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‘A Sabbath Rest Still Remains’: The Reception and Transformation of Hebrews 4.9 in Late Antiquity

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 September 2026

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Luke Drake*
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Department of Comparative Arts and Letters, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT, USA
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Abstract

This article explores how the unsettled meaning of the Sabbath in ancient Christian culture shaped the transmission of the Letter of the Hebrews by Christian editors and copyists. The textual variants in question occur toward the end of a complex literary unit (Heb 3.1–4.11) in which the author elaborates on the concept of ‘rest’, culminating in an appeal to the term σαββατισμός (Heb 4.9). After examining how the term σαββατισμός functions in its immediate context, the article turns to textual variants in various Greek and Latin manuscripts (including Codex Sinaiticus, Codex Claromontanus, Codex Vaticanus and several medieval witnesses), situating them within broader late ancient debates about Sabbath meaning and observance, and more specifically within discourse that employs the text of Heb 4.9.

Keywords

HebrewsSabbathtextual criticismSinaiticusVaticanusClaromontanusearly Christianity

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New Testament Studies , Volume 71 , Issue 4 , October 2025 , pp. 422 - 435
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This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution and reproduction, provided the original article is properly cited.
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© The Author(s), 2026. Published by Cambridge University Press.

1. Introduction

Disagreements around the origins and meaning of the Sabbath were a persistent feature of early Christian communities from their inception until well after Christians governed the Roman Empire.Footnote 1 By the fourth century, Christians had variously described the Sabbath as: one of the ten commandments given by God to Moses for ongoing ritual observance;Footnote 2 one of the ten commandments given by God to Moses not for physical rest, but for the contemplation of divine law and the abandonment of servile activities;Footnote 3 one of the ten commandments given by God to Moses for allegorical interpretation;Footnote 4 one of the ten commandments given by God as a temporal (and therefore temporary) extension of a pre-existent, eternal Sabbath;Footnote 5 absent from the ten commandments given by God to Moses;Footnote 6 one of the temporary pieces of ceremonial law imposed by God on the Jews only, be it for typological or for punitive reasons;Footnote 7 a piece of ritual legislation given by a just, lower God, the material manifestation of which is of no concern to Christians;Footnote 8 an alternative title for the unjust demiurge Ialdabaoth;Footnote 9 an alternative name for the cosmos produced by the demiurge;Footnote 10 the Hebrew term used to describe the most high God’s rest from creation;Footnote 11 and the ‘ceasing’ of God’s creative activity.Footnote 12 Early Christian practice was similarly variegated. In a lengthy doxological conclusion to his ‘Medicine Chest’, Epiphanius characterises Christian practice vis-à-vis the Sabbath with a sort of ambivalence: ‘In certain locations they also hold gatherings on the Sabbath, but not everywhere.’Footnote 13 Socrates Scholasticus, writing in the middle of the fifth century, characterises the situation with a bit more texture: ‘While the churches throughout the entire world perform the sacred mysteries each week on the Sabbath, the Christians in Alexandria and those in Rome refrain from doing so, on account of some ancient tradition. The Egyptians bordering Alexandria and those who inhabit Thebais carry out their religious services on the Sabbath, although they do not partake of the mysteries in the manner customary to Christians.’Footnote 14

In important ways, New Testament literature both reflected and contributed to this complicated historical landscape, evincing variety and ambiguity on questions related to Sabbath observance.Footnote 15 To the possible chagrin of later commentators and polemicists, those first- and second-century texts that would become canonical scripture contain no clear-cut denunciations of Sabbath observance, nor any obvious celebrations of Sunday supremacy.Footnote 16 If early Christians wanted to use these texts to defend their respective positions on sacred time, it would need to be through creative interpretation or textual alteration. It is to this latter practice that we turn our attention here.

Numerous studies have demonstrated that late ancient copyists revised the text of the New Testament to align with competing theological perspectives, including conceptions of Sabbath observance.Footnote 17 In what follows, I explore how the unsettled nature of what the Sabbath meant in Christian culture shaped the way that Christian editors transmitted elements of the Letter to the Hebrews. The variants in question occur toward the end of an intricate literary unit (Heb 3.1–4.11) in which the author elaborates on the concept of ‘rest’, with an appeal to the term σαββατισμός (Heb 4.9). In order to understand why late ancient copyists and readers might have wanted to modify this earlier reading, we will first examine how the term σαββατισμός functions in its immediate, intricate context. We will then turn to the variants themselves, contextualising them both broadly in contemporaneous late ancient discourse on Sabbath meaning and observance, and specifically within discourse that employs the text of Heb 4.9.

2. Heb 4.9 in its Original Context

Hebrews (mid- to late-first century ce) is known for its literary subtlety and artistry, especially when compared to other first-century Christian texts.Footnote 18 Its extensive vocabulary, rhythmic prose and conformity to principles of Hellenistic rhetoric evince a well-educated author capable of presenting a theological case in nuanced terms.Footnote 19 And while Hebrews’ overarching structure, themes and argument remain the subjects of intense debate, Heb 3.1–4.11 is generally taken as a literary unit aimed at paraenesis.Footnote 20 In Hebrews 3.1–6, the author presents his audience with two positive, albeit unequal, examples of faithful witnesses to God: Moses, the one who ‘was faithful in all God’s house’ and Jesus, ‘the apostle and high priest of our confession, [who] was faithful to the one who appointed him’ (Heb 3.1–2).Footnote 21 Both figures are honourable, but just as a builder is superior to the constructed edifice (3.3), so Jesus is ‘worthy of more glory’ than Moses. This comparison sets the stage for the author’s exhortation to faithfulness, which Hebrews supplements with Ps 95: ‘Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, “Today (σήμερον) if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, as on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your ancestors put me to the test…therefore I was angry with that generation…[and] in my anger I swore, they will not enter my rest (κατάπαυσις)”’ (Heb 3.7–11). By citing this psalm, the author does at least two important things: first, he compares the potential situation of his audience with the traditional plight of Israel in the wilderness – one which is plagued by unbelief (the psalm served anciently as a warning against rebellion).Footnote 22 Second, the psalm’s conclusion introduces what will be a keyword for the author: κατάπαυσις, ‘rest’, which occurs eight times in these twenty verses of Hebrews (accounting for all but one of the times this word appears in the New Testament).Footnote 23

Rest, in Hebrews, is reserved for those who believe (Heb 4.3). As with other aspects of Hebrews’ reasoning – by which the heavenly realities associated with faithfulness to Jesus are superior to the earthly articulations of Israelite cult practice – the ‘rest’ that Joshua (the ancient Ἰησοῦς) offered the Israelites was not the true rest on offer by belief.Footnote 24 If it had been, the author asks, how could the Davidic psalm have begun with an exhortation to inherit κατάπαυσις with the temporal adverb ‘today’ (σήμερον): ‘For if Joshua had given [his people] rest [with the inheritance of the promised land], God would not speak later about another day’ (Heb 4.8). ‘Rest’ as the ultimate prize of the believer is further affirmed by the claim that it is the activity enjoyed by God: ‘For in one place’ – he says, speaking of Gen 2.2 – ‘it speaks about the seventh day as follows, “And God rested on the seventh day from all his works”.’Footnote 25 For Hebrews, the key to human reception of heavenly rest, enjoyed by God and bungled by previous biblical generations, is faithful obedience to that with which one has been entrusted.

