Sabbatarian, a. and n.
(sæbəˈtɛərɪən)
[a. L. sabbatāri-us (Sp. sabatario, Pg. sabbatario), f. sabbatum Sabbath: see -arian.]
A. adj. † a. Of or pertaining to the Sabbath or its observance. Obs. b. Having relation to the tenets of the Sabbatarians.
| a 1631 Donne in Select. (1840) 105 A sabbatarian righteousness is no righteousness. 1654 H. L'Estrange Chas. I (1655) 129 The rigour and strictnesse of Sabbatarian Ministers, in denying People recreations on the Sunday. 1668 Wells (title) The Practical Sabbatarian or Sabbath Holiness crowned with Superlative Happiness. 1733 Neal Hist. Purit. II. 250 These Divines, instead of softening some excesses in Bradbourne's Sabbatarian strictness, ran into the contrary extreme. 1796 Morse Amer. Geog. I. 436 These are called Sabbatarian, or Seventh day Baptists. 1837 Whewell Hist. Induct. Sci. (1857) I. 224 With references to Jewish Sabbatarian notions. 1859 Mill Liberty 161 Another important example of illegitimate interference with the rightful liberty of the individual..is sabbatarian legislation. 1863 A. Blomfield Mem. Bp. Blomfield I. vi. 154 He entertained rather strict, or what would now be called ‘Sabbatarian’ notions. |
B. n.
1. A Jewish observer of the (Saturday) Sabbath.
| 1613 Purchas Pilgrimage (1614) 149 The word Masbothæi, Scaliger saith, signifieth Sabbatists or Sabbatarians, because they professed to haue learned the obseruation of the Sabbath from Christ, and therein differed from the other Iewes. a 1641 Bp. R. Montagu Acts & Mon. (1642) 454 These Esseni were yet further, more, and most rigid Sabbatarians, beyond all other sects and schismes amongst the Jewes. 1830 D'Israeli Chas. I, III. xv. 330 Sabbatarians, became a term of reproach for the Jews with the Polytheists. |
2. A Christian who regards the Lord's Day as a Sabbath, deducing its obligation from the Fourth Commandment. Also, and more commonly, one whose opinion and practice with regard to Sunday observance are unusually strict.
| 1620 J. Dyke Counter-poyson 15 He is none of your precise Sabbatarians. 1656 Heylin Extraneus Vapulans 110 We are now come unto the business of the Lords day, in which our Author sheweth himself a stiffe Sabbatarian. 1718 Hickes & Nelson J. Kettlewell iii. xxiv. 237, I don't know whether you are a Strict Sabbatarian. 1864 E. B. Eastwick 3 Years in Persia I. 4, I am not a Sabbatarian, I showed it by travelling on Sunday. |
3. A member of a Christian sect founded towards the close of the sixteenth century, the members of which maintained that the Sabbath should be observed on the seventh and not on the first day of the week; a Seventh-day Baptist. Cf. Sabbatary n., Sabbatharian.
| 1645 E. Pagitt Heresiogr. (1647) B j, The Sabbatarians affirme the old Jewish Sabbath to be kept, and not the Lords day. 1710 Steele & Addison Tatler No. 257 ¶12 Præ-Adamites, Sabbatarians, Cameronians, Muggletonians..and the like. 1820 Trav. Cosmo III 445 Robert Dogs, a coal-man in London, was the first founder of the sect of Sabbatarians. |