Were Christians Keeping the Sabbath in Second Century A.D.?

WES RINGER

The Seventh-day Baptists, who arose around 1650 and the Seventh-day Adventists who began keeping the Sabbath in 1846, both hold firm theological convictions that God is asking them to keep the seventh-day Sabbath. They believe that the Ten Commandments are the eternal Law of God for all men for all time and believe that God wants them the keep the Sabbath of the fourth commandment on the seventh-day. I believe that both groups felt justified in their understanding, because most Christians in the English-speaking world in those days often used the terms Sabbath and Lord’s Day interchangeably to refer to Sunday, and the majority of them felt that they were keeping the Sabbath of the fourth commandment when they worshiped on Sunday. My own grandfather, Luther Ringer, felt that he was keeping the Sabbath when he went to church on Sunday and only became a Seventh-day Adventist after he could find no place in the New Testament that said that the day of Christian worship had been changed from Sabbath to Sunday.

Thus the Seventh-day Baptists have a 350-year history of keeping the seventh-day Sabbath, and the Seventh-day Adventists have a 175-year history of being seventh-day sabbatarians. The Adventists’ sabbatarian history began after Ellen White and other Adventists pioneers began keeping the Sabbath in 1846., and they believe that the Sabbath should continue to be kept based on the following five assumptions: 

1. They assume that in Genesis all of the patriarchs from Adam to Jacob and his sons kept the Sabbath based on their understanding of Genesis 1-2 and Exodus 20:11: “For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.” 
2. They assume that all of the Ten Commandments remain the eternal Law of God for all Christians to continue to keep, and that when Christ referred to the Law in Matthew 5:17-18 he was referring specifically to the Ten Commandments.
3. They assume that the apostles instructed all Christians to keep the Sabbath and that the Gentile Christians universally kept the Sabbath in the first century after the death, burial and resurrection of Christ.
4. They assume that the pope and the Catholic Church changed the weekly day of worship from the Sabbath to Sunday sometime after Constantine became emperor and stopped the persecution of Christians with the Edict of Milan in 313 AD. 
5. They assume that E. G. White was correct when she saw in a number of visions that the Sabbath had become a testing truth for all Christians after Christ entered the Most Holy Place for the first time in October 22, 1844, and that the Sabbath would divide true Christians from false Christians just before Christ comes with those failing to keep the seventh-day Sabbath receiving the Mark of the Beast and persecuting those keeping the true Sabbath.

If the first four of these assumptions are correction, then one would expect that at least the majority of Christians would have continued to keep the Sabbath until the end of the second century—a period of time which would have been about 170 years after the death, burial and resurrection of Christ, or approximately the same amount of time that Seventh-day Adventists have continued to keep the Sabbath since 1846. So let us look at what Christians living in the second century have to say about the seventh-day Sabbath and the first-day of the week, which they often called the Lord’s Day, or the eighth-day. 

As I have read through the writings of these early Christians in the second century, I find some of their reasoning from Scripture to be more persuasive than others, but what they do say helps us to understand what Christians practiced and understood about the Sabbath and Lord’s Day in the second century AD. It is clear from reading their writings that Christians during this time continued to be persecuted both by the Roman authorities and by Jews who had not accepted that Jesus was the Christ, and many suffered death because they were followers of Christ. I will be quoting their writings from Volume 1 of the Ante-Nicene Fathers. I would encourage everyone to take the time to read more of the context of each passage from which I quote.

What the Church Fathers Say

Let us first look at Ignatius, who was a friend of the apostle John and the bishop of the church in Antioch, Syria. He was arrested and brought to Rome, where he was but to death because of his faith in Christ around 108 AD. While on the way to Rome, he wrote a number of epistles to different Christians churches. He wrote the following in his Epistle to the Magnesians:  

“If, therefore, those who were brought up in the ancient order of things have come to the possession of a new hope, no longer observing the Sabbath, but living in the observance of the Lord’s Day on which also our life has sprung up again by Him and by His death—whom some deny, by which mystery we have obtained faith, and therefore endure, that we may be found the disciples of Jesus Christ, our only Master—how shall we be able to live apart from Him, whose disciples the prophets themselves in the Spirit did wait for Him as their Teacher?” 

He goes on to say that Christians should not keep the Sabbath as the Jews do, but that after the Sabbath, “… let every friend of Christ keep the Lord’s Day as a festival, the resurrection day, the queen and chief of all the days of the week”. 

