Anna

What gets me is when we keep going on about obeying instructions in order to survive Armageddon. This weekends WT study mentioned it agaiin....comparing the GB to Joshuah and Zerubabel. (Otherwise the study was very good). "Sometimes God’s people received direction that did not appear to be practical from a human standpoint but turned out to be lifesaving". 
The WT gave a couple of current examples....just stopping short of mentioning getting vaccinated against covid (thank goodness).
Are we not putting too much emphasis on the organization being the saving power, in other words our salvation being dependent on instructions coming from imperfect men? Whereas salvation is clearly going to come from Jesus, and we may be anywhere doing anything when Jesus saves us. Or is the mark for survival from the secretaries ink horn contingent on having our backpack ready or hunkering down somewhere?? As if Jesus cannot save us uless we listen to these types of instructions. I always thought the criterion was dependent on pure worship. This whole life we live is a test of our loyalty to Jesus and Jehovah. Everything we do today and tomorrow, the choices we make with respect to pure worship is what places that mark on our foreheads. And after all these tests we encounter every day, then there will be another test to see how obedient we are to the GB?? Give me a break! Past Bible examples do show that there were certain procedures the people had to follow in order to survive, BUT the situation at Armageddon will be incomparable, it cannot be said to parallel any other situation before then. I don't know why we keep obsessing that it is the same. It's like regurgitating types and anti types again....drawing parallels where there are none.

We can always trust that Jehovah is righteous and his judgments are righteous. When all things are made new, the old will be forgotten. And I don't think we know enough about who will and won't survive anyway.

It’s okay JWI…I hadn’t actually finished my comment when I posted…and I’m just grateful the teaching has been changed….Jesus was a stumbling block for his own people…..and I beleive the organization at times has been like that with their own…a stumbling block.".the sadness of it at times is just overwhelming for those who dont survive.

I think that TTH says he is currently reading the book "Children" which includes this idea, but it started earlier. Rutherford tended to make EVERYTHING fall into only two categories, either it was part of Jehovah's organization or Satan's organization:

Children, p.67
Of course, this included not just the earthly part of that organization, but the focus was on the heavenly part. So it was not so much different, in principle, than the way we understood Paul's words in Galatians about Sarah vs. Hagar:

Children, p.79
Of course, Rutherford uses the term organization 160 times in the book Children alone. The problem, in my opinion, is when he focuses too much on the earthly part of the organization, and he accepted that the word of the earthly organization should be seen as the equivalent of the "word of the Lord" himself. The "confusion" started with his very early idea that Jesus came to inspect his "Temple" in 1918. This Temple was the earthly organization, even though you wouldn't have expected that the "Temple" would picture something earthly. There are many times in the publications (under Rutherford) where "salvation" is too closely attributed to the organization, and not Jesus and Jehovah.
Organizational directions, no matter how mundane, became "instructions from the Lord."

Watchtower, 7/1/43, p.204
 

Are you kidding me? Who can tolerate that stuff?
Everyone but me, apparently. It’s my bad, I know. But whether it was right or wrong, it’s 100 years old and we’ve long since moved on, either building upon or discarding it. 
I’m glad there are people who take interest in the old stuff, and I won’t say I don’t have any. Yes, I did recently purchase it at the eclectic book store. Yes, I did issue an off-the-cuff remark to Srecko that’d I’d finish it and get back to him. But there are just too many things of higher priority to me.
It’s a little like when Minh offered me a treat he really really enjoyed and it was horrible. “I do like it,” I told the hopeful fellow, “it’s just like I like other things more.”
I may get to it someday, about the same time I read Rud’s book.

“Now TTH had been saying: “It was for nothing that I kissed up to this cantankerous old fellow in the wilderness. Not a single thing bad thing about him did I say [lately], and yet he repays me evil for good.  May God do the same and more to the enemies of TTH if I allow a single sentence of his to survive until the morning!”
He already told you he has a copy.
I didn’t know he had a son.
I can honestly say I have never read an apostate book. A few online articles here and there, but mostly not even that. So many others have that I find it easy to glean whatever I need from them. You are far more versed in their bile than I

The problem with apostate literature is that the people that read it, the great majority, do not have the background or analytical skills that most of us here on this forum have.
When I read the book “ 30 Years a Watchtower Slave” l had sufficient experience and background to understand the fallacies of the assumptions and therefore the fallacies of the conclusions that the author drew.
For example, he recounted that before World War I that (paraphrased) “ … the teachings of the Watchtower were taking over all of Europe, and especially Germany … but FORTUNATELY World War I intervened …”.
WOW!
To me, that was encouraging that JWs did in fact have “The Truth”.
If the Watchtower had been successful, perhaps there would have been no World War I … but the author preferred the war.

