Stef,
Earlier you had said you were curious about what they believe.
At the bottom of the page you'll find a number of links (quotes.com I think you've been to already) to sites that are helpful but, as you said, are too much to read.
I agree. There's a lot of info to be digested and it's not just what they believe, but also why.
I've listed a few of their beliefs that I think you'd find most relevant for your age and situation in life (single, about out of school, close to leaving home perhaps). You can look for info of these topics on the links already noted as well as on here by using the "search" option in the upper left hand corner of each page:
- The Witness' beliefs about the worth of higher education.
- Husband and wive's roles in a marriage--headship, iow.
- Their statements on marital sex--specifically oral and anal sex--even foreplay techniques.
Other issues you could research as a change, just as you eat more than one food at a meal, would be:
- Why they won't take blood transfusions--study this if you would like children someday.
- " " " observe holidays or birthdays.
Thes are more useful from the point of view of being married and starting a family, and considering how your children (who want acceptance from their peers as much as anyone else does) would be seen by friends and classmates for observing these beliefs and living their lives by them.
Having done that, should you approach Chad with questions about the material, you'll hear statements like these:
- "Those are "apostates" saying those things. They were kicked out or left Jehovah's organization and have an axe to grind." (Acta 20:29, 30)
"Apostate," to a Witness, is like saying "tax-and-spend liberal" about a conservative's political opponent; a nice, smear-`em-all-with-the-same-brush slur. A "flash word," in my vocabulary. Designed to get an emotional reaction, a visceral, unthinking hatred of the person maligned that way.
I, among others here, was disfellowshipped (excommunicated) and no longer believe in their teachings, or that they are the "true religion." That doesn't mean I have an axe to grind about it. (BTW, every Witness who came from another religion to become a Witness is an "apostate" from that previous religion, right? There's the pot calling the kettle black!) Many people here would, and rightly so imo, criticize about the degree of noncommunication that goes on between people who were once "brothers and sisters" and now are split because one was kicked out or left. You'll read horror stories on here about how friends, family, and co-workers, now "df'ed," have been treated at times by active Witnesses. (Search using "shunning" or "disfellowshipping.")
So far, have you felt anger, fanatical hatred, or anything like that from the people who've responded to you? If not, the "axe to grind" argument loses some (not all) of its truth. There are angry, and very hurt/injured, people here and on other sites.
- "Their attacks are Satan's tries to destroy us." (Rev. 12:10)
This is a frequent defense against unpleasant information. The natural curiosity (and sense that "there's two sides to every story") can be squashed without guilt. It's an ad hominem: ignore the message, attack the messenger. He may even see you as having been "tricked" by us sly imps into doing the Dark Lord's bidding and attacking his faith.
The problems the Witnesses have are being brought on by themselves in many cases. Facts exist and can be verified. With the Internet, information has become too widely available to be controlled. And high-control groups like them thrive on insulating their followers from it. Their last resort is to brand it all as lies and scare their members away from even thinking about reading from sites like this. No loyal Witness should even think of questioning the F&DS (Faithful and Discreet Slave), iow the Society. (The Society tells them that the Internet is a bad place--except for their site. Kind of like its criticizing Christendom for adopting pagan holidays and the Church calling the holidays "Christian" as a result.)
- "The Society hasn't changed its doctrines; we just got new light." (Ps. 4:6)
Check the sub-forums under "Health and Family Matters" about ideas on medicine they had in the past since proved false. That way you don't have to take my word for it. Things like: vaccinations are useless; organ transplants equalled cannibalism; we can't take blood transfusions (but certain blood components are OK now). There are more but I can't remember them all.
To them, doctrinal changes mean it's being more and more clearly revealed. To me, it's like trying to walk during an earthquake; what firm (belief or ground) is there to stand on?
- "We're living in the last days of this system of things."
In 1914, they say, Christ returned and took up kingship; Satan was thrown out of Heaven at the same time and confined here, and that's why the world has been in such turmoil since (Rev. 12:7-12). And the generation that saw (was old enough to remember) all this wouldn't all die off before the New System arrived (Matt. 24:34). Decades passed, no New System, and the doctrine was changed (a generation needn't be just 80 years, for example) to explain the delay (Ps. 90:10). Finally, trying to hold its occcuring in "one generation" were abandoned entirely. They also said that in 1925 Abraham, Issac, and other "worthies of old" would rise and live in San Diego, California, in the US. (Why not Israel? Is modern Hebrew so different they'd be unable to communicate?) The Society built a house for them and later a JW leader moved in to it--but no "ancients" of Biblical days. In 1975, expectations were very high (www.freeminds.org has excellent info on this) that "this could be it"--6,000 years since Adam's creation, iow, and therefor a new era of human history was about to unfold. Many Witnesses quit jobs, sold homes, put off needed medical care, etc., fully convinced there was no further need of these things--and were greatly disillusioned when nothing happened. And whose fault was that? Why, the rank and file's, of course! How dare anyone imply the Society raised false hopes. You people read too much into it, was the attitude that came down from the Governing Body.
In the Society's literature is a statement that if a prophet's words fail to pass, you're entitled to consider them a false prophet--but the Society doesn't feel this applies to them. And never mind the Bible's quoting Christ as saying even He didn't know when things would occur (Matt. 24:36).
I hope this helps, and that it isn't overkill. There are other topics--the UN, pedophilia, the Society owning stock ("wordly" but if they do it, apparently OK) in a company that itself is a major stockholder in another company doing work with possible military applications (from a religion stressing its pacificism) I haven't touched on.
The facts are there; the Governing Body does its best to hide them and the JW's simply refuse to look at them when shown.
