Nice references to be archived @ blondie
The Big Secret
by finishedmystery 12 Replies latest watchtower scandals
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aqwsed12345
There was a time when Jehovah’s Witnesses stood out for their elaborate, if imaginative, interpretive schemes—where nearly every Old Testament narrative had a prophetic counterpart, every shadow had a substance, and every minor figure in Scripture foreshadowed some vital element of their eschatological worldview. These “types and antitypes,” as they were called, offered the illusion of a grand theological coherence, albeit an artificial one. But now, without warning or apology, the very leadership that crafted this interpretive edifice has swept it all away—silently, strategically, and with staggering consequences. And almost no one within their ranks has noticed.
The so-called "Governing Body" has methodically unraveled the interpretive framework that underpinned their most foundational teachings—without offering any adequate replacement. The cities of refuge no longer represent anything. The Jehu/Jehonadab model, which justified the two-class theology of “anointed” and “other sheep,” has vanished. The Watchtower’s unique interpretation of Malachi 3, once the core proof text of their claim to be the one true religion, has been discarded without ceremony. Their bizarre 1914 doctrine—built on the supposed antitype of Nebuchadnezzar’s madness—suddenly floats in a vacuum. And rather than explain or defend this revolution, the leadership offers only silence. They do not defend the remnants. They do not declare any exceptions. They simply erase and move on.
But this is not mere theological refinement. This is a self-immolation of identity. For over a century, these prophetic “types” justified their distinctiveness—justified their doctrine, their exclusivity, their two-tier salvation system. And now that foundation is gone. With it crumbles the rationale for the 8.8 million adherents to believe that their salvation depends on loyalty to an organization which, by its own admission, no longer possesses divine insight. Instead, the members are told—implicitly, yet forcefully—that none of this matters. Do not question. Do not discuss. Obey, even if it seems illogical. It is Orwellian in its boldness: the doctrinal pillars can vanish, but the structure must remain standing.
This is not simply confusion. It is theological gaslighting.
Even former members who still cling to much of the movement’s theology have noticed the absurdity. One disillusioned academic insider observed that with the abandonment of prophetic types, hundreds of Watchtower publications have retroactively become meaningless. Generations were taught to build their lives upon teachings that are now openly declared to be speculative fiction. These were not minor footnotes—they were the blueprints. But in place of these discarded typologies, we now receive little more than moralistic platitudes. Naboth is no longer a Christ-figure or a symbol of the anointed; he is just a man who stood up for what was right. Elijah no longer foreshadows the prophetic class; he is merely a bold example. The cities of refuge, which once pointed to organizational safety, now mean... nothing. All that remains is “practical application”—but with no theological anchoring, no eschatological significance, and certainly no compelling reason to believe this group speaks for God.
The Watchtower’s new interpretive minimalism is not humble. It is evasive. The leadership’s newfound "simplicity" is a shield—not from error, but from accountability. For decades, they claimed that they alone could interpret the prophetic Word. Now, having undermined their own credentials, they refuse to acknowledge the spiritual damage caused by their false predictions and typological acrobatics. It is not that they are returning to biblical restraint. It is that they are retreating from the battlefield of reason and responsibility.
Worse still is the cruelty of what this abandonment implies: the erasure of hope. The previous theology, though flawed, at least offered a vision—of vindication, of deliverance, of paradise. Now, salvation is a shell. The old dual-class structure—anointed versus other sheep—was dubious to begin with, but at least it claimed biblical roots in types and shadows. Now those shadows have been declared formless, the types merely incidental, the structure unsupported. And yet, the system remains in force. You must still believe in it. You must still obey. Or face expulsion.
This is not Christianity. This is institutional delusion.
What Christian body, however errant, has ever dared to declare that it can strip away the theological grounds of its own salvation schema while demanding unquestioning loyalty to it? What church has ever said: “We have removed the reason for your hope. Now trust us all the more”? It is spiritual abuse cloaked in “greater discretion.” It is not prudence; it is paralysis.
In their refusal to allow serious doctrinal inquiry among their own members, the leadership has enacted something like a doctrine of willful ignorance. The problem is not simply that they no longer explain prophecy—it is that they mock the very desire to seek meaning. They infantilize their followers, punish theological curiosity, and weaponize obedience. To suggest that Solomon may not be resurrected is not caution—it is absurdity. It is the institutionalization of not knowing, elevated to virtue.
This shift betrays what little confidence the leadership has in their own theology. And so they fortify their control through what one ex-member rightly called “brainwashing preemptive damage control”: if the masses ever begin to grasp what has happened—if they connect the dots and realize their doctrinal foundation has been silently removed—they are already conditioned to respond with apathy or fear.