Hebrews then promises that such rest is still on offer in an interesting way, and in language which would be problematic for some later Christian readers: ‘So then, a Sabbath rest still remains for the people of God; for those who enter God’s rest also cease from their labours as God did from his’ (Heb 4.9–10). The Greek term behind ‘Sabbath rest’ in Heb 4.9 is not κατάπαυσις (as in 3.11, 3.18, 4.1, 4.3, 4.5 and 4.10), but rather σαββατισμός.Footnote 26 A σαββατισμός still remains for us, the people of God, says the author of Hebrews, ‘for those who enter God’s rest also cease from their labours as God did from his’. The author concludes the literary unit with the injunction, ‘Let us therefore make every effort to enter that rest’ (4.11).

Just what exactly this rest/σαββατισμός entails remains the subject of extensive debate. Many modern studies have attempted to pin down Hebrews’ elusive conception of rest (a heavenly sanctuary that exists in space? an eschatological state or condition? a blending of spatial/temporal motifs? a mystical experience?) alongside or against specific ancient worldviews (Gnosticism, Jewish apocalypticism, Middle Platonism, or some amalgamation of these) and literary comparanda (e.g. Philo, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Wisdom of Solomon, priestly literature, etc.).Footnote 27 The interpretive difficulties associated with this passage go back to its earliest reception: prominent early Christian commentators on scripture describe Hebrews’ treatment of rest as particularly challenging.Footnote 28

In fact, it appears that the passage’s sense of artistry or nuance was not always appreciated by its earliest readers and copyists since, like the sermon as a whole, the text of Heb 4.9 was the subject of contestation, as attested in the manuscript tradition and in its reception history.Footnote 29 Two of our earliest and best Greek manuscripts contain variants at Hebrews 4.9.Footnote 30 The first hand of Codex Sinaiticus (01) does not include the verse at all. It has been added to the top of the manuscript by a corrector. Codex Vaticanus (03) states that a σαββατισμός will be abolished (ἀπολεῖται) for the people of God. Finally, our earliest Latin witness, Codex Claromontanus (GA 06; VL 75), employs requies in place of σαββατισμός, while several medieval Latin manuscripts render it sabbatissimus. In what follows, I will discuss each of these variants and demonstrate how they inform our understanding of the reception of Heb 4 in particular, and late ancient Christian conceptions of the Sabbath in general.

3. Heb 4.9 in Late Antiquity: Manuscript and Interpretive Traditions

3.1 The absence of σαββατισμός: Heb 4.9 and Codex Sinaiticus

Heb 4.9 is not present in the first hand of Codex Sinaiticus.Footnote 31 While this might be the result of a scribal error by a copyist who has omitted material elsewhere in the Pauline corpus,Footnote 32 there are significant reasons for considering that Heb 4.9 may have been intentionally removed at some point in its transmission. First, there is nothing in the text that clearly suggests that some form of scribal oversight is at work, such as an error occasioned by homoeoteleuton. Furthermore, the absence of Heb 4.9 is among the largest of the singular omissions (seven words) within this particular copyist’s work,Footnote 33 and the passage reads just as smoothly with Heb 4.9 as it does without it.Footnote 34 Finally, ideological differences around the Sabbath and Sabbath observance in the second, third and fourth centuries would have made Heb 4.9 a potential target for editorial tampering.Footnote 35 For on its surface, this passage is the closest the New Testament ever gets to recommending Sabbath observance,Footnote 36 and we have substantial evidence (discussed below) that σαββατισμός as a term, and Heb 4.9 as a passage, were the subjects of particular contestation in debates around Jewish-Christian differentiation and normative practice.

One possible challenge for late ancient Christian readers of Hebrews was its nuanced use of the term σαββατισμός – valued positively in the text – in a socio-historical context of mounting contestation over which inheritances were Christian and which were Jewish. In his critique of Trypho’s Judaism, Justin had argued that God had done away with σαββατισμός almost as quickly as he had instituted it: ‘Observe that the elements are not idle and do not keep the Sabbath. Remain as you were born. For if, before Abraham, there was no need of circumcision, and if, before Moses, there was no need for Sabbath observance (σαββατισμοῦ) or feasts or sacrifices, then there is no need for them now.’Footnote 37 Two centuries later, however, somewhere in Antioch, the term functioned as a completely normative aspect of Christian practice and belief. The author of the pseudepigraphic Apostolic Constitutions admonishes his readers to ‘observe the Sabbath’ which he equates with ‘a meditation on the laws, not as idleness of the hands’ (σαββατιεῖς …σαββατισμὸν μελέτης νόμων, οὐ χειρῶν ἀργίαν).Footnote 38 Contemporaneous to such admonitions we find Epiphanius’ critique of Ebion who, according to the heresiologist, ‘adhered to the law of Judaism regarding Sabbath rest’ (ἐν τῷ τῷ νόμῷ τοῦ Ἰουδαϊσμοῦ προσανέχειν κατὰ σαββατισμόν) and other Jewish and Samaritan practices.Footnote 39 In sum, for Christians in the second, third and fourth centuries, the significance and status of the term σαββατισμός was a matter of some debate: did a σαββατισμός truly remain with the people of God? Or had such things been abolished?

Furthermore, we have evidence that in those few instances when Heb 4.9 was employed in third- and fourth-century debates about Jewish-Christian differentiation and Sabbath observance, it occasionally posed a challenge to exegetes and homilists on account of its form of expression.Footnote 40 This can be seen most clearly in the writings of Origen and John Chrysostom.

Origen puts Heb 4.9 to use three times in his surviving corpus.Footnote 41 Of interest here is the discussion of the Sabbath in his sustained apologia against the writings of the pagan philosopher Celsus (fl. 180 CE):Footnote 42

Then Celsus next says: Therefore both the Jews and these people have the same God, clearly by the latter meaning the Christians. And as if he were drawing a conclusion which would not be accepted, he says this: Obviously the members of the great Church confess this, and believe that the story of the making of the world current among the Jews is true even in respect of the six days and the seventh in which, according to the Bible, God ceased (κατέπαυσεν) from His work and retired into the contemplation of Himself, though Celsus, because he did not read the scriptures carefully and did not understand them, says that God rested (ἀναπαυσάμενος), which is not the word used. However, we could say much that is mysterious, profound, and hard to explain, about the making of the world and the sabbath rest for the people of God which remains after it (μετ’ αὐτὴν ἀπολειπομένου σαββατισμοῦ τῷ λαῷ τοῦ θεοῦ).Footnote 43

To account for the rationale that informs Origen’s response and his use of Heb 4.9, we need a clear picture of Celsus’ polemical programme. One of Celsus’ consistent tactics throughout the True Doctrine is to associate Christianity with Judaism – to insist on their common origins, their common scriptures and their common God. By doing so, he is able to attack his Christian opponents on two fronts. First, it allows him to accuse Christians of ‘barbarian’ superstitions by association with what he sees as corrupt Jewish tradition and practice.Footnote 44 Second, it enables him to indict Christians for faithlessness toward their ancestral traditions by calling attention to the differences between Jewish and Christian belief and practice. In this way, Christianity can be reduced to a ‘deviant Jewish sect’.Footnote 45

The first of these two polemical rationales instigates Celsus’ reference to the Christian belief in ‘the story of the making of the world current among the Jews’, since elsewhere in his True Doctrine Celsus lambasts traditional Jewish cosmogony as ‘extremely foolish’.Footnote 46 Most ridiculous, however, was the Jewish conception of a deity who, ‘exactly like a bad workman, was worn out and needed a holiday to have a rest…It is not right for the first God to be tired or to work with his hands or to give orders’.Footnote 47 In the passage above (Cels. 5.59), Origen comes to the defence of both Christianity and Judaism by critiquing Celsus’ reading of Jewish scripture. Celsus apparently described God’s activity on the seventh day of creation as a sort of ἀνάπαυσις, which, according to Origen, is substantively different from the verb καταπαύω used in the Septuagint (LXX Gen 2.2) and which contains, according to a longstanding allegorical tradition, connotations of continuous contemplation.Footnote 48 Origen therefore characterises Celsus as both a sloppy reader and poor interpreter of ancient literature.Footnote 49

