When Bill Wilson wrote the Big Book, he defined many of its concepts in its early pages. He usually did not redefine these concepts later in the book. He expected anyone reading the Big Book to start at the beginning, on page 1, and continue through page 164.

Fraser Trevor

When Bill Wilson wrote the Big Book, he defined many of its concepts in its early pages. He usually did not redefine these concepts later in the book. He expected anyone reading the Big Book to start at the beginning, on page 1, and continue through page 164. For example, Bill defines the term "spiritual life" on page 15. Therefore, if someone reads about this term on page 35 or page 83, before they read about it on page 15, they might not know how Bill had originally defined this term. Some of us, when we were new to the program, became confused when we read the Big Book. This was often because someone would suggest that we read passages out of order. We might have read passages on page 84, then page 64, and then page 159. These pages have interesting information on them. However, we could not understand them as clearly as we would have, if we had read them in context. We could not define the terms and concepts on them in the same way that the founders defined them.