Hi,
If you followed the thread I posted earlier about the PO coming by to talk about my objections to their shunning policy, you know that the PO had to cancel and rescheduled the meeting till next Monday. Oh the busy lives of Janitors. My wife, the Loyal Dub also told him that I have a problem with the blood issue. I wrote up a summation of a few of the problems I have with it and I thought perhaps it would be useful to some of you, if not now perhaps at a latter time as the issue comes up. As always some of it is borrowed from other sources, and some of it, including the typo’s comes from my hollow head. He already has my letter on shunning now I’m going to stick this in the PO’s face when he comes over. See what you think…and if you wish let me know what you think. PS: sorry for the formatting, it looks great in MS Word but did not do well in the translation to html.
Freeman
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Notes on Inconsistencies Found In The Current Blood Policy
·June 15, 2000 Watchtower on page 30 states, “God’s law on blood is not open to reform”. However this very article itself is an example of reform in that it is now permitted to use any and all fractions of the major components of blood where previously only some were permitted. Looking at the history related to the policy on abstaining from blood, this policy appears to have always been in a state of reform, especially in the areas of which or if any blood fractions could be acceptable to Christians.
For example this is what the Watchtower of 9/15/1961 page 559 said about blood:
“Regardless of weather it is whole blood or a blood fraction, whether it is blood taken from one’s own body or taken from someone else, whether it is administered as a transfusion or as an injection, the divine law applies. God has not given man blood to use as he might use other substances; he requires respect for the sanctity of blood”. This policy and teaching as stated in the 9/15/1961 WT is totally the opposite of the new teaching and policy as stated in the June 2000 Watchtower. How is this consistent, how is this logical?
·Today the claim is made that “we abstain from blood”, however, it is a fact that we do not abstain from the medical use of blood in products that contain parts of blood. How is this consistent, how is this logical?
·Today the vast majority of Witnesses receive and allow their children to receive vaccinations, many of which are derived in part from blood. However this was not always the case. In the past Witnesses were prohibited from receiving vaccinations. Note what the Jan. 5, 1929 issue of the Society’s magazine The Golden Age had to say about vaccinations: "Thinking people would rather have smallpox than vaccination, because the latter sows seeds of syphilis, cancers, eczema, erysipelas, scrofula, consumption, even leprosy and many other loathsome affections. Hence the practice of vaccinations is a crime, an outrage, and a delusion". Many persons following this advice from the Watchtower Society likely died as a result. Smallpox alone has more then a 30% mortality rate, let alone all the other diseases preventable by simple vaccinations that were prohibited to Witnesses at the time. In light of the present policy on vaccinations, how is this consistent, how is this logical?
·While we do not donate blood ourselves, it is a fact that the Red Cross has had to collect thousands and thousands of extra units of blood and process this extra blood into fractions for use in caring for Jehovah’s Witnesses. The Witness’s use of blood fractions has caused a need for more blood to be collected and processed into fractions and the Witness’s need for this blood has caused a large volume of blood to be collected and never poured out on the ground. How is this consistent, how is this logical?
·Witnesses cannot store their own blood for transfusion at a later date because we are told it must be poured out on the ground, but somehow it remains permissible to cause others to have their blood stored for processing into blood fractions for Witnesses use. How is this consistent, how is this logical?
·Witnesses are told that they cannot accept platelets, which make up only 0.17% of blood or leukocytes making up only 0.1% of blood, but somehow they can accept hemoglobin making up some 13.5% of blood by volume. In this case the amount of the approved fraction, hemoglobin, is many, many times greater then the two banned parts of blood combined; yet for some reason the two smaller fractions are inexplicably not permitted. How is this consistent, how is this logical?
·Witnesses have been disfellowshipped, cut off from God, handed over to Satan as it were for accepting organ transplants or accepting once “forbidden” components of blood that are now deemed acceptable. Conversely, Witnesses have even died refusing what was forbidden to them at one time, died as a result of not excepting the very same things that now are allowed. Who is to blame for this? How is this consistent, how is this logical?
Are the men in Brooklyn who interpret God’s word and determine for all Witnesses what may or may not be considered a conscience issue aware that identical twins who share the same placenta exchange their blood during pregnancy?
Due these men who created the list of approved and banned components understand that the blood that is exchanged between twins in the womb is not in the form of fractions. Due they realize that this is whole blood exchanged from one twin to the other in the natural setting of the womb.
This simple well-known medical fact presented above begs the question: does God violate his own law? Very unlikely!
Yet current Watchtower policy on blood claims that it would indeed be a violation of God’s law, for these same twins years later and now grown, to have blood from one twin donated to the other twin, even in the event of a medical emergency. In fact both the donor and the recipient twins could be subject to judicial action if they were baptized members of the congregation. Yes both twins could be subject to judicial action for willingly allowing a procedure outside the womb that God in his wisdom has allowed naturally inside the womb. Again it must be asked; how is this consistent, how is this logical?
Conclusion:
It is a fact that God is a god of order. He is not a god of disorder, confusion, or illogic. God is true to his word and his word is absolutely unchanging. The material presented above, (just a small fraction of such material that could be presented on this subject), overwhelmingly demonstrates that the Watchtower policy on blood is most definitely subject to change at any time, and when carefully examined, quite illogical in many respects.
Would it be the course of wisdom to dogmatically follow a policy that appears to be quite imperfect, a policy that could and in fact has caused a great loss of life over the years? Should one follow a policy not explicitly laid out in scripture and that has claimed the lives of so many innocent children? Should one blindly follow a policy that has been demonstrated to be subject to revision at any time, and perhaps revised yet again after the unnecessary death of other innocent persons including our precious children? And one final question, does this policy seem to reflect the perfect unchanging will of God, or does it seem to reflect the imperfect and changing will of man?
You be the judge.