JW Insider

Hey AnonymousBrother. Great to see you back!!! And hopefully coming back to the States will be a good move, too. I've heard you tell of your retirement planning talk in the past. Although you are right about the math supporting it, there are congregations where such talk will not be so welcome, of course. I imagine you raised a few eyebrows when you first talked about "100 years" more in this old system of things. That's going to be seen as "apostate" talk in some circles. But even this idea that the math can support "100 years" potentially produces exactly the problem we had in 1975. We all acknowledge that the end can come at any time, that's a given. But the "overlapping generation" math, even when using maximum ages of 120, and an "anointing" acknowledged as early as age 15, doesn't extend forever. (Could stretch to 2124.) But what happens if you were asked to give that same talk 50 years from now? The math would only support a maximum that's closer to 50 years. And what happens 90 years from now? The math would only support a number closer to 10 more years. That's the same thing that started in 1966, when the system was expected to go on for only 10 to 15 more years. Brother Splane once laughed about persons who might be sitting at the JW Broadcasting desk years down the road after he's gone, so I know he's thought of the possibility. According to the "Watchtower," as I'm sure you already know, Brother Russell started to lose faith in 1914 near the end of 1913 and early in the year 1914, and he also began speculating about how people might look back and laugh "100 years from now" on what he had been predicting. On the Long Island Rail Road a few years ago, I spoke to a "Harold Camping" guy who, along with his wife, had quit their jobs because it was May 20, and only ONE day before their BIG day. I told him about our religion and 1874, 1878, 1881, 1914, and 1925 and 1975, and how you have to consider what you will do if the end doesn't come as expected. I asked if he had thought about the kind of counseling members of his faith might need on May 22 if it doesn't happen. He spoke to me about how this new date was not wrong, and it would show a grave lack of faith to be considering the possibility that it wouldn't happen. I told him about Mt 24:36; Acts 1:7, and 1Th 5:1, and that Harold Camping was wrong about his "end date" on a previous occasion, and this man was completely prepared to handle those objections. He had a whole CD of information he was giving out that explained May 21, 2011 and had a good explanation for what went wrong on a previous prediction. I gave him my number and told him I'd be happy to talk to him on May 22. At least Russell had been able to imagine people laughing at him 100 years down the road (2014). And many brothers that I knew were not taking 1975 very seriously either. This included my father, who even got in trouble for kind of letting that slip in a circuit assembly talk. Although my mother was a great believer in 1975, my father had a serious talk with me about 1975, confiding some of his objections about the fact that I was quitting school early to begin regular pioneering. He was of the opinion that we can believe it and be excited about it, but that it could be an embarrassment and reflect badly on Jehovah and his organization if we didn't count the cost, and consider all the possibilities before making a decision that we might "kick ourselves" for, looking back.

Do you have something specific in mind, perhaps to do with the overlapping generation, or something more general? Yes, the primary, specific driver of the problem is the fact that Brother Splane has already pointed out the fact that "GROUP 2" are getting "up there" in years, and he pointed to specific people as examples, showing how many of the prime examples from "GROUP 2" have already died. But while this is the driver there are, yes, I think there are a few more general items that combine and catalyze to provide the fuel for the transmission of this vehicle. One of those general items is a subtle attempt to "herd the cats" back into a more well-defined pen again. The idea of obeying what we might not understand has now been implicitly repeated at least three times recently in various contexts. In 1966, when the first problem started, we were as a group, even more united in thinking than we were in 1925 when some brothers sold their property and created financial issues for themselves. Not everyone, of course, but thousands were just as united in thought as in 1914 when people were pretty much counting down to the very month and day on their countdown cards to October 1, 1914. Many at that time sold property and even bought life insurance policies to provide for their "non-Russellite" relatives when they would be taken. The difference was that, around 1975, we weren't looking to specific day this time, but to a short time period of just months, not years, after 1975 when the 6th creative day would run out. (Of course, brothers were only willing to wait until about December 1975 before forgetting ) The 2018 Circuit Assembly talk on using social media is another example of "herding the cats."

