“Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.”
John 20:19
“And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and continued his speech until midnight… When he… had broken bread, and eaten, and talked a long while, even till break of day, so he departed.”
Acts 20:7
“They came and saw where He dwelt, and abode with Him that day: for it was about the tenth hour.”
John 1:39
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Order of Contents
Recommended 2
Collection: Historical Quotes
Articles 7
Quotes 5
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Recommended
Brief
Perkins, William – ‘When does the Sabbath Begin?’ in Works (1631), vol. 3, Cases of Conscience, end of book 2, pp. 111-12
Perkins, a father of puritanism, gives numerous Biblical and persuasive reasons in this short article why the Sabbath was kept morning to morning in both the Old & New Testaments.
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In-Depth & Detailed
Fentiman, Travis – The Biblical Sabbath is from Dawn to Dawn (RBO, 2018) 100 pp.
In the most comprehensive treatment to-date on the subject, Fentiman, in this academic article, demonstrates from Scripture that the Sabbath has always been from dawn-to-dawn since Creation throughout the Bible, without exception.
‘Morning’ in Gen. 1 is more accurately translated as ‘dawn’, the phrase signifying that each day of Creation ended with dawn, with the next day beginning therefrom. The Old Testament speaks of days starting from the morning or dawn in over 30 verses. The Israelites kept the Sabbath morning to morning in Ex. 16 and the rest of Old Testament history is consistent with this reckoning.
The New Testament throughout its pages likewise reckons days to start in the morning. The Temple in the New Testament counted the hours of the day from 6 A.M. The disciples’ buying of spices in the evening after the death of Jesus is shown to be inconsistent with an evening-to-evening reckoning of the Sabbath. The Resurrection accounts of Christ rising from the dead at dawn assume continuity with the Old Testament reckoning. Christ celebrates the Lord’s Day in Jn. 20:19 with the disciples in the evening of the 1st day of the week, which the apostles continued to practice in Acts 20:7-11.
The corruption of the Sabbath by Jewish traditionalism in keeping the Sabbath from evening to evening likely started in the inter-Testamental era and was preserved in their Talmuds. A very full survey of the inter-Testamental and extra-Biblical literature is surveyed on the issue, as well as reformed history. Make your heart assured on this Scriptural subject and make the Sabbath a delight (Isa. 58:13-14)!
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A Collection of Historic Quotes
Myers, R. Andrew – ‘When Does the Lord’s Day Begin?’ (RBO, 2010), a one page introduction with 33 excerpts from puritans and other historic, reformed writers
A very helpful collection of quotes from puritans and reformed figures on the subject. The majority puritan view was that the Sabbath in the Old Testament was from evening to evening, though some held it to be from midnight and others from the morning.
In the New Testament, the vast majority of puritans held that the Lord’s Day begins in the ‘morning’ (the peculiar evening-aspect of it falling away with the Old Testament, the Day reverting to natural days). The ‘morning’ was often specified to start at midnight, though sometimes it was held to start at dawn. Often the start of the Lord’s Day was considered to be indifferent according to civil reckoning. For the fullest survey of reformed history on the question to-date, see Fentiman’s article above.
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Articles
1600’s
Widley, George – pp. 61-62 of bk. 1, ch. 4, section 3, ‘When the Sabbath Begins & Ends’ in The Doctrine of the Sabbath… (London, 1604)
Widley (b. 1566 or 1567) was an English minister in Portsmouth, England.
“…we begin our Sabbath at the dawning of the day…” – p. 61
Palmer, Herbert & Daniel Cawdrey – Pt. 3, ch. 2, ‘The Sabbath Begins in the Morning’ in Sabbathum Redivivum, or the Christian Sabbath Vindicated… (1651-2), pp. 348-411 Outline
Palmer & Cawdrey were Westminster Divines. They argue against the New England, Independent puritans Thomas Shepard and John Cotton (without explicitly naming them), whom argued and practiced the evening to evening view.
Palmer & Cawdrey consider midnight, day-break and sunrise to be various degrees of morning, and hence do not argue for one in particular, but only that the Sabbath begins in the morning generally, as all natural days do. They argue a morning to morning view of Gen. 1, and that the Sabbath started in the morning in both Testaments.
This appears to be the most in-depth puritan treatment of the issue, it being longer than Shepard’s 36 page treatment. Fentiman was not aware of this piece at the time he wrote his article.
Richardson, John – on Gen. 1:5 in On Gen. 1 in Choice Observations & Explanations upon the Old Testament, containing in them Many Remarkable Matters Additional to the Large Annotations made by Some of the Assembly of Divines (d. 1654)
Richardson was reformed and printed this only a few afters the second edition of the English Annotations (which were nicknamed the Westminster Annotations as 6 of the 11 commentators were Westminster divines), to which it was designed as a supplement.