The qualification “in effect” makes the quote not a direct quote from the Watchtower,  but a comparison of similarity.(?) of Christendom’s sentiments and the Watchtower’s sentiments.
At least that is how I read it.

I suppose JWI will clarify.
I do know that the 9-1/2 years the Society was affiliated with the United Nations as an NGO, there were puff pieces in the Awake! Magazine about the United Nations.

 
What the NGO supporting articles stated was precisely fair and accurate, but the puffery was to fulfill their obligations to the UN to show they supported the IDEALS of the UN.
My guess is the articles by themselves were sent to the UN, and not the whole Awake!.

I have never asked the Librarian to ban anyone. 
One thing I would like to know; why do you write G-d? Are you a secret Jew? There is no good reason if you are a JW. Well actually there is no good reason for a Jew either, only something they made up. Why do you do it?

I have never asked the Librarian to ban anyone. 
One thing I would like to know; why do you write G-d? Are you a secret Jew? There is no good reason if you are a JW. Well actually there is no good reason for a Jew either, only something they made up. Why do you do it?

I have never asked the Librarian to ban anyone. 
One thing I would like to know; why do you write G-d? Are you a secret Jew? There is no good reason if you are a JW. Well actually there is no good reason for a Jew either, only something they made up. Why do you do it?

That was only his personal opinion.  If I recall correctly he had a lot of verbal abuse - and he went too far!    None of us wanted him off!   The only reason people are kicked off here is when they really go over the boundaries of mild abuse to extreme abuse. 

as though that doesn’t happen anywhere else.
as though everyone else celebrates when their wife dies.
Whatever her influence once was, she’s been dead for several years. Her death preceded the release of Volume II. As to parameters, I’m not versed enough in the history to know what they might be.
In the 70s some touring Bethel brother presented a few clips from the PhotoDrama of creation at the Blue Cross Arena [then the Rochester War Memorial]. I was struck by how it appeared to be his own project and that otherwise Bethel would have let the film disintegrate through neglect. Not that anyone was ashamed of it. It was just that they were forward looking and didn’t do much to preserve history. The tone of his remarks was that he had to sort through the basement, or the attic, to assemble what he had, which was not in good shape and soon would have vanished.
The release of the Proclaimers book seemed to signal a shift from neglect of the past to cherishing ‘our spiritual heritage.’ Nothing wrong with that, in my view. It was as though, after assembling the yearbook material for 74 and 75 (Germany and US) it occurred to the brothers, seemingly for the first time, that if they didn’t start preserving records of the past it would soon be lost forever.
Maybe that’s why Rud can find an audience for his expensive book (I should take lessons from him in commanding a price); there’s a relative dearth of official historical material. It’s not my field of interest, but I recognize everyone wants to tell their own story and relate their own ‘expertise.’ As for me, I say, ‘If you have to go back 100 years to dig up dirt, there can’t be too much dirt to dig.’ Alas, they have modern-day allies, who endeavor to dig it up —some would say ‘concoct’—in the present too.

No Walter, (am I really taking time out to reply to this nonsense?) you are a troll with ADHD and a persecution complex. Please believe me when I say NO ONE can be bothered to delete content or ban anyone. You are not that important, this site is not that important, no one here is that important.
Once in a blue moon when the Librarian takes a look in here he may have banned someone for breaking forum rules....but I don't even know that. I am just taking your word for it when you say you've been banned. I know for a fact that neither JWI nor me have banned you or deleted any of your content....or anyone else's content.
But you won't believe me of course because you evidently have delusional views of your own importance and grandeur. 
(wasted minute I will never get back)
 
 

