Preface
On October 31 1916, Charles Taze Russell died. Russell had founded a religious sect known as the International Bible Students, which would later become known as the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Like the followers of many other charismatic leaders, Russell’s followers experienced a traumatic time upon and after his death. In fact, sects often disappear altogether when their founders die. As we know, this sect not only survived the ordeal following its founder’s death, it thrived and grew. At the time of Russell’s death, it had about 10,000 followers. Today the movement has about 6 million active and zealous members worldwide.
The person who laid the foundation for this impressive growth was Russell’s successor, Joseph Franklin Rutherford. He became the 2nd President of the Watch Tower Society (hereafter: WTS) in 1917, and shortly thereafter he was the supreme leader of the movement.
At Russell’s death, it is no exaggeration to say that the sect was focused primarily on his person. It took determined effort from Rutherford and many confrontations to secure the loyalty of the community. When Rutherford died in 1942, the organization had no problematic successor problem. The members of the sect had at that time loyalty more towards the whole organization than a single individual.
The major objective of this thesis is to investigate some factors in Rutherford’s presidency that caused this change. A religious community founded primarily on loyalty to a single individual will naturally experience a crisis when this individual passes away. A religion that exists for a long time does so because its followers have loyalty towards the movement itself. Since religions are often founded by charismatic religious leaders –and Russell surely was one of them – what we can call the ‘successor problem’ may well be a general one. This thesis will describe the specific solution that Rutherford’s presidency proved to become.
It is also an objective of this study to briefly look at some issues concerning change in a religion more generally. In more ‘mature’ religions, change is a complicated process. In the case of the Bible Students/Jehovah’s Witnesses, at this stage, the change was initiated mainly by the decision of the leader. Russell and thereafter Rutherford had very much power to personally initiate change in both organization, policy and even the major doctrinal framework, and they both had enough charisma to make the majority of their followers accept even 180 degree turns on major, fundamental teachings.
To facilitate the study of these questions, this text will first investigate the presidency of Rutherford. We will look briefly at the background of the movement – the American Adventist movement, and will also look at key events and developments in the leadership of Charles Taze Russell. A major part of the study will be concentrated at Rutherford’s presidency in the Watchtower movement, investigating important events and pointing out what this author will argue are milestones in the movements’ history. We will also try to put these milestones into a theoretical framework investigating the importance of the leadership in changes. By employing a model provided to us by organization theory, life-cycle analysis, we will also look at these changes and milestones from the perspective of the organization itself. Perhaps unique to the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the concept of organization has taken a religious meaning. This author argues that a number of interesting similarities between the Watchtower organization and a modern business corporation make theory from management science particularly useful, while also pointing out important differences, especially related to the concept of power and leadership succession.
As noted earlier, Rutherford was a charismatic leader just as Russell had been. It is a major subject of this thesis that Rutherford initially had to change the loyalty of the followers to the late pastor Russell’s person (and his ideas) into loyalty to himself. If Rutherford then had been the same sort of leaders as Russell was, a similar crisis would occur on Rutherford’s death. What Rutherford did was create what was first and foremost loyalty to an organization. Rutherford’s personal charisma notwithstanding, his followers indeed had their primary loyalty directed at an organization that ensured continuity and easy acceptance of whoever succeeded him.
I can no doubt be accused of emphasizing one person’s influence and downplaying the influence of a community of thousands of members. The same problem faces any student of history. Did, for example, Adolf Hitler merely exploit a social trend in his days and enjoy a ‘lucky break’ given by history, or can we make a good case for the idea that without Hitler’s magnetic personality, Nazism would have been a fluke in the history of ideology and WWII was unlikely to have happened? I don’t purport to answer such questions in a general way, but I can state that my research on the role of Rutherford in the Watchtower movement has convinced me that individual decisions, caused by that person’s circumstances, actually contributes considerably to creating major teachings that guide the lives of thousands many years later.
One example, that may seem out-of-place in a study of this type, is the discussion of Russell and Rutherford’s marital problems. As we will see, Russell’s troubled relationship to his wife actually contributed to the creation of one of the primary doctrines of the Bible Students and later the Jehovah’s Witnesses, namely the ‘faithful and discrete slave’ or ‘that servant’ teaching. We will see that a number of such seemingly arbitrary decisions[1] and events that were outside the Witness community’s control contributed heavily to its makeup – both doctrinal and social. If this thesis is correct, it lends supports to the position that the leader’s personality and individual decisions are very important in ensuring the survival of a religious group over time.
During Rutherford’s presidency, the movement went through what can only be described as major changes. The leadership and the followers experienced crisis upon crisis.
First, Rutherford and his associates experienced that a significant number of the other leaders – appointed by Russell in his will – objected to the style of leadership. Rutherford won the power struggle, but many leading members left the movement.
Second, strong attacks on militarism and clergymen during World War I, when patriotic fever was rampant, caused a serious backlash which culminated in Rutherford and seven other Watch Tower leaders in 1917 being sentenced to long prison terms for sedition. The Bible Students were subject to harsh persecution, which included both legal challenges and mob violence. Even though all eight WTS officials were later released and the rulings against them reversed, the harshness of this period would mark Rutherford for the rest of his life, and it actually was a decisive influence on his religious decisions later. Persecution would also become a very important topic during and after WWII, when the Jehovah’s Witnesses were subject to the harshest persecution by Nazi authorities in Germany and the occupied countries.
The first book published under Rutherford’s presidency, Studies in the Scriptures VII – The Finished Mystery, published in 1917 and indeed a primary source of material used in the sedition charge, should also prove an embarrassment in another way. It had, like Russell’s writings earlier, made a lot of predictions about major prophetic events, especially in 1918, 1920 and 1925. It is interesting to look at how Rutherford dealt with disappointment. The concept of a sacred chronology, including prophecies for specific dates, has been fundamental to this movement from the beginning. When these dates failed to fulfill the expectations of the members, we could expect the followers to experience a crisis of faith. It’s important to look at how Rutherford handled this crisis.
Rutherford also made a number of major doctrinal changes, many of which offended those who had been followers of Russell. After one set of such changes, in 1928, perhaps as many as 4 out of 5 members left the movement. It is interesting to look both at what may have caused Rutherford to make such changes and why these changes caused this reaction. Again, how Rutherford responded to the crisis is an important object of study.
Lastly, it is not possible to say anything about Rutherford without mentioning his enormous production of writings, ranging from books, booklets and pamphlets to magazine articles and tracts. Publication has indeed been a major hallmark of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, and a number of later Watchtower writings discuss Rutherford’s person, his decisions and even interpret major events in Rutherford’s presidency as being direct fulfillments of Bible prophecy.
Source Considerations
There is no biography of Joseph Rutherford currently available. Neither is there, to the best of my knowledge, diaries or other close sources that would help a biographer. Thus, I will use a number of different sources to throw light on Rutherford’s presidency.
A number of primary sources are available to us today. Rutherford was a particularly productive author, and we have a significant number of books, booklets and especially Watchtower magazine articles written by his hand, and others written by his coworkers. We have existent gramophone records with Rutherford’s voice, originally used door-to-door in the preaching work. There are also court documents from the numerous court cases that involved Russell and Rutherford. There exist a number of newspaper articles, including interviews with Rutherford, from all over the world. A number of contemporary articles in other religious journals and critical books, not to mention personal notes, letters and other documents from the era, complete this quite extensive list of primary sources. This author has available many of these sources, and has read extensively from them. However, a systematic analysis of all primary sources is well beyond the scope of this thesis.
To some degree, the references for this text will focus on the secondary sources. First among these, we have the more or less modern works by historians, sociologists and other scholars about the Jehovah’s Witnesses (Penton 1985, Botting 1984, Beckford 1975, Rogerson 1969). Second, there are the official history versions from the Watchtower Society, the Jehovah’s Witnesses leadership (Proclaimers, Yearbook 1975, Yearbook 1974, Purpose, various Awake! and Watchtower articles[2]). Third come two specific and important books written by individual Jehovah’s Witnesses, but published outside the organization (Macmillan 1957, Cole 1955). Fourth, books written by former Jehovah’s Witnesses, which often mix personal testimonies with discussions of historical or doctrinal material (Franz 1983, Jonsson 1983, Harrison 1978, Schnell 1956).[3] Fifth, and finally, we have writings about Jehovah’s Witnesses written by members of competing religious communities, often somewhat polemic in nature (Gruss 1970, others).
There is obviously a major source critical challenge here.
The primary historical treatise on the Jehovah’s Witnesses, including the Rutherford era, is the historian M. James Penton’s Apocalypse Delayed – The Story of Jehovah’s Witnesses. This work shines primarily as a source-critical analysis, since Penton carefully investigated the original sources, which we outlined earlier, and debunked a number of ‘accepted’ opinions about early events in the Watchtower movement.
Sad to say, the official WTS versions of the organization’s history leave much to be desired. It is not difficult to understand that such sources are reluctant to admit that significant teachings have been reversed, that prophecies have failed, together with other events that would be embarrassing for today’s believers. The basic problem is that the official WTS works are not only ideological, they are sloppy and suffer from so many errors, inaccuracies and outright falsehoods that even books that have been written against the movement sometimes makes the mistake of putting too much stock in the official versions of history. Fortunately, the latest official history version, the 1993 book Jehovah’s Witnesses – Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom (here: Proclaimers) goes a long way in correcting outright errors; probably this has been necessary after the publication of especially Penton’s book.[4] Proclaimers does suffer, however, from having a less than logical organization; it is largely ‘thematic’ instead of chronological. The fact that it is well indexed and is supplied in fully searchable form on the Watchtower Library CD-ROM[5] compensates somewhat for the poor organization. As we will see, however, even this book contains serious errors and falsehoods.
