One of the most basic identity markers for Reformed Christians in the Low Countries was attendance at Sunday worship services. However, expectations for Sunday observance went beyond simply going to church. The Fourth Commandment, as explained in the Reformed tradition, might appear simple at first glance. Indeed, the tendency in modern scholarship has been to ground the origin of theological disputes about the Sabbath in the Puritan tradition, which arose in England and was later transported by migrations to the Low Countries and the Americas. However, recent studies have begun to demonstrate the complexity of understandings of the Sabbath within Dutch Reformed communities.

Theological debates about the Sabbath had significant implications for expectations regarding how Sundays were to be observed. Not surprisingly, the theological expectations did not translate seamlessly into practice. A number of academic studies have tangentially noted the ways in which Sabbath complaints were registered and disciplined in church records. My previous research has also focused on the ways in which the Sabbath was disciplined at a variety of ecclesiastical levels; I have focused on how Sabbath expectations and practices aligned or failed to align with theological understandings. The current chapter builds on my previous research and expands it in two ways.

First, this chapter will broaden current understandings of Dutch Reformed theological approaches to the Sabbath. Given the number and variety of theological voices within the Dutch Reformed tradition, which itself defies neat categorization, developing a more complete understanding of the theological perspectives requires additional scholarly work to add to what has previously been done.