and hallowed it" (Ge 2:3).

From the very nature of the basis of the Sabbath, as set forth in this commandment, both the institution itself and the definite day of the Sabbath are of a permanent nature. So long as it is true that God created heaven and earth, and all things therein, so long will the Sabbath remain as a memorial of that work; and so long as it is true that this creative work was completed in six days, and that God Himself rested on the seventh day, and was refreshed in the enjoyment of His completed work, so long will it be true that the memorial of that work can properly be celebrated only upon the seventh day of the week.

During all the period from the deliverance out of Egypt to the captivity in Babylon, the people of God were distinguished from the nations about them by the worship of the only true God, and the observance of His holy day. The proper observance of the true Sabbath would preserve them from idolatry, being a constant reminder of the one God, the Creator of all things. Even when Jerusalem was suffering from the attacks of the Babylonians, God assured His people, through the prophet Jeremiah, that if they would hallow the Sabbath day, great should be their prosperity, and the city should remain forever (Jer 17:18). This shows that the spiritual observance of the Sabbath was the supreme test of their right relation to God. In those prophecies of Isaiah, which deal primarily with the restoration from Babylon, remarkable promises were made to those who would observe the Sabbath, as recorded in Isa 56:1-7.

(2) New Testament Teaching.

From the record found in the four Gospels, it is plain that the Jews during all the previous centuries had preserved a knowledge both of the Sabbath institution and of the definite day.

It is equally plain that they had made the Sabbath burdensome by their own rigorous exactions concerning it. And Christ, the Lord of the Sabbath, both by example and by precept, brushed aside these traditions of men that He might reveal the Sabbath of the commandment as God gave it—a blessing and not a burden. A careful reading of the testimony of the evangelists will show that Christ taught the observance of the commandments of God, rather than the traditions of men, and that the charge of Sabbath-breaking was brought against Him for no other reason than that He refused to allow the requirements of man to change the Sabbath, blessed of God, into a merely human institution, grievous in its nature, and enforced upon the people with many and troublesome restrictions.

All are agreed that Christ and His disciples observed the seventh-day Sabbath previous to the crucifixion. That His followers had received no intimation of any proposed change at His death, is evident from the recorded fact that on the day when He was in the tomb they rested, "on the sabbath .... according to the commandment" (Lu 23:56); and that they treated the following day, the first day of the week, the same as of old, is further evident, as upon that day they came unto the sepulcher for the purpose of anointing the body of Jesus. In the Book of Acts, which gives a brief history of the work of the disciples in proclaiming the gospel of a risen Saviour, no other Sabbath is recognized than the seventh day, and this is mentioned in the most natural way as the proper designation of a well-known institution (Ac 13:14,27,42; 16:13; 18:4).

In our Lord’s great prophecy, in which He foretold the experience of the church between the first and the second advent, He recognized the seventh-day Sabbath as an existing institution at the time of the destruction of Jerusalem (70 AD), when He instructed His disciples, "Pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on a sabbath" (Mt 24:20). Such instruction given in these words, and at that time, would have been confusing in the extreme, had there been any such thing contemplated as the overthrow of the Sabbath law at the crucifixion, and the substitution of another day upon an entirely different basis.

That the original Sabbath is to be observed, not only during the present order of things, but also after the restoration when, according to the vision of the revelator, a new heaven and a new earth will take the place of the heaven and the earth that now are, is clearly intimated in the words of the Lord through the prophet Isaiah: "For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith Yahweh, so shall your seed and your name remain. And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith Yahweh" (Isa 66:22,23).

Seventh-Day Adventists regard the effort to establish the observance of another day than the seventh by using such texts as Joh 20:19,26; Ac 20:7; 1Co 16:1,2; Re 1:10 as being merely an afterthought, an effort to find warrant for an observance established upon other than Biblical authority. During the last two or three centuries there has been a movement for the restoration of the original seventh-day Sabbath, not as a Jewish, but as a Christian, institution. This work, commenced and carried forward by the Seventh-Day Baptists, has been taken up and pushed with renewed vigor by the Seventh-Day Adventists during the present generation, and the Bible teaching concerning the true Sabbath is now being presented in nearly every country, both civilized and uncivilized, on the face of the earth.

2. What History Says about the Sabbath:

(1) Josephus.

This summary of history must necessarily be brief, and it will be impossible, for lack of space, to quote authorities. From the testimony of Josephus it is clear that the Jews, as a nation, continued to observe the seventh-day Sabbath until their overthrow, when Jerusalem was captured by Titus, 70 AD. As colonies, and individuals, scattered over the face of the earth, the Jews have preserved a knowledge of the original Sabbath, and the definite day, until the present time. They constitute a living testimony for the benefit of all who desire to know the truth of this matter.

(2) Church History.

According to church history, the seventh-day Sabbath was observed by the early church, and no other day was observed as a Sabbath during the first two or three centuries (see HDB, IV, 322 b).

In the oft-repeated letter of Pliny, the Roman governor of Bithynia, to the emperor Trajan, written about 112 AD, there occurs the expression, "a certain stated day," which is usually assumed to mean Sunday. With reference to this matter W.B. Taylor, in Historical Commentaries, chapter i, section 47, makes the following statement: "As the Sabbath day appears to have been quite as commonly observed at this date as the sun’s day (if not even more so), it is just as probable that this ‘stated day’ referred to by Pliny was the 7th day as that it was the 1st day; though the latter is generally taken for granted." "Sunday was distinguished as a day of joy by the circumstances that men did not fast upon it, and that they prayed standing up and not kneeling, as Christ had now been raised from the dead. The festival of Sunday, like all other festivals, was always only a human ordinance, and it was far from the intentions of the apostles to establish a divine command in this respect, far from them, and from the early apostolic church, to transfer the laws of the Sabbath to Sunday. Perhaps at the end of the 2nd century, a false application of this kind had begun to take place; for men appear by that time to have considered laboring on Sunday as a sin" (Tertullian De Orat., c. 23). This quotation is taken from Rose’s Neander, London, 1831, I, 33 f, and is the correct translation from Neander’s first German edition, Hamburg, 1826, I, pt. 2, p. 339. Neander has in his 2nd edition, 1842, omitted the second sentence, in which he expressly stated that Sunday was only a human ordinance, but he has added nothing to the contrary. "The Christians in the ancient church very soon distinguished the first day of the week, Sunday; however, not as a Sabbath, but as an assembly day of the church, to study the Word of God together and to celebrate the ordinances one with another: without a shadow of doubt this took place as early as the first part of the 2nd century" (Geschichte des Sonntags, 60).

Gradually, however, the first day of the week came into prominence as an added day, but finally by civil and ecclesiastical authority as a required observance. The first legislation on this subject was the famous law of Constantine, enacted 321 AD. The acts of various councils during the 4th and 5th centuries established the observance of the first day of the week by ecclesiastical authority, and in the great apostasy which followed, the rival day obtained the ascendancy. During the centuries which followed, however, there were always witnesses for the true Sabbath, although under great persecution. And thus in various lands, the knowledge of the true Sabbath has been preserved.

3. The Significance of the Sabbath:

In the creation of the heavens and the earth the foundation of the gospel was laid. At the close of His created work, "God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good" (Ge 1:31). The Sabbath was both the sign and the memorial of that creative power which is able to make all things good. But man, made in the image of God, lost that image through sin. In the gospel, provision is made for the restoration of the image of God in the soul of man. The Creator is the Redeemer and redemption is the new creation. Since the Sabbath was the sign of that creative power which worked in Christ, the Word, in the making of the heaven and the earth and all things therein, so it is the sign of that same creative power working through the same eternal Word for the restoration of all things. "Wherefore if any man is in Christ, there is a new creation: the old things are passed away; behold, they are become new" (2Co 5:17 margin). "For neither is circumcision anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation" (Ga 6:15 margin). "For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God afore prepared that we should walk in them" (Eph 2:10).

A concrete illustration of this gospel meaning of the Sabbath is found in the deliverance of Israel from Egypt. The same creative power which wrought in the beginning was exercised in the signs and miracles which preceded their deliverance, and in those miracles, such as the opening of the Red Sea, the giving of the manna, and the water from the rock, which attended the journeyings of the Israelites. In consequence of these manifestations of creative power in their behalf, the children of Israel were instructed to remember in their observance of the Sabbath that they were bondsmen in the land of Egypt. Israel’s deliverance from Egypt is the type of every man’s deliverance from sin; and the instruction to Israel concerning the Sabbath shows its true significance in the gospel of salvation from sin, and the new creation in the image of God.

Furthermore, the seventh-day Sabbath is the sign of both the divinity and the deity of Christ. God only can create. He through whom this work is wrought must be one with God. To this the Scriptures testify: "In the beginning was the Word, .... and the Word was God. .... All things were made through him; and without him was not anything made that hath been made." But this same Word which was with God, and was God, "became flesh, and dwelt among us" (Joh 1:1,3,14). This is the eternal Son, "in whom we have our redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace" (Eph 1:7). To the Christian the Sabbath, which was the sign and memorial of that divine power which wrought through the eternal Word in the creation of the heaven and the earth, becomes the sign of the same power working through the same eternal Son to accomplish the new creation, and is thus the sign of both the divinity and the deity of Christ.

Inasmuch as the redemptive work finds its chiefest expression in the cross of Christ, the Sabbath, which is the sign of that redemptive work, becomes the sign of the cross.

Seventh-Day Adventists teach and practice the observance of the Sabbath, not because they believe in salvation through man’s effort to keep the law of God, but because they believe in that salvation which alone can be accomplished by the creative power of God working through the eternal Son to create believers anew in Christ Jesus.

Seventh-Day Adventists believe, and teach, that the observance of any other day than the seventh as the Sabbath is the sign of that predicted apostasy in which the man of sin would be revealed who would exalt himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped.

Seventh-Day Adventists believe, and teach, that the observance of the true Sabbath in this generation is a part of that gospel work which is to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.

