Haven't sent this yet: might not, but I think it would help people here:
To all my family members and friends of the Jehovah’s Witnesses
For the past year and a half I have been deeply immersing myself in the community which you refer to as the “apostates”: the Ex Jehovah’s Witness Community. I have learned almost every aspect of their particular side of the story. I now have a broad perspective from both sides as a believer and a non believer. I am the son of a former elder and for a several year period in my adolescence I was training specifically for the end goal of becoming an elder myself. I was encouraged to do this by the elders of my congregation and I gladly accepted their invitation to train. It was certainly a path to righteousness that would make my father and family proud.
That’s not quite the way it turned out for me once I actually got the reigns to my own life. I am currently happily married to my wife of almost 8 years. We have a 15 month old baby boy who is toddling around while growing up at an exponential rate. Rather than sitting in my study with my nose in the Bible, or helping someone get through their sinful tendencies I am strategizing the life of my family and working hard. My goal is simply to help others as I can, while sustaining myself and my family, while attempting to live my life as a moral example. This, to me, is how I am choosing to follow Jesus’ teachings.
Unlike my past I don’t have a worry in the world in regard to my conduct before God because I know he sees my very best every day. I would never give anything less, not just because of God’s approval, but because survival demands it. Sometimes survival demands more than your best and when it does we sometimes, as humans, don’t make it through.
It is a fact that the Jehovah’s Witnesses statistically have a higher suicide rate than average. Many people within the Ex Jehovah’s Witness Community have known a Witness who had committed suicide after losing it all. I was astonished and deeply saddened by these stories of people that lived a similar life to me that ultimately gave up.
Even the ones that make it through the emptiness and sadness are still blinded by the immense and powerful light of the world they were cast into. They see Good and Evil always fighting each other even though both sides always attest that they are of the Good side. Who is it then that chooses who is lying and who is telling the truth? It is the individual that, in the end, has to make the final choice. The individual, as the Organization that brought me up so thoroughly and repeatedly taught me, is imperfect. So, naturally, at times the final choices individuals make will end in failure. These failures come at low and high costs involving every aspect of our human lives. Failure is a serious matter and a necessary evil.
Although Fear of Failure should never be allowed to dwell within our minds because I have learned that it is useless. External or internal statements such as “Maybe I don’t have what it takes” blow gaping holes in our own feet.
The difference between the Gospels and the books that come before and after them is, in my opinion, immense. Jesus’ message strongly advocated aiding the downtrodden by absolving their guilt they had for themselves and their choices. Once their guilt was lifted they wanted to do good and Jesus knew this. Jesus’ contemporaries were an oppressed people by both their government and their religion. They were tired; just as many of us are today. Jesus had the opportunity to live that life with them and then have the glory of giving them hope and strength.
Jesus specifically chose the poor to deliver his message because they were humble. They were humble because they were outcasts of society and truly no part of the world; they had to depend on each other while they were persecuted.
When a member chooses a different lifestyle than that of the Jehovah’s Witnesses or other more religiously conservative groups they take a much more dangerous route; they become, willfully, the persecuted. While in full knowledge of their family and friends vehement disapproval they have to create their own identity in relation to God; if they even chose to believe in an intelligent Cause.
It’s amazing to me that, after all my criticism of the Bible, the Gospels alone ended up being what I cherished the most while strongly criticizing the rest. What Jesus actually did and how it actually happened has been lost in time, but his message was so powerful that it can still be ascertained through reading the Bible which has been subject to so many “telephone games” for millennium. Still Jesus message never changes and remains steady, easily findable and understandable: love your God and love your neighbor as yourself.
If the Bible is indeed inspired by God it would only be a linguistic vessel containing a simple message. A complex message would never make it through the gauntlet that the Bible has been allowed to be put through over time. One large fact that is always underplayed by the Witnesses is that the Bible is an ancient artifact and must be studied carefully and skillfully.
The New World Translation is no different than any other serious attempt at translating our Sacred Archeology and in many regards is inferior to other attempts. We have a zeal for the pursuit of truth just as Pastor Russell, the founder of the Watch Tower Society, did as he studied the pyramids of Giza all those years ago. How is he remembered for his ventures and passion? His works, and his true identity, was forgotten and replaced by something quite different.
