Prophetic Tool Chest Chapter 9

PROPHETIC TOOL CHEST

CHAPTER NINE

THE SEAL OF GOD & THE MARK OF THE BEAST

Is the mark of the Beast a tattoo of some kind or a microchip that is placed in the forehead or hand? Not primarily, though it is possible that before the end, there may be some kind of control mechanism to regulate and control the populace. We do acknowledge that there is certain logic in believing that the New World Order system will use control pervasive elements to regulate society under the coming dictatorship. But, even if this happens, the primary definition of the Mark is not such a device. God’s people will not be willing to allow such a device to be placed in their body, so if Christians are held down by inescapable coercion, and have such a device planted in the body, will they have the Mark? No!

In this chapter we establish “what” God’s “Mark” is; thus, we will know what the Beast’s mark represents, for the Devil is not original; he twists God’s attributes to suit himself. We will see that God’s mark has an outward sign, which demonstrates loyalty to the Everlasting Covenant, while the Beast’s mark too has an outward sign, which represents loyalty to the covenant of the great Dragon power and its system of Paganism. Moreover, we will see that God’s Mark and the Beast’s Mark revolve around God’s Holy Law.

A Simple Illustration For Identification

God And Israel Satan And Babylon

Rev. 1:4, 5. The Trinity - Father Rev. 12; 13; 16:13, 19 False Trinity Son, and Holy Spirit. - dragon, beast, false prophet.

Rev. 1:1; 6:2. God commissions Rev. 13:2. The dragon gave the beast his His Son, and gives Him authority “power, and his seat, and great authority.”and power.

Rev. 5:6. Christ is likened to a Lamb Rev. 13:11. False prophet has two horns likewith seven horns - all power in heaven a lamb, but speaks later as a dragon - politicaland on earth. power controlled by church.

Rev. 22:16. Jesus means Saviour Rev. 9:11. Apollyon or Destroyer. Rev. 12:7 - 9; 20:2. Satan or Adversary.

Rev. 1:18; 3:7. Keys of death and Rev. 9:1. Key of bottomless pit.of hades.

Rev. 3:21. Christ’s “throne.” Rev. 2:13; 16:10. “Throne” of Satan.

Ps. 113:5; Isaiah 40:18. “Who is Rev. 13:4. “Who is like unto the beast?”like unto the Lord?”

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The Seal Of God & The Mark Of The Beast

Rev. 5:6. “A lamb as it had been Rev. 13:3. One of the heads of the beast “asslain.” though it had been slain.”

Rev. 2:8. Christ died and lived again. Rev. 13:14. Beast received stroke of death “and lived.”

Rev. 1:4. God: “He which is, and which Rev. 17:8. Beast “was, and is not,” and is was, and which is to come.” about to come out of bottomless pit.

Rev. 6:16. The wrath of the Lamb Rev. 12:12. The wrath of the Dragon comescomes down with great wrath. down with great wrath.

Rev. 7:2. God’s seal. Rev. 13:17. Beast’s mark.

Rev. 7:3. Seal in forehead. Rev. 13:16; 20:4. Mark in forehead or hand.

Rev. 14:1. Contains the name of God. Rev. 13:17. Contains the name of the beast.

The preceding list illustrates that Satan attempts to parallel and emulate God. Satan even attempts to parallel God’s seal in the forehead with his own mark. In order to begin to understand what the mark of the Beast represents, we must first know who the Beast is; we have already accomplished this. The Papacy is the Beast. The next step is to identify the Papacy’s mark; but in order to do this, we have to establish what God’s mark is; thus, we will know that the Beast’s mark is simply a corruption of God’s mark.

GOD’S MARKEzekiel 9:1 – 6:

(1) He cried also in mine ears with a loud voice, saying, Cause them that have charge over the city to draw near, even every man with his destroying weapon in his hand.

(2) And, behold, six men came from the way of the higher gate, which lieth toward the north, and every man a slaughter weapon in his hand; and one man among them was clothed with linen, wit a writers inkhorn by his side: and they went in, and stood beside the brasen alter.

(3) And the glory of the God of Israel was gone up from the cherub, whereupon he was, to the threshold of the house. And he called to the man clothed with linen, which had the writer’s inkhorn by his side;

(4) And the Lord said unto him, Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and cry for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof.

(5) And to the others he said in mine hearing, Go ye after him through the city, and smite: let not your eye spare, neither have ye pity:

(6) Slay utterly old and young, both maids, and little children, and women: but come not near any man upon whom is the mark; . . . .

The preceding passage of scripture, in Ezekiel, was a vision that foretold the doom of Israel when the Assyrians and Babylonians would come and destroy the nation. The mark on the forehead is obviously a symbol of God’s character written in the minds

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(Rev. 14:1) of those who were unwilling to participate in the idolatry of the nation. This is an example that can be paralleled with Elijah the Prophet’s experience when he told the Lord, “for the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine alters, and slain the prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away (1 Kings 19:10)”; and then Elijah soon found out that there was a remnant of 7,000 in Israel who did not bow down to Baal (Verse. 18). In Elijah’s day, what was the problem with Israel? 1 Kings 18:17, 18 says:

And it came to pass, when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said unto him, Art thou he that troubleth Israel? And he answered, I have not troubled Israel; but thou, and thy father’s house, in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord, and thou hast followed Baalim.”

Israel’s problem was that they had forsaken God’s Holy Law and followed after the sun god. This too was the problem in Ezekiel’s day. In the time of Ezekiel—like Elijah’s time—God wanted to spare those who did not forsake His Law for sun worship; but rather, had the law written in their minds. God’s MARK is HIS LAW! Take some time to analyze the following diagram:

Ezekiel 9:1 - 6

God has a Mark that He

places in the forehead.

Dueteronomy 6:1 - 9

(Verse 8)

Exodus 13:9

Forehead and Hand.

Revelation 7:1 - 3; 14:1

God will put his seal in

the forehead.

Matthew 5:21, 22, 27, 28

Hebrews 8:10

One of the impotant aspects of

New Covenant is Law put in the

minds of the believers.

Romans 8:6 - 8

Carnal Mind not subject to Law

Must be renewed in the spirit of

the Mind.

Ephesians 4:21 - 24

Then the requirements of the Law

will be fulfilled in us.

Romans 8:4

Hands Represent Action

Psalm 24:3, 4

26:6

Psalm 125:3

44:20, 21

Bad ActionsGood Actions

The Right Hand: Symbol Of The Strength Of Action

Good Action

Psalm 121:5

63:8

Bad Action

Psalm 26:9, 10

Psalm 144:11

Ezekiel's day was a type of the last days.

God's MARK is His LAW

God's law is placed in

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THE OUTWARD SIGN OR SEAL OF GOD’S LAW

Revelation 7:1 – 3 shows that God has a seal that He must put in the foreheads of the saints prior to the closing of earth’s history:

1 After these things I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, on the sea, or on any tree. 2 Then I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God. And he cried with a loud voice to the four angels to whom it was granted to harm the earth and the sea, 3 saying, "Do not harm the earth, the sea, or the trees till we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads."

In the preceding section, we saw that in ancient Israel, God’s law was to be placed in the forehead; this is also the case in the New Covenant (Heb. 8:10). Indeed God’s people prior to the close of earth’s history will have God’s character written in their minds (Rev. 14:1). This is why both Revelation 12:17 and 14:12 describe the saints as “keeping the commandments of God.” The question we must ask, then, is “Will there be an outward sign of God’s law—amongst the saints—for the world to see? Absolutely!

In Revelation 7:1 – 3, the Greek word for seal is, Sphragis, meaning, “a mark or stamp, as a seal that is placed on a book.” In Romans 4:11 we find more insight into the meaning of this word:

And he (Abraham) received the sign (Gr. Semeion: “A mark, token, or sign; that by which a person or thing is distinguished from others”) of circumcision, a seal (Sphragis) of the righteousness of the faith which he had while still uncircumcised, that he might be the father of all those who believe, though they are uncircumcised, that righteousness might be imputed to them also,

For Abraham, circumcision became both a sign and seal of the faith relationship that he possessed with God. In essence, circumcision was a mark or token that distinguished Abraham and his offspring from the surrounding nations. Romans 4:11 demonstrates that “sign” and “seal” are interchangeable words. Why is this significant? Ezekiel 20:12 says, “Moreover I also gave them My Sabbaths, to be a SIGN (Heb. Oth: “Distinguishing Mark”) between them and Me, that they might know that I am the LORD who sanctifies them. Ezekiel 20:20 says, “Hallow My Sabbaths, and they will be a SIGN between Me and you, that you may know that I am the LORD your God.” In these scriptures we have in sight the fact that the Sabbath was to be a sign—a distinguishing mark—of two issues: (1) A sign of the sanctification that God’s people are to receive, and (2) a sign of the supremacy of God over all things. In fact Exodus 31:17 emphasizes that the Sabbath is a sign of God as the Creator forever: “It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.”

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The Sabbath As The Sign Of Sanctification: Hebrews 4

In ancient Israel the Sabbath was to be the sign or seal of the sanctification from God (Ezekiel 20:12). Hebrews chapter 4 not only acknowledges that the Sabbath was to be the sign of Sanctification for ancient Israel, but Hebrews 4 reintegrates this truth into the New Covenant. According to Hebrews 4:1 – 3, the unbelieving Israelites were unable to enter into the rest (Gr. Katapausis: “a perpetual state or place of rest”) because of unbelief. “Katapausis,” here, undoubtedly points to the gospel rest of Salvation, the unilateral provision of God. This rest, in essence, is a place of being. This is the place that all the saints listed in Hebrews 11 dwelt. The “Katapausis is the “secret place of the Most High (Psalm 91:1),” the kingdom of God within our minds (Luke 17:20, 21; 1 Cor. 3:16, 17). This is the place were Moses was able to see into the invisible (Heb. 11:24 – 27). The “Katapausis” is the spiritual habitation where faith is the guiding principle that allows us to see the deep things of God; where faith places our trust in the omnipotent and omniscient provision of God. The Israelites, through their bilateral path in the Covenant, did not enter into the “Katapausis.” Consequently, neither were they able to enter into the seventh day Sabbath rest (verses’ 4, 5).

Interestingly, Hebrews 4:4 places the “Katapausis” in connection with the seventh day Sabbath. In fact, verse 4 emphasizes that God’s rest on the seventh day was the “Katapausis.” Hebrews 4:5 tells us that unbelieving Jews will never enter into the Sabbath day rest. Why? They will not enter that rest, because they are not experiencing the perpetual place of rest in the gospel. Hebrews 4:6—in connection with verse 3—explain that those who believe in the Gospel will enter into God’s rest.

Hebrews 4:7, 8 compare the day (not a literal day: see Hebrews 3:7 – 19) of Joshua with that of David. In Joshua’s day, the Israelites were invited into the gospel rest that Abraham had experienced; the Israelites chose the bilateral path. David’s day was another invitation to enter into the gospel rest. The writer of Hebrews—in looking at the whole message of the book—has David’s day as being an example of the present fulfillment of the New Covenant. In other words, the present Davidic covenant where Jesus is both king and priest after the order of Melchizedek is another invitation for the Israel of God to enter into the “Katapausis.” Hence, the New Covenant is the Everlasting Covenant more fully recaptured.

Hebrews 4:9 says something very intriguing; it says “there still remains a Sabbatismos for the people of God. What is the Sabbatismos? We know that the Greek for Sabbath is Sabbaton; meaning, the seventh day of rest. This word in Hebrews 4:9 is unprecedented. If Paul is the writer of Hebrews, we say that this is a word he coined together. We have a theory about this word. Hebrews chapter 4, as whole, deals with entering into the Katapausis, which is the gospel rest. Paul contrasted David’s day from Joshua’s day as a re-invitation to enter into the Gospel rest, which had been the experience of the Fathers of Israel. Paul parallels the New Covenant with David’s day, for the New Covenant is the Davidic Covenant. Hebrews 4:3 – 5 connect the Katapausis with God’s seventh day Sabbath as something that only those who experience the gospel can enter into. We concur that the Sabbatismos was a word coined together to combine the Sabbaton with the Katapausis, making the Sabbath day, itself, a sign of the perpetual rest found in the unilateral provision of God; hence, the Sabbath day is the Sign of the New Covenant.

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NIV Hebrews 4:1 Therefore, since the promise of entering his rest (Katapausis) still stands, let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it. 2 For we also have had the gospel preached to us, just as they did; but the message they heard was of no value to them, because those who heard did not combine it with faith.

3 Now we who have believed enter that rest (Katapausis), just as God has said, "So I declared on oath in my anger, 'They shall never enter my rest (Katapausis).'" And yet his work has been finished since the creation of the world.

4 For somewhere he has spoken about the seventh day in these words: "And on the seventh day God rested from all his work."

5 And again in the passage above he says, "They shall never enter my rest (Katapausis)."

6 It still remains that some will enter that rest, and those who formerly had the gospel preached to them did not go in, because of their disobedience. 7 Therefore God again set a certain day, calling it Today, when a long time later he spoke through David, as was said before: "Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts." 8 For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken later about another day (David’s day—opposed to Joshua’s day—was another invitation for Israel to enter into rest, and David’s day typified the New Covenant of today).

9 There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest (Sabbatismos) for the people of God;

10 for anyone who enters God's rest (Katapausis) also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. 11 Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest (Katapausis), so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience.

