Ellen White Calls God's Sabbath Laws "Senseless Restrictions"

By Robert Sanders, Truth or Fables Newsletter, July 15, 2004

God commanded the Jews not to light a fire in their dwellings on the Sabbath day.

Exodus 35:2-3 (NIV) For six days, work is to be done, but the seventh day shall be your holy day, a Sabbath of rest to the LORD. Whoever does any work on it must be put to death. Do not light a fire in any of your dwellings on the Sabbath day.

Ellen White accuses the Jews of perverting the Sabbath, making it a yoke of bondage and calls God's law "senseless restrictions". Then she blames the scribes and Pharisees of making the Sabbath  "an intolerable burden" because the Jews were not allowed to "kindle a fire or light a candle on the Sabbath." It was God that commanded not lighting a fire on the Sabbath, not the scribes and Pharisees. This shows she is a false prophetess:

"The Jews had so perverted the law that they made it a yoke of bondage. Their meaningless requirements had become a byword among other nations. Especially was the Sabbath hedged in by all manner of senseless restrictions. It was not to them a delight, the holy of the Lord, and honorable. The scribes and Pharisees had made its observance an intolerable burden. A Jew was not allowed to kindle a fire nor even to light a candle on the Sabbath. As a consequence the people were dependent upon the Gentiles for many services which their rules forbade them to do for themselves. They did not reflect that if these acts were sinful, those who employed others to perform them were as guilty as if they had done the work themselves. They thought that salvation was restricted to the Jews, and that the condition of all others, being already hopeless, could be made no worse. But God has given no commandments which cannot be obeyed by all. His laws sanction no unreasonable or selfish restrictions."
(Ellen White, The Desire of Ages, p. 204, para. 1)

How many SDAs have a fire in their home from the furnace, water heater, gas range, etc.? Of course they can say this law does not apply to them, as Mrs. White has given her sheep a dispensation.

Category: Bible vs. Mrs. White
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