Every movement in society, politics or religion begins with the personality and drive of one charismatic man (or woman.)
Here is a recap of the birth and transformation of the person and personalities creating the religion now known as Jehovah's Witnesses.
1.Russell's mother was a Scottish Presbyterian who filled young Charles' head with fear of hell. Being intelligent and sensitive, it electrified his very being with an intellectual struggle to grasp why a loving God would kill him!
2.Russell's dad was a successful businessman who gave him a unique sense of responsibility. He learned how to make an organization flourish. Russell was tutored, educated and driven by a sense of personal mission and purpose early in life.
3.Russell had a crisis of faith at an early age due to the "harsh" judgements of mainstream religion. (My theory is that Russell probably had illicit sex and suffered a profound sense of guilt about it. He personally vowed he would never do it again if God would forgive him. Remember, this is my crackpot theory!)
4.Russell listens to an explication of End Times which tickles his sense of how very soon the end of the ages might come. He invites the speaker to personally instruct him. On the basis of charts, graphs and dispensation theology, Russell moves to throw himself into making this known to everybody by becoming a writer/publisher. (Remember my theory? I think Russell was compensating for his sexual guilt hang-ups and sublimating.)
5.Due to his personal talent for self-expression, Russell (like William Miller before him) becomes the center of attention in his writings about End Times.
6.Russell's access to personal wealth (men's clothing stores) enables his pet projects.
7.Russell surveys all the crackpot theories of his time (of which there were a considerable number!). He picks and chooses what appeals to his own personal tastes and combines them into a Pet Theory (no, not a theory about pets!).
8.The cork in the crackpot bottle is the Great Pyramid of Giza. C.T.Russell finds the correspondency between other End Time predictions and the Great Pyramid measurements (which purport to demonstrate God's hidden time chart of prophecy) too perfectly self-supporting to ignore.
9.Russell takes the bull by the horns. He shakes off all association with other writers (from whom he got his framgmentary ideas and theories) and creates his own personal version of End Times theory and publishes these ideas with the help of easily persuaded associates.
10.A movement grows up around Russell's teachings and writings.
STOP!
At some point (I don't know exactly where) a personality change came over C.T.Russell. He found himself at the center of something very powerful which included being admired, listened to, beseeched for answers and praised for his "special" role in warning mankind (noble cause!) about the End just ahead.
A pivotal relationship with Maria, his wife, is one of the most essential ingredients in what was to follow!
I have no doubt Charles Taze Russell had sexual feelings. He was human, after all! But, I personally think he was neurotically afflicted about these feelings. Because of his mother's influence on him (and Scottish Presbyterian bugaboos about the evil of sexuality) Russell entered the "marriage" with a weird and perverse "prenuptial agreement" never to have physical relations with Maria.
Maria was clearly C.T. Russell's intellectual equal. Her writings and self-expression were extraordinarily gifted, poetic, well-informed and equally crackpot! That Russell viewed Maria as an important helpmeet is obvious.
However.......
There would eventually be a few sources of conflict between them. I am pretty much convinced these conflicts were due to C.T. Russell's now distorted views about sex and his compulsions. We need not speculate. Conflict is conflict.
The important (very important!) contribution of wife Maria was DOCTRINAL!
It was Maria herself who invented the now famous (and startling) interpretation of the phrase "Faithful and Discreet Slave". (Faithful and Wise Servant in 1800's parlance.)
Maria identified C.T. Russell as the antitypical fulfillment. Moreover, she felt that she (Maria) was one flesh with this prophetic fulfillment which made HER (Maria) ALSO the faithful and discreet slave!! (More theorizing here: I'm quite convinced Maria was able to get Charley to have sex at least once in order to fulfill the bible's admonition to "become one flesh" and make the marriage legal.) Otherwise, Russell could deny she was one flesh with him and not part of the faithful and discreet slave definition.
It has been written and claimed that Charles Taze Russell denied he was such an important prophetic figure. Maybe, at first. But, the throngs of admirers, listeners, beseechers of wisdom who adulated Russell eventually penetrated his sense of ego and self-importance and he would privately admit he was, indeed, this prophetic fulfillment of "faithful and discreet slave."
(I might add a point here. It was a novel interpretation which made this casual metaphor by Jesus into a prophetic importance in the first place! This is now the CENTRAL DOCTRINE of Jehovah's Witnesses reshaped and distorted over the years. It creates a magisterium for the Watchtower as central authority. It apes the Catholic doctrine of magisterium: to wit, only the church can interpret accurately what the true intent of scripture and prophecy is.)
Whatever followed, the WTS sprung from 3 main facts.
1.Russell was driven to relieve his personal anxiety about hell and punishment by inventing his own plausible theology which eventually became entirely contrarian and novel.
2.The WTS became a launching pad for crackpot explanations of End Times musings largely "proved" by a jerry-rigged chart (not at all different from the hundreds of such charts already being used by religious groups which sprung from William Miller's movement.) combined with a Great Pyramid theory dovetailing in concrete theology.
3.The "proof" of accuracy of Russell's theories combined these charts, graphs and unique interpretations into a personal mystique of being personally chosen by Christ.(Faithful and Discreet Slave) Maria sought to share this limelight. She would endure Russell's eccentricities (and coldness in the bedroom) if he allowed her equal measure of admiration and authorship which he refused. The marriage ended and Russell's personal woes commenced.
All the above is ground zero historically for what followed.
Just as Miller and his movement stimulated hysterical interest in Last Days and Return of Christ fanaticisms; so too Russell's terminated again and again in disappointment. (Great disappointment) Yet, each failure required adjustments and explanations and adaptations of what was presented previously as "GOD'S DATES, NOT OURS."
Intellectual dishonesty is on two levels: private and public. Russell crossed both lines and levels!
If C.T.Russell had not believed his own nonsense he would have allowed the non-happening of the non-rapture, non-Armageddon to disprove all his speculations. He would have folded his hands and published a retraction which clearly admitted failure and error. But, no True Believer can shatter his own absolute conviction of rightness.
Russell began fudging dates, changing phrases, altering absolutes and recasting contexts in an effort to rescue his Grand Illusions as he struggled against accusations of infidelity, crooked business dealings and pettiness in dealing with his spouse.
Those who had joined Russell's sideshow of creepy credulity included some talented and shrewd men who would control the destiny of this neo-religion after Russell died in 1916. Two men stand out among the rest: Fred Franz and J.F.Rutherford.
Suffice to say the background of Russell's novel scheme and corporate manifestation of his neurotic preoccupations with End Times was too strong and lucrative to be allowed to die.
The Russell/Millerite movement of colporteurs, book salesman and true believers split into two main groups (others would follow).
The INTERNATIONAL BIBLE STUDENTS were the pure (non business oriented) followers who still exist to this day and only publish Studies in the Scriptures as their ministry. They have small meeting groups and utterly believe that C.T.Russell's early writings were accurate.
The second half of the split was led by J.F.Rutherford whose posturing, ravings and machinations contorted the Russellites into becoming pawns in his international powerplay.
What Jehovah's Witnesses largely are today is the result of J.F.Rutherford's madness and shrewd imagination.