An Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 96

1 BOOK IV — CHAPTER 23: Against the Jews on the question of the Sabbath.

2 The seventh day is called the Sabbath and signifies rest. For in it God rested from all His works, as the divine Scripture says. God, knowing the denseness of the Israelites and their carnal love and propensity towards matter in everything, made this law: first, in order that the servant and the cattle should rest; next, in order that when they take their ease from the distraction of material things, they may gather together unto God, spending the whole of the seventh day in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs and the study of the divine Scriptures and resting in God.

3 But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Only-begotten Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law that we might receive the adoption of sons. So that we are no longer servants but sons: no longer under the law but under grace: no longer do we serve God in part from fear, but we are bound to dedicate to Him the whole span of our life. These are the things which the spiritual law of Christ enjoins on us and those who observe that become superior to the law of Moses.