Evaluating Raymond Franz

by greendawn 59 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

  • mouthy
    mouthy

    What did the GB say that they kicked him out from the GB for?

    For having lunch with Peter Gregerson a D/f

  • BluesBrother
    BluesBrother
    I have seen here some people criticize him as not being a really heartfelt opponent of the WTS

    What more does a man have to do? He gave up a comfortable life in Bethel where he was respected and at the top of the tree. He left , to take ordinary work in Alabama. His departure really was a "Crisis of Conscience" . He could have swept the thoughts from his mind and studied his own "Aid Book" to regain his faith in dubdom. Two best selling books have helped many thousands of people.

    OK so in recent years he has not campaigned against the Society. If he had of done the rumours that he was drawing followers after himself might have been substantiated . His relative silence proves those rumours to be lies.

    I salute the man - A real hero

  • truthsearcher
    truthsearcher

    A man of incredible courage and conviction

  • MeneMene
    MeneMene

    I had not been to meetings in probably 8 or 10 years when my daughter started dating a young man that was Assembly of God. She started researching the WTS to prove to him they were the "Truth". Well, that backfired.

    She gave me a copy of CoC to read. I was really scared when I started it. I was waiting for lightning to strike me dead at any moment.

    By the time I finished it I had a calm come over me like I had never felt before.

    I had a young relative that was disfellowshipped and I was trying to figure out how to approach him about reading CoC. I visited him one day and happened to see he already had a copy and was reading it! We had a nice long chat after that.

    Thank you Ray Franz. You have helped more people than you could have ever imagined when you wrote that book.

  • eddie c
    eddie c

    I used to meet secretly with an elder from my old Kingdom Hall.(i am considered to be apostate) This elder could not break away from the Watchtower. I gave him a copy of Cof C. A few days later he came back,put the book on the table and broke into tears. He explained that he too was having a crisis of conscience.Rays book was a lifeline for him,everthing became clear and he was able to finally break away from the Watchtower.

    We used to stand outside Watchtower Conventions holding up Rays book and announcing a new release from the governing body. A few brave witnesses came and took a copy.

    I agree with the above sentiments about Ray.

    Eddie

  • Bangalore
    Bangalore

    Bttt.

    Bangalore

  • moshe
    moshe

    Just imagine what might have changed for JWs, if Ray's crisis of conscience could have happened during his public WT assembly keynote address. By 1973 he must have smelled a rat in the WT religion.

    http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=lQIOAAAAIBAJ&sjid=LW0DAAAAIBAJ&pg=7350,328062&dq=ray+franz+jehovah%27s&hl=en

  • designs
    designs

    Ray was the real deal and genuinely helped thousands. Schnell just went from one Cult into another Cult.

  • IbenLyed2
  • Juan Viejo2
    Juan Viejo2

    Schnell's book came out when I was still just a kid JW. I remember hearing about it. When it was mentioned Schnell was always described as being "demon possessed," or as someone who was angry because he wasn't moved up in the organization fast enough. He was described as a very angry person. I did not actually read his book until sometime in the late 1970s.

    When Schnell's book came out, the Watchtower authorized Marley Cole to write his book around 1952. This was a standard hardcover book. Later, I found out that Cole was a JW and that the Watchtower provided some of the funds for the publication of the book. Every JW family rushed out to buy a copy, so for a brief time it was on the best seller lists. Talk about a kiss-ass piece of sh3t.

    Just a few years later, A. H. MacMillan wrote "Faith on the March." Again, the Watchtower Society funded the publication of his book (MacMillan could not afford to publish it - he was a member of the Bethel family). MacMillan was an associate of both Russell and Rutherford, so his perspective was interesting from a historical perspective. But later on I found out that much of the material in his book was actually partly written and approved by the Writing Committee at Bethel. It was sort of a precursor to the "Proclaimers" book.

    Franz's first book was the first one that I read that seemed to be an honest reporting job of the WT's history and the events that surrounded the 1975 debacle and the formation of the Governing Body. As you read it, you can almost imagine Ray sitting in the room with you and just telling his story in an honest and forthright way. As many have mentioned before, I did not see any anger in his writings, but there was frustration and a feeling that many good deeds were left undone by those who had it in their power to correct the errors and the course that the Society was taking.

Share this

Google+
Pinterest
Reddit