JTF.ORG Forum
General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: muman613 on September 29, 2010, 10:38:31 PM
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I just listened to a Shuir on Bereishit and learned something new. I did not know that Sir Isaac Newton studied Jewish wisdom. He was an avid believer in Maimonides Torah commentary.
I found this article from the USA Today website...
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/discoveries/2007-06-19-newton-religious-papers_N.htm
Papers reveal Newton's religious side
JERUSALEM — Three-century-old manuscripts by Isaac Newton calculating the exact date of the apocalypse, detailing the precise dimensions of the ancient temple in Jerusalem and interpreting passages of the Bible — exhibited this week for the first time — lay bare the little-known religious intensity of a man many consider history's greatest scientist.
Newton, who died 280 years ago, is known for laying much of the groundwork for modern physics, astronomy, math and optics. But in a new Jerusalem exhibit, he appears as a scholar of deep faith who also found time to write on Jewish law — even penning a few phrases in careful Hebrew letters — and combing The Tanach's Book of Daniel for clues about the world's end.
VIRTUAL EXHIBITION: 'Newton's Secrets' from the Jewish National and University Library
The documents, purchased by a Jewish scholar at a Sotheby's auction in London in 1936, have been kept in safes at Israel's national library in Jerusalem since 1969. Available for decades only to a small number of scholars, they have never before been shown to the public.
In one manuscript from the early 1700s, Newton used the cryptic Book of Daniel to calculate the date for the Apocalypse, reaching the conclusion that the world would end no earlier than 2060.
"It may end later, but I see no reason for its ending sooner," Newton wrote. However, he added, "This I mention not to assert when the time of the end shall be, but to put a stop to the rash conjectures of fanciful men who are frequently predicting the time of the end, and by doing so bring the sacred prophesies into discredit as often as their predictions fail."
In another document, Newton interpreted biblical prophecies to mean that the Jews would return to the Holy Land before the world ends. The end of days will see "the ruin of the wicked nations, the end of weeping and of all troubles, the return of the Jews captivity and their setting up a flourishing and everlasting Kingdom," he posited.
The exhibit also includes treatises on daily practice in the Jewish temple in Jerusalem. In one document, Newton discussed the exact dimensions of the temple — its plans mirrored the arrangement of the cosmos, he believed — and sketched it. Another paper contains words in Hebrew, including a sentence taken from the Jewish prayerbook.
Yemima Ben-Menahem, one of the exhibit's curators, said the papers show Newton's conviction that important knowledge was hiding in ancient texts.
"He believed there was wisdom in the world that got lost. He thought it was coded, and that by studying things like the dimensions of the temple, he could decode it," she said.
The Newton papers, Ben-Menahem said, also complicate the idea that science is diametrically opposed to religion. "These documents show a scientist guided by religious fervor, by a desire to see G-d's actions in the world," she said.
More prosaic documents on display show Newton keeping track of his income and expenses while a scholar at Cambridge and later, as master of the Royal Mint, negotiating with a group of miners from Devon and Cornwall about the price of the tin they supplied to Queen Anne.
The archives of Hebrew University in Jerusalem include a 1940 letter from Albert Einstein to Abraham Shalom Yahuda, the collector who purchased the papers a year earlier.
Newton's religious writings, Einstein wrote, provide "a variety of sketches and ongoing changes that give us a most interesting look into the mental laboratory of this unique thinker."
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That's really cool! :)
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He was also an alchemist and Jews had a big influence on alchemy. That's probably one reason he was interested in the topic.
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He was also an alchemist and Jews had a big influence on alchemy. That's probably one reason he was interested in the topic.
Sir Isaac Newton is considered to be one of the smartest individuals of all time. Many scientists, mathematicians think he's even smarter than Einstein. And one thing people never learn about him, is that he was DEEPLY religious.
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Obviously not the first one to learn from our Sages.
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He was also an alchemist and Jews had a big influence on alchemy. That's probably one reason he was interested in the topic.
Sir Isaac Newton is considered to be one of the smartest individuals of all time. Many scientists, mathematicians think he's even smarter than Einstein. And one thing people never learn about him, is that he was DEEPLY religious.
Yes, I admire this man very much. He lay the foundations of modern rational science.
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He was also an alchemist and Jews had a big influence on alchemy. That's probably one reason he was interested in the topic.
Sir Isaac Newton is considered to be one of the smartest individuals of all time. Many scientists, mathematicians think he's even smarter than Einstein. And one thing people never learn about him, is that he was DEEPLY religious.
Yes, I admire this man very much. He lay the foundations of modern rational science.
