This statement has been credited by many learned Protestants,[976] some
of whom must be acknowledged as men of candor and judgment. But Dr.
Twisse[977] discredits Barclay because he did not name the individuals
with whom Calvin consulted, and produce them as witnesses; and because
that King James I. of England at one time suspected Barclay of treachery
toward him. But no such crime was ever proved, nor does it appear that
the king continued always to hold him in that light.[978] His veracity
has never been impeached. The statement of Barclay may possibly be
incorrect, but it is not inconsistent with Calvin’s doctrine that the
church is not tied to a festival that should come once in _seven_ days,
even as Tyndale said that they could change the Sabbath into Monday or
could “make every tenth day holy day, only if we see cause why,” and it
is in perfect harmony with Calvin’s idea of Sunday sacredness as shown in
his acts already noticed. Like the other reformers, Calvin is not always
consistent with himself in his statements. Nevertheless, we have his
judgment concerning the several texts which are used to prove the change
of the Sabbath, and also respecting the theory that the commandment may
be used to enforce, not the seventh day, but one day in seven, and it is
fatal to the modern first-day doctrine.
John Knox, the great Scottish reformer, was the intimate friend of
Calvin, with whom he lived at Geneva during a portion of his exile from
Scotland. Though the foundation of the Presbyterian church of Scotland
was laid by Knox, or rather by Calvin, for Knox carried out Calvin’s
system, and though that church is now very strict in the observance of
Sunday as the Sabbath, yet Knox himself was of Calvin’s mind as to the
obligation of that day. The original Confession of Faith of that church
was drawn up by Knox in A. D. 1560.[979] In that document Knox states the
duties of the first table of the law as follows:—
“To have one God, to worship and honor him; to call upon him in
all our troubles; to reverence his holy name; to hear his word;
to believe the same; to communicate with his holy sacraments,
are the works of the first table.”[980]
It is plain that Knox believed the Sabbath commandment to have been
stricken out of the first table. Dr. Hessey, after speaking of certain
references to Sunday in a subsequent work of his, makes this statement
respecting the present doctrine of the Sabbath in the Presbyterian
church:—
“On the whole, whatever the language held at present in
Scotland may be, it is certainly not owing to the great man
whom the Scotch regard as the apostle of the Reformation in
their country.”[981]
That church now holds Sunday to be the divinely authorized memorial of
the resurrection of Christ, enforced by the authority of the fourth
commandment. But not thus was it held by Calvin and Knox. A British
writer states the condition of things with respect to Sunday in Scotland
about the year 1601:—
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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