1975 - A weak argument?

by Christ Alone 89 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  brinjen

  See... this is the part I don't get. They thought 1975 would be the year as it supposedly marked the start of the 7th millenium since the earth was created. So by rights, it's Jehovah's day off, and they thought that would be an appropriate time for Satan and his demons to be locked up while Jehovah got caught up on the footy and drank a few beers his Watchtower studies.

  So if it is Jah's day off... wouldn't that delay armageddon until 2975 at least? Obviously that won't work for them... no "end is near" crap to peddle. So where would that leave their 1 day = 1,000 years spin seeing as this is an essential requirement for "calculating" the 1914 date also? They lay so many traps for themselves without realising, no wonder it's always "wait on Jehovah".
• 

  Bobcat

  Just as an aside which is indirectly related to this subject:

  When the WT study discusses probable/improbable/hard-to-pin down things, always compare the question for the paragraph with what the paragraph actually says.

  The paragraph might say something like, 'Its quite possible that such-and-such is the case.' Then the question will say something like, 'Why was such-and-such the case?' or, 'What proves that such-and-such was the case?'

  The paragraph will postulate but the question will ask the audience to stamp it as true. This is why conductors were instructed not to rephrase the questions. The questions are every bit as much of what is being taught as the paragraph. I've seen it for years now.

  I can see from the comments that much of 1975 was similar. The Society has learned to CYA but still get what they want. And their aura of being F&DS pushes any 'probable/possible' statements into the realm of, 'yea, that is exactly case.' And they never hold the R&F back from running with it. Only when they are called on the issue, then they say, 'We never specifically said that,' or 'The R&F ran ahead . . .,' or similar.

  CA, thanks for bring the topic up, even as aquestion, because it helps expose what is really going on, the unsaid things.
• 

  Ucantnome

  Christ Alone

  I think taking the 1975 approach with a JW is...weak. Was it wrong (and false prophetic) of them? Absolutely. But technically the didn't actually say "Armageddon will come by 1975". The elluded to it. The did everything BUT say it. But the fact remains, they didn't say it WOULD happen.

  In front of me is the book God's Eternal Purpose Now Triumphing for Man's Good (1974 WTB&TS) In the front of this book my wife has written the date August 1974 and the assembly she recieved the book at I presume. Inside there are several other dates relating to when it was studied at the meeting I assume. Starting in December 1974 and the last date is May 1975.

  On page 131 in paragraph 5 it states,

  "The first half or 'evening' period of God's seventh creative 'day' was now closing, 3,500 years from the creation of Adam and Eve. The morning of this creative 'day' was due to begin at 526 B.C.E."

  This was under the heading, "Morning of the seventh Creative day begins 526 B.C.E."

  Earlier in the book on Page 51 there is a subheading "Evening of the Seventh Creative Day begins 4026 B.C.E."

  From these statements I would conclude that the seventh creative day was 7000 years in length and started in 4026 BCE. Maybe I reading it wrong but I don't think so as this is what I understood at the time that we believed the creative days to be 7000 years long.

  On Page 53 the book says "At the beginning of this 'seventh day' almost six thousand years ago God 'proceeded to bless the seventh day and make it sacred.'"

  As it says it was almost 6000 years into the seventh creative day. Which I believe would be exactly 6000 years in in October of 1975.

  The last chapter of the book is "Making the Seventh Creative 'Day' Sacred" page 187.

  on page 189 talking about Satan the Devil it reads,

  "For six thousand years he and his seed have been allowed to continue their effort to make it seem to be a cursed day unsacred... During the thousand years that the Great Serpent and his demon seed are abyssed, Jehovah will reverse all the wickedness."

  This thousand years of the Devil being abyssed was yet to come but before the end of the 7000 year seventh creative day.

  On the following Page 190 it says,

  "...God's seventh creative day will end up blessed, sacred, sanctified. Jehovah having blessed that day six thousand years ago..."

  On page 186 it says "With all his earthly seed destroyed at Har-Magedon," it then asks the question "Are the original serpent and his invisible demonic seed to be left on the loose in the vicinity of our earth down to which they have been ousted from heaven? No!"

  "By removing the Serpent and his demons from the nieghborhood of the earth and hurling them into the abyss and sealing them up there, bound as with chains for the next thousand years. Revelation 20:1-3 pictures this, not as a part of the war at Har-magedon, but as a follow up of that war."

