more stumpers for the jehovah's witnesses

8/14/2019 More Stumpers for the Jehovah's Witnesses

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More Stumpers for the Jehovah's Witnesses

Some core beliefs of the Jehovahs Witnesses (JWs) were examined in our tractentitled Stumpers for Jehovahs Witnesses. In this "sequel" tract, we will examinesome additional beliefs and teachings of the Watchtower Society (WTS), the parentorganization of the JWs.

1. Are Jesus and Michael the Archangel Really the Same Person?

One of the most peculiar of the WTSs teachings is their assertion that Jesus isactually Michael the Archangel. If the JW has difficulty explaining any particulardoctrine, it will be this one. Even JWs will admit that if one were to have walkedup to any of the apostles or disciples of Christ and asked them who Jesus was,they would not have said, "Well, hes Michael the Archangel!" Not only was thevery idea was unheard of before Charles Taze Russell (the founder of the WTS), butthe Bible explicitly rejects the possibility of it.

For example, the author of Hebrews states, "To which of the angels did God eversay, You are my son? . . . Let all the angels of God worship him. . . . Yourthrone, O God, stands firm forever. . . . O Lord, you established the earth, andthe heavens are the works of your hands . . . to which of the angels has he eversaid Sit at my right hand . . . " (Heb. 1). Here, the author of Hebrewsseparates Jesus from angels, and commands the angels to worship him (cf. Rev.5:13-14,14:6-7). The obvious problem is this: Archangels are creatures, but theBible forbids any creature to worship another creature. Thus, either the Bible isin error by commanding the angels to worship an archangel, or Jesus is uncreatedand cannot be an archangel. Since this gave the JWs a tremendous problem, theyeven had to change their own Bible translation, called the New World Translation(NWT), to eliminate the references to worshipping Christ. (The 1950, 1961, and1970 editions of the NWT read "worship" in Hebrews 1:6.) Beyond this, Jesus has

the power to forgive sins and give eternal life, but no angel has this capacity.

2. Jesus: Creature of Creator?

The doctrine that most clearly sets the WTS apart from Christianity is its denialof the divinity of Christ. JWs maintain that Jesus is actually a creaturea highlyexalted one at thatbut not God himself. Scripturally, the evidence is not intheir favor.

John 1:1 states unequivocally, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was

with God, and the Word was God." This verse gave the JWs tremendous difficulty,and so in their own NWT they render the end of this verse as, "And the word was agod." One great difficulty with this translation is how it contradicts passagessuch as Deuteronomy 32:39, which says, "I alone, am God and there are no godstogether with me." Further contradictions can be seen in Exodus 20:3, "Have noother gods besides me," and Isaiah 43:10, "Before me no god was formed nor shallthere be any after me." When a particular translation so clearly opposes otherverses in Scripture, one can know immediately that it is inaccurate.

In John 20:28 Thomas says to Jesus, "My Lord and my God." In the original Greek itliterally reads, "The Lord of me and the God of me." It would be nothing short of


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blasphemy for Jesus not to rebuke Thomas if he was wrong. Jesus does nothing ofthe sort, but instead accepts Thomas profession of his identity as God.

The Bible indicates that God alone created the universe (Is. 44:24), and "he thatconstructed all things is God" (Heb. 3:4). However, Jesus created the heavens andthe earth (Heb. 1:10). This passage by itself proves that Jesus is God, since anOld Testament reference to God (Ps. 102:26-28) is now given to him.

In John 8:58, Jesus takes the name of God, "I AM" (Ex. 3:15-18), and applies it tohimself. Only God may use this title without blaspheming (Ex. 20:7, Deut. 5:11),and the punishment for someone other than God to use the sacred "I AM" is stoning(Lev. 24:16). Thus in verse 59, Jesus audience picked up stones to kill him,because they correctly understood his use of "I AM" as his claim to being God andhence thought he was guilty of blasphemy. This verse also proved to be difficultfor the JWs to combat, and so they changed "I AM" to "I have been." The Greek hereis ego eimi, which any first-semester Greek student can tell you means "I am." Itshould also be noted that it would be rather strange for people to stone Jesus forsaying that he "had been."

JWs maintain that only Jehovah God may be prayed to. But Stephen prayed to Jesusin Acts 7:59, and so one must conclude that Jesus is God. Otherwise, Stephen

blasphemed while filled with the Holy Spirit (7:55). Now the JWs will assert thatStephen was praying as a result of the vision he originally beheld, where he sawGod and Jesus in heaven (verse 55). However, verse 58 says that Stephen wasdragged out of the city to be stoned, so clearly the vision had ended, for hisstoning took place in a different location and at a later time. It is in thecontext of this later setting when Stephen clearly prays to Jesus that he might"receive [Stephens] spirit."