Let us next look at the Epistle of Barnabas, which is thought to have been written by a Jewish Christian from Alexandria around 100 AD, during the reign of emperors Trajan and Hadrian. He quotes for Isaiah 1:11-14: 

“‘What is the multitude of your sacrifices unto Me, saith the Lord? I am full of burnt-offerings, and desire not the fat of lambs, and the blood of bulls and goats, not when ye come to appear before Me: for who hath required these things at your hands? Tread no more My courts, not though ye bring with you fine flour. Incense is a vain abomination unto Me, and your new moons and sabbaths I cannot endure.’  He has therefore abolished these things, that the new law of our Lord Jesus Christ, which is without the yoke of necessity, might have a human oblation.” 

Later the writer of the Epistle of Barnabas says, 

“Further He says, “Your new moons and your Sabbaths I cannot endure.” Ye perceive how He speaks: Your present Sabbaths are not acceptable to Me but that is which I have made, [namely this,] when giving rest to all things, I shall make a beginning of the eighth day, that is, a beginning of another world. Wherefore, also, we keep the eight day with joyfulness, the day also on which Jesus rose again from the dead. And when He had manifested Himself, He ascended into the heavens.”

Justin Martyr was born a Gentile in Samaria around 114 AD and died a martyr for Christ in Rome in 165 AD. He studied various schools of philosophy before coming to learn of Christ through an old man that he met. He wrote his First Apology to Antonius Pius, who was emperor from 138-161 AD, to explain to him who Christians were and to appeal that Roman authorities should no longer persecute or put to death believers in Christ merely because they were Christians. In explaining who Christians were, he quotes often from the words of Christ in the four Gospels and also from the Old Testament where he makes extensive references to the prophecies about Christ. He explains the time when the Christians come together to worship as follows: 

“And on the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one place, and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as time permits; then, when the reader has ceased, the president verbally instructs, and exhorts to the imitation of these good things.” 

He goes on to explain more about why Christians meet on Sunday by saying, 

“But Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly, because it is the first day on which God, having wrought a change in the darkness and matter, made the world; and Jesus Christ our Savior on the same day rose form the dead. For He was crucified on the day before that of Saturn (Saturday); and on the day after that of Saturn, which is the day of the Sun, having appeared to His apostles and disciples, He taught them these things, which we have submitted to you also for your consideration.” 

Justin Martyr also wrote Dialogue with Trypho, in which he has an extended conversation with Jew named Trypho. I would encourage all to read the full account of this discussion, as I will only be able to give a few highlights of their discussion here. In this discussion, Justin was seeking to convince Trypho that Jesus was the Messiah, who fulfilled all that the Law and Old Testament prophets that had been written about him, while Trypho was seeking to persuade Justin to become circumcised and keep the whole Law of Moses including circumcision, the Sabbath and the other festivals. Early in this discussion Justin asks Trypho, 

“Is there any other matter, my friends, in which we are blamed, than this, that we live not after the law, and are not circumcised in the flesh as your forefathers were, and do not observe sabbaths as you do?” 

Trypho replies to Justin, 

“Moreover, I am aware that your precepts in the so-called Gospel are so wonderful and so great, that I suspect no one can keep them; for I have carefully read them. But this is what we are most at a loss about: that you, professing to be pious, and supposing yourselves better than others, are not in any particular separated from them, and do not alter your mode of living from the nations, in that you observe no festivals or sabbaths, and do not have the rite of circumcision; and further, resting your hopes on a man that was crucified, you yet expect to obtain some good thing from God, while you do not obey His commandments. Have you not read, that that soul shall be cut off from his people who shall not have been circumcised on the eighth day?  And this has been ordained for strangers and for slaves equally.”

After affirming that Christians believe with Jews in the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob who led the people of Israel out of Egypt, Justin said that he believed in a final law and covenant which is greater than the Law of Moses: 

“For the law promulgated on Horeb is now old and belongs to yourselves alone; but this is for all universally. Now law placed against law has abrogated that which is before it, and a covenant which comes after in like manner has put an end to the previous one; and an eternal and final law—namely, Christ—has been given to us, and covenant is trustworthy, after which there shall be no law, no commandment, no ordinance.” 

Here Justin seems to be referring to the point that Paul was making in Galatians 3:15-25 that the Law was to continue only until the coming of the Seed, which is Christ, and that now that faith has come we are no longer under the supervision of the Law. Likewise in Ephesians 2:11-16 Paul speaks of Christ destroying the barrier dividing Jewish and Gentile believers,“by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations.” Paul also remarked in 2 Corinthians 9:19-23 that while he was not under the Law, he was not lawless, but was under the Law of Christ.

