In other words, they are SELF APPOINTED, not Spirit Anointed.
The ruse is that Jesus chose CT Russell to be the FDS in 1918-1919. But that has been completely deconstructed from every logical standpoint, the result that it has been completely exposed as the utterly ridiculous doctrine that it is.
Later, during Rutherford's watch, the FDS concept was reworked to mean all the anointed. That has more or less has been the elastic concept used to this day. It was in the '70s, during Knorr's presidency, that the GB came into existence. According to Ray Franz, Knorr was not receptive to the arrangement, but more or less capitulated to the power struggle.
The Watchtower of December 15, 1971 was the first to unambiguously capitalize the term "Governing Body of Jehovah's witnesses" as the defined group leading the religion, with a series of articles explaining its role and its relationship with the Watch Tower Society.
This was followed with a bunch of revisionist history articles making claims that "a governing body made its appearance" some time after the formation of Zion's Watch Tower Society in 1884, though it had not been referred to as such at the time. The article claimed that Watch Tower Society president Charles Taze Russell had been a member of the governing body.
Only a few months ago the Governing Body made this surprising admission:
"We thus have no way of knowing the exact number of anointed ones on earth; nor do we need to know. The Governing Body does not keep a list of all partakers, for it does not maintain a global network of anointed ones." - Question From Readers, w2011 8/15 p. 22 - Emphasis added
To any reasoning, thinking individual this completely belies their claims of being representatives of the "Faithful and Discreet Slave" class; they don't even know who the anointed are for Christ's sake!
The reason you can't find any concrete statement in any of the Society's publications clearly explaining WHO exactly authorized/appointed/selected/chose the Governing Body to serve in this capacity, and by extension selected the individual members to serve on it, is because they don't want anyone to know the simple truth: They chose themselves and each other.
They just keep putting up the front of it all being done by Holy Spirit issued forth from and invisible God that had delegated this work to his equally invisible Son, who by the way has been ruling invisibly since 1914 don't you know ... evidently!
It's all a complete con-game.
Sources:
- "Theocratic Organization with Which to Move Forward Now; A Governing Body as Different from a Legal Corporation". The Watchtower. December 15, 1971.
- "A Governing Body as Different from a Legal Corporation". The Watchtower: 761. December 15, 1971.
- Franz, Raymond (2007). Crisis of Conscience. Commentary Press. pp. 58. ISBN 0-914675-23-0.
