The pope has changed the day of rest from the seventh to the first day. -- Ellen White, Early Writings, page 65, paragraph 1.
The challenge is made: Which pope?
1. The sentence is "the pope" not "a pope". Thus the process was over time, not just a single pope.
2. HOWEVER, there is dogumented proof when a pope decreed just such a change.
He was pope living at the same time as Constantine. His name "Sylvester"
Yes, there were groups of Christians honoring the first day prior to this. But here we have a pope officially making a decree that the rest of the Sabbath should be transferred to the Sunday. More over, this same pope shows the Romans were calling the days by the names of gods, and he insisted on calling them by number names. The planatary week obviously being in existance.
Week, Names of Days, Decreed Changed by Pope Sylvester (314–335) From Name of Gods
Source: Rabanus Maurus, De Clericorum Institutione (On the Institution of the Clergy), bk. 2, chap. 46, in MPL, Vol. 107, col. 361. Trans. from the Latin by Frank H. Yost. Used by permission of Mrs. Frank H. Yost.
"Sylvester the pope first among the Romans ordered that the names of the days, which before they called according to the names of their own gods, that is (the day) of the sun, of the moon, of Mars, of Mercury, of Venus, of Saturn, they should call feria (day of celebration), that is, first feria, second feria, third feria, fourth feria, fifth feria, sixth feria, because in the beginning of Genesis it is written that God had said for each day: first, "Let there be light"; second, "Let there be the firmament"; third, "Let the earth produce living plants", etc. But the Sabbath he commanded they call by the ancient name of the law, and the first feria the Lord’s day, because the Lord rose on that day. Moreover the same pope ordered that the rest (otium) of the Sabbath would better be transferred to the Lord’s day, so that we should leave that day free of worldly works in order to praise God."
Officially -- it was Pope Sylvester. Pope during Constantine's reign.
But how did this power that thinks to change God's times and laws, foretold in Daniel, come about?
There is much in history to show the horrific struggle that went on as the devil tries to overthrow God's commandments and set up his own counterfeit religion --- all in the name of Christ!
The speed with which early Christianity tobogganed into apostasy takes one's breath away! The devil lost no time at all in attacking what Christ had set up. We often look to Constantine as the "initiator" but, sad to say, many falsehoods had already crept into the church — especially those situated in the more powerful centers of Alexandra and Rome, long before Constantine came on scene.
One thing we really need to be aware of — apostasy does not start with a decree. Apostasy did not start with Constantine, it didn't start with Pope Sylvester, it was not initiated by either. Constantine only provided the catalyst and conducive climate that enabled the church to set up it's counterfeit abominations. Constantine's decree marked the beginning of legislative efforts to instal Sunday in the place of God's Holy Day.
It is the church that changed Saturday to Sunday, previous departure enabled Pope Syslvester to quickly pass his own declaration that the sanctity of the Sabbath was transferred to Sunday.
It is true that if Christianity had remained true to it's virgin doctrines, Constantine's laws and councils and plans could not have affected the church. They would have rather laid down their lives than join Constantine's paganized idea of the union of beliefs. Yet, the church in Rome joined Constantine quite willingly and then turned to lead the rest of Christianity into conformity.
The groundwork had already been laid, but at that point the decrees began.
The same is happening today! The Mystery of Iniquity first seeks to weaken true faith and cast doubts, using deceptive influences to break the commitment of people to truth, before it can move in more radical, legal measures to achieve it's ends. This is what we witness upon many forums — the constant barrage of deceptions to weaken the commitment of Adventists to the pure doctrines and thus preparing them to accept, with little or no protest, when the radical, legal measures start to move in. Remember, in the last great scenes of Revelation the whole world is WORSHIPING. But they are worshiping at the wrong altar. Only a few are worshiping the God who created the heavens, and the earth, the rest are worshiping the beast, his image, and the dragon!
To understand how a Pope and an Emperor could simply DECREE Sunday as the day of worship 300 years after Christ, one needs to understand the forces that undermined the Sabbath.
In this post I want to look at the Gnostic influence that was already causing problems in the days of the apostles.
It was Gnosticism that helped bring in — not only Sunday, but most of the other doctrines that now stand in opposition to Biblical doctrines.
Now Gnosticism was a movement within the Christian Church, it was not the part of the main body of believers, and we know that the church did eventually refute the more outlandish ideas of gnosticm, yet there is no denying that its influence in more subtle ways, greatly shaped doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church.
One of the big things Gnostics attacked was the Old Testament.