Justin continued by affirming that the righteous men mentioned in Genesis before Abraham, who included Melchizedek, were uncircumcised and kept no Sabbaths. He concludes by saying to Trypho that, 

For if there was no need of circumcision before Abraham, or of the observance of Sabbaths, of feasts and sacrifices, before Moses; no more need is there of them now, after that, according to the will of God, Jesus Christ the son of God has been born without sin, of a virgin sprung from the stock of Abraham. 

Justin here is observing that the first mention of anyone keeping the seventh-day Sabbath is found in Exodus 16:23, where the leaders of Israel came to Moses to try to understand why the people had gathered a double portion of the manna on the sixth-day. It was only then that Moses told them that tomorrow will be a holy Sabbath of rest. 

Justin also makes the same point as does Paul in Romans 4:9-12, that Abraham received circumcision as a sign of the righteousness that he had received by faith before he was circumcised when he said that, 

For when Abraham himself was in uncircumcision, he was justified and blessed by reason of the faith which he reposed in God, as the Scripture tells. Moreover, the Scriptures and the facts themselves compel us to admit that He received circumcision for a sign, and not for righteousness.

Justin asks Trypho why, if it was so important that the Sabbath be kept, that the priests worked on the Sabbath by offering sacrifices in the temple, and that sons were circumcised on the Sabbath. Here Justin echos the point made by Jesus in Matthew 12:5 that the priests desecrate the Sabbath and yet are innocent. Trypho in reply acknowledged that he did not have a good answer to Justin’s questions.

Later in the discussion Trypho asked whether those who believe in Jesus as the Christ yet also wish to keep the institutions of Moses can still be saved. Justin replied, 

“In my opinion, Trypho, such an one will be saved, if he does not strive in every way to persuade other men,—I mean those Gentiles who have been circumcised from error by Christ, to observe the same things as himself, telling them that they will not be saved unless they do so.”  

Trypho replied, “Why then have you said, ‘In my opinion, such an one will be saved,’ unless there are some who affirm that such will not be saved?” 

Justin acknowledged that there were some Christians who would have no fellowship with those Christians who were circumcised and keep the Law and the Sabbath, but that he did not agree with them. Justin says that as long as these believers in Christ who keep the Sabbath and circumcision do not compel other Christians “… either to be circumcised like themselves, or to keep the Sabbath, or to observe any other such ceremonies, then I hold that we ought to join ourselves to such, and associate with them in all things as kinsmen and brethren.” 

However, Justin observed, “But if Trypho some of your race, who say they believe in this Christ, compel those Gentiles who believe in this Christ to live in all respects according to the law given by Moses, or choose not to associate so intimately with them, I in like manner do not approve of them.” 

Justin acknowledges to Trypho that Christians fell into four groups regarding circumcision, the Law, and the Sabbath: 

1. Some Jewish Christians continued to circumcise their sons and keep the Law and the Sabbath but had fellowship with Gentile believers who did not.
2. Other Jewish Christians circumcised their sons, keep the Law and the Sabbath and taught that Gentile Christians must do likewise or they would not be saved. 
3. Justin and most Gentile Christians did not submit to circumcision, or the keeping of the Law and the Sabbath, but had full fellowship with those Jewish believers who did not demand that the Gentile believers do likewise, but did not have fellowship with those who insisted that Gentile believers must be circumcised, and keep the Law and the Sabbath. 
4. Some Gentile believers would have no fellowship with Jewish believers who continued to circumcise their sons and keep the Law and the Sabbath even if they did not seek to compel Gentile believers to do likewise; however Justin makes clear that he does not agree with them.

The Jewish believers from the second group had a well-developed theology, which came from the Old Testament, in which they taught that all people should become circumcised and keep the whole Law of Moses including the Sabbath and other festivals in the Law. They held the same view regarding circumcision and the Law as did the circumcision party that Paul confronted in Antioch in Acts 15.

Likewise, when Paul returned to Jerusalem in Acts 21, the leaders of the church spoke about how many Jews had come to believe in Christ and that they were all zealous for the Law. These leaders urged Paul to keep the Law because he was a Jew, but agreed the Gentles need only keep the rules given at the Council at Jerusalem in Acts. 

“Take these men, join in their purification rites and pay their expenses, so they can have their heads shaved. Then everybody will know there is no truth in these reports about you, but that you yourself are living in obedience to the law. As for the Gentile believers, we have written to them our decision that they should abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality.” 

