~ 41 ~
to the planetary week, can be set on the other side, but they are few in comparison. At the same time, there is, as I have said, a certain element of truth in this view. I have little doubt that the existence of the planetary week and the fact that the day on which the Jew abstained from work coincided with the day of the planet most adverse to enterprise promoted Sabbatarianism, and served to confirm many outsiders in the belief that it and Judaism in general deserved their respect and imitation.
The other view that the Jewish Sabbath was the parent of the planetary week cannot be set aside on merely chronological grounds, and it has this much on its side, that while the passages which bring the Sabbath and the planetary week into connexion with each other are a small proportion of those which speak of the Sabbath, they are a very large proportion of those which speak of the week. In fact, it may be said that, if we leave inscriptions and the like out of the question, a considerable majority of the literary allusions to the week are introduced by a mention of the Sabbath. This is the case with Tibullus (again adopting the usual interpretation of his words) and Frontinus[1]. It is the case with Justin, and I have already noted that with him the Sabbath or Saturn's day is the pivot of the week, and that from it the other days are measured. It is the case with the great passage in Dion Cassius.
- ↑ V. p. 16.