Concerning the preceding illustration of Hebrews 4, we emphasize the following: It is very important to notice that between verses’ 3 – 5, the writer of Hebrews connects the Katapausis with the actual 7th day of creation. He ties them together as though they are inextricably connected; this is very significant. Notice that in verse three, the writer of Hebrews says, “they (meaning unbelieving Israel) will not enter into the Katapausis”;

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and then, in verse 5—referring to the 7th day of creation in verse 4—he says, “they will not enter into the Katapausis.” We deduct 4 conclusions out of these scriptures:

(1) The Katapausis is inextricably connected to the 7th day Sabbath; (2) According to verse 3, unbelievers will not enter the Katapausis; (3) According to verses’ 4 and 5, unbelievers will not enter the 7th day, which is inextricably

connected to the Katapausis. In other words, the 7th day is not affective without the Katapausis. Israel could never truly keep the 7th day Sabbath unless they had the Lord of the day.

(4) Verse 9 distributes a word—the Sabbatismos—that describes the connection of the 7th

day with the Katapausis in verses’ 3 and 4.

Verses’ 7 and 8—dealing with the concept of “Today”—is being recapitulated into this chapter from Hebrews 3 to emphasize that we are in the New Covenant. The writer of Hebrews undoubtedly uses “David’s Day” as an example that David’s time frame was another invitation to enter into the Katapausis, whereas in Joshua’s day Israel failed to enter that rest. The writer of Hebrews, in essence, takes David’s Day—of the past—and calls it “Today” in the present New Testament. In other words, David’s Day, in the past, being a new invitation of Sabbath rest—opposed to Joshua’s day—typified the New Testament of today where the Sabbath is to be kept, not without the Katapausis, but as the high point of a intimate experience that Christians have with God. In other words, while it is called “Today,” the 7th day Sabbath will become the acme of what Christians are experiencing in Christ during the 6 days preceding the 7th day.

What does Hebrews 4 tell us? Exodus 31:13 says:

Speak also to the children of Israel, saying: 'Surely My Sabbaths you shall keep, for it is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the LORD who sanctifies you.

Hebrews 4 tells us that the seventh day Sabbath, as the sign of sanctification, has continued in the New Covenant. The Katapausis is Sanctification, and the seventh day Sabbath is inextricably connected to this Sanctification. It is unequivocal that Ezekiel 20:12 and Exodus 31:13 is highlighted in Hebrews chapter 4.

The Sabbath As The Sign Of The Creator

Concerning the seventh day Sabbath, Exodus 31:17 says, “It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.” Exodus 31:17 tells us that the Sabbath is to be a sign between God and Israel forever, in that God is the Creator of heaven and earth. The New Testament shows that the Church is now the Israel of God (Gal. 3:28, 29; 4:22 – 31; 6:15, 16). It is only a matter of simple logic: If the Church is now the Israel of God, then the promise of Exodus 31:17 applies to the Church.

In an attempt to parry the clear demonstration, which we have just made, Dispensationalists tell us: “The command to observe the Sabbath was given to Israel Exclusively. It was not given to the Gentiles. It was given to Israel as the “SIGN” of the

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“Mosaic Covenant” (Clarence Larkin, Dispensational Truth, 31). We completely agree that the Sabbath was the sign of the Mosaic covenant; however, we do not agree that the Sabbath was the sign of only that covenant. Why is this the case? In chapters’ 3 and 4 we demonstrated the unequivocal fact that the 7 dispensations, contrived by dispensationalists, are indeed imagined dispensations.

Ultimately, there is one Everlasting Covenant encompassing the saints of all ages. Hebrews 11 perspicuously describes this truth. When we understand the unity of the saints as Hebrews 11 reveals, then it becomes clear that the Adamic, Noahic, Abrahamic, Mosaic, Davidic, and New Covenant are not distinct dispensational covenants; but rather, they are the gradual culmination of the reintroduction of God’s Creation Covenant. This Covenant will be totally restored in the New Earth.

The Bible shows in Genesis 2:1 – 3 that the Sabbath was blessed and Sanctified in commemoration to God‘s creative work. This means that the Sabbath, described as the sign of God as the Creator in Exodus 31:17, was God’s sign back in Genesis 2:1 – 3. The Sabbath was the Sign of the Creation Covenant being introduced to Adam. The Sabbath was the Sign of the First Creation; it will be the Sign of the Second Creation (see Isaiah 66:22, 23). This is exactly why the Sabbath was the sign of—what is styled—the Old Covenant, and this is why the Sabbath is still the sign of the New Covenant.

Eternity Past Eternity Future

Creation

Covenant

Noahic

Covenant

Abrahamic

Covenant

Mosaic or Old

Covenant

Davidic

Covenant

Jesus

ratifies

Eternal

Covenant

New

Covenant

Man sinned and the Eternal Covenant wasbroken.

Adamic

Covenant

The progressive reintroduction of the Everlasting Covenant

throughout history

Eternal Covenant

is recaptured.

ETERNAL CREATION COVENANT

THE CREATION COVENANT WILL BE COMPLETELY RESTORED IN THE NEW HEAVEN AND EARTH

THE SABBATH THE SABBATH

Dispensational Errors On Genesis 2:1 – 3

Dispensationalists will tell us:

If God instituted the “Sabbath” before the “Fall of Man,” it seems strange that the fact is not recorded in Genesis, and that Adam was not told to observe it. Nowhere in the Book of Genesis do we read of Adam, or any of his descendants, or Noah, or Abraham observing the Sabbath (Larkin, Dispensational Truth, 31).

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First of all, it is a fact of Genesis that the Sabbath was instituted before man’s fall. The Sabbath came in Genesis 2; the fall of man came in Genesis 3. Secondly, this is a classic case of the fallacy, Appeal to Ignorance, meaning, “to use the absence of proof for something to prove the opposing argument.” This argument says, “The Sabbath was not explicitly mentioned as a holy day before the time of Moses, so it did not exist as a holy day before Moses.” This is an omission of textual clarity that leads to the fallacy of “False Alternative.” When the Sabbath was instituted in the law at Mt. Sinai (Ex. 20:9 – 11), the Lord emphasized that the Sabbath was an already existing institution—based on the creation (see verse 11). Dispensationalists want us to believe that when God blessed and sanctified the seventh day in Genesis 2:3, he was blessing and sanctifying that day for Himself. No! Mark 2:27 says that the Sabbath was made for man. Since the Sabbath was MADE for MAN, and man came into being over 2,000 years before there was a Jew, then Genesis 2:3 shows that God blessed and sanctified the Sabbath for mankind.

The dispensational approach on this matter does not work, for we cannot directly prove either position: the Sabbath being kept or the Sabbath not being kept by mankind—prior to Moses—on the basis of the rules dispensationalists apply to Genesis. Dispensationalists apply an infinitesimal search for the word “Sabbath” between Adam and Moses as a criteria for its existence between Adam and Moses, as though Genesis 2:3 and Mark 2:27 are not good enough to prove the point. The dispensational infinitesimal search for the word “Sabbath” becomes a hopeless case to sustain an argument in opposition to the clarity of Genesis 2:3 and is a poor choice of methodology. Why? “Prayer” to God was not explicitly mentioned until Genesis 12:13 when Abraham was said to pray. Are we to imagine that “prayer” did not exist until Abraham—based on the usage of that word? That is ridiculous! If dispensationalists can be so acute about the usage of the word “Sabbath,” why not be this detailed with the word “prayer?” Dispensationalists are simply committing an additional fallacy: Subjectivism. They simply want the Sabbath not to be important, so to them, it is not! What dispensationalists want to be true is irrelevant. The reality of the institution of the Sabbath in Genesis 2:3 supercedes dispensational wants.

The Sabbath was not given to Israel exclusively as a “SIGN” of the “Mosaic” covenant and only that covenant. This methodology of interpretation is the fruit of dispensational divisions, which are completely false. The Sabbath was first brought to the world at creation before there was any such thing as a Jew. Since the Sabbath is the Sign of both the first and second creation, and the second creation is the absolute re-introduction of the Covenant that was lost in Eden, then it becomes clear that the Sabbath was re-introduced into God’s Covenant with man as a whole. No where—We mean NO WHERE—in the scriptures do we see the term “Jewish Sabbath.” The Sabbath is always called, “the Sabbath of the Lord thy God” or “His Holy Day (Isaiah 58:13, 14).” Mark 2:27 states that the Sabbath was made for Man, not exclusively the Jew.

THE MARK OF THE BEAST

Since God’s mark is His character (the 10 commandments) written in the mind of believers, and the seal or sign of the believer’s sactification—in relation to the Creator—is the Sabbath; then the mark of the Beast (the Papacy) is a corruption of God’s law, which also possesses a sign or seal of loyalty. How is this the case? As we have seen, the

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Devil emulates God; the Devil is not original; for the Devil wants to BE LIKE THE MOST HIGH.

The Protestant Understanding Of The Mark

The Protestant’s of the Reformation days have given us a basic “road map” for identifying the Mark of the Beast for the final days of earth’s history. “The friend and zealous co-worker of Martin Luther, Nicolaus von Amsdorf (1483 – 1565),” made an interesting observation concerning the Mark:

This beast we know is the Roman Empire, which carries and supports the red Babylonian whore, which is the Papacy. The mark of the beast is the canons, the decrees and ceremonies of the Pope, and all ecclesiastical traditions concerning food, drink, and dress, singing, reading, and other childish things which have nothing to do with, nor belong to, the kingdom of God, which is true Christianity (Funff furnemliche und gewisse Zeichen aus gottlicher heiliger Schrifft, so kurtz vor dem Jungsten tag geschehen sollen. (Jena: Rodinger, 1554), sig. B3v., B4r.Emphasis mine).

The Protestant Reformer, Amsdorf, observed that the mark was, in its essence, the elements of Catholic religion. The English martyr and Reformer, Nicholas Ridley (1500 – 1555), like Amsdorf, identified the mark as allegiance to the traditions of the Catholic system:

Wherefore what I suppose is to bear the beast’s mark, I will tell thee, and commit the judgment of mine interpretation, as in all other things, to the spiritual man. I suppose he beareth the beast of Babylon’s mark in his forehead, which is not ashamed of the beast’s ways, but will profess them openly to set forth his master the beast Abaddon. And likewise he beareth his mark in his hand, that will and doth practice the works of the beast with his power and hand (A Piteous Lamentation of the Miserable Estate of the Church in England, in the Time of the Late Revolt from the Gospel, in The Works of Nicholas Ridley, D. D. Sometime Lord Bishop of London, Martyr, 1555. Edited for the Parker Society, by the Rev. Henry Christmas. (Cambridge: University Press, 1841), 69.Emphasis mine)

The Reformer, Ridley, saw the mark of the beast as the traditions of the Papacy. He saw the forehead as the symbol of the mind, and he saw the hand as the symbol of action. Moreover, Ridley repudiated the idea of the mark being a literal device:

Thus I suppose these prophecies are spiritually to be understood: and to look for other corporal marks, to be seen in men’s foreheads, or in their hands, is nothing else but to look that there should come some brute beast out of Babylon, or some elephant, leopard, lion, or camel, or some other monstrous beast with ten horns, that should do all the wonderful things spoken in John; and yet of a beast speaketh John; but I understand him so to be called, not for that he shall be any such brute beast, but for that he is and shall be the child of perdition, which for his cruelty and beastly manners is well called a beast (A Piteous Lamentation of the Miserable Estate of the Church in England, in the Time of the Late Revolt from the Gospel, in The Works of Nicholas Ridley, D. D. Sometime Lord Bishop of London, Martyr, 1555. Edited for the Parker Society, by the Rev. Henry Christmas, 70).

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These preceding citations illustrate that we must interpret the mark symbolically, for if the Beast is symbolic, his mark must be symbolic; and the forehead and hand are symbolic of the mind and the action that comes from thought. We must conclude that the Reformers,’ Amsdorf and Ridley, were on the right track in coming to a correct interpretation of the Mark of the Beast. Well did the follower of John Wycliff, Walter Brute, connect the abolishment of Christ‘s commandments for the substitution of Papal Sacraments as being the Mark of the Beast:

Also the Bishop of Rome doth make man to worship him as God, because that the special Sacrifice that God doth require of us, is to be obedient unto him in keeping of his Commandments. But now the Popes Commandments be commanded to be kept, and be kept in very Deed; but the Commandments of Christ are condemned and rejected. Thus sitteth the Bishop of Rome in the Temple of God, shewing himself as God, and extolling himself above all that which is called God, or worshipped as God . . . . He giveth to small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, Marks in their right Hands, and in their Foreheads; that no man should buy or sell, but those that shall have the marks of the name of the Beast . . The Pope saith, that in the Administration of every sacrament he doth Imprint a certain Character or Mark into the soul of him that receiveth it. In Baptism he saith that he doth Imprint, into the soul of him that is Baptized, a Mark that cannot be wiped out, and so likewise in other Sacraments (John Foxe. Acts and Monuments of Matters Most Special and Memorable, Happening in the Church.. 9th ed, Vol. 1, 569. Emphasis mine)

To the Reformers, the Mark of the Beast was the counterfeit law of the Papacy where additions, subtractions, and changes had occurred. The Reformers were definitely on the right track—establishing a foundation for interpretation for the final days of earth’s history. We are now going to see that the Law of the Papacy—like God’s law—has an outward sign of allegiance.