Gnostic teachers sprang up everywhere. Saturnius flourished in Antioch. Bailides in Egypt, Cerinthus in Asia Minor. Valentinus and Marcion in Rome. Each teacher had his own theories but all agreed on this, the "Gnosis" (Greek for knowledge) is salvation and what was the particular knowledge on which the Gnostic based their hopes? The belief that the God of the Old Testament was evil!
Gnosticism envisaged the world as a series of emanations from the highest "One", that produced a series of emanations. The lowest emanation was an evil god (the demiurge) who created the material world as a prison for the divine sparks that dwell in human bodies. The Gnostics identified this evil creator with the God of the Old Testament, and saw the Adam/Eve and the ministry of Jesus as attempts to liberate humanity from his dominion, by imparting divine secret wisdom. (Overview of Gnosticism by Lewis Loflin)
Christian Gnosticism came from Greek and/or Eastern thought — not Biblical, it was mixed with mysticism and then coated with Christian terminology. It accepted the notion that matter is evil, that this earth and all the material bodies that inhabit it are inherently bad, and that it follows from this that the God who created matter and men must Himself be bad. This is blasphemy, of course; but we will never understand where the modern doctrines came from unless we recognize how the early thought leaders thought.
Gnostic Christians did not worship the Old Testament God. How could they? The Creator-God of the Old Testament they saw as evil.
Yet they did not throw the Bible (old testament) out completely. They still quoted it to prove their points! As for the New Testament — it was not yet canonized so everyone chose what he liked.
Marcion of Rome had no use at for the Old Testament since it was the book of the Creator God, in particular of the law giving God. Out with the law, cried Marcion, and in with grace alone. Out with Matthew and James, and in with Paul and Luke. (Sound familiar?)
Marcion was very popular — Justin Martyr (the one often quoted for his attack on the Sabbath) was influenced by him, though there is supposedly a lost document he wrote against Marcion.
As for the Sabbath, what gnostic would want to memorialize the "evil" Creator-God"? Much better to celebrate the life giving light of the "Son". On the first day light was made — the eighth day light celebrates the resurrection of Christ, and etc.
Another error brought in is the immortality of the soul. The concept that the spirit inhabits the body but is not really part of the body lead to the belief of the immortality of the soul. The whole "all matter is evil" it is only the spirit that counts, idea, added great fuel to the immortality doctrine --- it was to the point where people considered it good to engage in bad habits to kill off the body more quickly so the spirit could be freed.
Today elements of Gnostism is not dead by any means.
The Jewish people never accepted the Roman rulership over them, and thus frequently rebelled against them. This led the Romans to regard the Jews as a rebellious people, a situation they had to vigoriously deal with.
So in 70 AD, Jerusalem, along with its temple was destroyed by the Roman armies. But this was not the only time!
In 130 A.D., Hadrian visited the ruins of Jerusalem, in Judaea, left after the Roman-Jewish War of 66–73. He rebuilt the city, renaming it Aelia Capitolina after himself and Jupiter Capitolinus, the chief Roman deity. He built two heathen temples, one for Venus and another for Jupiter, the later on the original temple site.
The Jews rebelled and this lead to a lengthy war. The Romans suffering considerable loss in their attempt to put down the revolt. They finally did win. But Hadrain was now determined to extinquish the Jewish power once and for all.
In A.D. 135, at the end of the Jewish rebellion against Roman domination, the emperor Hadrian passed laws forbidding circumcision, the keeping of the Sabbath, and the study or teaching of the Torah. Though aimed at the Jews, these laws affected the course of the young Christian church to a greater degree than many realize. Some among the Christians murmured that, in allowing the utter defeat of the Jews, God had shown His displeasure not only with them but with all things Jewish.
The Sabbath being the Biblical day of worship, had been outlawed by the emperor Hadrain who had shown the world that he was deadly serious in enforcing compliance. This affected not only Jews but Christains as well. They could no longer worship openly upon the Sabbath day.
Antonius Pius, who succeeded Hadrian, relaxed some of the anti-Jewish laws, but he prohibited proselytizing by any Christians who still believed they ought to keep the Sabbath. The anti-Sabbath laws were not relaxed. How then did the Christians cope with this situation?
We can see how some reacted by Justin's letter to the emperor Antonius Pius. "We have our worship assemblies on the day of the sun....." he says. The Gnostic influence having done its work, this was simply the next step.
Now, not all by any means followed this trend, but enough to get the ball rolling toward the transition to Sunday.
Reflecting on the above, one might well ask. "Just how would I relate to Sabbath laws or Sunday laws or anti-Sabbath laws if they should be passed by our legislators today?"