Most books contain an explicit declaration of the positions of their author(s). When a book is published by the Watchtower Society it is pretty obvious which way the bias goes, even though it is not explicitly stated. The same is true about books from ex-members or members of competing denominations. One exception included in my bibliography is Cole’s Jehovah’s Witnesses: The New World Society. This book somehow pretends to be written by an unbiased observer, even though Cole certainly was a member of the sect, and his work was sponsored and directly influenced by the WTS leadership. It is journalistic in style, that is, it contains no actual references.
The second book in this category, Macmillan<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Macmillan, A. H.:Autobiography" <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>’s autobiography Faith on the March (1957), is a more important source. Macmillan was a senior Watchtower official largly responsible for Rutherford’s rise to power. As a first-hand source it cannot be underestimated, but his work is, unfortunately, tainted by several examples of selective memory. Also, while being quite detailed in describing events leading up to 1930, Macmillan is much less forthcoming when dealing with the last years of Rutherford.
Some writings by former members are also of primary importance. Raymond Franz<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Franz, Raymond" <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>’ Crisis of Conscience (1983) is the candid and impressive personal testimony of the only member of the supreme Governing Body of the Jehovah’s Witnesses who left the organization.[6] Much inside information would not be available without this book. As a source germane to the Rutherford era, though, it is generally second hand.
Carl Olof Jonsson’s writings (e.g. 1983) are written as historical and doctrinal exposès, but offers so much insight and information from new sources they can hardly be overlooked. Jonsson has gone through early material that to the best of my knowledge had never been published before. Lastly, Barbara Harrison’s Visions of Glory (1978) is an interesting mixture of personal biography and an historical analysis. Harrison grew up in the sect after the end of the Rutherford era. Since Harrison is a feminist writer – she has for example written for Ms magazine – it is no surprise that she pays much attention to the gender aspect of the religion, including Russell’s and Rutherford’s relationships with and to women. The book is invaluable in that way; it doesn’t hurt that it is also arguably the best-written Jehovah’s Witnesses book.
Writings by former members are usually rejected outright by believers, and are sometimes also treated with much skepticism by scholars (e.g. Wilson 1990, 6). It is, however, a fact that current members are unlikely to disclose information considered bad publicity, especially in a sect with a very high missionary zeal. On the other hand, those that have never been members have neither studied the subject in enough detail, nor do they have the experience peculiar to having been a JW; thus these are likely to misunderstand the special vocabulary of the sect’s literature and culture as well as often failing to appreciate the sociological milieu in which JWs are immersed. I will give two examples of this from otherwise credible sources:
First, as Penton points out (1985, 361), it is somewhat illogical for Beckford (1975, 106) to assert that the Jehovah’s Witnesses “‘believe in’ ghosts,” considering that they don’t even believe that the metaphysical soul exists. Second, Garbe (1997, 500) says that, in 1933 Germany, between 25,000 and 30,000 people professed to belong to the ‘faith community’ of the Jehovah’s Witnesses. This number was derived from a report of 24,843 people having attended the ‘Memorial’ (comparable to the Eucharist) celebration that year (Yearbook 1974, 110). Neither a member nor an ex-member would be likely to commit the error of assuming that this ceremony should be taken to define the lower bounds of membership or religious profession. This is because witnesses are encouraged to, and frequently do, invite a significant number of friends, relatives and other ‘interested ones’ to the Memorial.
One former member source does, alas, confirm some of the worst fears one could have about books written by ‘disgruntled’ ex-members intended to warn people against a ‘dangerous sect.’ W. A. Schnell<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Schnell, W. A. " <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>’s Thirty Years a Watchtower Slave (1957) could have been a major, even the most important, source of information about the movement’s inner workings during Rutherford’s reign. The author was a senior member of the ‘Bethel’ (headquarters) staff in Germany and the United States during the late 20’s and the 30’s, and his book contains much information. It is a shame that Schnell does little to document his statements,[7] and he also engages in strong, almost violent, anti-Witness polemic in what seems to be every paragraph of the book. Yet, this author have yet to see examples of outright falsehoods in the book, and a thorough knowledge of Witness culture and history will tend to confirm that more often than not, Schnell’s claims are correct.
Books written by religious opponents who never were sect members suffer from some of the same problems. Some, like Walter Martin’s famous and widely available books, are so riddled with error that the reader is better off leaving them unread.[8] Others generally rehash information better available elsewhere, and supply polemics of little scholarly interest. Some few (e.g. Gruss 1970) are valuable sources of information and provide good summaries of historical information and excellent analyses of the religion.
Selection of Material
No matter how truthful the facts in an account are, everyone can be accused of bias in selection of material. It is always tempting for any scholar, when challenged to distill an enormous amount of material, to emphasize the sensational and downplay the ordinary. However, since the emphasis of this work is change in religion, it is natural to look at the defining moments in the sect’s history, when the course was changed, and these are, per force, the most dramatic moments.
Moreover, since my main thesis is that the individual leader’s heavy influence on the development of a sect is critical to its survival in the ‘marketplace of religion,’ it follows that some or many aspects of the leader’s personal conduct are important to discuss. It is also worth noting that other influential characters in the Watchtower leadership, for example Woodworth and Macmillan, contributed heavily to creating the social world that would become the community of the Jehovah’s Witnesses. But primarily it was the masterful voice of Judge Joseph Rutherford that directed its course.
Jehovah’s Witnesses Today
Before discussing the historical background of the Rutherford era, and the historical events during Rutherford’s reign, it is worth looking at some key issues that defines the Jehovah’s Witnesses today, particularly for the reader who may not be familiar with the movement.
The Jehovah’s Witnesses are part of the Adventist tradition of Bible based Protestant Christianity, but their doctrines are considered heretical relative to mainstream American Protestantism. JWs reject certain doctrines, like the Trinity, the teaching of the immortal soul and hellfire. JWs do believe in the verbal inspiration and inerrancy of the original autographs of the Bible (unavailable today). They deny that its leadership are inerrant and inspired, but claim ‘divine guidance’ and will ‘disfellowship’ (expel and subsequently shun) members who express any disagreement with current doctrine.
The movement has vacillated between an outright hostile and a distanced view of the secular world and secular authorities. JWs refuse military service, and until very recently, even compulsory civil service. They do not vote in general elections or seek any political office. Members are expected to attend a number of weekly meetings (instructional in nature more than devotional), and to use as much time as possible preaching door-to-door. The primary vehicles of propaganda are the magazines Watchtower and Awake!, but the Watchtower Society, the publishing house and de facto governing institution, has an enormous range of books, pamphlets and tracts.
The harsh discipline towards any dissenters and ‘wrongdoers’ and its refusal to participate in common holidays and do military service has attracted much public criticism and sometimes, outright persecution. Also, the JWs refusal to accept blood transfusions provoked hostile reactions, especially when members die unnecessary.
JWs are proud of their internationalism. There are publishing houses and congregations in practically all countries and regions of the world, but the significant numbers can be found in Christian countries.[9]
Currently there are about six million Jehovah’s Witnesses that report active participation in the ‘witnessing program’ worldwide. About one million are in the United States, its place of origin.[10]
Historical background
“[We] will present the Bible evidence proving that the full end of the times of the Gentiles, i.e., the full end of their lease of dominion, will be reached in A.D. 1914; and that that date will be the farthest limit of the rule of imperfect men.” – C. T. Russell, The Time is at Hand, 1889, pp. 76,77 (in 1907 edition)
Millennial and eschatological expectations lie at the core of the Christian religions, but these ideas are expressed more typically in revivalist, counter-establishment and sectarian movements than in the established churches. Such movements enjoyed a great popularity in English speaking countries, and in particular in the United States, in the 19th century. The following briefly reviews some of the history of this movement.
The Adventist Movement
One important proponent of such ideas in the U.S. was William Miller<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Miller , William" <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–> (1782-1849), originally a Baptist preacher. He started to preach that the Second Coming of Jesus Christ would occur some time between March 21, 1843 and March 21, 1844. Miller’s followers, who were to become the Adventist movement within Protestant Christianity, may have numbered as many as 100,000. When Christ failed to materialize within the appointed time, Miller set a new date, October 22, 1844. What followed has been called the Great Disappointment, and the different responses various leading Adventists chose to this challenge were to form the major denominations within Adventism.
Generally, there are three different avenues available to a body faced with a failed prophetic prediction. First, it can admit error and post no new statements beyond an apology. Second, it can claim the date was correct, even though the expectations for this date were obviously wrong. Third, it can set a new date on which the predicted events will occur.
William Miller actually chose the first option. This, in fact, brings him out of the picture. This was not to become a very typical example for later Adventists to follow.
Some followers of Miller, notable among them Joseph Bates, James White and in particular Ellen Harmon White, chose to believe there was nothing wrong with Miller’s date calculations. The error was what they had expected. They chose the second avenue outlined above. These, who were to become known as the Seventh Day Adventists, started to teach that Christ had indeed returned in 1844, not to Earth but to His heavenly Sanctuary (fulfilling, they taught, Daniel chapter 8 verse 14), and thus started a day of preparation. Still, the actual Second Coming, the Parousia, was imminent. (Smylie 1988)
Other Millerites (as the media had called them) started to believe there was something wrong with Miller’s prophetic calculations, and started to come up with a number of new dates. One leader, Jonathan Cummings, declared that the Parousia would occur in 1853-54. This movement later became the Advent Christian Church, which aside from the Seventh Day Adventists is the most important Adventist Church.
Nelson Barbour
Another Millerite, Nelson H. Barbour<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Barbour, Nelson H." <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>, was originally among those who had been disillusioned in 1844 and started doing something else. He went to Australia to dig for gold. On his long voyage home, he started to reinvestigate the Bible prophecies that had been the basis on which Miller’s predictions were built: namely Daniel and Revelation. Barbour came to believe that the correct date for Christ’s Second Coming was 1873, not 1844. When he came back to the United States, he immediately started to spread this message, in particular through his 1870 pamphlet called Evidences for the Coming of the Lord in 1873: or the Midnight Cry, and his monthly The Midnight Cry from 1873. In the meantime, 1873 had become 1874, but that did not prevent another disappointment.
