~ 4 ~
or market-day, recurred every eighth day and thus produced a week which was marked on their calendars by the letters a to h, as our week is marked in the prayer-book calendar by the letters a to g, was always explained by them in the same way. The agriculturists worked in the fields for seven days and came into the city on the eighth to sell their produce. This explanation seems reasonable enough. The Jewish week, as we all know, was produced by the recurrence every seventh day of a 'sabbath,' that is a periodical abstention from work, believed to be enjoined by the Deity and observed in honour of him. Here the connexion of the Jews with Babylon and perhaps the fact that the earlier mentions of the Sabbath couple it with the New Moon give some plausibility to the view that it was developed out of the 'lunar' week. But this plausibility falls far short of certainty. If the belief that the Deity demands a 'sabbath' is once established, the needs of human life ensure that it should not recur at too frequent intervals. The Jews themselves had, of course, an explanation of the seven-day interval, which has no connexion with the 'lunar.' The antiquity of this explanation may be doubted, but apart from this the number seven is as likely as any other, and may have been determined by the sanctity which, whatever the cause, from early times adhered to this particular number[1].
- ↑ V. p. 56.
