Was Rutherford Mentally Ill?

by VM44 38 Replies latest watchtower scandals

• 

  VM44

  In the Golden Age Goodies thread Leolaia has posted two letters that were printed in the magazine written by Rutherford, one in 1928 and the other in 1938. In both letters Rutherford states either that radio "was created by God" or "No man invented radio".

  Rutherford also goes into his conspiratorial ideas of how the Roman Catholic church was working with the Nazis to overthrow the governments of England and of the USA to bring in a totalitarian fascist government to both countries.

  These remarks sound like the ravings of someone who is not mentally all there.

  So the question that naturally arises is this: Was Rutherford mentally ill?

  I believe that he was.

  --VM44
• 

  LittleToe

  He appears to have been a power-hungry lunatic, but I'm not quite sure that he was mentally deranged. Just as today, conspiracy theorists abounded, with Nazis holding the centre stage.
• 

  slimboyfat

  I think you should lay off Rutherford. I think he must have had some redeeming qualities, and I am going to make a post to that effect shortly in order to show all you apostates wrong.

  Slim
• 

  Stephanus

  "Mentally ill" probably doesn't really describe the Judge. I think he's one of those "strong egos gone wrong" types.
  
  Like SlimboyFat...
• 

  slimboyfat

  I am sure Stephanus has come redeeming qualities too.

  Slim
• 

  The Mayor of Turiwhate

  He may not necessarily have been mentally ill.

  J.F. Rutherford was an alcoholic, and could well have been under the influence - rather than mentally ill - when he made a lot of his utterances .

  I would agree with you that something definitely wasn't right much of the time:

  - going by what he said and wrote!

  The Mayor.
• 

  Stephanus

  I am sure Stephanus has come redeeming qualities too.

  I don't worry too much about you, mate - I've seen people come out, but who are still a little taken aback by the over-exhuberant anti-Dub manner of many here, and then start to become partial 'Tower defenders/Apostate baiters. But eventually everybody calms down, and starts talking in a civil manner again. NYT becomes Mike Musto.

  Just don't get so pointed in your discussions that you get banned from the board - nobody wins in those situations!
• 

  Stephanus

  The Mayor.

  Are you the kind of New Zealand mayor who fines a farmer squillions for clearing a tree from his own property, and then has a stand of ancient trees chopped down on council land?
• 

  Lady Lee

  Well there are all kinds of "mental illness" out there.

  Was he insane. I don't think so.

  • He made a plan on how to establish a vast publishing company and rake in huge amounts of money. And the plan worked probably better than he even dreamed of.
  • He knew exactly how to manipulate people to get what he wanted.
  • He had a knowledge of the law and knew how to use that to create situations that furthered his plan.
  • He also knew enough about group behavior and management to manipulate groups of people both inside and outside his organization.
  • He was an alcoholic and was able to hide it from the average JW
  • He was able to convince hundreds of people to believe his nonsense
• 

  greendawn

  No he was not deranged but he was to some degree psychopathic, he was too aggressive and too narcistic to be normal and this showed in his grandiose ideas that he was one of the characters appearing in the book of Revelation 2000 earlier in prophetic visions and that he was chosen by God to be over the interests of the kingdom here on earth.
  
  Normal people do not propagate such ideas, it could also be the alcohol and the demonic occultic activities he was involved in.