The British & European Supplement to May/June 2013 The 2000-Year-Old Church Jesus Built: Then and Now A pervasive, clever counterfeit of the New Testament Church has taken centre stage. Within it, man-made traditions and pagan concepts abound – none of which were found in the first-century Church. Rather, the latter’s beliefs and practices were based on the Hebrew Scriptures, the teachings of Jesus Christ and the inspired writings of His apostles. That Church has survived through the centuries. fter the early Church that people. Nor could the Latin Bible be ing station for salvation, was no longer Christ built, a rival religious read except by privileged members of taught. organisation soon emerged, the Roman Church. and with the passing of time estab- The Roman Sunday or A Enter the Protestant lished itself with a belief system that biblical Sabbath? was at variance with that of the Bible. Reformation But as a weekly rest day, most It created its own dogma and was The Protestant Reformation in the Protestants retained Sunday rather than willing to accept modes of worship 16th century changed all that. Or did it the biblical Sabbath as the proper day from non-Jewish and non-Christian really? It’s true that Bible reading was of worship – in spite of the fact that the sources. As such, it became a clever encouraged after centuries of suppres- seventh-day Sabbath was changed to forgery of the true New Testament sion. And in due time it could be trans- Sunday only by the authority of the Church. lated into the language of the indige- Catholic Church. There is no biblical Early in the 4th century, the Roman nous people. Only by studying the basis for observing the first day of the emperor Constantine sanctioned the Bible could the Roman Church be week as a weekly rest day. (For the Roman Church as the official church challenged – to see whether there was Bible evidence, ask for our free booklet throughout his empire. As the centuries any biblical basis to its doctrines and Sunset to Sunset: God’s Sabbath Rest.) rolled by, it set itself against those practices. This was also true of the yearly reli- who refused to accept its dogma, God’s Word then became the focus gious festivals of Christmas and Easter, confronting those who adhered to the of the scholars’ studies to find out what both of which were brought into the Judaeo-Christian Bible rather than the the Bible really said. It soon became Christian calendar by the Roman dictates of the Roman Church. clear that much of what that church Church. These two festivals are not Its pervasive influence spread all taught had no biblical basis. As a con- even mentioned in the Greek New over Europe and beyond. Freedom of sequence, the pope was no longer seen Testament, the language in which it religion was not allowed. Religious as the ‘vicar of Christ on earth’. was written. (The King James Version material was confined to what it pub- The Virgin Mary was no longer mentions Easter in Acts 12:4, but this is lished. It forbade the translating of the worshipped, nor Catholic saints vener- a gross mistranslation, because the Bible into the common language of the ated by Protestants. Purgatory, the wait- original Greek term is pascha, meaning Published by the United Church of God – British Isles. Address: The Good News, PO Box 705, Watford WD19 6FZ. Telephone: 01494 875003. Fax: 020 8386 1999. Website: www.ucg.org.uk. the Passover. The New King James The faithful Hungarians ‘All the unbiblical festivals, of this Version and other modern versions of Transylvania there can be no doubt, originate with correctly render it Passover.) Among the faithful were a group the Italians. As a witness to this fact Celebrating the birth of Jesus on of Hungarians in Transylvania we have in the papal city the pope Christmas was introduced into the (presently Romania) who went all the himself. If you ask him, he will admit church calendar as late as the mid- way in restoring the true teachings of that his festivals don’t originate with fourth century, and Easter was substi- the Bible. Not only did they keep the God, but with the popes . The Bible tuted for the biblical Passover in the seventh-day weekly Sabbath, but they he is forced to proclaim as divinely second century by Pope Victor I (AD also kept the biblical Passover and the inspired, yet his festivals are not found 189-198). seven annual Holy Days mandated in therein. And he will not deny that the Bible. Very much in the minority Rome invented them by human The Quartodeciman among mainstream Protestants, they decree. Yet he himself [ie, his prede- Controversy rejected observing any days or festi- cessors] used to keep – and there can Earlier, Pope Sixtus I had initiated vals that originated in pagan or