This brings us back to the second of the three options outlined above. Barbour and his followers now started to reexamine the evidence. One of Barbour’s readers, B. W. Keith<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Keith, B. W." <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>, came up with a solution. Having obtained a new translation of the New Testament, Benjamin Wilson’s The Emphatic Diaglott, Keith noticed a marginal alternative translation of Parousia, the Greek word normally translated ‘coming,’ namely ‘presence.’[11] None of these men were skilled in Biblical Greek, but the idea took hold that what had started in 1874 was indeed Christ’s invisible presence. [12] (Jonsson 1983) This year, Barbour said, started a millennial morning, and the periodical The Midnight Cry became The Herald of the Morning. Barbour failed to convince many of his original readers, but he did manage to convert one young man. This man was Charles Taze Russell<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Russell, Charles Taze" <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–> (1852-1916).
Russell had an exceptional talent for business. Being in his early teens, he worked with his father in a very successful clothing store business. Yet, his primary interest was religion. He did, according to his own words, take exception to many doctrines preached by the major Churches, in particular the teaching about a fiery hell. This problem caused him to doubt Christianity. He credits the Second Adventists, in particular the preacher Jonas Wendel, for having rebuilt his faith in the Bible. Around 1870, he started to study the Bible with some friends. They had met at a Second Adventist meeting, but he never joined that denomination. One day he received a copy of The Herald of the Morning from Nelson Barbour. Russell somewhat ironically recalls that he “examined it with some curiosity to see what time they would next set for the burning of the world.”[13]
According to this account, Russell was astonished when he learned that Barbour had come to the same conclusions as himself. At this time, Russell said, he and his fellow Bible students had already come to the conclusion that Christ would not return to destroy, but to bless mankind. Russell taught that the Second Coming would be accompanied by the resurrection of the whole of mankind: “all must come forth from their graves and be brought to a clear knowledge of the truth and to a full opportunity to gain everlasting life in Christ.”[14] Russell also seems to claim that he had come to believe in the two-stage coming of Christ before he read about it in Barbour’s periodical, but that is unlikely to be true.[15]
Russell, being a wealthy young man, paid for Barbour to come down from New York to meet him in Allegheny, Pennsylvania, and during the conversation Russell was convinced that Christ had indeed returned invisibly in 1874. When Russell learned that Barbour’s periodical was almost suspended due to financial problems (the original readers were far from convinced by Barbour’s explanation of the 1874 disappointment), he agreed to help finance its publication. Also, he made Nelson Barbour write a booklet that set forth these chronological ideas, which was published and distributed at Russell’s expense. This booklet, Three Worlds and the Harvest of This World, was published in 1877 with both names on the cover, although Barbour wrote it alone.
Three Worlds would impress many who read it, with its seemingly amazing number of advanced calculations based on Biblical figures and symbols, all leading up to an array of prophetic dates in their own time. The harmony between many allegedly independent calculations, all pointing to the same overall pattern, made this an important work in the history of this branch of the Adventist movement. In this system, the 6th millennium of humanity ended in 1873. Christ’s invisible Parousia started in 1874. This year also started Armageddon, a period of great calamities for mankind, which would end with the full establishment of God’s Kingdom on Earth 40 years after the start of his parousia, in 1914. Three and a half years into this period, corresponding to the length of Jesus’ ministry, the remnant of the 144,000 saints – Christ’s church on Earth, along with them Russell, Barbour and their followers – would be raptured. This was 1878, the following year. At the time, Barbour was “not willing to admit that this calculation is even one year out.”[16]
Russell, being relatively new to this line of thought, was nevertheless more than willing to ‘spiritualize’ the fulfillment of this prediction also, when 1878 came and went.[17] Barbour, however, became disillusioned. It is quite apparent that there were a number of disagreements between the two, culminating when Barbour published a series of articles where he rejected the substitutionary atonement doctrine as Russell taught it: that Christ had died as a “corresponding price” or “ransom” to pay the price for Adam’s sin. Russell answered in later issues of the Herald, and the rift between the two former associates grew. Russell writes that because of this difference over the ransom doctrine, “I therefore […] withdrew entirely from the Herald of the Morning and from further fellowship with Mr. B.”[18]
Another of Barbour’s close associates, and an important person in the Second Adventist tradition, J. H. Paton<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Paton, J. H." <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>, followed Russell, but should part from him already in 1881, over similar doctrinal differences. B. W. Keith was the only important person among the original followers of Barbour’s ideas on chronology and eschatology who stayed with Russell.
Russell’s Early Ministry
Immediately after the schism with Barbour, Russell decided he needed to publish his own periodical. In July 1879 the first edition of Zion’s Watch Tower and Herald of Christ’s Presence[19] was published. The same year, Russell married Maria Frances<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Russell, Maria Frances" <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–> Ackley<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Ackley , Maria Frances" \t "See Russell" <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>, a woman who shared his interests in prophecy, and also was at least his match in writing and preaching skills.
Russell continued, from the first Watch Tower issue, to revise the chronology he had learned from Barbour. When he moved the rapture to 1881, it no doubt served to take his followers’ attention away from the failure of the predictions about 1878. And yet, after that year, Russell sometimes even denied having made such predictions (Penton 1985, 25ff).
Russell was a tireless writer and he also traveled widely to preach his understanding of Scripture, and the number of his followers grew. Using his personal wealth, Russell made sure the Watch Tower was widely distributed, and his sermons were printed in a large number of newspapers all over the United States. By the time of his death, his total production totaled some 50,000 printed pages, and nearly 20 million copies of his books had been distributed worldwide (Penton 1985, 26). The first of his real books, Millennial Dawn or Studies in the Scriptures was published in 1886. This would become volume I in a series of six books with the same title, and the book was later known as The Divine Plan of the Ages.[20] Full-time preachers, called colporteurs, and missionaries, as well as ‘normal’ Bible Students – as Russell’s followers started calling themselves – distributed his publications near and far. The Bible Students succeeded in establishing churches – choosing the Greek name ‘ecclesia’ – overseas: First in England and later in a number of other countries in Europe. Russell’s texts even reached an interested audience in Africa, where it had an unwanted and unexpected political potency.
The books, and also the Watch Tower, were translated into German, Swedish and Dano-Norwegian. Russell also traveled. In 1891 he went to Scotland, Ireland, England, Russia, other European countries and even the Middle East.[21] Especially in England and Scandinavia were people receptive to Russell’s preaching.
At this time, it is worth looking briefly at what Russell taught:
· Chronology: The importance of Biblical chronology, as we have outlined earlier, can hardly be understated. A large portion of the first three volumes of Studies in the Scriptures was dedicated to various ‘prophetic’ dates.
· Anti-organization: Russell had learned from George Storrs a clear dislike of organized religion. In Adventist circles, it is common to refer to the Roman Catholic Church as ‘the Whore of Babylon.’ Storrs, and also Russell, widened this application of the apocalyptic symbol to refer to all organized churches and denominations. Russell denied forming a new denomination, even though later events would make it hard for observers to spot such a difference between his own and other groups.
· Neo-Aryanism: Unlike Barbour and Paton, and even Storrs who were unclear on the question of Christology, Russell openly and directly denied the Trinity doctrine.[22] The preaching of Neo-Aryanism, or more correctly a denial of the Trinity doctrine,[23] should place the Watchtower movement outside mainstream Christianity and lead to much opposition from established churches.
· Conditionalism: The denial of the doctrine of the soul’s immortality, and especially the emphatic denial of the hell-fire doctrine, was dear to heart to Russell, and is no doubt the reason he was attracted to the Adventist movement. Russell found the idea of God’s eternal torture of the souls totally repugnant and spared few chances to say so. This was met with hard opposition from the mainstream churches.[24]
· Zionism: The return to Palestine of the Jews, and later, in 1914, a wholesale miraculous conversion of the Jews to Christianity, was a teaching Russell shared with Barbour. Russell was certainly a friend of the New York Jews and Zionism.[25]
· Near-Universal Salvation: It was the central belief of Russell that Christ returned, not to destroy but to save mankind. He taught the salvation of four different groups, and in this order of importance: 1) The 144,000, the ‘bride of Christ’, in short: the original first-century Christians and Russell’s followers. 3) The ‘Great Company Class,’[26] Christians not fully worthy of the ‘high calling’ of the 144,000. 2) Israel Restored. 4) Mankind generally. Russell taught that all the three latter groups would be given a new ‘test’ of loyalty after being taught about God’s Plan, and he assumed the majority would remain loyal. Those who did not (and Russell seems to assume there would be few) would be annihilated.[27]
While all the above doctrines had a central importance to the Bible Students, it is clear that to Russell, they all – with the exception of the salvation doctrine and the atonement – were secondary compared to the chronology. Alan Rogerson explains, referring to the Studies in the Scriptures:
“The most surprising thing about the six volumes was their lack of discussion of basic doctrines – less than sixty of the 3,000 pages were devoted to discussing the trinity, the immortality of the soul and hell-fire. The second volume contained no doctrinal material at all; … (One last example: in the first volume Russell devoted only two paragraphs in the whole book to showing that the idea of eternal torment was unscriptural.)” (Rogerson 1969, 17)
Nevertheless, clergymen did not take lightly on Russell’s preaching. While laymen ministers were certainly not uncommon in the United States, the clergy took exception to their Church being referred to as the whore of Babylon, not to mention the fact that Russell did not restrain himself from calling them liars and hypocrites.
At this time, the combatants generally limited themselves to verbal and written attacks. Later in his career, however, Russell should become very familiar with courtrooms. Luckily, then, a member of the staff at Bethel – which the headquarters were called – was a lawyer and former auxiliary judge. This man was Joseph Franklin Rutherford.
