Hi qwerty:
This statement that former members and family members are not shunned absolutely baffles me too! I've mentioned this in a couple of my recent posts on the subject. How can they expect to get away with that kind of an outright lie with so many non-JWs becoming aware of the real 'truth'???
Perhaps Thirdson has hit the nail on the head with his quotation from the Insight book:
Lying generally involves saying something false to a person who is entitled to know the truth... Insight on the Scriptures(it-2-E) 1988
Along with that, HesterPryne found and quoted in her post on "Questions for Shunned Persons" in the Beliefs and Doctrines" topics, 2 WT articles showing further what the WTS says about lying and when its OK.
Here is what the WTS says for those of us who have forgotten this or never knew it:
Watchtower 1956
"The enemies [here identified as those who resist or persecute Jehovah's Witnesses] did not deserve to learn the truth to the hurt or endangerment of Jehovah's servants. In wartime it is proper to misdirect the wolfish enemy. .. It is proper to cover over our arrangements for the work that God commands us to do. If the wolfish foes draw wrong conclusions from our maneuvers to outwit them, no harm has been done to them by the harmless sheep, innocent in their motives as doves." {WT Feb 1 1956 80/86}
So I guess it is part of their "maneuvers to outwit" the public who must be considered to be the wolfish enemy and doesn't deserve to know the truth.And then if we don't agree with their strategy, we are reminded to not criticize the 'mother org,' in this next article in the 1957 Watchtower.
"Trust Your Proved, Faithful Brothers.. Showing respect for Jehovah's organization really resolves itself down to our attitude toward God's visible channel and the trust that we place in our proved, faithful brothers. If we have become thoroughly convinced that this is Jehovah's organization, that he is guiding and directing his people, then we shall not be unsettled by anything that happens.If something comes up that we do not understand we will wait patiently until it is made thoroughly clear to us. If we feel sure something is wrong we will 'keep the commandment' of our Father and take whatever theocratic steps are open to us and then wait on Jehovah. We will not 'forsake our mother's teaching' by immediately beginning to criticize and find fault. We will realize that Jehovah knows what is going on in his organization, and if he is willing to permit it, who are we to insist it should be different? If we really have faith, we will know that if it is wrong he will straighten it out eventually, and we are far safer inside his organization even with these minor difficulties than we would be on the outside where only chaos and destruction await us..[We must] show our respect for Jehovah's organization, for she is our mother and the beloved wife of our heavenly Father, Jehovah God..
A Witness of Jehovah was going from house to house in Eastern Germany when she met a violent opposer. Knowing at once what to expect she changed her red blouse for a green one in the very next hallway. No sooner had she appeared on the street than a Communist officer asked her if she had seen a woman with a red blouse. No, she replied, and went on her way. Did she tell a lie? No, she did not. She was not a liar. Rather, she was using theocratic war strategy, hiding the truth by action and word for the sake of the ministry." {WT May 1 1957 284-5}
I'm glad to have come across this info on the WTS official website and the quotations found by Thirdson and HesterPryne. The statements seem to sum up the "strategy" quite clearly.
Had Enough (of doublespeak and lies, trying hard to remember the good)
