Watchtower's strange interpretation of Galatians 6:16 "..the Israel of God."

by yadda yadda 2 5 Replies latest watchtower bible

  • yadda yadda 2
    yadda yadda 2

    The Watchtower Society repeatedly and consistently quotes this scripture to support their peculiar doctrine that the "Israel of God" is a separate group of anointed Christians with a 'heavenly hope' distinct from 99.9% of JW's who only have an 'earthly hope' and who are thus not included as a part of "the Israel of God" Paul refers to in Galatians 6:16. The Watchtower leaders are perpetuating a dispensationalist interpretation of Gal 6:16 to the effect that the "Israel of God" is the whole Church, but taking it even further to only mean a small sub-set of their JW church: the so-called "little flock" who go to heaven. The rest of JW's are excluded.

    I have only done some cursory research but, in contrast to the Watchtower's unique and forced interpretation, it seems that most theologians view the "Israel of God" as merely a reference to the part of the early church who were natural Jews. One website sums it up as follows:

    The Book of Galatians is concerned with Gentiles who were attempting to attain salvation through the law. The ones deceiving them were Judaizers, who were Jews demanding adherence to the Law of Moses. To them, a Gentile had to convert to Judaism before he qualified for salvation through Christ. In verse 15 Paul states that the important thing for salvation is faith, resulting in the new man. He then pronounces a blessing on two groups who would follow this rule of salvation through faith alone. The first group is the “them,” the Gentile Christians to and of whom he had devoted most of the epistle. The second group is the “Israel of God.” These are Jewish believers who, in contrast with the Judaizers, followed the rule of salvation by faith alone. Covenant Theologians must ignore the primary meaning of kai [the conjunction which is usually translated “and”] which separates the two groups in the verse in order to make them both the same group.

    For Dispensational Israelology, the conclusion is that the Church is never called, and is not, a “spiritual Israel” or a “new Israel.” The term “Israel” is either used of the nation or the people as a whole, or of the believing remnant within. It is never used of the Church in general or of Gentile believers in particular. http://www.middletownbiblechurch.org/reformed/israelaf.htm

    This article in particular has some excellent research: http://www.bible-researcher.com/gal6-16.html

    This reminds me of JW's peculiar and unconvincing interpretation of the meaning of "other sheep" at John 10:16. Nearly all commentators state that the "other sheep" are merely the Samaritans and gentiles who Jesus would bring in to the flock, along with Jews, to become one united Christian flock regardless of one's nationality or race. Instead, the JW's interpret John 10:16 to be a prophesy by Jesus referring to the prospective "great crowd" who would form about 1900 years later, or more broadly, all Christians who have an earthly hope. Using similar strange reasoning but on the flip-side of the coin, JW's interpret the "Israel of God" at Galatians 6:16 to be a reference by Paul to only "anointed Christians" to the exclusion of all supposed non-anointed Christians who only have an earthly hope. But similarly JW's distort it to essentially refer to a group of anointed Christians who would only appear many centuries later, now in the form of the tiny minority of modern-day JW's who partake of the memorial emblems. This makes absolutely no sense when we remember that in fact all Christians in the first century were anointed (a point acknowledge by the WT), so why would Paul want to differentiate the "Israel of God" from all other Christians when he had absolutely no concept of the JW notion of two classes of Christians: one class with a "heavenly hope" (the 'faithful and discreet slave" class) and one class with an "earthly hope"?

    So as it turns out, Galatians 6:16, which the Society quotes a lot, is just another JW 'proof-text' that when put under closer examination does not stand up. A little 'independent thinking' (very dangerous to JW's) and research reveals there there are more natural and convincing interpretations that make more sense in the broader scriptural context. Sadly, JW's never get to learn of those other interpretations.

  • Narkissos
    Narkissos

    The WT strictly sides with mainstream (i.e. non-dispensationalist) interpretation on this particular verse ("the Israel of God" includes Gentile Christians) but integrates it into a dispensationalist-like doctrinal system, which establishes within (its version of) Christianity a distinction similar to that of Jews and Gentiles from the perspective of early Christianity (the demarcation line which Paulinism and post-Paulinism in particular had been aiming at removing). The current WT demarcation line is non-ethnical (unlike Russell's) but characteristically draws on "prooftexts" which refer implicitly to the Jew/Gentile categories (such as John 10:16 and Revelation 7). Not to the texts which refer to them explicitly (e.g. Colossians-Ephesians).

    To use all texts referring to the Jew/Gentile distinction in support of their two Christian class system the WT would have to admit that its interpretive method is actually typological (e.g. the "other sheep" in John 10 meant Gentiles in the 1st century but now they mean something else); that's just what they are doing all the time with the OT but (afaik) have mostly avoided to do with the NT so far. Doing so would be more internally consistent but would mark them one step further away from early Christianity. The alternative option consists in denying the contextual meaning of a limited stock of available "prooftexts".

  • Chalam
    Chalam

    Hi,

    The "Israel of God" are explained elsewhere, here's one occasion.

    Romans 9:6-8 (New International Version)

    6 It is not as though God's word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. 7 Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham's children. On the contrary, "It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned." 8 In other words, it is not the natural children who are God's children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as Abraham's offspring.

    So who are they? Those that have faith as Paul explains in the subsequent chapters.

    All the best,

    Stephen

  • yadda yadda 2
    yadda yadda 2

    It's indicative of how dumbed down this website has become re genuine JW related bible research when a subject like this only gets two responses. If I started a subject on farts there would no doubt be pages of responses.

  • snowbird
    snowbird

    The children of the promise are all who put faith in the Savior.

    Wasn't it to Him whom Abraham looked and rejoiced?

    More later.

    Sylvia

  • ninja
    ninja

    he he.....yadda said farts

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