Could Jehovah's Witnesses Have Conquered the Roman Empire with the WTS Message?

by RottenRiley 27 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  Phizzy

  Just to answer the Thread Title, I know the WT could not.

  But neither did the "Chrisitans" "conquer" the Roman Empire.

  Far from it.

  Constantine, and his advisors, obviously decided it was a good, unifying, thing to have an Empire that was Monotheistic.

  For some reason, probably constant tribal disputes,and tribal resistance of Roman rule, the old method of tolerance of religious belief locally, and encouraging syncretism, especially if that included a worship of the Roman Emperor, was no longer working 100%.

  So, someone chose a form of Christianity, (mainly that of Paul), to be the Roman Empire's sole approved religion.

  This worked, as a uniting influence, on the surface. But in reality the old gods were not abandoned by the Romans spread throughout the Empire, they continued to worship Mithras or whoever, but had a Chapel that was Christian that could be seen by visitors who would likely report back to Rome.

  Below this, with easy access from the Villa, was a functioning Temple to their god of choice.

  Even the "Christianity", adopted for political reasons by Rome, hardly conquered the hearts and minds of its subjects.
• 

  RottenRiley

  Phizzy why did a peaceful non-violent religion conqueor the Empire, compare your assessment to the rapid spread of Islam's method of killing all who oppose the Prophet. I repsectfully disagree with your position, nothing said back's up the unification of the people who felt morally bankrupty. Religious differences existed but why was Christianity the winner?

  Empereor Julian tried to compete with Christian qualities by sanctioning the State Pagan religions and he admitted he failed badly! Julian lived after Constantine, his frustration can be seen with the pagan priests through historical writings. We need to give credit where credit is due, why did Julian fail at unification of the Empire? Christians who followed Christ were not violent, the Church Fathers accounts through Eusebious writings and oral tradition show Christians had great love, the Gnostics were the opposite, the pagans did not give a dam about the community, so why did a weak religion like Christianity succeed?
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  RottenRiley

  Hi, I am sorry I did not keep the my original Argument that the "Watchtower Society" could not have conqueored the Roman Empire but their brand of religion of "Fearing the Masses with each World event" and driving everyone to a state of anxiety, anxiousness, depression, coveting the neigboors goods and no true love among the Jehovah Witness Organization would have flopped along with Mithra's Cult.

  My reasonings for believing the Watchtower Organization would fail if offered to the Roman Empire Masses is based off iductive experience. The early Christian way was often accepted by the poor and slaves of society, it took time before the rich who felt their lives were empty joined the ranks along side with the rank-and-file poor. The Christians according to early Church Historicans sold themselves in to slavery to make payments for their brothers and sisters who were slaves, they did this willingly and not under some type of compulsions and guilt.

  Jehovah's Witnesses who follow the Watchtower's Governing Body orders dont mingle in Society, they don't help the poor, they don't make life for the orphans and widows easier, they add more burdens on those who can least bear it, therefore adding more anti-depressant medications or alcoholic beverages to the list. JWs instead of adding security and stability, attack members who feel like they are secure by pressuring them to do more, to not feel good about yourself, it's a religion that feeds off fear and I don't think it would have lasted unless we had the Freedoms of Religion like the United States has.

  The JW Religion is run by men who are out of touch with reality, they live a secure life in their own Paradise Bethel away from the conduct (At least that's the illusion they create) of Worldy Individuals. Jehovah's Witnesses are not the "Light of the World" and reflect more of Satan's qualities than Jesus Christ's, why do we feel the JWs are professional Pharisees? Not everyone can be wrong, something is wrong with the Organization if there are Millions now living who know the Watchtower's teaching change's only a small population of it's followers.

  Why does the Watchtower have to have filler-Magazines like this week's lesson about the elders? Why are the elders so incompetent and why are they allowed to positions they are not qualified to hold? Once there was a elder (you might have seen him on a video) who said "I am a psychologist, counselor, money manager, builder, marrige mender, lie dectector, ect....) who made huge claims he could not back up, he filed bankruptcy four times, drinks massive amounts of alcoholic beverages and finally his body imploded, why?
• 

  Phizzy

  "so why did a weak religion like Christianity succeed?"

  Theodosius the Great, in about 380 if memory serves, issued a Decree that made Nicene Christianity the official religion.

  Your question should be, why did Thodosius choose this brand of christianity ?

