Biblion Bible Commentary
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Remember the Sabbath Day
Exodus 20:8-11
8 “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. · WEB
The longest commandment asks for memory rather than innovation, and grounds a weekly rest in the making of the world.
Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy Exodus 20:8.
The fourth is the longest of the ten and the only one that begins by asking for memory. It does not institute anything. Something already existing, already known, and already neglected is being recalled, which is precisely what the narrative has shown: a month before this mountain, in the wilderness of Sin, the double portion appeared on the sixth day and some went out to gather on the seventh and were asked how long do you refuse to keep my commandments Exodus 16:28.
You shall labor six days, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to Yahweh your God Exodus 20:9–10.
Six days are commanded as firmly as one. The rest is not idleness recommended to the tired; it is a rhythm, and the working days belong to it.
The list of who is covered is the longest in the Decalogue and runs downward through the household: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your livestock, nor your stranger who is within your gates Exodus 20:10. Servants, foreigners, and animals are named. A man cannot keep the day by resting while his workforce carries on, which makes this the only commandment that legislates rest for people who have no power to claim it. Given to a nation of former slaves seven weeks out of Egypt, that is not incidental.
For in six days Yahweh made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day; therefore Yahweh blessed the Sabbath day, and made it holy Exodus 20:11.
The reason given is creation. Not the exodus, which is the reason given for the Passover and for nearly every other institution in this book, but the making of the world — and the sentence reproduces the language of Genesis 2:2–3 almost exactly, where God rested, blessed the seventh day, and made it holy while there was one family on the earth.
Three things follow, and each rests on the text rather than on inference.
The day is older than Israel. It was blessed in Eden, before any covenant, any nation, or any law existed to attach it to; what is instituted at Sinai is the regulation of something instituted at creation.
The day belongs to the human race. It was given when the whole race was two people, and the reason offered here — that God made the world and rested — is a reason that holds for anyone alive, since the creation is not Israel's private history.
And the reason is a literal week. The commandment argues from six days of making to six days of working, and the argument depends on the two being the same kind of unit. A commandment cannot ask a farmer to labor six days in imitation of six ages.
One further note on the wording. The seventh day is called a Sabbath to Yahweh your God — his, not the nation's. It is not observed to make anything happen, and it is the only part of the ten where obedience consists chiefly in stopping.
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