I have never banned anyone at all. Much less likely I would be to ban anyone who challenges me. I love being challenged, and wouldn't even be here if I didn't enjoy it.
I'm sorry I called your behavior "unchristian." When I refer to the unchristian behavior of others, I'm not saying that I am right myself or that I am even a good judge of who else is acting Christian or not. I refer mostly to how some people tend to appear in their comments. If a person continues to tell untruths, I don't necessarily think of them as a liar; they are often just mistaken. Like your false and mistaken belief that I have banned people. What you do on your own time isn't anything I would try to do anything about. If you are a non-Christian, atheist, or even an apostate (I don't think you are) I still think you should be welcome here. When I mention "unchristian" behavior, which I admit I should not have done, I am referring to a propensity to create dissension, etc.
I think that many of us, including Pudgy, and myself too, have done this to an extent. And this is one reason I would never try to get one person banned over another, it's a kind of judgment call that I would probably screw up, not knowing who was egging on the other to push buttons or get a rise out of them. I see several people who use snide remarks or hints about things that they evidently think will produce a response from another person. But I can't read minds; I can barely understand half of what some people say outright. So I would agree that I shouldn't have used the term "unchristian." I should have just said a propensity to promote dissension, rivalry, petty arguments over words, etc.

It is my bad @Thinkingfor saying jumping and thanks JWI for the correction. Just goes to show how fleeing out of a window or balcony becomes jumping out of it. That is what had stuck in my mind, I did not mean jumping as in jumping from a great height in danger of hurting oneself, but figuratively speaking as in running away....it sounds more dramatic but easily givers a false impression. I had wanted to read the whole account again for accuracy but I was on my phone and all my files were on the computer. The account is in a booklet called Harvest Siftings that was later reprinted in a WT of the same year I believe.
Here it is in PDF file of Harvest Siftings. It will give you a good idea of what transpired during that period, at least from the point of view of Rutherford and others. The bit about the window saga is on page 6.
https://ia600902.us.archive.org/5/items/WatchtowerLibrary/booklets/1917_shf_E.pdf
 
 

It is my bad @Thinkingfor saying jumping and thanks JWI for the correction. Just goes to show how fleeing out of a window or balcony becomes jumping out of it. That is what had stuck in my mind, I did not mean jumping as in jumping from a great height in danger of hurting oneself, but figuratively speaking as in running away....it sounds more dramatic but easily givers a false impression. I had wanted to read the whole account again for accuracy but I was on my phone and all my files were on the computer. The account is in a booklet called Harvest Siftings that was later reprinted in a WT of the same year I believe.
Here it is in PDF file of Harvest Siftings. It will give you a good idea of what transpired during that period, at least from the point of view of Rutherford and others. The bit about the window saga is on page 6.
https://ia600902.us.archive.org/5/items/WatchtowerLibrary/booklets/1917_shf_E.pdf
 
 

It is my bad @Thinkingfor saying jumping and thanks JWI for the correction. Just goes to show how fleeing out of a window or balcony becomes jumping out of it. That is what had stuck in my mind, I did not mean jumping as in jumping from a great height in danger of hurting oneself, but figuratively speaking as in running away....it sounds more dramatic but easily givers a false impression. I had wanted to read the whole account again for accuracy but I was on my phone and all my files were on the computer. The account is in a booklet called Harvest Siftings that was later reprinted in a WT of the same year I believe.
Here it is in PDF file of Harvest Siftings. It will give you a good idea of what transpired during that period, at least from the point of view of Rutherford and others. The bit about the window saga is on page 6.
https://ia600902.us.archive.org/5/items/WatchtowerLibrary/booklets/1917_shf_E.pdf
 
 

