July 2, 2009

"I too, I shall laud you on an instrument of a stringed sort,
as regards your trueness, O my God."

Jehovah's Witnesses have been one of the most controversial Christian religions since Charles Taze Russell and the International Bible Students first began publishing the Watchtower Magazine in 1879. (Originally called Zion's Watch Tower and Herald of Christ's Presence) From an initial printing of a mere 6,000 issues, the Watchtower has grown to become the most widely-distributed religious journal in the world—with a semi-monthly circulation of approximately 20 million copies published in 150 languages! (All of C.T. Russell’s writings are available online.) The companion Awake! Magazine enjoys a comparable circulation.

After Charles Taze Russell unexpectedly died in 1916, the Watchtower headquarters was thrown into confusion at a critical time. Toward the close of the First World War the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society was the target of a clergy and government conspiracy to silence the voice of truth. The result was that the 2nd president of the Watchtower, J.F. Rutherford, along with seven other leading officers of the Watchtower Society, were railroaded off to prison on false charges of sedition. Afterwards, however, they were later completely exonerated. After their release from prison the Watchtower organized a series of annual conventions for the purpose of revitalizing the evangelizing work. (Additional reading: Faith on the March and Jehovah’s Witnesses in the Divine Purpose)

In 1931, the approximately 50,000 active International Bible Students adopted the distinctive name of Jehovah's Witnesses.

During the 1930's and 40's, Jehovah's Witnesses came under intense persecution in many lands. Nazi dictator, Adolph Hitler, vowed to exterminate the brood of ‘Bible worms,’ as he called Jehovah's Witnesses. And indeed, the Nazis arrested thousands of Jehovah's Witnesses. Many were sent to the infamous concentration camps such as Auschwitz. Hundreds were executed. The stand of Jehovah's Witnesses against Nazi tyranny has been preserved in the Holocaust museum.

In America, during that same period, Jehovah's Witnesses were subjected to clergy-incited mob violence. Many Supreme Court rulings during that period pertained to upholding our religious liberties. However, thousands of Jehovah's Witnesses in the United States and Britain went to prison for refusing military service.

At the close of WWII the so-called New World Society embarked on a great expansion work that continues to the present. Beginning in 1950, the New World Translation of the Bible (Now available online) has been the focus of much controversy. Jehovah's Christian Witnesses' neutrality toward this world's wars and political affairs, as well as our refusal on religious grounds to take blood transfusions, has generated considerable controversy as well. Jehovah’s Witnesses beliefs that the man does not posses and immortal soul; hell is not a place of eternal torment and that only 144,000 anointed Christians go to heaven to rule with Christ, while the rest of mankind has the opportunity to live forever in paradise on earth, are all teachings that have created much debate among religious people during the past one hundred years.

Just as Jesus originally lit the fires of controversy amidst the Jewish religious system, so too, Jehovah's Witnesses have shaken the orthodox churches of Christendom by identifying them as part of Babylon the Great—the wicked harlot of Revelation—the promoter of pagan doctrines like the Trinity, hellfire and the immortal soul, and the fomenter of war.

As an alternative to the Babylonish teachings of Christendom, the Watchtower has emphasized the importance of Christ's ransom and the name of Jehovah. Jehovah's Witnesses have consistently called attention to God's purpose to destroy Satan's entire world-system of things at Armageddon. Afterwards the earth will be gradually be cultivated and transformed into a paradise of peace under the rule of Christ's kingdom. The dead will even return from the grave. As opposed to the rapture, popularized by the “Left Behind” fictional series, the good news that Jehovah's Witnesses preach is that the last generation before Armageddon has the hope of surviving the end of the world and thereafter living forever on earth. 

In the last 20 years internal disputes and doctrinal controversies have surfaced within the Watchtower Society itself, and as a result many of Jehovah's Witnesses have been stumbled from the faith. With the advent of the Internet Jehovah's Witnesses are being increasingly exposed to numerous faith-challenging issues, often promoted by ex-Jehovah's Witnesses.

The Watchtower doctrines related to 1914 and particularly the doctrinal change published in the November 1st, 1995, issue of the Watchtower magazine, concerning the generation that would pass away before the war of Armageddon, have caused some of Jehovah's Witnesses to begin to seriously question the Watchtower's interpretations. The highly publicized scandals surrounding child abuse and the Silentlambs organization composed of sexually abused Jehovah's Witnesses, has confronted Jehovah's Witnesses with the sort of hypocrisy that we thought only existed in the churches of Christendom. Not only that, but the Watchtower's scandalous10-year affiliation with the United Nations as an NGO has also surfaced in recent years.

Ironically, the success of the Watchtower Society has been its undoing. In many respects Bethel has become an idol in the eyes of Jehovah’s Witnesses. E-watchman is a devoted Jehovah Witness dedicated to re-examining Bible prophecy with the intent of announcing Jehovah’s judgments upon the Watchtower Society and the world.

More about Jehovah's Witnesses