Genesis 2:1-3 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. The finished heavens and earth and their host prepare the day of rest. God ended his work as an interchange of darkness and light. I. THE REST OF THE SABBATH IS NOT INACTION, BUT THE CESSATION FROM THE LOWER ORDER OF WORK FOE THE HIGHER. The idea of the first proclamation seems to be that creation was perfectly adjusted through the six days into a settled harmony which puts heaven and earth in their abiding relation to one another. II. Then THERE IS NO MORE SAID OF EVENING AND MORNING. The seventh day is only light. God's rest is complacency in his works. The blessing on the seventh day which hallowed it is the blessing on that which the day represents - perfect peace between heaven and earth, God satisfied in his creation, and inviting his intelligent creatures to "enter into his rest by communion with him. It seems quite unnecessary to vindicate such a sanctification of the seventh day from the insinuations of critics that it was a late addition made by the Jewish legislator to support the fourth commandment. In that case the whole cosmogony must be renounced. Such an observance of a day of rest seems a natural antecedent to the patriarchal as well as the Mosaic economy. We have already intimated that the whole account of creation is placed at the commencement of revelation because it has a bearing upon the positive ordinances of religion. It is not either a scientific or poetic sketch of the universe; it is the broad, fundamental outline of a System of religious truth connected with a body of Divine commandments. The sabbath is thus described in its original breadth. The sanctification of it is - 1. Negative. It is separation from the lower conditions of work, which in the case of man are the characteristics of days which are sinful days - days of toil and conflict, of darkness and light mingled. 2. Positive. It is the restful enjoyment of a higher life, a life which is not laboring after emancipation from bondage, but perfect with a glorious liberty; the true day, sacred, high, eternal noon," God and man rejoicing m one another, the creature reflecting the glory of the Creator. - R. § 2. THE GENERATIONS OF THE HEAVENS AND OF THE EARTH (Genesis 2:4-4:26). Parallel Verses KJV: Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.WEB: The heavens and the earth were finished, and all their vast array. |
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