But why does he go on to cite Heb 4.9? The answer probably lies in Celsus’ ongoing effort to depict Christians as derelict Jews – a critique that appears consistently in Books 1–2 of Contra Celsum, Footnote 50 as well as in the immediate context of the passage at hand.Footnote 51 Origen appears to be addressing the unstated (or unreported) objection of his deceased pagan critic that Christians understand Sabbath observance in ways that diverge from traditional Jewish practice, despite shared biblical traditions. With the Jews, Christians believe that God ceased from certain activities on the seventh day; against the Jews, Christians observe σαββατισμός in competing ways. For Celsus, this is evidence of religious deviance; for Origen, it is traceable to hermeneutical difference.Footnote 52 Here then, we find early and subtle evidence that Heb 4.9 was retained in questions regarding Sabbath observance, and the tension that non-Sabbath-keeping Christians felt about this disconnect from their ancestral past. Importantly, however, Origen concedes that this proof-text poses its own interpretive challenges: there is no quick way to explain Heb 4.9 and its ostensible endorsement of Sabbath observance: it is too deep (βαθύς), too mystical (μυστικός), too hard to explain (δυσερμήνευτος λόγος – an allusion to Heb 5.11). In it lies the answer to why Christians do not practise the Sabbath in the way Jews do – but getting to that answer is not always immediately possible.

John Chrysostom’s homiletic treatment of Heb 3–4 similarly acknowledges the difficulties posed by the text’s style and argumentation. He warns his audience to ‘be careful’ when listening, since Hebrews (which, for Chrysostom, is Paul) phrases its ideas in ways that are distinctly difficult to comprehend (δυσκολώτερον… καὶ δυσκαταληπτότερον), and suggests that it is best to ‘state first our own views and explain briefly the entire subject’ before ‘letting loose the message in the scriptures’.Footnote 53 He explains that although there are ‘three rests’ (τρεῖς…καταπαύσεις) mentioned in Hebrews – God’s rest on the first Sabbath, the land of Palestine and the coming kingdom of God – Paul’s discourse is really only concerned with the last of these.Footnote 54 After some additional exposition on Israel’s wilderness wanderings, Chrysostom’s audience is at last prepared for his reading of this difficult text. At Heb 4.9, he equates the kingdom of God with the term σαββατισμός (and not κατάπαυσις), concluding that this was ‘the suitable expression’ (τὸ οἰκεῖον ὄνομα) that a Jewish audience would celebrate.Footnote 55 He continues to explain that the term σαββατισμός reflects a more exalted reality than the term σάββατον.Footnote 56 For whereas the Sabbath (σάββατον) is the earthly day on which God commands the abstention from all evil deeds and the singular performance of worship, σαββατισμός is the cipher for the cosmic counterpart of such things – an inexpressible kingdom in which one rests eternally from every type of pain and labour, and basks forever in peace, goodness and light.Footnote 57 Having spent much of his homily securing this definition and thereby Christianising a dangerously Jewish term, he concludes with a brief exhortation to attain to this kingdom.

All of which brings us back to Heb 4.9 in Codex Sinaiticus. While it is possible that its omission can be attributed to a ‘scribal habit’, there is significant evidence to support the case that it is the product of an anti-Sabbath ‘tendency’ somewhere within the manuscript tradition. Not only were Christians in the second, third and fourth centuries debating the significance of σαββατισμός generally, but Hebrews’ particular application of the term was seen as potentially problematic to major figures who put the text to use. The case for an anti-Sabbath ‘tendency’ becomes stronger alongside additional traces of editorial concerns around Heb 4.9 discussed below.

3.2 Replacement and Supersessionism: Heb 4.9 and the Latin New Testament

Differences among Old Latin and medieval readings of Heb 4.8–9 indicate multiple interpretive approaches to Hebrews’ argumentation around Sabbath rest. One of the earliest Latin readings of this passage in Hebrews – as represented by Codex Claromontanus (GA 06; VL 75) – exhibits an aversion to the term ‘sabbatismus’: quoniam si Iesus illis requiem dedisset non de alio dixisset postera die ergo restat requies populo dei.Footnote 58 According to this tradition, sabbatismus is replaced with requies, making the passage more amenable to Christians in search of a less-Jewish apostle and apostolic message. Certainly, all late ancient Christians could agree that a ‘rest’ remains for God’s people, although the contours of such rest undoubtedly varied from group to group.

Fourth-century witnesses of this variation of the Hebrews text include Lucifer of Cagliari (d. 370 ce) and Ambrose of Milan (d. 397 ce). Lucifer employs Heb 4.9 in his treatise against Arianism.Footnote 59 An apologetic tactic in his work is to compare Arian Christians to Jews: heretics who defy Nicene orthodoxy are like the blind Jews of Joshua’s day who failed to inherit the rest afforded them. The Latin reading’s replacement of sabbatismus with requies would have facilitated Lucifer’s critique of Arian Christians who ‘remain in Jewish treacheries’.Footnote 60

Ambrose of Milan appeals to Heb 4.9 in his explication of LXX Psalm 47,Footnote 61 which bears the title Psalmus cantici filiis Core, secunda sabbati.Footnote 62 In its original context, this superscription may have functioned as instruction for ritual recitation during the Jerusalem Temple’s final years of operation.Footnote 63 If so, then Psalm 48 (LXX Ps 47) was to be recited on the second day of the week. Operating centuries later from the episcopal see in Milan, Ambrose interprets the superscription supersessionistically: Secunda sabbati does not refer to the second day of the week, but rather to ‘the Lord’s Day, which follows the Sabbath’. What better day, he contends, could the noble sons of Korah have chosen to sing praises of the risen Christ’s ascension from the dead?Footnote 64 Prior to Christ, he continues, when sanctification came through the law, the Sabbath was numerically superior; but with Christ came the end of the law, and with his resurrection, the first day (the Lord’s Day) became the eighth day, achieving numerical and theological pre-eminence over all others.Footnote 65 Ambrose concludes by referring to the strange variant at Luke 6.1, where Jesus is said to heal on σαββατω δευτεροπρωτω.Footnote 66 Modern scholars have proposed a number of solutions to this ‘almost untranslatable’ phrase, though it is generally understood to be the result of a transcriptional error.Footnote 67 Ambrose, however, sees no problem with the variant. Like the term secunda sabbati of the psalm, it is meant to indicate the diminishment of the Jewish Sabbath in light of the pre-eminence of the Lord’s Day.Footnote 68 It is in this context that Ambrose cites Heb 4.9, appending the final two words of Heb 4.8 to further associate the passage with the Lord’s Day: ‘whence also the apostle, writing to the Hebrews, says, “the following day, therefore, there remains a rest for the people of God”.’Footnote 69 ‘True rest’, then, is ‘no longer cessation of work’, but rather the spiritual observation of Christian experience, inaugurated by the resurrection of Jesus, perfected in God’s heavenly city and commemorated on Sunday, the eighth day.Footnote 70

Finally, many medieval manuscripts render the term sabbatismus with what appears to be a superlative: a sabbatissimus remains for the people of God.Footnote 71 While it is not clear precisely when or how this term became part of the Latin tradition, it may have been introduced as a morphological way of marking difference between Jewish and Christian notions of sacred time, with the superlative retaining the underlying Jewish term while simultaneously subordinating it to Christian belief and practice. This would accord with similar strategies found in the writings of various late ancient commentators, some of whom were commenting directly on Heb 4.9.