W. W. Prescott

jur’-ni (sabbatou hodos): Used only in Ac 1:12, where it designates the distance from Jerusalem to the Mount of Olives, to which Jesus led His disciples on the day of His ascension. The expression comes from rabbinical usage to indicate the distance a Jew might travel on the Sabbath without transgressing the Law, the command against working on that day being interpreted as including travel (see Ex 16:27-30). The limit set by the rabbis to the Sabbath day’s journey was 2,000 cubits from one’s house or domicile, which was derived from the statement found in Jos 3:4 that this was the distance between the ark and the people on their march, this being assumed to be the distance between the tents of the people and the tabernacle during the sojourn in the wilderness. Hence, it must have been allowable to travel thus far to attend the worship of the tabernacle. We do not know when this assumption in regard to the Sabbath day’s journey was made, but it seems to have been in force in the time of Christ. The distance of the Mount of Olives from Jerusalem is stated in Josephus (Ant., XX, viii, 6) to have been five stadia or furlongs and in BJ, V, ii, 3, six stadia, the discrepancy being explained by supposing a different point of departure. This would make the distance of the Sabbath day’s journey from 1,000 to 1,200 yards, the first agreeing very closely with the 2,000 cubits. The rabbis, however, invented a way of increasing this distance without technically infringing the Law, by depositing some food at the 2,000-cubit limit, before the Sabbath, and declaring that spot a temporary domicile. They might then proceed 2,000 cubits from this point without transgressing the Law.

And in some cases even this intricacy of preparation was unnecessary. If, for instance, the approach of the Sabbath found one on his journey, the traveler might select some tree or some stone wall at a distance of 2,000 paces and mentally declare this to be his residence for the Sabbath, in which case he was permitted to go the 2,000 paces to the selected tree or wall and also 2,000 paces beyond, but in such a case he must do the work thoroughly and must say: "Let my Sabbath residence be at the trunk of that tree," for if he merely said: "Let my Sabbath residence be under that tree," this would not be sufficient, because the, expression would be too general and indefinite (Tractate ‘Erubhin 4:7).

Other schemes for extending the distance have been devised, such as regarding the quarter of the town in which one dwells, or the whole town itself, as the domicile, thus allowing one to proceed from any part of the town to a point 2,000 cubits beyond its utmost limits. This was most probably the case with walled towns, at least, and boundary stones have been found in the vicinity of Gaza with inscriptions supposed to mark these limits. The 2,000-cubit limits around the Levitical cities (Nu 35:5) may have suggested the limit of the Sabbath day’s journey also. The term came to be used as a designation of distance which must have been more or less definite.

H. Porter

See COVERED WAY.

See DAY BEFORE THE SABBATH.

See MORROW AFTER THE SABBATH.

(sabbaton deuteroproton (Lu 6:1), literally, "the second-first sabbath," of the Revised Version margin): We will mention only a few of the explanations elicited by this expression.

(1) It was the first Sabbath in the second year of a 7-year cycle comprising the period from one Sabbatic year to the other;

(2) the first Sabbath after the second day of Passover, i.e. the first of the seven Sabbaths the Hebrews were to "count unto" themselves from "the morrow after the sabbath" (the day after Easter) until Pentecost (Le 23:15);

(3) the first Sabbath in the Jewish ecclesiastical year (about the middle of March), the first Sabbath in the civil year (about the middle of September) being counted as the "first-first" Sabbath;

(4) the term deuteroprotos, is a monstrous combination of the words deuteros, "second," and protos, "first," attributable to unskillful attempts at textual emendation on the part of copyists. This supposition would, of course, render unnecessary all other efforts to unravel the knotty problem, and, as a matter of fact, deuteroprotos is omitted by many manuscripts (including Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus). To those not feeling inclined to accept this solution we would suggest the first of the above-named explanations as the most natural and probable one.

William Baur

sab’-bath-brak’-ing.

See CRIMES; PUNISHMENTS.

sab-a-the’-us: the King James Version = the Revised Version (British and American) SABBATEUS (which see).

sab’-aths, (shabbethoth shanim; anapauseis eton (Le 25:8)): The seven sabbatic years preceding the Year of Jubilee.

See SABBATICAL YEAR; JUBILEE YEAR; ASTRONOMY, sec. I, 5.

sa-bat’-ik-al, shenath shabbathon; eniautos anapauseos, "a year of solemn rest"; or shabbath shabbathon; sabbata anapausis, "a sabbath of solemn rest" (Le 25:4); or shehath ha-shemittah; etos tes apheseos, "the year of release" (De 15:9; 31:10)):

1. Primary Intention:

We find the first rudiments of this institution in the so-called Covenant Book (Ex 21-23). Its connection with the day of rest (Sabbath) is obvious, although it strikes us as somewhat remarkable that in Ex 23:10-12 the regulation regarding the 7th year should precede the statute respecting the 7th day. Still it seems natural that after the allusion in verse 9, "Ye were sojourners in the land of Egypt," the Covenant Book should put in a good word for the poor in Israel (verse 11: "Let it rest and lie fallow, that the poor of thy people may eat"). Even the beasts of the field are remembered (compare Jon 4:11).

We must, therefore, conclude that in this early period of the history of Israel the regulation regarding the 7th year was primarily intended for the relief of the poor and for the awakening of a sense of responsibility in the hearts of those better provided with the means of subsistence. It would be wrong, however, to deny its Sabbatic character, for the text says expressly, "But in the 7th year thou shalt let it rest" (literally, "thou shalt release it"), implying that the land was entitled to a rest because it needed it; it must be released for a time in order to gain fresh strength and insure its future fertility. Two motives, then, present themselves most clearly, one of a social, the other of an economic character, and both are rooted in God’s dealings with Israel (compare Ex 21:1).

2. Mosaic Legislation Humane:

Another evidence of the humane spirit pervading the Mosaic Law may be found in Ex 21:2-6 where, in the case of a Hebrew slave, the length of his servitude is limited to six years. The connection with the idea of the Sabbath is evident, but we fail to detect here any reference to the Sabbatical year. It is clear that the 7th year in which a slave might be set free need not necessarily coincide with the Sabbatical year, though it might, of course, The same is true of De 15:12-18; it has nothing to do with the Sabbatical year. On the other hand it is reasonable to assume that the "release" mentioned in De 15:1-3 took place in the Sabbatical year; in other words, its scope had been enlarged in later years so as to include the release from pecuniary obligation, i.e. the remission of debts or, at least, their temporary suspension. This means that the children of Israel were now developing from a purely agricultural people to a commercial nation. Still the same spirit of compassion for the poor and those struggling for a living asserts itself as in the earlier period, and it goes without saying that the old regulation concerning the release of the land in the 7th year was still in force (compare 15:2: "because Yahweh’s release hath been proclaimed").

According to De 15:1, this proclamation occurred at the end of every 7 years, or, rather, during the 7th year; for we must be careful not to strain the expression "at the end" (compare 15:9, where the 7th year is called "the year of release"; it is quite natural to identify this 7th year with the Sabbatical year).

Moreover, we are now almost compelled to assert the Sabbatical year by this time had become an institution observed simultaneously all over the country. From the wording of the regulation regarding the 7th year in the Covenant Book we are not certain about this in those early times. But now it is different. "Yahweh’s release hath been proclaimed."

3. General Observance:

It was a solemn and general proclamation, the date of which was very likely the day of atonement in the 7th month (the Sabbatical month). The celebration of the Feast of Tabernacles (booths) began five days later and it lasted from the 15th day to the 21st of the 7th month (Tisri). In the Sabbatical year, at that time, the Law was read "before all Israel in their hearing," a fact which tends to prove that the Sabbatical year had become a matter of general and simultaneous observance (compare De 31:10-13). Another lesson may be deduced from this passage: it gives us a hint respecting the use to which the people may have put their leisure time during the 12 months of Sabbatical rest; it may have been a period of religious and probably other instruction.

In Le 25:1-7 the central idea of the Sabbatical year is unfolded. Although it has been said we should be careful not to look for too much of the ideal and dogmatic in the institutions of the children of Israel, yet we must never lose sight of the religious and educational character even of their ancient legislation.

4. Central Idea:

One central thought is brought home to them, namely, God is the owner of the soil, and through His grace only the chosen people have come into its possession. Their time, i.e. they themselves, belong to Him: this is the deepest meaning of the day of rest; their land, i.e. their means of subsistence, belong to Him: this reveals to us the innermost significance of the year of rest. It was Yahweh’s pleasure to call the children of Israel into life, and if they live and work and prosper, they are indebted to His unmerited loving-kindness. They should, therefore, put their absolute trust in Him, never doubt His word or His power, always obey Him and so always receive His unbounded blessings.

If we thus put all the emphasis on the religious character of the Sabbatical year, we are in keeping with the idea permeating the Old Testament, namely that the children of Israel are the chosen people of Yahweh. All their agricultural, social, commercial and political relations were to be built upon their divine calling and shaped according to God’s sovereign will.

But did they live up to it? Or, to limit the question to our subject: Did they really observe the Sabbatical year? There are those who hold that the law regarding the Sabbatical year was not observed before the captivity. In order to prove this assertion they point to Le 26:34 f, 43; also to 2Ch 36:21. But all we can gather from these passages is the palpable conclusion that the law regarding the Sabbatical year had not been strictly obeyed, a deficiency which may mar the effect of any law.

The possibility of observing the precept respecting the Sabbatical year is demonstrated by the post-exilic history of the Jewish people. Nehemiah registers the solemn fact that the reestablished nation entered into a covenant to keep the law and to maintain the temple worship (Ne 9:38; 10:32 ). In 10:31 of the last-named chapter he alludes to the 7th year, "that we would forego the 7th year, and the exaction of every debt." We are not sure of the exact meaning of this short allusion; it may refer to the Sabbatical rest of the land and the suspension of debts.

For a certainty we know that the Sabbatical year was observed by the Jews at the time of Alexander the Great. When he was petitioned by the Samaritans "that he would remit the tribute of the 7th year to them, because they did not sow therein, he asked who they were that made such a petition"; he was told they were Hebrews, etc. (Josephus, Ant, XI, viii, 6).

During Maccabean and Asmonean times the law regarding the Sabbatical year was strictly observed, although it frequently weakened the cause of the Jews (1 Macc 6:49,53; Josephus, Ant, XIII, viii, 1; compare Josephus, Jewish Wars, I, ii, 4; Ant, XIV, x, 6; XV, i, 2). Again we may find references to the Sabbatical year in Josephus, Ant, XIV, xvi, 2, etc.; Tac. Hist. v.4, etc., all of which testifies to the observance of the Sabbatical year in the Herodian era. The words of Tacitus show the proud Roman’s estimate of the Jewish character and customs: "For the 7th day they are said to have prescribed rest because this day ended their labors; then, in addition, being allured by their lack of energy, they also spend the 7th year in laziness."

See also ASTRONOMY, sec. I, 5, (3), (4); JUBILEE YEAR.

