Prediction in "Bible Teach" book is already a false prophecy

by hamsterbait 24 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  sabastious

  They warn the person actually reading the book that they should heed their warnings of Armageddon, as it "will come in YOUR lifetime"

  This would explain the scattered reports of droves of Witnesses reading the book to infants.

  -Sab
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  Leolaia

  The intentional vagueness in many of the printed statements about 1975 was an attempt at avoiding making the same mistake of being too specific as Russell had been about 1914, Woodworth had been about 1918 (in the Finished Mystery book), and Rutherford had been about 1925. Rutherford acknowledged he had made a "jackass" of himself regarding the latter date. What is generally not recognized is that Rutherford and then Knorr indulged in further false prophecy during WWII (and in the lead-up to WWII) which, although avoided the trap of date-setting, made somewhat definite statements about the future that history has proved wrong. This should count just as much as the 1914, 1918, 1925, 1975 predictions.

  So, for instance, Rutherford wrote in 1936 that although Jehovah's witnesses do not know "just what hour or year Armagedoon will take place," they do "certainly know that it cannot be far removed from the present day, because that work marked out for them, and which they are doing, immediately precedes Armageddon" (Watchtower, 1 December 1936, p. 365). It is inconceivable that 75 years, the length of a human lifetime, is not "far removed" from the year 1936. Then in 1938 he advised Jonadabs contemplating childbearing and marriage to "wait a few years until the fiery storm of Armageddon is gone" (Face the Facts, 1938, pp. 46-50). It is difficult to imagine a young couple, say both of them 20 years old in 1938, having to wait till age 94 (at least!) to start having kids. Rutherford also interpreted the events of the war as directly relevant to the timing of Armageddon. In an article in the 1 September 1938 issue of the Watchtower, Rutherford acknowledged that there had been mistakes in the past of what was expected in 1914, 1918, and 1925, but said that although "no man can precisely say what day or year Jehovah's battle at Armageddon will be found, it is easy to be seen that now conditions among the people are such as to indicate that a great crisis is near" and Jehovah's "day of vengeance is here, and his terrible battle at Armageddon is near and certain to fall upon 'Christendom', and that within an early date ... and must shortly be executed" (pp. 269-270). That "great crisis" consisted of the war between the King of the North (the Axis powers) and the King of the South (the Allied powers), which would lead directly into Armageddon. Early on, Rutherford expected the short-lived triumph of the Axis powers. In Face the Facts, he told the British people that the "totalitarian combine" will obtain Britain and it is useless to fight against it. With Nazi Germany shutting down JW offices in Austria, Poland, and Czechoslovakia, Rutherford concluded: "It is quite evident that the witness work is near an end in continental Europe, and this is further proof that Armageddon is near at hand" (1940 Yearbook, pp. 132, 192). In reality, this had nothing to do with the nearness of Armageddon, since the Witness work recovered and flourished after the War.

  "The year 1940 is certain to be the most important year yet, because Armageddon is very near," as the May 1940 issue of the Informant states (p. 1). In a 1941 booklet, Rutherford wrote that the two powers were currently engaging "in the most deadly and destructive war of all time" and "these present-day events will be quickly followed by the complete destruction of Satan's rule" (Comfort All That Mourn, 1941, pp. 16-21). But indeed, WWII was not "quickly followed" by Armageddon, with at least 65 years (easily the length of a human lifetime) separating the two in the time since. The sense of urgency is ramped up even more in the 1 Feburary 1942 issue of the Watchtower. Again, the circumstances of the War inform the belief that Armageddon is at hand: "Now we are near the FINAL END of the 'time of the end', and the nations of 'Christendom' are in the throes of war and turmoil....Jehovah's witnesses, as pictured by Jeremiah, have a great and serious job to do, and the time in which to do it is limited by the approaching hour which God knows and has fixed for the beginning of Armageddon....With totalitarian rule overrunning the whole earth, and Armageddon swiftly approaching, the conditions now require that Jehovah's commissioned people and their companions follow the example of the huntsman.....The final gathering by the Lord is on. Let nothing for one instant interrupt the onward push of his covenant-people in His service" (pp. 37-45). And this rallying cry continued to intensify further: "Now, with Armageddon immediately before us, it is a matter of life or destruction....The world emergency with Armageddon at the door is the very time to most anxiously keep God's law and obey him rather than obey desperate men" (Watchtower, 1 May 1942, pp. 139-142).