Thanks. But I was referring to the irony of responding to a point about "honesty" by creating additional, false, contradictory accounts -- alter-egos or "personalities," as it were. However, that is almost a perfect lead-in to what many of us saw happening not long after the 1970's came and went without the expectations fulfilled. I haven't studied the psychology of these things, so I can't speak to egos and ids as others might be able to. But I can agree that ego in the more common meaning of the word would help explain why so many people didn't want to admit having been wrong -- and were more than happy to adjust to the belief that this whole thing didn't really happen the way it did, and even if it did, it was only because a few brothers and sisters "ran ahead" of Jehovah's organization. Even people who lived through the time period, as I did my along with own large family, including an extended family of Witnesses, were very quick to dismiss the idea that anything was ever said in the way it was actually said. A Bible study could actually read directly from photocopies of 10 to 20 year old publications to my mother and father, and they would deny that these were actual photocopies. My grandmother, who collected almost every special talk from every traveling visitor and Society (branch) representative, had all the old talks from the period, and even a circuit assembly from 1970, I think, that was just full of amazingly unscriptural talks about what the 1970's were sure to bring. My father was usually the "Sound Servant" (speakers, mics, mixers, amps, wires) at any assembly we attended, whether circuit, district, international, special meeting, and we often attended at least 6 assemblies a year due to this fact. He kept a master copy of most of the assemblies and visits to the Norco Assembly Hall (the first one) and I would sometimes hear a talk again when he made copies of some of these talks on request. I heard the talks from this period more times than I care to remember. Still, I found this time period to be exciting and entertaining. And I still think that the expectations--even though they were not fulfilled at the time many of us expected--were sill faith-strengthening rather than devastating, as they were to some. I thought they made us imagine more clearly what our lives could be like in just a few years, and it made us imagine what they might be like if things didn't happen as many expected. I never had a problem with this "exercise" of our faith. It was like a kind of mental "fire drill." I think it helped many to clarify their relationship with Jehovah. I was baptized in 1967, when the 1966 book that started this post was required reading for baptism. and began to auxiliary pioneer with all the magazines and books related to this issue. I was scheduled to graduate in 1975 but quit high school to pioneer full-time in 1973, not even 16 years old. This was recommended and encouraged by elders, circuit overseers and district overseers. My father, an electrical engineer, put some strict conditions on me if I were to leave school, including the amount of money I had to earn and split with the family per month, how soon I had to be able to support myself and leave the house (when I was 18 years old). So my life was defined around 1975 in such a way that I was not as apt to forget what happened and why. But many persons who lived through the same period are now quick to deny that any of what happened actually happened, including things that happened to them personally. This is a disconcerting observation.

Irony sharpens irony.

I have not made it a secret that I think we are currently hurtling toward the same problem we created for ourselves in the 1970's. Therefore, I think it's very important that we don't forget this part of our history, as we can learn from it. I think we learn just as much from the defensive attempts, like the one on "Defending Jehovah's Witnesses" linked above. In fact, I think the mistakes made back in the 1960's and early 1970's with respect to 1975 were very trivial compared to the lessons we can learn about our own egos, our pride and our honesty. Honesty is a form of faithfulness, and that's the only reason that this discussion might still be important to some of us today.

LOL! Thanks for the information. Google returned this same general content that you posted in about 11 places, but after checking several of them, the ones I checked were missing the fifth paragraph and the last paragraph found on your post, which is why I assumed that you might have added both these paragraphs yourself. My apologies for the assumption that you had provided both of the extra paragraphs as your own comment. It looks to me now as if you only added the final sentence/paragraph: "There seems to be a disconnect between what people actually thought about 1975 in the eyes of the world.... " The versions I found on YAHOO ANSWERS didn't have the missing paragraphs, but some had versions of the 10 extra paragraphs that I quoted from the longer version in the last post. These versions are each a bit different, but repeat many of the key paragraphs. Examples: https://br.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20111008133433AA7SDXA https://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20130824022819AAzCbIj https://br.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100108180505AAc6yvr My goal was to make sure that if I responded, I was going to be able to separate the part you wrote from the part you quoted. So thanks for helping me out on that point. Apparently, as you have now pointed out, you got your version from a place that perfectly matches http://defendingjehovahswitnesses.blogspot.com/2013/09/did-jehovahs-witnesses-organization.html I had already glanced at that sight, but didn't inspect it because it was so quickly obvious that it was about 10 paragraphs too short to be the original answer. Anyway, the "Defending Jehovah's Witnesses" blog also agrees that it came originally from YAHOO ANSWERS and from BAR-ANERGES. Not that these differences mattered much to the point being discussed, but I thought the author (BAR-ANERGES) wrote a very good thesis to discuss under this topic, because it is a fairly complete general answer that matches much of what I myself have said to people, in defense of 1975, and what my parents and many others typically say. So I thought it would be good to address all of it. (Along with anything you might have said in defense of it.)

@DefenderOTT I know that you have already said (elsewhere) that you were not the originator of much of the post you offered above. Just to help clarify what you are saying, I noticed that the first four paragraphs are exactly what can be seen from a person who wrote this on YAHOO ANSWERS about 6 years ago. https://br.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20111008133433AA7SDXA Those are the 4 paragraphs that start and then end as follows: Then you apparently added your own words in the fifth paragraph above: Then it appears that you went back to quoting YAHOO ANSWERS, quoting the next three paragraphs, which started and ended, thus: Then apparently you added your own words again to finish up the discussion. I only went to the trouble of mentioning all this because I would like to respond at some point to those claims from YAHOO ANSWERS. For reference, here is the remaining part of the quote that was found on YAHOO ANSWERS. Although it's mostly wrong, it's also partly correct, and it's well written, and I expect that the points will come up from time to time:

[I'm repeating here a post which is a response I just made to this claim about Armstrong, as it was moved to a new topic:] And, don't forget that, in 1956, Herbert W Armstrong supposedly stole the idea from the February 1, 1955 Watchtower, which put the end of 6,000 years within one year of 1976: *** w55 2/1 p. 95 Questions From Readers *** In 1953 in preparing the chart that appears in the book “New Heavens and a New Earth” a one-year error was brought to light. By the aid of the New World Translation of the Hebrew Scriptures the difference between the two numbers appearing at Genesis 7:6 and Genesis 7:11 became apparent, especially since there are two different Hebrew words here maintaining a distinct difference. At Genesis 7:6 the number 600 referring to Noah’s age means 600 full years, being what is generally termed a cardinal number. Whereas at Genesis 7:11 the number “600th,” an ordinal number, means 599 full years plus a portion of another year. . . . Inasmuch as previously our chronology considered Noah as 600 full years old when he entered the ark, instead of the actual 599 years and some months, as we now see, this has meant that the preflood dates must be shrunk by one year, this bringing Adam’s creation for the fall of 4025 B.C. Incidentally, Jesus, who became the second or “last Adam,” was born in the fall of the year around the first of October.—1 Cor. 15:45, NW. It is well to understand that all Bible chronology dates for events prior to 539 B.C. must be figured backward from the Absolute date of 539 B.C. In the sure date of 607 B.C. for the fall of Jerusalem we have an anchor for the chronology establishment of the important year of 1914. By an overwhelming number of physical facts occurring since 1914, this great turning-point year in man’s history, 1914, has been abundantly confirmed. According to Genesis 1:24-31 Adam was created during the last part of the sixth creative-day period of 7,000 years. Almost all independent chronologists assume incorrectly that, as soon as Adam was created, then began Jehovah’s seventh seven-thousand-year period of the creative week. Such then figure that from Adam’s creation, now thought to be the fall of 4025 B.C., why, six thousand years of God’s rest day would be ending in the fall of 1976. However, from our present chronology (which is admitted imperfect) at best the fall of the year 1976 would be the end of 6,000 years of human history for mankind, 6,000 years of man’s existence on the earth, not 6,000 years of Jehovah’s seventh seven-thousand-year period. Why not? Because Adam lived some time after his creation in the latter part of Jehovah’s sixth creative period, before the seventh period, Jehovah’s sabbath, began. . . . The very fact that, as part of Jehovah’s secret, no one today is able to find out how much time Adam and later Eve lived during the closing days of the sixth creative period, so no one can now determine when six thousand years of Jehovah’s present rest day come to an end. Obviously, whatever amount of Adam’s 930 years was lived before the beginning of that seventh-day rest of Jehovah, that unknown amount would have to be added to the 1976 date. Of course, just a decade or so later, the Watchtower began minimizing the amount of time it would have taken for a perfect man to name all the animals if Jehovah brought them to him in a steady stream. The flaw in this reasoning was that angels would surely know that amount of time that Jehovah had kept a secret, so they would be aware of the day and the hour "when 6,000 years of Jehovah's present rest day come to an end." There is also evidence that Fred W. Franz, who wrote the article above, in 1955, began recalculating in the early 1970's and wanted to begin publishing October 1974 as the date for the end of the 6,000 years of human history. F.W.Franz, I am told, thought this would have strengthened the 1975 argument. But this was supposedly one of the few times when N.Knorr put his foot down and told him he had caused enough trouble with 1975, and that Knorr thought that this vacillation would actually weaken the faith that people put in the Watchtower. You probably already know this, but to your point, many Witnesses had to be counseled not to listen to Armstrong's radio program, especially in the late 1960's and early 1970's when many Witnesses claimed that he sounded exactly like the Watchtower.

This brings up a topic that often comes up worldwide on the topic of having married or remarried incorrectly based on previous incorrect understanding of divorce and remarriage when the erroneous advice came from a previous religion or culture. The basic idea is to require no changes if the current legal state of a (non-polygamous) marriage is difficult to change. But difficulties in making legal changes after one become a Witness (after an improper divorce and remarriage) will not make the person guilty (or at least reprehensible) of on-going adultery as it would if the person made an improper choice as a Witness, but there are still levels of privilege in their congregational assignments to be considered and various requirements that are suggested for elders to look into. Also: *** w83 3/15 p. 31 Honor Godly Marriage! *** Those who acted on the basis of the knowledge they had at the time are not to be criticized. Nor would this affect the standing of a person who in the past believed that a mate’s perverted sexual conduct within marriage amounted to porneia and, hence, obtained a divorce and is now remarried. This cannot begin to cover, however, several cases of those (sisters, usually) who wanted to divorce a husband whom they discovered to have been homosexual. In the 1950's through part of the 1980's and beyond, marrying a sister was considered to be the best solution for Witnesses who are homosexual but are sure they will never act upon their sexual desires. Elders even recommended it. But then, even after infidelity on the part of the husband, and after the husband was usually disfellowshipped, the innocent sister could still never marry a Christian husband for the rest of her life, potentially. This is the primary type of case I referred to when I mentioned to tromboneck that there are still persons living for whom this injustice, even if later corrected, had affected their lives and is still affecting their lives. The problem actually lasted for decades, not months.

Pretty much. Excellent summary.

I suspect that while Fred Franz was almost surely both the writer and the "approval checker" of the 1956 article, that he kept his distance from the Aid Book project. This does not mean that the information in the Aid Book , "Divorce" article (written likely at least one year before section A-E was released at an assembly in 1969) came directly from R.Franz. It was obviously copied very closely from the 1956 article. It was also true that R.Franz says that, when working on the Aid Book, he did not think he had the leeway to make changes to the current doctrines, but he also admits to not even having any thought or inclination to discuss changes to doctrines until after such questions were brought to the Governing Body around 1972 and after. And even though he was not a member of the Governing Body, but just a new guy in the Writing Department, I still kind of "blame" him for being given an opportunity to research through these topics again, and not to question them immediately and strongly. All of us are supposed to question everything, and he appears to have been given a wonderful opportunity from at least 1968 to 1971, and yet spent more of his "political capital" on the new elder arrangement. Returning to an elder arrangement like the one that Rutherford had opposed was a good thing, of course. But I think he was in a good position to push for many more changes and he evidently never considered these things closely. Of course, I have the same issue with the other brothers who just let things go along as tradition had said, but most of the others were not given an assignment with the leeway to just let the facts fall where the Scriptures lead. He says that this is what Fred Franz told him he should do, and there are a couple of blatant areas where he fell short in this assignment.