William Baur

sa-be’-us (Sabbaias): In 1 Esdras 9:32, the same as "Shemaiah" in Ezr 10:31.

sa’-bi:

(1) Codex Alexandrinus Sabei; Codex Vaticanus Tobeis, Fritzache; the King James Version, Sami): Eponym of a family of porters who returned with Zerubbabel (1 Esdras 5:28) =" Shobai" in Ezr 2:42; Ne 7:45.

(2) The King James Version = the Revised Version (British and American) SABIE (which see).

sa-bi’-as (Sabias, Fritzsche, Asabias; the King James Version Assabias): One of the six "captains over thousands" who supplied the Levites with much cattle for Josiah’s Passover (1 Esdras 1:9) =" Hashabiah" in 2Ch 35:9.

sa’-bi-e (Sabeie, or Sabie; the King James Version Sabi): In 1 Esdras 5:34 both the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American), following Codex Alexandrinus, read "the sons of Phacareth, the sons of Sabie" (the King James Version "Sabi") for the "Pochereth-hazzebaim" of Ezr 2:57; Ne 7:59. Codex Vaticanus reads correctly as one proper name: "Phacareth Sabie."

SABTA or SABTAH

sab’-ta (cabhta’, cabhtah): Third son of Cush (Ge 10:7 = 1Ch 1:9). A place Sabta is probably to be looked for in South Arabia. Arab geographers give no exact equivalent of the name. Al Bekri (i.65) quotes a line of early poetry in which Dhu ‘l Sabta is mentioned, and the context might indicate a situation in Yemamah; but the word is possibly not a proper name. It is usually identified with Saubatha (Ptol., vi.7, 38) or with the Sabota of Pliny (vi.32; xii.32), an old mercantile city in South Arabia celebrated for its trade in frankincense and, according to Ptolemy, possessing 60 temples. It is said also to have been the territory of a king Elisarus, whose name presents a striking resemblance to Dhu ‘l-Adhar, one of the "Tubbas" or Himyarite kings of Yemen. Another conjecture is the Saphtha of Ptolemy (vi.7, 30) near the Arabian shore of the Persian Gulf.

A. S. Fulton

sab’te-ka (cabhtekha’; Sabakatha, Sebethacha; the King James Version Sabtechah): The 5th named of the sons of Cush in the genealogy of Ge 10:5-7. In 1Ch 1:8,9 the King James Version reads "Sabtecha," the Revised Version (British and American) "Sabteca." Many conjectures have been made as to the place here indicated. Recently Glazer (Skizze, II, 252) has revived the suggestion of Bochart that it is to be identified with Samydake in Carmania on the East of the Persian Gulf. This seems to rest on nothing more than superficial resemblance of the names; but the phonetic changes involved are difficult. Others have thought of various places in Arabia, toward the Persian Gulf; but the data necessary for any satisfactory decision are not now available.

W. Ewing

sa’-kar (sakhar):

(1) Father of Ahiam, a follower of David (1Ch 11:35, Codex Vaticanus Achar; Codex Alexandrinus Sachar =" Sharar" of 2Sa 23:33; Sharar is favored as the original reading).

(2) Eponym of a family of gatekeepers (1Ch 26:4).

sak’-but.

See MUSIC, III, 1, (f).

sak’-kloth.

See BURIAL.

sak’-ra-ments:

1. The Term:

The word "sacrament" comes from the Latin sacramentum, which in the classical period of the language was used in two chief senses:

(1) as a legal term to denote the sum of money deposited by two parties to a suit which was forfeited by the loser and appropriated to sacred uses;

(2) as a military term to designate the oath of obedience taken by newly enlisted soldiers.

Whether referring to an oath of obedience or to something set apart for a sacred purpose, it is evident that sacramentum would readily lend itself to describe such ordinances as Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. In the Greek New Testament, however, there is no word nor even any general idea corresponding to "sacrament," nor does the earliest history of Christianity afford any trace of the application of the term to certain rites of the church. Pliny (circa 112 AD) describes the Christians of Bithynia as "binding themselves by a sacramentum to commit no kind of crime" (Epistles x.97), but scholars are now pretty generally agreed that Pliny here uses the word in its old Roman sense of an oath or solemn obligation, so that its occurrence in this passage is nothing more than an interesting coincidence.

It is in the writings of Tertullian (end of 2nd and beginning of 3rd century) that we find the first evidence of the adoption of the word as a technical term to designate Baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and other rites of the Christian church. This Christian adoption of sacramentum may have been partly occasioned by the evident analogies which the word suggests with Baptism and the Lord’s Supper; but what appears to have chiefly determined its history in this direction was the fact that in the Old Latin versions (as afterward in the Vulgate) it had been employed to translate the Greek musterion, "a mystery" (e.g. Eph 5:32; 1Ti 3:16; Re 1:20; 17:7)—an association of ideas which was greatly fostered in the early church by the rapidly growing tendency to an assimilation of Christian worship with the mystery-practices of the Greek-Roman world.

2. Nature and Number:

Though especially employed to denote Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, the name "sacraments" was for long used so loosely and vaguely that it was applied to facts and doctrines of Christianity as well as to its symbolic rites. Augustine’s definition of a sacrament as "the visible form of an invisible grace" so far limited its application. But we see how widely even a definition like this might be stretched when we find Hugo of Victor (12th century) enumerating as many as 30 sacraments that had been recognized in the church. The Council of Trent was more exact when it declared that visible forms are sacraments only when they represent an invisible grace and become its channels, and when it sought further to delimit the sacramental area by reenacting (1547) a decision of the Council of Florence (1439), in which for the first time the authority of the church was given to a suggestion of Peter Lombard (12th century) and other schoolmen that the number of the sacraments should be fixed at seven, namely, Baptism, Confirmation, the Eucharist, Penance, Extreme Unction, Orders, and Matrimony—a suggestion which was supported by certain fanciful analogies designed to show that seven was a sacred number.

The divergence of the Protestant churches from this definition and scheme was based on the fact that these proceeded on no settled principles. The notion that there are seven sacraments has no New Testament authority, and must be described as purely arbitrary; while the definition of a sacrament is still so vague that anything but an arbitrary selection of particulars is impossible. It is perfectly arbitrary, for example, to place Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, which were instituted by Christ as ordinances of the church, in the same category with marriage, which rests not on His appointment but on a natural relationship between the sexes that is as old as the human race. While, therefore, the Reformers retained the term "sacrament" as a convenient one to express the general idea that has to be drawn from the characteristics of the rites classed together under this name, they found the distinguishing marks of sacraments

(1) in their institution by Christ,

(2) in their being enjoined by Him upon His followers,

(3) in their being bound up with His word and revelation in such a way that they become "the expressions of divine thoughts, the visible symbols of divine acts."

And, since Baptism and the Lord’s Supper are the only two rites for which such marks can be claimed, it follows that there are only two New Testament sacraments. Their unique place in the original revelation justifies us in separating them from all other rites and ceremonies that may have arisen in the history of the church, since it raises them to the dignity of forming an integral part of the historical gospel. A justification for their being classed together under a common name may be found, again, in the way in which they are associated in the New Testament (Ac 2:41,42; 1Co 10:1-4) and also in the analogy which Paul traces between Baptism and the Lord’s Supper on the one hand, and Circumcision and the Passover—the two most distinctive rites of the Old Covenant—on the other (Col 2:11; 1Co 5:7; 11:26).

3. Institution by Christ:

The assumption made above, that both Baptism and the Lord’s Supper owe their origin as sacraments of the church to their definite appointment by Christ Himself, has been strongly challenged by some modern critics.

(1) In regard to Baptism it has been argued that as Mr 16:15 f occurs in a passage (16:9-20) which textual criticism has shown to have formed no part of the original Gospel, Mt 28:19, standing by itself, is too slender a foundation to support the belief that the ordinance rests upon an injunction of Jesus, more especially as its statements are inconsistent with the results of historical criticism. These results, it is affirmed, prove that all the narratives of the Forty Days are legendary, that Mt 28:19 in particular only canonizes a later ecclesiastical situation, that its universalism is contrary to the facts of early Christian history, and its Trinitarian formula "foreign to the mouth of Jesus" (see Harnack, History of Dogma, I, 79, and the references there given). It is evident, however, that some of these objections rest upon anti-supernatural pre-suppositions that really beg the question at issue, and others on conclusions for which real premises are wanting. Over against them all we have to set the positive and weighty fact that from the earliest days of Christianity Baptism appears as the rite of initiation into the fellowship of the church (Ac 2:38,41, et passim), and that even Paul, with all his freedom of thought and spiritual interpretation of the gospel, never questioned its necessity (compare Ro 6:3 ff; 1Co 12:13; Eph 4:5). On any other supposition than that of its appointment by our Lord Himself it is difficult to conceive how within the brief space of years between the death of Jesus and the apostle’s earliest references to the subject, the ordinance should not only have originated but have established itself in so absolute a manner for Jewish and Gentile Christians alike.

(2) In the case of the Lord’s Supper the challenge of its institution by Christ rests mainly upon the fact that the saying, "This do in remembrance of me," is absent from the Mark-Matthew text, and is found only in the Supper-narratives of Paul (1Co 11:24,25) and his disciple Luke (Lu 22:19). Upon this circumstance large structures of critical hypothesis have been reared. It has been affirmed that in the upper room Jesus was only holding a farewell supper with His disciples, and that it never occurred to Him to institute a feast of commemoration. It has further been maintained that the views of Jesus regarding the speedy consummation of His kingdom make it impossible that He should have dreamed of instituting a sacrament to commemorate His death. The significance of the feast was eschatological merely; it was a pledge of a glorious future hour in the perfected kingdom of God (see Mt 26:29 and parallels). And theory has even been advanced that the institution of this sacrament as an ordinance of the church designed to commemorate Christ’s death was due to the initiative of Paul, who is supposed to have been influenced in this direction by what he had seen in Corinth and elsewhere of the mystery-practices of the Greek world.