It was clear that these Jewish believers in Jerusalem continued to keep the whole Law as demonstrated by the request that the leaders of the church in Jerusalem made to Paul, so that he would show that he also kept the Law. He was asked to join in the purification rites of those who had taken a Nazrite vow, and to pay for their expenses which included the offering or a lamb sacrifice in the temple.

I would like us next to hear from Irenaeus who lived from about 130 to 202 AD. He served as the bishop of Lyon which is in what is now southern France. He was concerned with many different heresies facing the Christian Church and wrote Against Heresies. He spoke of a group of Jewish Christians called Ebionites, who practiced circumcision and kept the law:  

“They use the Gospel according to Matthew only, and repudiate the Apostle Paul, maintaining that he was an apostate from the law.” 

Justin had also mentioned Jewish believers who sought to force Gentile believers to practice circumcision, the Law, and the Sabbath. We can see why these Judaizers would have also rejected Paul. 

Eusebius, who lived from 260-339 AD, also wrote about the Ebionites in his The History of the Church. He notes that Christians called them Ebionites, which means “poor” in Hebrew, because they held a low opinion of who Christ was. One group held that Jesus was born of Mary with a human father and became the Christ because of his righteous character. Other Ebionites held that Jesus was born of the virgin Mary by the Holy Spirit but denied his pre-existence as the Word of God. He noted that both groups of Ebionites “. . . observed the Sabbath and the whole Jewish system: yet on the Lord’s Day they celebrated rites similar to our own in memory of the Savior’s resurrection.” 

Let us now summarize what we learn from these early church fathers. what do we see was the consistent witness of Christians in the second century? 

First, Christians always distinguish the Sabbath from Sunday, which they often refer to as the Lord’s Day or the eighth day. 

Second, they never affirmed that when they gathered on Sunday to worship Christ that they were keeping the fourth commandment of the Decalogue. 

Third, there was small minority of Jewish Christians who continued to keep the Law which included circumcision and keeping of the Sabbath and other festivals. 

Fourth, Justin and most other Gentile believers continued to have fellowship with Jewish believers who circumcised their sons and kept the Law and the Sabbath—as long as they did not demand that all Gentile Christians do likewise. 

Fifth, there were some Jewish Christians who continued to teach that Gentile Christians must become circumcised and keep the Law including the Sabbath and other festivals or they would not be saved. They held to the same teaching that was held by the circumcision group that Paul confronted in Antioch in Acts 15.

The Adventist Sabbath Assumptions

Let us now look at the five assumptions that Seventh-day Adventists have made concerning the Sabbath and see how they measure up to the teachings of Scripture and the witness of the second century Church. We will look at each assumption again and follow it with the early church’s answer to each one.

1. Seventh-day Adventists assume that in Genesis all of the patriarchs from Adam to Jacob and his sons kept the Sabbath based on their understanding of Genesis 1-2 and Exodus 20:11: “For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.”

Answer: Justin repeatedly affirmed that the Sabbath was not kept before the time of Moses and Trypho never challenged him on this. While Exodus 20:11 could be understood as stating that the Sabbath began at Creation, Deuteronomy 5:15 says that reason that the children of Israel were to keep the Sabbath was to remember that they had been slaves in Egypt and that God had delivered them from Egypt with a mighty hand. An argument from silence is not a powerful argument. Exodus 16 is a much better wittiness to the fact that the people of Israel did not keep the weekly Sabbath before the manna was given to them in the desert.

2. Seventh-day Adventists assume that all of the Ten Commandments remain the eternal Law of God for all Christians to continue to keep, and that when Christ referred to the Law in Matthew 5:17-18 he was referring to the Ten Commandments.

Answer: Justin gives no indication that there were Jewish believers who were only urging the keeping of the Ten Commandments on the Gentile believers. In Matthew 5:17-18 Jesus was speaking about the fact that He did not come to destroy, but to fulfill the Law and the prophets. The Law and the prophets are mentioned many times by Christ, and it is clear that he was referring to all of the five books of the Law and all of the writings of the prophets.

Most readers also fail to see that the word ‘until’ is used twice in Matthew 5:18. Clearly the first ‘until’ heaven and earth disappear has not yet happened, but the second ‘until’ has occurred: everything is accomplished has been fulfilled by Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection which brought in the New Covenant. 