I have never discussed with anyone how far back these errors actually went, but my father tells me that he knew of the problem when he was first a Congregation Servant in the 1960's and an elder since 1971. I have an uncle who would know, but I'm not comfortable asking about the topic with him, even though, as a former circuit overseer, he could speak to things that came up in entire circuits. My father just mentioned an article they used from the 1950's just months before I was born. I found it: *** w56 10/1 p. 588 par. 12, 20 Marriage Obligations and Divorce *** 12 By the laws of states and nations today divorce is granted on a number of grounds. Persons who have lost or killed their love for their marriage mate try to grab hold of whatever legal grounds they can to break the marriage tie, such as mental cruelty, laziness, refusal of conjugal rights, drunkenness, insanity, incurable disease, desertion or abandonment, barrenness, sodomy, bestiality, criminality, incompatibility, change of one’s religion, and so on, besides adultery. But are all these legal grounds Scripturally right, valid for the Christian? Jesus Christ is Jehovah’s Counselor for us. The Jewish Pharisees once tested him with this question: “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife on every kind of grounds?” Jesus did not answer those questioners by referring to the Roman Caesar’s laws concerning divorce. He referred to the superior law of the Most High God and showed there is but one ground for divorce—adultery or moral unfaithfulness. Sodomy (or the unnatural intercourse of one male with another male as with a female), Lesbianism (or the homosexual relations between women), and bestiality (or the unnatural sexual relations by man or woman with an animal) are not Scriptural grounds for divorce. They are filthy, they are unclean, and God’s law to Israel condemned to death those committing such misdeeds, thus drastically putting these out of God’s congregation. But such acts are not adultery with the opposite sex, making the unclean person one flesh with another of the opposite sex. One would think that the term "adultery or moral unfaithfulness" would have covered the "AOS" ground, but notice that the paragraph explicitly mentioned that bestiality and sodomy were legal grounds but not Scriptural grounds. My father says that questions about this went to the Service Department and in the mid-1960's, at least, Harley Miller (Service Department Overseer) would actually get on the phone with the Congregation Servant and give the instructions that sodomy and bestiality were not the same as "adultery." I can't say how consistent this was over the years, but my father says it was already in effect in the mid-1960's. And here we also have one of the Watchtowers used in defense of it going back to the mid-1950's. As an aside, the same article from 1956 allowed for scriptural divorce for a wife's artificial insemination where she does not get permission from the impotent husband. This makes some sense, but the idea of "a virtual committing of adultery" should have provided the slippery slope to resolve these other issues. But even where they both agree, they would both be disfellowshipped. Note that there was a stronger tendency to rely on the Mosaic Law to develop some of these rules: *** w56 10/1 pp. 590-591 par. 18 Marriage Obligations and Divorce *** Where a man is impotent today the married couple in their desire for children might agree for the wife to receive the seed of another man by artificial insemination. Some law courts have already held that artificial insemination is adultery and that children produced by such means are illegitimate. The recent British Royal Commission on Marriage and Divorce recommended as a ground for divorce the wife’s acceptance of artificial insemination by a donor of seed without her husband’s consent. Such a divorce would be Scriptural. But where the husband consented it would be grounds for the disfellowshiping of both man and wife. Why? Because it is a virtual committing of adultery, and both man and wife consented to the immoral act. The husband in effect gave her to another man to receive the seed of copulation, and the wife gave herself to a man not her husband to become the mother of a child by that other man with whom she was not one flesh. It is an adulterous course, and the fact that the husband adopts the child does not do away with the fact that he consented to the adulterous use of his wife.—Lev. 15:16-18, 32, 33; 19:20; Num. 5:12, 13, NW. Also, it's odd that even where the congregation would normally disfellowship, he or she can avoid the disfellowshipping if the innocent spouse has forgiven the other spouse: 33 When a congregation withholds an excommunication action because of the innocent mate’s prior forgiveness, this does not mean that the guilty mate may not and should not be deprived of any special responsibilities or service privileges in the congregation. Here, not excommunication, but the qualifications for special service positions in the congregation are involved.