All these hypothetical fabrics fall, of course, to the ground if the underlying assumption that Jesus never said, "This do in remembrance of me," is shown to be unwarrantable. And it is unwarrantable to assume that a saying of Jesus which is vouched for by Paul and Luke cannot be authentic because it does not occur in the corresponding narratives of Matthew and Mark. In these narratives, which are highly compressed in any case, the first two evangelists would seem to have confined themselves to setting down those sayings which formed the essential moments of the Supper and gave its symbolic contents. The command of its repetition they may have regarded as sufficiently embodied and expressed in the universal practice of the church from the earliest days. For as to that practice there is no question (Ac 2:42,46; 20:7; 1Co 10:16; 11:26), and just as little that it rested upon the belief that Christ had enjoined it. "Every assumption of its having originated in the church from the recollection of intercourse with Jesus at table, and the necessity felt for recalling His death, is precluded" (Weizsacker, Apostolic Age, II, 279). That the simple historical supper of Jesus with His disciples in the upper room was converted by Paul into an institution for the Gentile and Jewish churches alike is altogether inconceivable. The primitive church had its bitter controversies, but there is no trace of any controversy as to the origin and institutional character of the Lord’s Supper.

4. Efficacy:

In the New Testament the sacraments are presented as means of grace. Forgiveness (Ac 2:38), cleansing (Eph 5:25 f), spiritual quickening (Col 2:12) are associated with Baptism; the Lord’s Supper is declared to be a participation in the body and blood of Christ (1Co 10:16). So far all Christians are agreed; but wide divergence shows itself thereafter. According to the doctrine of the Roman church, sacraments are efficacious ex opere operato, i.e. in virtue of a power inherent in themselves as outward acts whereby they communicate saving benefits to those who receive them without opposing any obstacle. The Reformed doctrine, on the other hand, teaches that their efficacy lies not in themselves as outward acts, but in the blessing of Christ and the operation of His Spirit, and that it is conditioned by faith in the recipient. The traditional Lutheran doctrine agrees with the Reformed in affirming that faith is necessary as the condition of saving benefits in the use of the sacraments, but resembles the Roman teaching in ascribing the efficacy of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, not to the attendant working of the Holy Spirit, but to a real inherent and objective virtue resident in them—a virtue, however, which does not lie (as the Roman church says) in the mere elements and actions of the sacraments, but in the power of the divine word which they embody.

See BAPTISM; LORD’S SUPPER.

LITERATURE.

Candlish, The Christian Sacraments; Lambert, The Sacraments in the New Testament; Bartlet, Apostolic Age, 495 ff; Hodge, Systematic Theology, III, chapter xx.

J. C. Lambert

hu’-man: As an expression of religious devotion, human sacrifice has been widespread at certain stages of the race’s development. The tribes of Western Asia were deeply affected by the practice, probably prior to the settlement of the Hebrews in Palestine, and it continued at least down to the 5th century BC. At times of great calamity, anxiety and danger, parents sacrificed their children as the greatest and most costly offering which they could make to propitiate the anger of the gods and thus secure their favor and help. There is no intimation in the Bible that enemies or captives were sacrificed; only the offering of children by their parents is mentioned. The belief that this offering possessed supreme value is seen in Mic 6:6 f, where the sacrifice of the firstborn is the climax of a series of offerings which, in a rising scale of values, are suggested as a means of propitiating the angry Yahweh. A striking example of the rite as actually practiced is seen in 2Ki 3:27, where Mesha the king of Moab (made famous by the Moabite Stone), under the stress of a terrible siege, offered his eldest son, the heir-apparent to the throne, as a burnt offering upon the wall of Kir-hareseth. As a matter of fact this horrid act seems to have had the effect of driving off the allies.

As in the case of the Canaanites, the only specific cases of human sacrifice mentioned among the Israelites are those of the royal princes, sons of Ahaz and Manasseh, the two kings of Judah who were most deeply affected by the surrounding heathen practices and who, at the same time, fell into great national distress (2Ki 16:3; 2Ch 28:3; 2Ki 21:6; 2Ch 33:6). But it is clear from many general statements that the custom was widespread among the masses of the people as well. It is forbidden in the Mosaic legislation (Le 18:21; 20:2-5; De 18:10); it is said in 2Ki 17:17 that the sacrifice of sons and daughters was one of the causes of the captivity of the ten tribes. Jeremiah charges the people of the Southern Kingdom with doing the same thing (Jer 7:31; 19:5; 31:35); with these general statements agree Isa 57:5; Eze 16:2 f; 20:31; 23:37; Ps 106:37 f. A study of these passages makes it certain that in the period immediately before the captivity of Judah, human sacrifice was by no means confined to the royal family, but was rather common among the people. Daughters as well as sons were sacrificed. It is mentioned only once in connection with the Northern Kingdom, and then only in the summary of the causes of their captivity (2Ki 17:17), but the Southern Kingdom in its later years was evidently deeply affected. There were various places where the bloody rite was celebrated (Jer 19:5), but the special high place, apparently built for the purpose, was in the Valley of Tophet or Hinnom (ge-hinnom, Gehenna) near Jerusalem (2Ch 28:3; 33:6). This great high place, built for the special purpose of human sacrifice (Jer 7:31; 32:35), was defiled by the good king Josiah in the hope of eradicating the cruel practice (2Ki 23:10).

The Biblical writers without exception look upon the practice with horror as the supreme point of national and religious apostasy, and a chief cause of national disaster. They usually term the rite "passing through fire," probably being unwilling to use the sacred term "sacrifice" in reference to such a revolting custom. There is no evidence of a continuance of the practice in captivity nor after the return. It is said, however, that the heathen Sepharvites, settled by the Assyrian kings in the depopulated territory of the Northern Kingdom, "burnt their children in the fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim" (2Ki 17:31). The practice is not heard of again, and probably rapidly died out. The restored Israelites were not affected by it.

Compare SACRIFICE (Old Testament), VI, 10.

William Joseph McGlothlin

IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

I. TERMS OF SACRIFICE EPITOMIZED

II. ATTITUDE OF JESUS AND NEW TESTAMENT WRITERS TO THE OLD TESTAMENT SACRIFICIAL SYSTEM

1. Jesus’ Attitude

2. Paul’s Attitude

3. Attitude of the Author of Hebrews

III. THE SACRIFICIAL IDEA IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

1. Teaching of John the Baptist

2. Teaching of Jesus

3. Teaching of Peter

4. Paul’s Teaching

5. Teaching of Hebrews

6. Johannine Teaching

IV. RELATION OF CHRIST’S SACRIFICE TO MAN’S SALVATION

1. Redemption or Deliverance from Curse of Sin

2. Reconciliation

3. Remission of Sins

4. The Cancellation of Guilt

5. Justification or Right Standing with God

6. Cleansing or Sanctification

7. Sonship

V. HOW CHRIST’S SACRIFICE PROCURES SALVATION

1. Jesus’ Teaching

2. Paul’s Teaching

3. Teaching of Hebrews

4. Petrine and Johannine Teaching

VI. RATIONALE OF THE EFFICACY OF CHRIST’S SACRIFICE

1. Jesus’ Teaching

2. Paul’s Teaching

3. The Teaching in Hebrews

VII. THE HUMAN CONDITIONS OF APPLICATION

1. Universal in Objective Potentiality

2. Efficacious When Subjectively Applied

VIII. THE CHRISTIAN’S LIFE THE LIFE OF SACRIFICE

1. Consequence of Christ’s Sacrifice

2. Christ’s Death the Appeal for Christian’s Sacrifice

3. Necessary to Fill Out Christ’s Sacrifice

4. Content of the Christian’s Sacrifice

5. The Supper as a Sacrifice

LITERATURE

I. Terms of Sacrifice Epitomized.

The word "offering" (prosphora) describes the death of Christ, once in Paul (Eph 5:2); 5 times in Hebrews (Heb 10:5,8,10,14,18). The verb prosphero, "to offer," is also used, 15 times in Hebrews (Heb 5:1,3; 8:3,4; 9:7,14,25,28; 10:1,8,11,12; 11:4). The noun prosphora occurs 15 times in the Septuagint, usually as the translation of minchah, "sacrifice." This noun in the New Testament refers to Old Testament sacrifices in Ac 7:42; 21:26; to the offering of money in Ac 24:17; Ro 15:16. The verb anaphero, also occurs 3 times in Hebrews (7:27; 9:28; 13:15); also in 1Pe 2:5.

The word "sacrifice" (thusia in the Septuagint translates 8 different Hebrew words for various kinds of sacrifice, occurring about 350 times) refers to Christ’s death, once in Paul (Eph 5:2) 5 times in Heb (5:1; 9:23,26; 10:12,26). It refers several times to Old Testament sacrifice and 5 times to Christian living or giving (Php 2:17; 4:18; Heb 13:15,16; 1Pe 2:5). The verb "to sacrifice" (thuo) is used once by Paul to describe Christ’s death (1Co 5:7).

The blood (haima) of Christ is said to secure redemption or salvation, 6 times in Paul (Ro 3:25; 5:9; 1Co 10:16; Eph 1:7; 2:13; Col 1:20); 3 times in Hebrews (9:12,14; 10:19; compare also 10:29); 2 times in 1 Peter (1:2,19) and 5 times in the Johannine writings (1Joh 1:7; 5:6,8; Re 1:5). Unmistakably this figure of the blood refers to Christ’s sacrificial death. "In any case the phrase (en to autou haimati, ‘in his blood,’ Ro 3:25) carries with it the idea of sacrificial blood-shedding" (Sanday, Commentary on Epistle to Romans, 91).

(lutron, "ransom," the price paid for redeeming, occurring in Septuagint 19 times, meaning the price paid for redeeming the servant (Le 25:51,52); ransom for first-born (Nu 3:46); ransom for the life of the owner of the goring ox (Ex 21:30, etc.)) occurs in the New Testament only twice (Mt 20:28; Mr 10:45). This word is used by Jesus to signify the culmination of His sacrificial life in His sacrificial death.

(antilutron, "ransom," a word not found in Septuagint, stronger in meaning than the preceding word) occurs only once in the New Testament (1Ti 2:6).

(apolutrosis, "redemption," in Ex 21:8, meaning the ransom paid by a father to redeem his daughter from a cruel master) signifies

(1) deliverance from sin by Christ’s death, 5 times in Paul (Ro 3:24; 1Co 1:30; Eph 1:7,14; Col 1:14); once in Hebrews (9:15);

(2) general deliverance, twice (Lu 21:28; Heb 11:35);

(3) the Christian’s final deliverance, physical and spiritual (Ro 8:23; Eph 4:30).

The simple word (lutrosis, "redemption," 10 times in Septuagint as the translation of 5 Hebrew words) occurs once for spiritual deliverance (Heb 9:12).

(exagorazo, "redeem," only once in Septuagint, Da 2:8) in the New Testament means

(1) to deliver from the curse of the law, twice by Paul (Ga 3:13; 4:5);

(2) to use time wisely, twice by Paul (Eph 5:16; Col 4:5).

