Though it lasted only one year as a periodical, the Bible-Reading Gazette was a precursor to one of the most widely-used tools for presentation and study of biblical doctrines in Adventist history.1
After declaring themselves to be “highly gratified with the exercises in Bible-readings, conducted by Brother [S.N.] Haskell and others at this Conference,” the delegates to the 1883 General Conference voted that a “printed sheet” containing such Bible studies be distributed monthly.2 A Bible-Reading Bureau was created as publisher, with a “Central Committee” comprised of Uriah Smith, W. C. Sisley, W. H. Littlejohn, W. C. Sisley, E. B. Miler, and M. J. Chapman.3
Accordingly, the Bible-Reading Gazette was published monthly in 1884. The subscription price was set at $1 for those who submitted one or more studies for publication, and at $5 for others.4 The twelve issues contained a total of 162 lessons on a wide range of scriptural topics that covered the teachings espoused by Seventh-day Adventists.
More than 12,000 copies of the Gazette were distributed in 1884, but a large inventory remained undistributed. In explaining its decision to discontinue the periodical, the 1884 General Conference noted that “its continuance for more than a year was not contemplated” and that “it has well accomplished its object.”5
Remaining copies of the series sold well when bound together as a 288-page book, first published in 1884 with subsequent editions appearing in 1887 and 1888. An expanded, 593-page book was published by the Review and Herald under a new title, Bible Readings for the Home Circle.6 Already in 1892, according to J. N. Loughborough, canvassers had sold “many thousands of copies” of the book in the “revised and enlarged” form.7 Since then, the book has been reprinted, revised, and expanded in a profusion of editions, and continues to be widely used and distributed in the twenty-first century.
Sources
Bible-Reading Gazette. January, 1884.
Loughborough, Rise and Progress of Seventh-day Adventists. Battle Creek, MI: General Conference Association of the Seventh-day Adventists, 1892.
Seventh-day Adventist Encyclopedia, 2nd rev. edition. Hagerstown, MD: Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1996. S.v. “Bible-Reading Gazette.”
Transcription of minutes of GC sessions from 1863-1888. General Conference Online Archives, http://documents.adventistarchives.org/Minutes/GCSM/GCB1863-88.pdf.
Notes
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This article has been adapted and enlarged from Seventh-day Adventist Encyclopedia, 2nd rev. edition (1996), s.v. “Bible-Reading Gazette” by Douglas Morgan.↩
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“Tenth Meeting, November 16, 1883,” Transcription of minutes of GC sessions from 1863-1888, 238, General Conference Online Archives, http://documents.adventistarchives.org/Minutes/GCSM/GCB1863-88.pdf.↩
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Bible-Reading Gazette, January 1884, 1.↩
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“Tenth Meeting, November 16, 1883,” GC session minutes.↩
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“Fourteenth Meeting, November 19, 1884, Transcription of minutes of GC sessions from 1863-1888, 265, General Conference Online Archives, http://documents.adventistarchives.org/Minutes/GCSM/GCB1863-88.pdf.↩
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Complete text of the three editions of Bible-Readings Gazette in book form, and the first fourteen editions of Bible Readings for the Home Circle at General Conference Online Archives, http://documents.adventistarchives.org/Books/Forms/AllItems.aspx.↩
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J.N. Loughborough, Rise and Progress of Seventh-day Adventists (Battle Creek, MI: General Conference Association of the Seventh-day Adventists, 1892), 339.↩