Saturday sabbath or Sunday-does it matter?

[Ken]

So do you have any evidence that the seven day sequence has been thrown off in the last 2,000 years, causing us to mistakenly think that a day other than our Saturday would sync to the weekly Sabbath day that Jesus would have practiced?

It isn't just 2,000 years. Judaism just takes it on faith that the sabbath practiced by say Moses during the Bronze Age aligns perfectly with the sabbath practiced today despite centuries upon centuries of complete gaps in the historic record. And many empires with different calendar systems coming and going during that time. There are also big gaps in the dark ages from the fall of Rome in the 5th Century to the early Medieval period in the 10th Century. Our current Gregorian Calendar wasn't adopted until 1582.

One can certainly make the claim that the Hebrew Calendar is perfectly accurate and traces an accurate and unending series of 7-day weeks all the way back to creation in the year 5785. Such that the sabbath practiced by Moses in the 10 commandments aligns perfectly with our modern Saturday. But that is an article of faith, not history.

So your answer to the question more succinctly, is….?

My answer is that there is no evidence whatsoever that any calendars match up with Biblical times or that the modern Hebrew Calendar is accurate. And to assert so is an article of faith, not history.

For example, there is near millennium gap in the historical record from Bronze Age early books of the Bible, the Pentateuch, written between 1400 and 1500 BC. And the later books of the Old Testament mostly written during the Babylonian Exile 800-900 years later. And we can't pin down most of them to an exact decade or even century, let alone a specific week. During this time, many empires using different calendar systems came and went. And most modern Biblical historians believe much of it was ancient oral legends set down in print many centuries later.

[Bootstrap]

One can certainly make the claim that the Hebrew Calendar is perfectly accurate and traces an accurate and unending series of 7-day weeks all the way back to creation in the year 5785. Such that the sabbath practiced by Moses in the 10 commandments aligns perfectly with our modern Saturday. But that is an article of faith, not history.

I imagine that a week with two Wednesdays—or none at all—would have been remarkable enough to be recorded somewhere in history. That makes me doubt that disruptions of that kind could have slipped by unnoticed.

In October 1582, ten dates were dropped (Oct 4 was followed by Oct 15), but the weekdays continued seamlessly — Thursday Oct 4 was followed by Friday Oct 15. In recorded history, at least, the sequence of weekdays has been stable in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic calendars.

Speculating that a day might have been added or subtracted without evidence doesn’t seem like a reliable basis for drawing conclusions. It feels more like building on an assumption than on actual history.

[R7ehr]

It isn't just 2,000 years. Judaism just takes it on faith that the sabbath practiced by say Moses during the Bronze Age aligns perfectly with the sabbath practiced today despite centuries upon centuries of complete gaps in the historic record. And many empires with different calendar systems coming and going during that time. There are also big gaps in the dark ages from the fall of Rome in the 5th Century to the early Medieval period in the 10th Century. Our current Gregorian Calendar wasn't adopted until 1582.

One can certainly make the claim that the Hebrew Calendar is perfectly accurate and traces an accurate and unending series of 7-day weeks all the way back to creation in the year 5785. Such that the sabbath practiced by Moses in the 10 commandments aligns perfectly with our modern Saturday. But that is an article of faith, not history.

So your answer to the question more succinctly, is….?

My answer is that there is no evidence whatsoever that any calendars match up with Biblical times or that the modern Hebrew Calendar is accurate. And to assert so is an article of faith, not history.

For example, there is near millennium gap in the historical record from Bronze Age early books of the Bible, the Pentateuch, written between 1400 and 1500 BC. And the later books of the Old Testament mostly written during the Babylonian Exile 800-900 years later. And we can't pin down most of them to an exact decade or even century, let alone a specific week. During this time, many empires using different calendar systems came and went. And most modern Biblical historians believe much of it was ancient oral legends set down in print many centuries later.

So when the burden of proof is on you to show that the 7 day week has been thrown out of rhythm in the last 2,000 years, you have nothing.

[Ken]

So your answer to the question more succinctly, is….?

My answer is that there is no evidence whatsoever that any calendars match up with Biblical times or that the modern Hebrew Calendar is accurate. And to assert so is an article of faith, not history.

For example, there is near millennium gap in the historical record from Bronze Age early books of the Bible, the Pentateuch, written between 1400 and 1500 BC. And the later books of the Old Testament mostly written during the Babylonian Exile 800-900 years later. And we can't pin down most of them to an exact decade or even century, let alone a specific week. During this time, many empires using different calendar systems came and went. And most modern Biblical historians believe much of it was ancient oral legends set down in print many centuries later.