non- be no doubt – the biblical Passover as observing an earlier version of Easter. biblical religions. mentioned in the Bible. It was Pope But the churches in Asia Minor had Here is what the Chief Rabbi of Victor [as Bishop of Rome ca. AD long kept the Christian Passover Budapest said in 1894 in his exhaus- 196] who changed the Jewish festival (1 Corinthians 5:7) at the very time tive work, The Sabbatarians of [Passover] into another feast’ (Kohn, the apostles observed it on the 14th of Transylvania (1588-1623, by Dr pp 64-65). Abib (or Nisan), the Jewish calendar’s Samuel Kohn, 1894, p8). ‘There were ‘Instead of the Sabbath, they keep first month – regardless of the day of also those who went one step further Sunday. Passover they have altered to the week on which the Passover fell. and decided to restore the original and Easter,’ are the exact words of the Polycarp, a disciple of the apostle true Christianity in that they actually Transylvanian Sabbath and Holy Day John, firmly maintained that the tradi- accepted and practiced Jewish reli- keepers (Kohn, p. 91). These Sabbath tional teaching of the New Testament gious customs and statutes, which the and Holy Day observers Church should be continually rejected the non-biblical adhered to. Conditions prevalent in Europe traditions of both the Eusebius, an early church shortly after the Reformation allowed Roman Church and the historian, had written about a remnant of the apostolic Church Jews. As Samuel Kohn Polycrates who wrote a letter stated: ‘Such religious cus- to Pope Victor I. ‘We observe to flourish. toms and ordinances of the the exact day; neither Jews which were not adding, nor taking away’ (emphasis Old Testament prescribes and which found in the “Lawbook” they avoided. added throughout). Then in that letter original Christianity observed as bind- They celebrated, for example, only Polycrates mentions the original New ing and only later discarded.’ those festivals mentioned in the Testament apostles Philip and John Yet when the New Testament apos- Pentateuch [the first five books of the tles died, a counterfeit church estab- who ‘observed the fourteenth day of Bible], and rejected all other feast and lished itself and produced its own the Passover [Leviticus 23:5] accord- fast days of the Jews’ (p 117). religious dogma, often borrowing con- ing to the Gospel, deviating in no cepts and festivals from pagan and respect’ (Life of Constantine, chapter The apostolic Church other religions. This practice is called 24). emerges syncretism. But faithfully following the apos- The suitable conditions prevalent But the Sabbath keepers in in Europe shortly after the Reforma- tles regarding the Passover date Transylvania in the late 16th century resulted in mass excommunication (under the leadership of Andreas tion allowed a remnant of the apostolic and being declared anathema from Eossi) based their religious beliefs on Church of God to flourish. The Church the church. At the time of the the Bible. That included the seven bib- in Transylvania saw that the Bible Reformation, most Protestants were lical festivals that the apostolic New became their prime authority on doc- unwilling to reject the pagan religious Testament Church continued to keep. trines and moral behaviour, rejecting festivals that the church at Rome had They refused to lean on other religions pagan days that originated with other introduced. But a small minority were for their worship practices and put for- religions. willing to worship God on those spe- ward the following reasons for not fol- They kept neither Christmas nor cial days mandated by the Judaeo- lowing in the footsteps of the Roman Easter, but their religious calendar had Christian Bible. Church: the annual festivals and Holy Days in 2 The British & European Supplement to The Good News addition to the weekly seventh-day among this world’s intelligentsia don’t. tive response from those He has given Sabbath. In the following chapter Paul continues a true understanding of His Word. It These days depict to God’s Church to explain: ‘But we speak the wisdom should never be shelved. today the basic steps in God’s plan of of God in a mystery, the hidden wis- God’s Church today bases its salvation. (To understand more about dom which God ordained before the beliefs and practices solely on God’s these annual festivals, write for our free ages for our glory, which none of the Word – the Bible. None of its annual booklet: God’s Holy Day festivals have been bor- Plan: The Promise of Hope Throughout the centuries God has rowed from pagan, non- for All Mankind). called people to a true understanding biblical religions. The days Samuel Kohn found in and feasts it keeps have a his research that these of His Word.