Pynchon, William – Holy Time: or, the True Limits of the Lord’s Day. I. Proving that the Lord’s Day does begin with the Natural Morning, & that the Morning of the Natural Day does begin at Midnight; & so consequently that the Lord’s Day must both begin with the natural morning at midnight, & end with the natural evening at mid-night. II. Proving, that the Jews’ beginning of the day at the sun-set evening was only in relation to the date of the person purified from his levitical uncleanness. III. That the Jews themselves did hold, that the natural day did continue after sunset till midnight… (London, 1654) 120 pp. ToC Scripture Index
Pynchon (1590–1662) was an English colonist who spent much of his life in Massachusetts, New England, and was one of the wealthiest men there. He pubilshed a book on the atonement in the New World that went against the theology of reformed puritanism; it was the first book burned and banned in New England. The above treatise of his is noteworthy in that New England mostly held to a sun-down to sun-down Lord’s Day.
It is possible for persons to argue that midnight is the beginning of morning insofar as that is the point at which the night sky begins to grow infinitesimally lighter; hence the reason why it has been a common marker for the new day in many civilizations throughout history.
Warren, Edmund – Position 6, ‘That the Sabbath Begins in the Morning’ in The Jew’s Sabbath Antiquated & the Lord’s Day Instituted by Divine Authority... (London: Maxwel, 1659), pp. 242-45
“This position has been also handled and proved abundantly by others, chiefly by Mr. Cawdrey and Mr. Pynchon, whose arguments I judge unanswerable. ‘Tis to me an unquestionable conclusion that the Sabbath, being a natural day consisting of 24 hours, it must begin and end as the natural day itself does.” – p. 242
Warren takes the morning to start with midnight.
“…the night of the first day was that which followed the light, after God had separated the light which he called ‘day’ from the darkness which he called ‘night’; to object the order of the words is vain, Moses himself takes off that objection by inverting that order in the following words, for v. 4, he puts light before darkness and day before night.” – p. 244
Durham, James – An Exposition of the Ten Commandments, pp. 247-51 (1676)
Durham held the Sabbath to be from midnight to midnight in both the Old and New Testaments.
van Mastricht, Peter – ch. 15, section 10, ‘3. The Early Morning of that Day’ in Theoretical Practical Theology (RHB), vol. 4, bk. 5
Mastricht takes the Lord’s Day to begin at daybreak, as Christ’s Resurrection.
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1700’s
Keach, Benjamin – ‘When the Lord’s Day Begins’ 5 pp. in The Jewish Sabbath Abrogated, or, The Saturday Sabbatarians Confuted… (1700)
Keach was a calvinistic baptist. He follows, and summarizes, Owen on the topic, who held that only daylight hours constituted the length of rest of the Sabbath.
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1900’s
Price, Greg – ‘When Does The Sabbath Begin? Morning or Evening?’ (1995) 38 paragraphs, with an Appendix 23 paragraphs long
Price answers the question as ‘morning’ and has correct view of the Creation Week in Gen. 1. His article is succinct, brief and helpful, though he defines ‘morning’ to start at midnight. For the argument against the midnight view, in preference for the dawn-view, see Fentiman’s article above.
Note: Price’s article is very helpful, though do be aware that he is part of the Reformed Presbytery in North America (General Meeting), which group of a few churches are Steelites. The Still Waters Revival Bookstore (which name is more well-known) is loosely associated with them and holds to the same doctrinal distinctives. Steelites (from David Steele) have unBiblical views regarding covenanting and separatism, which are very spiritually dangerous.
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More Quotes in addition to those in Fentiman & Myers’ articles above
Order of Quotes
Lyra
Perkins
Mayer
Martindale
Burman
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Nicholas of Lyra d. 1349
As quoted by Matthew Poole, Synopsis of Biblical Interpreters (From Reformation to Reformation Translations, 2017), on Gen. 1:5, p. 89
“Lyra appears to think otherwise. He places first ‘the evening’ as the completion of the day (artificial), and he places ‘the morning’ as the completion of the night (Lyra).”