The simple verb (agorazo, meaning in Le 27:19 to redeem land) occurs twice in Paul (1Co 6:20; 7:23) and means "to redeem" (in a spiritual sense). katallage, "reconciliation," only twice in the Septuagint) means the relation to God into which men are brought by Christ’s death, 4 times by Paul (Ro 5:11; 11:15; 2Co 5:18,19).

(katallassein, "to reconcile," 4 times in Septuagint (3 times in 2 Maccabees)) means to bring men into the state of reconciliation with God, 5 times in Paul (Ro 5:10 twice; 2Co 5:18,19,20).

The words with the propitiatory idea occur as follows: (hilaskomai, "to propitiate," 12 times in the Septuagint, translated "to forgive") occurs twice (Lu 18:13; Heb 2:17); (hilasmos, 9 times in Septuagint, Nu 5:8; Ps 129 (130):4, etc.; "atonement," "forgiveness") occurs twice in 1 Joh (2:2; 4:10); (hilasterion, 24 times in the Septuagint, translates "mercy-seat," where God was gracious and spake to man) translates in the New Testament "propitiation" (Ro 3:25), "mercy-seat" (Heb 9:5).

Christ is called "the Lamb," amnos, twice by the Baptist (Joh 1:29,36); once by Philip applied to Christ from Isa 53:7 (Ac 8:32); and once by Peter (1Pe 1:19); arnion, 28 times in Re (5:6,8,12,13; 6:1,16; 7:9,10,14; 19:7,9; 21:9,14,22,23,27; 22:1,3).

The cross (stauros) is used by Paul 10 times to describe the sacrificial death of Christ (1Co 1:17,18; Ga 5:11; 6:12,14; Eph 2:16; Php 2:8; 3:18; 1Co 1:20; 2:14) and once by the author of Hebrews (12:2). Jesus also 5 times used the figure of the cross to define the life of sacrifice demanded of His disciples and to make His own cross the symbol of sacrifice (Mt 10:38; 16:24; Mr 8:34; Lu 9:23; 14:27, with contexts; compare Joh 3:14; 12:32, etc.).

Though it is not our province in this article to discuss the origin and history of sacrifice in the ethnic religions, it must be noted that sacrifice has been a chief element in almost every religion (Jainism and Buddhism being the principal exceptions). The bloody sacrifice, where the idea of propitiation is prominent, is well-nigh universal in the ethnic religions, being found among even the most enlightened peoples like the Greeks and Romans (see article "Expiation and Atonement" in ERE). Whether or not the system of animal sacrifices would have ceased not only in Judaism but also in all the ethnic religions, had not Jesus lived and taught and died, is a question of pure speculation. It must be conceded that the sect of the Jews (Essenes) attaining to the highest ethical standard and living the most unselfish lives of brotherhood and benevolence did not believe in animal sacrifices. But they exerted small influence over the Jewish nation as compared with the Pharisees. It is also to be noted that the prophets Amos, Hosea, Micah and Isaiah exalted the ethical far above the ceremonial; even denounced the sacrifice of animals if not accompanied by personal devotion to righteousness (Am 5:21 ff; Ho 6:6; Mic 6:6 ff; Isa 1:11 ). The Stoic and Platonic philosophers also attacked the system of animal sacrifices. But these exceptions only accentuate the historical fact that man’s sense of the necessity of sacrifice to Deity is well-nigh universal. Only the sacrifice of Christ and the destruction of Jerusalem caused a cessation of the daily, weekly, monthly and annual sacrifices among the Jews, and only the knowledge of Christ’s sacrifice of Himself will finally destroy the last vestige of animal sacrifice.

II. Attitude of Jesus and New Testament Writers to the Old Testament Sacrificial System.

1. Jesus’ Attitude:

Jesus never attacks the sacrificial system. He even takes for granted that the Jews should offer sacrifices (Mt 5:24). More than that, He accepted the whole sacrificial system, a part of the Old Testament scheme, as of divine origin, and so He commanded the cleansed leper to offer the sacrifice prescribed in the Mosaic code (Mt 8:4). There is no record that Jesus Himself ever worshipped by offering the regular sacrifices. But He worshipped in the temple, never attacking the sacrificial system as He did the oral law (Mr 7:6 ). On the other hand, Jesus undermined the sacrificial system by teaching that the ethical transcends the ceremonial, not only as a general principle, but also in the act of worship (Mt 5:23,24). He endorses Hosea’s fine ethical epigram, ‘God will have mercy and not sacrifice’ (Mt 9:13; 12:7). He also commends as near the kingdom the scribe who put love to God and man above sacrifice (Mr 12:33). But Jesus teaches not merely the inferiority of sacrifice to the moral law, but also the discontinuance of sacrifice as a system, when He said, "This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many" (Mr 14:24; Mt 26:28; Lu 22:20). Not only is the ethical superior to the ceremonial, but His sacrifice of Himself is as superior to the sacrifices of the old system as the new covenant is superior to the old.

2. Paul’s Attitude:

Paul’s estimate of the Jewish sacrifices is easily seen, although he does not often refer to them. Once only (Ac 21:26) after his conversion does he offer the Jewish sacrifice, and then as a matter of expediency for winning the Judaistic wing of Christianity to his universal gospel of grace. He regarded the sacrifices of the Old Testament as types of the true sacrifice which Christ made (1Co 5:7).

3. Attitude of the Author of Hebrews:

The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews discusses the Old Testament sacrifices more fully than other New Testament writers. He regards the bloody sacrifices as superior to the unbloody and the yearly sacririce on the Day of Atonement by the high priest as the climax of the Old Testament system. The high priest under the old covenant was the type of Christ under the new. The sacrifices of the old covenant could not take away sin, or produce moral transformation, because of the frailties of men (10:1-11), shown by the necessity of repeating the offerings (5:2), and because God had appointed another high priest, His Son, to supplant those of the old covenant (5:5; 7:1-28). The heart of this author’s teaching is that animal sacrifices cannot possibly atone for sin or produce moral transformation, since they are divinely-appointed only as a type or shadow of the one great sacrifice by Christ (8:7; 10:1).

To sum up, the New Testament writers, as well as Jesus, regarded the Old Testament sacrificial system as of divine origin and so obligatory in its day, but imperfect and only a type of Christ’s sacrifice, and so to be supplanted by His perfect sacrifice.

III. The Sacrificial Idea in the New Testament.

The one central idea of New Testament writers is that the sacrifice made by Christ on the cross is the final perfect sacrifice for the atonement of sin and the salvation of men, a sacrifice typified in the various sacrifices of the Old Testament, which are in turn abrogated by the operation of the final sacrifice. Only James and Jude among New Testament writers are silent as to the sacrifice of Christ, and they write for practical purposes only.

1. Teaching of John the Baptist:

The Baptist, it is true, presents Jesus as the coming Judge in the Synoptic Gospels, but in Joh 1:29,36 he refers to Him as "the Lamb of God," in the former passage adding "that taketh away the sin of the world." Westcott (Commentary on John, 20) says: "The title as applied to Christ .... conveys the ideas of vicarious suffering, of patient submission, of sacrifice, of redemption, etc." There is scarcely any doubt that the Baptist looked upon the Christ as the one who came to make the great sacrifice for man’s sins. Professor Burton (Biblical Ideas of Atonement, Burton, Smith and Smith, 107) says that John sees Christ "suffering under the load of human sin." 2. Teaching of Jesus:

There are recorded in the Synoptic Gospels two unmistakable references by Jesus to His death as a sacrifice (Mr 10:45 parallel Mt 20:28; Mr 14:24 parallel Mt 26:28 parallel Lu 22:20; compare 1Co 11:25). In the former He declares He came to give His "life a ransom." Thayer (Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament) says this word means "the price paid for redeeming." Hence, the idea in ransom must be of sacrificial significance. But if there could be any doubt as to the sacrificial import of this passage, there is a clear case of the sacrificial idea in Mr 14:24. Practically all writers of the New Testament theology, Wendt, Weiss, Stevens, Sheldon and others, hold that Jesus considered the death as the ratification sacrifice of the new covenant, just as the sacrifice offered at Sinai ratified the old covenant (Ex 24:3-8). Ritschl and Beyschlag deny that this passage is sacrificial. But according to most exegetes, Jesus in this reference regarded His death as a sacrifice. The nature of the sacrifice, as Jesus estimated it, is in doubt and is to be discussed later. What we are pressing here is the fact that Jesus regarded His death as a sacrifice. We have to concede the meagerness of material on the sacrificial idea of His death as taught by Jesus. Yet these two references are unquestioned by literary and historical critics. They both occur in Mark, the primitive Gospel (the oldest Gospel record of Jesus’ teachings). The first occurs in two of the Synoptists, the second in all three of them. Luke omits the first for reasons peculiar to his purpose. According to Lu 24:25, Jesus regarded His sufferings and death as the fulfillment of the Old Testament Scriptures.

3. Teaching of Peter:

Though the head apostle does not in the early chapters of Ac refer to Christ as the sacrifice for sin, he does imply as much in 2:36 (He is Lord and Christ in spite of His crucifixion); 3:18,19 (He fulfilled the prophecies by suffering, and by means of repentance sins are to be blotted out); 4:10-12 (only in His name is salvation) and in 5:30,31 (through whose death Israel received remission of sins). In his First Epistle (1Pe 1:18,19) he expressly declares that we are redeemed by the blood of the spotless Christ, thus giving the sacrificial significance to His death. The same is implied in 1Pe 1:2; 3:18.

4. Paul’s Teaching:

Paul ascribes saving efficacy to the blood of Christ in Ro 3:25; 5:9; 1Co 10:16; Eph 1:7; 2:13; Col 1:20. He identifies Christ with a sin offering in Ro 8:3, and perhaps also in 2Co 5:21, and with the paschal lamb in 1Co 5:7. In other passages he implies that the death of Christ secured redemption, forgiveness of sins, justification and adoption (Ro 3:24-26; 5:10,11; 8:15,17, etc.).

5. Teaching of Hebrews:

The argument of the author of Hebrews to prove the finality of Christianity is that Christ is superior to the Aaronic high priest, being a royal, eternal high priest, after the order of Melchizedek, and offering Himself as the final sacrifice for sin, and for the moral transformation of men (4:14; 10:18).

