| The enemy at the door All religions are comprised of 2 categories of people: the followers - usually a large group of somewhat gullible and insecure people, and the leaders - usually a small group of hypocritical old men. In this sense the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society (Jehovah's Witnesses) is no different from any other religion. But make no mistake, this religion is very different in the manner and the degree with which its leaders, The Governing Body, exploit the gullibility and insecurity of their followers. Whether it is the (literal) sacrifice of children who need blood transfusions, or the break-up of families because of “shunning”, or the financial ruin of those who put their total trust in their leaders’ promise of an imminent Armageddon, the Watchtower Society’s Governing Body display a callous indifference to the welfare of their followers. This gang of theological thugs allow nothing, absolutely nothing, to interfere with their prime objective: to increase membership and their corporate bottom line! This is achieved in a three stage process: Firstly, they declare that they, the Governing Body, are what the Bible calls, God’s “faithful and discreet slave” - His only true representatives on Earth. With that authority established they then decree that the followers’ most important duty in life is to go, “on the doors” , preaching “this good news of the kingdom,” i.e. recruit, recruit, recruit! Secondly, As an aid in this recruiting process the Watchtower and Awake magazines serve a dual role: They are a sales tool designed to ensnare the unsuspecting “lost sheep” who foolishly open their front doors, and for the recruiters they provide, in written form, the “increased light” that God is apparently constantly shining down on His chosen people!
Thirdly, to ensure the followers stay constantly motivated the Governing Body dangles the carrot of surviving the coming battle of Armageddon. Apparently, very soon now, God is going to exterminate approximately 6 billion men, women and children who have rejected the truth of Witness doctrine. Faithful, good Christians, i.e. Jehovah’s Witnesses, can look forward to a post Armageddon eternal life on a paradise Earth. The one big problem with this (up to recently) magnificently successful scam is the positioning of the dangled Armageddon carrot. For the Governing Body, time has this irritating habit of marching on! And that means to keep the carrot just out of reach every few years the date of Armageddon has to be pushed forward. Then they have the problem of explaining why the previous date was wrong. In the late 19th and most of the 20th century their explanations involved re-writing their history, denying divine inspiration and by blaming “over-enthusiasm” by Watchtower writers and “misplaced speculation” by its readers. In the pre-digital age, with a constant influx of new and ignorant followers, these doctrinal stains could be covered up fairly easily. But now, in the age of the internet, things are very different. With just a few clicks of a mouse the whole history of this religion’s errors, hypocrisy and lies are available to everyone. Jwfacts.com contains photocopies of Witness literature guaranteed to redden the face of any Witness reader! And in his book, Crisis of Conscience, ex Governing Body member Raymond Franz catalogues the whole history of the Governing Body's manipulation and deceit. If the Jehovah’s Witnesses on your doorstep are not completely brainwashed they may have the courage to read the following three examples of Witness error, hypocrisy and lies. These examples have already been presented to many Jehovah’s Witnesses, including their headquarters in New York. Predictably, the response from all of them is always the same: a deafening silence, or,“We’ll get back to you on this,” followed by... a deafening silence! Because all the evidence comes from their own literature they cannot dismiss it as Satanic or even innocently misguided. On reading the following their choice is stark: turn away from the evidence and continue to live a lie, or face up to the evidence and its logical conclusion: their God, or their religion, or both, are false! **** The Awake! magazine of December 22, 1949 described the then new science of organ transplants as, “wonders of modern surgery.” But in the November 15, 1967 Watchtower the Witnesses learned that,
Imagine during the 1970’s a situation where the child of devout Witness parents needed an organ transplant to survive. Those parents, following the then current published Witness doctrine would have refused permission for that transplant and as a consequence their child would likely have died. Now imagine how those same parents would have felt after reading the March 15, 1980 Watchtower:
How could a published divinely inspired policy change 180 degrees and then change again back to near its original position and still be called “enlightenment” from a perfect God? **** Jehovah’s Witnesses base their beliefs regarding blood transfusions on their interpretation of one or two bible scriptures. But this interpretation was not always so. This is another instance of God providing “increased light” – this time in the July 1st 1945 Watchtower which informed the Witnesses that from then on blood transfusions were banned. But what the Witnesses were not told was that the technique of transfusing blood successfully was mastered in the year 1916. If Jehovah God, truly “knoweth all things” (1John 3:20) then surely He was fully aware that His chosen people were giving and receiving blood from 1916 onward. If for 29 years between 1916 and 1945 God gave no enlightenment on this issue doesn’t that indicate that He saw nothing wrong with it? If having a blood transfusion is such a serious offence that Witnesses can be disfellowshipped (excommunicated) for having one, how come God didn’t provide enlightenment in 1916? From God’s point of view why would it be acceptable to have a blood transfusion up to June 30,1945 but not the next day? There is no way of knowing for certain but we guess in 1945 the Governing Body dreamed up this no-transfusion rule as a way to distinguish their religion from some other very similar ones that were gaining prominence at that time, notably Christadelphians and Seventh Day Adventists (with whom the Witnesses share a common origin). From 1945 to 1961 the no-transfusion rule was often stated but never enforced. After 1961 it became a disfellowshipping offence and Witness parents started to refuse permission for their sick children to have essential blood transfusions. As soon as the first children started dying this policy was widely recognized as being a colossal error in judgement - one that all subsequent Governing Bodies would have loved to reverse, but could not. They knew that to claim even more "increased light" that permitted transfusions again would have torn the religion apart. It would also have invited litigation from the families of children who had died unnecessarily. So what they did, and what they continue to do today, is back-peddle on the policy by gradually permitting the infusion of more and more blood components. So eating a ham and cheese sandwich is still not allowed but eating the ham, and the cheese, and the bread, separately is allowed. How ridiculous and insulting it is to ascribe this convoluted, contradictory and murderous ruling to an allegedly perfect God! **** For most of the 20th century up to 1995 the central theme in Jehovah’s Witness doctrine was that the generation that witnessed the year 1914 “shall not pass away” before Armageddon arrived. During all those years, at every Kingdom Hall Sunday afternoon sermon, in every country in the world, the link between Armageddon and the year 1914 was not just mentioned... it was proclaimed! From the standpoint of the religion's leadership this link was a wonderful tool that promoted solidarity and created a sense of urgency that spurred the sheep into knocking on doors and gaining new recruits. In 20th century Witness literature there are literally hundreds of references to Armageddon being linked to the year 1914. Here are just a few examples:
