# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_November 1863_S332
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

332

(Submitted by Prof. Crämer.)

Report of the Sixth Regular Synodical Assembly
of the Norwegian=Evangelical=Lutheran Church in America,
held in the church at Rock River, Wisc., from June 10 to 17, 1863.
(Continued.)

The subject that occupied the Synod the most was:

The Doctrine of Sunday.

In the proceedings on this subject, which we communicate in excerpt, it
says:

"At the previous Synod only the 1st thesis of a report on this subject
prepared by Past. Ottesen could be discussed, of which, to be sure, the
majority of the members of the Synod had declared that they were
clear; yet a large part had not been able to grasp the doctrine
contained in it precisely enough. This Synod therefore began with the
reading of the 1st thesis: " "When the 3rd Commandment says:
Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, then the word 'Sabbath
day' contains for us Christians no such reference to a particular day
as it did for the Jews, cf. Col. 2:16; Rom. 14:5–6; Gal. 4:9–10." " —
then of the whole report in question and of the deliberations on it held
at the previous Synod, whereupon the chairman asked whether anyone
wished to speak concerning this 1st thesis.

Past. C. L. Clausen, as one of those who had been unclear on this
point at the previous Synod and had therefore wished the matter
postponed, now stated that he had since, as opportunity allowed,
sought to make himself familiar with the matter, and believed that he
agreed in essentials with the presentation of the report — namely with
what the 1st thesis asserts, that the 3rd Commandment does not
oblige us Christians to keep any particular holy day, and that the
keeping holy of Sunday is not commanded us in the 3rd Commandment.
He believed, on the other hand, that the author of the report went too
far in the following theses when he spoke of Sunday as a merely
human institution; he therefore did not wish to agree yet to the 1st
thesis before the remaining ones had been gone through, since the
author might perhaps have put more into them than he now supposed.
He meant, namely, that Sunday has divine validity as a consequence of
other passages of Holy Scripture, but believed that the time to explain
himself more closely on this would come only in the treatment of the
following theses. Since meanwhile many found it very desirable to
know to which passages Past. Clausen was here alluding, it was
resolved by vote to depart so far from order that Pastor Clausen was
first asked which passages he meant, and he explained that he derived
his opinion, that Sunday is a divine ordinance, from many passages of
the New Testament and their connection. Here belong the passages
from which we see that the apostles used Sunday for