Dear Board-
An old JW friend of mine called me a week ago. We talked, she has doubts. We talked more, now she wants to know why I "left" the truth.
I have written an e-mail to a select few of you for some much needed assistance. Here is what I responded to her for the time-being...
Don't be critical folks. I did hte best I could, she wanted a response right away and I stole a lot of this from websites.
Kisses,
Moe
-----Original Message-----
From: *****@fake.com
Sent: Wednesday, April 10, 2002 12:02 PM
To: *****@fake.com
Subject: RE: HEY
Dear ****,
E-mail me back at [email protected]. My computer been freaking lately, tho, but I will check my box from work.
Just because you have been taught and told something your whole life does not make it true.
Ok, since you asked, I will show you a few basics of why I no longer beleive they have "the TRUTH." For one truth is truth, not based upon false stuff or lies. Truth is truth, plain and simple. When I did confront my dad, he said the lies and covering up were ok in order to protect the congregation. It is called Theocratic Warfare, just like when Abraham lied that his wife was his sister. I still don't get his reasoning and it was my parents own Watchtower/Awake bound-volumes that made me see.
If you want to beleive in the bible or not is up to you. The bible says it is inspired by God, not written by him. It also say husbands own their wives and that women should not cut thier hair. But, that is a whole point to itself. Do I belive in God? Yes, of course, just not a book written by yahoos riding thousands of years ago on camels. Anyhow, like I said, that is beside the point and I will base all of your quesitons uponf the bible and the Watchotwer literature.
Here are a FEW points. There is SO MUCH MORE. Take a deep breath, ok? There is a LOT here and much more on the way, if you want... no pressure...
They have consistently taught false prophecies since the beginning of their movement.
They falsely stated that the end of the present world or system of things would come in 1914 and 1925. They implied over and over again that it would end in 1975.
They said the generation that went though and saw 1914 would NOT die.
They indicated that the remnant of the 144,000 would be taken to heaven in 1878, changed that to 1881, cahnged it again to 1914, and once again to 1918, and finally changed it to 1920.
They taught between 1925 and 1950 that the ancient prophets (Jesus forefathers like David and Joseph) would return in the resurrection prior to the battle of Armageddon. They made a mansion for them in California to live. It's called Beth-Sarim. I can find a link to the scanned legal property deed where it actually said the house was for the prophets when they get resurrected. Yes, this is a legal document on public records.
They long taught that the "final end" must come by 1914. When that failed to happen, they came to assert that the end would have to come before the generation alive in 1914 would pass away. Now they have changed that. I have seen documentation on this as well directly from the literature.
The year 1914 is somthing Russell origianially took from forutne telling/divination of the Egyptian Pyramids. YUP. I have seen the scanned documents on this, too.
The organization has shifted its position many times on who would and who would not be resurrected like the people from Sodom and Gommorah.
Used to not be allowed to have organ transplants. They have now changed this rule.
You can get disfellowshipped for oral sex even when you are married. This is a rule they have flipped back and forth on as well.
God will kill innocent children at Armageddon, yet, Jehovah is Love.
Jehovah is the Alpha and the Omega and Jesus is not equal to him. BUT read the last chapter of Revelation. Jesus calls himself the Alpha and the Omega and says he sent his angel to the earth.
Russell said he had "lightening flashes in the Temple" from the thrones of Jehovah and Christ and "new truths" were delivered to him personally by angels. After he died, Knorr and Franz returned to teaching that Jehovah's Witnesses were Spirit directed.
Many of the rules they have developed have nothing to do with the Scriptures. The reporting of time in preaching, disfellowshiping for such things as smoking, celebrating birthdays, many rules concerning what is and is not proper in the marriage bed (like oral sex) etc...
The Watch Tower has lied consistently about the nature of its policy in Nazi Germany in 1933. The legal Declaration published at Berlin in 1933 was an attempt to compromise with the Nazis, was openly anti-Semitic, anti-British, and anti-American.
Jehovah's Witnesses ignore the clear biblical instructions in James and other parts of the New Testament to carry on works of love such as caring for widows, orphans, and their fellow humans. Placing Watchtower magazines at the doors does not feed empty bellies. In this sense Jehovah's Witnesses have faith without works.
They don't partake of the bread and wine - but Jesus commanded everybody partake.
