Seventh Day Adventism & Colossians 2:16f

Seventh Day Adventists are a denomination of Protestantism that are best know for their stand that the Sabbath Day (7th Day of the week) is God's true day of worship, and that "Christendom" as a whole has corrupted this, making Sunday the day that Christians should set aside to worship on. The subject of this post is whether their position aligns with Scripture, in which Catholics and most Protestants believe no.

Most Adventists are aware of Colossians 2:16-17,

¹⁶Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. ¹⁷These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ.

Here, non-Adventists argue that according to the plain teaching of Scripture, the Sabbath Day regulations have been abolished, thus refuting an essential tenet of Seventh Day Adventism. Most Adventists are aware of this passage and argue that it isn't talking about the 'Seventh-Day-Sabbath' because the Greek term for Sabbath in this passage is in the plural (i.e. Sabbaths), and thus it must refer to the annual 'feasts days' of the Old Testament sometimes referred to as "Sabbaths" (e.g. the Day of Atonement, Lev 16:31).

But is that response valid? Here are two considerations which indicate a negative response to that question:

1) The Greek term for Sabbath - "sabbaton" (sabbatwv) - is in plural form in Col 2:16. However, this same plural form is used in Mat 28:1, Luke 4:16, and Acts 16:13, yet they all are in reference to the 7th-Day Sabbath. The plural form even appears in the Greek Old Testament in Exodus 20:8, which is discussing the 7th-Day Sabbath of the 4th Commandment! Thus the plural form can easily mean 7th Day Sabbath, and there is no indication it is used in the New Testament in the form of Day of Atonement type sabbath.

2) The format of Col 2:16 is that of: Yearly-Monthly-Weekly. This three-term format appears in various Old Testament passages, referring to yearly feasts, new moons, sabbaths. Given this, it wouldn't make sense for Paul to say the Sabbath in Col 2:16 is the Day of Atonement Sabbath, because that would fall under the yearly feasts category he just mentioned.

The more important point to consider here is that those were all foreshadowing Christ in some way, and thus were pointing to something bigger than themselves. So the Sabbath being the day of rest in the OT was actually the day Jesus was in the tomb, preparing the way for New Life, Sunday. Further, Hebrews 4 speaks of the Sabbath in it's fulfilled sense as being reconciled and thus at peace with God, not a day of the week, but a state of being.

While SDA reasoning can at first seem valid, it really doesn't do justice to the Biblical testimony.