The Sabbath before Sinai

A decisive proof that the Sabbath was well known to the Israelites previous to the giving of the law, is found in Exodus 16:4, 5, 22-30: “Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no. And it shall come to pass, that on the sixth day they shall prepare that which they bring in; and it shall be twice as much as they gather daily.” Then we have an account of the falling of the manna. He continues in verses 22-30: “And it came to pass, that on the sixth day they gathered twice as much bread, two omers for one man; and all the rulers of the congregation came and told Moses. And he said unto them, This is that which the Lord hath said, ‘Tomorrow is the rest of the holy Sabbath unto the Lord; bake that which you will bake to-day, and seethe that you will seethe. And that which remains over lay up for you to be kept until the morning.’ And they laid it up till the morning, as Moses bade; and it did not stink, neither was there any worm therein. And Moses said, Eat that today; for to-day is a Sabbath unto the Lord: to-day you shall not find it in the field. Six days shall you gather it; but on the seventh day, which is the Sabbath, in it there shall be none. And it came to pass that there went out some of the people on the seventh day for to gather, and they found none. And the Lord said unto Moses, How long refuse you to keep my commandments and my laws? See, for that the Lord hath given you the Sabbath, therefore he gives you on the sixth day the bread of two days; abide you every man in his place, let no man go out of his place on the seventh day. So the people rested on the seventh day.”ChSa 22.2

From the foregoing language the following conclusions are inevitable:ChSa 23.1

1. God had a law, of which the seventh-day Sabbath was a, part, more than a month previous to proclaiming his commandments from Mount Sinai.ChSa 23.2

2. He proved his people by giving them bread from heaven, to see whether they would obey his law or not, the test coming on their observance of the Sabbath, which, therefore, must be a most important part of that law.ChSa 23.3

3. The language shows that the people had a knowledge of the Sabbath, and that many of them desired to keep it before any commandment whatever was given them as a people concerning it. For the record of their deliverance from Egypt does not give a single hint concerning the Sabbath previous to this point.ChSa 23.4

4. We are constrained, therefore, to conclude that when he says, “How long refuse you to keep my commandments and my laws?” He must refer to the original institution of the Sabbath at creation, the knowledge of which had been preserved by the patriarchs and the general acquaintance of the ancient nations with the Sabbath.ChSa 23.5

The fall of manna, which continued through the forty years of their wanderings, with its double portion on the sixth day of the week and none upon the seventh. Its being kept from corruption on the Sabbath, while it would soon spoil on other days, attested which was the true creation Sabbath at that time, and their perfect knowledge of it.ChSa 24.1

An objection is sometimes offered upon the passage, “See, for that the Lord hath given you the Sabbath,” etc., that it belonged wholly to the Israelites. But surely it must have had a previous existence or it would not have been proper to say he had given it to them. He did this in precisely the same sense that he gave himself to that people, and thus became the God of Israel. The nations had gone into idolatry, or were fast doing so, rejecting alike the true God and the great memorial of his creation work, the Sabbath. He had separated from among them the descendants of Abraham who still regarded both. From this time on, the Sabbath and the knowledge of the true God rapidly disappeared from the nations of the earth, and they became heathen. While the Israelites remembered God and his Sabbath, and preserved the knowledge of each, to be given again under more favorable auspices to the Gentile nations.ChSa 24.2

From these considerations we cannot doubt that Israel regarded the Sabbath more or less sacredly while in Egyptian bondage, although it is not to be supposed that they could keep it as fully then as they were able to do afterward. It seems unreasonable to conclude, however, that they lost all regard for it, or that the most pious among them gave it no respect. God says of their great progenitor, “Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.” We are certain that Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph followed the same example, and therefore must have kept the Sabbath. The last two were in Egypt, and no doubt their kindred followed their example, and regarded the Sabbath as sacredly as the circumstances would permit. They looked back to these noble patriarchs with the deepest respect. They still had a regard for the Sabbath, as we learn in Exodus 16, even before the giving of the law. Hence it was not to them a new institution.ChSa 24.3

In this brief account it has been plainly shown that the Sabbath of the Lord was given to the human family at creation, and was well known to those who had any regard for the true God. It certainly was not a Jewish institution; for it existed, and was commanded to be observed by the God of heaven, long ages before a Jew lived. The Jews sprung from Judah, one of the sons of Jacob; but the Sabbath was set apart in Eden for man’s benefit. It was “made for man.”ChSa 25.1