# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1850 02 19_S97
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Der Lutheraner.
"God's Word and Luther's doctrine shall never pass away."
Published by the German Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States.
Edited by C. F. W. Walther.
Volume 6.  St. Louis, Mo., February 19, 1850.  No. 13.
Terms: Der Lutheraner appears once every two weeks at the yearly subscription price of One Dollar for out-of-town subscribers, who are to pay for it in advance and to bear the postage. — In St. Louis each single number is sold for 5 Cents. Only those letters which contain communications for the paper are to be addressed to the editor; all others, however, which contain business matters, orders, cancellations, money, etc., are to be sent hither under the address: Mr. F. W. Barthel, care of C. F. W. Walther, St. Louis, Mo.

The Doctrine of Our Church Concerning the End of the Sabbath in the Time of the New Testament.

I. Extracts from the Symbolical Books of Our Church.

Those who hold that the ordinance concerning Sunday in place of the Sabbath was set up as necessary are greatly in error, for the Holy Scripture has abolished the Sabbath, and teaches that all the ceremonies of the old Law may be relaxed since the opening of the Gospel; and yet, because it was needful to appoint a certain day, in order that the people might know when they should assemble, the Christian Church appointed Sunday for this purpose, and had so much the more pleasure and willingness in this change, that the people might have an example of Christian liberty, that men might know that neither the keeping of the Sabbath nor of any other day is necessary. There are many incorrect disputations concerning the transformation of the Law, concerning the ceremonies of the New Testament, concerning the change of the Sabbath, all of which have sprung from a false and erroneous opinion, as though there had to be in Christendom a worship such as would conform to the Levitical or Jewish worship, and as though Christ had commanded the apostles and bishops to devise new ceremonies which were necessary to salvation. These same errors have crept into Christendom because the righteousness of faith was not taught and preached purely and plainly. Some therefore dispute about Sunday, that it must be kept, though not by divine right, and they set forth the form and measure of how far one may work on the holy day. But what are such disputations other than snares of the conscience? For although they undertake to mitigate and soften human ordinances, yet no mitigation or relief can ever be attained as long as the opinion stands and remains that they are necessary. Now this same opinion must remain if one knows nothing of the righteousness of faith and of Christian liberty. — Augsburg Confession, Article 28. (Page 55, New York edition of the Book of Concord.)

Therefore this (third) commandment, according to its coarse sense, does not concern us Christians, for it is a wholly external thing, like other ordinances of the Old Testament, bound to particular manner, person, time, and place, all of which have now been set free through Christ. But to grasp a Christian sense for the simple, what God requires of us in this commandment: note that we keep a holy day, not for the sake of the intelligent and learned Christians, for these have no need of it at all, but first also for bodily cause and necessity, which nature teaches and demands for the common multitude, men-servants and maid-servants, who all the week attend to their work and trade, that they may also set aside a day to rest and be refreshed, and then, above all, that on such a day of rest (since one cannot otherwise get to it) one may take room and time to attend to the service of God, so that one may come together to hear and handle God's Word, and then to praise God, to sing and to pray. But this (I say) is not so bound to time as among the Jews, that it must be exactly this or that day, for no day is better in itself than another, but it ought indeed to be done daily; but since the multitude cannot attend to it, one must at least set apart one day in the week for it. But since Sunday has been appointed for it from of old, one ought also to let it remain so, that things may proceed in harmonious order, and no one cause disorder by needless innovation. So this is the simple meaning of this commandment: since holy days are kept in any case, that such a holy day be employed to learn God's Word; so that the proper office of this day is the office of preaching, for the sake of the young folk and the poor multitude; yet that the keeping of the day be not so strictly drawn that other incidental work, which cannot be avoided, would be forbidden. (Luther's Large Catechism, p. 381.)

II. Extracts from Luther's Writings.

1. In Luther's treatise "Against the Heavenly Prophets" it says, §§ 44—51 and 58—62, thus:

"Well then, let us go to the right ground, and say that these teachers of sin and Mosaic prophets are to leave us unperplexed with Moses; we will neither see nor hear Moses. How do you like that, dear factious spirits? And furthermore we say that all such Mosaic teachers deny the Gospel, drive out Christ, and abolish the whole New Testament. I speak now as a Christian and for Christians. For Moses was given to the Jewish people alone, and does not concern us Gentiles and Christians. We have our Gospel and the New Testament: if they prove from these that images are to be put away, we will gladly follow them. But if they would make Jews of us through Moses, we will not suffer it.

"What think ye? What will come of this? This will come of it, that men may see how these factious spirits understand nothing in the Scripture, neither Moses nor Christ, and seek and find nothing therein but their own dreams. And we lay here the ground from St. Paul, 1 Tim. 1, 9: ""The law is not made for a righteous man"" (as a Christian is). And Peter, Acts 15, 10: ""Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they."" With this saying (as Paul with his) St. Peter abolishes the whole of Moses with all his laws from the Christians.

"Yes, you say, that would be quite true of the ceremonies and Judicialia, that is, of what Moses teaches of outward worship and outward government; but the Decalogue, that is, the ten commandments, are surely not abolished, wherein nothing of ceremonies and Judicialia is found. I answer: I know full well that this is a common old distinction, but made without understanding; for from the ten commandments