Did Ray Franz manage to live out a comfortable retirement from the proceeds of his books.

by joe134cd 35 Replies latest watchtower scandals

• 

  steve2

  Nathan Natas wrote:

  I find it amusing and ironic that people who probably pirated their own copy of "COC" and/or "ISOCF" are now wondering if Ray enjoyed a rich and prosperous life with the "income" provided by the sale of his books.
  

  Huh? Where's this strangely badly-reasoned and judgemental comment coming from? Does this mean that anyone who asks how well - or otherwise - Ray did in publishing his books has "pirated" their copies of his books?

  That is a strange accusation on so many levels.

  Does this include loaning your copies of his books to others? or does that now mean "pirating"?

  I'm just surprised that such a sweeping generalization has been cast on a rather ordinary question. Not one poster has implied that Ray "enjoyed a rich and prosperous life with the "income' provided by the sale of his books".

  And even if they had, how does that implicate them in "pirating" copies of his books?

  Nathan you also could do worse than look up the definition of "ironic".
• 

  alcyone

  It is good this topic (Ray Franz making a fortune out of CoC) is mentioned here. I have heard / read some WTS apologists to use this to discredit Ray. They are trying to show he was not sincere in his decisions.

  This is in line with JW logic: "we are the truth, everybody leaving must do it because of demons / money / immorality / ..." - cultish way of thinking.
  
• 

  Simon

  I think Ray wrote the books primarily to get the information out and help others (at a time when a book was the best way to do that).

  I think if he were doing it today he would probably have self-published it online, maybe asking for contributions off those who wanted to give one and happy to provide it anyway to those who didn't.

  The amount he would "make" would probably be the same low amount in total and hardly offset the cost of the time he put into it.
• 

  Simon

  I have heard / read some WTS apologists to use this to discredit Ra

  Yeah, the WTS made way, way more on sales of their literature over the years (even now where they solicit donations to sidestep sales taxes instead of having direct pricing)
• 

  Village Idiot

  Vidiot

  "@ slimboyfat...

  "How much would you have cut Ray in for?"

  I think slimboyfat was referring to the time after Ray passed away. I believe that was when the books skyrocketed in price. I doubt though that anyone could sell more than a thousand nowadays without lowering the market price dramatically.

  I remember getting mine for $10.
• 

  Giordano

  Here's some interesting information on Ray:

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Franz

  "According to Franz, he began working in the organization's writing department and was assigned to collaboratively write Aid to Bible Understanding, the first religious encyclopedia published by Jehovah's Witnesses. On October 20, 1971 he was appointed as a member of the Governing Body.[9] In his personal memoir, Franz said that at the end of 1979 he reached a personal crossroad:

  "The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie.........but the myth—persistent, persuasive and unrealistic." I now began to realize how large a measure of what I had based my entire adult life course on was just that, a myth.............

  In March 1980, Franz and his wife took a leave of absence from the world headquarters for health reasons and moved to Alabama, where he took up laboring work on a property owned by a fellow Witness. The following month, a committee of the Governing Body raised concerns about "wrong teachings" being spread by headquarters staff ....... Staff were also questioned about comments Franz had made that may have contradicted Watch Tower doctrine.

  On May 21, 1980, Franz was called to a Governing Body session where he was questioned for three hours about his biblical viewpoints and commitment to Watch Tower doctrines.[2][19] Consequently, he agreed to a request to resign from the Governing Body and headquarters staff. Franz refused the Watch Tower Society's offer of a monthly stipend as a member of the "Infirm Special Pioneers".[20] The Governing Body investigation resulted in the disfellowshipping of several other headquarters staff.

  On March 18, 1981 Franz' employer in Alabama submitted a letter of disassociation from Jehovah's Witnesses. The September 15, 1981 issue of The Watchtower announced a change of policy on disassociation, directing that those who formally withdrew from the religion were to be shunned by Witnesses in the same manner as those who have been disfellowshipped.

  Franz, who continued to socialize with his employer, was summoned to a judicial hearing on November 25 and disfellowshipped for disobeying the edict.
  

  It is interesting that he passed up the monthly stipend apparently he did not want to be in their debt.
• 

  slimboyfat

  village idiot, the price is still over $50, and in my experience a book with that sales rank and profile could easily sell 1000s of copies per year for many years even at a high price.

  Who owns the copyright?
• 

  JWdaughter

  I don't see any way that he could have made much, if anything.

  They were always hard to come by, reasonably priced and huge. It was a pricy book to print and ship because of size/ weight.

  Not a big market and not interesting to those without a dog in the fight.
• 

  slimboyfat

  steve2 I'm sorry but I think you are wrong. Ray may not have got rich from his books but I reckon he would have made a reasonable living from them. A few thousand sales a year with say $6 profit a book, equals a reasonable living if not luxury. He could have made more if he bumped the price up a bit too. The cover price was always cheaper than it need be in my opinion. Maybe he didn't want to be seen to be profiteering, or he was satisfied with the amount of money he made anyway, but he could certainly have charged more for his books than he did without significant loss of sales.

  The existence of pirate books does not end the sale of physical books, far from it. Books are not music, their death (thus far) has been grossly exaggerated.
  
• 

  _Morpheus

  I wasnt aware that the 15 billion dollar a year music industry had died 😞 This makes me sad. I was looking forward to adell's new album.