Russell’s Later Years
The serious problems for Charles T. Russell started in the later years of the 19th century. Maria Frances<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Russell, Maria Frances" <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–> Russell had an important position in the Bible Student movement. She wrote a significant number of Watch Tower articles, and even had an important role in the writing of his books.[28] One of her most important contributions to later Jehovah’s Witness doctrine is the peculiar interpretation of the parable about the “the faithful and wise servant” in Matthew chapter 24 verses 45 to 47. Maria Russell brought forth the idea that her husband indeed was “that servant,” and Russell himself and his followers later accepted this doctrine. Later, the application should be changed somewhat, but would still remain the de facto ‘Biblical’ basis for the authority of the Watchtower leadership, from Rutherford to the present collective Governing Body. Maria later changed her opinion, and claimed that the following verses, describing the “evil servant,” better fitted her husband in his ‘fallen’ state.
The hostilities between the Russells gradually escalated, and culminated in 1903 with Maria Frances suing him for divorce from bed and board. The evidence showed to the court, including various letters sent by C. T. Russell to his wife and her relatives and friends, was devastating to his case. (Harrison 1978, 59ff; see also Penton 1985, 39)[29] These issues continued for some time to cause many problems for Russell, both in court and in his congregations.
The information about the marital problems of Russell, deemed inappropriate for a pastor, were widely spread and used to ridicule him. There were also accusations of inappropriate, if not immoral, conduct towards very young women, all adding to a very negative publicity. Russell had also naïvely involved the Watch Tower Society in a scandal by publicly advertising and selling “miracle wheat,” a seemingly amazingly productive strain of wheat that proved to be a useless mutant. A newspaper, The Brooklyn Eagle, attacked and ridiculed Russell over this and other affairs. Russell sued for libel but lost in court. There were a number of other issues as well that we will not go into here (Penton 1985, 43).
In 1907, Russell added internal turmoil to the outside pressure by starting to teach that the Christians were not subject to the New Covenant, something that caused a serious schism in his movement (Penton 1985, 42).[30] Since this was considered a central doctrine, it cost his movement hundreds of members. Then, the next year, those who were concerned that Russell had started to develop an authoritarian streak had their suspicions further confirmed. He created a “vow” where an important issue was to promise to never be in a closed room with a member of the opposite sex (family excepted), and then started to pressure both headquarters staff and full- and half-time preachers to take the vow. This caused massive opposition even among formerly loyal Bible Students.
Russell, however, continued to preach his message, both in print and by personally traveling near and wide. Former time prophecies had failed, but the final important year in Russell’s (or Barbour’s) chronology remained: 1914. As it approached, it was obvious that the events Russell had predicted for the years prior to 1914 would not materialize. No worldwide socialist revolution occurred, and the world was not thrown into anarchy. Russell bought another year by making 1914 into 1915, and he was more and more cautious about his formerly very confident predictions. Then, in August 1914, what we now call World War I broke out in Europe. Even though this was what Russell had explicitly said would not happen in 1914, he nevertheless claimed it as a remarkable fulfillment of his prophecy. This was, said Russell, just the final spasm of the current world.
The Bible Student community clearly experienced another disappointment when the first excitement about the war had settled. They had expected to be taken to heaven, and it did not occur. It was in this situation that disaster struck the sect: On a train near Waco, Texas, Charles Taze Russell died, October 31, 1916.
Historical Overview of Rutherford Era
“Individual persons are of small importance, and classes of persons are made more prominent by the Word of Jehovah God, and it is important for one to get into one of such classes. Jehovah has laid down his rules that relate to each class, and in His due time those who comply with his rules find a place in one of his provided classes.” – J. Rutherford: Salvation, 1939, p. 50.
Russell had left a will that outlined his wishes for the future of the movement. No single person should take over the editorial control of the Watch Tower, but Russell named five members of an editorial board. Everything printed should be approved by all five board members if possible, but certainly by at least three. Joseph Franklin Rutherford<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Rutherford, Joseph Franklin" <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>, who had become attorney for both the Society and Russell himself and probably helped Russell to draft the will, was listed in it only as one of the five alternative members of the editorial board (and, as we will see, even this can be questioned).
Rutherford’s ‘background’ is outlined in a box in the most recent Watchtower history version (Proclaimers 67), and it is fitting to quote all of it, since it contains a number of biographical details that will help us understand Rutherford’s conduct.
“J. F. Rutherford’s Background
Joseph Franklin Rutherford was born of Baptist parents on a farm in Morgan County, Missouri, U.S.A., on November 8, 1869. When Joseph was 16, his father consented to his attending college, provided that he pay his own way and that he pay for a hired laborer to take his place on the farm. A determined young man, Joseph secured a loan from a friend and managed to go to college while also studying law.
After completing his academy education, Rutherford spent two years under the tutelage of Judge E. L. Edwards. By the time he was 20, he became the official court reporter for the courts of the Fourteenth Judicial Circuit in Missouri. On May 5, 1892, his license to practice law in Missouri was granted. Rutherford later served for four years as public prosecutor for Boonville, Missouri. Still later, he served on occasion as a special judge in the Eighth Judicial Circuit Court of Missouri. That is why he came to be known as “Judge” Rutherford.
Interestingly, to help pay his way through school, Rutherford sold encyclopedias from house to house. It was not an easy job—there were many rebuffs. On one occasion he almost died when he fell into an icy stream while calling on farms. He promised himself that when he became a lawyer, if anyone ever came to his office selling books, he would buy them. True to his word, he accepted three volumes of “Millennial Dawn” from two colporteurs who appeared at his office early in 1894. Several weeks later he read the books and promptly wrote a letter to the Watch Tower Society, in which he said: “My dear wife and myself have read these books with the keenest interest, and we consider it a God-send and a great blessing that we have had the opportunity of coming in contact with them.” In 1906, Joseph F. Rutherford was baptized, and a year later he became the Watch Tower Society’s legal counsel.”
Rutherford’s career is the Watchtower movement can easily be described as remarkable. It was no doubt helped by the fact that Russell often found himself needing legal representation.
Securing Power
To understand the events that follow, we will have to summarize the persons involved. The will, along with a number of letters and other statements about the administration of the Watch Tower Society, was printed in the December 1, 1916 edition of The Watch Tower.[31] To the positions in the editorial board, Russell’s will had named W. E. Page, W. E. Van Amburgh<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Van Amburgh, H. C." <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>, H.C. Rockwell, E. W. Brenneisen and F. H. Robinson. Quite curiously, Russell’s will writes about “the five whom I suggest as possibly amongst the most suitable from which to fill vacancies” (emphasis added) and then lists six names: A. E. Burgess, R. Hirsh, I. Hoskins, G. H. Fisher, J. F. Rutherford and Dr. J. Edgar. It is certainly possible, but this author has not found it possible to fully confirm or reject this theory, that one name was added to the list after Russell had written it: Rutherford’s. Whatever the case may be, Page and Brenneisen declined to be on the Board for personal reasons, and Hirsh and Rutherford replaced them.[32]
In addition, two important persons must be mentioned: First, Alexander H. Macmillan<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Macmillan, A. H." <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>, who served as manager of the Watch Tower administration, a de facto interim president. Russell had himself appointed Macmillan. Second, Paul S. L. Johnson<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Johnson, Paul S. L." <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>, who had been a prominent member of the Bible Student movement. He had made many eager and not always well thought suggestions to Russell on theological and administrative questions, and there is no doubt a good reason he was not named to any position in Russell’s will. He certainly had illusions of grandeur, which frankly was not uncommon among these men.
Russell seems to have foreseen possible problems of succession. Russell’s portion of the shares that gave legal control of the Watch Tower Society was distributed to five loyal female Bible Students who would be “trustees for life.” Women could hold no position of responsibility in the Bible Student movement, especially after the conflict between Russell and his wife. Russell no doubt thought this separation between legal and ‘spiritual’ power would make it even more difficult for anyone to get complete power over the movement.
The official history versions of the WTS points out that many were ambitiously plotting to gain control of Russell’s position at this time. That is no doubt true. Macmillan describes the period up to the election in January 1917 with these words:
“As the day for election of the Society’s officers approached tension began to mount. A few ambitious ones at the headquarter were holding caucuses here and there, doing a little electioneering to get their men in, However, Van Amburgh and I held a large number of votes. Many shareholders, knowing of our long association with Russell, sent their proxies to us to be cast for the one whom we thought best fitted for office.” (Macmillan 1957, 68)
Rutherford was their person of choice for the position as president. According to Macmillan, Rutherford didn’t even know about this plotting.[33]
Shortly after Russell’s death, the executive committee, consisting of certain members of the editorial board as well as the leading officers of the WTS (among them Rutherford), had sent Paul Johnson to the WTS branch office in England to encourage the Bible Students there. He was well received there, but – according to the WTS sources – he let this praise go to his head. Johnson started to argue that he was the “steward” in Jesus’ parable about the penny, and that he was really the right man to take over Russell’s position. He tried, again according to Rutherford, to take control over the bank accounts of the London office, and he dismissed two of the officers from their positions.
