jerome,
1) How much do the JWs stress on the usage of theocratic warfare in the field service?
Now, that is a very good question. The answer is somewhere between "not very much" and "not at all."
Fact is, growing up a JW, I had never even heard the term before I learned it from opponents some time before I left the movement. Anticultists do, in my opinion, grossly oversell the term "thecratic war strategy" in anti-WTS propaganda. It is simply not true that there are instructions to rank & file JWs to deceive or lie in the 'preaching work.' That some outsiders are left with this impression from reading anti-WT material is IMO very unfortunate.
The simplistic argumentation does not take into account the complexity of the process that makes a convert into a 'publisher' who is willing to give outsiders a grossly distorted picture of the organisation. JWs learn by examples, and they learn by trial and error. WT literature typically tells a tale that may be technically true, but grossly misleading. JWs learn from this example, and practice the same form of deception. Sometimes JW spokesmen tells outright lies. True believers rationalize this dishonesty in various ways, and then they follow up the examples of their superiours.
One example. When I met with objections against the shunning policy in 'field service', and somebody told me that JWs were not even allowed to talk to close relatives that were disfellowshipped, I rebuttted this by pointing out that my own mother was DFd, and yet I had steady contact with her. This was totally true. What I omitted was the fact that I hereby violated official WT policy, and that I had met some criticism from other JWs for this. Yet, when I employed this tactic in field service, I was praised for being able to use such a good argument. So I learned to deceive.
Another example. JWs don't like to be asked if they believe that only they will be saved. The question is dodged by saying that 'god is the judge' or something along those lines, or it can be answered by saying JWs believe that millions of non-JWs will be saved. True, since it refers to those who will be resurrected, but grossly misleading since it doesn't answer what the questioner really wanted to know.
The JW organization is a massive sales organization. Rutherford organized it like a business, not a church. It is typical for salesmen to 'put their best foot forward' as the saying goes, and this includes being economical with inconvenient truths. JWs do the same. The community rewards success, and it does not punish success if it is achieved through less-than-honest methods. Thus, the JW sales force has an incentive to be dishonest, and they generally are.
The term 'theocratic war strategy' really is an offical, if rarely used, WTS expression. One can speculate that it was coined by the topmost leadership, who were able to see they were actually deceptive in many cases, as a rationalization and justification for lying. I doubt there has ever been a meeting in any Kingdom Hall anywhere where an elder has explicitly encouraged deception and lies, using this expression. On the contrary, JWs are somehow convinced through a massive dose of doublethink that even when they are dishonest, they are telling 'the Truth'.
- Jan
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- "How do you write women so well?" - "I think of a man and I take away reason and accountability." (Jack Nicholson in "As Good as it Gets")
