JWs and Doctors

by Gordy 4 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  Gordy

  I've been looking for quotes from WT publications or experiences about the JW attitude to doctors and medicine.

  Anyone know of any or have personal experience.
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  sabastious

  http://www.youtube.com/user/jwtruth

  ^This guy has a bunch of "pro JW doctor" bloodless surgery stuff. I think he's a little "special" but what do I know?

  -Sab
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  Gordy

  "JWtruth" isn't that an oxymoron ?

  Typical JW run site no ones allowed to question and any comments are vetted first.
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  wobble

  I don't have references for you, but I do know from observing JW's over the years that there is a general attitude of distrust toward both Doctors and Medicine.

  JW's view is that all Doctors are tools of Satan wishing to force a Blood transfusion on you at the first opportunity. All of the Doctors advice is suspect because the Doctors ignorance about BT's shows he/she is ill-informed.

  Any quack snake-oil remedy is looked upon as superior to conventional medicine, whatever the ailment,, because the Medical profession knows so little.

  These attitudes are endemic in the religion, and must come from the published and spoken words they poison their minds with.
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  blondie

  *** km 11/90 pp. 4-5 par. 18 Are You Ready to Face a Faith-Challenging Medical Situation? ***Examine carefully the release from liability form and the consent form the hospital asks you to sign upon admittance. Sometimes right after stating that they will respect your wishes, a succeeding paragraph will declare that the signer agrees that the hospital can administer “lifesaving” treatment when they encounter problems. That could include blood. You have the right to alter any such statements to exclude blood or cross them out altogether. Nurses may try to tell you that you cannot do that, but you can! Explain that such a form is a contract with them and that you cannot sign a contract you do not agree with. If anyone tries to force you to sign against your will, ask to speak to the administrator and/or the patient representative for that health care center.

  *** km 9/92 p. 6 par. 23 Safeguarding Your Children From Misuse of Blood ***When judges are called upon to issue court orders hastily, often they have not considered or been reminded of the many dangers of blood, including AIDS, hepatitis, and a host of other hazards. You can point these out to the judge, and you can also make known to him that you, as a Christian parent, would view the use of another person’s blood in an effort to sustain life as a serious violation of God’s law and that forcing blood upon your child would be viewed as tantamount to rape. You and your child (if old enough to have his own convictions) can explain your abhorrence for such bodily invasion and can appeal to the judge not to grant an order but to permit you to pursue alternative medical management for your child.

  *** w67 12/1 pp. 719-720 pars. 1-2 By Man’s Way or by God’s Way—Which? ***NO ONE may be excused or justified for breaking God’s sacred law on the plea that he is saving human life or prolonging it. With the exception of some conscientious individual members the medical associations treat God’s law as a myth of the Bible or as no longer having force. They put the life of imperfect, condemned, dying men above the law of God and break it on the claim of trying to save a human life, not for eternity, but for the short uncertain period of the present lifetime. This has resulted in an epidemic of blood transfusions that they claim are lifesaving.

  Convinced in their own minds of their obligation to save human lives in this manner, they will go even so far as to force transfusions on dedicated Christians who conscientiously object to breaking God’s law in order to try to preserve their lives. They try to procure a show of legality for doing this, although it denies the patient not only his God-given right but also his national constitutional rights according to an established Bill of Rights in certain countries. To protect themselves because of this the medics appeal to judges and lawmaking bodies of the land to authorize them to override the freedom of religion with its right to worship the living and true God Jehovah according to the dictates of conscience. In this case, according to such medical views, religion is a menace to life and must be brushed aside to enact an atheistic violation of God’s law on the sanctity of blood.

  *** bq pp. 23-24 pars. 63-64 Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Question of Blood ***Also, it is worthy of reemphasis that, although Jehovah’s Witnesses do not accept blood transfusions, they welcome alternative treatments that may help to keep them alive. Why, then, should anyone else insist on and even force a certain therapy that totally violates a person’s principles and profoundest religious beliefs?

  Yet that has occurred. Some doctors or hospital administrators have even turned to the courts for legal authorization to force blood on an individual. Concerning those who have followed this course, Dr. D. N. Goldstein wrote in TheWisconsinMedical Journal: