on, Was the
Sabbath an ordinance born of Mosaism, or not? Grant that the word
"Remember," if it stood alone, might conceivably express the emphasis of
a new precept, and not the recapitulation of an existing one. Grant also
that the mention in Genesis of the Divine rest might be made by
anticipation, to be read with an eye to the institution which would be
mentioned later. But what is to be made of the fact that on the seventh
day manna was withheld from the camp, before they had arrived at Horeb,
and therefore before the commandment had been written by the finger of
God upon the stone? Was this also done by anticipation? Upon any
supposition, it aimed at teaching the nation that the obligation of the
day was not based upon the positive precept, but the precept embodied an
older and more fundamental obligation.

How is the Sabbath spoken of in those prophecies which set least value
upon the merely ceremonial law?

Isaiah speaks of mere ritual as slightly as St. Paul. To fast and
afflict one's soul is nothing, if in the day of fasting one smites with
the fist and oppresses his labourers. To loose the bonds of wickedness,
to free the oppressed, to share one's bread with the hungry, this is the
fast which God has chosen, and for him who fasts after this fashion the
light shall break forth like sunrise, and his bones shall be strong, and
he himself like an unfailing water-spring. Now, it is the same chapter
which thus waives aside mere ceremonial in contempt, which lavishes the
most ample promises on him who turns away his foot from the Sabbath, and
calls the Sabbath a delight, and the holy of the Lord, honourable, and
honours it (Isa. lviii. 5-11, 13-14).

There is no such promise in Jeremiah, for the observance of any merely
ceremonial law, as that which bids the people to honour the Sabbath day,
that there may enter into their gates kings and princes riding in
chariots and upon horses, and that the city may remain for ever (Jer.
xvii. 24, 25).

And Ezekiel declares that in the day when God made Himself known to His
people in the land of Egypt, He gave them statutes and judgments and His
sabbaths (Ezek. xx. 11, 12). Now, this phrase is a clear allusion to
the word of God in Jeremiah, that "I spake not unto their fathers in the
day when I brought them out of Egypt, concerning burnt-offerings or
sacrifices, but this thing I commanded them, saying, Hearken unto My
voice," etc. (Jer. vii. 23). And it sharply contrasts the