By Randy Watters:
Changing Light
For several decades now, the Watchtower magazine (henceforth designated as WT) has taught that 1914 marked the invisible presence of Christ, and that the generation that saw the world events that occurred since 1914 would be the one to witness the end of the earthly governments and the establishment of God's Kingdom on earth. The May 1, 1985 WT (p. 4) makes the statement that "Before the 1914 generation completely dies out, God's judgment must be executed." Originally, it was taught that those who were old enough to understand the events that occurred in 1914 comprised such a generation [See WT 01/10/78 p.31, 10/15/80, p. 31], but in more recent years the Governing Body of Jehovah's Witnesses hinted that those who were born around 1914 comprised this generation (apparently to buy out more time until the end--see WT 05/15/84, p. 5)
While the passing of this "generation" necessitated a change of interpretation, there has apparently been some vacillation on the part of their Governing Body in recent years regarding just how they were going to reinterpret the "1914 generation" doctrine. The first printed evidence 1 of such vacillation came with the January 8, 1987 issue of the Awake! magazine. The traditional masthead on page 4 discontinued the statement saying that the generation that saw 1914 would not pass away, only to resume the statement with the March 8, 1988 issue. With the release of the Nov. 8, 1995 Awake!, the masthead has been altered to avoid mentioning "1914" or "generation" at all (see page 11).
A similar seldom-noticed change occurred back in 1989 when they reprinted the Jan. 1, 1989 Watchtower in book form ("bound volumes"). On page 12 in the magazine it had said that "He [the apostle Paul] was also laying a foundation for a work that would be completed in the 20th century," but by the end of the year when the bound volumes were completed, that sentence was changed to "...would be completed in our day," inadvertently revealing their own insecurity about being in that "special generation." Apparently the WT Society was no longer confident that Armageddon would occur in the 20th century after all.
It now appears the Governing Body has found a solution to the dilemma, and are "seeding the ground," giving Witnesses a taste of the changes to come, without disclosing the full implications of this major shift in doctrine.
http://www.freeminds.org/history/new1914.htm