On January 6, 1917, J. F. Rutherford was elected president. Van Amburgh became secretary-treasurer and A. N. Pierson<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Pierson, A. N." <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–> vice-president. But this was not a done deal, as there was not general agreement what this position meant. Van Amburgh, Macmillan and Rutherford himself had little doubt that all of Russell’s old authority really belonged to Rutherford. The editorial board, on the other hand, believed they were in charge, in accordance with Russell’s will. They considered, according to Macmillan, the president a ‘figurehead.’ (Macmillan 1957, 77)
Soon, open conflict broke out in London. Rutherford sent cables to Johnson, demanding that the dismissed officers be reinstated. Johnson replied with a number of cablegrams where he compared himself to various Biblical figures and offered Rutherford a position as his ‘right hand man’. Rutherford was not impressed, and ordered Johnson to return to New York. Some of Rutherford’s men succeeded in barring Johnson from control of the London branch’s bank accounts and even physically barricaded Johnson in his room. Johnson<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Johnson, Paul S. L." <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–> had to escape through the window and climb down a drainpipe. A letter from the London manager, which was later published by Rutherford, gave the full account. It noted that “the milk deliverers saw the ludicrous sight of a man in a tall hat and frock coat and, as they said, with goloshes only, letting himself down from the balcony into the street.”[34] (Penton 1985, 49)
Johnson went back to New York, and realizing he would receive no support from Rutherford, contacted the four other members of the WTS board.[35] At this time, they were more than ready to listen to criticism of Rutherford. The president had insisted that the board passed a series of bylaws, which gave the officers greatly expanded authority. Macmillan himself was deeply disliked by the directors, who considered him a schemer and a church politician of the worst kind, an opinion at least partly supported by the content of his own 1957 autobiography. Van Amburgh on his part kept the Society’s accounts and books an absolute secret to everyone except Rutherford. Even the vice-president, Pierson, was told he could only see the financial records if he then agreed to resign from office! The board members naturally objected to this secrecy. The most important cause for the trouble, however, was Rutherford’s personal behavior. All sources and parties agree in describing Rutherford as blunt, direct and sometimes harsh in his dealings with subordinates, a notable contrast to Russell. Macmillan nevertheless insists that Rutherford also treated others with love and care, but it’s hard to find others who agree with this (Macmillan 1957, 73; Penton 1985, 51-53; Beckford 1974, 23).
While Rutherford and the rest of his triumvirate continued to run the WTS behind the backs of the rest of the WTS’ board of seven, the conflict built up to a climax. On July 12, 1917, Rutherford secretly had the four opposing directors removed and replaced them with Macmillan, W. E. Spill, J. A. Bohnet and G. Fisher, all Rutherford loyalists. Also in secret, Rutherford had supervised the writing of a new publication, the seventh volume of Russell’s series Studies in the Scriptures. The book, titled The Finished Mystery, was written by George H. Fisher<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Fisher, George H." <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–> and another Rutherford supporter, Clayton J. Woodworth<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Woodworth, Clayton J." <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–>, loosely based on notes and statements made by Russell, and was styled the posthumous work of Pastor Russell. On July 17, Rutherford announced the book to the assembled ‘Bethel family,’ the headquarters staff. The official Watchtower version of the events, carefully following Rutherford’s own account, follows:
“The completed manuscript was approved for publication by officers of the Society and was released to the Bethel family at the dining table on Tuesday, July 17, 1917. On that same occasion, a startling announcement was made — the four opposing directors had been removed, and Brother Rutherford had appointed four others to fill the vacancies. What was the reaction? It was as if a bombshell had exploded! The four ousted directors seized upon the occasion and stirred up a five-hour controversy before the Bethel family over the administration of the Society’s affairs. A number of the Bethel family sympathized with the opposers. The opposition continued for several weeks, with the disturbers threatening to “overthrow the existing tyranny,” as they put it.” (Proclaimers 67)
Rutherford, Macmillan and the WTS further claims that Rutherford was in his full right to do this. First, they say, he had a moral right and duty to restore peace and order since Johnson and the four directors were disturbing the work, Rutherford had the support and loyalty of the Bethel staff, and finally because Rutherford was put in his place by ‘The Lord’ (Macmillan 1957, 77). Second, they allege, he had a legal right to do so, which is a bit hard to see. The president had no right to dismiss or appoint directors neither according to the WTS charter nor Russell’s will. Rutherford, however, claimed that according to the charter of the WTS, a Pennsylvania corporation, all directors had to be reelected annually in that state (something that had not happened since the headquarters moved to New York). Thus, the four were not legally elected. His opponents naturally objected that if the directors were not legally elected, neither were Rutherford nor any other officer of the Society. Rutherford’s response was that he was a legal officer of a subsidiary corporation, called People’s Pulpit Association, which Rutherford indeed had used to publish The Finished Mystery. This Association was legally incorporated in New York to allow the Pennsylvania corporation to operate in New York, and was wholly owned by it,[36] so it’s very hard to see how this argument carries any weight.
Most modern observers agree that Rutherford was lucky that the directors never took the case to court. Rutherford put an end to the quarrels at the headquarters by having the directors and Johnson physically thrown out, and on one occasion he actually attacked Johnson physically. For some time, the vice-president, Pierson, sided with Rutherford’s opponents, but he eventually landed on Rutherford’s side. (Penton 1985, 52-54; see also Purpose 71)
It is to be expected that the official WTS history versions side with Rutherford in this struggle. However, it remains a fact that in maintaining this position, a number of thorough distortions of fact have been propagated in WTS sources, and a number of modern authors have been mislead to accept some of these claims.
First, the WTS claims the opposition was primarily to the content of The Finished Mystery. While it is certainly true that the opponents should later ridicule that book – and it has proven a thorough embarrassment for the WTS ever since – it is patently untrue that there was any opposition to its content in the summer of 1917. Yet, in rewriting Johnson’s favorite parable about the penny,[37] Woodworth claimed that this was the case, and Rutherford and every WTS history version since has repeated the claim (Proclaimers 67; Purpose 73; Yearbook 1975, 50-51). The directors, on the other hand, claimed about the July 17 quarrel “the matter of the seventh volume was entirely outside the issues under discussion on that occasion.”[38] It is interesting to note that when Rutherford was asked about this in the 1918 court case against him, he gave exactly the same version as the directors, and contradicted his own ‘Harvest Siftings’ version.[39]
The second WTS claim is that Rutherford through all this was long-suffering and did everything to reason with his opponents (Macmillan 1957, 77, 81). The weight of the records available to us today, some of which outlined above, does nothing to suggest that this claim has anything to do with the truth. It must be emphasized that the Bible Students who witnessed this struggle first-hand could easily find faults at both sides (Penton 1985, 54). In balance, however, it’s hard to find that the directors’ request to at least be taken in on the decision making process in the WTS was unreasonable. For the unbiased observer it is hard to avoid the conclusion that the ‘triumvirate’ actually plotted for complete control by intentionally squeezing out the opponents.
Two more acts remained of this spectacle. First, Rutherford immediately started to distribute his version of the events in a pamphlet titled ‘Harvest Siftings’ (August 1, 1917). Johnson and the ‘ousted directors’ promptly responded with the pamphlet ‘Light After Darkness’ one month later, trying to get their version of the events across to the Bible Student community. A tit-for-tat war of pamphlets led up to the election in January 1918. Rutherford launched a successful preemptive strike against the would-be revolutionaries by calling for a referendum vote among all Bible Student congregations on November 1, 1917. Most of the members were totally unaware of the struggles that had happened, or they only knew Rutherford’s version. It comes as little surprise that of the 11,421 votes cast, 10,869 wanted Rutherford as president (Purpose 72). This vote of confidence no doubt helped Rutherford, even though it carried no legal weight. The shareholders that met in Pittsburgh on January 5 1918 reelected Rutherford and his men – except the vacillating Pierson, who was replaced by Anderson (Rogerson 1969, 38, 39) – and all the opponents were thrown out of their positions.
Rutherford and his party were now firmly in control of the Watch Tower Society and, through it, the Bible Student movement. The sociologist James Beckford calls this a Pyrrhic victory, since the turmoil caused a serious drop in the number of loyal Bible Students. He further claims, “the number of Bible Students sufficiently loyal to Rutherford at least to carry on subscribing to The Watchtower fell to less than 3,000.” (Beckford 1975, 24) It’s difficult to understand where Beckford obtained this figure. Official figures for Memorial[40] attendance shows a decline from 21,274 in 1917 to 17,961 in 1919, indicating a loss of around 4,000 associated members (Purpose 73).[41]
The ‘ousted directors,’ Paul Johnson and their followers now left the movement permanently. Johnson formed the Layman’s Home Missionary Society, and others formed a number of different Bible Student movements, some of which still exists and continues to reprint Russell’s writings. At the same time, unrelated to this struggle, other long-time loyal Bible Students formed a breakaway group called the ‘Standfasters’ because they did not approve of Rutherford ‘compromises’ with the authorities regarding military service. In hindsight, this seems quite ironic.
Persecution
It will be a mistake to believe that the ongoing internal turmoil did not allow Rutherford to accumulate external enemies as well. Especially the Finished Mystery, but other writings as well, contained harsh and vile attacks on the clergy, and did not restrain from attacking militarism, politicians generally and also ‘Big Business.’ At this time, the United States became involved in World War I, and patriotic feelings were strong. The Bible Students generally sought exception from military service, and some also refused the uniform.
The persecution started in Canada, where the government banned Watch Tower publications, and then spread south. Penton writes:
“The clergy and others took up a cry against them in the United States. Bible Students began to be arrested, mobbed, tarred and feathered, and harassed throughout the country.” (Penton 1985, 55)
It is interesting to note that according to Russell’s predictions, as set forth in The Finished Mystery, the ‘harvest work’ would end in 1918, when ‘false religion’ would be destroyed by the rage of the world’s nations. The persecution thus fit nicely into the Bible Student’s expectations, but its sheer ferocity may have surprised even them.