6. Johannine Teaching:

In the First Epistle of John (1 Joh 1:7; 2:2; 5:6,8) propitiation for sin and cleansing from sin are ascribed to the blood of Christ. In Re 1:5 John ascribes deliverance (not washing or cleansing, according to best manuscripts) from sin, to the blood of Christ. Several times he calls Christ the Lamb, making the sacrificial idea prominent. Once he speaks of Him as the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world (13:8).

To sum up, all the New Testament writers, except James and Jude, refer to Christ’s death as the great sacrifice for sin. Jesus Himself regarded His death as such. In the various types of New Testament teaching Christ’s death is presented

(1) as the covenant sacrifice (Mr 14:24 parallel Mt 26:28 parallel Lu 22:20; Heb 9:15-22);

(2) as the sin offering (Ro 8:3; 2Co 5:21; Heb 13:11; 1Pe 3:18);

(3) as the offering of the paschal lamb (1Co 5:7);

(4) as the sacrifice of the Day of Atonement (Heb 2:17; 9:12 ).

IV. Relation of Christ’s Sacrifice to Man’s Salvation.

The saving benefits specified in the New Testament as resulting from the sacrificial death of Christ are as follows:

1. Redemption or Deliverance from Curse of Sin:

Redemption or deliverance from the curse of sin: This must be the implication in Jesus’ words, "The Son of man also came .... to give his life a ransom for many" (Mr 10:45 parallel Mt 20:28). Man is a captive in sin, the Father sends His Son to pay the ransom price for the deliverance of the captive, and the Son’s death is the price paid. Paul also uses the words "redeemed" and "redemption" in the same sense. In the great letters he asserts that we are "justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: whom God set forth to be a propitiation .... in his blood" (Ro 3:24,25). Here the apostle traces justification back to redemption as the means for securing it, and redemption back to the "blood" (Christ’s death) as the cause of its procurement. That is, Christ’s death secures redemption and redemption procures justification. In Galatians (3:13), he speaks of being redeemed "from the curse of the law." The law involved man in a curse because he could not keep it. This curse is the penalty of the broken law which the transgressor must bear, unless deliverance from said penalty is somehow secured. Paul represents Christ by His death as securing for sinners deliverance from this curse of the broken law (compare Ga 4:5 for the same thought, though the word "curse" is not used). Paul also emphasizes the same teaching in the Captivity Epistles: "In whom we have our redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses" (Eph 1:7; compare Col 1:14). In the pastoral letters (1Ti 2:6) he teaches that Christ gave "himself a ransom for all." This is the only New Testament passage in which occurs the strong word antilutron for "ransom." In his old age the apostle feels more positively than ever before that Christ’s death is the ransom price of man’s deliverance from sin.

The author of Hebrews asserts that Christ by the sacrifice of Himself "obtained eternal redemption" for man (9:12). John says that Christ "loosed (luo) us from our sins by his blood" (Re 1:5). This idea in John is akin to that of redemption or deliverance by ransom. Peter teaches the same truth in 1Pe 1:19. So, we see, Jesus and all the New Testament writers regard Christ’s sacrifice as the procuring cause of human redemption.

2. Reconciliation:

The author of Hebrews also implies that Christ’s death secures reconciliation when he regards this death as the ratification of the "better covenant" (8:6 ff), and when he plays on the double meaning of the word (diatheke, 9:15 ff), now "covenant" and now "will," "testament." The death of Christ is necessary to secure the ratification of the new covenant which brings God and man into new relations (8:12). In 2:17 the author uses a word implying propitiation as wrought by the death of Christ. So the doctrine of reconciliation is also in the Epistle to the Hebrews. John teaches reconciliation with God through Christ our Advocate, but does not expressly connect it with His death as the procuring cause (1 Joh 2:1,2). Peter is likewise silent on this point.

3. Remission of Sins:

Reconciliation implies that God can forgive; yea, has forgiven. Jesus and the New Testament writers declare the death of Christ to be the basis of God’s forgiveness. Jesus in instituting the memorial supper said, "This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many unto remission of sins" (Mt 26:28). It is true Mark and Luke do not record this last phrase, "unto remission of sins." But there is no intimation that this phrase is the result of Matthew’s theologizing on the purpose of Christ’s death (see Wendt, Teaching of Jesus, II, 239 ff, who claims this phrase is not from Jesus; also Allen in "Mt," ICC, in the place cited.). But Paul leaves no doubt as to the connection between man’s forgiveness by God and Christ’s sacrifice for him. This idea is rooted in the great passage on justification (Ro 3:21-5:21; see especially 4:7); is positively declared in Eph 1:7; Col 1:14. The author of Heb teaches that the shedding of Christ’s blood under the new covenant is as necessary to secure forgiveness as the shedding of animal’s blood under the old. John also implies that forgiveness is based on the blood (1 Joh 1:7-9).

4. The Cancellation of Guilt:

True reconciliation and forgiveness include the canceling of the offender’s guilt. Jesus has no direct word on the cancellation of guilt. Paul closes his argument for the universality of human sin by asserting that "all the world may be brought under the judgment of God" (the King James Version "guilty before God," Ro 3:19). Thayer (Greek-English Lexicon, in the place cited.) says this word "guilty" means "owing satisfaction to God" (liable to punishment by God). But in Ro 8:1,3 Paul exclaims, "There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus .... God, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin" (the English Revised Version and the American Revised Version margin "as an offering for sin"). The guilt, or exposure of the sinner to God’s wrath and so to punishment, is removed by the sin offering which Christ made. This idea is implied by the author of Hebrews (2:15), but is not expressed in Peter and John.

5. Justification or Right Standing with God:

Right standing with God is also implied in the preceding idea. Forgiving sin and canceling guilt are the negative, bringing into right standing with God the positive, aspects of the same transaction. "Him who knew no sin he made to be sin (i.e. the sin offering; so Augustine and other Fathers, Ewald, Ritschl; see Meyer, Commentary, in loc., who denies this meaning) on our behalf; that we might become the righteousness of God in him" (2Co 5:21). In this passage Paul makes justification the divine purpose of the sacrificial death of Christ. This thought is elaborated by the apostle in Galatians and Romans, but is not expressed by Jesus, or in Hebrews, in Peter or in John.

6. Cleansing or Sanctification:

7. Sonship:

Divine sonship of the believer is also traced by Paul to the sacrificial death of Christ (Ro 8:17), though this thought is not found in other New Testament writers.

So, we sum up, the whole process of salvation, from reconciliation with God to the adoption of the saved sinner into heaven’s household, is ascribed, to some extent by Jesus, largely by Paul theologian of the New Testament, and, in varying degrees, by other New Testament writers, to the sacrificial death of Christ. Even Holtzmann (Neutest. Theol., II, 111) admits "It is upon the moment of death that the grounding of salvation is exclusively concentrated."

V. How Christ’s Sacrifice Procures Salvation.

It must be conceded that the New Testament writers, much less Jesus, did not discuss this subject from the philosophical point of view. Jesus never philosophizes except incidentally. Paul, the author of He, and John had a philosophy underlying their theology, the first and second dealing most with the sacrificial work of Christ, the last with His person. But Paul and the author of Heb did not write their letters to produce a philosophical system explaining how Christ’s sacrificial death can and does procure man’s salvation.

1. Jesus’ Teaching:

By some it is claimed that the word "ransom" (Mr 10:45) gives us the key to the philosophy of the atonement as presented by Jesus Himself. But the rules of exegesis are against this supposition. Jesus in the context is teaching His disciples that sacrificial service is greatness. To illustrate the truth He refers to His own example of coming to "minister, and to give his life a ransom for many." That is, Jesus is enforcing a practical principle and not elaborating a theoretical truth. Moreover, the word "ransom" is used metaphorically, and the laws of exegesis forbid us to press the literal meaning of a figure. The figure suggests captivity in sin and deliverance by payment of a price (the death of Christ). But Jesus does not tell us how His sacrificial death can and does pay the price for man’s redemption from sin. The word "ransom" does give the clue to the development of the vicarious sacrifice elaborated later by Paul. Ritschl (Rechtfertigung und Versohnung, II, 85) does not do the word "ransom" justice when he claims that it merely reproduces the meaning of the Hebrew kopher, "covering as a protection," and that Christ’s death, like a covering, delivers us by stimulating us to lead the life of sacrificial service as Christ did. Wendt (Lehre Jesu, II, 237; Teaching of Jesus, II, 226 f) admits the "ransom"-idea in the word, but says Christ delivers us from bondage to suffering and death, not by His death, but by His teaching which is illustrated by His sacrificial death. Beyschlag (Neutest. Theol., I, 153) thinks Christ’s death delivers us from worldly ambitions and such sins by showing us the example of Jesus in sacrifice. Weiss (Biblical Theology of the New Testament, I, 101-3) thinks Christ’s "surrender of His life .... avails as a ransom which He gives instead of the many" who were not able to pay the price themselves. He also adds, "The saying regarding the ransom lays emphasis upon the God-pleasing performance of Jesus which secures the salvation," etc.

Nor does Jesus’ saying at the Last Supper, "This is my blood of the covenant" (Mr 14:24) give us unmistakable evidence of how His death saves men. It does teach that sinners on entering the kingdom come into a new covenant relation with God which implies forgiveness of sin and fellowship with God, and that, as the covenant sacrifices at Mt. Sinai (Ex 24:3-8) ratified the legal covenant between God and His people, so the death of Christ as a covenant sacrifice ratifies the covenant of grace between God and lost sinners, by virtue of which covenant God on His part forgives the penitent sinner, and the surrendering sinner on his part presents himself to God for the life of sacrifice. But this statement fails to tell us how God can forgive sin on the basis of a covenant thus ratified by Christ’s death. Does it mean substitution, that as the animal whose blood ratified the covenant was slain instead of the people, so Christ was slain in the place of sinners? Or does it suggest the immutability of the covenant on the basis of the animal’s (and so Christ’s) representing both God and man, and killing signifying loss of life or will to change the covenant (so Westcott, Commentary on Hebrews, 301)? It could scarcely mean that Christ’s sacrifice was the offering of a perfect, acceptable life to God (Wendt, op. cit., II, 237), or that Christ’s death is viewed merely as the common meal sacrifice, that God and His people thus enter into a kind of union and communion (so some evolutionists in the study of comparative religion; see Menzies. Hist of Religion, 416 ff).