So when the burden of proof is on you to show that the 7 day week has been thrown out of rhythm in the last 2,000 years, you have nothing.

I didn't make any specific claims about the last 2000 years. Even though there are huge gaps there as well. Conservative Jews believe the Hebrew calendar is completely precise and accurate going back 5785 years to when they believe that the actual 7 days of creation occurred.

Do you think think this is an article of faith or something that can be demonstrated and supported by the historical record?

[ken_sylvania]

I was referring to the name. Our days of the week are named after the Roman names for the sun and moon and 5 visible planets and not anything Biblical. There is nothing that says Sunday (after the sun) needs to be the first day of the week.

Sure. With the Western calendar, some countries start the week with Sunday, some with Monday, some with Saturday. Not all cultures have had weeks. Not all cultures with weeks had 7 day weeks.

But when the Bible talks about the first day and the seventh day, it's using the Hebrew calendar.

Which we don't in fact use: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hebrew_calendar

According to the Hebrew Calendar, the current Hebrew year, AM 5785, began at sunset on 2 October 2024 and will end at sunset on 22 September 2025. And none of the sabbath days in the Hebrew calendar correspond to Saturdays in the Gregorian calendar except when it happens by chance.

That's quite a wild claim. Aren't the Sabbath days in the Hebrew calendar seven days apart? Or are you just talking about the fact that the months and days are counted differently? The only calendar overlays I can find show that the Sabbath days in the Hebrew calendar correspond with Saturday on our modern calendars.

[Bootstrap]

Aren't the Sabbath days in the Hebrew calendar seven days apart? Or are you just talking about the fact that the months and days are counted differently? The only calendar overlays I can find show that the Sabbath days in the Hebrew calendar correspond with Saturday on our modern calendars.

And the Sabbath has always been so incredibly central to Jewish practice that it's hard to imagine them losing track. Or intentionally changing the Sabbath by adding or losing a day or two.

[R7ehr]

I didn't make any specific claims about the last 2000 years.

Right. That is my question that I asked you. Not your claim.

Even though there are huge gaps there as well.

What is the proof/evidence of these huge gaps in the last 2000 years you claim exist?

Conservative Jews believe the Hebrew calendar is completely precise and accurate going back 5785 years to when they believe that the actual 7 days of creation occurred.

Do you have proof that their seven day week is messed up?

Do you think think this is an article of faith or something that can be demonstrated and supported by the historical record?

Do I think this is an article of faith you have (that the 7 day week has been out of kilter) can be demonstrated and supported by the historical record? I don’t know. That is what I’m trying to figure out. Where is your evidence for your faith?

[Ken]

One can certainly make the claim that the Hebrew Calendar is perfectly accurate and traces an accurate and unending series of 7-day weeks all the way back to creation in the year 5785. Such that the sabbath practiced by Moses in the 10 commandments aligns perfectly with our modern Saturday. But that is an article of faith, not history.

I imagine that a week with two Wednesdays—or none at all—would have been remarkable enough to be recorded somewhere in history. That makes me doubt that disruptions of that kind could have slipped by unnoticed.

In October 1582, ten dates were dropped (Oct 4 was followed by Oct 15), but the weekdays continued seamlessly — Thursday Oct 4 was followed by Friday Oct 15. In recorded history, at least, the sequence of weekdays has been stable in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic calendars.

Speculating that a day might have been added or subtracted without evidence doesn’t seem like a reliable basis for drawing conclusions. It feels more like building on an assumption than on actual history.

Much of what we think we know about the ancient world is built on assumption and supposition and not history. We are talking about centuries upon centuries of time for which there are no accurate written records. Wars happened, famines happened, different empires came and went, tribes were exiled for centuries. And during that whole time period ordinary people lived largely without writing or written records but oral traditions. We can't even pin down which century many supposed events occurred. To use a non-Biblical example, look at the Trojan war which is one of the most well-documented events in ancient history. Yet the best that historians can pin down is that it happened some time in the late Bronze Age maybe in the 11th or 12th century BC. But the history of the Trojan War in the form of the Iliad wasn't set down on paper form until the 5th or 6th century BC. So it lived as oral legend for 500-700 years. That would be like taking oral legends about events like the legend of Robin Hood that maybe happened 700 years ago and assuming that it is entirely historically accurate. Maybe there was a real Robin Hood who lived in Sherwood forest and had adventures with Friar Tuck and Maid Marion. Maybe not. There aren't any actual records from that place and time.

