Another False Doctrine floating around out there....
"The "Lunar Sabbath" is a fringe Christian belief that the Sabbath day is not fixed at the 7th day of the week but is dependent on the phase of the moon, Since seven does not divide evenly into the 29.5 day lunar cycle, it requires some days of the month not to be counted. Yet if an interpretation of the
Bible requires you to change how you count to seven in order to fit Scripture, could it really be what God meant?
If you are a Sabbath keeper, you may one day encounter the "Lunar Sabbath" doctrine.
This theory says that the fixed traditionally Jewish timing for keeping Sabbath of Friday sunset through Saturday sunset is a corruption of an "original" Biblically instructed reckoning of Sabbath based on the lunar cycle.
Under (one version) of this model, the Sabbath falls on the 8th, 15th, 22st and 29th day of each lunar month, or at the first quarter, full moon, last quarter, and new moon. The claim is made that God intended that one can just look up in the sky and know when the Sabbath is.
Let's review the biblical instruction for reckoning the Sabbath:
This should be a fairly obvious death knell to the Lunar Sabbath theory. You may wonder how anyone could answer this clear mathematical impasse? Proponents sidestep it by claiming that those one or two extra days at the end of the month while the moon is dark do not count because hidden days are "void" days. In other words, the seven or eight days interval between Sabbaths at month boundaries are equated with the required six day interval. If this sounds irrational to you then you are not alone.
When a doctrine is in conflict with pretty clear and explicit Scripture, it should be rejected, without fear. When this theory is so easily proven false mathematically just by following it across the
month boundary, then it must be rejected. It is not necessary to hear any more of the mountains of support usually presented for the theory. The God of the Bible does not expect us to use irrational logic to interpret his words.
If a teaching requires you suspend good common sense, such as how to count properly, then do not accept it no matter how much "supernatural" or even scriptural confirmation you believe you have received. You can support anything from the Bible to fool people who have not yet acquired well-developed discernment and critical thinking skills (skills that are not stressed in our education systems which reward you mainly for accepting and regurgitating what your teachers tell you)." Tim McHyde
"The "Lunar Sabbath" is a fringe Christian belief that the Sabbath day is not fixed at the 7th day of the week but is dependent on the phase of the moon, Since seven does not divide evenly into the 29.5 day lunar cycle, it requires some days of the month not to be counted. Yet if an interpretation of the
If you are a Sabbath keeper, you may one day encounter the "Lunar Sabbath" doctrine.
This theory says that the fixed traditionally Jewish timing for keeping Sabbath of Friday sunset through Saturday sunset is a corruption of an "original" Biblically instructed reckoning of Sabbath based on the lunar cycle.
Under (one version) of this model, the Sabbath falls on the 8th, 15th, 22st and 29th day of each lunar month, or at the first quarter, full moon, last quarter, and new moon. The claim is made that God intended that one can just look up in the sky and know when the Sabbath is.
Let's review the biblical instruction for reckoning the Sabbath:
Exodus 20:9–11—9 Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work:At first glance, the Lunar Sabbaths on the 8th, 15th, 22nd and 29th, spaced 7 days apart, resemble the biblically prescribed seven day Sabbath cycle. However, this resemblance ends once you pass a month boundary. Instead of there being the required six intervening work days between one Sabbath and next, you instead have alternately seven or eight days between the last Sabbath of the month on the 29th and the first Sabbath of the next month on the 8th. This is due to the fact that the lunar cycle averages 29.5 days, instead of the needed 28 days to make this idea work.
10 But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:
11 For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.
This should be a fairly obvious death knell to the Lunar Sabbath theory. You may wonder how anyone could answer this clear mathematical impasse? Proponents sidestep it by claiming that those one or two extra days at the end of the month while the moon is dark do not count because hidden days are "void" days. In other words, the seven or eight days interval between Sabbaths at month boundaries are equated with the required six day interval. If this sounds irrational to you then you are not alone.
When a doctrine is in conflict with pretty clear and explicit Scripture, it should be rejected, without fear. When this theory is so easily proven false mathematically just by following it across the
If a teaching requires you suspend good common sense, such as how to count properly, then do not accept it no matter how much "supernatural" or even scriptural confirmation you believe you have received. You can support anything from the Bible to fool people who have not yet acquired well-developed discernment and critical thinking skills (skills that are not stressed in our education systems which reward you mainly for accepting and regurgitating what your teachers tell you)." Tim McHyde
