Comment on The Origin of the Sabbath and the 7-Day Week by Sean Pitman.
@pauluc:
Sean I think you are treading on very dangerous ground. In making an argument against a God of the gaps explanation you are unwittingly (or perhaps indeed wittingly) decreasing the attribution of the 7 day cycle to divine fiat.
It is unlike the God of the Bible to be completely arbitrary – to command things for no reason outside of some private personal benefit (i.e., without some inherent benefit for those who follow his commands). According to the Bible, the Sabbath, and therefore the seven-day weekly cycle as well, is a special gift of God that was created and given to us for our benefit. In other words, according to the Bible, the seven-day week wasn’t an entirely arbitrary cycle of time created by God. Rather, it was a cycle of time that would in fact be to our benefit if followed. This directly implies some physiologic relationship between a seven-day cycle of work and rest and one’s overall health and well being. Even Jesus argued that, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.” (Mark 2:17)
So, just because something in nature is/was the result of a deliberate and intelligent act of God does not mean that these natural effects can readily be explained without any appeal to some source of deliberate intelligence in their formation.
Let’s say, for example, that “Chocolate cake was made for man, not man for chocolate cake.” One would expect, therefore, that chocolate cake would have a positive physiological effect on man for whom it was made. According to your argument, the fact that there may be some natural beneficial effect on those who eat chocolate cake must therefore mean that the chocolate cake was not deliberately designed and created via an intelligent agent – which of course is nonsense.
If there is indeed a natural basis for a 7 day cycle you may begin to argue there is a natural basis for many of the other things we have traditionally attributed to God. It is indeed a slippery slope you enter when you begin to look for natural explanations. Best avoid if you wish to maintain the status quo.
Again, having a natural basis isn’t the same thing as saying that God didn’t make it or that an intelligent source of some kind isn’t required to explain its origin. Explaining the origin of many aspects of nature (such as the fine tuning of the fundamental constants of the universe or the meaningful informational complexity of the most simple free living thing) demand the input of deliberate high-level intelligence and creative power that cannot be readily distinguished from a God or God-like power. The fact that they are found in nature is irrelevant to the fact that they were also clearly designed by a very intelligent designer…
On the other hand, one might argue that a natural phenomenon might just as easily be explained by apparently mindless forces of nature – such as the formation of the crystalline structure of a snowflake or a pyrite cube. Are the circaseptan cycles found in many living things easily explained by such apparently mindless forces of nature? If so, I’ve yet to find such a mindless mechanism since such circaseptan cycles are pretty much exclusive to living things without any influence by external environmental factors – such as cycles of heat and cold, light and dark, etc. Rather, it seems more consistent that whoever made life deliberately created life with an inherently cyclical pattern to many biological processes that happen to match the ideal circaseptan pattern described in Genesis for the seven-day weekly cycle of work, worship and rest.
Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com
Sean Pitman Also Commented
The Origin of the Sabbath and the 7-Day Week
@ken:
No, since the God of the Bible called everything “Good” at the end of creation week – which he would not have done if predation of sentient creatures existed on this planet before the moral fall of mankind. After all, the God of the Bible is pictured as experiencing pain in sympathy with animal as well as human suffering.
Given this background, it is quite clear that the eating of the fruit was only symbolic of allegiance. God made the tree and the fruit on it after all. It had no inherent power of its own, outside of God’s will and creative power, to prolong life…
Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com
The Origin of the Sabbath and the 7-Day Week
@Ken:
I do not disagree that there are numerous factors involved, to include genetics and overall lifestyle. However, it is interesting to me that there are other healthy groups of people out there who are also ethnically diverse. Yet, Adventists, in particular, live the longest among such ethnically diverse groups of people (note that the Okinawans are not ethnically diverse).
Again, all I can suggest is to try it out for yourself and see if you don’t notice a difference in your own personal experience…
Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com
The Origin of the Sabbath and the 7-Day Week
@Ken:
Consider that I’m presenting three different arguments at the same time. One argument is that there appears to be this intrinsic genetically-coded rhythm in all living things that is based on a 7-day cycle. That, by itself, is quite surprising and non-predictable form a naturalistic perspective – but not from a Biblical perspective.
After all, it was only the Bible that proposed, long before the circaseptan science came on the scene, to explain the origin of this 7-day rhythm as a creative act of God. The Bible also tells us how to best take advantage of this 7-day pattern by working six days and resting on every seventh day (my second argument) and that this work/rest cycle was given to us for our benefit (“The Sabbath was made for man”). In addition to this, the Bible claims that the original order of the days is important to God as a symbol between him and his people of their allegiance to God and he promises an additional supernatural blessing on those who strive to keep holy the true Sabbath day of his original blessing (my third argument).
In my opinion, these are all testable statements. The weekly cycle, by itself, has been shown to have intrinsic elements or biorhythms within all living things (first argument). If certain things are done in accordance with this pattern, living things function better (to include a lengthening of life for different kinds of creatures). On top of this, adding a “Sabbath” day of rest every 7th day appears to be beneficial to mind and body regardless of the actual 7th day chosen for rest – be that day Sunday or Saturday or Friday or whatever 7th day is chosen (second argument). So far, I don’t think there is very much disagreement with these arguments – even within the scientific community at this point (given the new information on circaseptan biorhythms within humans and all other living things and the general benefits of resting mind and body one day a week).
But, beyond this, it seems to me, from my own personal experience and the experience of certain key individuals that I have known, that if one strives to keep Holy the Biblical 7th day in particular (i.e., the Sabbath of the Jews or Saturday), that God actually gives such an individual an additional supernatural blessing (third argument).
Now, I’m sure that many will scoff at my last proposal. But, don’t be too hasty if you haven’t tried it out for yourself… If you haven’t actually tried to keep the Biblical Sabbath, Saturday, holy as the Bible describes. I think that this element plays a role in explaining why Adventists, among all ethnically diverse peoples of the world (to include other groups of people who try to be religious, healthy, and even vegetarian) live the longest and are generally the most blessed ethnically diverse group of people in the world.
Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com
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