Are You Also Excommunicated? - Awake! January 7, 1947

[a believer]

I was going through my JW archives again a couple days ago, and came across this gem that most brothers and sisters had no idea was ever published by the Society, but might be worth consideration when it comes to excommunication— disfellowshipping by the Society... and its pagan origins.

—Timothy,
a believer.

---

 

[a believer]

"The Church's right to excommunicate is based on her status as a spiritual society, whose members, governed by legitimate authority, seek one and the same end through suitable means. Members who, by their obstinate disobedience, reject the means of attaining this common end deserve to be removed from such a society."

Another example of the Watchtower organization patterning itself after the Roman Catholic Church?

That's for the reader to decide.

—Timothy,
a believer.

 

[a believer]

Other sections I had marked on my hardcopy printout:

"This is 'canon law' which the Roman Catholic Hierarchy seeks to enforce on the pretext that it is God's law. The authority for excommunication [disfellowshipping], they claim, is based on the teachings of Christ and the apostles... But the Hierarchy's [Governing Body's] excommunication [disfellowshipping], as a punishment and 'medicinal' remedy... finds no support in these scriptures. In fact, it is altogether foreign to Bible teachings.—Hebrews 10:26-31"

"Where, then, did this practice originate? The Encylopedia Brittanica says that papal [Governing Body] is not without pagan influence, 'and its variations cannot be adequately explained unless account be taken of several non-Christian analogues of excommunication.'"

"It was therefore after Catholicism adopted its pagan practices, A.D. 325, that this new chapter in religious excommunication was written."

"Thereafter, as the pretensions of the Hierarchy [Governing Body] increased, the weapon of excommunication [disfellowshipping] became the instrument by which the clergy attained a combination of ecclesiastical power and secular tyranny that finds no parallel in history."

[Bracketed text] is my own notes regarding the parallelism of the practice by the Society and its Watchtower organization's clergy, identified as, for example, "elders" and "circuit overseers".

—Timothy,
a believer.

 

[Roving Sage]

Valuable wisdom and perspective from 1947. Strict ex communication wasn't supposed to be the same. Not everyone that is disfellowshipped is an apostate but some turn that way when they are because they have no one else to turn to of they feel they were ostracized. It's why the organization cut back on some restrictions. Like, greeting disfellowshipped people that are coming to the kingdom hall instead of giving them the cold shoulder, like in the past.
I even heard some horror stories of some witnesses going above and beyond this in emergency situations, like in a medical emergency and not wanting their own disfellowshipped child to visit them when they are on their death bed. That pain would only cause more resentment and pushes them into a darker place.

 

[Nomex]

This brings to mind a few things I have been thinking about. As I was growing up in the 'truth" and as I got older and I was faced with confronting various injustices not just the things I observed in the world but in my own life and many times from within the Org itself, the one thing that has always stuck with me, and what I continue to find some comfort in even today, is the of the biggest reasons Jehovah has allowed wickedness is because Satan's challenge to Jehovah was directly towards the issue of free will. It was drilled in our heads the whole point of Job's test. Christendom often quotes one of Job's "comforters, 'the Lord, giveth the Lord taketh away." But we understood that it was in fact the challenge Satan was making, and in fact it was NOT Jehovah bringing the calamity on Job but Satan himself, and the reason Jehovah allowed it, was because of Satan's accusation about Job, "But, for a change, stretch out your hand and strike everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your very face.” There it is the accusation, take everything he has, (your family association's) and what will he do, "curse you to your very face.” But what was Jehovah's response? "Then Jehovah said to Satan: “Look! Everything that he has is in your hand."

So who is responsible for disfellowshipping? Did Satan not kill Job's whole family save his wife?

I came to believe and understand however, that what is going on is Jehovah is making way for all of us to choose willing whether we serve him. Key word here "willingly."That in fact is the whole point of the MOTB, which WT has rendered meaningless!

Are we not taught to "hate the sin but not the sinner?" Are we not taught only Jehovah and Jesus are our judges? Who are these men to judge any of us? Well we all know who they think they are, "Have you begun ruling as kings without us? I really wish that you had begun ruling as kings, so that we also might rule with you as kings." And if Paul was NOT talking about the GB then who? Who else could possibly fit that description?

In fact I think there is no better demonstration of what Disfellowshipping, actually accomplishes than "PIMO's. "Physically in Mentally Out." It completely undermines their claim that DF'ing moves a person to repentance. What it really does is create an entire "underground" of people who have "beaten the system" in the sense that rather than face shunning, they simply pretend to still believe. If Jehovah's Holy spirit was at work within the congregations how do those people exist? Do the angles not know they are PIMO's?

It reminds me of what I was learning regarding torture back during the beginning phases of the "war on terror", and how ineffective torture actually was, because the person will say anything to end the torture, and it almost certainly does not end with extracting the truth from the person. Is that not exactly why PIMO's exist? They will say anything to avoid the torture of being shunned by their loved ones and family, but usually ends up with them as "POMO", (physically out mentally out. anyway, because living as a PIMO's is it's own kind of torture?

My nephew told me that when he really became convinced, in his words "that this was not the truth", was when he was DF'd and trying to get reinstated. He told me he WAS repentant!! But the Elders would NOT reinstate him. He needed "more time on his own." Then he told me he no longer wanted to be reinstated, and in fact months later they reached out to him. He told me when he went to meet with the Elders he prayed about it, that if this was "the truth" he would NOT be reinstated because his attitude had now changed. What happened, he was reinstated!!

As Timothy has so succinctly put it, "it is NOT unity it is uniformity!"

