Joseph Bates - A Vindication of the Seventh-Day Sabbath and the Commandments of God

I know it is stated that Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly. I know of no way to prove it but by the recorded time that our Lord was in the earth. You see that Matthew says as he was three days, &c. Now for the proof of how long he was there . First testimony – his disciples, Luke xxiv: 21-23. Second testimony – Angels, v: 7. Third testimony – Jesus himself, 46 v. “Thus it behoved Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day.” This testimony, be it remembered, was given a few hours after the resurrection, on the same day. Here then is the proof of what Jesus had before asserted, recorded ten times by the evangelist, and once by Paul; 1st Cor. xv: 4; Matt. xvi: 21; xvii: 23; xx: 19; Mark ix: 31; x: 34 and viii: 31; 1 1 Campbell translates this in three, and Matt. xxviii: 63, within three days. Luke ix: 22; xiii: 32; xviii: 33; John ii: 19. And five times by his accusers, Matt. xxvi: 61; xxviii: 40 and 63; Mark xiv: 58; xv: 29. Every one of these eighteen texts records the resurrection in three, some of them within three days; and not a syllable about nights . The one in Matt xii: 40, says three days and three nights, referring to Jonas, as above. Now I ask, shall we take this one isolated text, out of the harmony of the whole eighteen, and then pervert it , to prove that some how or other the world have lost one day, and therefore the first day of the week is the seventh. We all know that our judgment always rests on the majority or weight of evidence. Here then we have seven to one besides the testimony of Jesus himself after his resurrection, that he arose the third day, and clearly demonstrating that he did not lie there three days and three nights, and proving, to my judgment, that Jonas was also delivered the third day. See other scripture rules, Esther iv: 16, 17, and v: 1. Here the Jews were to fast three days, but Esther ended it the third . See also 1st Kings, xx: 29, the seven days ended on the seventh. Also, Gen. xvii: 12, eight days. Lev. xii: 3, shows the eighth the same. Thus we see that the testimony of Jesus is clear.

It is clear to my mind that the Lord Jesus was not at furthest, more than thirty-eight hours in the tomb, and yet he was there, according to scripture proof, a part of Friday, the sixth day, all of the seventh day, Sabbath, and a part of Sunday, the first day, which last was the third day. Proof, Luke xxiii: 54-56. “And that day was the preparation and the Sabbath drew on.” Mark this, that the preparation had come, and they were drawing to the Sabbath. See here , the preparation was always on the day of the Passover, the fourteenth of the first month. The feast day was the fifteenth, the next day. Let Moses give the time: “And ye shall keep it up [the Lamb] until the fourteenth day of the same month, and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening.” Exo. xii: 6. The original – see margin – reads between the two evenings . See the same in Num. xxviii: 4, – practiced and carried out even to lighting the lamps in the tabernacle. Exo. xxx: 8.

Now our blessed Lord expired on the cross at the very time that this preparation always took place for 1670 years before, namely, the ninth hour, (Matt. xxvii, and Mark xv,) three o'clock in the afternoon. Then between the two evenings is just three hours, from 3 to 6 P. M. Keep this clear in mind and you will clearly understand how the disciples could have three hours from the death of their master to see him put in the tomb, to have gone and “bought sweet spices.” (Mark xvi: 1,) and be ready to keep the Sabbath according to the commandment, (please read it in Exo. xx: 8-11,) as stated in Luke xxiii: 54-56. You will understand Mark xv: 42, “Now when the even was come because it was the preparation, that is the day before the Sabbath ,” that it was the ninth hour, or 3 P.M. Here the preparation goes on for three hours, until the Sabbath commenced. You see he says this was the day before the Sabbath, and when the Sabbath was passed, early in the morning of the first day, they found he had arisen. Mark xvi. Here then is the three days: The day before the Sabbath he was entombed, between the hours of 3 and 6 P.M., and the day after the Sabbath, the first day of the week, he arose. As J. B. Cook says, I can conceive of nothing more definite. Whitby and Scott say, “It is a received rule among the Jews that a part of a day is put for a whole day.” And so, let me add, it is with the commercial nations of the earth. Every bill, or note, or deed, counts the day of its date and the day of its extinguishment. For instance, the transaction of an interest note takes place at half past 11 o'clock in the evening of the first day of January, 1847, and the interest is cast to the first day of January, 1848, the demand for it would be valid if called for at 30 minutes A. M. after midnight. Both of these dates are counted days in this and all other kinds of business transactions, as we reckon time. And I say it is impossible for any rational being to understand it in any other way. When one day ends the next begins, and so I have amply shown is the bible rule. Then, according to the testimony adduced, if the Saviour was placed in the tomb any where between the hours of 3 and 6 o'clock P. M. on Friday, then I say that day was as much counted for one, as the day on which he arose; and no man, not even J. Turner, undertakes to say that it was more than a part of a day. That this work of preparation was all accomplished before the Sabbath came, is perfectly clear from the two passages already quoted in Luke and Mark. See also John xix: 31. Here then the antetype agrees perfectly with the type, all the preparation work accomplished between the hours of three and six in the evening, called between the two evenings. Much also has been said about the next day, the fifteenth being a Jewish festival Sabbath, and therefore God's seventh-day Sabbath could not possibly be until the day after. Just as well might it be asserted when our fourth of July happens to fall on Sunday, that it could not be Sunday, because it was the anniversary of our independence, but the next day would be Sunday. This explains all the difficulty. This feast day of theirs always following the Passover day, happened this year to come on God's holy Sabbath day, hence the peculiar expression of John, “for that Sabbath was an high day.” God's instruction to Moses respecting all the feast days is right to the point, “ Every thing upon his day. ” Lev. xxiii: 37. You see there is no provision to defer the Sabbath festivals whenever they happened on the Sabbath of the Lord our God.

Now I think the above Scriptures do clearly and incontrovertibly establish the resurrection to have been on Sunday morning, the first day of the week, and the day before, on which the Saviour rested in the tomb and his disciples in the city of Jerusalem, was the seventh day of the week, the Sabbath of the Lord our God, according to the commandment; and the day before that, viz. on Friday, he was crucified and buried. This clearly overthrows your unscriptural arguments to establish the first day of the week for the seventh-day Sabbath.

I have gone much further into this argument than I should, had I not have heard and seen the incalculable mischief that was being accomplished by the spread of such an argument; from one too, who is looked upon by those not personally acquainted with him as an ambassador, fully approved of God; a pillar in the church of these last days; one who is fully competent to preach and take the lead in camp-meetings, &c. &c. And still I feel there is a duty devolving upon me, which I ought not to shrink from, notwithstanding his high profession, and being fostered, and upheld as a brother beloved, by the Advent papers.