To predict future events makes you a prophet. To predict a false date makes you a false prophet. The bible says to NOT follow a false prophet.
If you become a JW you can't:
http://www.jwfiles.com/jw-cant.htm
Interesting picture of the Egyptology fixation Russell had (Egyptology is a form of fortune telling/divination)
http://www.jwfiles.com/pyramid.htm
Generation that saw 1914 would not die
Scroll down - there is more than one scan
October 1980 WT
May 1984 WT
October 1995 Awake
November 1995 THE CHANGE without saying a word
http://www.jwfiles.com/1914Generation.htm
1975 Armegeddon Predition:
Awake,5/22/69,pg15
http://www.jwfiles.com/scans/AW5-22-69p15.htm
Prediction Armegeddon would arrive in the 20th Century (we are now in the 21st)
Book The Nations Shall Know That I Am Jehovah,1971,pg 216
http://www.jwfiles.com/scans/NationsP216.htm
Another 1975 prediction
Watchtower,10/15/69,pg622,623
http://www.jwfiles.com/scans/WT10-15-69p622-623.htm
They lied about how many witnesses were in Nazi concentration camps:
"A total of 6,019 had been arrested, several two, three or even more times, so that, all together, 8,917 arrests were registered. All together they had been sentenced to serve 13,924 years and two months in prison, two and a quarter times as long as the period since Adam's creation. A total of 2,000 brothers and sisters had been put into concentration camps, where they had spent 8,078 years and six months, an average of four years. A total of 635 had died in prison, 253 had been sentenced to death and 203 of these had actually been executed. What a record of integrity!" (1974 Yearbook of Jehovah's Witnesses, p. 212)
BUT
"Hitler failed to break them in prisons and concentration camps where he tortured 10,000 of them, and the Communists are failing to do it in their frightful prisons and slave-labor camps." (The Watchtower, June 1, 1960, p. 327)
"Hitler, a Roman Catholic, the arm of his church in Germany, forbade Jehovah's witnesses to preach the kingdom of God, and these modern-day Christians had to say to Hitler's Gestapo police: 'Whether it is righteous in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, judge for yourselves.' They kept preaching even though 10,000 of them were put in concentration camps and over 4,000 died there. The rest nearly starved to death. The war's end aided their survival." (The Watchtower, January 1, 1964, p. 13)
The question here is, if only 2,000 Witnesses were put into the camps, why print that there were 10,000 of them there? Where did the 8,000 additional persons come from? Did they perhaps come from the same place as the 4,000 Witnesses that is reported to have died in the camps? How can 4,000 people out of a total of 2,000 die? As we can see from the correct numbers of casualties reported by the 74 Yearbook, the real number of deaths is reported to be "a total of 635".
http://www.geocities.com/osarsif/ghost.htm
Quotes:
(I saw these in my parents bound-volumes of the Watchtower)
But, without a doubt, nothing has created more interest in this textbook than the first chapter with its chart and fine information regarding the 7,000 years of God's rest day. The observation that 1975 may well mark the beginning of mankind's great Jubilee has intrigued many.
Watchtower 1/1/67 pg.29
At all assembly points where it was released, the book was received enthusiastically. Crowds gathered around stands and soon supplies of the book were depleted. Immediately its contents were examined. It did not take the brothers very long to find the chart beginning on page 31, showing that 6,000 years of man's existence end in 1975. Discussion of 1975 overshadowed about everything else. "The new book compels us to realize that Armageddon is, in fact, very close indeed," said a conventioner. Surely it was one of the outstanding blessings to be carried home!
Watchtower 10/15/66 pg.628-9
'What about the year 1975? What is it going to mean, dear friends?' asked Brother Franz. 'Does it mean that Armageddon is going to be finished, with Satan bound, by 1975? It could! It could! All things are possible with God. Does it mean that Babylon the Great is going to go down by 1975? It could.
Watchtower 10/15/66 pg.631
In their new book, Famine—1975!, two noted food experts, William and Paul Paddock, make this forecast for the future, on page 61:"By 1975 civil disorder, anarchy, military dictatorships, runaway inflation, transportation breakdowns and chaotic unrest will be the order of the day in many of the hungry nations.
Watchtower 4/15/68 pg.227