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Commentary on "Lord of the Sabbath"
Day 3: Monday, February 13, 2012 - The Sabbath in Exodus
Overview
This lesson is a very good exegetical study of Ex 20:8-11. The biggest issue with the lesson is the question about the "us" references in the opening question.
What does the Lord tell us to do, and what reason does He give us to do it.
This command was given to Israel, not to "us".
Observations
From my wife's recent Proclamation article:
The Sabbath command was the very center of the old covenant for the children of Israel and was the sign of their special relationship with God as a nation.
"But as for you, speak to the sons of Israel, saying, ‘You shall surely observe My sabbaths; for this is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the LORD who sanctifies you'" (Ex. 31:13).
Normally it is the seventh-day Sabbath that is thought of in this context, because it is the one specifically mentioned in the 10 Commandments. However, there were multiple Sabbaths for the children of Israel: weekly (seventh-day Sabbath), monthly (new moon festival), yearly (seven fixed annual feasts), the Sabbath year (every seventh year) and the jubilee Sabbath (Year of Jubilee—the 50th year). Leviticus 23 and 25 discuss in depth each of these Sabbath festivals, and they are all tied together as an integral part of the Israelite's life. Moreover, they are all treated the same: all are holy Sabbaths in which no labor was permitted. 2 Chronicles 8:12-13 lists many of these Sabbaths:
"Then Solomon offered burnt offerings to the LORD on the altar of the LORD which he had built before the porch; and did so according to the daily rule, offering them up according to the commandment of Moses, for the sabbaths, the new moons and the three annual feasts—the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of Weeks and the Feast of Booths."
Keeping the Sabbath holy was not optional, and God laid out some strict rules for how the Sabbath day should be kept in order to prevent any work. We know the rabbis added extensively to God's specifications with their interpretations and safeguard rules. The Bible, however, lists specific things which God instructed Moses and later prophets could not be done on the Sabbath. These include:
- Don't bake (Ex. 16:23)
- Don't work (Ex. 20:10)
- Don't travel out of your place (Ex. 16:29)
- Don't light a fire (Ex. 35:3)
- Don't buy or sell (Neh. 10:31)
- Don't do your own pleasure (Is. 58:13)
- Don't carry a load (Jer. 17:21-22)
Keeping the Sabbath as God specified was important enough that intentionally breaking it carried the death penalty:
"Therefore you are to observe the sabbath, for it is holy to you. Everyone who profanes it shall surely be put to death; for whoever does any work on it, that person shall be cut off from among his people. For six days work may be done, but on the seventh day there is a sabbath of complete rest, holy to the LORD; whoever does any work on the sabbath day shall surely be put to death" (Ex. 31:14-15).
Numbers 15:32-36 records an incident when God had Moses carry out this penalty on a man who gathered wood on the Sabbath day. These passages reveal the high importance God placed on specific Sabbath times of physical rest for the children of Israel as the sign of the Sinaitic covenant signifying that they were God's chosen people in relationship only to Him.
The Israelites' history reveals that they often broke the Sabbath. God often reproved and pleaded with them through His prophets to honor the Sabbath as well as to give up their idol worship. (See Neh. 13; Is. 56; 58; Jer. 17; Ez. 20-23; Amos 8).
(Complete article here.)
Copyright 2012 BibleStudiesForAdventists.com. All rights reserved. Revised February 10, 2012. This website is published by Life Assurance Ministries, Glendale, Arizona, USA, the publisher of Proclamation! Magazine. Contact email: BibleStudiesForAdventists@gmail.com.
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