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*Note: This is the second installment in a three-part series. You can access the previous article here.

Premises 1 and 2: As a natural law, the Sabbath pattern[1] is universally binding throughout every generation of human history. From the outset of creation, God sanctified one day to be reserved for resting from weekly labor and worshipping Him as man’s source of eternal rest.

In order to ascertain how the Sabbath pattern is universally binding throughout every generation of human history, it must first be demonstrated how the Sabbath pattern is a “natural law.” Consequently, appropriate space must be allotted to portray how the body of Christ has considered the basis for embracing natural law in the first place. Thus, a survey of natural law perspectives from the Patristic (AD 100-500), Medieval (AD 500-1500), Reformation (AD 1500-1700), and Modern (AD 1700-present) eras are in order.[2]

Over the course of millennia, Christian thinkers have devoted significant attention to the concept of natural law, resulting in the formulation of broadly agreed upon conclusions. With reference to the Patristic era of church history, Saint Augustine opined voluminously on natural law and epitomized a concrete sample of how Patristic theologians sought to wrestle with this subject. In his work, Eighty-Three Different Questions, Augustine penned one of the clearest expressions of what he believed about natural law.

From this ineffable and sublime arrangement of affairs, then, which is accomplished by divine providence, a natural law [naturalis lex] is, so to speak, inscribed upon the rational soul, so that in the very living out of this life and in their earthly activities people might hold to the tenor of such dispensations.[3]

When considering the macrostructure of created reality, Augustine believed natural law was a peculiar feature that God had sovereignly embedded within all of His image-bearers. Because of its intrinsic nature, Augustine believed that natural law was discernable and applicable to every intelligible creature bearing the imago Dei. Therefore, properly understood, natural law provides an objective standard for how man is to live in this world and engage with his neighbor.[4] These architectonic distinctives of Augustine’s thought would effectively lay the groundwork for Thomas Aquinas to build on during his scholarship conducted in the Middle Ages. In Question 94 of the Summa Theologia, there is a strikingly Augustinian flavor reflected in how Saint Thomas Aquinas viewed natural law.

There belongs to the natural law, first, certain most general precepts, that are known to all; and secondly, certain secondary and more detailed precepts, which are, as it were, conclusions following closely from first principles. As to those general principles, the natural law, in the abstract, can nowise be blotted out from men’s hearts. But it is blotted out in the case of a particular action, in so far as reason is hindered from applying the general principle to a particular point of practice, on account of concupiscence or some other passion.[5]

The tangible overlap of opinions shared by these intellectual giants on the topic of natural law accentuates the catholicity enjoyed by Christians during the pre-Reformation eras of church history. For both of these men, natural law is a principle that cannot be “blotted out from men’s hearts.” Echoing the testimony of Romans 2:12-16, every person is equally accountable to the natural law that has been transcribed upon their conscience. While they may suppress their knowledge of the natural law in unrighteousness (Rom. 1:18-21)—“on account of concupiscence or some other passion”—human beings cannot escape the divinely instilled law that resides within them. These core Augustinian and Aquinian beliefs about natural law likewise find roots in the heritage of Reformed Protestantism. According to John Calvin, despite every faculty of the human nature being corrupted with sin, mankind is indelibly marked with some sense of Deity.[6] Thus, self-awareness of natural law is an ontological necessity for image bearers, rendering every person liable to their holy Creator (Heb. 4:13).

Nothing, indeed is more common, than for man to be sufficiently instructed in a right course of conduct by natural law… The end of the natural law, therefore, is to render man inexcusable, and may be not improperly defined—the judgment of conscience distinguishing sufficiently between just and unjust, and by convincing men on their own testimony depriving them of all pretext for ignorance… [On the basis of natural law] it is false to say that [man] sins only through ignorance.[7]

As illustrated in the aforementioned quotation, Calvin’s commentary on the definition and purpose of natural law displays overarching agreement with eminent theologians residing in the Patristic and Medieval eras of church history. By way of concluding this historical evaluation of how Christian theologians have contemplated natural law, attention must now be oriented to the Modern era. While there are a plethora of viable options to analyze at this juncture, drawing from the contributions of James Petigru Boyce will highlight how Baptists have, historically, stood in continuity with broader Christian understandings of natural law. As seen in his Abstract of Systematic Theology, Boyce offers a replete interaction with this salient theological issue.  

