I think everyone needs to hold on here......I think we are overstating this just a little bit. Let me explain.
I was ALWAYS taught that there have been annointed learning from annointed (JW's, just not called that) ever since Jesus' time. And yes, it would kind of be like an apostolic succession.
It's like this......it started with the apostles...then knowledge was passed down through the OVERLAPPING Generations....along came Martin Luther, then Calvin, then Miller, Barbour, Russell, Rutherford, Knorr, and finally down to our current Governing Body. I was taught that this is the way it was, and that now the Light is getting brighter and we are finally able to see some of this "lineage" of Truth.
However, what Jack Barr is stating about the Generation of 1914 is COMPLETELY different that what was in the WT and Awake! of May 1984 and up thru until 1995, 2008. We were distinctly told, PROMISED even, that THE Generation of 1914 that SAW or were born during the events that occurred during those times (1914-1919) would be the ones to see the Great Tribulation, and hence Armaggedon and then the New Order ushered in. This doctrine set a clear timetable for the End Times.
I just wanted to clarify that JW's ALWAYS felt that knowledge was passed down from generation of annointed to generation of annointed, that is NOT "New Light". What is "New Light" is Jack's statement of there now being more than "one" generation from the time of Christ's invisible parousia till the Great Tribulation/Armaggedon/New Order.
- Wing Commander