The Outward Sign Of The Beast

The first key that unlocks the mystery of what the mark of the Beast represents is the realization that the Beast’s mark is simply a corruption of God’s law. The second key to ascertaining what the mark of the Beast represents is found in the understanding of the origin of the number, 666. As we analyzed in chapter 6, the number 666 was the mystical number given to the great Serpent, Dragon power, and this mystical number was revealed primarily through the sun. The Zodiac, as it pertains to the sun, is numerically constructed to represent the trinity of the sun in three sixes.

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3

3

3 3

3

3

3 3

3

3 3

3

6

6

6

6

6

6

E W

The number 666 is inextricably connected to the sun:

The Western hermetic tradition originated with Pythagoras, who was inspired by the Egyptians. In this tradition, sacred geometry was of paramount importance. One of the great mathematical mysteries concerned the magical square of the sun, consisting of the numbers 1 to 36, arranged in rows and columns of six numbers each. Each row and each column adds up to 111, making a total of 666 for the magical square. This number was considered symbolical of the sun as the solar spirit, animating our universe (Georg Feuerstein, Spirituality by the Numbers, 242, 243.Emphasis mine.)

If we are to discover what the Beast’s mark will be, we must search for it in the Roman Catholic system. Revelation 14:11 predicts hell fire for those who worship the Beast and whoever receives the Mark of his Name. This is very important to notice: Mark of his Name. It is obvious that the NAME of the Catholic Church and the name of Popery equal 666.

ITALIAN CHURCH

I T A L I K A E K K L E S I A10 300 1 30 10 20 1 5 20 20 30 8 200 10 1 = 666

In Place Of Son Of GOD

V I C A R I U S F I L I I D E I5 1 100 0 0 1 5 0 0 1 50 1 1 500 0 1 = 666

How is this the case? The names of Rome and Popery ultimately point to the sun. There are three things that we must underscore immediately:

(1) The Mark of the Beast is a tradition that acknowledges the supremacy of Rome and Popery;

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(2) It is a tradition that is inextricably connected to the main symbol of the 666 god—the Sun; and

(3) It has something to do with God’s law for the simple fact that God’s law is His mark; and the devil emulates God.

Note: There is only ONE TRADITION that can be matched with the criteria of these three points; it is the tradition of SUNDAY!

The Papacy has thought to change the law of God. They claim that the Sabbath was changed to Sunday; this change fulfills points’1 and 3 above:

Q. Have you any other way of proving that the Church has power to institute festivals of precept?A. Had she not such power, she could not have done that in which all modern religionist agree with her;-she could not have substituted the observance of Sunday the first day of the week, for the observance of Saturday the seventh day, a change for which there is no Scriptural authority (Stephen Keenan, A Doctrinal Catechism, “On the Obedience Due to the Church,” chap. 2, 174).

You may read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and you will not find a single line authorizing the sanctification of Sunday. The scriptures enforce the religious observance of Saturday, a day which we never sanctify (James Cardinal Gibbons, The Faith of our Fathers (1917 ed.), 72, 73).

We learn from history what Sunday truly represents when this day was made a law by Constantine, and this of course fulfills the second element in identifying the Mark:

On the VENERABLE DAY of the SUN let the magistrates and people residing in cities rest, and let all workshops be closed. In the country, however, persons engaged in agriculture may freely and lawfully continue their pursuits; because it often happens that another day is not suitable for grain-sowing or for vine planting; lest by neglecting the proper moment for such operations the bounty of heaven should be lost. (Given the 7th day of March, Crispus and Constantine being consuls each of them for the second time.) (Codex Justinianus, lib. 3, tit. 12, 3; translated in History of the Christian Church, by Philip Schaff (Scribners, 1902 ed.) Vol. 3, 380).

Constantine was pleased to accommodate the Catholic Church’s desire to mandate—by law—the Venerable Day of the Sun, for this was in harmony with his own sun worship. Edward Gibbon points out:

But the devotion of Constantine was more peculiarly directed to the genius of the Sun, the Apollo of Greek and Roman mythology; and he was pleased to be represented with the symbols of the God of Light and Poetry (The Decline and Fall Of The Roman Empire, Vol. 1, 637. Emphasis mine).

It must be emphasized: If the Mark of the Beast is a corruption of God’s law, then this mark must point to a law that originates in the numerical system of 666 and has been fabricated into God’s law. This is Sunday! Knowing that the Popes represent the chief

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pontiffs of the Chaldean system; and knowing that the pagan pontiffs were believed to be the incarnation of the sun, leads us to the conclusion: that the Mark of the Name is a tradition that acknowledges the connection of the Chief Pontiff to the sun god. In this case it is the connection of Popery to the Sun. The Venerable Day of the Sun is the Sign or Mark that points to the 666 god.

The Catholic Church has adopted much of the pagan mysteries. This is the case with Sunday. Very factually Arthur Weigall tells us:

The Church made a sacred day of Sunday…largely because it was the weekly festival of the sun; for it was a definite Christian policy to take over the pagan festivals endeared to the people by tradition, and to give them a Christian significance (The Paganism In Our Christianity, 1928, 145).

Sunday or the Venerable Day of the Sun was a sacred day at different times in Paganism. Concerning the first day of the week and its significance in pagan idolatry, Sutton tells us:

The Greek word alepha (alpha) is the name of the first letter in their alphabet, and it means bull or ox. It is interesting to note that the ever-revered bull-god of the Orient (the elephant) has the same root (eleph) in his name, and almost every Hindu temple has its phallic idol to commemorate the life-giving qualities of their god (one). So to honour the Sun, the god (one), the Heavenly Bull-god, the first day of the week (Sunday) and the first of everything was dedicated to the bull-god as sacred. The first day of the month, the first day of the year, the first born son and the first fruits of the harvest and of the flocks, were dedicated to him (The Illuminati 666, 53, 54).

Why was the first day of the week so important to Paganism? Concerning the number one, Feuerstein says:

The One is considered to be the atemporal and aspatial origin of all manifestation. It is equated with the Divine, the Godhead, the Absolute prior to all differentiated forms (Sprituality by the Numbers, 21, 22).

To the pagans of ancient Babylon, the number one pointed to the first god of importance, the sun. The differentiated forms of the One, pointed to all the other astrological god’s; meaning, all gods of pagan idolatry had their identity in the sun itself. We analyzed in chapter 6 that the great Dragon of ancient Babylon was believed to be a trinity. Hall tells us:

The Supreme Being—the Mind—male and female, brought forth the Word, suspended between Light and darkness, was delivered of another Mind called the Workman, the Master-Builder, or the Maker of Things (Secret Teachings Of All Ages, XXXIX. Emphasis mine).

The trinity of the Dragon points to the numbers’ 666, and this three fold number is tied up in the number 1—pointing to the sun. Said another way, the Dragon represented his trinity through the sun, so the sun being the FIRST god of importance is made up of the three, which numbers are 666. Sunday is, undoubtedly, a day that points to the cosmic

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light of the Dragon in the sun. Sunday, as a day, points to the One god of importance to the pagans—equaling 666.

SUNDAY’S EXISTENCE BEFORE THE PAPACY

Now before we move any further into the preceding issue, we must look at some of the opposition against the idea that Sunday is an institution of the Papacy. Dispensationalists tell us:

It is claimed that the Roman Catholic Church changed the day of rest from the “Seventh Day” to the “First Day of the Week,” but the claim is false, for the Papacy did not exist until a long time after the “First Day of the Week” had become a fixed day for Christian worship (Larkin, Dispensational Truth, 31).

The fact that Sunday was being observed prior to Constantine by the “so called” prominent Church Fathers has become the great weapon among many evangelicals against keeping the seventh day Sabbath. Walter Martin, in his book Kingdom Of The Cults, says, “The Church Fathers provide a mass of evidence that the first day of the week, not the seventh, is the Lord’s day” (Kingdom Of The Cults, 460). Martin quotes different Church fathers to prove his point, such as: Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch (A.D. 110); Justin Martyr (100 – 165); The Epistle of Barnabas (120 – 150); Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons (about 178); Bardaisan (born 154); Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage (200 – 258); Eusebius (about 315); Peter, Bishop of Alexandria (about 300); Didache of the Apostles (about 70 – 75); and The Epistle of Pliny (about 112). Concerning all these citations, which say the first day of the week is the Lord’s day, Martin emphasizes: “In company with the overwhelming majority of historians and scholars, we believe that not only the New Testament but the following citations refute Sabbatarianism” (Kingdom Of The Cults, 460).

There are two propositions in the last quote from Martin that we must explore:

(1) The New Testament refutes Sabbatarianism, and (2) The Church fathers, just cited, refute Sabbatarianism.

The Three Principles Of Covenant(Refuting Proposition 1 From Martin)

That the Sabbath still applies to the Church is predicated by an understanding of the three principles of Covenant—outlined in the Biblical explanation of the Two Testaments. What are the three principles of Covenant?

(1) Before either of the two Covenants is put into affect, the conditions of the Covenants are made known (Ex. 24:1 – 8);

(2) Wherever there is a Covenant, the Covenant is sealed by the blood of the Testator (Heb. 9:16 – 22);

(3) Once the Covenant has been sealed by the blood, nothing can be added or subtracted from the covenant (Psalm 89:34; Gal. 3:15).

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Note: Study Following Diagram Carefully.

Friday Saturday Sunday

Exodus 24:1 - 9

Hebrews 9:16 - 22

( 1 )

be the death of the TESTATOR.

Exodus 24:8, 9; Hebrews 9:19, 20

Before the COVENANT is sealed,

the conditions are made known

( 2 )

Romans 3:31

Matthew 5:17 - 19

Matthew 5:18

Ecclesiastes 3:14

Once the COVENANT has

been SEALED, nothing can

be added or subtracted.

Galatians 3:15

( 3 )

OLD COVENANT

Matthew 24: 20

Pray that you keep

the Sabbath

PointPoint

Point

LUKE 23:50 - 56

NEW COVENANT

Where there is a COVENANT, there

must

; Psalm 89: 34

Point (1)

Point (2) Point (3)

A. D. 45

Acts 13: 42, 44

The Gentiles sought

to hear God's word

on the Sabbath. Why?

The three principles

of Covenant.

A. D. 53

Acts 16:5, 13

It was custom for

the early Church

to hold prayer on

the Sabbath.

A. D. 53, 54

Acts 17:2; 18:4

Paul not only reasoned

with Jews every Sabbath

He also reasoned with the

Greeks. Obviously the

Greeks held the same day.

A. D. 70

Matthew 24

Jewish Christians

fled Jerusalem in

Roman siege.

Jesus projected that the Sabbath would be kept in A. D. 70. Why? The three principles of covenant

Note: Luke wrote the book of Acts in A. D. 65

He never used the Sabbath in the past tense in the book of Acts

Deuteronomy 4:2

Hebrews 7:22

Matthew 26:27, 28

When the Old Testament was focalized in the Mosaic covenant, these three principles were put into affect. In every reintegration and enlargement of the Everlasting Covenant from Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses, God has always been the One to enlarge the Covenant. In the gradual reintegration of the Everlasting Covenant, we see the pattern of God enlarging the Covenant with the blood sacrifice—sealing the agreement. When scripture says that nothing can be added or subtracted, this points to man’s endeavors to alter the agreement with the Lord.

Preceding the inauguration of the New Covenant, the Lord Himself came and applied the three principles. Jesus made known in the synoptic gospels what His New Covenant was to be through both word and deed. When Jesus went to the cross, He sealed the New Covenant with His blood. Whatever is—or is not—within the framework of the New Covenant had to be explained or done by Jesus before He died on the cross. Let us raise the question: Did Christ—through deed—keep Sunday before he went to the cross? No! Luke 4:16 says, “So He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up. And as His custom was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up to read.” We agree with Canon Knox Little where he emphasizes: “It is certain that our Lord when on earth did observe Saturday, and did not observe Sunday. If they are consistent, as I have said, they must keep Saturday, not Sunday, as the day of rest” (Sacerdotalism (1894 ed.), 71, 89).

Let us ask another question: Did Christ—by word—mention Sunday or that the Sabbath would change? No! Christ never mentioned a new holy day. In fact Christ

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Himself explained in Matthew 5:17 – 19 that He did not come to do away with the Law; not a jot or iota would pass away in the law.

According to Luke 23:50 – 56, after Jesus sealed the New Testament with His blood, those who were closest to Jesus kept the day after Friday and before Sunday as the Sabbath. But why did they do this? They did this because Jesus said that not an iota would pass away in the law, and He never mentioned Sunday. Those who walked closest to Jesus remembered what He said in Matthew 24:20: To pray that they would be able to keep the Sabbath in a time that would come after the cross. Acts 13:42 – 44—several years after the ascension of Christ—reveals that the Gentiles sought to hear God’s word on the Sabbath. Popular Bible teachers would have us to believe that the Sabbath was only mentioned because the apostles were constantly working with Judaism within its territories. But that argument is worthless, because in Acts 16:5, 13—in the context of the Church with no mention of the synagogue—Sabbath keeping was taking place. Furthermore, Luke wrote the book of Acts in A.D. 65, and he never once mentioned the Sabbath as an anachronism. Luke, in A.D. 65, never said, “What was once the Sabbath” or “What use to be the Sabbath.” Luke called the Sabbath, THE SABBATH. In light of these examples, we completely agree with Mr. Morer of the Church of England were he says, “The Primitive Christians had a great veneration for the Sabbath, and spent the Day in Devotion and Sermons. And ‘tis not to be doubted but they derived this Practice from the Apostles themselves” (A Discourse in Six Dialogues on the Name, Notion, and Observation of the Lord’s Day, 189).

According to the third principle of Covenant, after the cross, we cannot add or subtract from this Covenant. The only way anything can be added or subtracted is if the Lord Himself comes and makes it known and seals a new inauguration with His blood as with the preceding Patriarchs. But this is not going to happen; the New Testament—up to the New Earth—is the final Covenant sealed by blood. So whatever is within the New Covenant had to be implicated before the cross. So, what do we say to Martin’s theory that the New Testament refutes Sabbatarianism? We look to the “THREE PRINCIPLES OF COVENAT,” which completely refutes Sunday, not the Sabbath.

Opposition To Judaism Led To Sunday

In a letter written by Samuele Bacchiocchi, Ph. D., Retired Professor of Theology and Church History, Andrews University, to a Dr. James Kennedy, we find some interesting things. Bacchiocchi points out that in the second century, the Invincible Sun-god became the chief god of the Pantheon and was worshipped on Dies Solis, “the Day of the Sun” (Excerpt of a letter from Dr. Samuelle Bacchiocchi sent to Dr. James Kennedy, 6). Bacchiocchi argues that the Roman’s, originally, had an eight day week, and borrowed the seven day week cycle from the Jews prior to the beginning of Christianity. The Romans named their days after the seven planetary gods. In the first century—for the Romans, the day of Saturn was the first day of the week; the day of the sun was the second day. Bacchiocchi contends that the Romans borrowed more than just the seven-day cycle from the Jews; they borrowed a form of Sabbath worship from the Jews. The Romans looked at the day of Saturn as their most sacred day, and this was paralleled with the seventh day Sabbath; meaning, that the Roman’s first day was paralleled with the seventh day. Bacchiocchi contends that two things—related to each other—created the

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importance of the Dies Solis (Day of the Sun) in the second century:

(1) The revolts of the Jewish nation. The first one came in A.D. 66 – 70 and between the years A.D. 69 – 79, the Sanhedrin was abolished by Vespasian. When the second revolt came between A.D. 132 – 135, Hadrian abolished the Jewish religion completely.

(2) As the gulf between Judaism and Romanism increased, so did the gulf between Judaism and Christianity.

(To see some of the writings of Bacchiocchi, see following web site: From Sabbath to Sunday)

Are Bacchiocchi’s assertions correct? Absolutely, for other writers of history tell us the following:

Opposition to Judaism introduced the particular festival of Sunday very early, indeed, into the place of the Sabbath . . . .The festival of Sunday, like all other festivals, was always only a human ordinance, and it was far from the intentions of the apostles to establish a Divine command in this respect, far from them, and far from the early apostolic Church, to transfer the laws of the Sabbath to Sunday. Perhaps, at the end of the second century a false application of this kind had begun to take place: for men appear by that time to have considered laboring on Sunday as a sin (Augustus Neander, The History of the Christian Religion and Church, 186).

The observance of the Sunday was at first supplemental to that of the Sabbath, but in proportion as the gulf between the Church and the Synagogue widened, the Sabbath became less and less important and ended at length in being entirely neglected (L. Duchesne, Christian Worship: Its Origin and Evolution (tr. From the 4th French ed. By M. L. McClure, London, 1910), 47).

Leslie Hardinge explains this issue well:

The Sabbath was ever carefully kept by the Hebrews, and was observed by our Lord. The first converts to the Christian faith had been Jews. They continued to observe the Sabbath. But several factors combined to induce Christians to give up the observance of the Sabbath in favour of Sunday in succeeding centuries. After the fall of Jerusalem in [A.D.] 70, and then the crushing of the revolt led by Bar Cochbar in [A.D.] 135, the Jews were scattered and their name and religion execrated. One of the more obvious marks of a Jew was his observance of the Sabbath. Christians, keeping the Sabbath, not because they were Jews but in honour of creation and in obedience to the fourth commandment, were, however, stigmatized as Jews. They were accused, especially in Roman metropolitan areas, of practicing an illegal religion (The Celtic Church In Britain, 75. Emphasis mine).

When the gulf between Judaism and Romanism increased to great heights by the second century, the Romans attempted to discard anything in their possession that resembled Judaism. The Romans, who associated their first and most important day of Saturn with that of the Sabbath of the Jews, began to find more favor with the sun god, so they changed their first day to Dies Solis, “The Day of the Sun” and made Saturn the seventh

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http://www.biblicalperspectives.com/books/sabbath_to_sunday/

http://www.biblicalperspectives.com/books/sabbath_to_sunday/


day. Is it accidental that in this time frame Roman Christianity too moved their day to the first day of the week? No! It is not accidental for two reasons: (1) Early Roman Christianity, while keeping the Sabbath, was associated with the Jews and were persecuted along with the Jews, so they found it necessary to disassociate from the fountain of persecution pervading amongst the Jews and (2) The early Church was influenced by the Pagans.

Early Roman Christianity Was Influenced By Paganism

Note: Concerning the second proposition of Martin’s statement that the Church fathers refute Sabbatarianism, we present the following labyrinth of information in the following sections in this chapter:

Walter Martin tells us: “The Church Fathers provide a mass of evidence that the first day of the week, not the seventh, is the Lord’s day” (Kingdom Of The Cults, 460). First of all, we cannot find one text—from Genesis to Revelation—where God said, “Sunday, or the first day of the week, is my day.” No such scripture exists; Sunday as the Lord’s Day—as derived from Scripture—is imaginary. The problem of Martin, like many evangelicals teachers, is that they induce their preconceived notion of Sunday sanctity into Revelation 1:10, which says: “I was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day.” Revelation 1:10 does not give the slightest indication which day is the Lord’s. It is only by means of using the whole Bible that we discover which day is the Lord’s. In Isaiah 58:13, God says that the seventh day Sabbath is “HIS HOLY DAY.” In Mark 2:28 Jesus says that He is “Lord of the Sabbath.” Throughout the Bible the Sabbath is not called, “The Jewish Sabbath,”; it is always described as God’s day.

Secondly, if Martin, like many evangelical teachers, chooses to rely on the Church fathers for the authentication of Sunday being the Lord’s Day, then they are using authorities whose description of the meaning of Sunday lead not to the Bible, but leads directly into Paganism. Concerning Constantine’s Sunday Law, the historian, Eusebius, explains the meaning of Sunday:

Accordingly he enjoined on all the subjects of the Roman empire to observe the Lord’s Day, as a day of rest, and also to honor the day which precedes the Sabbath; in memory, I suppose, of what the Savior of mankind is recorded to have achieved on that day. And since his desire was to teach his whole army zealously to honor the Savior’s day (which derives its name from light, and from the sun), he freely granted to those among them who were partakers of the divine faith, leisure for attendance on the services of the Church of God, in order that they might be able, without impediment, to perform their religious worship (Eusebius, “The Life Of Constantine” Chap. XVIII. Edited by Philip Schaff, D.D., LL.D., Henry Wace, D.D., A Select Library Of Nicene And Post-Nicene Fathers Of The Christian Church. 2nd Series, Vol. 1, 544, 545).

Notice that, according to Eusebius, Sunday derives its name from light and the sun. Let us ask: What kind of People emphasized Sunday as the day of light and the sun? Salaminius Hermias Sozomenus, concerning Constantine’s Sunday law, says:

He [Constantine] also enjoined the observance of the day termed the Lord’s day, which the Jews call the first day of the week, and which the pagans dedicate to

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the sun (“Ecclesiastical History Of Salaminius Hermias Sozomenus” book 1 chap. 8, translated by Chester D. Hartranft. in A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers Of The Christian Church, 2d series, Vol. 2, 245. Emphasis mine).

The pagans understood Sunday to be the day of light and the day of the sun.

It is unequivocal that the early Church fathers understood Sunday in similar terms as the pagans. One of the differences of the Church fathers—in contrast to the pagans—is that they layered the sun tradition with the concept of Christ’s resurrection on Sunday. Justin Martyr [A. D. 110 – 165] says:

And on the day called Sunday, all who live in the 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…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 Saviour on the same day rose from the dead. For He was crucified on the day before Saturn (Saturday); and on the day after the 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 (The First Apology Of Justin. Chap. LXVII in ANF, Vol. 1, 186).

Notice that Justin Martyr combined the resurrection of the Lord with the Day of the Sun and used cosmic light—associated with the first day of creation—as a justification for his theory. It is not difficult to understand why Justin Martyr believed this, for Edward Gibbon explains that before Justin Martyr studied the Old Testament prophets, he had “sought divine knowledge in the schools of Zeno, of Aristotle, of Pythagoras and of Plato”(The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire, Vol. 1, 440). All these figureheads inspired Justin, but what really strikes us is the fact that Justin studied Pythagoras. What is significant about him? Pythagoras was very involved with the sun and its 666 numerology (see quote on p. 443). Obviously, Justin combined tenets of SUN WORSHIP with Christ’s resurrection. The fact of the matter is: We cannot find one text in the New Testament that calls Sunday, “The Day of the Resurrection.” The sixth day is called the “Preparation Day,” and the seventh day is called, “The Sabbath Day”; but nowhere do we find Sunday being called anything that places it in a category with the Sabbath or anything important for that matter; in the New Testament, Sunday is only a number…nothing more! The resurrection, in essence, became an excuse after the fact that Sunday was truly a pagan institution. “Cosmic light” and the “day of the sun” point to SUN WORSHIP, not the worship of Jesus Christ.

Justin Martyr’s usage of “cosmic light” in connection with the “day of the sun” as a reason for observing the first day of the week has been applied by other Church fathers. Bacchiocchi, in his letter to Dr. Kennedy, quotes the following fathers as saying:

Eusebius said:In this day of light, first day and true day of the sun, when we gather together after the interval of six days, we celebrate the holy and spiritual Sabbath . . . .In fact, it is on this day of the creation of the world that God said: “Let there be

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light. It is also on this day that the Sun of Justice has arisen for our soul.” Jerome said:

If it is called day of the Sun by the pagans, we most willingly acknowledge it as such, since it is on this day that the light of the world has appeared and on this day the Sun of justice arose (Both Citations in Bacchiocchi’s letter, 10. Emphasis mine)

Franz Cumont tells us that the Church fathers attempted to distinguish the sun god from Christ, as the “Sun of Justice,” then Cumont follows up with an important question:

On the other hand, the ecclesiastical writers, reviving a metaphor of the prophet Malachi, contrasted the “Sun of Justice” with the “invincible Sun,” and consented to see in the dazzling orb which illuminated men a symbol of Christ, “the light of the world.” Should we be astonished if the multitudes of devotees failed always to observe the subtle distinctions of the doctors, and if in obedience to a pagan custom they rendered to the radiant star of day the homage which orthodoxy reserved for God? (The Mysteries of Mithra, 193).

Cumont rightly points out that there was a subtle distinction between the Church fathers’ usage of Malachi 4:2 and the pagan lingua for the sun. Why was there a subtle distinction? The Church fathers applied Malachi 4:2 in a way that was conducive to paganism; the Church fathers took Malachi 4:2 away from its Biblical intent and layered it with the language of sun worship. So, when Cumont asks if it is astonishing that the devotes continued to worship the sun, it is not astonishing; because the pagan Christians were hearing a message in their own native form—a message which cannot be found in the Bible, but rather is found in Paganism.

It is apparent that the early church fathers were combining the tenets of Paganism with Christianity. As the Church fathers layered both the resurrection and the symbolism of Malachi 4:2 on the pagan day of light and the sun to justify its sanctity, they too also layered the term “Lord’s Day” (Rev. 1:10) on the Venerable Day of the Sun in agreement with Paganism. E. M. Chalmers tells us:

The Gentile Christians of Rome and Alexandria began calling the first day of the week “The Lord’s Day.” This was not difficult for the pagans of the Roman Empire who were steeped in sun worship to accept, because they referred to their sun god as their Lord (How Sunday Came Into The Christian Church, 3).

When the Church fathers called Sunday the “Day of Light” in agreement with Paganism, we find it extremely important to ask: What is the true source of the cosmic light, recognized in the day of the sun? “This light was the spiritual nature of the Great Dragon itself” (Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages, XXXVIII). The true source of cosmic light, associated with the day of the sun, is the great Dragon of Hermeticism—the 666 god. No wonder Gibbon says:

In the unskillful hands of Justin and of the succeeding apologists, the sublime meaning of the Hebrew oracles evaporates in distant types, affected conceits, and cold allegories; and even their authenticity was rendered suspicious to an unenlightened Gentile, by the mixture of pious forgeries which, under the names

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of Orpheus, Hermes, and the Sibyls, were obtruded on him as of equal value with the genuine inspirations of Heaven. The adoption of fraud and sophistry in the defense of revelation too often reminds us of the injudicious conduct of those poets who load their invulnerable heroes with a useless weight of cumbersome and brittle armour (The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire, Vol. 1, 443. Emphasis mine).