It is manifest that the knowledge obtained from [natural law] must be abundant to teach man the simple facts upon which rests his duty to God; namely, that there is a God to whom he owes existence, and consequent reverence, service and love, and whose greatness enforces this obligation; also to show him that that duty has not been discharged, and that he has not the disposition to discharge it; and consequently to render him uneasy in his relations to God, and anxious to appease him, and secure some assurance of his pardon and approval. It has also been thought by many, that through reason alone man attains the conviction of immortality and of a future state of rewards and punishments.[8]

By virtue of canvassing select excerpts from notable Patristic, Medieval, Reformation, and Modern theologians, an organic progression of reasoning about natural law has been detected: (1) natural law is inextricably linked to the creation of man; (2) natural law’s association with the creation of man necessitates its universal application to image-bearers; (3) natural law’s universal application to humanity enables every person to adequately discern right from wrong; (4) natural law’s universal application to humanity, coupled with its enabling of man to adequately discern right from wrong, renders every person accountable to God for their moral behavior in this life.[9] At the rudimentary level, these four elements of natural law have been shared by orthodox Christians in every era of church history.[10] Having now concretized a benchmark explanation of natural law, its connection to the Sabbath pattern can be revisited. On what objective basis can the Sabbath pattern be deemed a natural law? Answer: Because of the Sabbath pattern’s origins in the week of creation.[11] In Genesis 2:1-4, it is recorded that after God spent six days structuring creation in accordance with His good pleasure, He rested on the seventh day. Moreover, as conveyed in Exodus 20:11, the reason why the Sabbath pattern should be observed by man is due to God resting from His work of creation on the seventh day and blessing it as a holiday.[12] Stated differently, God’s resting on the seventh day of the creation week was originally intended to remind humanity that their chief purpose for existence is to enjoy blissful rest for their souls; a rest that man can only obtain through personal communion with the triune God (Ps. 127:2).[13] Thus, the seven-day week is not an arbitrary, man-made convention. Rather, it is a historically entrenched reality that is rooted and grounded in the triune God’s purposes in creation. Flowing logically from this deduction, the six days of work and one day of rest example modeled by God (Sabbath pattern), as described in the creation narrative, must be apprehended as a universal and perpetual paradigm for humanity to observe. In the final analysis, to be negligent of the Sabbath pattern is to personify disobedience to the natural law undergirding humanity’s creaturely existence.

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[1] For an elaborate definition of what is meant by Sabbath pattern, refer to the explanations that were provided in the previous article of this series.

[2] In “Patristics and Reformed Orthodoxy: Some Brief Notes and Proposals,” The Southern Baptist Journal of Theology 12, no. 2 (2008): pp. 52-60, Carl Trueman identifies these four eras as “the standard division with which we now operate [in studying historical theology].” Thus, one noteworthy representative from each of those eras has been cited to introduce the reader to how natural law has been regarded by the universal church over the past 2,000 years. The date ranges are approximations derived from R. Scott Clark, “Historical Theology,” The Gospel Coalition, accessed December 25, 2021, https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/essay/historical-theology/.

[3] Augustine, Eighty-Three Different Questions, trans. David L. Mosher (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2002), 53 (2).

[4] On the basis of natural law, David Haines and Andrew Fulford connect man’s accountability before God, and man’s responsibilities to his neighbor, on page 13 of Natural Law: A Brief Introduction and Biblical Defense (New York, NY: Davenant Press, 2017), SCRIBD. “Natural law is said to be an order or rule of human conduct which is based upon the divinely created human nature and which is normative for all human beings. By its very definition, then, natural law assumes the existence of a superior being which is (1) the creator of human nature, or, at least, the governor of all human beings, (2) the rational author of the (natural) law which applies to human beings, and (3) the powerful enforcer of this law. In other words, if there is a natural law, then there is a Being which is superior to Human-beings, which is rational, and which is powerful enough to enforce the standard He has imposed upon the beings He governs.”