I was always taught by the Organization that the “roots” of everything must be researched so that a guideline could be put in place that prevents loss of favor from God. It is an odd pursuit to discover and create biblical trains of thought from our imperfect minds and apply them to the lives of others. How can a group of people be so obsessed with the roots of everything while they show little to no concern for the founders of their own religion? How many Witness households contain photo copies of the original Watchtowers? Or any of Charles Taze Russell’s or Judge Rutherford’s books. When I read their books I get that they were very proud of their works and much time and mental resources were put into them. I can’t help but think of things I have created in my life that I am proud of. What if a hundred years later the people who call themselves my successors did not show care for them?
I can’t help but wonder if there was any energy put forth by anyone in the Organization to “phase out” these books from the social circles. How many basic questions about Pastor Russell and the original movement could a Witness child answer? Would they know about the “Millions Now Living Will Never Die” presentations in the 1920’s? Or that Pastor Russell predicted the end of the world for 1914 and then when it didn’t come called Christ’s “invisible return”? Harold Camping recently did the same thing and if you research history you will find countless groups making the similar outlandish predictions. Is it because they were “over eager” or could it be part of a formula that many have used and are still using to this day?
Why don’t Witnesses care about this stuff? Is it because of Proverbs and the new light concept? I read a quote from Pastor Russell in an old Watchtower about just that; it was jaw dropping. He stated that new light should never cover over old light rendering it obsolete and I agree with him. The facts about God and his Organization in the last days should never become obsolete, but in a stroke of wild historical irony that is exactly what his successors did with his words. They simply created the logical counterpart to new light (old light) and assigned all of his works under that category. The historian in me wants to say that someone didn’t like Pastor Russell’s works and ordered a systematic phase out of them, but I guess that’s just a conspiracy theory.
Over the past year and a half I have made over 5,000 posts on ex Jehovah’s Witness forums and have made countless acquaintances and some good friends. I have videos on Youtube that have helped many people not feel alone in their exile from the Watchtower. What was extremely unexpected for me is that most of them uphold a respectable moral standard even if very different than the rigid framework of their past. I feel like I see Jesus’ teachings and complete message flowing through their words as they recount their fears, hopes and dreams with me and anyone else choosing to listen. It has been a deeply enlightening experience for me and I ask that you don’t let the writers of Brooklyn choose which color pen to write about the Ex Jehovah’s Witness Communities with.
I challenge you to follow in Jesus steps and truly be impartial with your judgments of others. If you give credit where credit is due it will always work out in both parties favor. Right now there is a disdain from both sides, one that could be mended if the Witnesses just took a good look at what the Ex Jehovah’s Witness Community have put together: the truth. You all are taught to avert your eyes so you don’t see the beauty that has formed out of their pain and their sorrow. It is exactly what happened in Jesus time, but this time around we didn’t need someone to be tortured to death to get the point. We have the power as God/Nature allows for and if we live in reverence of that simple truth and make decisions based off our collective experiences we will flourish. Unfortunately the only way to accomplish this is to change, sometimes fundamentally, when the facts stop making sense and, as Ex Jehovah’s Witnesses truly know, change doesn’t come easy.
The Watchtower uses a Bible verse to discourage what they refer to as “independent thinking.” They fail to understand the basics of that verse. Not leaning on our own understanding pertains to singling out our own experience with God while ignoring others experiences. The verse does not point to Brooklyn New York it points to collective mankind. We must stick together and glean from each other’s experiences especially when it comes to our spirituality. Frankly I am flabbergasted that the verse is used to validate the Watchtower as the only means of communication with God. That is blatant religious abuse just like in Jesus’ day; you must understand this as the times become increasingly more complex.
The Last Days section of the Bible was written only to be on hand within our minds when needed, not the sole reason for an entire doctrine and way of life. What happens to the mind when it lives in constant expectation of the end of the world? It’s not pretty, and you can see it by looking in the mirror and listening to your inner voices as people raised as Jehovah’s Witnesses. Our minds lay damaged and dysfunctional because of someone else’s obsession with eternal life. Keeping my eye on such a prize will never be something I apply in my life. I will keep my eyes on my feet and where they are going as I tread through this chaotic and enlightening world with God in my ear.
God is with the individual and the individuals are the ones that choose to become groups and organize. Many groups, after forming and operating for a while, forget how and why they came to be in the first place. This is true with the Jehovah’s Witnesses. All those years ago Pastor Russell was fed up with his contemporaries and their cumbersomely rigid view of the Bible. He rebuked religious elitism and encouraged personal study of the Bible and then taking that study, right or wrong, to the group for review. This open ended approach is the way religion should be run. In fact many religious communities around the world apply such frameworks with fruitful results. Unfortunately Judge Rutherford, the second president of the Watch Tower Society, left no chance at Russell’s work becoming more than just a new rigid view of the Bible. He decimated his memory right after he died by ignoring who his Society was to be given to in his will. The Jehovah’s Witness Movement was stifled before it even had a chance to become something other than “another wacky religion.”
