Christianity and Morals by Edward Westermarck

THE ethical teaching of Jesus discussed in the two last chapters was found to be an expression of intense moral emotions in which both the retributive and the altruistic elements come out very prominently. Specific religious and eschatological beliefs were blended with the ideas springing from those emotions. Our duties to neighbours were founded upon our submission to the will of God, and their sanctions were rewards or penalties for obedience or disobedience to his commandments. But those beliefs have not essentially altered the contents of the commandments, as is testified by the innumerable parallels between the teaching of Jesus and that of other moralists. We even find that certain doctrines which had crept into the moral system of the Jews from their religion, but were alien to the emotional origin of morals, were opposed by him. This is particularly apparent in his attitude towards the sabbath.

It has been alleged that the abundant regulations of the rabbis had "tended to obscure in the general mind the original character and intention of the sabbath law." These are evidently supposed to be explained by the words in the decalogue: "Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it." It is evident, however, that the institution of the sabbath was not due to any idea of giving a weekly day of rest to men and animals, but to the belief that it was inauspicious or dangerous to work on the seventh day; and there seems to be no doubt that the reason for this belief was the mystic connection which in the opinion of the ancient Hebrews existed between human activity and the changes of the moon. I have pointed out in another work that such a superstition is found among many peoples in different parts of the world. It has been sufficiently demonstrated that the sabbath originally depended upon the new moon, and this carries with it the assumption that the Hebrews must at one time have observed a sabbath at intervals of seven days corresponding to the moon's phases. In the Old Testament the new moon and the sabbath are repeatedly mentioned side by side; thus the oppressors of the poor are represented as saying: "When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell corn? and the sabbath, that we may set forth wheat?" Among modern Jews, at the feast of the new moon, which is held every month on the first or on the first and second days of the month, the women are obliged to suspend all servile work, though the men are not required to interrupt their secular employment.