Origen, for instance, refers to a verum sabbatum in his homily dedicated to the feasts of Num 28–9.Footnote 72 At the start of the passage, Origen associates the ‘sacrifice of the Sabbath’, (the ‘second feast’) with the sabbatismus of Heb 4.9, and enumerates three forms of Sabbath observance (observatio). The first Jewish observations (iudaicas sabbati observationes) go undefined, but are to be abandoned.Footnote 73 The second, the observatio Christiano, is marked by the renunciation of ‘all worldly activities’ and a dedication to the things of the soul: in the church, listening to divine lections, contemplating heavenly things, preparing for the coming judgement – ‘this is the Christian observance of the Sabbath.’Footnote 74 The third form is the verum sabbatum, the observation of which is beyond this world: ultra hunc mundum est veri sabbati observatio. The verum sabbatum constitutes the activity of God in the age to come, in which humankind may be granted to participate with the holy angels.Footnote 75

Eusebius takes a similar tack in his Commentary on the Psalms, Footnote 76 employing the term τέλειον Σάββατον in a direct interpretation of Heb 4.9 and the contours of the σαββατισμός that remains for the people of God.

A Sabbath rest (σαββατισμóς) remains for the people of God.’ And again: ‘let us strive to enter into that rest’. For the perfect Sabbath (τέλειον Σάββατον) and the perfect and thrice-blessed rest occurs in the kingdom of God, beyond the six-day creative act and outside of all perceptible things in the non-bodily things, and things beyond the created order, where suffering and pain and groaning flee. By becoming free there from mortal and corruptible life, and by pursuing leisure that is blessed and pleasing to God, and by becoming freed from the bodily works and the slavery of the flesh, and by being with God and engaged in him, we will keep Sabbath (σαββατίσομεν) and rest (ἀναπαυσόμεθα). Therefore, the Apostle says, ‘Let us strive, therefore, to enter into his rest.’ The men of God took a rest and abstained from the things which separated them from God, thereby bringing upon the earth an image of that Sabbath and of that perfect thrice-blessed rest. And back then they rested and kept the Sabbath by being entirely dedicated to the contemplation of divine things.Footnote 77

Like Origen, Eusebius here differentiates among multiple forms of σαββατισμός. Devotion to the things of the soul is a form of Sabbath-keeping. Righteous followers of God have done it since times past. But this form of Sabbath-keeping is but an image of the more perfect Sabbath, as expressed, he argues, in Heb 4.9.

Meanwhile, in his critique of Manichaeism, Epiphanius declares that Christ abolished the Sabbath associated with the Jewish law and replaced it with the ‘superior Sabbath’ (τὸ μέγα σάββατον), which he equates with ‘the Lord himself, our rest and σαββατισμός.’Footnote 78 Or consider the words of Pseudo-Athanasius, who argues that Christians ‘do not keep a Sabbath day according to the first [creation]’ but rather ‘hope for the coming Sabbath of Sabbaths (Σάββατα σαββάτων)’ – a festival without end.Footnote 79 In each of these late ancient commentators, the notion of a Christian σαββατισμός is secured through some form of linguistic enhancement: the true Sabbath, the perfect Sabbath, the supreme Sabbath, the Sabbath of Sabbaths. The sabbatissimus variant among the Latin versions of Heb 4.9, I suggest, gestures toward some similar concern for a higher and holier – less ‘Jewish’, and more ‘Christian’ – state of rest.

3.3 A ‘Jewish-Christian’ Emendation? Heb 4.9 and Codex Vaticanus

The most subtle variant in Heb 4.9 is found in the important fourth-century manuscript, Codex Vaticanus (03). The difference consists of a single syllable (πε) – a small deviation, with potentially significant consequences in the reading of the text. For whereas the earlier reading assures the reader that a σαββατισμός ‘remains’ (ἀπολείπεται) for the people of God, Vaticanus promises that σαββατισμός ‘will be abolished’ (ἀπολεῖται) for the people of God.Footnote 80 Because of the size of the variant, it is tempting to attribute it immediately to a copyist’s error. We ought to remember, however, that minor changes tend to be the norm, even in ideologically motivated revisions of scripture.Footnote 81 Furthermore, we have evidence that prior to the fourth century, some Christians were conceiving of the relationship between Sabbath and Christ in ways that were similar to Vaticanus’ rendering of Heb 4.9. It was not uncommon for early Christians to claim that Christ abolished the Sabbath and other elements of the Jewish law, particularly in their discursive invectives against so-called ‘Jewish-Christianity’.Footnote 82 Notably, however, Vaticanus’ variant places the abolition of the Sabbath in the future, a position which was apparently held by a group of ‘Jewish Christians’ in Caesarea, as recorded in the writings of Origen.

In the fifth book of his Commentary on Romans, Origen concludes his lengthy exegesis of Romans 5.12–14 with a discussion of Paul’s ambiguous statement on Adam, ‘who is a type of that which is to come’ (Rom 5.14).Footnote 83 The ambiguity has to do with where one situates the verb ‘to come’ in time. Is Paul pointing to a moment in the future of this age? Is he pointing to an age to come? Or does ‘to come’ refer to a future moment relative to Adam (i.e. pointing to Christ) and therefore to a moment in Paul’s past?Footnote 84 Origen sees a similar ambiguity in Colossians, which states that ‘matters of food and drink or with regard to festivals, new moons, or Sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come’ (V.1.39) and Heb 10.1, ‘For the law contains the shadow of the good things to come.’ Again, Origen asks, is Paul saying that the law was fulfilled with Jesus or will be in the age to come?

Origen concludes that Paul’s phrasing is irresolvably ambiguous. Christians can faithfully assume either position and adduce scripture to support their case. Those who argue that the Jewish law was fulfilled with the coming of Christ will adduce scriptural passages to buttress their views, and will be more prone to read the Sabbath commandment allegorically.Footnote 85 Others, however, have interpreted Paul to mean that the fulfilment of the law will occur in a future age, considering aspects of the law ‘to be images of the heavenly ministries which are to be fulfilled in that heavenly Jerusalem’ (V.1.41).Footnote 86 Such Christians will make sense of kosher food laws by an appeal to Matt 26.29 (‘Until I shall drink it with you anew in the kingdom of my Father’), the keeping of Jewish festivals through Hos 9.5 (‘What will you do on the day of the appointed festival and on the feast day of the Lord?’), and the observance of new moons by an appeal to Psalms (‘I have called to mind the eternal years and have meditated’, Ps 77.5) and Deuteronomy (‘Remember the eternal days’, Deut 32.7). Most importantly for our discussion, Origen says that such Christians will argue for the relevance of Sabbath observance by referring to Heb 4.9: ‘And of the Sabbath, “So then a Sabbath rest remains for the people of God.”’Footnote 87

What is most striking about Origen’s reading is that he freely admits that either interpretation (fulfilment at the coming of Christ/fulfilment at a future age) is plausible based on Paul’s words.Footnote 88 He identifies contemporary, faithful third-century Christians living in Caesarea who live by the tenets of the Jewish law, who base their practice on literal readings of scripture and who imagine that the end of the law will occur in a future age. What is more, Origen locates their practice of Sabbath observance within the acceptable bounds of Pauline thought, and places Heb 4.9 at the centre of their biblical hermeneutics and religious practice. Codex Vaticanus’ ‘will abolish’ (ἀπολεῖται) is most interesting when placed alongside these active, third-century debates regarding the status of the Jewish law in general, and the Sabbath in particular. Vaticanus’ variant may point to a so-called ‘Jewish-Christian’ interpretation in Caesarea.Footnote 89 Namely, that there will come a future date in which the law/Sabbath is abolished for God’s people – but that day has not yet come.

