Dispelling Myths: 1914 Expectations

AuldSoul

Jehovah's Witnesses currently teach that prior to 1914 no one could have predicted what happened in Europe in 1914. They teach that the world was heading toward such idyllic stability that the events of 1914 caught everyone off-guard. So surprised were the people of the time that they looked back with fondness at the calm preceding 1914 as a time that could never be gone back to.

What were the Bible Students teaching about 1914 prior to that year? In what capacity did they claim to be teaching?

Zion's Watchtower and Herald of Christ's Presence, July 15, 1894

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They refer the reader to the January 15, 1892 Watch Tower. What did it predict? What political state was expected to have occurred prior to 1915—specifically within 23 years of January 15, 1892?

Zion's Watchtower and Herald of Christ's Presence, July 15, 1894

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Bible Students were told to speak as "oracles of God" and were told to go forth saying, "Thus saith the Lord!" But their "Divine Plan of Ages", their "present truth", their "prophetic" knowledge, and their wisdom and discretion were all too well described by Ezekiel 13:1-12.

Ezekiel 13:1-12 — And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel that prophesy, and say thou unto them that prophesy out of their own hearts, Hear ye the word of the Lord; Thus saith the Lord GOD; Woe unto the foolish prophets, that follow their own spirit, and have seen nothing! O Israel, thy prophets are like the foxes in the deserts. Ye have not gone up into the gaps, neither made up the hedge for the house of Israel to stand in the battle in the day of the Lord. They have seen vanity and lying divination, saying, The Lord saith: and the Lord hath not sent them: and they have made others to hope that they would confirm the word. Have ye not seen a vain vision, and have ye not spoken a lying divination, whereas ye say, The Lord saith it; albeit I have not spoken?

Therefore thus saith the Lord God; Because ye have spoken vanity, and seen lies, therefore, behold, I am against you, saith the Lord God. And mine hand shall be upon the prophets that see vanity, and that divine lies: they shall not be in the assembly of my people, neither shall they be written in the writing of the house of Israel, neither shall they enter into the land of Israel; and ye shall know that I am the Lord God. Because, even because they have seduced my people, saying, Peace; and there was no peace; and one built up a wall, and, lo, others [whitewashed] it with untempered morter:

Say unto them which [whitewash] it with untempered morter, that it shall fall: there shall be an overflowing shower; and ye, O great hailstones, shall fall; and a stormy wind shall rend it. Lo, when the wall is fallen, shall it not be said unto you, Where is the [whitewashing] wherewith ye have [whitewashed] it?

The current doctrines of Jehovah's Witnesses regarding what they used to teach about the expectations for 1914 are a myth. The organization, through the Watchtower, was definitely holding out false hopes and were saying the Lord had spoken these.

Respectfully,
AuldSoul

Olin Moyles Ghost

Well done. I *love* it when JWs say that Russell & Co. knew that 1914 was a pivotal date, but they weren't sure what it meant. That is so false! They thought they knew exactly what it meant, as evidenced by the ZWT articles posted above.

cabasilas

Great work, Auld Soul!

Have you read the study by Thomas Daniels entitled "Historical Idealism and Jehovah's Witnesses"? It goes along with this and has many photocopies from early WT publications:

http://www.catholic-forum.com/members/popestleo/Historical%20Idealism%20and%20Jehovahs%20Witnesses.pdf

yknot

Excellent posting!

Giving the JWD lurkers something meaty to chew!

Much better then all this recycled old/new/old/new again light they are peddling.

OBVES

So many are diluted into bad thinking about the end-time predictions that they don't realize or don't know how advanced the understanding of the Bible is in our days. The simple formula is that with passing time the understanding of the Bible should increase the same way as with the increasing human technological progress. Up to the recent ages the mankind was almost in stagnantion as to the technicall progress . The same could have happened with the knowledge of the religions. Since the Bible is decidely a distinct sacred book we who want to know the True God should search this book deeply.

Since the Bible was completed God Yahweh ceased giving His direct revelations ; so not a single new book could have been added for so many centuries until the present day. The mircales God was giving to confirm His messages had to cease as well . So we were left with the what is written in the Bible and we must study the Bible. What the Watchtower taught back in the XIX century was good for that time but with the elapse of time new and new understandings came into light and they could replace the older ones.

No single preacher of the Bible is infallable !This is a fundamental principle . If you read the Bible by yourself the chances 100% you will not understand the Bible wholly at once .It can take years for you to understand some passages of the Bible .It may happen you will not understand many things in the Bible at all . The mankind for centuries did not understand some important issues of the Bible.

We should look now at how the Bible is understood in our present time ,not by going to the days when the true christianity was just reborn again . It was like a birth of a child and the first stages of the development were initial . For the end of the world to take place 120 years had to have passed since when ? Now it appears that the earliest date for the rebirth of the lost christian religion was the year 1879 AD !

Can you imagine all the predictions the Jehovah's Witnesses had ever made up to the year 1998 AD were wrong ?! This one new understanding refutes all predictions ever made by man.

Had I realized that I would have not predicted the year 1991 AD and 1994 AD.Yet at the time preceding each date given I had very good reasons to predict the end of the world ! At those days preceding each prediction I was convinced I was right and the predictions were good for that time.

The same can be behind the prediction for 1914 AD .The date was good at that time at that level of understanding the true servants of God Yahweh and Jesus Christ had. But now since we are living in the time when we have a period of 120 years behind and 2000 years since Christ had also passed we can be much more sure that the next predictions will be better. The great importance of the year 1914 AD was and is still now though we have a better view of that importance with the new light on the end-times.

The dates 1879 AD and 1914 AD are inseperably linked to the International Bible Students . It already puts them ahead of all other christian religions that existed then. The date 1914 AD cannot be simply ignored and put aside.

The year 1914 AD is in the end-timeline which I had already presented on many occasions on the internet.Check my posts on this forum and you can get an idea how to look at the year 1914 AD in the light of the end-time prophecies.

VM44

The Watch Tower has always just made things up.

TheOldHippie

I've often been wondering about that - how one now tells that pre-1914 times were so peaceful that everything was close to a paradise, yet according to Russell the brothers were asking him if it could not be that he was wrong in his calculations, because how could possibly Earth survive till 1914 when conditions were so bad?

Burger Time

In Penton's book he does a good job explaining how it wasn't till between 1918 and 1925 that 1914 even made a resurgence.

Bring_the_Light

Dearest OBVES,

Pray tell, how did Jesus respond when his faithful apostles asked "How shall we know false prophets?"

(If one of the Apostically inclined who actually are interested enough to research the bible could chime in with a Book/Chapter/verse my lazy, "don't need more info to know its crap" ass would appreciate it. Thx)

Bring_the_Light

THANKS GOOGLE!

Deu 18:21 And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the LORD hath not spoken?
Deu 18:22 When a prophet speaketh in the name of the LORD, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the LORD hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him.

Here's the New World Translation, straight off the Watchtower website:

20 “‘However, the prophet who presumes to speak in my name a word that I have not commanded him to speak or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet must die. 21 And in case you should say in your heart: “How shall we know the word that Jehovah has not spoken?” 22 when the prophet speaks in the name of Jehovah and the word does not occur or come true, that is the word that Jehovah did not speak. With presumptuousness the prophet spoke it. You must not get frightened at him.’

As you can plainly see in Deu 18:20, the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society is totally F-d'.

Dispelling Myths: 1914 Expectations

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