There are bits and pieces of this in our publications. It's only when you put all the pieces together and hear PSL Johnson's side of the story that some of the apparent discrepencies start to make sense. Persson discusses this episode at great length (of course), considering the 1973 Yearbook, 1975 Yearbook, Proclaimers, Jehovah's Witnesses in the Divine Purpose (1958), Faith on the March (1957) and the old Watchtower publications from 1916, 1917, and 1918. But he also quotes extensively from contemporary Bible Student sources and recent Bible Student sources such as the one's that @WalterPrescott has quoted from.
In fact, most of the paragraphs that Walter has been posting are taken directly from the writing of Rolando Rodriguez. You can find them here: https://millennialmessengers.wordpress.com/tag/charles-taze-russell/
and much of it repeated on a forum here: https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/thepresenttruthforum/the-fiery-cloudy-pillar-t4686.html?sid=a8e09c4a4332c2aea4e21c85819a15ac
Persson acknowledges contact with Rodriguez for his book and credits him with providing some historical document(s).
I think it's easy to get the idea from what's been said that PSL jumped out a window due to a mental breakdown. This is a conflation of several things that have been said about him in our publications. In fact, PSL apparently never jumped out of a window, but let himself down from the balcony where his feet could reach the fence, and then let himself down from the fence, also without jumping. He did this because he was being trapped in one of the London Bethel rooms with the door blocked, and under guard, likely both to keep him from being able to participate in a planned court hearing the next day, and to resolve a matter about some missing money. And Hemery, the person still managing the London Bethel, and an adversary in the court case, apparently wanted to go through his letters and papers in his briefcase before the court hearing took place. Hemery ended up doing just that.
Nobody was hurt, and Rutherford did not treat PSL as if he really had serious mental problems when he got back, as you might expect if everything said about him was true. Rutherford just didn't want him going back to the London Bethel where he had seen (or likely caused) so many problems.
[Edited to add: I was wrong on this point about Rutherford not dealing with PSLJ as if he had serious mental problems. Rutherford was actually quick to deal with PSLJ as insane and mentally unbalanced, but Rutherford was inconsistent, and seemed to soften his position toward him. This hadn't made sense to me originally, and I was partly influenced here by the comments of a brother I spoke to at length about this very recently after reading this portion of the book. But Persson's book provides a detail that I take as an obvious clue as to the reason for Rutherford's inconsistency. Persson doesn't appear to draw any conclusion from that detail, but it makes me think that it was not just an absent-minded inconsistency on Rutherford's part. It served a purpose.]
If you read the 1973 Yearbook, it looks like Hemery's account (the only one given) is an attempt to add a lot more dramatic flavor to the episode than most Watchtower-style writing. It's as if he wanted to write like an amateur Mickey Spillane.

True. And he gets to that of course.
I like to look out for positive things that are "admitted" to be true, even when you might not expect the source to admit those positive things. In this case, it made me think that Rutherford, in 1916, still had a lot of faith in the chronology and in the imminent "manifestation" of Christ's return. If it didn't happen in 1914 as expected, or even in 1915 using Russell's recently shifted chronology, then it was at least expected that Russell would live to see his reward in person. And now that Russell hadn't lived to see the "change/translation/rapture" actually happen, Rutherford must have had faith that the end must still be extremely close. Perhaps he thought there was no time for legal maneuvering and politics.
What would it matter who was president of the Society if the end were coming upon them in just a few days or weeks? 
What I am seeing is that there were several factors that motivated the maneuvering, and it wasn't all centered on Rutherford himself. Others played a large part in what finally happened. [Edtied to add that some of those "manipulations" evidently started out as various factions and disagreements within the current leadership, and it's partly a matter of how quickly Rutherford would side with those who already, like himself, wanted some out and some to stay.]

“No, no, Rude Person is actually a very nice guy!”
Sorry, it is just such low-hanging fruit. Why should this character be so named? It’s almost like Nabal—the ‘senseless one.’
All of this is a bit at odds with the “shrewd and scheming legal mind” he is said to have had in the book’s promo.

I had read about that in one of the old WT. It was quite crazy reading....Johnson jumping out of a window in London bethel to get away from the brothers who had come to ask him questions. Apparently it was in the local newspaper, reported by a passerby who saw him jumping, lol

I had read about that in one of the old WT. It was quite crazy reading....Johnson jumping out of a window in London bethel to get away from the brothers who had come to ask him questions. Apparently it was in the local newspaper, reported by a passerby who saw him jumping, lol