Yes, Justin and succeeding apologists were very much indoctrinated with Hermeticism and the Sibyls of pagan myth. How is this the case? “Gnosticism, to which Hermeticism was related…sought to incorporate Christianity,” says Kenneth Scott Latourette (A History of The Expansion Of Christianity, Vol. 1, 30). Hermeticism is related to Gnosticism, and Gnosticism filled the thinking of the apologists. Dr. Adolph Harnack tells us:

The Gospel was hellenised in the second century in so far as the Gnostics in various ways transformed it into a Hellenic religion for the educated. The Apologists used it—we may say inadvertently—to overthrow polytheism by maintaining that Christianity was the realization of an absolutely moral theism. The Christian religion was not the first to experience this twofold destiny on Graeco-Roman soil. A glance at the history of the Jewish religion shows us a parallel development; in fact, both the speculations of the Gnostics and the theories of the Apologists were foreshadowed in the theology of the Jewish Alexandrians, and particularly in that of Philo….Three centuries before the appearance of Christian apologists, Jews, who had received a Hellenic training, had already set forth the religion of Jehovah to the Greeks in that remarkably summary and spiritualized form which represents it as the absolute and highest philosophy, i.e., the knowledge of God, of virtue, and of recompense in the next world. Here these Jewish philosophers had already transformed all the positive and historic elements of the national religion into parts of a huge system for proving the truth of that theism. The Christian Apologists adopted this method, for they can hardly be said to have invented it anew (History Of Dogma: Translated From The Third German Edition by Neil Buchanan, Vol. 2, 174, 175).

How Did Sunday Penetrate 2nd Century Christianity In Rome?

Concerning the pagan Roman Empire, Latourette says the following:

The latest of the mystery religions to achieve wide popularity in the Roman Empire was Mithraism. Associated with the Persian faith, it spread into Armenia and Asia Minor…It was associated with the worship of the sun, a type of monotheism which was in vogue in the latter days of Roman Paganism (A History of The Expansion Of Christianity: The First Five Centuries. 4th edition, Vol. 1, 28).

Mithraism—sun worship—became prevalent in pagan Rome, and Hall explains that Mithraism found entrance into early Roman Christianty:

When the zealots of the primitive Christian Church sought to Christianize pagandom, the pagan initiates retorted with a powerful effort to paganize Christianity. The Christians failed but the pagans succeeded. With the decline

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of paganism the initiated pagan hierophants transferred their base of operations to the new vehicle of primitive Christianity, adopting the symbols of the new cult to conceal those eternal verities which are ever the priceless possession of the wise. The ideals of early Christianity were based upon the high moral standards of the pagan Mysteries, and the first Christians who met under the city of Rome used as their places of worship the subterranean temples of Mithras, from whose cult has been borrowed much of the sacerdotalism of the modern church (The Secret Teachings Of All Ages, CLXXXV, XXI).

Before we demonstrate that Sunday penetrated the 2nd century Church through Mithraism, we must ask: What is Mithraism? Another name for Mithraism is Zoroastrianism, and this is a religion from the Persian Empire, the Empire that immediately followed Babylon.

Zoroastrianism was a pagan monotheistic/polytheistic kind of religion, which paralleled the true religion of Jehovah during the Persian supremacy. This religion taught that God was both good and evil (Persian Dualism). The Good god was “Ahura Mazda,” and the evil god was “Angra Mainyu.” In essence Zoroastrianism was a religion based on a seven-fold dualism. It was believed that Mazda watched humanity through the sun, and he wore the stars like a garment. Mazda, it was believed, had six offspring, which governed his creation. Mazda with his six offspring represented the “Amesha Spentas.” The Amesha Spentas were believed to be seven immortals that protected the creation. Each one of these guardians represented a facet in nature and protected that part of nature—keeping balance in the world. Angra Mainyu—the evil part of this god—was the exact counterpart to Mazda. He had a counterpart for each of Mazda’s offspring. It was believed that the seven evil immortals were constantly attempting to possess that which the seven good immortals protected.

Like Nimrod’s Dragon worship through the seven astrological gods—the sun being the primary representation of the Dragon—Mazda was worshiped through the sun and the other six governors. As the Babylonians believed that their god was both good and evil, this was the same in Zoroastrianism. Furthermore, as the sun was the chief god over the other six planets, this was the same in Zoroastrianism. In truth Zoroastrianism is Mithraism. Durant says, “And the Undying Fire of the skies, the Sun, was adored as the highest and most characteristic embodiment of Ahura-Mazda or Mithra…” (Our Oriental Heritage, 369, 370). We agree with Cumont where he says that Zoroastrianism or Mithraism comes from Babylon:

The erudite and refined theology of the Chaldeans was thus superposed on the primitive Mazdean belief, which was rather a congeries of traditions than a well established body of definite dogmas. The legends of the two religions were assimilated, their divinities were identified, and the Semitic worship of the stars (astrolatry), the monstrous fruit of a long continued scientific observations, became amalgamated with the nature-myths of the Iranians. Ahura-Mazda was confounded with Bel, who reigned over the heavens; Anahita was likened to Ishtar, who presided over the planet Venus; while Mithra became the Sun, Shamash. As Mithra in Persia, so Shamash in Babylon is the god of Justice; like him, he also appears in the east, on the summits of mountains, and pursues his daily course across the heavens in a resplendent chariot; like him, finally, he too

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gives victory to the arms of warriors, and is the protector of kings. The transformation wrought by Semitic theories in the beliefs of the Persians was of so profound a character that, centuries after, in Rome, the original home of Mithra was not infrequently placed on the banks of the Euphrates (The Mysteries of Mithra: translated from the second revised edition by Thomas J. McCormack, 10).

Now having demonstrated this, what does Zoroastrianism or Mithraism have to do with Sunday? B. G. Wilkinson tells us the following:

Since it (Zoroastrianism) was pre-eminently a religion of sun-worship, what was more appropriate than to choose Sunday, the day of the sun, as the holy day? To enhance Sunday observance, the magi, Persian wise men, taught that the five planets, all that were known in their day, with the sun and the moon, were deities. A day of the week was dedicated to each one of the seven heavenly bodies. Thus Sunday was devoted to Mithra, or the sun, the greatest of all gods of Zoroastrianism (Truth Triumphant: The Church In The Wilderness, 130: Emphasis mine).

It is a historical fact that Sunday—the first day of the week—was a sacred day in Zoroastrianism or Mithraism. B.G. Wilkinson argues that, as cited above, the Zoroastrians named their days based on the seven planetary gods in an arrangement that made Sunday sacred. The question that we must ask is: Where did the Persians receive their understanding of the weekly cycle? As we just observed from Cumont, the religion of Zoroastrianism comes from Babylon; therefore, it seems most probable that the Persian weekly cycle, which made Sunday sacred, comes from the same place. Durant shows:

The great Ziggurat at Borsippa was called “The Stages of the Seven Spheres”; each story was dedicated to one of the seven planets known to Babylonia, and bore a symbolic color. The lowest was black, as the color of Saturn; the next above it was white, as the color of Venus; the next was purple, for Jupiter; the fourth blue, for Mercury; the fifth scarlet, for Mars; the sixth silver, for the moon; the seventh gold, for the sun. These spheres and stars, beginning at the top, designated the days of the week (Our Oriental Heritage, 255).

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Since the great Ziggurat of Babylon had this arrangement of the planets in its architecture, then in a very large way the stage for the present arrangement of the days of the week have been fixed by Babylon—regardless if the Greeks and the Romans applied modifications. If the top layer of the Ziggurat is to be reckoned as the first planet, we come up with the following order: the Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, and Saturn.

Why are these correlations significant? The 666 god of Babylon—the Zodiacal sun—and its alignment with the other planets was carried over to Zoroastrianism in a weekly cycle that made Sunday sacred. The Persian religion was simply the continuation of the solar theology of the Chaldeans, as Cumont explains in the following:

The solar theology of the ‘Chaldeans’ had a decisive effect upon the final development of Semetic paganism…[It led to their] seeing the sun the directing power of the cosmic system. All the Baals were thence forward turned into suns; the sun itself being the mover of the other stars—like it eternal and ‘unconquerable,’ whose revolutions together determined the succession of the phenomena of the universe according to the cycles of ‘great years.’ As the heart of the universe the sun was the seat of the divine energy pervading this vast organism to its extremities…Such was the final form reached by the religion of the pagan Semites, and, following them, by that of the Romans when Aurelian, the conqueror of Palmyra, had raised “Sol Invictus” [the invincible Sun] to the rank of supreme divinity in the Empire…It can easily be realized how a pagan theology so close to monotheism prepared the ground for Christian propaganda (The Cambridge Ancient History, Vol. 11, Franz Cumont, “The Frontier Provinces of the East,” 643, 646, 647).

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The similarities between early Roman Christianity and Mithraism are emphasized by Cumont:

The sectaries of the Persian god, like the Christians, purified themselves by baptism; received, by a species of confirmation, the power necessary to combat the spirits of evil; and expected from a Lord’s Supper salvation of body and soul. Like the latter, they also held Sunday sacred, and celebrated the birth of the Sun on the 25th of December, the same day on which Christmas has been celebrated, since the fourth century at least (The Mysteries of Mithra, 190, 191).

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Latourette also emphasizes the similarities between Mithraism and Roman Christianity:

Of all the mystery cults, Mithraism proved the most serious competitor of Christianity. The two showed many resemblances. Both had baptism, a sacramental meal, a belief in immortality, a resurrection, a last judgment, a heaven of bliss, and a hell of misery. Both made strong ethical demands on their adherents. Both organized into conventicles. Both observed Sunday and celebrated December 25th as a great feast (A History of The Expansion Of Christianity, Vol. 1, 29).

When Hall says: “The first Christians who met under the city of Rome used as their places of worship the subterranean temples of Mithras, from whose cult has been borrowed much of the sacerdotalism of the modern church,” he is making complete sense, because Mithraism is Zoroastrianism, and this system—either name is sufficient—taught that Sunday was sacred. We agree with Walter Hyde where he says:

Remains of the struggle [between the religion of Christianity and the religion of Mithraism] are found in two institutions adopted from its rival by Christianity in the fourth century, the two Mithraic sacred days: December 25, “dies natalis solis” [birthday of the sun], as the birthday of Jesus, and Sunday, “the venerable day of the Sun,” as Constantine called it in his edict of 321 (Paganism to Christianity in the Roman Empire, 60).

When the early apologists called Sunday “The Venerable Day of the Sun” or “The Day of Light,” they were speaking in accordance with the true meaning of that day. When popular Bible teachers argue that Sunday was being kept by the apologists before Constantine made the Sunday law, we are not impressed; because as Latourette says, “From the doctrines and the rituals of that same faith (Mithraism) are said to have come contributions to the teachings and language of some of the early Christian apologists” (A History of The Expansion Of Christianity, Vol. 1, 316. Emphasis mine). The early Roman Church fathers were indoctrinated by Mithraism and layered it with the resurrection of Christ on Sunday to justify their idolatry. Apparently the Baptist, Dr. Hiscox, understood this truth, for he says:

Of course I quite well know that Sunday did come into use in early Christian history as a religious day, as we learn from the Christian Fathers and other sources. But what a pity that it comes branded with the mark of Paganism, and christened with the name of the sun-god, then adopted and sanctified by the Papal apostasy, and bequeathed as a sacred legacy to Protestantism (Report of his sermon at the Baptist Minister’s Convention, in “New York Examiner,” November 16, 1893).

Very factually does Dr. L. David Moore tell us:

Unlike Judaism but like Christianity, Mithraism and Sol Invictus had Sunday [the “Sun’s day”] as their day of rest, i.e. their Sabbath. The change of the Sabbath from that practiced by the early Judeo-Christians was emphasized when Constantine passed legislation making Sunday the day of rest in the Roman

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Empire in an attempt to win over the followers of Mithraism or Sol Invictus to Christianity. As an added inducement, mosaics were created which showed Jesus as the Sun God, riding in his solar chariot. This made many Romans more comfortable with their new God. This is also a direct transference of pagan practices into Christianity, a possibility which would have been unthinkable to any original Jewish followers of Jesus (The Christian Conspiracy: How The Teachings Of Christ Have Been Altered By Christians, 277).

When Jesus walked the earth—before he sealed the New Covenant with His blood—He never acknowledged Sunday. Jesus, being all knowing, never said, “The day that the Zoroastrians keep will eventually become the Christian Sabbath.” No! Rather Jesus said, “Not an iota will pass away in the Law” (Matt. 5:18).”

The 8th Day Myth

As we noted some pages back, Walter Martin, in his book, Kingdom Of The Cults, attempts to use the early Roman Church fathers as evidence of the sanctity of Sunday. As we are seeing, reliance on these Church fathers is very misleading. Another example of how misleading reliance on the Church fathers can be is seen in the issue of the 8th day terminology. Among the early fathers, it has been mentioned that Sunday is the eighth day. The early Father Ignatius (A.D. 30 – 107) said concerning the Sabbath:

Let us therefore no longer keep the Sabbath after the Jewish manner, and rejoice in the days of idleness…For if we live according to the Jewish law, and the circumcision of the flesh, we deny that we have received grace…And after the observance of 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]. Looking forward to this, the prophet declared, “To the end, for the eighth day,” on which our life both sprang up again, and the victory over death was obtained in Christ… (Epistle Of Ignatius To The Magnesians. Chap. IX in ANF, Vol. 1, 62, 63).