I was listening a little bit to a new guy who showed up on Youtube an Ex Elder the other day, and he said his grown son, became an atheists when he was 12, and remained for years as a PIMO. It is no wonder Jesus is going to deal with them so "harshly." Harshly? There is a much better word for it. Justly!!! And by the one who actually can read hearts and actually knows if a person really is repentant.

And while the Gb "wait on Jehovah" this is the result.

‘Master, I knew you to be a demanding man, reaping where you did not sow and gathering where you did not winnow.25  So I grew afraid and went and hid your talent in the ground. Here, you have what is yours.’ 26 In reply his master said to him: ‘Wicked and sluggish slave, you knew, did you, that I reaped where I did not sow and gathered where I did not winnow?27 Well, then, you should have deposited my money with the bankers, and on my coming I would have received it back with interest... 30  And throw the good-for-nothing slave out into the darkness outside. There is where his weeping and the gnashing of his teeth will be.’"

 

[BARNABY THE DOG.]

This brings to mind a few things I have been thinking about. As I was growing up in the 'truth" and as I got older and I was faced with confronting various injustices not just the things I observed in the world but in my own life and many times from within the Org itself, the one thing that has always stuck with me, and what I continue to find some comfort in even today, is the of the biggest reasons Jehovah has allowed wickedness is because Satan's challenge to Jehovah was directly towards the issue of free will. It was drilled in our heads the whole point of Job's test. Christendom often quotes one of Job's "comforters, 'the Lord, giveth the Lord taketh away." But we understood that it was in fact the challenge Satan was making, and in fact it was NOT Jehovah bringing the calamity on Job but Satan himself, and the reason Jehovah allowed it, was because of Satan's accusation about Job, "But, for a change, stretch out your hand and strike everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your very face.” There it is the accusation, take everything he has, (your family association's) and what will he do, "curse you to your very face.” But what was Jehovah's response? "Then Jehovah said to Satan: “Look! Everything that he has is in your hand."

So who is responsible for disfellowshipping? Did Satan not kill Job's whole family save his wife?

I came to believe and understand however, that what is going on is Jehovah is making way for all of us to choose willing whether we serve him. Key word here "willingly."That in fact is the whole point of the MOTB, which WT has rendered meaningless!

Are we not taught to "hate the sin but not the sinner?" Are we not taught only Jehovah and Jesus are our judges? Who are these men to judge any of us? Well we all know who they think they are, "Have you begun ruling as kings without us? I really wish that you had begun ruling as kings, so that we also might rule with you as kings." And if Paul was NOT talking about the GB then who? Who else could possibly fit that description?

In fact I think there is no better demonstration of what Disfellowshipping, actually accomplishes than "PIMO's. "Physically in Mentally Out." It completely undermines their claim that DF'ing moves a person to repentance. What it really does is create an entire "underground" of people who have "beaten the system" in the sense that rather than face shunning, they simply pretend to still believe. If Jehovah's Holy spirit was at work within the congregations how do those people exist? Do the angles not know they are PIMO's?

It reminds me of what I was learning regarding torture back during the beginning phases of the "war on terror", and how ineffective torture actually was, because the person will say anything to end the torture, and it almost certainly does not end with extracting the truth from the person. Is that not exactly why PIMO's exist? They will say anything to avoid the torture of being shunned by their loved ones and family, but usually ends up with them as "POMO", (physically out mentally out. anyway, because living as a PIMO's is it's own kind of torture?

My nephew told me that when he really became convinced, in his words "that this was not the truth", was when he was DF'd and trying to get reinstated. He told me he WAS repentant!! But the Elders would NOT reinstate him. He needed "more time on his own." Then he told me he no longer wanted to be reinstated, and in fact months later they reached out to him. He told me when he went to meet with the Elders he prayed about it, that if this was "the truth" he would NOT be reinstated because his attitude had now changed. What happened, he was reinstated!!

As Timothy has so succinctly put it, "it is NOT unity it is uniformity!"

I was listening a little bit to a new guy who showed up on Youtube an Ex Elder the other day, and he said his grown son, became an atheists when he was 12, and remained for years as a PIMO. It is no wonder Jesus is going to deal with them so "harshly." Harshly? There is a much better word for it. Justly!!! And by the one who actually can read hearts and actually knows if a person really is repentant.

And while the Gb "wait on Jehovah" this is the result.

‘Master, I knew you to be a demanding man, reaping where you did not sow and gathering where you did not winnow.25  So I grew afraid and went and hid your talent in the ground. Here, you have what is yours.’ 26 In reply his master said to him: ‘Wicked and sluggish slave, you knew, did you, that I reaped where I did not sow and gathered where I did not winnow?27 Well, then, you should have deposited my money with the bankers, and on my coming I would have received it back with interest... 30  And throw the good-for-nothing slave out into the darkness outside. There is where his weeping and the gnashing of his teeth will be.’"

That brought back a few memories. You hit the nail on the head about what it does to people mentally. It’s like whipping yourself to endure going back. I was not Disfellowshipped, just reduced in rank, and I don’t know why to this day but the severance was just as much a disfellowshipping as if I had been. All it proved to me was that “they had no love amongst themselves” and that they themselves were no closer to Jehovah than anyone else. Jehovah continues to test our mettle whether we are in or out of watchtower though and it was far better a learning curve for me out of watchtower than it was inside of it. Who one is, seems more important to Jehovah than what one is termed as by others and so it has never bothered me to be outside of the org.

It is not whether one “belongs” to group of fellow believers, but whether one understands why they are. That insight is not to be found in watchtower because there is no binding unity in faith, it a facsimile based upon what the gb say it is. That simply does not work. When the brethren eventually get out, they will not be lost to that fact, but rejoice in it because the Truth will be made clear to them. Then for those still clinging to watchtower there will be only a grinding of teeth with them.