“The
Old Testament, which describes Jehovah’s work in Israel, and the New
Testament, which describes Jesus’ work in the Age of Grace, are both
records of God’s work in two different eras. The Old Testament records
His work in the Age of Law, and so it is a history book. The New
Testament is a product of God’s work in the Age of Grace, and when the
new work has begun, both testaments are out of date. So the New
Testament is also a history book. Of course, the New Testament is not as
systematic as the Old and does not record as many things.”
from “Concerning the Bible (1)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
“When
the Age of Grace arrived, people had already been reading the Bible for
generations, though they only had the Old Testament, not the New.
People had been reading the Bible for as long as the Old Testament was
in existence. After the period of Jehovah’s guidance, Moses wrote
Genesis, Exodus, Deuteronomy, and so on, recollecting Jehovah’s work and
committing it to paper. The Bible is a history book, and it also
contains the words of the prophets, which, of course, are not history.
It has several different parts, and is not just prophecies, records of
Jehovah’s work, or letters from Paul. You should be familiar with the
parts of the Bible. The Old Testament includes Genesis, Exodus … then
the books of prophecy, concluding with the Book of Malachi, all of which
records the work of the Age of Law under the guidance of Jehovah.
From
Genesis to the Book of Malachi, the Old Testament is a comprehensive
account of Jehovah’s work in the Age of Law. The experiences of the
people whom Jehovah led are all recorded there. During the Old Testament
Age of Law, Jehovah raised up many prophets to speak His prophecies,
instructing the people of all tribes and all nations, foretelling the
work that He planned to do. These were people upon whom Jehovah bestowed
the Spirit of prophecy. They saw visions and heard voices from Him,
thereby receiving revelations to write prophecies. Their work was to
express the voice of Jehovah, to prophesy on Jehovah’s behalf. When
Jehovah worked then, He only guided people as the Spirit, and He was not
incarnated; people could not see His face at all. And so He raised up
these prophets to do His work, allowed them to receive oracles and
reveal to all the tribes and clans of Israel. Their job was to utter
prophecies, and some of them recorded Jehovah’s words for others to
read. Jehovah raised them up to foretell the work that He would do or
had not yet done, so that the people would see His wondrousness and
wisdom. These books of prophecy are quite different from the other books
of the Bible; they are words spoken or written by people who received
the Spirit of prophecy, those who saw visions or heard voices from
Jehovah. All the other books are records of Jehovah’s work written after
the fact. These books are no substitute for the words of the prophets
raised up by Jehovah; for example, Genesis and Exodus cannot compare
with the Book of Isaiah or the Book of Daniel.
The prophecies are words
spoken before the work was done, and the other books are records of
Jehovah’s work written afterward, an act of which human beings are
capable. The prophets, receiving revelation from Jehovah, made some
prophecies, said many words, foretelling things about the Age of Grace
and the destruction of the world in the last days, that is, prophesying
the work that Jehovah planned to do; the other books are all records of
Jehovah’s work in Israel. So what one reads about in the Bible is mostly
the work that Jehovah did in Israel. The Old Testament mostly records
how Jehovah guided the Israelites—by means of Moses, He led them out of
Egypt free from Pharaoh’s bondage, and into the desert, then into the
land of Canaan. Then it describes their lives in Canaan, as well as
Jehovah’s work in various parts of Israel. The Old Testament is a record
of Jehovah’s work in Israel, where He created Adam and Eve. Beginning
with Noah, when Jehovah began formally guiding mankind on earth, the
Bible records only the work that He did in Israel. Why is there no
record of God’s work outside of Israel? Because Israel is the birthplace
of mankind; there were no countries outside of Israel then, and Jehovah
did no work there. So the Bible records only God’s work in Israel. The
words of the prophets—Isaiah, Daniel, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and so
on—foretold other work that would take place on earth, work that Jehovah
God would do Himself. They entirely came from God, and they were the
work of the Holy Spirit. Except for the books of the prophets, all the
other parts of the Bible are records of man’s experiences of Jehovah’s
work.”
from “Concerning the Bible (1)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
“Just
what kind of book is the Bible, exactly? The Old Testament concerns
God’s work in the Age of Law; it documents the work that Jehovah did in
that age as well as Jehovah’s creation of the world. All of it is an
account of Jehovah’s work, ending with the Book of Malachi. The two
components of God’s work recorded in the Old Testament—the creation of
the world and the promulgation of the law—were both done by Jehovah. The
Age of Law is the work that represents God’s name, Jehovah, all of the
work that was done primarily in the name of Jehovah. So the Old
Testament records Jehovah’s work, and the New Testament records the work
of Jesus, the work done primarily in Jesus’ name. What Jesus’ name
signifies, and what work He did, are for the most part all recorded in
the New Testament. In the days of the Old Testament, Jehovah built the
temple and altars in Israel and guided the lives of the Israelites on
earth, proving that the Israelites were His chosen people, the first
group of people He selected on earth who were after His own heart, the
first whom He led personally. In other words, the twelve tribes of
Israel were His first chosen people, so Jehovah continued to work on
them until the end of His work during the Age of Law. The second stage
of God’s work—the work of the New Testament Age of Grace—He did in the
tribe of Judah, one of the twelve tribes of Israel, thereby narrowing
the scope of His work, because Jesus was God incarnate. He worked solely
in the land of Judea, and for just three and a half years, which is why
the records of the New Testament are so few compared to the Old. Jesus’
work in the Age of Grace is mostly recorded in the Four Gospels. The
path walked by the people of that age was that of the most superficial
transformation of life disposition; this is mostly documented in the
epistles.”
from “Concerning the Bible (1)” in The Word Appears in the Flesh
“At
that time, Jesus did much work, but His disciples did not understand,
and Jesus did not explain; after He left, the disciples started to work
and to preach everywhere, and to write epistles and gospels for the sake
of that stage of the work. The Gospels of the New Testament were
written twenty to thirty years after Jesus was crucified. Before this,
the Israelites read only the Old Testament, which is to say that people
in the Age of Grace had only the Old Testament to read. The New
Testament did not exist until the Age of Grace; when Jesus was doing His
work, there was no New Testament. It was only after His resurrection
and ascent to heaven that people began recording His work and the Four
Gospels were written, as well as the letters of Paul, the letters of
Peter, and the Book of Revelation. Over three hundred years after the
Ascension, people collected these writings and assembled them into the
New Testament. It was only after Jesus’ work was done that the New
Testament came into being, not before. God did much work, and the
apostle Paul did much work. Later the letters of Paul and Peter were
gathered together into the one book, which concluded with the record of
the greatest vision that came to John on the isle of Patmos, because it
prophesied the work of the last days. All this was arranged by future
generations. This is not so with the words of today. … Their writings
are based on their own levels of literacy and their own caliber, and
they are a record of human experiences, with each person recording
things in a certain way, each person conveying a certain understanding
of events, and so each account is different. So, how foolish you are,
how utterly ignorant, if you worship the Bible as if it were God!”
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