Barnabas (A.D. 100; not to be confused with the apostle) said:

“And God made in six days the works of His hands, and made an end on the seventh day, and rested on it, and sanctified it.”Attend, my children, to the meaning of this expression, “He finished in six days.” This implieth that the Lord will finish all things in six thousand years, for a day is with Him a thousand years. . .Therefore, my children, in six days, that is, in six thousand years, all things will be finished. “And He rested on the seventh day.” This meaneth: when His Son, coming [again], shall destroy the time of the wicked man, and judge the ungodly, and change the sun, and the moon, and the stars, then shall He truly rest on the seventh day…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 eight day, that is, a beginning of another world. Wherefore, also, we keep the eighth day also with joyfulness, the day also on which Jesus rose again from the dead (The Epistle Of Barnabas, chap. XV in ANF, vol. 1, 146, 147).

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Walter Martin, in his book, cites both Ignatius and Barnabas to prove the point that Sunday is now the Christian day of worship. Martin, like many evangelicals, uses these citations as an authority without tracing the opinions of the Church fathers to their true origin. Did the eighth day terminology really point to the resurrection, or did this terminology point to something else? We know that between the years’ A.D. 1 – 50, a Hellenistsic Jew, who undoubtedly mixed the tenets of Paganism with his own Jewish beliefs, wrote the Slavonic Enoch. In “Slavonic of Enoch” 32:2 and 33:1, 2, we read:

And I blessed the seventh day, which is the Sabbath, on which he [Adam] rested from his works. And I appointed the eighth day also, that the eighth day should be the first-created after my work, and that the first seven revolve in the form of the seventh thousand, and that at the beginning of the eighth thousand there should be a time of not-counting, endless, with neither years, nor months nor weeks nor days nor hours.

The “eighth day” terminology was already an issue in the pseudepigrapha. The eighth day was simply another term for the first day and was associated with cosmic light in the coming new age. One can read this pseudepigraphal book and see that the Slavonic Enoch was loaded with mysticism, which has its origin in both Greek Hellenism and Persian Zoroastrianism. The Slavonic Enoch is said to be the first inference of the eighth day being a special day, but in this Jewish pseudo we find that this concept predates the second century Church. As we have seen in chapter 8, Beliar centered pseudepigrapha writings have helped to create the doctrine of the False Prophet. But the deception which Satan laid in the past did not stop with Beliar; Satan also created ideas such as replacing God’s sign of the Sabbath with eighth day or first day—day of the sun—myths to create Anti–Nomonism, a system which flourished in Gnosticism and now flourishes in dispensationalism.

The writer of the Slavonic Enoch most likely received his view of the eighth day from Zoroastrianism, for his emphasis on time being structured in 1,000 year segments is similar to what Durant calls the “four epochs of three thousand years each, in which Ahura-Mazda and Ahriman would alternately predominate” until good triumphs in the end (Our Oriental Heritage, 368). Leroy Froom, in Prophetic Faith Of Our Fathers Vol. 1 brings this charge against the Slavonic Enoch based on his research. In other words, the Persian concept of many ages in 1,000 segments became, in the hand of the Jewish writer of the SLAVONIC ENOCH, a shorter version based on the creation week in Genesis. But we should ask: Why is this correlation important? If the writer of the Slavonic Enoch borrowed his concept of time from Zoroastrianism, it is very probable that he borrowed the concept of the eighth day from the same quarter. How is this the case? As we have already emphasized, Sunday was a sacred day in Zoroastrianism or Mithraism. We must ask the question: How does Sunday, in Zoroastrianism, relate to the concept of the eighth day? Earlier we brought up the argument that the weekly cycle in Persia was borrowed from Babylon. Now, in realizing that the Zoroastrian concept of the seven days—with Sunday being sacred—was borrowed from the structure of the seven planetary gods and the solar theology of Babylon, we ask: what does the eighth day have to do with seven gods? Hall inadvertently tells us:

The Egyptians and the Chaldeans taught that there were seven corporeal worlds

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(i.e., worlds ruled by the intellectual powers); the first is of pure fire; the second, third, and fourth, ethereal; the fifth, sixth, and seventh, material; the seventh being the one called terrestrial and hater of light, and is located under the Moon, comprising within itself the matter called fundus, or foundation. These seven plus the one invisible crown, constitute the eight worlds (Secret Teachings Of All Ages, LIX, LX. Emphasis mine).

Connected to the seven planetary gods, it was believed that there were seven spheres. The eighth sphere was believed to be the place where the souls of men went to dwell in the pure light of the great Dragon power—depicted in the Hermetic vision (See Secret Teachings Of All Ages, XL). Unequivocally, the eighth sphere was the ultimate and purest habitation of the one god—the sun and the Dragon. Thus, the number 1 and 8 are inextricably connected as the essence of the sun god within his purest domain. The writer of the Slavonic Enoch makes the eight thousandth year the New World in which men will dwell with God. This correlates with the pagan concept of the eighth sphere being the place where men receive their immortality and dwell with the sun god. The writer of the Slavonic Enoch most likely made the eighth day sacred because—in Paganism—it represents the sphere inextricably connected to the first god of importance—the god of light, the sun. Therefore, we will emphasize that the number 8 as is applied to Sunday in both Zoroastrianism and the Slavonic Enoch makes Sunday the representation of the god of light in the eighth sphere. The writer of the Slavonic Enoch contorted the 12,000 years and the eighth sphere of Zoroastrianism into seven thousand years and the sanctity of the eighth day. Then, latter in the course of time, we find Barnabas and other Church fathers quoting this stuff as though its God’s word. But let us not forget the source of these pseudepigraphal writings, as Harnack explains:

The Jewish Apocalyptic literature, especially as it flourished since the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, was impregnated with new elements borrowed from an ethico-religious philosophy, as well as with Babylonian and Persian myths…A wealth of mythologies and poetic ideas was naturalized and legitimized, in the Christian communities, chiefly by the reception of the Apocalyptic literature… (History Of Dogma, Vol. 1, 100, 102).

When dispensationalists argue that Sunday was being kept by the apologists before Constantine made the Sunday law, we are not impressed; for Sunday was kept by the Zoroastrians 200 to 300 years before Jesus came to earth. Go back to the THREE PRINCIPLES OF COVENANT in light of this debate. When Jesus walked the earth—before he sealed the New Covenant with His blood—He never acknowledged Sunday. Jesus, being all knowing, never said, “The day that the Zoroastrians keep will inevitably become the Christian Sabbath.” No! Rather He said, “Not an iota will pass away in the Law” (Matt. 5:18).” Reliance on the early Roman church fathers by dispensationalists or evangelicals in general, then, becomes reliance on mythology. As the Jesuits created the futurist system from ideas of the early fathers—traced back to the pseudepigraphal, Beliar antichrist; today both the Papacy and many evangelicals are authenticating Sunday observance from the same places. Sunday does not possess God’s credentials; it is a day that honors the sun—the 666 god. So, what do we say to statements, such as the following?

In their zeal to establish the authority of the Sabbath, Adventists either reject

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contrary evidence as authentic (and so conflict with the preponderance of scholastic opinion), or they ignore the testimony of the early church. Although they seem unaffected by the evidence, the fact remains that the Christian Church has both apostolic and historical support for observing the Lord’s Day in place of the Sabbath (Walter Martin, Kingdom Of The Cults, 461).

We are utterly shocked that too many evangelicals don’t dig any deeper than a surface knowledge of the Church fathers; that they have failed miserably to illustrate the underling ideological foundation of the views of the Church fathers; that, Walter Martin, never mentions the Papacy in his book on cults—even though that system is the greatest concentration of falsehood the world has ever seen; that by not naming the Papacy as the largest cult inadvertently shows that he—like many evangelicals—are simply evangelical Catholics applying the same old arguments of the Jesuit Order to sustain the misleading arguments that the early Roman Church fathers are untarnished with error—when in fact they were filled with error.

Who Really Constitutes The Early Fathers Of Apostolic Christianity?

Those who argue incessantly that the early Roman church fathers are the true progenitors of the apostolic faith from the apostles leave far too much to be desired in a true understanding of the facts. What do mean by this statement? We mean to say that the terms “Church of the East” and “Church of the West” have not been brought to serious enough attention as to the origin of apostolic heritage. Many who argue in favor of the Roman Church fathers argue in favor of the “Church of the West” as though that was the only church. Today, multitudes of scholars are well conditioned to think that the progenitors of the Church of Rome are the true church fathers—even many evangelicals have been conditioned to think this way. Well does Wilkinson emphasize:

Many eminent theologians, particularly Protestant, speak against accepting the writings of the so-called apostolic fathers with too much authority: Augustus Neander says that they have “come down to us in a condition very little worthy of confidence [Neander, General History of the Christian Religion and Church, Vol. 1, p. 657].” John L. Mosheim testifies that they all believed the language of the scriptures to contain two meanings, the one plain, the other hidden; that they attached more value to the hidden meaning, thus throwing obscurity over the sacred Writings [Mosheim, Institutes of Ecclesiastical History, b. 1, cent. 3, pt. 2, ch. 3, par. 5]. Archdeacon Frederic W. Farrar writes: “There are but few of them whose pages are not rife with errors.” “Their acquaintance with the Old Testament is incorrect, popular, and full of mistakes [Farrar, History of Interpretation, pp. 162, 165].” While Martin Luther, who had studied deeply into the writings of those allegorizing, mystical church fathers, declared that God’s word when it is expounded by them is like straining milk through a coal sack [Luther, Table Talk, p. 228]. Adam Clarke testifies that “there is not a truth in the most orthodox creed, that cannot be proved by their authority, nor a heresy that has disgraced the Romish Church, that may not challenge them as its abettors.”[Clarke, Commentary, on Proverbs 8] (Truth Triumphant, 122, 123).

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The fact of the matter is simply this: the Apostolic Church was neither modeled nor continued through Roman Christianity. In 1 Thessalonians 2:14, Paul tells us what constitutes the model of Apostolic Christianity: “For ye, brethren, became followers of the churches of God which in Judea are in Christ Jesus: for you also have suffered like things of your own countrymen, even as they have of the Jews.” We agree with Harnack where he says:

Original Christianity was in appearance Christian Judaism, the creation of a universal religion on Old Testament soil. It retained therefore, so far as it was not hellenized, which never altogether took place, its original Jewish features (History Of Dogma, Vol. 1, 287).

The Jerusalem churches were the model of Apostolic Christianity. During the latter part of the first century—into the second—when Rome was forced to fight against the Jews, where did Jewish Christianity go? Wilkinson shows:

Because of his hatred of the Jews who had rebelled against Rome and were duly suppressed, the emperor forbade them, in 135, to enter the city of Jerusalem. This, of course, excluded Christians of Jewish descent. This act also contributed to the building up of new Syrian centers of Christianity (Truth Triumphant, 34).

Judean Christianity migrated into Decapolis and Antioch and spread throughout the eastern nations. Wilkinson emphasizes:

The fact that the East was full of Jews, and that the preponderance of converts in the early gospel communities was for a long time from among them, would indicate that the character of the beliefs and observances held by the Church of the East were modeled after the churches of Judea, not after Rome (Truth Triumphant, 42).

We are told that Syrian Christianity became very developed and dominated in scientific and literary knowledge (Truth Triumphant, 37). Wilkinson quoting DeLacy O’Learry emphasizes: “The Bibles produced by the Syrian scribes presented the Syrian text of the school of Antioch, and this text became the form which displaced all others in the Eastern churches and is, indeed, the Textus Receptus (Received Text) from which our Authorized Version is translated” (O’Leary, The Syriac Church and Fathers, p. 49; Cited on 37). History has recorded that Lucian (c. A.D. 250 – 312) became a great scholar for Syrian Christianity. Why is this champion of apostolic Christianity so important? He grew up in the Eastern, Syrian Churches—founded after the Judean Church, and he founded the school at Antioch to counteract the sun worship that was prevailing in Rome and Alexandria (Truth Triumphant, 47). Now, before proceeding any further on this matter, let us underscore the distinction between the Church of the East and the Church of the West. Harnack says:

Now the great question is, whether this Jewish Christianity as a whole, or in certain of its tendencies, was a factor in the development of Christianity to Catholicism. This question is to be answered in the negative…The Jewish Christians took no considerable part in the Gnostic controversy, the epoch-

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making conflict which was raised within the pale of the larger Christianity… (History Of Dogma, Vol. 1, 290)

Lucian battled against Manichaeism and Gnosticism. It is important to realize that both Manichaeism and Gnosticism were philosophical religions based on Sun Worship. One of the most destructive doctrines of Gnosticism was the idea that God’s law had been abolished. Irenaeus’s argument against the heresy of Marcion and his followers clearly defines the “no law” theory of Gnosticism:

And that the Lord did not abrogate the natural [precepts] of the law, by which man is justified, which also those who were justified by faith, and who pleased God, did observe previous to the giving of the law, but that He extended and fulfilled them, is shown from His words. “For,” He remarks, “it has been said to them of old time, Do not commit adultery. But I say unto you, That every one who hath looked upon a woman to lust after her, hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.” For all these do not contain or imply an opposition to and an overturning of the [precepts] of the past, as Marcion’s followers do strenuously maintain; but [they exibit] a fulfilling and an extension of them, as He does himself declare: “Unless your righteousness shall exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.” Now all these [precepts], as I have already observed, were not [the injunctions] of one doing away with the law, but of one fulfilling, extending, and widening it among us; just as if one should say, that the more extensive operation of liberty implies that a more complete subjection and affection towards our Liberator had been implanted within us (Irenaeus Against Heresies. Book IV, chap. XIII in ANF, Vol. 1, 477; chap. XII, 476)

Wilkinson, arguing from Milman, The History Of Christianity, Vol. 2, p. 270, tells us that Manichaeism “ridiculed the Sabbath of the fourth commandment and exalted Sunday” (Truth Triumphant, 49). Wilkinson’s analysis that Manichaeism argued in favor of Sunday observance only makes sense, for Nesta H. Webster tells us:

The fundamental doctrine of Manicheism is Dualism—that is to say, the existence of two opposing principles in the world, light and darkness, good and evil—founded, however, not on the Christian conception of this idea, but on the Zoroastrian conception of Omuzd and Ahriman (Secret Societies And Subversive Movements, 33).