  From the death of Jesus on several strands of belief in him are discernable, the Ebionites, Marcionites, variuous Gnostic groups etc, so many teachings and sects to choose from, and no one can really know exactly what they all taught and believed, yet Theodosius chose a religion that had sprung from Paul and then the "Fathers" who influenced Nicea.

  It is not that Nicene Christianity conquered in any way, apart from being chosen by the Emperor.
• 

  RottenRiley

  Hi Phizzy, I was reading a dreadful book "Foxes Book of Martyers", I did not know that Five Million Christians were slaughtered by the Roman Empire. JW Elders use to tell me that I could not trust "Foxes Book" but I think there is some good information in it. The following paragraphs explain why he made the official edict, he was a Christian and saw the massive growth and potential of the Christian.

  Here's a link I found interesting "http://www.unrv.com/culture/christianity.php

  The Might Two: "Constantine and Licinius" had different views how to handle the Christian Population, Licinius was getting bad-luck it seems with his poor choices well Constantine appeared to be blessed (Just my opinion).

  "Perhaps in order to lure Constantine into a final battle, Licinius began inciting Pagans against Constantine's edict which favored Christianity and championed a Pagan cause. By 324 AD, the conflict and rivalry came to a head. Constantine defeated Licinius in battles at Adrianople and Chrysopolis, which ended in Licinius' capture and execution."

  After Constantine's death in 337 AD, his son Constantine II held a tolerant, if not supportive view of the ancient Pagan faith. His second son, Constantius, was a brutal supporter of Arianism. Constans, the third son, was also a Christian, but adhered to strict Orthodoxy. A rift between sects of Christianity developed, as well as a struggle for supreme power among the brothers, causing much political instability. Constantine II was killed only a few years after his father, and the remaining brothers settled in to continue the advance of Christianity. During their reigns many anti-Pagan laws were put into place. Constans dealt with dissent in a particularly brutal fashion. The forcible expansion of Christianity on the populace, which was now quickly becoming a part of the every day social fabric, also brought a great of resentment from some. Julian the Apostate (so named later for his pro-Pagan stance) came to power upon the death of Constantius and attempted, in vain to stem the tide of Christian advancement.

  Julian attempted to bring back the ancient religion to the people of the Roman world, but Christianity had become too deeply ingrained. He removed various advantages that Christian priests and churches had enjoyed since Constantine and bestowed them upon Pagans instead. Christian teachers were also removed from their occupations in many cases. Though, for the most part he avoided open violence against the Christians, he did encourage the growth of non Catholic or Orthodox sects. The fight, which could be brutal at times, for religious supremacy evolved between these various factions, but Paganism was a dying part of the dominant culture. Even temples re-established by Julian were simply overrun by fanatic Christian mobs. Despite Julian's efforts, hindered by his short reign of 2 years, Paganism continued on the path to virtual extinction.

  The final death knell of the Pagan faith came only a generation later, under the rule of Theodosius. An ardent Christian, and recognizing the amazing growth of the still relatively young faith, Theodosius and his western counterpart Gratian, recognized Christianity as the official religion of the Empire in 380 AD. Gratian too, likely at the partial behest of Theodosius refused the title of Pontifex Maximus (head priest) and it was bestowed instead on the Catholic Pope in Rome. Severe punishments for Pagan, and especially 'heretic' Arianism were enforced and the established Churched prospered. In 390 AD, a massacre ordered by the Emperor of 7,000 people who revolted in Thessalonica resulted in his own 8 month penance. By the beginning of the 5th century, after just 400 years, the Church grew from a fledgling mystery cult into a power on nearly equal terms with the Roman Emperor himself. Though there would still be much work to be done, especially among Germanic tribes and in places such as Britain, Christianity would slowly come to dominate the entire western world."

  http://www.unrv.com/culture/christianity.php http://people.ucalgary.ca/
• 

  Phizzy

  What is very interesting is, that despite the way "christianity" became the official religion, as shown above, hardly something Jesus would approve of ! despite that, the christian religion had been widely taken up from the beginning by Gentiles.

  What started out as a sect of Judaism very quickly became a new religion of the gentiles, many of whom were prepared to die for it.

  The simple teachings of primitive christianity touched the hearts of these ordinary people, helped along by the fact that the pagan gods did little for the ordinary Joe, whereas the christians "looked after widows and orphans". I think this aspect is what appealed, more than Paul's complicated Messiah teachings.
• 

  kepler

  Hello, Phizzy, ( and RR).

