I'm reposting this with amendments as a helpful reminder to JWs to think about the true character of their 'mother organisation'
Watchtower punishments and legal reform.
All organizations need judicial procedures and sanctions, civil services, tradesmen's guilds, unions, the local rotary club, yes, even the Watchtower. So I am not going to argue against such things. Instead, I invite anyone interested in this organization, to look more carefully at its organizational policies, to make sure, and to question, whether they can honestly be said to come from God. I have relied on common principles of fairness and humanity in my view, and it seems these principles must be challenged to refute most of what am saying.
JWs may object to the title of this essay, that their organization does not actually punish, but rather applies 'loving' restrictions, for the protection of the congregation as a whole, and for the long-term benefit of the offender. Such arguments would typically come from inexperienced JWs. But it is wrong to deny the punitive element because even when someone is established by a judicial committee as being duly repentant for their offence they always receive restrictions on their personal congregational activity (removal of ‘privileges’). These cannot have been applied to rehabilitate the offender since repentance has already been established, therefore the only other purpose served by restrictions in these cases, is to punish.
Punishment, according to Cesare Beccarria, (author of 'On Crimes and Punishment',) should be public, prompt, proportionate to the crime, necessary, the least possible, and dictated by law. Though a Catholic Beccarria, he was speaking from a secular standpoint at a time when religious crimes received the severest punishments imaginable, when secular judicial torture was still common in France, and The Holy Office of the inquisition still held sway in Spain.
How do Watchtower punishments look when compared to Beccarria’s relatively humane criteria?
Public: All Watchtower trials are secret. However many offences deemed serious do receive public punishments: DF, DA, or Public Reproof. The same offences can be dealt with a private reproof, at the elder's discretion. Unfortunately most times, because reproofs come in the form of restrictions on public activities (e.g. field service), the privacy of reproofs is compromised, resulting in some form of public shaming for the reproved person.
Prompt: The local elders decide when and how to prosecute someone, barring unusual cases of nepotism or partiality, I think they are generally eager to ‘keep the congregation clean’ and to pursue a prosecution once they think they have enough evidence. Once a trial has arrived at a verdict the punishments are effective immediately or within a couple of days.
Proportionate: The range of punishments open to committees is not large. All punishments given by a judicial committee involve removal of ‘privileges’. This also includes a reproof, which is either public or private. DF or DA lies at the other end of the range. The variations in punishment come in with how long restrictions are maintained. Of course, there is no physical punishment, such as Beccaria was criticising, times have changed, but there is certainly a psychological punishment (see example #1 below).
Necessary: Beccarria viewed this in Utilitarian terms, i.e., the greatest good for the greatest number. So does "keeping the congregation clean" through present WT judicial policies achieve this type of good? In many cases, removal of individuals, like sexual predators and the persistently disruptive, must benefit the congregation as a whole. In other cases, where someone conscientiously and openly opposes certain policies of the WT leadership, but maintains respect for congregation order, their removal can be damaging to the whole. This is because in society at large, most people having different opinions can still maintain close relationships, whereas they generally shun the persistently disruptive or known predators from their association, and they do so of their own volition. Further, where somebody is punished for openly holding an opinion, which other less vocal members also hold, a conflict of loyalty is set up, and communication is impaired in the congregation with people fearing to express their own opinions.
The least possible, and dictated by law: While the range is small, the duration of punishments is at the discretion of the committee. They assess ‘indications of repentance’ which include: meeting attendance over a period of time, observance of their order-of silence at those meetings, and observance of non-contact with individual JWs. In short, they look for obedience and a wistful sorryness. But a restricted person can fulfil these criteria for many months until the committee thinks it has gone on long enough. Sometimes there is a point at which embarrassment sets in for the congregation, and the elders then reinstate. This aspect of the WT judicial process is the least "dictated by law" because it is at best a spurious examination of the individual’s ‘heart condition’. At worst it amounts to another trial, this time public, and a trial by ordeal which can be stretched out over months. Why a trial by ordeal? Because a repentant person must attend meetings regularly, without any human contact, it is an intense social situation for everyone except them, for while they attend they must be shunned. If they greet people or talk to anyone (other than a designated elder-contact) they have failed the ordeal and will not be reinstated.
Counter arguments.