I think this statement needs clarification. Perhaps it's a good idea, after all, to look into some background of this doctrine issue. We could go back much further, but since you brought up the Aid Book --a portion on divorce that was published in 1969-- I think we should go back further into the 1960's to start. The following would have most likely come from Fred Rusk or Fred Franz, approved at the time, I think, by Adams. *** w63 2/1 p. 78 par. 22 Conduct “Worthy of the Good News” *** 22 But what can be done where the marriage is not a happy one, where there are disagreements over religion or over other matters? Are there any grounds upon which such a marriage might be ended by divorce, allowing the man or woman to marry another partner with whom they feel they could get along better? The Bible does not permit divorce just for any reason. While the law of the land may permit a divorce just because a husband and wife do not get along together and want to be free to marry somebody else, the Bible states only one reason allowing for a divorce that really brings the marriage to an end, namely, adultery. Jesus made this clear when he said: “I say to you that whoever divorces his wife, except on the ground of fornication [that is, adultery], and marries another commits adultery.” (Matt. 19:9) By the act of adultery the unfaithful mate really becomes one flesh with someone other than his lawful marriage partner. Of course, the faithful partner may choose to forgive this act and continue to live with his mate, but if he chooses to divorce because of the adultery of his mate, then he will be free to marry some other person, since the marriage contract is thus Scripturally as well as legally broken. In view of the need for understanding and love to make a marriage last, the dedicated Christian heeds the wise counsel of the Scriptures to marry “only in the Lord,” that is, to marry one who is, like him, a dedicated Christian.—1 Cor. 7:39. A couple things to notice here. One point is nuanced but made clearer in other publications: that only the innocent party could choose to get the divorce, otherwise the divorce would not free the innocent mate to remarry. That's another story. Another point is that the "only one reason" allowing for divorce was tied in 1963 to 'becoming one flesh' with the other person -- not just any kind of "porneia" but only "straight" adultery. But notice that it is the type of thing that became bound up in the types of rulings that the Governing Body began to spend more and more of their time on. Per comments referring to the period 1971-1972 here is what R.Franz says, about the early meetings of the GB: At times the entire meeting lasted but a few minutes; one that I recall lasted only seven minutes (including the opening prayer). Then from time to time President Knorr would bring some “problem correspondence” involving questions as to certain conduct by individual Witnesses, and the Body was to decide what policy should be adopted regarding these, whether the particular conduct called for disfellowshiping, some lesser discipline, or no action at all. Those early meetings, he says, sometimes consisted only of reading a list of names of branch appointments from places like Suriname, Sri Lanka, or Zambia that no one usually recognized, and then the GB would vote on the appointments. But now, at least by 1972, the topics were beginning to include the following issues, R.Franz says: As weeks went along discussions were held on such subjects as whether a father qualifies as an elder if he allows a son or daughter to marry when only eighteen years of age; whether one qualifies as an elder if he approves of his son or daughter taking higher education; [Higher education was, and to some extent still is, generally frowned upon as conducive to loss of faith and as providing an atmosphere likely to contribute to immorality.] whether one qualifies as an elder if he does shift work and sometimes (while on night shift) misses congregational meetings; whether elders can accept circumstantial evidence of adultery, or the testimony of a wife that her husband confessed adultery to her, and whether this is sufficient to allow for Scriptural divorce and remarriage; whether a divorce is Scripturally acceptable if, even where adultery has been committed, the one obtaining the divorce is the guilty mate rather than the innocent mate; [At that time the ruling was that only if the innocent mate got the divorce was it Scripturally valid.] what validity a divorce has when obtained on grounds other than adultery if, after the divorce is granted, evidence of pre-divorce adultery comes to light; what the situation is if such a divorce is obtained and there is post-divorce adultery; whether an innocent mate’s having sex relations with an adulterous mate (subsequent to learning of the adultery) cancels out the right to divorce that mate and be free to remarry; whether it is proper for a Witness to pay a fine if that fine is imposed because of an infraction of law resulting from his witnessing activity or because of some stand he had taken in order to adhere to Witness beliefs; whether it is proper to send food or other assistance to persons by means of the Red Cross (the main issue here being that the cross is a religious symbol, and so the Red Cross organization might be quasi-religious . . . ). . . . The effect of our decisions was considerable in its impact on the lives of others. In matters of divorce, for example, the congregation elders serve as a sort of religious court and if they are not satisfied as to the validity of a divorce action, the individual who goes through with such a divorce and then later remarries becomes subject to disfellowshiping. I will break this up into smaller pieces so as to not create multi-page posts.