The WTS would have their followers believe that Jehovah and Jesus are necessarilydifferent beings, though the Bible tells another story. Jesus is called Mighty Godin Isaiah 9:6, and in the very next chapter the same title is given to Jehovah inverse 21. Other shared titles include: King of Kings (compare with Rev. 17:14),Lord of Lords (Deut. 10:17; Rev. 17:14), the only Savior (Is. 43:10-11; Acts

4:12), the First and the Last (Is. 44:6; Rev. 22:13), the Alpha and the Omega(Rev. 1:8; Rev. 22:13-16), Rock (Is. 8:14; 1 Pet. 2:7-8), and Shepherd (Ps. 23:1;Heb. 13:20-21).

Jesus and Jehovah have much more in common than titles, though. They are bothworshipped by angels (Heb. 1:6, Neh. 9:6). They are both unchanging (Heb. 13:8,Mal. 3:6). They both created the heavens and the earth (Heb. 1:10, Neh. 9:6) andare all-knowing (John 21:17, 1 John 3:20). Both give eternal life (John 10:28, 1John 5:11), and judge the world (John 5:22, Ps. 96:13). To them every knee willbend and every tongue confess (Phil. 2:9-11, Is. 45:23).

3. Is the Holy Spirit a Force or God?

Since the WTS insists that the Trinity is unbiblical and false, they relegate theHoly Spirit to the role of Gods impersonal active force which compels believersto do his will. In fact, they compare the Holy Spirit (which they render as "holyspirit") to electricity.

The Bible begs to differ, though. There are numerous verses in the New Testamentwhich clearly demonstrate both the personality and divinity of the Holy Spirit.For example, in Acts 13:2, the Holy Spirit says, "Set apart for me Barnabas and


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Saul for the work to which I have called them." In Acts 10:19-20, this "impersonalforce" considers himself to be a person. John 16 supports this idea by referringto the Holy Spirit as a "he" 10 times in the same chapter. First Corinthians 12:11states that the Holy Spirit "wills," which is an irrefutable attribute ofpersonhood, as is the capacity to love we see demonstrated by the Spirit in Romans15:30. Scripture also states that the Holy Spirit can: be lied to (Acts 5:3),speak (Acts 10:19-20), hear (John 16:13-15), know the future (Acts 21:11), testify(John 15:26), teach (John 14:26), reprove (John 16:8-11), pray and intercede (Rom.

8:26), guide (John 16:13), call (Acts 13:2), be grieved (Eph. 4:30), feel hurt(Is. 63:10), be outraged (Heb. 10:29), desire (Gal. 5:17) and be blasphemed (Mark3:29). Only a person is capable of these.

These examples demonstrate sufficiently that the Holy Spirit is a personal being,and so now one must demonstrate that he is God. Acts 5:1-4 teaches that a lie tothe Holy Spirit is a lie to God himself. Isaiah 44:24 insists that God alonecreated the heavens and the earth, but Job 33:4 and Psalms 104:30 explains thatthe Holy Spirit created them. Only God is everlasting, and this is likewise anattribute Scripture gives the Holy Spirit (Heb. 9:14). The Jews put Jehovah to thetest (Ex. 17:2), and the Holy Spirit takes the words of God, and claims they"tested and tried me" (Heb. 3:9). Unless the Holy Spirit is God, then he is animpostor. Again, in Hebrews 10:16, he claims to have placed his law in mans

hearts, though this was Gods work in Jeremiah 31:33. There is but one Lord (Eph.4:5), and one Creator (Mal. 2:10), yet both the Father and the Spirit claim theyare him (Matt. 11:25 and 2 Cor. 3:17; 1 Cor. 8:6 and Ps. 104:30). Only theCatholic understanding of the Trinity reconciles these passages.

4. Is There a Bodily Resurrection of Christ?

According to the WTS, "The man Jesus is dead, forever dead . . . " (Studies in theScriptures, Vol. 5, 454). "We deny that he was raised in the flesh, and challengeany statement to that effect as being unscriptural" (Studies, Vol. 7, 57). Jesus

fleshly body "was disposed of by Jehovah God, dissolved into its constitutiveelements or atoms" (The Watchtower, 9-1-1953, 518). "In order to convince Thomasof who he was, he used a body with wound holes" (You Can Live Forever in Paradiseon Earth, 145). He was raised as an invisible spirit creature, with no physicalbody (Reasoning From the Scriptures, 214-215).