But then in 1995 something happened. On November 8th the Awake masthead changed its wording. It now read,
The November 1, 1995 Watchtower declared that what Jesus really meant when he used the word “generation” in connection with Armageddon was,
With this change in the Awake! masthead and the fudging of the definition of the word “generation” the Governing Body removed all connection between the date of Armageddon and the people who witnessed the year 1914. In just a few sentences they swept away, what for over 70 years, had been the most important tenet of their religion! Surely any Jehovah’s Witness interested in the truth would have to ask, “Why?” The February 15, 2006 Watchtower lists many examples of “increased light” that Jehovah has provided for His people. It is highly significant that nowhere in this list is the dropping of the link between Armageddon and 1914, or the change in the meaning of the word “generation”. So if “increased light” from Jehovah God was not the reason for this change, what was? For Jehovah's Witnesses the unpalatable truth is that the link between the 1914 generation and Armageddon is, and always was, pure fiction - the product of over-active imaginations combined with a neurotic need to create significance for today - the time in which we happen to be alive. As the 20th century drew to a close and the 1914 generation became fewer and fewer it dawned on the Governing Body that they were between a rock and a hard place. Doing nothing was not an option because if the last person of the 1914 generation died with no sign of Armageddon the whole religion would have been exposed as a con and quite likely ridiculed out of existence. So what to do? “Increased light” was not an option because that would just have drawn attention to the fact that for literally decades they had been preaching a lie. Of course they could have just admitted that they had made a mistake… but God is supposed to communicate instructions and enlightenment to His flock through those men. Admitting that they had been in error for all those years on such a fundamental tenet of their religion would mean admitting they could not possibly represent God's, "faithful and discreet slave" - His chosen people! Having rejected all these options the Governing Body was left with just one course of action. The link between Armageddon and the year 1914 had to be severed and this was their explanation, again from the November 1, 1995 Watchtower:
The phrase, "at times" in this context is a blatant lie. Up to 1995 Jehovah’s Witnesses had always linked Armageddon with a date. As these dates came and went (with nothing happening) their significance was gradually and quietly forgotten. To that long list of dates we can now presumably add the year 1914. It is also interesting to note that the authors of this weasel-worded paragraph couldn't even bring themselves to mention the word, "Armageddon". The "Great Tribulation" is the period of persecution that the Witnesses will apparently suffer immediately preceding Armageddon. Re, “Jehovah’s people” having “speculated” about the arrival of Armageddon, firstly, no rank and file Jehovah’s Witness speculated on any aspect of this issue. All they did was read their Watchtowers and Awakes and take the words written there at face value. The only people who “speculated” were the Governing Body and their predecessors who invented this 1914 link in the first place. The reference to “Jehovah’s people” is a disgraceful attempt to spread the blame around and avoid doing the honest and honourable thing of admitting that they, the Governing Body, were entirely responsible for preaching this false doctrine for so many years. 2010 update The 1995 fudging of the definition of the word “generation” solved one problem for the Governing Body, but it created another, perhaps even more serious problem. When Armageddon was "just around the corner" it provided great motivation to knock on doors and gain new recruits. By removing the link with 1914 all sense of urgency disappeared and Witness membership numbers declined. According to their own published statistics Jehovah’s Witnesses now have the highest turnover rate of any religion in the civilized world. In an attempt to reverse this trend, in a move that can only be described as jaw-dropping, the Watchtower Society has restored the link between Armageddon and the 1914 generation… sort-of. Apparently, after receiving more "increased light" from Jehovah God, the Governing Body has announced that Armageddon will now arrive before the generation that overlaps the generation that witnessed the year 1914, passes away. No, we are not making this up! (see Apr 15, 2010 Watchtower) The concept of 'overlapping generations' is not exactly rocket science so why didn't God reveal this bit of "light" to His chosen people in 1995... or for that matter, 1895? Why, for over 100 years, would God "refine" His people on all sorts of issues, and at the same time, ignore the crucial fact that they were preaching a lie with regard to the timing of Armageddon? At best, this cynical stretching of the 1914 generation buys the Governing Body a few more years to continue their despicable scam, after which, what next? - Armageddon to arrive, before the generation that overlaps the generation that overlaps the generation that witnessed the year 1914, passes away!? Good grief, rank and file Jehovah's Witnesses, wake up! How much longer will you allow your intelligence to be so grossly insulted? How much longer will you stand idly by while innocent children die for want of essential blood transfusions? How many more families have to be torn apart by the cruelty of "shunning"? How many more elderly Witnesses have to face an impoverished future because they put their faith in their leaders' promises about Armageddon and consequently made no financial provision for their old age? How much longer can it be before someone at the New York headquarters, someone with an ounce of courage and integrity, finally blows the whistle on this shameful and evil organization? In the February 1881 issue of “Zion’s Watch Tower” (the predecessor of the current Watchtower magazine) the Jehovah’s Witness founder, Charles Russell wrote,
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