Paul Samuel Leo Johnson Born Paul Samuel Leo Levitsky
October 4, 1873 Titusville, Pennsylvania, US Died October 22, 1950(aged 77) Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, US Occupation Minister Years active 1898–1950 Known for Founder of the Laymen's Home Missionary Movement Notable work Epiphany Studies in the Scriptures Part of a series on Bible Students Communities Free Bible Students Laymen's Home Missionary Movement Publishing houses Dawn Bible Students Association Pastoral Bible Institute Publications The Dawn The New Creation Frank and Ernest (broadcast) Studies in the Scriptures The Photo-Drama of Creation Biographies Charles Taze Russell Jonas Wendell William Henry Conley Nelson H. Barbour Paul S. L. Johnson A. H. Macmillan J. F. Rutherford Conrad C. Binkele Beliefs Jehovah Nontrinitarianism Atonement Dispensationalism Sheol and Hades Resurrection Annihilationism Separations Jehovah's Witnesses  Christianity portal v t e Paul Samuel Leo (formerly Levitsky) Johnson (October 4, 1873 – October 22, 1950) was an American scholar and pastor, the founder of the Laymen's Home Missionary Movement. He authored 17 volumes of religious writings entitled Epiphany Studies in the Scriptures, and published two magazines from about 1918 until his death in 1950. The movement he created continues his work and publishes his writings, operating from Chester Springs, Pennsylvania.
He was born in Titusville, Pennsylvania on October 4, 1873, to Jewishparents who had recently immigrated from Poland. His father was a prominent Hebrew scholar,[citation needed] and eventually became president of the Titusville synagogue. His mother died when he was 12, and his father remarried, both of which caused him distress; he ran away from home several times.
He eventually converted to Christianity and joined the Methodist Church.[clarification needed]
In 1890, he entered the Capital University of Columbus, Ohio, and graduated in 1895 with high honors. Records in that University's Library show him enrolled as Paul Levitsky;[citation needed] he then went to the Theological Seminary of the Evangelical Lutheran Joint Synod of Ohioand graduated in 1898. He pastored a Lutheran church for a short time in Mars, Pennsylvania, and was then transferred back to Columbus, Ohio, at St. Matthew's Lutheran Church, which was later razed to make way for highway infrastructure. He soon built a new church building and was noted (by the Capitol University Synod)[citation needed] to have baptized more people and collected less money than any other pastor in the synod.
In May 1903 he left the Lutheran Church as a consequence of changes in his beliefs, and began fellowship with the Columbus Ecclesia of the Watch Tower Society. The Lutheran Church later claimed they had disfellowshipped him for heresy, but he had already left them of his own free will.[citation needed] A year later, Pastor Charles Taze Russellappointed him as a Pilgrim of the Bible Student movement. He eventually served as Russell's personal secretary. In time, he became Russell's most trusted friend and advisor.[citation needed]
Johnson suffered a nervous breakdown in 1910 a result of withstanding dissidents from within who were challenging the teachings of Pastor C.T. Russell on questions around his understanding of the new covenant and the ransom for all.
Johnson left the Watch Tower Society when Joseph F. Rutherford took over its direction after Russell's death. He founded the Laymen's Home Missionary Movement in 1920, and served on its board of directors from 1920 until his death on October 22, 1950.
 
Rutherford changed Russell’s understanding of the ark from that representing Jesus…to representing the organisation….and just from this fast cursory search it doesnt seem he was much of a friend to Rutherford as he was to Russell.

In the book, Persson notes that he first noticed a discrepancy in the book "Jehovah's Witnesses in the Divine Purpose" (jp) in the late 1960's, and that's when he first took an interest in our modern-day history. But he started his research in 1973 (still a Witness, of course) when he began writing to those who still had some first-hand knowledge or documentation. He planned to write the book in the late 1970's, he says, but was delayed with other matters (unspecified). There are many indications from his research that he was very serious about this project for many years prior to 2014.
I called an older brother from Bethel in his 80's last night and we spoke for about 2 hours about things he knew about the matter. I'd heard things from an elderly elder in the 1970's at Bethel (my "Table Head") but the elder I spoke to last night actually did a lot of historical research, and his writings are still being used in the current publications (but it's things he wrote several years ago; he is "retired" and not actively writing any more). He didn't know about the book, but won't get it or read it because he thinks of Rud Persson as an apostate. But he's happy to answer any questions. 
When at Bethel, I was just one of several Bethelites who taped interviews (about those "olden days") with persons like Maxwell Friend, Fred Franz, and Grace DeCecca because we could give non-outline Sunday talks in the congregations in those days, and I gave a couple of talks in several congregations based on excerpts from several hours of those interviews. This same brother I spoke to last night had helped me organize the excerpts.