1. (a) When and how did truth become an issue? (b) What grand new truth was stated in Eden?

TRUTH has long been at issue! This issue, as old as the history of mankind, was raised back in Eden when the original Serpent questioned the truthfulness of the Sovereign Lord Jehovah. Under temptation, our first parents chose to think independently and to go their own selfish way. They were not integrity-keeping advocates of truth. But God there made known the grandest of new truths, that a Kingdom “seed” would be brought forth to break up the works of the Devil.​—Genesis 3:1-6, 14, 15.

 2. (a) How was truth assaulted in the pre-Flood world? (b) Why did Noah and his family find favor with Jehovah?

² Truth was now under assault. The Archdeceiver enlisted the support of other rebellious spirit sons of God to cause ruination of the earth.

Ravages of Untruth

 3. What is Babylon the Great, and how did it get started?

³ Nevertheless, that old Serpent, the Devil, continued his efforts to muddy the waters of truth. No doubt, it was under Satanic direction that ancient Babylon was built. The ‘mysteries of Babylon’ became the foundation for a world empire of false religion, described at Revelation 17:5 as “Babylon the Great, the mother of the harlots and of the disgusting things of the earth.” Its numerous segments, with their conflicting sectarian teachings, have survived to this day as a grand repository of religious error.​—Genesis 10:8-10; Jeremiah 51:6.

 4. How did Jesus advocate truth, and with what result?

⁴ When Jesus Christ was on earth, he boldly advocated truth. Addressing the religious hypocrites of his day, he said: “You are from your father the Devil . . . He did not stand fast in the truth, because truth is not in him.”

 5, 6. (a) How did Satan continue his warfare on truth? (b) What contamination resulted, and what untruths stemmed therefrom? (c) Why should we want to be zealous advocates of truth?

⁵ Untruth goes hand in hand with lawlessness. It is not surprising, therefore, that in Satan’s continuing warfare against truth, he raised up an apostate clergy class, described at 2 Thessalonians 2:3 as “the man of lawlessness.” Following the death of the apostles of Jesus Christ, these lawless apostates exalted themselves above the laity and contaminated pure Christian teaching by fusing it with Babylonian “mysteries” and Greek philosophy, outstandingly Plato’s theory that the human soul is immortal.

⁶ This untruth has provided the basis for other untruths, such as ‘all good people go to heaven,’ ‘the not-so-good go to purgatory,’ and ‘the bad are roasted forever in a hell of torment.’

Hatching a Great Untruth

 7. (a) What is Satan’s goal, and how does he try to achieve it? (b) What false teaching came to the fore in the 19th century?

⁷ However, the Devil leaves no stone unturned in opposing truth. He is enraged that anyone should give any credence to God’s Word of truth, the Holy Bible. His goal is to ‘blind the minds of the unbelievers, that they might not know the glorious good news about the Christ.’ The Devil has aimed to discredit truth not only by having Christendom’s “man of lawlessness” try to tack false religious teachings onto the Bible but also by making the claim that the Bible is based on myth and legend. So, during the 19th century, that old Serpent hatched another false and deceptive teaching. It has been called the theory of evolution.​—2 Corinthians 4:4.