April 2020 study edition of the Watchtower

[Newtonian]

Here:

 

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/library/r1/lp-e/all-publications/watchtower/the-watchtower-2020/study-edition/april

 

Article "An attack coming from the North" - here:

 

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/2020364

 

For starters I like the point about how that early group of Bible Students incl. Brother Russell arrived at important Scriptural truths - a method we still use - studying the Bible by subject.  We also study the Bible in context as in our assigned Bible reading: [as reflected in our indexes]

 

"MORE than a century ago, Brother C. T. Russell and his associates, a small group of other students of God’s Word, began to meet together. They wanted to see if they could learn what the Bible really teaches about Jehovah God, Jesus Christ, the condition of the dead, and the ransom. Their method of study was simple. Someone would raise a question, and then the group would examine every scripture text related to the subject. Finally, they would make a record of their findings. With Jehovah’s blessing, those sincere Christian men discovered many fundamental Bible truths that we cherish to this day."

 

What are some of those truths learned so long ago (Mt.24:45 - at the proper time) which we still cherish?

[Cushi]

Ones that come to mind are our teachings on the immortality of the soul and hellfire. 

[Newtonian]

On 3/2/2020 at 10:40 PM, Brother Jack said:

Ones that come to mind are our teachings on the immortality of the soul and hellfire. 

And the trinity - did you know Isaac Newton, my user namesake, also rejected the trinity and that he wrote more on his Biblical research than on his scientific research!

 

See:

 

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1977284#h=1:0-60:672

 

Excerpts (see the article) - 

 

"Newton appreciated that God is the Source of all truth, and in line with the deep reverence he had for his Creator, he appears to have spent even more time searching after the true God than he did in searching out scientific truths. An analysis of all that Newton wrote reveals that out of some 3,600,000 words only 1,000,000 were devoted to the sciences, whereas some 1,400,000 were on religious topics.3"

 

"3. The Correspondence of Isaac Newton, edited by H. W. Turnbull, F.R.S., Cambridge 1961, Vol. 1, p. XVII."

 

"In his writings, Newton gave much attention to the doctrine of the Trinity. One of his most outstanding contributions to the Biblical scholarship of the time was his work An Historical Account of Two Notable Corruptions of Scripture, first published in 1754, twenty-seven years after his death. It reviewed all the textual evidence available from ancient sources on two Bible passages, at First John 5:7 and First Timothy 3:16."

 

"Using early Church writers, the Greek and Latin manuscripts and the testimony of the first versions of the Bible, Newton proved that the words “in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one,” in support of the Trinity doctrine, did not appear in the original inspired Greek Scriptures. He then traced the way in which the spurious reading crept into the Latin versions, first as a marginal note, and later into the text itself. He showed that it was first taken into a Greek text in 1515 by Cardinal Ximenes on the strength of a late Greek manuscript corrected from the Latin. Finally, Newton considered the sense and context of the verse, concluding, “Thus is the sense plain and natural, and the argument full and strong; but if you insert the testimony of ‘the Three in Heaven’ you interrupt and spoil it.”4"

 

"4. An Historical Account of Two Notable Corruptions of Scripture, by Sir Isaac Newton, Edition of 1830, London, p. 60."