Sunday set us free. It's a day when a wide majority of office goers, laborers, and students find time to engage themselves in other forms of activities besides work and study. While night owls choose longer Saturdays and the hit the bed in the wee hours of Sunday, after fun and frolic, the early birds opt for a relaxed Sunday morning, engaging themselves in recreational sports or religious activities, or the least, an extended mile of walk, without the turbulence of a clock ticking over their heads.
Most of us look forward to the Sunday, right from the middle of the week. Once we cross the Wednesday and enter into Thursday, hope fills our hearts and there is an unsaid ease in the mind. And by Friday, we almost become Monks, ready to forgive anyone, for we are close to redemption from a week of strive and labor. Many people have mandatory Sunday rituals of watching a movie or dining out with family and friends. Some sleep to glory. Altogether Sunday helps in rebuilding oneself, in whatever way one finds it best to pass a Sunday.
But how did Sunday became a day of rest?
The origin of the word Sunday can be traced back to the Hellenistic Calendar, developed in the Mediterranean, where each day is assigned a name based on a constellation. The name dies Sollis, meaning - the day of Sun, eventually become Sunedai in old English. The origin of weekly rest or the concept of a weekly day of rest, where one doesn't perform laborious activities, is a derivative of the practice of 'Sabbath' in Judaism.
The origin word of Sabbath is 'Savath' in Hebrew, which means cessation of activities. According to the Book of genesis, in chapters that explain creation (commonly accepted by both Judaism and Christianity), God created the heaven, the earth, and mankind in 6 days and chose to rest on the 7th day. It also signifies the day of the exodus, when Israelites got redemption from Egypt. Jews follow the day of Sabbath or the 7th day on Saturday. Since they consider that a new day begins from Sundown, Sabbath is observed from Friday Sundown till Saturday Sundown. There are strict protocols on 'not dos' for the last day of the week, but it is held equally as the day of prayers, merriment and family time by both Jews and some denomination of Christianity.
In Christianity, synonymous to Sabbath in Judaism, Sunday gets an equal reverence, as it is believed that Jesus Christ resurrected on Sunday (the 1st day of the week). So it came to be known as the Lord's day. Although it is not rigorously followed with strict protocols like in the case of Judaism, Sunday for church goers became the day for prayers. The first Christian Emperor of Rome, Constantine I, declared on the 7th of 321 that Sunday would be an official day of rest.
In India, Sundays as rest days was introduced by the British in the 1800s. And since a number of nations were under the British rule as colonies, it became easier for them to enact it as a law across these countries. Although 'rest on Sundays' finds its origin in religion and later as a colonial law in India, Sunday has now become a secular term for a much needed day of rest welcomed by all segments of the society.
Now that's just another reminder to think about the Sunday to come.