[5] Thomas Aquinas, “Question 94: The Natural Law,” trans. The Fathers of the English Dominican Province, The Natural Law Theory of Thomas Aquinas, accessed December 25, 2021, http://www.nlnrac.org/classical/aquinas/documents/question-94-natural-law#94-1.

[6] John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion (Edinburgh: Seltzer Books, 2018), SCRIBD, 82.

[7] Calvin, Institutes, SCRIBD, 426-427.

[8] James P. Boyce, Abstract of Systematic Theology (Memphis, TN: Charles River Editors, 2018), SCRIBD, 75.

[9] As speculated by theologians throughout church history, there has been debate as to the relationship between natural law and the moral culpability of infants, young children, and those who are mentally handicapped. For a balanced explication of the predominant views on these matters, see Ronald H. Nash, When a Baby Dies: Answers to Comfort Grieving Parents (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1999).

[10] The following resources trace the synthesis of natural law and the perpetuity of the Sabbath pattern throughout every major era of church history. Patristic (AD 100-500): D. A. Carson, ed., From Sabbath to Lord’s Day: A Biblical, Historical, and Theological Investigation (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 1999), 236; Medieval (AD 500-1500): Kenneth A. Strand and Daniel André Augsburger, The Sabbath in Scripture and History (Washington, D.C.: Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1982), 190-214; Reformation (AD: 1500-1700): Robert Cox, The Literature of the Sabbath Question (Edinburgh: Maclachlan and Stewart, 1865), 146; Modern (AD 1700-present): John Murray, Principles of Christian Conduct: Aspects of Biblical Ethics (London: Tyndale Press, 1957), 82-106.

[11] Caspar Olevianus (1536-1587), the sixteenth century German Reformed theologian, helpfully identifies the content of natural law—that of which has been written on the conscience of every human being at all times and in all places (Rom. 1:18-32; 2:12-16)—as perpetual and universally applicable ordinances. Stated differently, if any biblical precept is grounded in natural law, then humanity is morally obligated to obey it throughout every generation of history. “All men have the knowledge of God naturally engrafted in them and the work of the law by nature written in their hearts, and by the things created are constrained to know God, but nevertheless do not glorify Him, but do sin contrary to the law of nature… This is the unchangeable will of God, [that] all men be conformed to the law of nature, [and] also to the law written [in Scripture]. R. Scott Clark, “Caspar Olevianus on the ‘Law of Nature,’” The Heidelblog, May 19, 2018, https://heidelblog.net/2009/05/caspar-olevianus-on-the-law-of-nature/.

[12] In A New Testament Biblical Theology: The Unfolding of the Old Testament in the New (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2012), 780-81, G.K. Beale provides a cogent explanation for why God rested on the seventh day of creation week (Saturday): “[God’s resting on the seventh day] was to remind humanity of a final, eternal Sabbath rest without ‘morning or evening,’ that would no longer need to be repeated. That is, the ultimate goal of humanity was to enter into the kind of consummate rest into which God Himself had entered (Gen. 2:2). God is included within the purview of Gen. 2:3 in that the day is dedicated to him, so that it is ‘blessed’ and ‘set apart’ to recall his climactic rest. This day of rest appears not to have ceased but rather to be continuing on into the course of primeval history (since it is not like the other creation days, having no morning or evening… [continuing] on throughout time and can be shared in).” 

[13] With the inauguration of the age to come—the New Heavens and the New Earth—the people of God will enter into the eternal, consummate, eschatological Sabbath rest that they long to experience coram Deo (Rev. 22:1-5). As summarized by Geerhardus Vos in Biblical Theology: Old and New Testaments (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth Trust, 1975), 140, “the Sabbath [pattern] brings this principle of the eschatological structure of history to bear upon the mind of man after a symbolical and typical fashion. It teaches its lesson through the rhythmical succession of six days of labour and one ensuing day of rest in each successive week. Man is reminded in this way that life is not an aimless existence, that a goal lies beyond.”