I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it’s time for our Organization to either sink or swim. The Watchtower’s ex members are the least of their concern. Every day evidence is mounting that the Bible is not the inerrant book the Jehovah’s Witnesses want it so desperately to be. The ship of the Jehovah’s Witnesses will capsize if the breach in it’s hull is not mended.
That breach in the hull is the worship of the Bible and all the many detriments that come from that misplaced worship. If Jesus truly was divine and returned today he would find many fundamentalist groups, including the Jehovah’s Witnesses, knee deep in idolatry of the Bible itself. The stories of the Bible continue to be debunked by both science and archeology as real historical accounts. Philosophy and raw logic has rendered many stories in the Old Testament, without doubt, as mere allegory. We are in a time in our history where the reality of the Bible is becoming increasingly clearer. Archeology has found that the Bible refers to real cities and sometimes real people, but in no way does it confirm what actually happened with those people per the Bible.
We all grew up developing hatred for Adam and Eve. I remember many times confiding with all of you over the pain and suffering that they caused. We were genuinely angry at our First Parents. That story, told as a literal account, encourages and furthers the lie that all of our hard work can be rendered useless and replaced with sorrow because of a single choice with no personal means of fixing the problem. We are taught by that account, when told literally, that we have no real control in our lives and that existence is really just a celestial battle between God and his Adversaries. This is not what the story was written to be about at all.
The story is an allegory for Free Will. The tree of Life symbolizes human life chosen for them and the tree of Good and Bad symbolizes human life chosen by the individual. The serpent represents the animal instinct within us all to abandon reason, just as you are doing when you believe the story is a literal history. With a clear understanding of why these books were written we can then ascertain the deep things, if any, contained within.
You also quote Paul when he said “the time left is reduced” and apply it to our time while almost completely ignoring who he was talking to and why he was talking to them. Surely he didn’t mean that the end was so soon for him and his contemporaries so why are do the Witnesses connect his words to our time? He was talking to people and we tend to forget that. His words were not the prophecies for our time the Watchtower wants us to believe, they were merely letters to his beloved people. Thinking that one of his out of context verses from that letter somehow applies to our time thousands of years later surely is to abandon reason, just as Eve did with the Serpent. Once we abandon reason then believing whatever our egos concoct becomes quite easy.
Depression is another statistic more common within the Watch Tower Society’s members. Depression is a death sentence to some members of the Jehovah’s Witnesses and I believe that is provable. The Society, historically, expects too much out of their members, but it’s hard for the members to question the acts of God through the Watchtower so most just grin and bear it. The problem is that the actual mental issue arose is never dealt with and it festers. That’s why growing we saw a lot of “freak outs” from people that seemed out of character for them. This is because they were bottling up emotions that were not socially acceptable within their group so they felt the need to keep them inside of their heads which was a mistake. It is long term choices like that that end in committing suicide because the person eventually completely abandons reason out of fear of total rejection with no perceived way out.
It is the Watchtower’s system that facilitates the depression and until the Watchtower realizes this and makes the needed doctrinal and policy reforms their depression problem will worsen. Once again, it is the Watchtower’s stubborn grip on Biblical inerrancy that must be hurled overboard just as Jonah was because of causing the storms.
However, I fear that their stubbornness will not subside and they will continue to attempt to safeguard their Biblical ideals in a world where they have been proven otherwise. This cannot end well so I implore all of you to continue on with endurance and I want you to know that I love you very much. If you do not wish to leave then at least do not further the destructive ideas of ourselves that the Watchtower has created. We don’t start out bad we start out good and it is our experience and circumstances empowered by individual choice that molds us into who we eventually become. Our future generations should not have to make the same mistakes as we did in our hatred for ourselves.
The fact is that humanity has always been on the upswing it’s just impossible to see that while under certain circumstances. Only when we rise up as a true individual are we capable of shining as a single luminary amongst a collection of luminaries.
You and I are not our past no matter how much others may want to believe that we are. Whatever we have done, for good or for evil, is washed away with time. Who are we now? That is the question and the answer is of utmost importance.
I love you all and thank you for being a part of my life in the past. Of course I’m still around and always will be until I am not anymore. I’d like to see any of you if you have the strength to swallow the past and to make something new.
Your friend always,
-Alex
-Sab