Rutherford did try to appease the government by discontinuing the publication of the offending statements, which invited much criticism from the group that would be known as “Standfasters.” What was worse: this did very little to please the government prosecutors. The Proclaimers book admits:
“When it had been learned that the government objected to the book, Brother Rutherford had immediately sent a telegram to the printer to stop producing it, and at the same time, a representative of the Society had been dispatched to the intelligence section of the U.S. Army to find out what their objection was. When it was learned that because of the war then in progress, pages 247-53 of the book were viewed as objectionable, the Society directed that those pages be cut out of all copies of the book before they were offered to the public. And when the government notified district attorneys that further distribution would be a violation of the Espionage Act (although the government declined to express an opinion to the Society on the book in its altered form), the Society directed that all public distribution of the book be suspended.” (p. 652)
In a further attempt to appease their enemies, Rutherford published statements in The Watchtower urging Bible Students to buy war bonds, participate in a day of prayer for allied victory and only stopped short of encouraging armed service.[42] The Proclaimers book says:
“Although they endeavored to do what they felt was pleasing to God, their position was not always one of strict neutrality … Thus, in accord with a proclamation of the President of the United States, The Watch Tower urged the Bible Students to join in observing May 30, 1918, as a day of prayer and supplication in connection with the outcome of the world war. [The Watch Tower, June 1, 1918, p. 174]” (p. 191)
This did very little to stop the harsh persecution. Bible Students were subject to mob action and police harassment all over the United States, and many were arrested. Eight of the directors of the WTS were also arrested. These were Rutherford, Van Amburgh, Macmillan, R. Martin, C. J. Woodworth, G. H. Fisher, F. H. Robinson and G. De Cecca. They were charged with sedition under the American Espionage Act, “The Offence of unlawfully, feloniously and willfully obstructing the recruiting and enlistment service of the United States when the United States was at war” (Botting 1984, 40; Rogerson 1969, 42).
After a short trial they were sentenced to twenty years each in a federal prison in Atlanta, Georgia (except De Cecca, who received ten years). The court refused bail during the appeals process, and the eight were taken to Atlanta where they should remain in prison for nine months. The Bible Student community was in total shock, and in many ways the movement appeared to be destroyed. A number of members left the movement, and only a core of Russell’s movement now remained loyal to his successors.
Macmillan describes how the prisoners were expecting to be taken to heaven any day. Despite this perilous situation, and the ongoing harassment and persecution of the Bible Students, the annual election of the WTS’ officers took place in Pittsburgh the following January. With most of the officers in prison, Rutherford was nervous that opponents could gain the upper hand. He need not have worried, of course, since, first, his outspoken opponents had been ousted or had left the movement, and second, the unreasonable prison sentences gave the prisoners all the benefits of martyrdom among the members, who themselves experienced harsh persecution at the time. Yet, when word reached Rutherford that he had been reelected, he was very happy and stated that this was evidence that Jehovah was really running the Society. Rutherford also swore, according to Macmillan, that if he came out again, he would put an end to ‘creature worship,’ that is, the open veneration of the late Pastor Russell among the Bible Students (Macmillan 1957, 106).[43]
In the meantime, the war had ended, and the patriotic fever subsided. The appeals process proceeded. In March 1919, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered the prisoners to be released on bail. In April, the appeals court declared that the defendants had not received the “temperate and impartial trial of which they were entitled” and reversed the judgment. Evidently realizing that a more sober jury would not again find them guilty of the wartime crime, the government dropped all charges against them a year later (Penton 1985, 56; Rogerson 1969, 44; Macmillan 1957, 107-109).
Ironically, the prison sentence and the persecution may have succeeded in doing for Rutherford what he perhaps would not have obtained otherwise: convincing the Bible Student community that he could fill the vacancy left by Pastor Russell. The persecution created an esprit de corps among the remaining Bible Students. It also succeeded in taking away the focus from the failed prophecies about 1914 and 1918.
Rutherford immediately started to rebuild the organization. The two main buildings in New York had been sold during the persecution, and the only headquarter left was a small office in Pittsburgh. Thanks to generous contributions from at least one unnamed wealthy Bible Student, Rutherford and the other Watchtower leaders could start reorganizing the work (Macmillan 1957, 110). While Van Amburgh, Macmillan and the new vice-president C. A. Wise were busy setting up new headquarters in New York, Rutherford was in California. On May 4, 1919, he addressed a large audience in Los Angeles, and this success encouraged the group. The same day, however, Rutherford developed a serious case of pneumonia that he never really recovered from. Yet, shortly afterwards the group organized an assembly (convention) for all Bible Students at Cedar Point, Ohio, to begin September 1.
At Cedar Point, Rutherford announced a sister magazine to The Watch Tower, called The Golden Age.[44] It was to be the main vehicle for what Rutherford now announced to be the primary work for the movement: the preaching work. In a number of speeches during the assembly, Rutherford emphasized the importance of going door-to-door selling publications.
‘Millions Now Living Will Never Die’
Shortly before his imprisonment, on February 24, 1918, Rutherford had delivered to a Los Angeles audience a public talk titled “The World Has Ended – Millions Now Living May Never Die.” In 1920, Rutherford published a less tentatively named booklet, Millions Now Living Will Never Die, and also started a major speaking program with the same title. The booklet was translated into eleven foreign languages and became a massive bestseller (Penton 1985, 57).
A primary reason for the excitement was the prediction that God’s Kingdom would be established on Earth by 1925, a year that would also witness the resurrection of ‘ancient worthies’ like Abraham, Isaac and Jacob to come back to rule the world on God’s behalf. Sometimes tentatively, but just as often not, Rutherford and the Bible Student community emphasized the end of the world and their own return ‘home,’ to heaven, in 1925. Reports tell that numerous Bible Students refused to seed their spring crops this year and mocked those who did (Penton 1985, 58). The year 1925 had supposedly been pointed out already by C. T. Russell, but it was The Finished Mystery that had brought this year to the forefront of Watchtower chronology. Along with it, of course, that publication had predicted Babylonian ‘church members by millions slaughtered’ in 1918, and the fall of all governments leading to total anarchy on Earth in 1920,[45] but the Bible Students still had much faith in predictions about 1925 (Penton 1985, 58). [46]
There are many examples in Watchtower – and Adventist – history demonstrating that few things attracts converts as much as a date prediction for the end of the world. The movement’s following rapidly increased as that year approached. As the year was still some time off, Rutherford’s predictions held few words of caution. After telling its readers that “the physical facts” demonstrated that 1914 had indeed fulfilled expectations, The Watch Tower issue for September 1, 1922, said:
“The date 1925 is even more distinctly indicated by the Scriptures because it is fixed by the law God gave to Israel. Viewing the present situation in Europe, one wonders how it will be possible to hold back the explosion much longer; and that even before 1925 the great crisis will be reached and probably passed.” (Page 262)
In the issue for April 1, 1923, a question from a reader about 1925 was answered with these words:
“Our thought is, that 1925 is definitely settled by the Scriptures, marking the end of the typical jubilees. Just exactly what will happen at that time no one can tell to a certainty; but we expect such a climax in the affairs of the world that the people will begin to realize the presence of the Lord and his kingdom power.” (Page 106)
One year later, in the July 15, 1924 issue, we can see some caution:
“The year 1925 is a date definitely and clearly marked in the Scriptures, even more clearly than that of 1914; but it would be presumptuous on the part of any faithful follower of the Lord to assume just what the Lord is going to do during that year.”
When the expected year arrived, Rutherford began to demonstrate some second thoughts in the issue for January 1:
“The year 1925 is here. With great expectation Christians have looked forward to this year. Many have confidently expected that all members of the body of Christ will be changed to heavenly glory during the year. This may be accomplished. It may not be.” (Page 3)
As the year drew to an end the Watchtower had to exercise damage control:
“It is to be expected that Satan will try to inject into the minds of the consecrated, the thought that 1925 should see an end to the work.” (September 1925, page 262)
In 1926, when it was clear that the movement had experienced yet another great disappointment, Rutherford blamed his followers:
“Some anticipated that the work would end in 1925, but the Lord did not state so. The difficulty was that the friends inflated their imaginations beyond reason; and that when their imaginations burst asunder, they were inclined to throw away everything.” (Page 232)
During the same time, Rutherford saw fit to introduce some serious doctrinal and organizational changes. This did little to ease the tension, and it is unclear what offended long-time Bible Students most: the prophetic failures or the abandonment of cherished and central Russellite doctrines. The Proclaimers book says:
“’Birth of the Nation’—that was the title of a dramatic article appearing in the March 1, 1925, issue of The Watch Tower. It presented an enlightened understanding of Revelation chapter 12 that some found difficult to accept.” (p. 78)
This specific article was fundamental to later developments in the sect. Indeed, it has provided Macmillan with the title for his treatment of the whole Rutherford era (Macmillan 1957, 65-176). And it contained far more than a reinterpretation of a chapter in the Book of Revelation. It reinterpreted the whole movement’s position relative to the world and to God. Charles Taze Russell had learned a deep distrust of organizations, mainly from the Second Adventist George Storrs.[47] Russell had again and again emphasized that organization was “wholly unnecessary” and “out of harmony” with God’s plan.[48] Rutherford now told the Bible Student community that God’s plan was indeed that they were God’s organization, a nation chosen by God.
The ‘Birth of a Nation’ article was written even against the wishes of the editorial committee, even though it was filled with Rutherford loyalists like Van Amburgh. This committee was later to be abolished, which to Rutherford indicated, “The Lord himself is running the organization.”[49] (Penton 1985, 59, 322)
When such opposition existed within the headquarters staff, it is little surprise that the ‘Birth of a Nation’ article met with violent opposition among the rank and file. The Proclaimers book continues:
“’We sat down and studied it [the Watchtower article, ed] all night until I could understand it very well,’ wrote Earl E. Newell, who later served as a traveling representative of the Watch Tower Society. ‘We went to an assembly in Portland, Oregon, and there we found the friends all upset and some of them were ready to discard The Watch Tower because of this article.’” (p. 78-9)
Some did actually discard the movement because of this article. This was, to use a typical Watchtower expression, a time of ‘sifting.’ And it was only the beginning. Macmillan claims that already while in prison, Rutherford had sworn to crush “all this business of creature worship” in the movement (Macmillan 1957, 106). This in particular included the open veneration of the late Pastor Russell, who was still held to be ‘that servant’ in Matthew chapter 24.
In the January 1 issue of The Watch Tower Rutherford started attacking ‘creature worship’ as a Devil’s snare. The next month, he rejected the teaching that Russell was ‘the faithful and wise servant’, and from now on attributed this Biblical ‘type’ to the entire Bible Student community, the Church.[50] However, as unrivalled leader of the movement, Rutherford took Russell’s position for himself, de facto if not de jure. All this outraged many old-time Bible Students. According to available statistic for Memorial attendance, the Bible Student community was in 1928 reduced by four fifths – 80 % – and Rutherford was left with a following of less than 20,000 members, not more than what he had started with in 1917 (Penton 1961, 61). However, those who remained after the ‘sifting’ were all Rutherford loyalists, and they were actively doing what Rutherford openly stated was the sole reason for the movement’s existence: the preaching work.
The movement continued to attract new converts to replace those who had been alienated by the changes, mostly thanks to the relentless preaching campaign spearheaded by Rutherford himself. Like his predecessor, Rutherford believed in hard work. He traveled near and far to give public sermons, always attracting far greater audiences than the size of his following should dictate. His direct, authoritative style did strike a chord in the American working class, especially his aggressive attacks on the clergy, Big Business and politicians. His books and other publications reached an amazing circulation, and the Watchtower movement also pioneered the use of radio in preaching their gospel.[51]
All this time, Rutherford continued to strengthen his control of the local congregations. The elected elders gradually lost their power to a centrally appointed ‘service director’ responsible for the preaching work. Local initiative was discouraged and question-and-answer sessions of The Watchtower encouraged. More and more of the meeting activity were devoted to training for the preaching work. In time, the movement’s congregation program looked more like sales meetings than traditional religious worship. Rutherford even banned the use of music and religious hymns for the rest of his presidency (Penton 1985, 63).[52]
Rutherford also continued to distance his movement both from the other, existing Bible Student associations and the legacy of Pastor Russell. Up to and including 1929, Rutherford continued to push the old ‘Biblical chronology’ based on years like 1799, 1874 and 1878. Naturally, the year 1914 and its derivates 1918 and 1919 received increasing attention.
‘Religion Is a Snare And a Racket’
In 1930 Rutherford published the book Light I, and here the old chronology appears to be rejected, even though there were some odd references to 1874 in later publications. Light I also saw a total reinterpretation of the Book of Revelation, one that is mostly retained to this day. Instead of considering the book a description of past events including the papacy and various reformation characters, and Russell himself, Rutherford now had the focus moved to the events from 1914, and especially the dramatic years where he and his friends seized the power of the Watchtower organization. The wartime persecution of the Bible Students and especially his own imprisonment was now interpreted as fulfillment of various symbolisms in Revelation.
Another major change, continuing this trend, came in the year 1931. Until then, the movement had called itself the International Bible Students, and outsiders called them Russellites or sometimes more derogatory names. On a major convention July 26 at Columbus, Ohio, Rutherford had the audience adopt a resolution stating that the movement took a new name: Jehovah’s Witnesses.[53]
This not only gave the group a name to gather around; by selecting a distinct name Rutherford set the Watchtower movement apart from other offshoots of the Russellite movement, and continued the trend towards a total break with the past.
In summary, we can say that Rutherford directed his movement towards two distinct goals. First, he strengthened central control of the congregations and the movement as a whole. Second, he further separated the movement from its Russellite past, and, even more importantly, from other Christian denominations and sects in the Adventist family. In both these respects, we will find that Rutherford around 1930 entered a final phase.
In 1932, Rutherford finally did away with the local, elected elders. For a time, many elders had been opposed to the growing emphasis on the preaching and book-selling work that took up more and more of the movement’s focus. Even though Rutherford had weakened their positions by centrally appointing special ‘service directors’ responsible for magazine sale, in theory a congregation was still independent and chose its own pastors, or elders. The main articles in The Watch Tower for August 15 and September 1, 1932 should put an end to that. The elders were for a time replaced by a special service committee still elected locally, but in 1938 this arrangement was also replaced by one in which the leadership were centrally appointed. While the JWs reestablished a form of elder arrangement again in the early 1970s, these were – and are – centrally appointed.[54]
The same year, in 1938, Rutherford finally did away with all pretense of distributed control. To Russell and his followers the very word ‘organization’ had been anathema. It carried associations to the hated Roman Catholic hierarchy of clergy, which was everything the whole Adventist movement detested. Now, Rutherford brought the word ‘organization’ to the forefront. Among Jehovah’s Witnesses this word has remained a core focus. An article in the Watchtower, March 1, 1985 looks back:
““Organization” was the title of the study articles in The Watchtower of June 1 and 15, 1938. These discussed at length Isaiah 60:17, where Jehovah addresses his heavenly organization, saying: “Instead of the copper I shall bring in gold, and instead of the iron I shall bring in silver, and instead of the wood, copper, and instead of the stones, iron; and I will appoint peace as your overseers and righteousness as your task assigners.” In reflecting this better condition, Jehovah’s organization on earth was revitalized. Just as gold is more valuable than copper (and it is similar with the other materials here mentioned), so the theocratic arrangement that the Watch Tower Society explained to the congregations of God’s people back in 1938 – and which they wholeheartedly accepted – is much to be preferred over former democratic procedures.” (p. 18)
Rutherford chose the word theocracy to describe the system of government chosen for the Jehovah’s Witnesses. The Proclaimers book explains:
““Theocracy” means “God-rule.” Was that the kind of rule that governed the congregations? Did they not only worship Jehovah but also look to him to direct their congregational affairs? Did they conform fully to what he said about these matters in his inspired Word? The two-part article “Organization” that appeared in The Watchtower of June 1 and 15, 1938, pointedly stated: “Jehovah’s organization is in no wise democratic. Jehovah is supreme, and his government or organization is strictly theocratic.”” (pp. 217-18)
Rutherford’s control of the headquarters and publishing arm had been undisputed since the early 1920s at latest. Now he also had a direct control into the lives of every Jehovah’s Witness. Rutherford decided what they should learn at the meetings – less devotional and more commercial than ever – and what they should sell and say.
Rutherford also told JWs that ‘character building’; emphasis on personal Christian qualities, virtue and morality was quite unimportant and indeed a form of ‘creature worship.’ It is very illustrative to look up the word ‘adultery’ in the Watch Tower Publications Index 1930-1985.[55] Here you will not find a single reference to sexual adultery anywhere in the WTS literature before 1947. Later, in the 1950s, and until this day, articles denouncing all sorts of sexual sins flourished. In Rutherford’s vernacular, the word ‘adultery’ was reserved for his opponents’ religious sins.
Rutherford also moved the community further away from ‘the world.’ Today, Jehovah’s Witnesses are perhaps best know among the public for not celebrating some holidays that are almost universal among other Christian denominations and sects. This process was started by Rutherford after 1925. Birthdays and practically all religious celebrations were condemned as of ‘pagan origin.’ The Bible Students celebrated Christmas for the last time in 1926 (Proclaimers 200; Yearbook 1975, 147-9). The cross, until then an almost universal symbol for Christianity, was rejected as a pagan symbol. The Watchtower Society has since then insisted that Jesus was executed on an upright ‘torture stake’ without a crossbeam.
This trend towards a growing alienation from and even hostility towards the world culminated in Rutherford’s reinterpretation of Romans chapter 13, published in The Watchtower, June 1 and June 15, 1929. Here Rutherford insisted that the “higher authorities” to which Christians should subject could not be the earthly authorities. These “higher authorities,” he argued, had to be God and Christ. This only increased the Bible Student’s hostility towards the secular state, which was now openly denounced as demonic (Penton 1985, 65).
Perhaps the most striking turnaround in JW doctrine in this period was Rutherford’s view of salvation compared to Russell’s. Russell was very close to teaching universal salvation and was not at all eager to condemn people to destruction (the existence of hell, we remember, he dismissed). Rutherford, perhaps partly due to the persecution he had experienced in the war years, should take a much stricter view of salvation. Gradually he came to argue that only Jehovah’s Witnesses had any real chance of surviving Armageddon, Jehovah’s war against Satan and – in effect – mankind. A part of this was Rutherford’s new doctrine about “The Vindication of Jehovah’s Name,” still a central tenet of JW beliefs. Unlike Russell, who held that the redemption was the central doctrine, Rutherford preached that God’s vindication, by wiping out his enemies Old Testament-style in a large battle, was more important than individual salvation. Penton argues that this caused an important social change:
“Significantly, the doctrine of the vindication of Jehovah’s name was in many ways like John Calvin’s doctrine of the majesty of God. Equally significantly, it was no doubt a major factor in developing a burning, almost fanatical zeal in the Witnesses of the twentieth century just as Calvin’s teaching had among his followers in the sixteenth. That meant that, like the Calvinists of that era, the Witnesses became ever more intolerant of everything and everyone not in harmony with God’s new nation, the Theocracy, as they saw it.” (Penton 1985, 70)
This alienation from the world sometimes went to extremes that, at least judged in hindsight, were almost comical in character, and certainly justifies Penton’s reference to fanaticism.
Rutherford’s followers should scoff at anything even remotely ‘worldly.’ A common custom was almost by definition ‘pagan’ and therefore inappropriate for JWs. The Judge even frowned at marriage and marriage ceremonies, accepting common law marriages and in a sense preferring them to legal weddings (Penton 1985, 263).[56] There was a limit, however. Woodworth, the eccentric editor of The Golden Age, found that limit when he, in 1935, tried to persuade Rutherford and the JW community to abandon pagan month and day names. Rutherford harshly censured and ridiculed Woodworth in front of the whole ‘Bethel family,’ a spectacle that shocked many who may nevertheless have agreed with the sanity of Rutherford’s decision to not force such a radical change (Penton 1985, 66-7).
Woodworth<!–[if supportFields]> XE "Woodworth, Clayton J." <![endif]–><!–[if supportFields]><![endif]–> was, this episode excepted, no doubt second only to Rutherford as an important influence on the JWs in this period. One oddity about him was his burning hatred for medical professionals. He considered the compulsory vaccination programs a Satanic and commercial conspiracy to weaken Christians by introducing animalistic tissue into their veins, and he even rejected the germ theory of disease, preferring strange ‘electronic’ and ‘radio’ based apparatus instead. Actually, the Watchtower Society at one time marketed and sold alternative ‘medicine’ through The Golden Age. The only part of these ideas that remain in the JW organization and culture is the blood prohibition – which still gives the movement tragic headlines in the press worldwide – and perhaps a tendency among JWs today to be preoccupied with homeopathy and other ‘alternative’ quasi-medical procedures.[57]
Rutherford also, in 1935, initiated an important doctrinal change that would set the Jehovah’s Witnesses apart from most other Christian denomintaions and churches. Like other apocalyptic sects, the Bible Student community had great interest in the powerful symbolics in the Book of Revelation. In chapters 7 and 14, we find a vision of 144,000 Jewish virgin men, set apart for a special salvation. Originally, Russell interpreted these to be the whole Church, most specifically, it would be comprised of all loyal early (first century) Christians, and the Bible Students themselves. Since another symbol in chapter 7 of Revelation, the ‘Great Multitude’[58] or ‘Crowd,’ seems distinct from the 144,000, Russell argued that this was a secondary group of ‘nominal’ Christians, who would be saved but not glorified like the 144,000. Both, importantly, would go to heaven.
Now, in 1935, Rutherford changed this doctrine and started to teach that the members of the ‘Great Multitude class were all followers of the Watchtower movement, but they would be saved to live eternally on paradise Earth. It was the duty of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, then, to preach to all people and ‘harvest’ this ‘Great Multitude class.’ The possibility that there was any possible salvation outside the Watchtower movement was thus finally denied. Somewhat later, the term ‘Jehovah’s Witnesses’ should come to include this secondary class as well.
It can be interesting to look at what may have prompted Rutherford to make this change. Reports are conflicting, but it is reasonable to assume there was close to 60,000 active Jehovah’s Witnesses at this time. Even a very conservative estimate for loyal members in the first few centuries of Christianity should come close to a comparable figure. Rutherford’s movement was facing a tremendous growth, so it was not unreasonable that in a few years’ time it would have more than 144,000 members. A doctrinal change would be necessary. No documents exist that tells us whether Rutherford made himself such thoughts, or even if the change at all was inspired by these statistical facts, but it is not an unreasonable theory.
Rutherford made a number of other changes. Russell had been a promoter of Zionism and favored among New York’s Jewish population. Initially, Rutherford followed in Russell’s footsteps. The Golden Age reports:
“At New York, Tuesday, October 23rd, at Manhattan Opera House, Judge Rutherford was scheduled for a lecture on the “Restoration of Israel.” The house was filled, about 2,600 being present. A number of Jews were present, knowing that Mr. Rutherford is friendly to the orthodox Jew and his endeavors to exercise faith in his God in the face of many difficulties.” (The Golden Age, November 7, 1923, p. 83)
Nathan Straus, an important leader of the New York Jewish community, had written to Rutherford and said:
“I hail you as one of the prophets who will help the Jews towards the realization of their hopes of two thousand years.” (The Golden Age, November 7, 1923, p. 83)
Rutherford suddenly decided to abandon all this in the early 1930s. The doctrine that ‘fleshly Israel’ had any special favor with God was rejected. All prophecies earlier applied to a literal restoration of Israel in Palestine were reinterpreted to apply to the Jehovah’s Witness community itself. Rutherford wrote, in Vindication II:
“The Jews were evicted from Palestine and ‘their house left unto them desolate’ because they rejected Christ Jesus, the beloved and Anointed King of Jehovah. To this day the Jews have not repented of this wrongful act committed by their forefathers. Many of them have been returned to the land of Palestine, but they have been induced to go there because of selfishness and for sentimental reasons . . . The Jews have received more attention at their hands than they have really deserved. Therefore this prophecy must have its chief fulfillment upon the true people of God’s kingdom which are now on the earth.” (Vindication II, pp. 257-256) [59]
Just a few years later, in a 1934 booklet, we see that Rutherford openly practiced his newfound anti-Semitic position:
“The people now on earth called Jews are a commercial people. Among them are some of the richest and most avaricious men the world has ever known. Some of the chief men of Big Business are called Jews. Many of these people are very arrogant, self-important, and extremely selfish. They have little or no faith in God’s Word and do not believe at all in the Lord Jesus Christ as the Savior of man.” (Favored People, p. 5)
This has not gone unnoticed among Jewish authors. David Horowitz, an active Zionist and editor of the World-Union Press and the United Israel Bulletin, recently wrote (Horowitz 1990, 36-37):
“Rutherford gradually changed his views about the Jewish people. In 1929, in his book Life, he still maintained that Zionism was “the hope of the world.” But in his book, Vindication, which appeared in 1932, he asserted that the “Zionist” prophecies of Ezekiel (39 and 38) and Zechariah (8:23) were not related to Israel’s “natural” salvation, i.e., to the Jewish people of today.
In 1934 he went even further and declared that the new covenant which, according to Jeremiah, God will make with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah in the days to come (Jeremiah 31:31-34) was not meant for the Jewish people; it was the covenant which was concluded in 1918 with Jehovah’s Witnesses. Therewith Rutherford discarded his earlier views, and the literature of the Witnesses assumed an anti-Zionist tone….”
It is worth noting that at this time, after the Wall Street crash in 1929, a wave of anti-Semitism rolled over the United States, whose Jewish communities had hitherto been spared (Illman and Harviainen 1993, 171). This development was not an isolated trend, as we know all too well. And the Zionist past of the Watchtower movement – coupled with its anti-world and anti-military stand – should be harshly punished in Europe following Adolf Hitler’s rise to power.
It would be a serious mistake to believe that Rutherford was attracted to right-wing politics in general. Like his predecessor, he had a soft spot for the workingman’s struggles and contempt for what he called ‘Big Business.’ In Rutherford’s world, and in the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ world ever since, Satan’s system of things consists of three parts: False religion, politics (including the military) and Big Business. Rutherford was, like Russell before him, an anti-capitalist. Those on the receiving end of Rutherford’s harsh tirades could sometimes be mistaken for believing he had left-wing sympathies. In fact, Rutherford attacked everyone, but nobody with such ferocious demagogy as the rhetoric he heaped on Christendom and the clergy.[60]
In the 1930s, the JWs arranged what they called ‘information matches’. Large groups of members were gathered from near and far to participate in a sort of public demonstration, often on Sundays after church services. Carrying sandwich signs and posters with Judge Rutherford’s slogans, typically “Religion is a Snare and a Racket” and “Serve God & Christ The King,” the column marched through towns and cities. Also, they used sound cars with huge loudspeakers to preach the gospel to a less than receptive audience. At least one such vehicle was an armor-plated car used to deliver Rutherford’s vicious attacks on the papacy to hostile Catholics (Penton 1985, 71). [61]
These methods naturally met with much opposition from an outraged religious audience. However, Rutherford’s message of anti-capitalism and especially anti-Catholicism also reached an audience impressed that someone dared to say what many thought. Protestants naturally were delighted by the anti-papacy rhetoric, and labor leaders praised the anti-Big Business message. There is little doubt that for its size, the Witnesses reached a massive audience, especially in the English-speaking world. In 1935 there were probably no more than 56,153 active Witnesses in the world, almost half of them in the United States, but public awareness of the group greatly exceeded what the size should indicate (Proclaimers 443).
Riches
No organization on this scale could exist without financial resources. The early Russellite movement had escaped the problems of raising funds because Charles Taze Russell was personally rich.[62] This afforded the movement the luxury to forego traditional money-rising activities that other churches had to do, like taking up collection on church services.
In fact, Russell used this opportunity to heap scorn on the ‘money-loving’ clergy of the traditional churches. It has been a source of much pride among Bible Students and Jehovah’s Witnesses to this day that there is no collections and free entry to all meetings and other public activities. The Watchtower, December 12, 1993, proudly quoted an old article from the same magazine, written by C. T. Russell and published in the July 15, 1915 edition:
““On one occasion I was called upon by a minister of the Reformed church. He wanted to know how I managed my church. I said to him: . . . ‘We pay no salaries; there is nothing to make people quarrel. We never take up a collection.’ ‘How do you get the money?’ he asked. I replied, ‘Now, Dr.——, if I tell you what is the simplest truth you will hardly be able to believe it. When people get interested in this way, they find no basket placed under their nose. But they see there are expenses. They say to themselves, “This hall costs something… How can I get a little money into this cause?”’ He looked at me as if he thought, ‘What do you take me for—a greenhorn?’ I said, ‘Now, Dr.——, I am telling you the plain truth … When one gets a blessing and has any means, he wants to use it for the Lord. If he has no means, why should we prod him for it?’”
—Charles T. Russell, first president of the Watch Tower Society, “The Watch Tower,” July 15, 1915.” (p. 28)
Joseph Rutherford inherited this tradition, but not Russell’s wealth. Fortunately, he also inherited a vehicle for financing the organization: followers and congregations willing to distribute and sell the vast amounts of literature produced by the printing facilities in New York and later, elsewhere.
Russell’s productivity of publications was no match for Rutherford’s. The first major bestseller, The Finished Mystery, was marketed as Russell’s posthumous book. Already in 1920 Rutherford managed to create his own first major international bestseller, the booklet Millions Now Living Will Never Die. Already the next year came The Harp of God, a book that would eventually reach a circulation of 5,819,037 copies in 22 languages.[63]