The Sabbath is the seventh day of the week. This would, however, raise the question of whether this has always been the case. The “Saturday” was only introduced in the course of early history and the occasional calendar change was also made. However, the numerous names of the weekdays in other languages show that the Sabbath means Saturday and not Sunday.
Inhalt / Content
The Sabbath “survived” the calendar reforms
One last major change to the calendar was made by Pope Gregory XIII. made in 1582. The “Julian calendar” that had been valid until then was replaced by the so-called “Gregorian calendar”. On the basis of his papal bull “Inter gravissimas” in October 1582, Gregory simply skipped a few days. Thursday October 4th was immediately followed by Friday October 15th. 10 days were thus cut out. However, this calendar change was not implemented in all European countries and certainly not outside of the “Pope’s territory”. In addition to the now Protestant regions, this also affected the Russian Orthodox countries of Eastern Europe. The first adjustments were made by the Protestants in 1700 and by the Eastern Church in the course of the 19th century.
The federal government of Germany made a little-noticed change to the calendar effective January 1, 1976. Until then, Sunday was defined as the 1st day of the week. According to DIN 1355-1 (DIN, German industry standard), the first day of the week has been Monday ever since. It follows that according to DIN, Saturday is the sixth day of the week and Sunday is now the seventh.
Churches have adopted the “Sun-Day”.
The Protestant churches and the Roman Catholic Church anyway celebrate Sunday (“Sun-Day”) and not Saturday (“Sabbath”). Even the Bible says the 7th Day is the Sabbath (Exodus 20:8-11). The Roman Catholic Church itself gave the reason for moving the Sabbath to Sunday. The original initiator was Emperor Constantine with his decree to declare the Sunday as a day off from work. That was in the year 321 AD. The catholic Church took this as an opportunity to define Sunday as the “Lord’s Day”. However, a reason for this cannot be found in the Bible, as the Church itself emphasizes. After the “sanctification” of Sunday (“Sunday”), any true Sabbath holders have since been removed from the Catholic Church. Church mercilessly persecuted and for the most part also eradicated.
The word “Saturday” in other languages
The Protestant and Catholic Churches have recently been using the vocabulary “Sabbath” more and more and referring to Sunday. But such a construct, which is to be planted in people’s heads, could not be sustained simply by looking at the term for “Saturday” in other languages.
German and English
The German word “Samstag” also has its origin in the term “sabbaton”. Over the generations, sabbaton became sambaton, then sambaztac (Old German) and later sameztac (Middle High German) and finally Samstag.
The English word “Saturday” has its origin in “Saturn’s-Day”, i.e. the planet Saturn. A legacy of the Roman Empire. However, the English language is not alone here. Also the Saturdays in most languages of India and even Japan refer to Saturn. A clearly pagan origin.
