What were Jehovah's Witnesses (then known as the International Bible Students with J.F. Rutherford as their president) doing in the Spring of 1918? What did they believe?
This is important because today's Organization states that momentous events were happening in the Spring of 1918. For example:
May 1 1993 Watchtower p. 15
First, though, these anointed Christians needed cleansing. As Malachi 3:1-5 had foretold, Jehovah God and his “messenger of the covenant,” Jesus Christ, came to inspect the spiritual temple in the spring of 1918. Judgment was to begin with “the house of God.” (1 Peter 4:17) Malachi 3:3 foretold: “He [Jehovah] must sit as a refiner and cleanser of silver and must cleanse the sons of Levi; and he must clarify them like gold and like silver.” It was a period of refining and cleansing.
Passing through this judgment, which climaxed in 1918, the remnant of the slave class was cleansed from worldly and religious defilement. Why did Jehovah cleanse them? Because his spiritual temple was involved. This is the templelike arrangement for worshiping Jehovah on the basis of the propitiatory sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Jehovah wanted his temple to be in a clean condition so that when large numbers of worshipers with earthly hopes were brought there, they would find a place where his universal sovereignty is respected, where his divine name is sanctified, and where his righteous laws are obeyed. Thus, they would appreciate Jehovah and join in making known his grand purposes.
Revelation -- Its Grand Climax At Hand! p. 30
Thus, when the Lord’s day dawned in October 1914, there were still true Christians on earth. (Revelation 1:10) It appears that Jehovah came to his spiritual temple for judgment about three and a half years later, in 1918, accompanied by Jesus as his “messenger of the covenant.” (Malachi 3:1; Matthew 13:47-50) It was time for the Master to reject finally the false Christians and to appoint ‘the faithful and discreet slave over all his belongings.’—Matthew 7:22, 23; 24:45-47.
It was also time for this slave to give special attention to the things written in Jesus’ messages to the seven congregations, as we see from what is stated therein. For example, Jesus refers to his coming to judge the congregations, which judgment began in 1918.
On March 1, 1918, a special issue of The Watch Tower was published. It was a special edition of the book The Finished Mystery with some added material considering the book of Daniel. It was referred to as the ZG. Z stood for "Zion's Watch Tower" and G stood for the 7th volume of Studies in the Scriptures. Only a few copies of this magazine were circulated in 1918 due to the restrictions that were put upon the movement by U.S. Federal authorities. After World War I, many thousands of copies of this magazine were distributed by members of the International Bible Students Association.
For those interested, a PDF of this rare Watch Tower magazine is now available. It is available in two versions. The first one contains the black cover that was put over the regular magazine cover. It can be downloaded from:
http://www.sendspace.com/file/jz4te3
The second version does not have the black cover and just has the normal cover used for Watchtowers at that time. It can be downloaded from:
http://www.filesend.net/download.php?f=81855274241d40c99584e5ec3c7a3a74
Both files are about 71 MB and are bookmarked and fully searchable.
I have to thank some helpers who helped me ascertain that I had all the correct pages for this file. The paper my copy was printed on was highly acidic and extremely brittle. When I obtained it, it was missing a few pages. So, these helpers scanned a few pages from their copies and helped me make sure I had the correct pagination for this file. I made the choice to do a color scan for now and hope eventually to complete a black and white scan later. I could not have done this file without their help.
So, if you want to research what the members of the IBSA under Rutherford were teaching and doing at the Spring of 1918 when they were supposedly under special judgement by God, here's your chance. This magazine comes from the Spring of 1918 and is fully searchable and indexed. This is perhaps one of the most famous single Watchtower issues ever published and represents a considerable amount of JW/Bible Student history.
