Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel, and the Apocalypse of St. John

As you may know, Isaac Newton is best known for discovering the theory of gravity, formulating the laws of motion, inventing calculus, and inventing the reflecting telescope. And numerous other lesser scientific achievements. Many consider him the greatest scientist who ever lived. He's unquestionably in the top tier.What is not as well known is that he was also a devout Christian who took the Bible seriously. As is evidenced by this book on the prophecies of Daniel and Revelation.These are difficult books subject to many interpretations. As much respect as I have for Newton, I don't agree with all of his conclusions. But they're always well thought out and rigorously discussed. The man had a prodigious knowledge of ancient and medieval history, and brings in all sorts of information to back up his theories.A couple of tidbits that were the highlights of the book for me:At one point Newton says that the purpose of Bible prophecy is not to tell us what is going to happen in the future. Prophecies are too difficult to interpret for that to be practical. Rather, the purpose is that after the prophecy is fulfilled, we can look back and see how it was fulfilled, and this proves the inspiration of scripture.Remember Newton is writing in the 1600s. At one point he says that it is difficult to see how prophecies about Israel will be fulfilled, as the nation was destroyed. But, he says, somehow God will restore the nation of Israel someday. He says that he can't see how it will happen, but if the Bible says it will happen, then it will. Of course 300-plus years later God DID restore the nation of Israel.BTW this book has a lot of quotations from ancient writers that Newton gives in Greek and Latin, apparently just taking it for granted that his readers know these languages. I know a little Latin and zero Greek, so I ended up skimming over most of these sections, without seriously hurting my understanding of the book. Oh, and he has a tendency to switch between the modern BC/AD calendar, the Jewish calendar, the Julian period, Roman calendars, etc. I found it necessary to jot down some "translation dates" on a piece of paper to keep track of it.

Many people do not realize that, Sir Isaac Newton, one of the histories great scientific minds, wrote more about subjects related to the Bible than he did science. Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalypse of St. John, provides a window into Newton’s thoughts on the prophecies found in the books of Daniel and Revelation.For those interested in the prophecy of Daniel 9, the so called “70 weeks” prophecy, you’ll find Newton’s perspective unique and insightful. Though I do not agree with Newton on the prophecy of 70 weeks there is plenty of information in this book which makes it a great addition to any library on Bible prophecy.For instance here is a quote from his notes in Chapter 10 which addresses Biblical time as it relates to the prophecy of Daniel 9.“[11] The antient solar years of the eastern nations consisted of 12 months, and every month of 30 days: and hence came the division of a circle into 360 degrees. This year seems to be used by Moses in his history of the Flood, and by John in the Apocalypse, where a time, times and half a time, 42 months and 1260 days, are put equipollent. But in reckoning by many of these years together, an account is to be kept of the odd days which were added to the end of these years. For the Egyptians added five days to the end of this year; and so did the Chaldeans long before the times of Daniel, as appears by the Æra, of Nabonassar: and the Persian Magi used the same year of 365 days, till the Empire of the Arabians. The antient Greeks also used the same solar year of 12 equal months, or 360 days; but every other year added an intercalary month, consisting of 10 and 11 days alternately.” Newton, Isaac (2011-03-24). Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel, and the Apocalypse of St. John (Kindle Locations 1512-1518). . Kindle Edition.In summary I enjoyed seeing eschatology though the eyes of one of the great scientific minds of the 17th & 18th centuries.

PROS: The book's cover is as advertised, it contains the work of Isaac Newton that it claims to, and the text is in a clearly printed medium-large size font.CONS: The book itself is not well designed. - The spine is blank, so it'll be hard to pick this off of a book shelf if I'm looking for it. - The back of the book is nearly blank as well as the synopsis is only one sentence long and contains no useful information that isn't on the front cover. - Additionally, if you open the book to a random page, there's no way to tell where you are in the book. The header of every page only contains the title of the book with no mention of the current chapter. You have to refer to the Table of Contents to find the page number (which are in the page footer). - There are also some alignment issues in the text, where many italicized words are jammed up against the previous word. - Lastly, there's no introduction whatsoever. I'm not typically one to complain about such things as I think that the introduction of most books goes on for far too long, but in this case I think a brief statement on the circumstances of the books writing and publication is appropriate. It would likely take less than a page.NOTES: This book appears to be printed on demand. I ordered the book on May 7th, the last page of the book says it was printed on May 8th, and it arrived on May 11th.

An astonishing attempt to write a world history using astronomical data and ancient writings and to fit them together into one grand synthesis. We think of Newton as a mathematician but he was no mean linguist either.I have given this 3 stars because it has been superseded but it still carries the force and originality of genius in its pages.

I thought I was reasonablly intelligent but did not get far with this book.

Excellent. Thought provoking. Well, what do you expect from Isaac Newton?Thank you for producing this in Kindle format - and free of charge too!

It was an interesting read in the light of current Global events 2020-2021

We live in a world that will surely come to an end in many different ways as many our inclinations are. So this is a very good book that explains those signs and gives direction to approaching the end.