Because this post was moved away from its original context, a response to a post about Armstrong's promotion of 1975, I will edit the post below to contain all of @AllenSmith's original material, here. I'm moving his images outside the quote, so that they can be more easiliy seen as relevant to the discussion of H.W.Armstrong, as Allen intended.   And, don't forget that, in 1956, Herbert W Armstrong supposedly stole the idea from the February 1, 1955 Watchtower, which put the end of 6,000 years within one year of 1976: *** w55 2/1 p. 95 Questions From Readers *** In 1953 in preparing the chart that appears in the book “New Heavens and a New Earth” a one-year error was brought to light. By the aid of the New World Translation of the Hebrew Scriptures the difference between the two numbers appearing at Genesis 7:6 and Genesis 7:11 became apparent, especially since there are two different Hebrew words here maintaining a distinct difference. At Genesis 7:6 the number 600 referring to Noah’s age means 600 full years, being what is generally termed a cardinal number. Whereas at Genesis 7:11 the number “600th,” an ordinal number, means 599 full years plus a portion of another year. . . . Inasmuch as previously our chronology considered Noah as 600 full years old when he entered the ark, instead of the actual 599 years and some months, as we now see, this has meant that the preflood dates must be shrunk by one year, this bringing Adam’s creation for the fall of 4025 B.C. Incidentally, Jesus, who became the second or “last Adam,” was born in the fall of the year around the first of October.—1 Cor. 15:45, NW. It is well to understand that all Bible chronology dates for events prior to 539 B.C. must be figured backward from the Absolute date of 539 B.C. In the sure date of 607 B.C. for the fall of Jerusalem we have an anchor for the chronology establishment of the important year of 1914. By an overwhelming number of physical facts occurring since 1914, this great turning-point year in man’s history, 1914, has been abundantly confirmed. According to Genesis 1:24-31 Adam was created during the last part of the sixth creative-day period of 7,000 years. Almost all independent chronologists assume incorrectly that, as soon as Adam was created, then began Jehovah’s seventh seven-thousand-year period of the creative week. Such then figure that from Adam’s creation, now thought to be the fall of 4025 B.C., why, six thousand years of God’s rest day would be ending in the fall of 1976. However, from our present chronology (which is admitted imperfect) at best the fall of the year 1976 would be the end of 6,000 years of human history for mankind, 6,000 years of man’s existence on the earth, not 6,000 years of Jehovah’s seventh seven-thousand-year period. Why not? Because Adam lived some time after his creation in the latter part of Jehovah’s sixth creative period, before the seventh period, Jehovah’s sabbath, began. . . . The very fact that, as part of Jehovah’s secret, no one today is able to find out how much time Adam and later Eve lived during the closing days of the sixth creative period, so no one can now determine when six thousand years of Jehovah’s present rest day come to an end. Obviously, whatever amount of Adam’s 930 years was lived before the beginning of that seventh-day rest of Jehovah, that unknown amount would have to be added to the 1976 date. Of course, just a decade or so later, the Watchtower began minimizing the amount of time it would have taken for a perfect man to name all the animals if Jehovah brought them to him in a steady stream. The flaw in this reasoning was that angels would surely know that amount of time that Jehovah had kept a secret, so they would be aware of the day and the hour "when 6,000 years of Jehovah's present rest day come to an end." There is also evidence that Fred W. Franz, who wrote the article above, in 1955, began recalculating in the early 1970's and wanted to begin publishing October 1974 as the date for the end of the 6,000 years of human history. F.W.Franz, I am told, thought this would have strengthened the 1975 argument. But this was supposedly one of the few times when N.Knorr put his foot down and told him he had caused enough trouble with 1975, and that Knorr thought that this vacillation would actually weaken the faith that people put in the Watchtower. You probably already know this, but to your point, many Witnesses had to be counseled not to listen to Armstrong's radio program, especially in the late 1960's and early 1970's when many Witnesses claimed that he sounded exactly like the Watchtower.

That's a good topic. It's been discussed here before. Perhaps someone can point to the place.

True. I remember that this topic came up once before a couple of years ago and I stayed out of it. But that woman, Anna, she kept dragging my name into it, and so I bit into the subject this time. I am not exactly staying on topic as narrowly as it seems defined here. I speculated about marriages broken up over the Watchtower's counsel on this topic. The term "homosexual behavior," you will remember, was being used (during that time period) as a stand-in phrase for aberrant sexual practices between heterosexual married partners that could include anal or oral sex (AOS). Perhaps, I will use this made-up term "AOS" rather than spell it out. So, on the topic of breaking up marriages, consider, for example, that a sister might wish to obtain a divorce against a husband (believing or unbelieving) who insisted on AOS, during a time when the Service Department (and Branch) was inconsistent. If the sister obtained a divorce and remarried, she could be subject to disfellowshipping, even if the congregation had approved of her divorce. (In some countries, especially in unstable or "failed" states, the congregation was a better record-keeper of marriage/divorce than the state itself.) This topic evidently came up much more often within heterosexual marriages, especially marriages between a believer and non-believer, when either the husband or wife wished to engage in AOS, and their partner did not wish to engage. Or both wished to engage and one or both ended up disfellowshipped. I handled more than one of these cases myself, and at the time, my wife knew of even more cases than those which came to the elders. These situations were evidently common, and the stress of perceived intrusion by the congregation and/or unscriptural legalism resulted in broken marriages, divorce, and questions about freedom to remarry, injustice, anger, and even disfellowshipping for unscriptural remarriage. While I was at Bethel, a brother in Writing -- I won't name him because he's still alive -- complained to me that more unmarried, young people than ever were taking some recent counsel as permission to engage in oral sex.** He was somewhere between "livid" and "flabbergasted." I remember he said: "How can even a married couple think of doing this?!?! They know the angels are watching!" The idea of angels in a couple's bedroom was an odd image that stuck with me. At any rate, I know that this brother was involved in the actual writing of one of the corrections or clarifications of a previous view. **Although this might seem impossible, I heard it stated to me directly by one of these persons in 1977, who had once believed it, but had come to his senses. He said that since 1974 with Armageddon around the corner, no one really knew for sure what lay ahead, and even if the Society was promising eternal marriages in perfect paradise, that, for all they knew, this might be the last chance to know what sex is like. And that this was a way to experience it without sinning to the extent of becoming "one flesh" with the other person. I'm not sure it will mean much to go through the history of these issues. But I'm willing to see if I can add anything to the conversation if anyone thinks it could be useful.

