Michael Morrison's Sabbath salve (1)

In a moment of giddy madness - a rush of blood to the head - I downloaded Michael Morrison's book, Sabbath, Circumcision and Tithing, onto my Kindle.  It cost 99c, and frankly that was way too much.

It seems a bit weird, having said that, but I actually agree with a lot that Morrison says.  He adopts a non-Sabbatarian (Saturday or Sunday) position.  Despite the endless posturing of Seventh-day Adventists and blue-stockinged Puritan Calvinists, the question has never been "which day is the Christian Sabbath?"  The question is, "is there a Christian Sabbath?"

And the answer is a no fuss no.  So far so good.

But the jungle paths Morrison walks down, NIV machete in hand, to get to his conclusion is full of pot holes, boa constrictors and the bleached bones of the unwary. 

Of course nobody is under the illusion (I hope) that Morrison is striking out to embrace any kind of considered, objective assessment of the evidence.  This is a blatant work of apologetic, decked out in wig and tights.  At times it even seems to read like a Chick tract.  In fact, by the last page I was almost tempted to re-embrace that peculiar variety of Christian pseudo-Sabbatarianism that Michael and I both emerged from, which wasn't nearly as toxic as Michael makes it seem, just out of sheer cussedness.

Almost.

So its time to dive back in with a series of posts that engage Mr Morrison's arguments and approach.  Nothing systematic, it hardly warrants that, but some objections along the way in the spirit of, "Oi, Michael, mate!, you can't be serious."