JWs could answer this by claiming that any legal problems (such as miscarriages of justice or flawed procedures) are avoided by the action of Holy Spirit on the three-elder committee. This, they say, overrides prejudices, reveals true ‘heart condition’ and ensures justice. In other words, despite all appearances, or evidence to the contrary, judicial decisions are always correct. However, if that is so, then why does an appeal committee sometimes overturn a verdict? Surely, this means that the first committee must have lacked Holy Spirit. And without Holy Spirit were those three men capable of acting as congregation elders to start with, let alone as committee judges? If not, shouldn’t they be removed as elders? Of course, that is not what happens. So the Holy Spirit argument tends to be used as a ‘fudge', and as an excuse for not setting up a better system, the saying is "Jehovah will sort it out". When an elder or committee makes a good decision, then, one infers long afterwards that Holy Spirit was present, when a bad decision is made one infers that it was not present. This is hit-and-miss justice.
A second dodge is for JWs to give good examples of judicial decisions. What about these, for there must be such examples? Yes there are. These are the result of decisions made with adequate evidence by capable and good-hearted elders. However such examples would be hard to come by because all trials are supposed to be secret. Any details, which were forth coming, would likely be termed gossip. Any judicial system must be more robust than the individuals who operate it. Relying exclusively on good-heartedness and/or a capricious spiritual influence is not enough. It amounts to fair-weather justice.
A final JW defense is to say: yes, there are some bad decisions, these are still Holy Spirit directed, but they are tests of our faith.
OK, what are the consequences of this defense? A couple of examples…
Example #1: Brother 'P' is making his case for reinstatement. Once the accounts servant, he had been convicted of stealing money from the collection boxes. 'X' 'Y' and 'Z' are his elder-judges in committee. After 30 minutes brother 'P' is sent out so the judges can confer. Y and Z are convinced the man is repentant, but X disagrees. The reinstatement is refused. After other such hearings attempting to get reinstated, brother 'P' gives up and stops attending meetings. Did he lack repentance by giving up? And did the Holy Spirit guide X so as to prevent brother 'P' returning? Nobody can say. It is just as likely that he could no longer bear rejection by God, or more accurately, the psychological pain of fruitless rejections by an organization, which he believes, represents his God on earth.
Example #2: 'D' has been disfellowshipped, for molesting children, and 12 months later seeks reinstatement. The committee (X, Y, and Z) are hearing his case. Of course 'D' does not tell them, he is still abusing, but he does show all the appropriate displays of being sorry about the incident which caused his expulsion. They decide he is repentant and 'D' gets reinstated. He soon begins abusing a child in the congregation. Question: Did the Holy Spirit guide this committee? If so, Jehovah must have wanted to test people in the congregation (notably the child and its close family) by allowing this person back. A really troubling conclusion to reach.
Conclusions
To recap, one is asked to accept that: Holy Spirit can: prejudice the elders against the candidate for reinstatement’s case, blind them to evidence of ‘true repentance’, and allow unrepentant persons back into the congregation. This latter point seems ridiculous enough, but worse, it undermines the avowed purpose of judicial action: "keeping the congregation clean". In other words, the congregation is clean, so long as Jehovah's Holy Spirit hasn't directed any judicial committees to reinstate any serious wrongdoers lately, to test the congregation!
I hope it seems clear that Watchtower judicial procedures do not tend to provide for justice for individuals, and that neither do they tend to protect the congregation. The procedures simply give an appearance of providing these things. And so long as one does not examine them closely, or experience them oneself, this fact usually goes unnoticed. There are however things they reliably do provide: a scapegoat function (people to shun), congregational splits of loyalty, intrigue and gossip engendered by the secrecy of trials, and forceful reminders of the power of the elders and of the organization.
To many, it is a startling conclusion that this organization, despite being made of, and led by, a largely decent and well-meaning people, cannot itself as a whole be characterized in this positive way. Could the Watchtower organization remove its façade of legal procedures, and reform? Possibly. But if that happened it would certainly become more difficult to prosecute its members. Most people, who view organizations to be in certain ways less important than their memberships, would think this a good thing, but is this so with the Watchtower? A radical reform, also in line with ideas of 'simplification', could be to begin judicial hearings with prayer, asking "Jehovah, what shall we do with Brother Accused?" then casting lots, and trusting the Holy Spirit to deliver the correct decision. I am not joking, please note this is how Thaddeus was appointed an Apostle.
Do not the present Watchtower judicial policies stand as an indictment of the whole organization: betraying trust, weakening congregations, and demonstrating an uncaring attitude toward its members?
philo