Yes and no. (Mostly no.) It was not so simple. There were multiple issues that arose and two separate corrections. I don't think R.Franz has ever claimed to have written more than a few specific articles in the Aid Book, only mentioning a couple of them where he discusses the questions and research that was necessary for them. He had responsibility for starting and completing the Aid Book, but much of this was done by assigning hundreds of small articles to various Branch personnel worldwide who had some writing experience writing talks, yearbook experiences, Awake correspondent articles, translating publications, and handling branch correspondence. Major Bible-based articles in the Aid Book were mostly handled by a team of only about 5 brothers in Brooklyn - in Writing plus one Gilead Instructor. R.Franz became more of a collator, editor and "project manager" for the Aid Book. It's true that there was a procedure to get all Writing approved, but remember that there was no Governing Body while this book was written and approved. Only one person among the corporate directors (a kind of proto-GB) would have had the say to approve or not. This was Fred Franz, and his eyesight was already poor and he was dictating many of his own articles and having a lot read to him (instead of reading it himself). I don't know if Lyman Swingle was supposed to read it before publication, I have heard it implied that he did. When I was in research, a GB member named Schroeder had not read it, and even asked me if I would read through it, looking for certain points he had in mind. About a dozen sisters read through assigned portions of it both for proofreading and so that the 1966-1970 Index (out in 1971) could include all the topics and scripture references for the full 1971 Aid Book (A through Z). We did not have electronic storage of it at that time. So, up to a greater point than some realize, R.Franz really was responsible for errors he made, too.

The Aid Book was the primary Bible study reference for all JWs until 1988, 29 years ago, but I'm guessing that 90% of the original articles stayed the same even in the Insight Book that replaced it in 1988. I'm sure there are people still alive whose marriages were broken up over the Watchtower's counsel on this topic. And perhaps there are some who are still alive who were disfellowshipped and should not have been, and some that should have been disciplined and were not, resulting in injustice. The basic issues and definitions that were once wrong on this topic were fixed relatively quickly, but this alone does not resolve the stress and loss and injustice that some suffered due to the short-lived "gaffe" in the Watchtower. The Bible acknowledges that injustice can have a bad effect not only on the person but even on their children and grandchildren. I can't speak for J.R.Ewing JR, but I'd say you might have misunderstood the reason he presented the material he presented. I think he's one of Jehovah's Witnesses and that he was trying to defend the morality of JWs, both historically and currently. He was not, imo, trying to promote a non-Witness idea.

Most of what I'm sharing here is taken from one of the books by R.Franz. I can only corroborate a small part of it. At any rate, it looks like R.Franz admits that he was asked to write both the first defense of the bad policy and the later correction.

I think you are right. Fred Franz wrote a 1969 article that got much of these concerns started over the definition of "porneia," and this article started a number of judicial issues which were typically handled by the Service Department (Harley Miller, Merton Campbell, etc.) Believe it or not, Knorr and Fred Franz had very little input into congregational discipline issues from about 1968 to nearly 1980. Harley Miller was trusted to manage this through his team. He was the chief "executioner" in those days. Fred Franz was a prophecy specialist and the primary doctrines he took an interest in were related to fulfillment of prophecy. Nathan Knorr was a bureaucrat, whose work running a fast-growing organization left him with almost no time for anything else. With the only other active organizational officers like G.Suiter, L.Swingle, and M.Henschel, the g.b. only existed for corporate, bureaucratic functions like signing checks, buying presses, paper, property and ink, etc. The governing body did not exist as a "body" or even a "committee" of any kind until 1971 when R.Franz, G.Gangas, L.Greenlees, and W.Jackson were added to the corporate-defined officers. But none of these men, not even Knorr, even in 1971 would have thought it possible to suggest a change in doctrine, which could have only fallen to F.Franz. There became one exception to that rule, because one member of this new Governing Body was put there specifically because he had successfully completed the Aid Book, and a couple items from the Aid Book resulted in policy/doctrinal changes. One of those policy changes was the creation (in 1971) of the "elder arrangement" with committees, which by extension, resulted in the creation of the "Governing Body." But Franz, in his book, says that even then 1971-1974, he still would never had thought of suggesting a change in doctrine, and the initial meetings of the GB were not about spiritual matters, but just bureaucratic matters like rubber-stamping the sign-off on lists of names selected for full-time branch assignments and traveling overseers. But Knorr began bringing in some of the questionable disfellowshipping decisions (from Harley Miller and Merton Campbell, etc) and other Service Department issues. Most people didn't notice, but the Writing Department was still on a 20-year cycle (updating articles that had been printed approximately 20 years earlier, starting in the mid-1930's) with a lot more, new prophecy-related updates by F.Franz interspersed. So the 1972 article was to be written as a defense of the current disfellowshippings by the Service Department, and R.Franz was given the assignment during a time when he still did not question the general doctrines. Remember that the Aid Book didn't even question our chronology even though R.Franz already should have known better based on all the contrary research they found while preparing that book. According to Franz it was not until between 1974 and 1976 when he realized that he disagreed with the rest of the Governing Body who voted that a sister was not free to get a divorce because her husband only had anal sex with another woman. The Governing Body's opinion was that oral or anal sex or bestiality on the part of the husband with other women (or animals) would not have freed her to remarry. At this point he was sure the other members had it wrong and when the policy finally changed, he says he was happy that he was also assigned to write the updated correction to the old ruling in 1976.

