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The New Moon and the Weekly

Sabbath -- Side-By-Side!

Throughout the Bible we find mention of the weekly Sabbath
side-by-side with new moon observance. Is this coinciden-
tal, or an indication that these two days are meant to be ob-
served together, and that one is dependent upon the other for
determining its place in time? What does the book of Gene-
sis say we should use to determine time -- the sun? the
moon? both? The answer to this question is vital in deter-
mining when God's weekly Sabbath day should be kept.

John D. Keyser

Calendar disputes are nothing new. When the Northern ten tribes of Israel broke away from
Judah Jeroboam, their new king, established a feast in the eighth month in rebellion to the scrip-
tural one in the seventh month (Tabernacles.). During the time of Christ there is evidence that the
Sadducees were keeping a solar calendar or reckoning while that of the Pharisees was lunar
based. The Essenes moved to Qumran in the Judean wilderness because they accused the high
priests in Jerusalem of being wicked and in error regarding the calendar. There, in Qumran, ar-
chaeologists have found evidence that the Essenes used the Maccabean period Book of Jubilees --
which demands a solar based calendar be kept that used a 364-day year.

In our day, notes author Jonathan Brown, "disputes between 'Sabbatarians,' (Saturday sab-
bath) and 'Lord's Day' keepers are of such variety that they now even include the theories of
whether a 'day' includes the 'night' of dark hours where there is no sunlight; and whether sabbath
begins at noon because noon is actually the 'evening.' These arguments are all based upon the as-
sumption that our current seven-day cycle is something which has always been with mankind. In-
deed the Seventh-Day churches fervently argue that Sunday through Saturday has run continuously
from creation. However, just because we grew up with this cycle doesn't mean it always existed"
(Keeping Yahweh's Appointments, p. 41).

And, although they might interpret it otherwise, all the authorities I have read agree that the
basis in law for God's calendar is found in Genesis 1:14 -- notice, for example:

A calendar is an orderly system of dividing time into years, months, weeks, and days.
Long before man's creation, God provided the basis for such measuring of time. Genesis
1:14, 15 tells us that one of the purposes of the "luminaries in the expanse of the heavens"
is that they might serve for "seasons and for days and years." The solar day, the solar year,
and the lunar month are thus NATURAL divisions of time, governed respectively by the
daily turning of the earth on its axis, by its annual orbit around the sun, and by the

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