Teoría general de la prueba

3. The Sabbath and Work

In his analysis of “The Idea of the Sabbath,” Gustave Oehler observed, concerning it, that, first , “Man, like God, is to work and to rest; thus human life is to be a copy of Divine life.” The work of God’s people is to be instrumental in the restoration of the divine order to the earth.Second ,

Divine labor terminates in happy rest; not till the Creator rests satisfied in the contemplation of His works is His creation itself complete. So, too, human labor is not to run on in resultless circles, but to terminate in a happy harmony of existence.

The jubilee in part brings out this aspect of the sabbath. Moreover, because “the whole course of human history is not to run on in dreary endlessness,” because its goal is a glorious victory, we, too, “are to find a completion in an harmonious and God-given order” which “is guaranteed by the Sabbath of creation, and prefigured by the sabbatical seasons.” The sabbath of creation, unlike the previous six days, is not ended with an evening. “The Divine rest of the seventh day of creation, which has no evening, hovers over the world’s progress, that it may at last absorb it into itself.”

Work and goal, effort and result, these are the two concepts which are basic to the idea of the sabbath, according to Oehler. The sabbath gives purpose to man’s life, in that it makes labor

meaningful and purposive: it links it to a joyful consummation. The sabbath, Oehler noted, looks backward to the creation rest for its pattern and faith; it looks upward to God in the assurance of His grace and victory; it looks forward to the great sabbath consummation.

The full purport, however, of the idea of the Sabbath is not attained until that dominion of sin and death, which have entered into the development of mankind, is taken into account. It was after the curse of God was imposed upon the earth, and man condemned to labor in the sweat of his brow in the service of his perishable existence, that the desire for the rest of God took the form of a longing for redemption (Gen. v. 29). Israel, too, learned, by suffering under Egyptian oppression without any refreshing intermission, to sigh for rest. When their God bestowed upon them their regularly recurring period of rest, by leading them out of bondage, this ordinance became at the same time a thankful solemnity in remembrance of the deliverance they had experienced.Hence it is said, in the second version of the Decalogue (Deut. v. 15): “Remember that thou wast a bondman in the land of Egypt, and the Lord thy God brought thee out thence, with a mighty hand and a stretched-out arm; therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath-day.” This passage does not, as it has often been understood, merely urge a motive for the special duty of not hindering servants from resting on the seventh day: nor, on the other hand, does it contain, as has also been asserted, the proper objective reason for the sanctification of the sabbath, which is, on the contrary, expressed, as already said, in the first version of the Decalogue, Ex. xx. 11; but it applies to the keeping of the Sabbath, in particular, that consideration which is the deepest subjective incitement to the

fulfilling of the whole law. How closely the remembrance of the deliverance from Egyptian bondage was bound up with this very institution of the Sabbath, is evident from what, according to the testimony of Roman authors given above (Tacitus, Hist. v. 4; Justin, Hist. 36. 2), was known to the heathen concerning the reason for the celebration of the Sabbath.234

Attention has been called to the fact that restoration is basic to the concept of the sabbath. But restoration clearly involves work. As Oehler pointed out, “one point, important in an ethical aspect, remains to be noticed. The Sabbath has its significance only as the seventh day, preceded

by six days of labor. . . . Thus it is only upon the foundation of preceding labor in our vocation that the rest of the Sabbath is to be reared.”235

The sabbath is God’s covenant sign with man, declaring God’s grace and God’s efficacious work unto salvation, so that man can rest, “forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord” (1 Cor. 15:58).

It must be remembered that an important aspect of the fourth law-word is this, “Six days thou shalt labour,” i.e., six days are set aside for work. There is a positive command, therefore, to work. The creation mandate declared to man, “Be fruitful, multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; bear rule over the fish of the sea; over the birds of the air and over every living, moving creature on earth” (Gen. 1:28, Berkeley Version). This mandate was declared before the Fall. The duties of fertility, work, and dominion were established thus before the Fall; they continued after the Fall, but with a serious impediment. Without regenerating grace, man cannot keep God’s law and discharge his duties. The redeemed man’s work is not an attempt to create a paradise on earth, but to fulfill God’s requirements within the kingdom. The redeemed man is a citizen of the Kingdom of God, and he abides by the laws thereof: this is his work, his duty, and his path to dominion. The fact of the sabbath presupposes the fact of work.