Manichaeism was just another form of sun worship. Harnack says, “Four times a day had the Manichaean to utter prayers; and these were preceded by absolutions. He who prayed turned to the sun or moon, or to the North as the seat of light… [Manichaean prayer] was directed to the God of light…” (History Of Dogma, Vol. 3, 327. Emphasis mine). Manichaeism was another form of Zoroastrianism or Mithraism, and this doctrine—with its emphasis on Sunday observance—influenced the Church of Alexandria and Rome, which was the seat of Roman Christianity. Moreover, the Gnostic doctrine, which maintained the law was abolished, supported the theory that the fourth commandment was no longer important.

Lucian is accredited with arguing against the ideas of Justin Martyr, Tatian, Clement, Origen, Tertullian, and others who all were advocating traditions that did not

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belong to Apostolic Christianity, but rather belonged to the ideas of Alexandria and Rome. In other words Syrian Christianity laid the foundation for the continuance of Apostolic Christianity throughout the world, whereas the popularized Church fathers were more closely related to the schools of Alexandria and Rome—schools that were filled with Gnosticism and Manichaeism.

It was the work of Lucian and the school of Antioch that divided the Eastern Church from the Western Church and eventually caused Socrates to emphasize:

For although almost all the churches throughout the world celebrate the sacred mysteries on the Sabbath of every week, yet the Christians of Alexandria and at Rome, on account of some ancient tradition, have ceased to do this (Socrates, church historian of fifth century, Ecclesiastical History, Book 5, chap. 22, Translated by A.C. Zenos, D.D. in A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers Of The Christian Church, 2d series, Vol. 2, 132).

Socrates’ observation of the Sabbath keeping world was a product of Syrian Christianity. The ancient tradition, according to Socrates, that kept the Alexandrian and Roman Church from keeping the Sabbath was Manichaeism and Gnosticism—stemming back to Zoroastrianism in Persia, and ultimately Sun worship in Babylon. Leslie Hardinge explains the Gnostic and Mithraic situation in the early centuries of Christianity:

Soon after the founding of the faith Gnosticism and Mithraism raised tensions in Christian thinking. Gnostics “celebrated the Sunday of every week, not on account of its refference to the resurrection of Christ, for that would have been inconsistent with their Docetism, but as the day consecrated to the sun, which was in fact their Christ.” The influence of Mithraism tended to the same direction, for as G. L. Laing declared rightly: “Our observance of Sunday as the Lord's day is apparently derived from Mithraism. The argument that has sometimes been used against this claim, namely, that Sunday was chosen because of the resurrection on that day, is not well supported.” Those Christians who were looking for a way out of their difficulty with Sabbath observance moved towards a greater regard for the first day of the week. But others on the outskirts of the Empire, where anti-Semitism did not exist, continued their veneration of the seventh day Sabbath (The Celtic Church In Britain, 75, 76).

Very factually W. D. Killen says:

Between the days of the apostles and the conversion of Constantine, the Christian commonwealth changed its aspect . . . .Rites and ceremonies, of which neither Paul nor Peter ever heard, crept silently into use, and then claimed the rank of divine institutions (The Ancient Church, Preface, XV, XVI).

When Lucian (A.D. 250 – 312) was alive, he made war on Sunday along with other tenets of Manichaeism and Gnosticism. For a long period of time, Sabbath keeping Christianity was able to spread throughout the world. After Lucian’s day, Roman Christianity was not only established with the tenets of Manichaeism and Gnosticism, but it gained favor with the Roman government through Constantine. It was approximately 9 years after Lucian’s death—in the year 321—that Constantine made the first civil Sunday Law, which demanded those under Roman power not to work on that day. Though this

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law did not abolish the seventh day Sabbath, it did enforce Sunday observance. This truth is seen in the fact that, as a result of the constant pressure from the Western Church, many Sabbath keepers kept Sunday along with the Sabbath. Hermias Sozomen reveals this: “The people of Constantinople, and almost everywhere, assemble together on the Sabbath, as well as the first day of the week, which custom is never observed at Rome or at Alexanderia” (“Ecclesiastical History,” in A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 2nd Series, Vol. 2, book 7, chap. 19, 390). A. C. Flick says, “The Celts used a Latin Bible unlike the Vulgate, and kept Saturday as a day of rest, with special religious services on Sunday” (The Rise of the Medieval Church, 237). Socrates tells us:

The Arians, as we have said, held their meetings without the city. As often therefore as the festival days occurred—I mean Saturday and Lord’s day—in each week, on which assemblies are usually held in the churches, they congregated within the city gates about the public squares, and sang responsive verses adapted to the Arian heresy (“Ecclesiastical History” book 6, chap. 8, A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers Of The Christian Church, 2d series, Vol. 2, 144).

The Western Church never endorsed the Sabbath and, not being content that many Sabbath keepers also kept Sunday in accordance with Constantine’s law, sought more and more to completely remove the Sabbath out of the world. This is precisely what the Council of Laodicea wanted to accomplish:

Christians must not Judaize by resting on the Sabbath, but must work on that day, rather honoring the Lord’s Day; and, if they can, resting then as Christians. But if any shall be found to be Judaizers, let them be anathema from Christ (“Synod Of Laodicea A.D. 343 – 381” Canon XXIX, A Select Library Of Nicene And Post-Nicene Fathers Of The Christian Church. 2nd Series, Vol. 16, 148).

The pressures from Romanism against the Sabbath keeping Church is the reason Lyman Coleman could say:

Down even to the fifth century the observance of the Jewish Sabbath was continued in the Christian church, but with a rigor and a solemnity gradually diminishing until it was wholly discontinued (Ancient Christianity Exemplified, chap. 26, sec. 2).

Vincent J. Kelly says:A history of the problem shows that in some places, it was really only after some centuries that the Sabbath rest really was entirely abolished, and by that time the practice of observing a bodily rest on the Sunday had taken its place (Forbidden Sunday and Feast-Day Occupations, 15).

The constant pressure of Rome caused many Christians to give up the Sabbath, but regardless of Roman persecution, “the Syrian type of theology had great influence, endured until the Reformation, and kept its apostolic stamp” (Truth Triumph, 39). Of course Syrian Christianity continued to exist, for that is precisely why we—who wrote this course—are able to tell the reader these things.

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What has been said up to this point is only a small illustration of this issue. We highly recommend that the reader get the indispensable book, Truth Triuphant, by B.G. Wilkinson, for that book gives a very in depth analysis of the rise of the Eastern Church and the spread of the apostolic gospel to all points of the globe. Wilkinson’s research shows that the true apostolic faith—though brought to Rome by Paul—did not maintain its apostolic heritage as the Roman Church grew. Wilkinson demonstrates that the apostolic faith found more success in the East, and as Roman persecution increased, the apostolic heritage went into hiding for the centuries. Wilkinson proves through his research that the apostolic faith—though Romanism sought to destroy it—continued through the centuries. He shows that the Sabbath was observed by the Waldenses; by the church of Ireland; by the Church of Scotland; even in the churches of Africa and China.

We will emphasize this: The Syrian centers of Christianity were not perfect, and there was indeed much Paganism in the East, but the Syrian centers of Christianity were more closely related to the Jerusalem Church than the Church of the West. The Western Church from its beginnings was pagan. Those who emphasize the church fathers under Roman Christianity as being the true heir of the apostolic faith are leaving out so much more of the Christian Church—in its hugeness—to support the myth that Roman Christianity is the only picture of the Church. This is neither historical nor logical. Dispensationalists can argue the Hermetic Roman Church fathers all day long; it does not change the fact that there was another Church in the East, which kept the true Bible Sabbath. Many evangelicals will tell us incessantly that Sunday is the Lord’s Day, but which Lord is the Lord of Sunday? Chalmers factually answers this question:

The Gentile Christians of Rome and Alexandria began calling the first day of the week “The Lord’s Day.” This was not difficult for the pagans of the Roman Empire who were steeped in sun worship to accept, because they referred to their sun god as their Lord (How Sunday Came Into The Christian Church, 3)

CAN SUNDAY OBSERVANCE BE ENFORCED

We have provided sufficient evidence in chapter 5 to prove that the Papacy is the Antichrist. God has told us in Daniel 7 that it would be the Antichrist who would “THINK TO CHANGE TIMES AND LAWS.” The only law in the 10 commandments that has to do with TIME is the Sabbath. Was it Jesus who changed the Sabbath? No! Jesus said not one iota would change. It is the Papacy who has thought to change God’s law. Why does the Papacy think

that she could do this? The Papacy tells us:

The Pope is of so great authority and power that he can modify, explain, or interpret even divine laws. . . .The Pope can modify divine law, since his power is not of man, but of God, and he acts as vicegerent of God upon earth (Lucius Ferraris, Prompta Bibliotheca, “Papa,” art. 2, (1772 – 1777) Vol. 6, 26).

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It was pope Leo XIII who said: “We hold upon this earth the place of God Almighty” (Pope Leo XIII, In an Encyclical Letter, dated June 20, 1894). Because the Pope believes that he is God on earth, he feels that he can change God’s law when it suits him. Kelly tells us:

God simply Gave His [Catholic] Church the power to set aside whatever day or days, she would deem suitable as Holy Days. The Church chose Sunday, the first day of the week, and in course of time added other days, as holy days (Forbidden Sunday and Feast-Day Occupations, 2).

Not only does Sunday point back to the Sun worship of ancient Babylon, but it has been legalized by the Papacy—the Beast. The Roman Catholic Church simply grabbed onto the errors of their predecessors—the Roman Church fathers—and mandated Sunday into Catholic law. It does not require a PHD to realize that Sunday is 666 DAY, because it honors the sun and therefore honors the GREAT RED DRAGON who is the DEVIL.

It is the Papacy—who is the little horn and the Beast—who boasts that 666-day has replaced the Sabbath by the power of the Pope. They boast: “Of course the Catholic Church claims that the change [of the Sabbath] was her act…and the act is a MARK of her ecclesiastical power” (from the office of Cardinal Gibbons, through Chancellor H. F. Thomas, November 11, 1895). Notice the Papacy claims that Sunday is a MARK of her religious power.

We should ask: Could Sunday observance be legislated? We know, historically, there have been Sunday laws. Very factually, Roland R. Hegstad emphasizes:

The Sunday-law problem has been with mankind for quite a few centuries now—since Constantine’s first civil Sunday code of A.D. 321. The theological dimensions of the Sabbath-Sunday controversy have even more venerable beginnings, dating to pagan sun worshippers who worshipped on the “venerable day of the Sun” half a millennium or more before Christ. For nearly sixteen centuries church councils and civil courts have dispensed decrees and exemptions, and citizens ranging from a Roman peasant to the first President of the United States have run afoul of Sunday laws (Cited in Dateline Sunday, U.S.A.: The Story of Three and a Half Centuries of Sunday-Law Battles in America, preface.).

Constantine made the first civil Sunday law in Christianity. Did Sunday laws continue after Constantine?

The decrees of latter emperors between 364 and 467 added other prohibitions and exemptions from time to time. Justinian’s code collected the laws of the empire on the subject, and from the time when Charlemagne, king of the Franks, was crowned emperor (800), this code was in effect all over what latter became the “Holy Roman Empire.” The medieval decrees and canons of popes and councils concerning Sunday observance were enforced by the civil power (The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, Vol. 11, 147).

Hyde tells us:When the Church became a part of State under the Christian emperors, Sunday observance was enforced by civil statues, and latter when the Empire was past, the Church in the hands of the papacy enforced it by ecclesiastical and also by civil enactments (Paganism to Christianity in the Roman Empire, 1946, 261).

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Sunday Laws In America

Sunday laws even existed in colonial America. The first Sunday law was enacted in 1610:

Every man and woman shall repair in the morning to the divine service, and sermons preached upon the Sabbath day, and in the afternoon to divine service, and catechizing, upon pain of first fault to lose their provision and the allowance for the whole week following, for the second to lose the said allowance and also be whipped, and for the third to suffer death (For the Colony in Virginea Britannia, Lavves, Morall and Martiall & c, in Peter Force, Tracts Relating to the Colonies in North America, Vol. 3, No. 2, 10).