However, according to Scripture, "If Christ has not been raised, your faith is invain, and you are still in your sins" (1 Cor. 15:17). Jesus makes clear, evenbefore death, that it is his body that will be raised up. He promises to raise upthe temple once it is destroyed. "He was speaking about the temple of his body"(John 2:21). After he had risen, he gives the same testimony, "See my hands and myfeet, that it is I myself; feel me and see, because a spirit does not have fleshand bones just as you behold that I have. . . . Do you have something there to

eat?" (Luke 24:39, 41). Jesus insists that Thomas place his finger into hiswounded side, so as to prove that he had indeed risen from the dead (John 20:27).There is no question that Jesus had truly risen from the dead. No Christian wasunder the impression that he was invisibly raised as Michael the Archangel, whileGod the Father dissolved his natural body. Such a presumption is withouthistorical or scriptural warrant, and the "proof is in the pudding": Ask the JW toshow you a Scripture verse which backs up the WTSs assertion about God disposingof Jesus body. He cant, because there isnt one.

5. Is Heaven Just for the "Anointed Class"?


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The WTS teaches that only the anointed 144,000 seen in Revelation 7 will enterheaven (the "anointed class"), while the remainder that are not annihilated (the"other sheep") will live forever on earth in paradise. However, the Bible posessome irreconcilable difficulties with this idea.

If Revelation 7 is to be taken literally, there would only be 144,000 Jewish malevirgins taken from a square shaped earth that are now in heaven worshipping asheep. This would mean that Peter (not a virgin), the Blessed Mother (not a male),and Charles Taze Russell (not a Jew) could not be in heaven. Reading one numberliterally while taking the rest of a book symbolically is not sound exegesis.Beyond this, we see in Revelation 14 that the 144,000 stand before the 24 eldersfrom Revelation 4:4. This at least brings the grand total to 144,024 people. But,the Scriptures indicate that there are still more to come. Revelation 7:9 speaksof a countless multitude before the throne, which is in heaven (Rev. 14:2-3).Still in the book of Revelation, we read that all those with their name in thebook of life are in heaven (Rev. 21:27), while all whose names are not in the bookof life are thrown into the pool of fire (Rev. 20:15). There is no third "earthly"class. Jesus reiterates this, and never speaks of two flocks. He has one bride,

whose "reward is great in heaven" (Luke 6:23). Paul even exhorts the Christiancommunity, calling them to remember, "As for us, our citizenship exists in theheavens" (Phil. 3:20).

The JWs attempt to use verses such as Psalms 37:29 as evidence that the just areto inherit the land forever, which is earth. In context, this refers to inheritingthe promised land as a sign of Gods blessing in the Old Testament. But, Hebrews11:8-16 indicates that there is a homeland better than the promised land on earth,and this is the heavenly one for those who die in faith. The Old Testamentpatriarchs "publicly declared that they were strangers and temporary residents inthe land . . . they are earnestly seeking a place of their own. . . . But now theyare reaching out for a better [place], that is, one belonging to heaven. . . . God. . . has made a city ready for them. . . .These [OT men and women] did not get

the [fulfillment of the] promise . . . as God foresaw something better for us"(Heb. 11:13-16,39-40). Even the footnote of the NWT makes clear that the "city"spoken of in these verses is the heavenly Jerusalem mentioned in Hebrews 12:22 andRevelation 21:2. But, the Watchtower still maintains that no one that lived beforeChrist will ever enter heaven. "The apostle Paul in the eleventh chapter ofHebrews names a long list of faithful men who died before the crucifixion of theLord. . . . These can never be a part of the heavenly class" (Millions Now Living,p. 89). Only the 144,000 elite that all lived after the death of Christ willsupposedly go to heaven. Matthew 8:11-12 provides severe difficulties for thisidea, since Jesus proclaims, "many from eastern parts and western parts will comeand recline at the table with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of theheavens; whereas the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the darkness outside.There is where [their] weeping and the gnashing of [their] teeth will be." No

verse could be clearer in declaring that the patriarchs are in heaven. Thefollowing verses all demonstrate that Christians go to heaven, and do not remainon earth: 2 Corinthians 5:1; Hebrews 3:1; Ephesians 2:6; Colossians 1:4-5; 1 Peter1:4.

NIHIL OBSTAT: I have concluded that the materialspresented in this work are free of doctrinal or moral errors.Bernadeane Carr, STL, Censor Librorum, August 10, 2004

IMPRIMATUR: In accord with 1983 CIC 827


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permission to publish this work is hereby granted.+Robert H. Brom, Bishop of San Diego, August 10, 2004

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