The relationship between the sabbath and work is one that brings all things into relationship to God and in dedication to Him. Nothing can be, nor can be deemed to be, outside of God. Not only covenant man but all his work must be circumcised in a sense, or baptized, into the kingdom. The custom of the firstfruits was an aspect of this. But another law bears even more plainly on this matter:

And when ye shall come into the land, and shall have planted all manner of trees for food, then ye shall count the fruit thereof as uncircumcised; three years shall it be as uncircumcised unto you: it shall not be eaten of. But in the fourth year all the fruit thereof shall be holy to praise the Lord withal. And in the fifth year shall ye eat of the fruit thereof, that it may yield unto you the increase thereof: I am the LORD your God. (Lev. 19:23-25)

This law clearly is linked with laws previously discussed which bear on soil conservation, the fertility of the trees, and respect for the life of all creation. Ginsburg’s comments bring out this aspect excellently:

Trees which bore fruit unfit for human food, which grew up by themselves, or which were planted for hedges or timber, did not come under this law.

Then ye shall count the fruit thereof as uncircumcised. — Literally,then shall ye circumcise the uncircumcision, its fruit , that is, cut off or pinch off its uncircumcision, which the text itself explains as “its fruit.” The metaphorical use of circumcision is thus explained by the text itself: it denotes the fruit as disqualified or unfit. In chap. xxvi. 41 the same metaphor is used for the heart which is stubborn or not ripe to listen to the Divine admonitions. And in other passages of Scripture it is used with reference to lips (Ex. vi. 12, 30) and ears

(Jer. vi. 10) which do not perform their proper functions.236

For the first three years the fruit must be pinched off and allowed to rot on the ground. In the fourth year, it could be eaten if redeemed from the Lord by paying its value plus a fifth part: it belonged to God. In the fifth year, the fruit could be harvested, and for five years thereafter, or,

until the next sabbath year.

This law is concerned with the preservation of life by due respect for the conditions of life, but more is involved, because the worduncircumcised is deliberately and emphatically used. It means that the ground is indeed cursed for man’s sake, because of his sin, and all man’s work is futile and uncircumcised apart from God.

Concerning the uncircumcised fruit, Peake’s comment is an illustration of the absurdity of unbelief:

The point is perhaps that during the first three years it is taboo and must be left alone; it may srcinally have been left for the field-spirits. Notice that animal firstlings were also not used till they were three years old. The Arabs propitiate the jinn with blood when a piece of land is ploughed for the first time.237

This masterpiece of irrelevance is so treasured by the modernist mind that Nathaniel Micklem perpetuated it a generation later by quoting Peake in his own commentary on Leviticus 19:23- 25.238 Bonar, whom neither Peake nor Micklem would recognize as a commentator, since he took God’s law seriously, observed:

Was this precept not a memorial of the Forbidden Tree of Paradise? Every fruit- tree was to stand unused for three years, as a test of their obedience. Every stranger saw, in Israel’s orchards and vineyards, proofs of their obedience to their supreme Lord — a witness for Him.239

The conservation of the soil and the preservation of the fertility of the tree are important: they underlie this fact of uncircumcision. The earth is the Lord’s, and it is to be used on His terms and under His law. The sabbath is not kept merely by inactivity, nor can any man commend himself to God by abstaining from eggs over which a hen labored on the sabbath. The sabbath presupposes work, work fulfilling God’s creation mandate and performed under God’s law, and the sabbath is the joyful rest from the exercise of this godly dominion. On the sabbath, a man rejoices that the earth is the Lord’s, and all the fulness thereof (Ps. 24:1). In that confidence man rests, and in that joy he surveys the work of his hands, knowing that his “labour is not in vain in the Lord” (1 Cor. 15:58). On that day, and in the sabbatical season, he abstains from the fruit and the tree, now like a forbidden tree to him, because the Lord, who commands work in order that man may exercise dominion, also sets the boundaries on that dominion.

Man knows that his “labour is not in vain in the Lord” ( 1 Cor. 15:58) because the sovereign God makesall things work together for good unto them that love Him, who are the called according to His purpose (Rom. 8:28). Covenant man recognizes, or is called to recognize, that to break the law at one point is to break the whole law (James 2:10), for to disregard the law at any point is to place ourselves in the position of gods at that point. The fact that Adam and Eve obeyed at all

other points but disobeyed with respect to one tree did not give them a favorable balance with God. At that point they revealed a new operating principle: to be as gods, knowing or determining good and evil for themselves (Gen. 3:5). Both work and rest must be unto the Lord, and their presupposition must be the sovereignty of the triune God.