2. Paul’s Teaching:

Ritschl and many modern scholars are disposed to reject all philosophy in religion. They say, "Back to Christ." Paul was only a human interpreter of Jesus. But he was a divinely-guided interpreter, and we need his first-hand interpretations of Jesus. What has he to say as to how Christ’s death saves men?

(1) The Words Expressing the Idea of Redemption.

See above on the terms of sacrifice. The classical passage containing the idea of redemption is Ro 3:24-26: "Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: whom God set forth to be a propitiation, through faith, in his blood, to show his righteousness because of the passing over of the sins done aforetime, in the forbearance of God; for the showing, I say, of his righteousness at this present season: that he might himself be just, and the justifier of him that hath faith in Jesus." A fair interpretation of this passage gives us the following propositions: (a) The believer obtains right standing with God by means of, through the channel of (see Thayer, Greek-English Lexicon, dia, A, III, 2), redemption which is in Christ. (b) This redemption in Christ involves, or is based upon, the divinely-purposed propitiation which Christ made in His death. (c) The design of God in making such a propitiation was the exhibition of His righteousness; i.e., the vindication of that side of His character which demands the punishment of sin, which had not been shown in former generations when His forbearance passed over men’s sins. See Sanday, Commentary on Romans, in the place cited. The classical passage containing the other word to redeem (exagorazo) is Ga 3:13: "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us," etc. Professor E. D. Burton (AJT, October, 1907) thinks:

(a) Law here means "law legalistically understood."

(b) The "curse" was the verdict of the law of pure legalism, "a disclosure to man of his actual status before God on a basis of merit."

(c) The redemption meant is that Christ "brought to an end the regime of law .... rather than deliverance of individuals through release from penalty."

He bases this argument largely on the use of hemas, "us," meaning Jews in antithesis with ethne, the Gentiles (Ga 3:14). Everett (The Gospel of Paul) thinks that Christ was cursed in that He was "crucified" (the manner not the fact of His death being the curse); that is, as Everett sees it, Christ became ceremonially unclean, and so free from the law. So does His follower by being crucified with Christ become ceremonially unclean and so free from the law. The passage seems to give us the following propositions:

(a) Man under law (whether the revealed law of the Old Testament or the moral law) is under a "curse," that is, liable to the penalty which the broken law demands.

(b) Christ by His death on the cross became a "curse for us."

(c) By means of Christ thus becoming a "curse for us" He delivered us, "not the Jews as a nation, but all of us, Jews and Gentiles, who believed," from the curse incurred by the breaking of the law.

Professor Burton admits that the participle genomenos, "becoming," may be a "participle of means" (the article cited above, 643), and so we have "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us." The passage at least suggests, if it does not declare, that Christ saves us by vicariously enduring the penalty to which we were exposed.

(2) The Idea of Reconciliation.

Paul uses the phrase "wrath of God" (Ro 1:18, etc.) to express the attitude of God toward sin, an attitude of displeasure and of grief, of revulsion of holy character which demands the punishment of sin. On the other hand, God loves the sinner; love is the prompting cause of redemption through Christ (Ro 5:8; 8:32). That is, wrath is love grieving and righteousness revolting because of sin, and both phases may act simultaneously (Simon, Redemption of Man, 216, to the contrary). So Paul says, "God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not reckoning unto them their trespasses" (2Co 5:19). Now this word "reconcile" (katallassein) means in the active, "to receive into favor," in the passive, "to be restored to favor" (Thayer). See also Revelation and The Expositor, October, 1909, 600 ff, where Professor Estes shows, from Sophocles, Xenophon, Josephus, Septuagint and passages in the New Testament like Mt 5:24, that the word must mean a change in the attitude of God toward men and not merely a change of men toward God. Practically the same is taught by Meyer (Commentary on 2 Corinthians); Lipsius (Handcomm. zum New Testament); Sanday (Commentary on Romans); Denney (Exegetical Greek Testament on Romans); Lietzmann (Handbuch zum New Testament); Holtzmann (Neutest. Theol.); Weiss (Religion of the New Testament); Pfleiderer (Paulinism); Stevens (Christian Doctrine of Salvation), and in nearly all the great commentaries on Romans and 2 Corinthians, and by all the writers on New Testament theology except Beyschlag.

See also RECONCILIATION; RETRIBUTION.

(3) The Idea of Propitiation.

Only once (Ro 3:25) does Paul use the word "propitiation." As saw in (1) above, the redemption in Christ is based upon the propitiation which Christ made in His death. Thayer (Greek-English Lexicon, in the place cited.) says the noun signifies "a means of appeasing, expiating, a propitiation, an expiatory sacrifice." He thinks it has this meaning in Ro 3:25, but refers it to the "mercy-seat" in Heb 9:5. Sanday (Comm. on Rom, 88) regards hilasterion as an adjective meaning "propitiatory." De Wette, Fritzsche, Meyer, Lipsius and many others take it in this sense; Gifford, Vaughan, Liddon, Ritschl think it means "mercy-seat" here as in Hebrews. But with either meaning the blood of Christ is viewed as securing the mercy of God. Propitiation of God is made by the blood of Christ, and because of that men have access to the mercy-seat where shines the glory of God in His forgiveness of man’s sins.

See ROMANS, EPISTLE TO THE, 9, (3).

(4) The Prepositions Huper, and Anti.

Paul never uses anti ("for," "instead of," "in place of," so Thayer) to express what Christ’s sacrifice does for the sinner, but huper ("for one’s safety or advantage," primarily, but also "in the place of," "instead of," so Thayer). See Ro 5:8; 8:32; 14:15; 1Co 11:24; 2Co 5:15; Ga 3:13; Eph 5:2,25; 1Th 5:10; 1Ti 2:6; Tit 2:14. It is to be noted that in 1Ti 2:6 Paul uses antilutron, "ransom," compounded with the preposition anti, but follows it with huper, which may suggest that huper is here used in the sense of anti, "in the place of."

Summing up Paul’s teaching as to how Christ’s sacrifice saves:

(a) The propitiatory sacrifice does not "soften God, or assuage the anger of God" (as Bushnell claims the advocates of the satisfaction theories assert, Vicarious Sacrifice, 486). God is already willing to save men, His love makes the propitiatory sacrifice (Ro 5:8). God’s love makes the sacrifice, not the sacrifice His willingness to save.

(b) But man by breaking God’s law had come under the curse, the penalty of the broken law (Ga 3:13), and so was under God’s wrath (Ro 1:18), i.e. man’s sin exposed him to punishment, while at the same time God’s love for the sinner was grieved.

(c) Christ by His sacrificial death made it possible for God to show His righteousness and love at the same time; i.e. that He did punish sin, but did love the sinner and wish to save him (Ro 3:25,26; 5:8).

(d) Christ, who was sinless, suffered vicariously for sinful men. His death was not due to His sins but those of men (2Co 5:21).

(e) His death, followed by His resurrection which marked Him off as the sinless Son of God, and so appointed the Saviour of men (Ro 1:4), was designed by God to bring men into right relation with God (Ro 3:26; 2Co 5:21).

3. Teaching of Hebrews:

The author of Hebrews adds nothing to Paul’s teaching respecting the method whereby Christ’s sacrifice operates in saving men. His purpose to produce an apology showing forth the superior efficacy of Christ’s high-priestly sacrifice over that of the Aaronic priesthood fixes his first thought on the efficacy of the sacrifice rather than on its mode of operation. He does use the words "redemption" (9:12; compare 9:15), "propitiate" (2:17), and emphasizes the opening up of the heavenly holy of holies by the high-priestly sacrifice of Christ (the way of access to the very presence of God by Christ’s death, 10:19,20), which gives us data for forming a system based on a real propitiation for sin and reconciliation of God similar to the Pauline teaching formulated above.

4. Petrine and Johannine Teaching:

Peter asserts that Christ suffered vicariously (1Pe 2:22-24), who, although He "did no sin," "his own self bare our sins in his body upon the tree"; who "suffered for sins once, the righteous for (huper, not anti) the unrighteous" (1Pe 3:18). But Peter goes no farther than Paul (perhaps not so far) in elaborating how Jesus’ vicarious suffering saves the sinner. The Johannine writings contain the propitiatory idea (1 Joh 2:2; 4:10), although John writes to emphasize the incarnation and not the work of the Incarnate One (Joh 1:1-18; 1 Joh 4:2,3).

To sum up the New Testament teachings on the mode or operation: Jesus asserts His vicarious suffering (Mr 10:45; compare Joh 10:11) and hints at the mode of its operation by using the "ransom" figure. Paul, Peter and John teach that Christ’s sacrifice was vicarious, and all but Peter suggest the idea of propitiation as to the mode of its operation. There is no direct discussion of what propitiation means.

VI. Rationale of the Efficacy of Christ’s Sacrifice.

1. Jesus’ Teaching:

Jesus emphasizes His voluntary spirit in making the sacrifice. "The Son of man also came .... to give his life a ransom." The sacrifice was voluntary, not compulsory. God did not force Him to lay down His life; He chose to do so (compare Joh 10:11). But Jesus gives us no philosophy on this or any other element in His sacrifice as being the ground of its efficacy.

2. Paul’s Teaching:

Paul also emphasizes the voluntary gift of Christ (Ga 2:20), but he urges rather the dignity of Him who makes the sacrifice as a ground of its efficacy. It is the sacrifice of God’s Son, shown to be such in His resurrection (Ro 1:4; 4:25). It was no ordinary man but the sinless Son who gave "himself" (Ga 2:20). It was not merely a dying Christ but the Son who rose again "in power" (Ro 1:4), who secures our "justification" (Ro 4:25; 1Co 15:3,4,17). Paul also emphasizes the sinless life and character of Jesus as a ground of efficacy in Christ’s sacrifice, "who knew no sin" in His life experience (2Co 5:21).

3. The Teaching in Hebrews:

The author of Hebrews, most of all New Testament writers, elaborates the grounds of efficacy in Christ’s sacrifice.

(1) It was a personal not an animal sacrifice (9:12-14; 9:26, "sacrifice of himself"; 10:4).

(2) It was the sacrifice of the Son of God (3:5).

(3) It was a royal person who made the sacrifice (6:20b; 7:1, "after the order of Melchizedek .... king of Salem").

(4) It was a sinless person (7:26,27; 9:14; 10:10,12). Westcott, Commentary on Hebrews, 298, well says, "It becomes necessary, therefore, in order to gain a complete view of the Sacrifice of Christ, to combine with the crowning act upon the Cross His fulfillment of the will of God from first to last, the Sacrifice of Life with the Sacrifice of Death."

(5) It was an eternal person (6:20, "for ever"; 7:16, "after the power of an endless (margin "indissoluble") life").

The author of Hebrews reaches the climax of his argument for the superior efficacy of Christ’s sacrifice when he represents Him as entering the holy of holies in the very presence of God to complete the offering for man’s sin (8:1,2; 9:11,12,24).

Peter and John do not discuss the ground of efficacy, and so add nothing to our conclusions above. The efficacy of the sacrifice is suggested by describing the glory of the person (1Pe 1:19; 2:22,23; 1 Joh 1:7; 2:2).

To sum up our conclusion as to the efficacy of Christ’s sacrifice: Jesus and the leading New Testament writers intimate that the efficacy of His sacrifice centers in His personality. Jesus, Peter and John do not discuss the subject directly. Paul, though discussing it more extensively, does not do so fully, but the author of Heb centers and culminates his argument for the finality of Christianity, in the superior efficacy of Christ’s sacrifice, which is grounded in His personality, divine, royal, sinless, eternal (see Menegoz, Theol. de l’Ep. aux Hebreux). It is easy to see, from the position taken by the author of He, how Anselm in Cur Deus Homo developed his theory of satisfaction, according to which the Divinity in Christ gave His atoning sacrifice its priceless worth in God’s eyes.

VII. The Human Conditions of Application.

1. Universal in Objective Potentiality:

The sacrificial death of Christ is universal in its objective potentiality, according to Jesus (Lu 24:47, "unto all the nations"); according to Paul (Ro 1:5; 5:18; 11:32; 2Co 5:14,15; Ga 3:14); according to the author of Hebrews (2:9, "taste of death for every man"); according to John (1 Joh 2:2, "propitiation .... for the whole world").

2. Efficacious When Subjectively Applied:

But the objective redemption to be efficacious must be subjectively applied. The blood of Christ is the universally efficacious remedy for the sin-sick souls of men, but each man must make the subjective application. How is the application made? And the threefold answer is, by repentance, by faith, and by obedience.

(1) By Repentance.

(2) By Faith.

Jesus connected faith with repentance (Mr 1:15) as the condition of receiving the Messianic salvation. Paul makes faith the all-inclusive means of applying the work of Christ. The gospel is "the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth" (Ro 1:16); "whom God set forth to be a propitiation, through faith" (Ro 3:25); "faith (not works) is reckoned for righteousness" (Ro 4:5); "justified by faith" (Ro 5:1). In Galatians, the letters to the Corinthians, in the Captivity and the Pastoral Epistles he emphasizes faith as the sole condition of receiving salvation. But what kind of faith is it that appropriates the saving benefit of Christ’s death? Not historical or intellectual but "heart" faith (Ro 10:10). To Paul "heart" meant the seat or essence of the whole personality, and so faith which applies the redemption Christ is the personal commitment of one’s self to Christ as Saviour and Lord (2Co 5:15). See Thayer, Greek-English Lexicon, pisteuo, 1, b, gamma, for a particular discussion of the meaning of faith in this sense. The author of Heb discusses especially faith as a conquering power, but also implies that it is the condition of entrance upon the life of spiritual rest and fellowship (chapters 3 and 4, passim). Peter (1Pe 1:9) and John (1 Joh 3:23; 4:16; 5:1,5, etc.) also regard faith as a means of applying the saving benefits of Christ’s death.

(3) By Obedience in Sacrificial Service.

Jesus said, "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me" (Mr 8:34). Here He lays down two elements in the conditions of discipleship, denying one’s self and taking up his cross. The former means the renunciation of self as the center of thought, faith, hope and life. The latter means the life of sacrifice. Jesus was stressing this truth when He uttered that incomparable saying, "The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many" (Mr 10:45 parallel Mt 20:28). Paul also emphasizes this phase of the human condition of salvation when he shows how sanctification grows spontaneously out of justification (Ro 6:8) and when he says that what "avails" is "faith working through love" (Ga 5:6). The author of Hebrews says, "He became unto all them that obey him the author (Greek aitios, "cause") of eternal salvation" (5:9). Peter and John, the latter especially, emphasize the keeping of His commandments, the life of service, as the means of appropriating to the fullest the saving benefits of Christ’s death. The theologians in classrooms and preachers in the pulpits have failed to emphasize this aspect of "saving faith" as did Jesus, Paul, the author of He, and John. in the New Testament salvation is a process as well as an instantaneous act on the part of God, and the process is carried on by means of obedience, the life of service, which appropriates by faith the dynamic of Christ’s sacrifice.

VIII. The Christian’s Life the Life of Sacrifice.

This discussion of the faith that "obeys" leads to the consideration of that climactic thought of New Testament writers, namely, that the Christian’s life is sacrificial living based on Christ’s sacrifice for him. We note in outline the following:

The Christian’s life of sacrifice is the logical consequence of Christ’s sacrificial death. The Christ who sacrificed Himself for the believer is now continuing the sacrifice in the believer’s life (Ga 1:20; Php 1:21).

1. Consequence of Christ’s Sacrifice:

Paul was crucified when Christ was crucified (in a bold mystic figure), and the life of Christ which sacrificed itself on the cross and perpetuates itself in resurrection power now operates as a mighty dynamic for the apostle’s moral and spiritual transformation (Php 3:10,11). It is to be noted, Jesus also emphasized this kind of living, though not so expressly connecting the believer’s sacrificial life with His sacrificial death (see Mr 8:34 f).

2. Christ’s Death the Appeal for a Christian’s Sacrifice:

Christ’s sacrificial death becomes the persuasive appeal for the Christian’s sacrificial life, "Because we thus judge, that one died for all, therefore all died; and he died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves, but unto him who for their sakes died and rose again" (2Co 5:14,15). Because He died for us we should live for Him. But what is the appeal which Christ’s sacrificial death makes to the saved sinner? "The love of Christ constraineth us" (2Co 5:14). Christ’s death on the cross exhibits His love, unspeakable, unthinkable love, for it was love for His "enemies" (Ro 5:10), and that matchless love kindles love in the forgiven sinner’s heart. He is willing to do anything, even to die, for his Saviour who died for him (Ac 21:13; Php 1:29,30). It is a greater privilege for the saved sinner to suffer for Christ than it is to believe on Him. Peter (1Pe 3:17,18), the author of Hebrews (12; 13:13) and John (1 Joh 3:16; 4:16-19) emphasize this truth.

3. Necessary to Fill Out Christ’s Sacrifice:

The Christian’s sacrifice is necessary to fill out Christ’s sacrifice. "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and fill up on my part that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body’s sake, which is the church" (Col 1:24). Roman Catholic exegetes have made the apostle teach that the sufferings of the saints, along with Christ’s sufferings, have atoning efficacy. But Paul nowhere intimates that his sufferings avail for putting away sins. We may hold with Weiss (Comm. on the New Testament) that Paul longed to experience in his life the perfect sacrificial spirit as Christ did; or with Alford (in loc.) that he wished to suffer his part of Christ’s sufferings to be endured by him through His church; or, as it seems to us, he longed to make effective by his ministry of sacrificial service to as many others as possible the sacrificial death of Christ. Christ’s sacrifice avails in saving men only when Christians sacrifice their lives in making known this sacrifice of Christ.

4. Content of the Christian’s Sacrifice:

(1) The Christian is to present his personality (Ro 15:16). Paul commends the Macedonians for "first" giving "their own selves to the Lord" (2Co 8:5).

(2) Christians must present their "bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God" (Ro 12:1). In the old system of sacrifices the animals were offered as dead; Christians are to offer their bodies, all their members with their powers, to God a "living sacrifice," i.e. a sacrifice which operates in lives of holiness and service (see also Ro 6:13,19).

(3) Christians must offer their money or earthly possessions to God. Paul speaks of the gift from the church at Philippi as "a sacrifice acceptable, well-pleasing to God" (Php 4:18). This gift was to the apostle a beautiful expression of the sacrificial spirit imparted to them because they had the "mind" of Christ who "emptied himself, .... becoming obedient even unto death, yea, the death of the cross" (Php 2:5-8). The author of Hebrews (13:16) exhorts his readers, "But to do good and to communicate forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased."

(4) The general exercise of all our gifts and graces is viewed by Peter as sacrificial living (1Pe 2:5): "Ye also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices" etc. All Christians are priests and daily offer up their burnt offerings acceptable to God, if they ‘suffer as Christians’ (1Pe 2:20; 3:18) in the exercise of their graces and powers.

But how do these sacrifices of the Christian affect him and God? The New Testament writers never hint that our sacrifices propitiate God, or so win His favor that He will or can on account of our sacrifices forgive our sins. They are "well-pleasing" to Him a "sweet odor"; that is, they win His approval of our lives thus lived according to the standard which Christ gives us. Their influence on us is the increase of our spiritual efficiency and power and finally a greater capacity for enjoying spiritual blessings in heaven (1Co 3:14).

5. The Supper as a Sacrifice:

Some scholars (Roman Catholic, Episcopalian, etc.) regard the memorial supper as a kind of sacrifice which the Christian offers in worship. Neither Jesus, Paul, the author of Hebrews, Peter, or John, ever hints that in eating the bread and drinking the wine the Christian offers a sacrifice to God in Christ. Paul teaches that in partaking of the Supper we "proclaim the Lord’s death till he come" (1Co 11:26). That is, instead of offering a sacrifice ourselves to God, in partaking of the Supper we proclaim the offering of Christ’s sacrifice for us. Milligan argues that as Christ in heaven perpetually offers Himself for us, so we on earth, in the Supper, offer ourselves to Him (Heavenly Priesthood, 266). Even Cave (Spiritual Doctrine of Sacrifice, 439) maintains, "In a certain loose sense the Lord’s Supper may be called a sacrifice." See the above books for the argument supporting this position.

To sum up our conclusions on sacrifice in the New Testament:

(1) Jesus and New Testament writers regard the Old Testament sacrificial system as from God, but imperfect, the various sacrifices serving only as types of the one great sacrifice which Christ made.

(2) All the writers, except James and Jude, with Jesus, emphasize the sacrificial idea, Jesus less, giving only two hints of His sacrificial death (in the Synoptic Gospels), the author of Heb putting the climactic emphasis on Christ’s sacrifice as the sacrifice of atonement.

(3) As to the relation of Christ’s sacrifice to man’s salvation, the latter is the achievement of the former, so expressed only twice by Jesus, but emphatically so declared by Paul,