  So from this book released in 1974 and I believe studied in 1975 it showed that 4026 was the start of the 7th creative day it would end up sacred and blessed with the devil abyssed after Armageddon for the last one thousand years of the 7th creative day.

  The first 6000 years of the 7th creative day would end in 1975 the last one thousand years being the abyssing of the Devil after Armagedon during the thousand year reign of Christ.

  Unless I've misunderstood something I think they were teaching that Har-magedon would occur in 1975
• 

  Slidin Fast

  The real answer to this is that you had to be there. Every witness believed that the end was coming in 1975, if they had any doubts they would not have dared express them for fear of being labelled apostate.

  There was wild speculation and excitement everywhere from bethel to the furthest outreaches on the details of how it would occur. Talks from the platform assumed it as given truth just as much as the blood doctrine or the trinity.

  The society never spoke a word or wrote a line that would have put any sort of a damper on all this. As has been stated, people sold their homes, cashed in their pensions and life insurances in total faith in what they had been taught to believe.

  When the society continued to build new bethels and KHs, many questioned why. We were told that when the end comes that there would be a forward looking going concern. I myself however as a humble pioneer was critised for taking on a $1500 mortgage in 1973 since I dshonestly knew I would never pay it back.

  There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that the whole thrust of everything done and said at that period was ruled by 1975. I would stand in any court of the land and say so.
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  Slidin Fast

  Just an aside, in 1976 I think the WT had the bare assed cheek to blame all this on the R & F. That really upset the brothers, already deflated at having got through 1975, as usual, nothing happened and now suddenly its their fault. Where could they possibly have got that idea from. I wish I had walked out there and then.

  I can still see my best friend at the time standing on the platform trying to dispense that idea as if he believed it. Jeeze
• 

  dozy

  CA has a point & I wouldn't shoot him down in flames. Some arguments resonate with JWs - others don't. ( For me the UN thing wasn't a big issue , but 607 was ). Different strokes for different folks.

  Just to share my experience - I was a child pre '75. But my experiences are very similar to others. It was hyped up by the WTBTS to a ridiculous level. My parents ( especially my father who was an elder ) were motivated in 1973 to give up a well paid comfortable job , sold our house & moved me & my siblings hundreds of miles to a crappy town renting a frozen house to " serve where the need is greater ". ) He once showed me his notebook where he had written down the amount of time that the familys money would last - he gave it till early 1976 to allow a bit of wiggle room.

  I still remember lying in my bed ( presumably some time in 1976 ) listening to my parents arguing bitterly over what a foolish thing they had done & how on earth were they going to pay the bills. The argument ended with my mother running down the street with my father running after her ( we watched from behind the curtains ).

  The WTBTS loves to revise their history , and 1975 is no different in that respect. But those who lived through that era , if they are honest with themselves , know how culpable the society was. The WTBTS somewhat grudgingly apologised for the 1975 debacle ( Yearbook 1980 ) - Ray Franz was asked by the GB to pen the apology & writes about it extensively in his books.

  As every year passes the failed 1975 prophecy retreats further into the past & many of the younger JWs know little or nothing about it.
• 

  Heartofaboy

  Watchtower, August 15, 1968, p. 499:

  "'Adam Created At Close Of 'Sixth Day' Are we to assume from this study that the battle of Armageddon will be all over by the autumn of 1975, and the long-looked-for thousand-year reign of Christ will begin by then? Possibly, but we wait to see how closely the seventh thousand-year period of man's existence coincides with the Sabbath-like thousand-year reign of Christ....It may involve only a difference of weeks or months, not years.'

  37 YEARS later...............

  Enough said.
• 

  Splash

  For October 2015 we should organise a 40th anniversary party.

  Splash
• 

  designs

  Fred Franz was a Septem-millenarian. The Millennium was to start in 1976, you have to have a Armageddon to have a Millennium.
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  Splash

  So what happened immediately after October 1975 had come and gone?

  · Those that had sold up to pioneer were let down and left disenchanted.

  · The Society saw its first ever decrease in the number of memorial attendees.

  · Annual baptisms decreased year on year from 295,073 in 1974 to 95,052 in 1977.

  · The Society lost 660,000 publishers (approx 30%) over the following five years.

  · The enthusiasm had gone, the congregations became despondent.

  Trying to address this exodus was a KM in November 1975 urging all to not stop preaching since it is Jehovah who decides when to 'shut the door' .

  Splash