I have the first volumes of The Watchtower from the 1800's to the 1900's.
I will highlight Vol. 2 January 15, 1892 to help the reader understand the truth regarding Russell and his supposed appointment as, what the Watchtower this year referred to, "he certainly was THAT MINISTER" ...making vague reference to his being called "The Laodicean Minister" (found on his tombstone)
Photos of the actual Watchtower below.
What qualities do we see in CTR and what divinity do we see in his "appointment"?
We find CTR discussing his, and his merry band's, activity. He says they were...
"visiting Europe during the past summer”.
What did CTR find over there?
Seems that what CTR and the merry men saw gave them a stark change of heart!
He begins,
“In Germany every man is a soldier; and what wonderful soldiers they seem to be:… military methods extending into every department of life, business, etc. And, by the way, we experienced quite a change of view with reference to this matter of German military influence. We had heretofore considered as an almost unmixed evil the taking of hundreds of thousands of men from the tilling of the soil to spend four years each in the prime of life in military service; but now we see another side to the question.”
Wow, the CTR merry men had a big shift in thinking! When once they thought the German military was “unmixed evil”, CTR now writes,
“… it has been the greatest and most rapid educator of the men of that nation, and thus, under divine providence, an instrumentality for awakening the world and preparing for the great change of dispensation about to be inaugurated.”
Imagine, the German army was “divine providence” and was part of the “dispensation” !
But alas, CTR does not stop there. He goes on,
“It has taken sleepy, thoughtless boys from the farm and has waked them up and educated them, often to far more practical benefit than four years of a college course would have done. As a result, one seldom meets a stupid German.”
WOW! No stupid Germans. Just like the present day, Watchtower “divine education”, the German military also was “divine” and better than College!
Oh how CTR loved the German Military. He said about the German government,
“ ..the present government and emperor are very popular.”
Well, why not, one might ask, since after all…
“The last ten years have witnessed for the masses a great social and financial elevation; laws have been enacted for the protection, and gradually for the betterment, of the poorer classes;”
Obviously, Jesus, when he came to his spiritual temple just a few years later, would see such a keen appreciation of CTR for something as wonderful as the “divine” German military. Surely CTR wold be appointed as “the faithful slave”!
But wait… CTR mentions,
“German military preparation is so well known…. Germany is today, humanly speaking, the arbiter of the world’s peace.”
Surely God saw how great the German military was?
But did God not see that the German military was a brutal regime, bent on committing acts of genocide?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herero_and_Namaqua_genocide
What kind of gawd appoints a man who advocated for mass murderers?