Luke 10:25
Luke 10:2525One day an expert in the law stood up to test Him. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
sets up the Good Samaritan parable. JW commentary reads the lawyer's question ("what must I do to inherit everlasting life?") as the right kind of question — life is inherited by doing, by obedient service to Jehovah's commands. The parable's emphasis on practical mercy is read as supporting the JW emphasis on the preaching work as the primary expression of love for neighbour, with disaster relief among fellow Witnesses as a secondary expression.
Read the parable in v. 30-37 alongside ("pure worship from the standpoint of our God and Father is this: to look after orphans and widows in their tribulation"). Jesus's Samaritan crossed religious and ethnic lines to care for a beaten stranger; the priest and Levite (the religious insiders) passed by. The parable defines neighbour-love as practical mercy to anyone in need, regardless of religious affiliation. The Watchtower's organisational practice — disaster relief primarily for fellow Witnesses, no public hospitals or food banks or shelters serving the wider community — fits the priest-and-Levite pattern more than the Samaritan's. Pair with , ("toward all"), and ("if you love only those who love you, what reward do you have?") for the cumulative case.
As at and , the NWT renders aiōnios zōē as "everlasting life" rather than "eternal life." The same systematic NWT pattern across the New Testament. Standard translations vary, but most prefer "eternal" because aiōnios carries a qualitative dimension (the life of the age to come) alongside its durative dimension. "Everlasting" emphasises duration only, fitting the JW expectation of unending biological life on a paradise earth.