THE EARLY CHRISTIAN SABBATH - Friends of the Sabbath Australia

The Early Christian Sabbath
Sabbath he retained from the ancient Scriptures!'-In Migne, Patrologia Latina, volume 90,
column 584.
In the meantime, a sect of sun worshipers had been making great progress in the
Roman Empire. A peculiar form of the cult of the sun was introduced from Persia by
Roman soldiery who had, in the century before Christ, been campaigning in the east. This
form of worship is called Mithraism, and its deity was Sol Invictus, or the unconquerable
sun. According to archaeological evidence, the Mithraists used Sunday, the first day of
the week, .as their day for doing special honor to the sun. Franz Cumont, the great French
authority on Mithraism, in his book, The Mysteries of Mithra, page 191, says that the
Mithraists “held Sunday sacred and celebrated the birth of the Sun on the twenty-fifth of
December.”
However, sun worship in the Roman Empire was not by any manner of means
dependent for its continuance upon the Mithraists. In fact, sun worship has always been a
characteristic of heathen religions everywhere and at all times, and Roman religion was
by no means an exception. Again and again the Roman emperors showed their great
interest in sun worship. For instance, Bassianus, who under 'the name of Heliogabalus
(the sun god) was emperor of the Roman Empire (AD 218-222), had been a priest of sun
worship in the eastern city of Emesa before he was placed by the soldiery on the imperial
throne. The emperor Aurelian (AD 270-275) enriched the old, magnificent temple of the
sun in Rome with gifts and embellishments amounting to several millions of dollars in
value.
Constantius, the father of Emperor Constantine the Great, Saw in sun worship a
type of monotheism which pleased him. Through Christian associates, such for instance
as his concubine, the mother of Constantine, he was aware of Christianity; and it is
probable that he saw similarities in the two kinds of worship. However that may be, his
son Constantine, who had the title of emperor from the year 306, and was sole emperor
from 323 to 337, When he died, was devoted to the worship of the sun. We read this
description:
“His liberality restored and enriched the temples of the gods; the medals which
issued from his imperial mint are impressed with the figures and attributes of Jupiter and
Apollo, of Mars and Hercules; and his filial piety increased the council of Olympus by
the solemn apotheosis of his father Constantius. But the devotion of Constantine was
more peculiarly directed to the genius of the Sun, the Apollo of Creek and Roman
mythology; and he was pleased to be represented with the symbols of the God of Light
and Poetry. The unerring shafts of that idol, the brightness of his eyes, his laurel wreath,
immortal beauty, and elegant accomplishments seem to point him out as the-patron of a
young hero. The altars of Apollo were crowned with the votive offerings of Constantine;
and the credulous multitude were taught to believe that the emperor was permitted to
behold with mortal eyes the visible majesty of their Solar deity. And that, either waking
or in a vision, he was blessed with the auspicious omens of a long and victorious reign.
The Sun was universally celebrated as the invincible guide and protector of Constantine.”
- Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 20,
paragraph 3.
John C. L. Gieseler, the careful German scholar and church historian, makes this
comment concerning Constantine's religious expectations:
“With regard to the history of Constantine's religious development, till the time
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