4. Conclusion

In the eighth and ninth centuries, the interpretive difficulties posed by Heb 4.9 began to be addressed in the manuscript tradition by means of paratextual intervention. In many manuscripts, Chrysostom’s equation of σαββατισμός with ‘kingdom of heaven’ appears alongside Heb 4.9, offering the reader an orthodox interpretation of a potentially difficult passage.Footnote 90 Meanwhile, hundreds of Greek manuscripts contain the Euthalian ὑποθέσεις (summaries of biblical books) prior to the letters of Paul.Footnote 91 The ὑπόθεσις of Hebrews is remarkably short in light of the length of Hebrews itself. The editor summarises Heb 3–4 as follows: ‘and the [Jewish] people did not rest, but the day of rest – common to us all – remains’.Footnote 92 Once more, the troublesome σαββατισμός has been replaced with a more tame ‘day of rest’ which is ‘common to us all’. Following erasure, revision, translation and later orthodox interpretation, Hebrews’ σαββατισμός found some degree of stability, and rest, in the manuscript tradition.

Competing interests

The author declares none.

References

1 W. A. Rordorf, Sabbat und Sonntag in der Alten Kirche (Zurich: Theologischer Verlag, 1972); D. A. Carson, ed., From Sabbath to Lord’s Day: A Biblical, Historical, and Theological Investigation (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1982).

2 R. A. Pritz, Nazarene Jewish Christianity: From the End of the New Testament Period Until Its Disappearance in the Fourth Century (Studia Post-Biblica 37; Jerusalem: Magnes Press; Leiden: Brill, 1988) 108–10.

3 Const. Ap. 2.36.1, 7.36.1; Origen, Hom. Num. 23.4; Tertullian, Adv. Marc. 2.21.

4 Barn 15.

5 Tertullian, Adv. Jud. 4; Epiphanius, Pan. 30.32.1–9.

6 Theophilus, Autol. 2.34–5 and 3.9.

7 Justin, Dial. 19, 27, 43; Hippolytus, Comm. Dan. 4.23; Did. apost. 26

8 Early Christians adopted a different rationale for such a position. For Marcion, the existential break between Jesus and the Creator rendered the Sabbath legislation obsolete to the Christian disciple. In the tripartite conception of (lesser) divine law presented in Ptolemy’s Letter to Flora, the Sabbath injunction is categorised as symbolic legislation (τὸ συμβολικόν) – those commandments whose physical practice has been substituted for their spiritual essence by the Saviour. See Epiphanius, Pan. 33.5.8–6.5 (eds. K. Holl, M. Bergermann and C.-F. Collatz; Epiphanius I: Ancoratus und Panarion haer. 1–33 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2013) 455–6).

9 Ap. John (NHC II 11.34f; III 18.7f; and IV 18.24f). See T. Baarda, ‘“If You Do Not Sabbatize the Sabbath…”: The Sabbath as God or World in Gnostic Understanding (Ev. Thom., Log. 27)’, Knowledge of God in the Graeco-Roman World (ed. R. van den Broek, T. Baarda and J. Mansfeld; Études préliminaires aux religions orientales dans l’Empire romain 112; Leiden: Brill, 1988) 185–7.

10 Interp. Know. (NHC X1 11.18–33) and Gos. Truth (NHC I 32.22–38). See Baarda, ‘Sabbatize’, 189–92.

11 Theophilus, Autol. 2.12.

12 Ancient interpreters resisted the notion that God needed ‘rest’ by claiming that the biblical narrative depicts God as ‘ceasing’ on the seventh day. See fn. 48 below.

13 Epiphanius, De fide 24.7: ἔν τισι δὲ τόποις καὶ ἐν τοῖς σάββασι συνάξεις ἐπιτελοῦσιν, οὐ πάντη δέ (Epiphanius III: Panarion haer. 65–80, De fide (eds. K. Holl and J. Dummer; GCS 37; Berlin: De Gruyter, 1985) 525). Unless stated otherwise, the translations herein are my own.

14 Socrates, Hist. eccl. 5.22: τῶν γὰρ πανταχοῦ τῆς οἰκουμένης ἐκκλησιῶν ἐν ἡμέρᾳ σαββάτων κατὰ πᾶσαν ἑβδομάδος περίοδον ἐπιτελουσῶν τὰ μυστήρια οἱ ἐν Ἀλεξανδρεἰᾳ καὶ οἱ ἐν ῾Ρώμῃ ἔκ τινος ἀρχαίας παραδόσεως τοῦτο ποιεῖν παρῃτήσαντο. Αἰγύπτιοι δὲ γείτονες ὄντες Ἀλεξανδρέων καὶ οἰ τὴν Θηβαΐδα οίκοῦντες ἐν σαββάτῳ μὲν ποιοῦνται συνάξεις, οὐχ ὡς ἔθος δὲ Χριστιανοῖς τῶν μυστηρίων μεταλαμβάνουσιν (Sokrates Kirchengeschichte (ed. G. C. Hansen; Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1995) 301).

15 H. Weiss, A Day of Gladness: The Sabbath among Jews and Christians in Antiquity (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2003).

16 As seen in the starkly different ways in which ancient practices and beliefs are historically reconstructed. See G. Rouwhorst, ‘The Reception of the Jewish Sabbath in Early Christianity’, Christian Feast and Festival: The Dynamics of Western Liturgy and Culture (ed. P. Post et al.; Louvain: Peeters, 2001) 223–66, esp. 235–6.

17 B. Ehrman, The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture: The Effect of Early Christological Controversies on the Text of the New Testament (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993); J. Combs, ‘Christian Anti-Sabbath Polemic and the Textual Transmission of Luke 4.16 and 23.56’, TC 26 (2021) 29–46; J. Combs, ‘The Polemical Origin of Luke 6.5D: Dating Codex Bezae’s Sabbath-Worker Agraphon’, JSNT 42.2 (2019) 162–84.

18 J. Thompson, Hebrews (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008) 6.

19 C. Spicq, L’Épître Aux Hébreux (Sources Bibliques; Paris: J. Gabalda, 1952) 1.4–26; H. Attridge, The Epistle to the Hebrews (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1989) 1–28; H.-F. Weiss, Der Brief an Der Hebräer (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1991) 35–51; C. Koester, Hebrews: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (New York: Doubleday, 2001) 79–95; L. T. Johnson, Hebrews: A Commentary (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006) 1–3, 8–15.

20 There is some disagreement on when the literary unit begins and ends. For bibliography, see the commentaries and S. Docherty, ‘Recent Interpretation of Hebrews Chapters 3–4: Critical Issues and Scholarly Trends’, Irish Theological Quarterly 81 (2016) 385–96.

21 Translations of Heb are from the NRSV.

22 H. Attridge, ‘“Let Us Strive to Enter That Rest”: The Logic of Hebrews 4:1–11’, HTR 73 (1980) 279–88 and G. Steyn, ‘The Reception of Psalm 95(94):7–11 in Hebrews 3–4’, Psalms and Hebrews: Studies in Reception (ed. D. J. Human and G. Steyn; The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies; New York: T&T Clark, 2010) 194–228.

23 Acts 7.49 cites Isa 66.1. The verbal form (καταπαύω) appears three times in this passage, and once more in Acts 14.18.

24 J. Thompson, The Beginnings of Christian Philosophy: The Epistle to the Hebrews (Catholic Bible Quarterly Monograph Series; Washington: Catholic Biblical Association, 1982) 31–2, 69–75, 96–127.

25 Heb 4.4: καὶ κατέπαυσεν ὁ θεὸς ἐν τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τῇ ἑβδόμῃ ἀπὸ πάντων τῶν ἔργων αὐτοῦ. Cf. LXX Gen 2.2: καὶ κατέπαυσεν ἐν τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τῇ ἑβδόμῃ ἀπὸ πάντων τῶν ἔργων αὐτοῦ.

26 LSJ, s.v. Σαββᾰτεῖον, τό, p. 1579. This term appears in the first century only here in Hebrews and once in Plutarch’s Moralia 166a.

27 The bibliography around this topic is extensive and has grown significantly in the last few decades. The following studies represent only some of the more recent contributions to the field, each offering valuable bibliographic and historical information related to the question at hand: D. Lanzinger, ‘“A Sabbath Rest for the People of God” (Heb 4.9): Hebrews and Philo on the Seventh Day of Creation’, NTS 64 (2018) 94–107; N. Moore, ‘Jesus as “The One who Entered His Rest”: The Christological Reading of Hebrews 4:10’, JSNT 36 (2014) 383–400; B. J. Whitfield, Joshua Traditions and the Argument of Hebrews 3 and 4 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2013); J. Calaway, The Sabbath and the Sanctuary: Access to God in the Letter to the Hebrews and Its Priestly Context (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013) 1–31, 59–97; J. Barnard, The Mysticism of Hebrews: Exploring the Role of Jewish Apocalyptic Mysticism in the Epistle to the Hebrews (WUNT II/331; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012) 7–23, 180–4; J. Laansma, ‘I Will Give You Rest’: The Rest Motif in the New Testament with Special Reference to Mt 11 and Heb 3-4 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1997).

28 See especially the comments of Origen and John Chrysostom below.

29 The ‘acceptance’ of Hebrews as a text is often described in geographically bifurcated terms, with ‘Eastern’ Christians accepting Hebrews as authoritative and Pauline from an early date, and the Latin ‘West’ having misgivings about the text’s authority until the fourth and fifth centuries. See H. Gamble, ‘The New Testament Canon: Recent Research and the Status Quaestionis’, The Canon Debate (ed. L. McDonald and J. Sanders; Peabody: Hendrickson, 2002) 289.

30 Greek manuscripts are cited below using the Gregory-Aland numbering system. Latin manuscripts of Hebrews are cited using the numbering system in the Vetus Latina edition of Hebrews, H. J. Frede, Epistulae ad Titum, Philemonem, Hebraeos (VL 25/2; Freiburg: Herder, 1983–91) 2.1048–9 (see esp. n. 71 below). In the case of Codex Claromontanus, a Greek-Latin bilingual manuscript, both numbering systems are employed (GA 06;VL 75).

31 On a fourth-century date and unknown provenance, see H. J. M. Milne and T. C. Skeat, Scribes and Correctors of the Codex Sinaiticus (London: British Museum, 1938) and J. Knust and T. Wasserman, To Cast the First Stone: The Transmission of a Gospel Story (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2018) 186–92.

32 D. Jongkind, Scribal Habits of Codex Sinaiticus (Piscataway : Gorgias Press, 2013) 217.

33 Jongkind, Scribal Habits, 218 identifies seventeen omissions within ‘Scribe A’s’ contribution to the Pauline corpus, fifteen of which are between one and three words.

34 Heb 4.8 and 4.10 in Sinaiticus read: ει γαρ αυτους ις κατεπαυσεν ουκ αν περι αλλης ελαλει μετα ταυτα ημερας. ο γαρ εισελθων εις την καταπαυσιν αυτου και αυτος κατεπαυσεν απο των εργων αυτου ωσπερ απο των ιδιων ο θς. See Codex Sinaiticus: Facsimile Edition with Reference Guide (London: British Library; Peabody: Hendrickson, 2010) and the Codex Sinaiticus website: http://codexsinaiticus.org/.

35 See n. 17.

36 In fact, Attridge, Hebrews, 131 suggests that ‘a foretaste of the eschatological sabbath festivity may be actualized in the worship of the community [of Hebrews]’.

37 Justin, Dial. 23: Ὁρᾶτε ὅτι τὰ στοιχεῖα οὐκ ἀργεῖ οὐδὲ σαββατίζει. Μείνατε ὡς γεγένησθε· εἰ γὰρ πρὸ τοῦ Ἀβραὰμ οὐκ ἦν χρεία περιτομῆς οὐδὲ πρὸ Μωϋσέως σαββατισμοῦ καὶ ἑορτῶν καὶ προσφορῶν οὐδέ νῦν (Iustini Martyris Dialogus cum Tryphone (ed. M. Marcovich; Patristische Texte und Studien 47; Berlin: De Gruyter, 1997) 108).

38 Const. ap. 2.36.2 (Les Constitutions Apostoliques (ed. M. Metzger; Sources chrétiennes 320; Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf, 1985) 260).

39 Epiphanius, Pan. 30.2.2 (Epiphanius I: Ancoratus und Panarion haer. 1–33 (ed. K. Holl, M. Bergermann and C.-F. Collatz; Berlin: De Gruyter, 2013) 334).

40 Prior to the fifth century, only a handful of Christian authors cite Heb 4.9 in their writings, including Origen, Eusebius, Chrysostom, Didymus the Blind, Jerome and Ambrose of Milan.

41 Sel. Exod. (PG 12.289); Hom. Jes. Nav. 2.1; Cels. 5.59.

42 Contra Celsum was probably written in the late 240s ce. See Origen: Contra Celsum (ed. H. Chadwick; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1965) xiv–xv. For a critical edition, see Origène, Contre Celse (ed. M. Borret; vols. I–V; Sources chrétiennes 132, 136, 147, 150, 227; Paris: Cerf, 1967–9, 1976).

43 Cels. 5.59 (trans. Chadwick, 310; Borret, Contre Celse, 3.160–2). The italicised text comes from Chadwick’s translation and is his attempt to reconstruct Celsus’ True Doctrine.

44 E.g. Cels. 1.2 and 1.22, and Chadwick, Contra Celsum, xxi.

45 L. Alexander, ‘The Gospel According to Celsus: Celsus’ Representation of Christianity’, Celsus in His World: Philosophy, Polemic and Religion in the Second Century (ed. J. C. Paget and S. Gathercole; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021) 254–87, esp. 264–5.

46 Cels 6.49: Ἔτι γε μὴν καὶ ἡ κοσμογένεια μάλα εὐηθική (Borret, Contre Celse 3.300).

47 Cels 6.61 (trans. Chadwick, 376; Borret, Contra Celse 3.330).

48 An apologetic differentiation between ‘resting’ and ‘ceasing’ traces back to Aristobulus and Philo of Alexandria and is echoed by later Christian writers. See Eusebius, Praep. ev. 13.12.11 (Aristobulus); Philo of Alexandria, Leg. 1.5–6; Clement, Strom. 6.141.7; Augustine, Civ. 11.8.

49 See also Cels 6.61.

50 Alexander, ‘Gospel According to Celsus’, 264–5.

51 Immediately after citing Heb 4.9, Origen depicts Celsus as enumerating other traditions shared between Christians and Jews – the Adamic origins of humankind, patriarchal traditions and shared beliefs about the Exodus narrative – which prompts Origen to defend the differences in Christian interpretation (Cels. 5.60): ‘If we may give an exact answer to Celsus’ words when he thinks that we hold the same opinions as the Jews about the stories he quotes, we will say that we both confess that the books were written by divine inspiration, but concerning the interpretation of the contents of the books we no longer speak alike. In fact, the reason why we do not live like the Jews is that we think the literal interpretation of the laws does not contain the meaning of the legislation’ (trans. Chadwick, 310; Borret, Contra Celse 3.162–4).

52 See n. 51.

53 Chrysostom, Hom. Heb. 6 (PG 63.53.41–5): Προσέχετε δέ· δυσκολώτερον γάρ πως αὐτὸ ἔφρασε, καὶ δυσκαταληπτότερον. Διὸ χρὴ τὰ παρ’ ἡμῶν πρότερον εἰπόντας, καὶ συντόμως τὴν πᾶσαν ὑμᾶς ὑπόθεσιν διδάξαντας, οὕτως ἐπαφεῖναι τὸν λόγον τοῖς γεγραμμένοις.

54 Chrysostom, Hom. Heb. 6 (PG 63.53.60–54.36).

55 Chrysostom, Hom. Heb. 6 (PG 63.57.31–4): Καὶ καλῶς συνεπέρανε τὸν λόγον. Οὐ γὰρ εἶπε, κατάπαυσις, ἀλλὰ, Σαββατισμὸς, τὸ οἰκεῖον ὄνομα, καὶ ᾧ ἔχαιρον καὶ ἐπέτρεχον, σαββατισμὸν τὴν βασιλείαν καλῶν.

56 Compare Gen. Rab. 17.5; B. Berakot 57b.

57 See especially PG 63.58.52–60.19. On the Sabbath (Σάββατον) as a type of the heavenly kingdom of God see PG 63.55.17–18.

58 This reading is referred to as text-type D in the Vetus Latina edition. For the text, see Frede, Epistulae ad Titum, 2.1192–3. For a description of the Latin text-types of the Pauline letters in general, see Frede, Epistulae ad Titum, 1.143–60; for the Latin text-types of Hebrews in particular, including text-type D, see Frede, Epistulae ad Titum, 2.1027–48.

59 Lucifer, De non conveniendo cum haereticis 10, Luciferi Calaritani: Opera quae supersunt (ed. G. F. Diercks; CCSL 8; Turnhout: Brepols, 1978) 181.56–7. There are no relevant variant readings for this passage.

60 Lucifer, De non conveniendo cum haereticis 10 (CCSL 8.181.76–7): Cum haec ita sint, quomodo potuerat quis nostrum transire ad vos in perfidia manentes Iudaeorum?

61 Ambrose, Explanatio XII psalmorum 47, Sancti Ambrosii Opera: Pars Sexta (ed. M. Petschenig; CSEL 64; Vienna: F. Tempsky, 1919/Turnhout: Brepols, 1978) 346ff.

62 Greek: Ψαλμὸς ᾠδῆς τοῖς υἱοῖς Κορε· δευτέρᾳ σαββάτου (Rahlfs-Hanhart Septuaginta (ed. A. Rahlfs and R. Hanhart; Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2006) 2.47).

63 G. Rendsburg, ‘The Psalms as Hymns in the Temple of Jerusalem’, Jesus and Temple: Textual and Archaeological Explorations (ed. J. Charlesworth; Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014) 95–122, at 108–10.

64 Ambrose, Explanatio XII psalmorum 47.1 (CSEL 64.346.14–347.2): et ideo cum psalmorum ante arcam domini cotidie canendorum munus et officium recepissent, videntur electi, ut psalmum cantici in secunda sabbati specialiter reciperent concinendum. etenim quibus recte videbatur esse commissum, ut ascensionem domini ab inferis resurgentis voce sua psallerent, his utique deferendum fuit, ut ipsum resurrectionis diem munere suo ministerioque celebrarent. quid est enim secunda sabbati nisi dominica dies, quae sabbatum sequebatur?

65 Ambrose, Explanatio XII psalmorum 47.1 (CSEL 64.347.2–347.8): dies autem sabbati erat dierum ordine posterior, sanctificatione legis anterior. sed ubi finis legis advenit, qui est Christus Iesus—finis enim legis Christus ad iustitiam omni credenti—et resurrectione sua sanctificavit octavam, coepit eadem prima esse quae octava est et octava quae prima, habens ex numeri ordine praerogativam et ex resurrectione domini sanctitatem.

66 See Codex Alexandrinus (02), Codex Ephraemi (04), Codex Bezae (05), K Codex Koridethi (038), Codex Basiliensis (07), Family 13/The Ferrar Group (ƒ13), etc.

67 J. Fitzmyer, The Gospel According to Luke I–IX: Introduction, Translation, and Notes (AB; New York: Doubleday, 1981) 607–8.

68 See a similar argument in Ambrose, Expositio Euangelii secundum Lucam 5.31.

69 Ambrose, Explanatio XII psalmorum 47.1 (CSEL 64.347.12–14): unde et ad Hebraeos scribens apostolus ait: postera die ergo restat requies populo dei. There are no relevant variant readings for this passage.

70 Ambrose, Explanatio XII psalmorum 47.2 (CSEL 64.347.16–347.23): Requies ergo vera iam non in operis cessatione, sed in resurrectionis est tempore. ideoque qui sabbati secundum legem sollemnitatem custodiebant, unam sabbati nuncupabant, quasi unum esset sabbatum et non aliud. nos, qui observantiam induimus spiritalem et ad similitudinem et requiem dei cupimus nostram formare militiam atque in illa civitate caelesti nostrum exhibere ministerium, ubi non est exemplar, non umbra, sed veritas, primam dicimus sabbati, sicut est scriptum.

71 Frede, Epistulae ad Titum, Philemonem, Hebraeos, 1193 poses the possibility of a superlative meaning (sensu superlativi) and offers an extensive list of New Testament manuscripts (61 K* M H* E V W ZM* ZL* ΣC ΦE* σRH* – see n. 30 above) and patristic sources (Jerome, Rufinus, Augustine and Chrysostom) that contain the variant. Note: in Frede, Epistulae ad Titum, an asterisk next to a manuscript symbol means that a secondary hand has emended the reading, usually changing sabbatissimus to sabbatismus.

72 Origen, Hom. Num. 23 (Origène: Homélies sur les Nombres III (ed. L. Doutreleau; SC 461; Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 2001) 106–45).

73 Note the play on the passive and active forms in Rufinus’ translation: Quae est autem festivitas Sabbati, nisi illa, de qua Apostolus dicit: Relinquetur ergo sabbatismus, hoc est Sabbati observatio, populo Dei? Relinquentes ergo iudaicas Sabbati observationes (SC 461.120–22)

74 Origen, Hom. Num. 23.4.1: qualis debeat esse christiano Sabbati observatio, videamus. Die Sabbati nihil ex omnibus mundi actibus oportet operari. Si ergo desinas ab omnibus saecularibus operibus et nihil mundanum geras, sed spiritalibus operibus vaces, ad ecclesiam convenias, lectionibus divinis et tractatibus aurem praebeas, de caelestibus cogites, de futura spe sollicitudinem geras, venturum iudicium prae oculis habeas, non respicias ad praesentia et visibilia, sed ad invisibilia et futura, haec est observatio sabbati christiano (SC 461.122).

75 Origen, Hom Num 23.4.4: Erit ergo uerum Sabbatum, in quo requiescet Deus ab omnibus operibus suis, saeculum futurum, tunc cum aufugiet dolor et tristitia et gemitus et erit omnia et in omnibus Deus. In quo Sabbato concedat etiam nobis Deus diem festum agere secum et cum sanctis angelis suis festa celebrare (SC 461.126). The future aspect of this particular mode of Sabbath observance is reflected in the future passive form of relinquo preserved in Origen’s citation of Heb 4.9: Relinquetur ergo sabbatismus…populo Dei (SC 461.120).