[Ken]

I didn't make any specific claims about the last 2000 years.

Right. That is my question that I asked you. Not your claim.

Even though there are huge gaps there as well.

What is the proof/evidence of these huge gaps in the last 2000 years you claim exist?

Conservative Jews believe the Hebrew calendar is completely precise and accurate going back 5785 years to when they believe that the actual 7 days of creation occurred.

Do you have proof that their seven day week is messed up?

Do you think think this is an article of faith or something that can be demonstrated and supported by the historical record?

Do I think this is an article of faith you have (that the 7 day week has been out of kilter) can be demonstrated and supported by the historical record? I don’t know. That is what I’m trying to figure out. Where is your evidence for your faith?

What gaps do we have in the past 2000 years? Much of what we have for the late Roman Empire in the 3rd Century is very sketchy. Plagues, wars, sacking of cities, civil unrest, Barbarian invasions (Huns, Mongols, Goths, Vandals, etc.) in an age before the printing press meant most hand-written records that did exist are lost to time. Same thing for the so-called "dark ages" after the fall of Rome in the west. And in the east, centers of knowledge and repositories of historical records like Baghdad were sacked and razed to the ground by the Mongols.

Rolling back the clock further into the Bronze and Iron ages we have entire missing centuries for which we know basically nothing.

We have misplaced entire centuries. Yet you want to claim that we have never misplaced a Wednesday? I mean, OK. Maybe. I'm simply saying it is an article of faith to believe the Hebrew Bible is precise and accurate to the exact day going back 5785 years to the seven days of creation. And that is not even touching on archaeology which portrays an entirely different narrative.

[R7ehr]

I didn't make any specific claims about the last 2000 years.

Right. That is my question that I asked you. Not your claim.

Even though there are huge gaps there as well.

What is the proof/evidence of these huge gaps in the last 2000 years you claim exist?

Conservative Jews believe the Hebrew calendar is completely precise and accurate going back 5785 years to when they believe that the actual 7 days of creation occurred.

Do you have proof that their seven day week is messed up?

Do you think think this is an article of faith or something that can be demonstrated and supported by the historical record?

Do I think this is an article of faith you have (that the 7 day week has been out of kilter) can be demonstrated and supported by the historical record? I don’t know. That is what I’m trying to figure out. Where is your evidence for your faith?

What gaps do we have in the past 2000 years? Much of what we have for the late Roman Empire in the 3rd Century is very sketchy. Plagues, wars, sacking of cities, civil unrest, Barbarian invasions (Huns, Mongols, Goths, Vandals, etc.) in an age before the printing press meant most written records that did exist are lost to time. Same thing for the so-called "dark ages" after the fall of Rome in the west. And in the east, centers of knowledge and repositories of historical records like Baghdad were sacked and razed to the ground by the Mongols.

Rolling back the clock further into the Bronze and Iron ages we have entire missing centuries for which we know basically nothing.

We have misplaced entire centuries. Yet you want to claim that we have never misplaced a Wednesday? I mean, OK. Maybe. I'm simply saying it is an article of faith to believe the Hebrew Bible is precise and accurate to the exact day going back 5785 years to the seven days of creation. And that is not even touching on archaeology which portrays an entirely different narrative.

The argument seems to be that because we today cannot look back through the lenses of time and see clearly, that those people must have what, forgotten how to count to seven? Imagine 2,000 years into the future, everything about us is lost to time. That would not be evidence that we don't know how to count today, or that we somehow lost track of the Sabbath.

Religion and culture - as you well know - are one of the most enduring elements of humanity. And so on balance, I find it harder to believe that the Jews would accidentally lose track of one the single most important things in their religion and culture. If, on the other side of the argument is merely, "well we don't have non-Jewish records that verify their records".
This is not even close to being on the same scale as Maid Marion and the Trojan horse. The way that secularist blindly conflate the strength devout religion with lore, has done the secularists a huge disservice over the past 20 years in terms of Islamic relations. Secularist cannot, it is impossible, for them to comprehend the religious. We see it in the American culture wars too.

In fact you might be aware that one of the ideas (strangest?) of warning humans in the future of our nuclear waste dumps, is to genetically alter cats, so that their fur glows when they are near radiation. And instituting a priesthood to pass down warnings etc, which include the notion that where a cat glows, danger is there. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_cat