by Dansk 6 Replies latest jw friends
I'm pretty sure I once read that Charles Taze Russell said something along the lines that the negro was an inferior but amiable fellow. Is this correct? Does anyone have a reference - preferably a snippet they can publish here?
If Russell did, indeed, say something so outrageous it pours yet more scorn on the fact that he was Divinely inspired.
Thanks,
Ian
From quotes website:] The Golden Age, July 24, 1929, p. 702
They have been and are a race of servants, but now in the dawn of the twentieth century, we are all coming to see this matter of service in its true light and to find that the only real joy in life is in serving others; not bossing them. There is no servant in the world as good as a good Colored servant, and the joy that he gets from rendering faithful service is one of the purest joys there is in the world.
I remember the quote you mentioned about being inferior but amicable, but couldn't find it on there.
Kwin
Hi Dansk
go here:
http://www.jwtruth.com/timeline.asp
Select Racism from the Control drop down menu - also Russell from the People menu and click update. It will give you lots of references and links to look at
http://www.freeminds.org/history/blacks.htm
http://www.freeminds.org/african/african.htm
You'll have to cut & paste-
Sorry I'm on my mac and I can't link these.
Thanks Everyone! The links are extremely useful. I just copied this, which says enough about the racist attitude of Russell and others. How can any decent JW accept that Watchtower has always been Divinely inspired when it was undoubtedly a racist organisation? Once again here is an example of how most JWs are completely unaware of their own organisation's history.
Jehovah's Witnesses, Blacks and
DiscriminationJerry Bergman, Ph. D
Abstract
This paper researches the history of the racism found in the official teachings of the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, whose followers are now known as Jehovah's Witnesses. Their history reveals they are not free of racism as they now claim, but have manifested extreme racists views in their official, mandatory teachings. Even though 52% of the Witness' membership are non-white, not a single minority person held a leadership position in 1994.
As Russell explained in the late 1800s, he confidently believed that the end of the world and the start of the millennial kingdom will occur very soon, bringing humankind into an earthly paradise and a rapid restoration of the whole earth to the perfect garden of Eden state. Russell acknowledged that the conditions for Afro-Americans were poor in the present system, but he argued that this will work for their advantage during the millennium because they will have learned humility from their inferior position. The current conditions, he taught, were important to help them develop the needed "strength of character", but only if they remained humble and did not challenge the status quo:
If nature favors the colored brethren and sisters in the exercise of humility it is that much to their advantage, if they are rightly exercised by it. A little while, and [their]... humility will work out for [their]... good... those who have been faithful... will be granted new bodies, spiritual, beyond the veil, where color and sex distinctions will be no more. (Watchtower, April 1, 1914:110).
Russell taught that those privileged to live in the "new world" which is just upon us would also be physically returned to humankind's original bodily state, including our "original" skin color and language, which the Watchtower taught was white and Hebrew:
A little while, and the Millennial kingdom will be inaugurated, which will bring restitution to all mankind--restitution to the perfection of mind and body, feature and color, to the grand original standard, which God declared "very good," and which was lost for a time through sin, but which is soon to be restored by the powerful kingdom of the Messiah (Watchtower, April 1, 1914:110).