76 Historically, this work of Eusebius has only been available in PG 23 and PG 24. A critical edition is in the works at the Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften.

77 Eusebius, Comm Ps 91 (PG 23.1168): Ἆρα ἀπολείπεται σαββατισμὸς τῷ λαῷ τοῦ Θεοῦ; καὶ πάλιν· Σπουδάσωμεν οὖν εἰσελθεῖν εἰς ἐκείνην τὴν κατάπαυσιν. Τὸ γὰρ τέλειον Σάββατον, καὶ ἡ τελεία καὶ ἡ τρισμακαρία κατάπαυσις ἐν τῇ τοῦ Θεοῦ βασιλείᾳ τυγχάνει, ὑπὲρ τὴν ἑξαήμερον δημιουργίαν καὶ τῶν αἰσθητῶν ἁπάντων ἐκτὸς ἐν ἀσωμάτοις καὶ ὑπερκοσμίοις, ἔνθα ἀπέδρα ὀδύνη καὶ λύπη, καὶ στεναγμός· ἔνθα τῆς θνητῆς καὶ φθαρτῆς ζωῆς ἀπαλλαγέντες, καὶ ἀργίαν ἀργήσαντες τὴν θεοφιλῆ καὶ μακαρίαν, τῶν τε σωματικῶν πράξεων καὶ τῆς δουλείας τῆς σαρκὸς ἐλευθερωθέντες, σὺν αὐτῷ τῷ Θεῷ καὶ παρ’ αὐτῷ γενόμενοι, σαββατίσομέν τε καὶ ἀναπαυσόμεθα. Διό φησιν ὁ Ἀπόστολος· Σπουδάσωμεν οὖν εἰσελθεῖν εἰς ἐκείνην τὴν κατάπαυσιν. Εἰκόνα δ’ ἐκείνου τοῦ Σαββάτου καὶ τῆς τελείας ἐκείνης καὶ τρισμακαρίας ἀναπαύσεως φέροντες ἐπὶ γῆς τοῦ θεοῦ ἄνδρες σχολὴν μὲν ἐποιοῦντο καὶ ἀργίαν τῶν μακρὰν ἀφιστάντων τοῦ θεοῦ ὅλοι δὲ πρὸς τῇ τῶν θείων θεωρίᾳ γιγνόμενοι δι’ ἡμέρας τε καὶ νυκτὸς τῇ τῶν ἱερῶν λόγων μελέτῃ προσκαρτεροῦντες ἅγια σάββατα καὶ ἀνάπαυσιν φίλην τῷ θεῷ διανέπαυον τότε καὶ ἐσαββάτιζον.

78 Epiphanius, Pan. 66.85.9: ἔλυσε δὲ ἐκεῖνο τὸ σάββατον καὶ ἔδωκεν ἡμῖν τὸ μέγα σάββατον, ὅπερ ἐστὶν αὐτὸς ὁ κύριος, ἡ ἀνάπαυσις ἡμῶν καὶ ὁ σαββατισμός (Holl, Epiphanius III, 128).

79 Pseudo-Athanasius, De sabbatis et circumcisione (PG 28.133.23–32): Τὴν μὲν οὖν προτέραν κτίσιν ποιῶν ὁ Θεὸς κατέπαυσε· διὰ τοῦτο καὶ τὸ Σάββατον ἐν τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τῇ ἑβδόμῃ ἐτήρουν οἱ τῆς γενεᾶς ἐκείνης· ἡ δὲ δευτέρα κτίσις τέλος οὐκ ἔχει· διὰ τοῦτο οὐδὲ κατέπαυσεν, ἀλλ’ ἕως ἄρτι ἐργάζεται. Ὅθεν οὐδὲ σαββατίζομεν ἡμέραν ὡς ἐπὶ τῇ πρώτῃ, ἀλλὰ τὰ μέλλοντα ἐλπίζομεν Σάββατα σαββάτων, ἃ οὐ τέλος λαμβάνει ἡ καινὴ κτίσις, ἀλλὰ φανεροῦται καὶ διόλου ἑορτάζει. Διὰ γὰρ τοῦτο ἐδόθη τὸ Σάββατον τῷ προτέρῳ λαῷ, ἵνα γινώσκῃ καὶ τὸ τέλος καὶ τὴν ἀρχὴν τῆς κτίσεως. See also Hippolytus, Fr. Ps. 9.

80 A tenth- or eleventh-century corrector has added a breathing mark and the circumflex for the variant term.

81 See E. Epp, ‘The “Ignorance Motif” in Acts and Anti-Judaic Tendencies in Codex Bezae’, HTR 55 (1962) 55 and K. Haines-Eitzen, The Gendered Palimpsest: Women, Writing, and Representation in Early Christianity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012) 4.

82 Among others: Justin, Dial. 23; Tertullian, Marc. 5.4.5; Acts Pet. 1; Victorinus, De Fab. Mundi 5; Chrysostom, Anom. 12.3; Eusebius, Gospel Problems and Solutions, Latin Fragment 26; Ambrose, Exp. Luc. 5.31; Epiphanius, Pan. 30.32.1–9; 66.85.6–9.

83 Origen, Comm. Rom. V.1.1–41. English translations below are from T. Scheck, Origen: Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, Books 1–5 (Washington: Catholic University Press, 2001) 325–8. The critical edition of Rufinus’ translation can be found in C. P. Hammond Bammel, ed., Origenes, Der Römerbriefkommentar des Origenes: Kritische Ausgabe der Übersetzung Rufins (3 vols; Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder, 1990–98)

84 Comm. Rom. V.1.38.

85 Comm. Rom. V.1.39–40. Origen states that Acts 10.9 (‘What God has made clean, you should not call common’) and 1 Cor 11.25 (‘This cup is the new covenant’) can be used to allegorise food laws, 1 Cor 5.7–8 (‘Christ our Passover lamb was sacrificed’) can represent the dissolution of Jewish festivals, and Malachi 3.20 (‘the sun of righteousness’) releases such Christians from the observance of the new moon.

86 The term ‘heavenly Jerusalem’ (Ἰερουσαλὴμ ἐπουρανίῳ) appears once in the New Testament, in Heb 12.22.

87 Comm. Rom. V.1.41 (trans. Schenk 328).

88 Origen Cels. 2.1–4 similarly accepts such ideological diversity, describing faithful Jewish converts to Christianity as heterogenous in their posture toward the law: 1) some no longer practise the law, but interpret it allegorically, 2) some interpret scripture allegorically while practising the law as before their conversion, and 3) some refuse allegorical interpretations of scripture, but accept Jesus and observe the law in traditional ways.

89 Although Vaticanus’ origins are elusive, some renowned commentators have placed its production in Caesarea, potentially strengthening the tie between Origen’s writings and the Vaticanus variant. See G. Zuntz, ‘Die Überlieferung der Evangelien’, Lukian von Antiochien und der Text der Evangelien (ed. B. Aland and K. Wachtel; Heidelberg: Winter, 1995) 26–55, at 42–5.

90 Mss 018, 075, 0142, 0151, 454, 619, etc.

91 L. C. Willard, A Critical Study of the Euthalian Apparatus (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2009) and V. Blomkvist, Euthalian Traditions: Text, Translation and Commentary (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2012) offer valuable histories of scholarship on the Euthalian Apparatus. Willard, Critical Study, 160–9 provides a list of Greek manuscripts that contain elements of the Apparatus.

92 V. Blomkvist, Euthalian Traditions, 85: καὶ οὐ κατέπαυσεν ὁ λαὸς, ἀλλὰ κοινὴ πᾶσιν ἡμῖν ἀπολείπεται ἡ ἡμέρα τῆς καταπαύσεως.