  A week or two back we had crossed paths on another topic discussing Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the RE" - and I noticed elsewhere that you mentioned you were about to sit down and read Tom Holland's book, "In the Shadow of the Sword". As it turned out, I ran into the same book in a used bookstore and read it as well. Both are pretty good backgrounds for this discussion.

  As for myself, I had hit Holland's book right about chapter 40 in Gibbon. Gibbon was discussing events in Justinian's reign and then the abridged paperback edition I had omitted the chapters about Belisarius reconquering the lands lost in the west and kicking the Goths out of Italy and Rome. What the ...?? As I had mentioned, all of Gibbon's text is available on line - so whatever he said can be found - but I digress - save that Holland's account probably goes into more detail about several things than does Gibbon's account:

  1. The devastations of the bubonic plague on the Mediterranean basin and Persia.

  2. The continuing military campaigns in the West and in Persia by Justinian and Heraklius. The Persians actually seized Jerusalem, Syria and Egypt and the Constantinople based Roman Empire had to seize it all back.

  3. Arab auxiliaries in the East were near as common as "barbarian" legions in the west - and when the plague hit. the Roman regulars were outnumbered and outgunned.

  The same was true for the Persian Empire in the 600s. Cities were depopulated, survivors did not fully recover. Estimates of about 1/3 of the world's urban population had died in the wake of 580s sweep of the plague. Very apocalyptic when compared with 1914.

  Now, here's a kicker. Holland and others are sceptical that the first wave of Arabic conquests was Moslem per se; and a number of commanders might even have been Christian or as open to it as Constantine. Parenthetically, it should be noted that Aryan and Orthodox dominance shifted back and forth all over the Roman Empire map, from Emperors, to invaders from beyond the frontiers being evangelized by Aryans or vice versa. It was the same with Arabs, but with a difference. Because...

  Notice how Abraham's seed was promised a domain that stretched from Egypt to the Two Rivers? Well, let's see, who has been in charge of those areas? Not the descendants of Isaac, but the illegitimate side of the family, so to speak. The 7th century Arabs happened to notice their case for probate via Hagar and they ran with it all the way to Tours beyond the Pyranees (732 AD) and farther into Asia than Alexander ever got.

  And as for 95% of the Promised Land they have stayed there for about as many centuries as it was promised before the NT.

  Prophecy and exegesis are fascinating, aren't they.

  As to the JW movement conquering the RE, the contention of the JW movement was that the RE coopted Christianity - and they are somehow mysteriously getting belief back on its track - by distributing endless commentaries by anonymous authors from a mysterious printing press in Brooklyn:

  I have trouble imagining how this was supposed to work in the first century or a couple centuries thereafter since Christianity did not have a canon for centuries. And it established its foundations for one only after this presumed co-opting by the Roman state. We essentially subscribe to the collection of book and letters that Athanasius, the archbishop or patriarch of Alexandria recommended decades after Constantine later in the 4th century - 367 AD. Aside from the Torah and TaNakh, the WTBTS society would have to wait for Paul to write his epistles and wait decades later for the Gospel writers to print something as well. Futher complicated by the absence of a faithful and discreet slave, since the phrase and parable from which the notion was derived had not yet been penned - nor had Rutherford yet appeared on earth to conduct a purge of his counsel Moyle after he had already slammed the door on his way out.

  But then again, having the WT is somewhat akin to having communities of rabbis in Mesopotamia writing commentary on the Torah and TaNaKh and writing themselves into the ancient text. Was it by accident or design?

  Admittedly, many things Holland suggests, I am sceptical of myself. But things he simply mentions in passing are eye openers.
• 

  Phizzy

  I find Tom Holland very readable, and as you say, he points out things that may not have occurred to a simple soul such as I.

  One ,which is in the "Sword" book, is the now blindingly obvious fact to me, that the Quran has no provenance, just as the whole Bible, but especially the N.T, has no provenance.

  Both works were passed down orally in the first place, were subsequently written down, and then were changed.

  As Bart Ehrman says, if God were able to miraculously inpire the words in the first place, he should have been up to the easier task of preserving them, as he did not do so, we can conclude neither the Bible nor the Koran are inspired.

  (actually Prof Ehrman seems frightened to draw the same conclusion about the Koran as he does the Bible, at least in public).

  Thanks for pointing out the impossibility of the WT being effective in preaching in the first Century, Kepler, you are so right, what would they have preached ?

  The message which I posit above that appealed to the common man in those early centuries , i.e look after each other, and widows and orphans especially, is never one the WT has preached or even come near to putiing in to practice.