Thanks for all Leolia.
To add something about the help that some JW made to individual jews. Even if i disagree with Penton who argue in his book that all the JW help jews mainly to convert them. I have found in Google print a book called "Children Who Survived the Final Solution":
http://books.google.com/books?ie=UTF-8&hl=fr&vid=ISBN0595309259&id=8kN7PwWyimcC&pg=PA1&lpg=PA1&dq=children+who+survived+the+final+solution&sig=2dFfEbUbkV60-u-BnN7740WeSm8
In Page 143, 144 a jews is telling his story as a young jews in Ukrain. He was helped by a couple of JW who has tried to convert him, by telling him that "Jews were responsible for killing Christ". The author thinks it is because their ukranian's background, we know by "The Declaration of Facts" that JW could use this argument.
In Page 144, he tell how he has left the JW, because his brothers wanted him not to go to School because they thought that he learn communism there, and how they have "dropped" him.
Bye
Charles
JWs and Nazis in WW II
by robhic 27 Replies latest watchtower scandals
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chasson
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TheOldHippie
I don't know to what extent I would use children's recollections to make a point.
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JW83
I read a great book by Margarete Buber, 'Under Two Dictators', in which she criticised the female Jehovah's Witnesses she was in the camps with severely for being naive, stubborn & self-interested. From recollection, Buber was not a Jew but was a communist who was imprisoned by both the Nazis & the Russians.
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Bangalore
Bump.
Bangalore
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J. Hofer
anti-jewish sentiment is still in many (not most) heads here in rural austria. even though most people don't know a single jew. it's all the propaganda that was passed on for ages. i heard several JWs and other christians say something along the lines that the jews must have deserved the holocaust because "they killed jesus". some even still use "jew" as an insult, which in that context has about the same meaning as "sly mofo".
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Band on the Run
What is wrong with being a commercial Jew? Jews could not engage in any other trade. European civilization would have come to a halt if there were not a way around usury laws that applied to Christians. Indeed, no cathedrals, no public works could be financed with Jewish bankers. If the Jews consciously chose to become commercial bankers might be one thing. They were restricted from all other occupations.
Rutherford did not have to mention Jews at all. His grand witness was diluted by attempts to prove that JWs were more loyal than Jews. Himmler found the JWs blind obedience convenient. It is a chilling indictment of the Witness culture. I'd rather be part of the resistance. Frankly, I don't recall rank antisemitism in my KH. I don't think they would know a single Jewish person if one bit them.
Jesus and all the apostles were Jewish. In Germany, they would be forbidden to practice carpentry or be fishermen. In the US, Harvard and the other Ivy League colleges had quotas for Jews. Only a certain number could be admitted regardless of merit. Law schools held mandatory first year classes on Saturdays to discourage Jewish applicants. The old large corporate law firms were either Jewish or Christian. The Christians ones did the prestigious work. Joint Christian=Jewish law firms were formed only after WWII.
I don't see the difference between Rutherford's letter and Pope Pius' inaction against the concentration camps.
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Mary
Jim Penton gave me a copy of the book he wrote this very subject called Jehovah's Witnesses and the Third Reich. I think that with Rutherfraud running the show during the war, there was indeed, a certain about of prejudice towards the Jews by many (but not all) of the Witnesses at the time.
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Band on the Run
My family was proJewish. I don't know if they were Zionist. They only knew Jewish doctors and lawyers. My mom was very impressed with the Jewish stance towards education. I grew up in the 1950s and 1960s. There was some mocking. The gospels lead to it. Rutherford's statements are way more antiSemitic than anything I recall. Rutherford called the shots. I don't recall Knorr going out of his way to disparage them. Of course, I was young.
Growing up in NYC, I interacted with many Jews all the time. Stereotypes are easier in areas where real one don't exist to diffuse the stereotype. A lady in the laundromat was making fun of Jews who are orthodox in fibre content of clothing. It sounds funny on its face. Sort of similar to blood transfusions or flag salute. I happened to meet investment bankers and lawyers who follow the Jewish laws. They were powerful and extremely well groomed. Reality can often shatter old beliefs.