In Latin: The Sacred Bible with Glosses & Postilla, vol. 1, Gen-Deut (Leiden, 1545), on Gen. 1:5, p. 24b, rt col., mid
On Lyra:
“The Postilla, or short commentaries of De Lyra [c. 1270-1349], are far superior to the age in which he flourished, and show great acquaintance with the literal sense of Scripture. They are especially valuable for the Old Testament, from his superior knowledge of Hebrew and the Rabbinical writers… many other editions [of Lyra’s work] were printed. The best are those which accompany the Glossa of Strabo.” – James Darling
“A book regarded as having no small part in bringing on the Reformation. ‘Lyra’s lyre woke Luther’s dance.’” – Howard Malcom
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William Perkins 1558-1602
A Digest or Harmony of the Books of the Old and New Testament in The Works of William Perkins ed. Stephen Yuille (Reformation Heritage Books, 2014), vol. 1, pp. 9-10
“A Hebrew day is either natural or artificial.
A natural day is the space of 24 hours, containing also both the morning and the evening. The morning and the evening are the bounds of every day, and the evening is of two sorts. The first is from the ninth hour [counted from 6 am, that is, 3 pm] to the setting of the sun. The second is from the sun-setting [roughly 6 pm] unto the shutting in of the night. “In the first month and the fourteenth day of the month, between the two evenings shall be the Passover of the Lord” (Lev. 23:5).
A natural day according to the diverse uses thereof is either a work day or a holy day. A work day is that which is appointed for our civil business, and (as it seems to me) this day among the Jews, lasted from the sun-rising to the sun-rising, that is, it began at the morning: “Why sittest thou thyself alone, and all the people stand about thee from morning to even?” (Ex. 18:14). “In the end of the Sabbath when the first day of the week began to dawn” (Matt 28:1). It is not likely that Matthew spoke these things after the manner of the Romans, seeing that he wrote his gospel especially for the Hebrews.
A holy day is that which is appointed for holy uses. A holy day is only made by God to whom only it belongs to bless and hallow the times. A holy day begins at the evening and ends at the evening: “From even to even shall ye celebrate the Sabbath” (Lev. 23:32). The holy day common to all ages is the Sabbath, which according to the moral law is a certain seventh day set apart for divine worship. Here is to be noted that sometimes the word Sabbath is put for the whole week: “I fast twice a Sabbath” (Luke 18:12); “The first of the Sabbath” (1 Cor. 16:2).
An artificial day is the space of time from the rising of the sun to the setting (John 11:9-10), wherefore it is longer in summer and shorter in winter.”
[Perkins above, speaking of the Sabbath being kept evening to evening, has specific reference to the Old Testament economy, as his book deals primarily with the Old Testament. See also volume 2 of Perkins’ Works, as quoted in Myers’ article above, where Perkins argues that the Lord’s Day follows natural days and is to be kept morning to morning.]
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Mayer, John 1623
The English Catechism Explained (1623), The Table Mayer was English and reformed. He was perhaps best known for his commentary on the entire Bible.
“Question: When does the Lord’s Day begin and end?
Answer: It begins in the morning at the dawning of the day, and ends next morning likewise.”
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Adam Martindale
Divinity-Knots Unloosed… (London, 1649), ch. 12, pp. 53-54 Martindale (1623-1686) was an English presbyterian minister who had taken the Solemn League & Covenant.
“56. Doubt: How should I know when to begin and conclude the Lord’s day?
Resolution: It it a great question among divines: For mine own part (with submission) I think it begins at the dawning of the day, when Christ arose:
I know it is said (Gen. 1) ‘The evening and the morning’ and not ‘The morning and the evening;’ nor dare I say it is an Histero proteron, for the often inculcating of it seems to point at some mystery: But this I say, that though it be granted that the natural day and particularly the Sabbath, containing four and twenty hours, had its revolution from evening to evening, yet nothing hinders why the Christian Sabbath may not be from morning to morning; for seeing the Lord’s Day is kept in memory of Christ’s resurrection, why should it not as well begin at the hour and minute, as be celebrated on the day that he rose from the dead?”
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Francis Burman 1671
A Synopsis of Theology (Utrecht, 1671), vol. 1, bk. 1, locus 5, section 42, paragraph 36, p. 293 Burman (1628-79) was a Dutch, reformed, professor of theology at Utrecht. tr. Fentiman
[In contrast to light being made after darkness at the beginning of creation, and 2 Cor. 4:6] “But so ‘it was evening’ (even the light receding) and ‘it was morning’ (the light returning and approaching): ‘day one’, that is, the ‘first’ [day] (verse 5).
At that time, therefore, first it was light [with ‘Let there be light’], and then it was evening, in which, after night, succeeded the morning. What followed the First Day was not from the darkness or evening, but took hold from the start of that same morning and was ended in returning to that. Accordingly, so the First Day was not evening-morning, but morning-evening.
It is allowed that in the [Mosaic] Law, according to the ritual, night preceded the day, due to a mystery, or δήλωσιν πνευματω [it vaporizing unto the manifestation (of Christ)].”
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