  By the summer of 1942, the Axis advance was stalled and Allied plans for the post-war period were unveiled. Now it was no longer taught that the War itself would end in God's intervention at Armageddon but that there would be a very brief postwar declaration of "peace and security". Knorr declared: "For such fundamental reasons man's postwar arrangement will not survive the battle of Armageddon. The 'battle of that great day of God Almighty' will break out suddenly upon the postwar builders when they think they can cry out, 'Peace and security' " (Watchtower, 1 September 1942, p. 259). "Do you see the structure of the postwar world being shaped in the fires of this total war? It is sure evidence that 'the battle of that great day of God Almighty' must and will come. When the postwar builders cry 'Peace and safety!' then will break forth the battle and will destroy this old world with its record of bloodshed, suffering, religion and oppression of the people" (Kingdom News, April 1943, p. 2). "When the postwar builders get their political, commercial, religious structure erected and operating and begin to cry 'Peace and Safety!' ... suddenly complete destruction from God and by Christ will come upon the whole postwar arrangement" (Fighting For Liberty on the Home Front, 1943, pp. 28-29). But history has shown that the postwar arrangement has now lasted some 66+ years. Armageddon did not come in 1945 or the immediate years thereafter. And after V-E Day, when the end of the War was finally in sight, Knorr gave a talk on 10 June 1945 (The Commander to the Peoples, 1945, pp. 21-23, 26, 28) which contained such breathless statements as:

  "It is a day of decision, and its precious hours of opportunity are remorselessly ticking out."
  "The zero hour for the final war of Armageddon is undelayably coming on, although no man knows the day nor the hour thereof."
  "What, then, could that foretold 'abomination of desolation' be but the global government of which the Dumbarton Oaks plan was only a tentative diagram, to be amended by the 1945 San Francisco Conference?"
  "The international 'abomination of desolation', therefore, represents the final total lineup of this old world against Jehovah's universal domination and his Theocratic Government."
  "It is the time for the battle of Armageddon, and the Captain of all of Jehovah's hosts is his 'Commander to the peoples' "

  Similarly in the Watchtower: "The hour of decision is near. The hour of opportunity to choose is ticking out. The zero hour of Armageddon's battle undelayably comes on" (Watchtower, 1 July 1945, p. 223). And after the war was concluded, the Society continued to expect "sudden destruction" in the relatively near future: "The world catastrophe of Armageddon is whither the nations are now marching, even under banners and slogans of peace" (Watchtower, 15 September 1945, p. 277). "Let all the willing and unwitting tools and dupes of Satan build their postwar structure ever so strong. Let them praise and exalt the work of their hands ever so highly. Let their false prophets paint it ever so white with whitewash and daub it with untempered mortar. Before the onward march of The Theocracy, their 'abomination of desolation' is doomed to come to a most ignominious end" (Informant, October 1945, p. 1). "Youth now are facing the most serious problem in all human history....The nations are bent on continuing their march through the postwar period to the battlefield of Armageddon....In that universal war of Armageddon a person's having youth will be no advantage to him nor a guarantee of surviving alive into the new world" (Watchtower, 15 November 1945, p. 339). A young person reading that in 1945 is now an old man or woman, if not dead. And the postwar arrangement has now been in place for generations. The vast majority of people in the world were not even alive when the postwar cry of "peace and security" occurred.

  But it was also in the first months of the postwar period when the Society finally began to back down from the expected immediacy of Armageddon. Rather than the battle of Armageddon breaking forth at the cry of "peace and security" as earlier expected, the Society now begins to refer to "the oncoming postwar years" (Watchtower, 1 September 1945, p. 266), "the oncoming postwar period of the nations" (1 October, p. 297), "the coming postwar epoch" (15 October, p. 308). And now Armageddon may be at least several years off: "It matters not how few years or many years the battle of Armageddon may be off, now is the time to remember and serve the great Creator of the New World" (15 November 1945, p. 343). Earlier, during the War and its leadup, it was customary instead to refer to "the few remaining months until the breaking out of that universal cataclysm" (Universal War Near, 1935, pp. 26-27) or "the remaining months before Armageddon" (Watchtower, 15 September 1941, p. 288). It was almost "the zero hour" in the summer of 1945. But once the postwar world got underway and the Society saw that it was not going way any time soon, the Society had to backpedal. And then before long, it became forgotten that Armageddon was supposed to have an intrinsic relationship with the events of WWII.
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  Quendi

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  PaintedToeNail

  Very interesting, I'll have to remember this for future use!
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  mP

  There is no prophecy in the Bible to begin with.

  Most of the so called prophecies about Jesus are bulldust. If one honestly checks each and every one that is given it is easy to dimiss them all.

  Micah 5:2 does not predict Jesus becase he did not defeat the Assyrians as it is said in v5.

  Daniel which most people assume is prophetic was actually written after the fact. Scholars have proven this, using language and name changes.

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Daniel

  Though traditionally the book was believed to have been written by the Daniel figure of the court tales, today the scholarly consensus is that it is a product of Maccabean times. Though many evangelical commentators still defend a sixth century date, for mainstream scholarship the issue was settled over a century ago [2] . The common view is that the court tales represent a stratum of older, traditional stories, while the visions and final redaction of the work date to the second century BCE. The visions describe the national crisis that occurred under Antiochus IV Epiphanes , a Seleucid king who polluted the temple, halted its services, and attempted to wipe out the Jewish religion.

  Revelation is also not prophetic but an angry Jew who is ranting, raving and hoping for the destruction of Nero and Rome. The beast is Nero

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_of_the_Beast

  An Aramaic scroll from Murabba'at, dated to "the second year of Emperor Nero", refers to him by his name and title. [36] In Greek it is Nrwn Qsr (Pronounced "Neron Kaisar"). In Latin it is Nro Qsr (Pronounced "Nero Kaisar").