On resurrection Sunday, Jesus spoke about how He has fulfilled the things written about Him in the Law, the prophets and the Psalms. Since Jesus is talking about the whole Law of Moses in Matthew 5:17-18, if one were to argue that all things have not yet been fulfilled, then he would be arguing that one must keep the whole Law of Moses, as indeed also Trypho urged Justin to do, which would have included circumcision and the sacrifices of a lamb for a sin offering in the temple as well as the Sabbath.  

3. Seventh-day Adventists assume that the apostles instructed all Gentile Christians to keep the Sabbath and that they universally did so in the first century after the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ.

Answer: Paul in his epistles addresses the issue of holy days three times. In Galatians 4:8-11 Paul says he fears for the believers in Galatia in their keeping of days, that they wish to be enslaved all over again. He wrote his epistle to the Galatians because Gentile believers were being taught by some Jewish believers that they must be circumcised and keep the Law.

In Romans 14:5-8. he speaks about one person considering one day special and another considering every day to be alike, and that each should follow his own convictions. This freedom is the same position that Justin takes with regard to believers who keep Sabbath but do not insist that other believers do likewise. 

In Colossians 2:16-17 Paul says, “Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ.”

It is clear that he understood the meaning of festival, new moon celebration, and Sabbath in the same way as these terms were used in eight Old Testament passages that use these terms together: festivals clearly refer to yearly festivals, New Moons to monthly new moons, and Sabbaths to the weekly the Sabbath. 

Let us look at one of these passages in 2 Chronicles 2:4 “Now I am about to build a temple for the Name of the Lord my God and to dedicate it to him for burning fragrant incense before him, for setting out the consecrated bread regularly, and for making burnt offerings every morning and evening and on Sabbaths and New Moons and at the appointed feasts of the Lord our God. This is a lasting ordinance for Israel.” 

Here one sees a clear sequence of times when sacrifices are to be offered in the temple, twice daily, once a week on the Sabbath, on each New Moon, and on all of the yearly festivals. Therefore, the terms festival, new moon celebration, and Sabbaths include all of the holy days of the Jews. If Paul had meant to exclude the weekly Sabbath, he could have simply written that festivals and New Moon celebrations were shadows of Christ. 

In addition Gentile Christians would have faced many practical difficulties to be able to refrain from working on the Sabbath, a day which was not a holiday in the Roman world. Employers and slave masters would have both demanded that their workers and their slaves work on that day. Yet we find no questions being asked by believers of Paul in any of his epistles that would indicate that Gentile believers were facing such difficulties, because they were attempting to keep the Sabbath. 

In addition all the evidence from the second century indicates that the majority of Gentile Christians never kept the Sabbath in the first century, or they would have continued to have kept the Sabbath in the second century, just as Seventh-day Adventists have continued to keep the Sabbath for over 175 years since 1846.

4. Seventh-day Adventists assume that pope and the Catholic Church changed the weekly day of worship from the Sabbath to Sunday sometime after Constantine became emperor and stopped the persecution of Christians with the Edict of Milan in 313 AD.

Answer: The church fathers of the second century witness that Christians were gathering to worship the risen Christ on Sunday long before the bishop of Rome had any of the authority that popes would later claim for themselves. This assumption just does not stand up to the facts of history. The evidence is that by 100 AD Christians were gathering to worship the risen Lord on Sunday—well over 200 years before the Edict of Milan. 

5. Seventh-day Adventists assume that E. G. White was correct when she saw in a number of visions that the Sabbath had become a testing truth for all Christians after Christ entered the Most Holy Place for the first time in October 22, 1844. In addition she affirmed that the keeping of the Sabbath would divide true Christians from false Christians just before Christ comes with those failing to keep the seventh-day Sabbath receiving the Mark of the Beast and persecuting those keeping the true Sabbath.

Answer: Since the New Testament never commands Gentile Christians to keep the Sabbath, Ellen White’s visions cannot be used to confirm this idea. Also the book of Hebrews affirms that Jesus fulfilled the high priest’s work done on the Day of Atonement at His ascension when He sat down at the right hand of the Father as our high priest. The writer of Hebrews compares the work of the high priest on the Day of Atonement (described in Leviticus 16) with with the work of Christ as our high priest who entered once for all the heavenly most holy place by means of his own blood. 

Therefore, the writer of Hebrews contradicts Ellen White’s second vision that Christ for the first time entered the Most Holy Place in October 22, 1844.

Free to Do Anything?

On a final note, in my discussions with Seventh-day Adventists concerning the Law of Moses lasting only until the coming of Christ in Galatians 3:19, I often get the reply that if that is so, then Christians would be free to do anything that they want. However, Jesus in the Great Commission in Matthew 28:19-20, makes it clear that his disciples are not only to make disciples from every nation, but they were also to teach them everything that Christ commanded them. 

Likewise Trypho in his dialogue with Justin Martyr acknowledges that the teachings of the Gospels are so wonderful that he doubts that anyone can keep them. Justin Martyr in turn speaks of a new covenant and new law that comes from Christ, which Christians keep. This is similar to what Paul says in Galatians 6:2 about fulfilling the Law of Christ, or when he says that, “To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law.” 

In conclusion, what does the evidence show about how many Christians where keeping the Sabbath in second century AD? It shows that a minority of largely Jewish believers continued to keep the Sabbath in the second century, but the majority of Gentile believers did not. This shows that the first four assumptions that Seventh-day Adventists make about the Sabbath are not supported either by the evidence from Scripture nor from the practices of Christians in the second century. For Seventh-day Adventists who find it hard to accept this conclusion, you must ask yourself why would these believers remain faithful and die rather than deny Christ, yet turn from the Sabbath if the apostles in the first century had clearly taught them to keep it?

Resources

1. Ante-Nicene Fathers Vol. 1, edited by Philip Schaff, Christian Classics Ethereal Library, Grand Rapids, Michigan,   https://www.ccel.org.
2. Ignatius, Epistle to the Magnesians p. 62, Chapter IX – Let Live with Christ, Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 1.
3. Ibid. 
4. Epistle of Barnabas, p. 138, Chapter II  – The Jewish Sacrifices are now Abolished, Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 1.
5. Epistle of Barnabas, p. 147, Chapter XV  – The false and the true Sabbath, Ibid.
6. Justin Martyr, The First Apology of Justin, p. 185, Chapter LXVII – Weekly worship of the Christians, Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 1, Ibid.
7. Ibid. 
8. Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, Chapter X – Trypho blames the Christians for this alone—the non-observance of the law, p. 199, Ibid.
9. Ibid. 
10. Ibid. Chapter XI – The law abrogated: the New Testament promised and given by God, p. 200, Ibid.
11. Ibid. Chapter XXIII – The Opinion of the Jews regarding the Law does an Injury to God, p. 206, Ibid.
12. Ibid.
13. Ibid. p. 208 Chapter XXVIII – True righteousness is obtained by Christ.
14. Ibid. p. 217, Chapter LXVI – Trypho asks whether a man who keeps the Law even now will be saved. Justin Proves that it Contributes Nothing to Righteousness.
15. Ibid. p. 218.
16. Ibid.
17. Ibid.
18. Ibid.
19. Read about the decision of the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15:22-29.
20. Acts 21:24-25 from NIV.
21. Read about the Nazrite vow in Numbers 6:1-21.
22. Irenaeus, Against Heresies, p. 352, Chapter XXVI  – Doctrines of Cerinthus, the Ebionites and Nicolaitanes, Ibid.
23. Eusebius, The History of the Church, book 3, chapter 27, p. 90-91.
24. Luke 24:27, 44.
25. Festivals, new moons and Sabbaths: Numbers 28-29, 1 Chronicles 23:30-31, 2 Chronicles 2:4, 2 Chronicles 8:12-13, 2 Chronicles 31:3, Nehemiah 10:33, Isaiah 1:13 -14, Ezekiel 45:17, Ezekiel 46:1-15, Hosea 2:11.
26. The work of Christ compared to the work of the high priest on the Day of Atonement: Read Leviticus 16, Hebrews 6:19-20, Hebrews 9:6-14, 23-28; 10:19-22, 13:11-15.
27. 1 Corinthians 9:27 in NIV.

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Wesley Ringer was raised a fifth generation Seventh-day Adventist by loving Adventist parents who served ten years in missions with the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Korea from 1971-1981. The story of his journey from first learning the gospel to finally leaving Adventism for the sake of Jesus is published here. Wes began studying New Testament Greek in 1994, which finally lead him to do a MA in Applied Linguistics, which included taking four upper division Greek courses in seminary. He has been serving Christ with Wycliffe Bible Translators since 2005 as a translation consultant in South Sudan, helping with the finishing of five New Testaments. Wes wrote The Shut-door and the Sanctuary: Historical and Theological Problems for the Southern Conference of Seventh-day Adventists in April 6, 1982, and revised this paper in May 22, 2011. It contains many of Ellen White’s unpublished and all of her published letters and articles from 1844 to 1855 and quotes extensively from both Shut-door and Open-door Adventist papers from that time period. Contact him at: wesleyringer@gmail.com