I love to read the Watchtower's article "The Church Fathers—Advocates of Bible Truth?" (w01 4/15 pp. 17-21). There we may read the most contadictory statements of the Watchtower Society, which shows how deceptive and ignorant is the Jehovah's Witnesses religion.
"For slightly more than 100 years after Nicaea, theologians, most of them writing in Greek, worked out in a long and bitter debate what was to be the distinguishing doctrine of Christendom, the Trinity. Chief among them were Athanasius, the assertive bishop of Alexandria..."
Yes, but you needed Athanasius to defend the Pauline authorship of the Letter to the Hebrews:
Writership of the letter to the Hebrews has been widely ascribed to the apostle Paul. It was accepted as an epistle of Paul by early writers. ... Hebrews is listed among “fourteen letters of Paul the apostle” in “The Canon of Athanasius,” of the fourth century C.E. (it-1 pp. 1077-1080)
Or consider the teaching of the immortality of the soul, a belief that some part of man lives on after the body dies. Again, the Church Fathers were instrumental in introducing this notion to a religion that had no teaching about a soul surviving death. The Bible clearly shows that the soul can die: “The soul that is sinning—it itself will die.” (Ezekiel 18:4) What was the basis for the Church Fathers’ belief in an immortal soul? “The Christian concept of a spiritual soul created by God and infused into the body at conception to make man a living whole is the fruit of a long development in Christian philosophy. Only with Origen in the East and St. Augustine in the West was the soul established as a spiritual substance and a philosophical concept formed of its nature. . . . [Augustine’s doctrine] . . . owed much (including some shortcomings) to Neoplatonism,” says the New Catholic Encyclopedia. And the magazine Presbyterian Life says: “Immortality of the soul is a Greek notion formed in ancient mystery cults and elaborated by the philosopher Plato.”
really?....the church fathers just took "the belief that some part of man lives on after the body dies" from Jesus teachings. For example, Irenaeus, a second century bishop of Lyon wrote the following:
The Lord has taught with very great fullness, that souls not only continue to exist, not by passing from body to body, but that they preserve the same form [in their separate state] as the body had to which they were adapted, and that they remember the deeds which they did in this state of existence, and from which they have now ceased—in that narrative which is recorded respecting the rich man and that Lazarus who found repose in the bosom of Abraham. In this account He states (Luke 16:19, etc.) that Dives knew Lazarus after death, and Abraham in like manner, and that each one of these persons continued in his own proper position, and that [Dives] requested Lazarus to be sent to relieve him— [Lazarus], on whom he did not [formerly] bestow even the crumbs [which fell] from his table. [He tells us] also of the answer given by Abraham, who was acquainted not only with what respected himself, but Dives also, and who enjoined those who did not wish to come into that place of torment to believe Moses and the prophets, and to receive the preaching of Him who was to rise again from the dead. By these things, then, it is plainly declared that souls continue to exist that they do not pass from body to body, that they possess the form of a man, so that they may be recognised, and retain the memory of things in this world; moreover, that the gift of prophecy was possessed by Abraham, and that each class [of souls] receives a habitation such as it has deserved, even before the judgment. (Against Heresies (Book II, Chapter 34))
After even this brief examination of the historical backdrop of the Church Fathers, as well as the origins of their teachings, it is appropriate to ask, Should a sincere Christian base his or her beliefs on the teachings of the Church Fathers? Let the Bible answer.
For one thing, Jesus Christ himself ruled out the use of the religious title “Father” when he said: “Do not call anyone your father on earth, for one is your Father, the heavenly One.” (Matthew 23:9) The use of the term “Father” to designate any religious figure is unchristian and unscriptural
Really?...so the Apostle Paul was an apostate because he said "For though you may have 10,000 guardians in Christ, you certainly do not have many fathers; for in Christ Jesus, I have become your father through the good news." (1 Cor 4:15)
The written Word of God was completed about 98 C.E. with the writings of the apostle John. Thus, true Christians do not need to look to any human as the source of inspired revelation. They are careful not to ‘make the word of God invalid’ because of human tradition. Letting human tradition take the place of God’s Word is spiritually lethal. Jesus warned: “If . . . a blind man guides a blind man, both will fall into a pit.”—Matthew 15:6, 14.
Does a Christian need any revelation besides the word of God as contained in the Bible? No. The book of Revelation cautions against adding anything to the inspired record: “If anyone makes an addition to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this scroll.”—Revelation 22:18.
How do they know that the last writings belonged to the apostle John?. The early source the Watchtower has is what Irenaeus (a Church Father) wrote about the authorship of them, that is 80 years after those supposedly writings of John. On the other hand, about the inspired books, why the first book of Enoch was not included in the canon?....we know that Jude quoted it. If Jude quoted the book of Enoch, the Bible used by the Watchtower is incomplete. Furthermore, we don't know how the original of the book of Revelation was. For instance, we have two versions of Rev. 13:18, some manuscripts say 616 and other ones 666. Even Irenaeus reported such discrepancy in the second century. Professor David Parker, Professor of New Testament Textual Criticism and Paleography at the University of Birmingham, thinks that 616, although less memorable than 666, is the original. However, the New World Translation ignores it.
On the other hand, in the 2013 revision of the NWT, the NWT contains the Gospel of Mark until the verse 8 of chapter 16. How do they know that the original ended in that verse?. How do they know that John 1:18 says "the only-begotten god" and not "the only-begotten son"?.
Moreover, the true Christian congregation is “a pillar and support of the truth.” (1 Timothy 3:15) Its overseers safeguard the purity of their teaching within the congregation, preventing any doctrinal pollutant from creeping in. (2 Timothy 2:15-18, 25) They keep out of the congregation ‘false prophets, false teachers, and destructive sects.’ (2 Peter 2:1) After the death of the apostles, the Church Fathers allowed “misleading inspired utterances and teachings of demons” to take root in the Christian congregation.—1 Timothy 4:1.
The consequences of this apostasy are evident in Christendom today. Its beliefs and practices are a far cry from Bible truth.
Really?...what do you think the Apostle Paul would say after reading the following Rutherford's new light?
“Instead of the ‘servant’s’ being moved into action by the operation of the holy spirit as a helper, the Scriptures seem clearly to teach that the Lord directs his angels what to do and that they act under the supervision of the Lord in directing the remnant on earth concerning the course of action to take. -Rev. 8:1-7″ (Salvation, 1939, p. 263)
So, angels (demons), replaced the "Holy Spirit" in the Watchtower teachings during Rutherford's age.