But truth is not afraid of questions. Hope does not thrive in the absence of understanding. And Christ never required blind submission to an evolving theological fog. The real tragedy is not just that millions are being misled. It’s that they are being deprived—of the very thing they most desire: the certainty of God’s promises and the joy of salvation. All that remains is a counterfeit gospel propped up by suppression, not revelation.
In the end, the greatest scandal is not the change itself—it’s the silence.
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finishedmystery
As the author of the OP I would like to say something else about this now that there are a few comments in the thread. Awhile back I listened to a youtube video by Eric Wilson of the Beroean Picketts channel that maybe dated back a couple years. In it he called attention to the fact that the end of the antitypes had effectively ended the other sheep/anointed paradigm that leads to a two class religion because this doctrine is based on two antitypes that are now in the dustbin so to speak. I am sorry to say that that was my moment of awakening regarding this matter because up to then I was as dumbed down on it as everyone else. Frankly, I had forgotten the connection between the two, but my moment of awakening was the main reason I stopped associating with the religion because I realized that it was a religion of 8.8 million people that had no salvation hope for them whatsoever, and if I were to call attention to this fact I would have been disfellowshipped. I subsequently had some email correspondence with Wilson about the subject and I complemented him on his insights, but I pointed out that he had not gone on to make the point that the GB had to have known what they were doing, that they could not have done this unwittingly.
Then a couple months ago Wilson did a new video about the Satanic origins of the other sheep doctrine, and this time he did say that the GB knew what they were doing. To date this video has about 9k views and counting. At the same time I wrote an article about it on ex jw reddit and it received about 17k views, so it is safe to say that about 25k people know about this now. But here's what disappointments me enormously. I scanned the comments thread, which was quite lengthy, for Wilson's video and there were many comments about various aspects of the video, but I could not find one single reference to the GB knowing that they ended the doctrinal basis for the other sheep doctrine. There is just something about this subject where it doesn't even register with ex witnesses. You practically have to slap everyone upside the head to make them get it. There's just something about this that even ex witnesses when they are told just don't grasp the gravity of what the GB has done. What they have done is wicked, evil, and heinous in the extreme, but the fact of that just doesn't click with people. The big difference between me and Wilson is that he's a nicer guy than I am. He politely stated that the GB knew what they were doing. I, on the other hand, called them out as wicked and evil to have done this.
Aqwsed says the greatest scandal is not the change but the silence. I would go onto say, and this is my original point, that the even deeper scandal is unknown, namely the reason for the silence. Wally may have been on to something. All the exposes of SRA, Satanism in the Watchtower may be part of it as well, but I'm probably now about to answer my own question. I suspect that the GB has by and large lost their faith. They simply don't believe in the religion anymore, and everything they do is a reflection of that. I am by no means a theologian in any professional or formal sense of the word, but I am 10 times the theologian of any of the GB. They are ignorant men who have chosen to formalize their ignorance as the new and now institutionalized doctrine of willful ignorance. I doubt if even one of them has ever done even a simple act of research on any given scripture at biblehub.com to examine the commentaries or Strong's Lexicon on anything. In this sense they are a disgrace to the natural love for the truth that all true Christians have.
I am reminded of an email exchange to be found on Paul Grundy's jwfacts website where he posts Franz' email to him where Franz said that he believed that the GB saw the religion of Jehovah's Witnesses as simply the last 'good' religion on earth, and that it was really all it was to them. Tom Cabeen, the overseer of the factory pressroom at the time, said that Dan Sydlik told him that the other sheep were the gentile Christians, yet according to Randall Watters, Sydlik indulged in abusive epithets hurled at the so called apostates of 1979 to 1982 who were advocating for the very thing that Sydlik said to Cabeen! Really, these men have known what the truth is regarding the true identity of the other sheep all the way back to the 1970s. Watters also quoted Albert Schroeder as saying "the apostasy was against the organization and not the Bible". Aside from falling out of my chair and having to pick myself up off the floor when I read that I realized that Schroeder knew that the 'apostasy' of the time was the truth and he didn't care. In fact he was persecuting the truth, knew it, and didn't give a damn.
When all is said and done these are, in truth, very cynical men, who have no real faith in Christianity, and are persecutors of the truth. I have no problem whatsoever with anyone who chooses to say that the GB is part of the God or deity of 2 Thessalonians 2. They are men of lawlessness, and it's because they do not love the truth. It grieves me to accuse any man of such a thing, but it is where the trail of the facts and evidence inevitably leads me.