This was a bit tongue-in-cheek. I was havin' a laugh (or in this case "having a loaf" as one of your UK ads says it.) But here goes: There are about 365 days in a year. So all disfellowshippings take place between 0 and 365 days after the Memorial. The average amount of time is therefore 365/2, which is 182.5 days. Just to allow for some unpredictable skewing, and to be a little more conservative, and because the word "most" is technically at least 50.0001%, I pretended that the year has two extra weeks, so that the average would be 380/2 which is 190 days. So it was no different than saying that about half of all disfellowshippings will take place during a six-month period, on average. Saying on average, should make the estimate even a bit more conservative, since some years all of a congregation's disfellowshippings might take place towards Winter, but in other years all of them might take place closer to Summer. It should always be the case that a disfellowshipping is either 182.5 (or 183) days before or after a Memorial because this will cover the entire year, although I left out the word "on average" here which would have better accounted for the times when one Memorial is in March but the following year's Memorial is in April. Still, if, on average, all events (DF'ing or anything else) take place either 182.5 days before or after a Memorial, then the average amount of days that these events take place on EITHER side of a Memorial is 91.25 days (182.5/2) or 91.375 accounting for leap years. I rounded this to 90 instead of 91.375.** ** In my own experience in about 6 congregations from Californian, Missouri and New York, there is a strong skewing toward summer disfellowshippings, and some of this might even be related to the reminders all the elders get in the "season" of extra shepherding visits encouraged just before the Memorial, and the follow-ups just after. This helps my numbers by a few decimal points, but is unnecessary where I said "average." At any rate, after correcting the 90 to 91.375, I stand by these numbers, on average.

Sounds rhetorical, here, too. One, of course, involves a commandment from a higher authority and a tradition just refers to periodically repeated actions (or attendant rites) not based on any specific requirements or commandments. I suppose you might be pointing out the fact that the Israelites were keeping a command to celebrate their harvests, and Thanksgiving has nothing to with a command to celebrate harvests. If this is what you are saying, I would agree. The Israelites played a part in every one of those actions toward the native Egyptians in the land they left and toward the Canaanites and other related nations in the land promised to them, and even towards non-conforming members of their own nation of Israelites. But it was by command of God, as they understood it, or through the direct actions of God.

True. Thanks for pointing that out. Psalm 23's omission of the divine name was especially glaring. I think that the following must include the portion of the preface that you referred to: Â

Alas! As with so many facets of life, even the value of the Bible as a printed book has sometimes been eclipsed by the value put on of a book of science. Wikipedia (linked from a Wikipedia article about the Bay Psalter) The Codex Leicester (also briefly known as Codex Hammer) is a collection of famous scientific writings by Leonardo da Vinci. The Codex is named after Thomas Coke, later created Earl of Leicester, who purchased it in 1719. Of Leonardo's 30 scientific journals, the Codex may be the most famous of all. The manuscript currently holds the record for the second highest sale price of any book, as it was sold to Bill Gates at Christie's auction house on 11 November 1994 in New York for US$30,802,500 (equivalent to $49,772,200 in 2016).[1][2][3]

I have heard this too, but never from a source I knew personally. I believe it may have been true of the first wife of South Africa's President Nelson Mandela. Per Wikipedia (and other sources): Evelyn became a Jehovah's Witness,[2] and separated from Mandela in 1955 after what her husband described in his autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, as an irreconcilable conflict between politics and religion. "I could not give up my life in the struggle, and she could not live with my devotion to something other than herself and her family", he wrote. "I never lost my admiration for her, but in the end we could not make our marriage work."[13] Evelyn moved to Cofimvaba in the eastern Cape, where she opened up a shop, and pinned a notice to the gate asking media to leave her alone.[3] One reporter, Fred Bridgland, did manage to obtain an interview, in which he discussed the proposals surrounding Mandela's release from prison. She was angry at the situation, believing that it was being treated like the second coming of Christ and proclaiming "How can a man who has committed adultery and left his wife and children be Christ? The whole world worships Nelson too much. He is only a man."[3] Evelyn spent much of her later years working as a Jehovah's Witness missionary. She kept the name Mandela, but in the late 1990s she married retired Soweto businessman Simon Rakeepile.[14] She died on 30 April 2004.[1] Mandela attended the funeral along with his second and third wives.[15] Perhaps, since Grace Mugabe also came from South Africa, these facts helped promote a rumor. I did notice that in the comments section of more than one newspaper article about Grace Mugabe, that commenters left messages that have the sound of something one of Jehovah's Witnesses might say in her defense: Here's one good example found at: https://dev.newsday.co.zw/2015/11/mugabe-is-suffering-grace/ The article ends on this note: On Friday Grace told a rally she often skips meals in solidarity with starving Zimbabweans. One of the best responses was: Please tell the Queen that SOMETIMES we eat in solidarity with the first family Most of the responses were sarcastic, except possibly this one: Chief Mola November 23, 2015 at 7:39 am This woman’s statement vindicates God’s word. There is nothing worth living for except Jehovah’s word as written in the Bible, a book written by our ancestors not the whiteman (Job 30v30, Song of Songs 1v5&6, Psalms 119v83, Lamentations 5v10). We should be preparing for Jesus Christ’s imminent return not the worldly emptiness that we persue. I don't mention this as evidence that Grace Mugabe might actually be a JW, but to show how easy it is to keep such a rumor going, if that's what it is.