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A False Issue – The Day-line — 15 Comments

  1. This article from the 1906 issue of the Signs of the Times gives some indication of how persistent the agitation over the “Eden Day-line” was in our history. The first published reference to it of which we are aware was in a letter by Ellen White in 1900, as published in Selected Messages, Vol III. And here we see another article published in 1906!

    This day line theory served to bring in confusion, adding to the confusion regarding the actual date line in places such as Tonga, where not only Seventh-day Adventists but other denominations as well were confused over which week to follow.

    So what is the lesson for us today?

    • This idea is one I had not been aware of this till now.
      Wow! Guess Satan,the self-styled god, is up to scheme
      of last day deceptions to deceive, if possible, the very
      elect! Let’s not fall for his tricks.

    • Praise the Great Name of JESUS CHRIST, this site must be made easily available to all, especially in the Pacific Island region, as many have been confused by the changes in time zones. I can only say, stay True to the Name of the day for it signifies Whom we worship. The devil always use ‘technical wordings’, we just need to pray and ask the LORD GOD All Knowing GOD. Amen.

  2. Interesting comment from Matt Rosenberg, the geographer at About.com (the learning website).

    “As a geographer who respects history and the calendar, I find the move by the SDA to Sunday to be somewhat historically unprecedented.”

      • Matt Rosenberg does not appear to believe that the weekly cycle has been kept unbroken since Creation Week, nor that the Saturday of today is the 7th day of creation. I would take serious issue with that. God has always had His commandment-keeping people throughout the world’s history, and we have not lost track of which day is the Sabbath. In my view, it’s when we start demanding an unbroken personal or national cycle, under any and all circumstances, that we involve ourselves in difficulty.

        God made His Sabbath for a round world, so travel across the date line, and its location being adjusted from time to time — with the necessary adjustments to be made by Sabbath keepers — were evidently a part of His plan from the beginning.

        • Just letting people know MR had apparently changed his original thought…and later realized that he probably isn’t Jewish.

        • R.G. White, Evening and Morning was the 7th. day, and not Evening and Morning was Saturday. Saturday keepers are doing it from Evening to Evening which explains the darkness hovering over deeper and deeper into permanent lost. Let us humble ourselves and be saved.

          • Asoleiuga Faatiu ILaoa wrote:

            “Evening and Morning was the 7th day, and not Evening and Morning was Saturday.”

            Seeing we are using the English language, there is no difference. Saturday is the 7th day by definition. Any other interpretation is a deception. We trust that the Lord will protect the humble from being deceived.

  3. Forget the “day line”, God gave the Sabbath to the Jewish people and the world has not lost rack of the seventh day. When Israel keeps the Sabbath is the seventh day. and just follow on from there to each and every country on the globe and keep the Seventh Day Sabbath when it comes to you, “from even to even” and delete the day line, it really does not exist !

    • Thank you for that. I agree, and this is what I was tought as I first became Aventist. I also remember being tought that not only to “expect” these sort of issues to arise, even from within our own church, but to keep your eyes on Jesus as these “issues” are Satan’s devices to distract us from what’s really important and to cause strife amongst God’s people. Let’s pray that we all won’t let him distract us.

  4. Saturday is the Sabbath Day whether the time changes from different places. However,we should humble ourselves and worship Lord God rather than worshipping the day.

  5. I have only become aware of the Eden Day line theory as a result of the Samoan Sabbath Dilemma. This dilemma has raised the real issue of the need for a formal church position on the Sabbath Date line which is consistent with biblical teaching. The true Sabbath should not be reckoned from the day before the day that Rome keeps but from sunset Preparation Day to Sunset Sabbath day as revealed to the people of Israel while they were on the journey from Egypt to the promised land. The reference is not the arbitrary decisions of Rome but the revelation from God. We therefore must keep the Sabbath as kept by the Jewish people in the Middle East. However unlike the advocates of the erroneous Eden Day line theory we simply recognise the Middle Eastern Sabbath as the Central Sabbath Time Zone which it is. Halfway across the earth from this time zone is the Sabbath Date line. That means over the present day 150 deg line over the Pacific Ocean. This is approximately two time zones east of the current International Date Line. The Eden Day line is in fact supposed to be the Prime Sabbath meridian in contrast to the Universal Standard Time meridian over Greenwich in Englamd.

    • Dear Simba! You have it right! The correct date line should be adjusted according to the calculated geographical place of Eden. And then it actually would come in a a very good place. All the Pacific islands would have the same day and American continent another. The line could be close to Pitcairn island. The present date-line is an artificial one and creates a lot of confusion in the minds of those who understand the issue and want to be conscientious in Sabbath keeping.

    • Simba, your idea is very similar to the Eden Day Line theory. You just want to dray the dateline at a different spot.

      If it were as simple as you suggest, I suspect that world powers would have figured it out long ago. No straight line of longitude is going to satisfactory as a date line. And it just takes a cursory look at a globe to determine that a 150-degree date line would create more problems than the current one.

      The reality is that we have no control over the date line, and the seventh-day Sabbath is a social as well as a divine institution. It was created as a day to be in special fellowship with the Creator and with one another. And it has always been a sign of distinction for God’s people. Thus it is not possible for God’s Sabbath to be the very same day to which the church of Rome points as evidence of her authority – no matter where on this planet we happen to live.

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