Oh, by the way. Im sure StørmFrønt has a revision of these facts, where Issac Newton was in fact, a Jew hater and paleo-nazi, just like Benjamin Franklin, Walt Disney, George Washington, Jesus, and Moses.
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He was also an alchemist and Jews had a big influence on alchemy. That's probably one reason he was interested in the topic.
Sir Isaac Newton is considered to be one of the smartest individuals of all time. Many scientists, mathematicians think he's even smarter than Einstein. And one thing people never learn about him, is that he was DEEPLY religious.
Yes, I admire this man very much. He lay the foundations of modern rational science.
Oh, by the way. Im sure StørmFrønt has a revision of these facts, where Issac Newton was in fact, a Jew hater and paleo-nazi, just like Benjamin Franklin, Walt Disney, George Washington, Jesus, and Moses.
This "people" live in their own fantasy world. Nothing they will ever claim will shock me. I think it is a punishment of god himself, that they are that nuts.
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I really think science, math and humanity would be better served if Newton stuck to math and physics instead of diverging into useless pondering about biblical codes.
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I really think science, math and humanity would be better served if Newton stuck to math and physics instead of diverging into useless pondering about biblical codes.
I disagree. There are lots of evil people in this world who mislead people by saying "the end is near".
In my time as book trader, I have had lots of books about this topic in my hand from the last three centuries.
It was a nice thing, that he tried to prove, that this is all nonesense. Not so nice was, that he named a certain year. But it was far in the future, so for his time he did a service. But if we will see the year he mentioned, it will causes problems again.
My oppinion on this issue is, that no one knows the end of the times. We will see it, if it happens.
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I don't think we will know when the world will end but I do think we should not necessarily see that as a bad thing, since God is control.
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Re: "...I don't think we will know when the world will end "
Skeeter Davis knows.
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I don't think we will know when the world will end but I do think we should not necessarily see that as a bad thing, since G-d is control.
Wisely spoken Ruby. :)
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Sir Isaac Newton is considered to be one of the smartest individuals of all time. Many scientists, mathematicians think he's even smarter than Einstein. And one thing people never learn about him, is that he was DEEPLY religious.
I've seen Newton ranked as #1 in lists of geniuses. I agree, this guy created the fundamental laws of motion. Einstein would be a close second.
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In one manuscript from the early 1700s, Newton used the cryptic Book of Daniel to calculate the date for the Apocalypse, reaching the conclusion that the world would end no earlier than 2060.
I have checked this against my figures, and it appears that he was correct.
J/k. I think Maimonides actually forbade calculating the end times.
I believe that Jews are forbidden from calculating the date of the Messianic era... But I do not know if there is Halacha which forbids non-Jews from attempting to do so.
http://www.moshiach.com/temple/articles/essay_the_legalities_of_destruction.php
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As the Temple ruins lay smoldering, the process of rebuilding was already underway. Moshiach, the Divine emissary empowered to bring redemption to the world and the eternal Sanctuary to Jerusalem, was born on the Ninth of Av.[xxiii]
This explains a curious phenomenon in the history of our exile: many of our sages-including such prodigious figures as Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, Rabbi Saadiah Gaon, Maimonides, Nachmanides, Rabbeinu B'Chaye and Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi-predicted various dates for the revelation of Moshiach and the rebuilding of the Holy Temple, despite the Talmud's admonishment of those who "calculate deadlines" for the Redemption.[xxiv]
For these great visionaries had a view of history that penetrated beyond the surface mayhem of the Destruction. They understood that G-d could not have destroyed the Temple if the very moment of the destruction was not also the moment which commenced its reconstruction in its greater, eternal form. They understood that galut is not a "void" or "hiatus" in G-d's presence in our world, but an integral part of the process of redemption. To them, the 9th of Av was, above all, the birthday of Moshiach.
[xxiv]. Talmud, Sanhedrin 97b, cited by Maimonides (who himself calculates the date of Moshiach's coming in his famed Yemen Letter) as a halachic prohibition in his Mishneh Torah, Laws of Kings 12:2.
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I think people should be watchful all the time for the end of days and therefore knowing the date in advance (or convincing yourself that you do, even if you're wrong) can take away from that.
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I just listened to a Shuir on Bereishit and learned something new. I did not know that Sir Isaac Newton studied Jewish wisdom. He was an avid believer in Maimonides Torah commentary.
I found this article from the USA Today website...
Indeed, it is true. He's portrayed as a non-believer, but in reality his writings reflected a belief in monotheism, a great respect for the Jews and admiration of Jewish religion and rabbis. When his descendants saw these indications of affinity to Jews in his private writings, they quickly closed them up and kept them secret for a host of reasons...