There followed other Sunday laws in America, such as: Massachusetts (1650), Connecticut (1656), and Maryland (1692 – 1715). W. L. Johns tells us: “The iron fist of the clergy-dominated state was an everyday fact of colonial life. Strict Sunday laws were a weekly reminder of this union” (Dateline Sunday, U.S.A., 5). These laws were enforced before the Constitution and Bill of Rights were established. It is a good thing that the United States adopted the Bill of Rights, for if she had not, we would have—sooner or latter—been nothing more than a Western version of Catholic Totalitarianism at a much earlier time. We completely agree with W. L. Johns where he says:

From its inception the Federal Government had no established religion or church tradition. Free of establishments, the new republic was consequently free of Sunday laws on a national level. James Madison liked it that way (Dateline Sunday, U.S.A., 33).

Well did George Washington and Benjamin Franklin acutely emphazize:

Every man, conducting himself as a good citizen, and being accountable to God alone for his religious opinions, ought to be protected in worshipping the Deity according to the dictates of his own conscience (Writings of George Washington, Vol. 30, 321).

When a religion is good, I conceive that it will support itself; and, when it cannot support itself, and God does not take care to support, so that its professors are obliged to call for the help of the civil power, it is a sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one (Letter to Dr. Price, Oct. 9, 1780, in The Writings of Benjamin Franklin, edited by Albert Henry Smyth, Vol. 8, 154).

Obviously these founding fathers were not understood, because on May 21, 1888, Senator H. W. Blair of New Hampshire proposed a national Sunday Law. In the first session we read:

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress Assembled. That no person, or corporation, or the agent, servant, or employee of any person of any person or corporation, shall perform or authorize to be performed any secular work, labor, or business to the disturbance of others, works of necessity, mercy, and humility excepted; nor shall any person

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engage in any play, game, or amusement, or recreation, to the disturbance of others, on the first day of the week, commonly known as the Lord’s day, or during any part thereof, in any territory, district, vessel, or place subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States; nor shall it be lawful for any person or corporation to receive pay for labor or service performed or rendered in violation of this section (Cited in G. Edward Reid, Sunday’s Coming, 80).

This document continues with issues such as providing mail, commerce, military drill, and etc. This Bill was apposed by Adventists, Seventh Day Baptists, and Jews and was defeated; It was defeated as it should have been for all time. Mark 12:17 has given us clear directive about politics and religion: “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” These two institutions do not belong with each other. As we are seeing, Protestants in the past have tried to enforce Sunday Laws. Back in the 1880’s, when evangelicals wanted to enforce Sunday laws, the Papacy said:

For ages all Christian nations looked to the Catholic Church, and, as we have seen, the various states enforced by law her ordinances as to worship and cessation of Labor on Sunday. Protestantism, in disregarding the authority of the church, has no good reason for its Sunday theory, and ought logically, to keep Saturday as the Sabbath. The State, in passing laws for the due Sanctification of Sunday, is unwittingly acknowledging the authority of the Catholic Church, and carrying out more or less faithfully its prescriptions. The Sunday, as a day of the week set apart for the obligatory public worship of Almighty God, to be sanctified by a suspension of all servile labor, trade, and worldly avocations and by exercises of devotion, is purely a creation of the Catholic Church (The American Catholic Quarterly Review, January, 1883, 152, 139).

The Papacy has even challenged the Protestant inconsistency of Sunday observance:

We Catholics, then, have precisely the same authority for keeping Sunday holy instead of Saturday as we have for every other article of our creed, namely, the authority of the Church…whereas you who are Protestant have really no authority for it whatever; for there is no authority for it [Sunday] in the Bible, and you will not allow that there can be authority for it anywhere else. Both you and we do, in fact, follow tradition in this matter; but we follow it, believing it to be part of God’s word, and the [Catholic] Church to be its divinely appointed guardian and interpreter; you follow it [the Catholic Church], denouncing it all the time as a fallible and treacherous guide, which often makes the commandment of God of none effect. [The Brotherhood of St. Paul, “The Clifton Tracts,” Vol. 4, tract 4, p. 15]

The truth of the dispensational controversy is truly described in the following:

Protestants often deride the authority of Church tradition, and claim to be directed by the Bible only; yet they, too, have been guided by customs of the ancient Church, which find no warrant in the Bible, but rest on Church tradition only! . . . The Bible, which Protestants claim to obey exclusively, gives no

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authorization for the substitution of the first day of the week for the seventh. On what authority, therefore, have they done so? Plainly on the authority of that very Catholic Church which they abandoned, and whose traditions they condemn (John L. Stoddard, Rebuilding a Lost Faith (1826 ed.), 80).

The Catholic Church claims that Sunday observance is her institution. James Cardinal Gibbons of Baltimore has told us:

The Divine institution of a day of rest from ordinary occupations and of religious worship, transferred by the authority of the Church from the Sabbath, the last day, to Sunday, the first day of the week, has always been revered in this country, has entered into our legislation and customs, and is one of the most patent signs that we are Christian people (The Claims of the Catholic Church in the Making of the Republic, in John Gilmary Shea and others, The Cross and the Flag, Our Church and Country, 24, 25)

Is it possible that, today, a Sunday Law can be passed that could get as severe as the 1610 Virginia Law? In the following chapter, we are going to analyze with clarity the fact that Evangelicals and Catholics are working together for control of the political structure. Evangelicals and Catholics—through both political and religious ecumenism—are seeking to change the fabric of America. It is their goal to redesign America in an image homogeneous to their religious views. We are going to discover that the United States is fulfilling the prophecy of the 2nd Beast in Revelation 13, and we are going to see that when the United States, through the civil powers, enforces a Sunday law, such an enactment will constitute AN IMAGE to the first Beast (Rev. 13: 11 – 18). America will then look like the sea Beast who, throughout the centuries, has compelled the human race to bow before Rome. When America erects an image of the intolerance of Papal Rome and enforces that Papal mark, Sunday, America will have filled up her cup of abominations before God. In the next chapter, we are going to cover this issue more.

Conclusions

In concluding this chapter, we must emphasize that Sunday is undoubtedly the counterfeit of God’s sign of the Everlasting Covenant, which is the Sabbath. Sunday is the sign of Papal power. Furthermore, Sunday is the sign of the Dragon system of pagan idolatry. Sunday, as a day, points to sun worship. Dispensationalists have created weak excuses for the observance of the first day of the week. Their emphasis on the early fathers for Sunday is akin to the Beliar myth. Ultimately, Sunday is based on pseudepigrapha and pagan myth, like the prophetic construct of futurism, which the Jesuits developed. In essence, dispensational attempts to make Sunday a Christian institution are—in truth—an indirect scheme to justify the works of Popery. A scheme that the devil plans on using to unite the world under his banner. We must, as Christians, come to the realization that the venerable day of the sun points to the god of 666; it points to sun worship, the sign of the Dragon covenant.

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Works Cited

[Vols. 1 – 7 Edited by Philip Schaff, D.D., LL.D., Henry Wace, D.D.,] Edited by Henry R. Percival, M.A., D.D. A Select Library Of Nicene And Post-Nicene Fathers Of The Christian Church. 2nd Series. 16 Vols. (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons Oxford And London Parker & Company, 1900)

A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers Of The Christian Church, 2d series, 16 Vols. Edited by Philip Schaff, D.D., LL.D., and Henry Wace, D.D. (New York, The Christian Literature Company; Oxford and London: Parker and Company, 1890) Vol. 2

Edited by S.A. Cook, LITT.D., F.E. Adcock, M.A., M.P. Charlesworth, M.A. Vols. VII – XI. The Cambridge Ancient History (Cambridge: At The University Press, 1936), Vol. 11

Rev. Alexander Roberts, D. D., and James Donaldson, LL.D., eds. Ante-Nicene Fathers (New York: The Christian Literature Company, 1886), Vol. 1

Bible Readings For The Home: A Studyof Vital Scripture Topics in Question-and-AnswerForm. Contributed by a Large Number of Bible Scholars (Published Jointly by Review And Herald Publishing Association: Washington, DC; Hagerstown, MD; and Pacific Press Publishing Association: Boise, ID; Oshawa, Ontario, Canada, 1963, 1967, 1980)

Cumont, Franz. The Mysteries of Mithra: translated from the second revised edition by Thomas J. McCormack (New York, NY: Dover Publications, Inc., 1965)

Durant, Will. Our Oriental Heritage (New York: Simon And Schuster, 1954)

Feuerstein, Georg. Spirituality by the Numbers (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1994)

Froom, Leroy Edwin. The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers: The Historical Development of Prophetic Interpretation, Pre-Reformation and Reformation Restoration, and Second Departure, (Washington D.C.: Review And Herald Pub. Assoc., 1948), Vol. 2 Flick, A. C. The Rise Of The Medieval Church (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1909)

Gibbon, Edward. The Decline and Fall Of The Roman Empire (New York: The Modern Library by Random House, Inc.), Vol. 1

Hardinge, Leslie. The Celtic Church In Britian (Brushton, New York: Teach Services, Inc.1973)

Hall, Manly P. The Secret Teachings of All Ages: Diamond Jubilee Edition (3910 Los Feliz Boulevard, Los Angeles, Cal.: The Philosophical Research Society Inc. 1998)

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Dr. Harnack, Adolph. History Of Dogma: Translated From The Third German Edition by Neil Buchanan, 6 Vols. (Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1897)

Johns, Warren L. Dateline Sunday, U.S.A.: The Story of Three and a Half Centuries of Sunday-Law Battles in America (Mountain View California and Omaha Nebraska: Pacific Press, 1967)

Keenan, Stephen. A Doctrinal Catechism (3rd American ed., rev.: New York, Edward Dunigan & Bro., 1876)

Larkin, Clarence. Dispensational Truth (Philadelphia, Pa.: Clarence Larkin Est. 1918, 20)

Latourette, Kenneth Scott. A History of The Expansion Of Christianity: The First Five Centuries. 4th edition (New York and London: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1937) Vol. 1

Dr. Moore, L. David. The Christian Conspiracy: How The Teachings Of Christ Have Been Altered By Christians (Atlanta Georgia: Pendulum Plus Press, 1994)

Martin, Walter. Kingdom Of The Cults (Minneapolis Minnesota: Bethany House Pub. 1965, 1977, 1996)

Reid, G. Edward. Sunday’s Coming

Sutton, William Josiah. (Compiler) and Roy Allan Anderson (Introduction). The Illuminati 666 (Brushton, New York: Teach Services, Inc., 1983)

Wilkinson, B. G. Truth Triumphant: The Church In The Wilderness (Brushton, New York: Teach Services, Inc., 1994)

Webster, Nesta H. Secret Societies and Subversive Movements (Palmdale, CA: Omni Publications, 1924)

Sources Cited In Prophetic Faith Of Our Fathers, Vol. 2

(John Foxe. Acts and Monuments of Matters Most Special and Memorable, Happening in the Church.. 9th ed. (London: Company of Stationers, 1648), Vol. 1

(Nicolaus Amsdorf. Funff furnemliche und gewisse Zeichen aus gottlicher heiliger Schrifft, so kurtz vor dem Jungsten tag geschehen sollen. (Jena: Rodinger, 1554), sig. B3v., B4r.]

Nicholas Ridley. A Piteous Lamentation of the Miserable Estate of the Church in England, in the Time of the Late Revolt from the Gospel, in The Works of Nicholas Ridley, D. D. Sometime Lord Bishop of London, Martyr, 1555. Edited for the Parker Society, by the Rev. Henry Christmas. (Cambridge: University Press, 1841)

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Sources Cited in Bible Reading For The Home

Arthur Weigall, The Paganism In Our Christianity, 1928

Augustus Neander, The History of the Christian Religion and Church

Letter to Dr. Price, Oct. 9, 1780, in The Writings of Benjamin Franklin, edited by Albert Henry Smyth, Vol. 8

Canon Knox Little, Sacerdotalism (1894 ed.)

E. M. Chalmers, How Sunday Came Into The Christian Church

Dr. E.T. Hiscox, report of his sermon at the Baptist Minister’s Convention, in “New York Examiner,” November 16, 1893

Writings of George Washington (J. C. Fitzpatrick, ed.), Vol. 30

James Cardinal Gibbons, The Faith of our Fathers (1917 ed.)

Lyman Coleman, Ancient Christianity Exemplified

Lucius Ferraris, Prompta Bibliotheca, “Papa,” art. 2, (1772 – 1777) Vol. 6

L. Duchesne, Christian Worship: Its Origin and Evolution (tr. From the 4th French ed. By M. L. McClure, London, 1910)

For the Colony in Virginea Britannia, Lavves, Morall and Martiall & c, in Peter Force, Tracts Relating to the Colonies in North America (Washington, 1844), Vol. 3

Mr. Morer of the Church of England, A Discourse in Six Dialogues on the Name, Notion, and Observation of the Lord’s Day

Codex Justinianus, lib. 3, tit. 12, 3; translated in History of the Christian Church, by Philip Schaff (Scribners, 1902 ed.) Vol. 3

Vincent J. Kelly, Forbidden Sunday and Feast-Day Occupations

Walter Woodburn Hyde, Paganism to Christianity in the Roman Empire

W. D. Killen (Presbyterian), The Ancient Church

Walter W. Hyde, Paganism to Christianity in the Roman Empire, 1946

The American Catholic Quarterly Review, January, 1883

The Brotherhood of St. Paul, “The Clifton Tracts,” Vol. 4

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The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, Vol. 11

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