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The Finished Mystery

The next president of the Watchtower, Joseph “Judge” Rutherford, eventually rejected many of his predecessor’s teachings, but he couldn’t do so right away because Charles Taze Russell was revered by his followers.

When Russell died in the fall of 1916, the Watchtower leaders moved quickly to bridge to the future.

In 1917, they published The Finished Mystery. It was presented as Volume 7 of Studies in the Scriptures, the posthumous book of Russell.

In fact, it was written by other men.

The Watchtower now claims that in 1918-1919, Jesus Christ personally inspected all the world’s religions. He found the Watchtower organization to be spiritually cleansed from past errors and faithfully dispensing spiritual food. Accordingly, he designated it to be the “faithful and discreet slave” of Matthew 24:45 and gave it dominion over all of his affairs on earth.

In effect, it became Jehovah’s one true religious organization on earth, authorized to speak and act on his behalf.

Given that The Finished Mystery was the last book it published and promoted before Jesus’ claimed inspection, I want to take some time to discuss it. Continue reading

1914—Changed Meanings

In last week’s post, I mentioned that when its 1914 prophecies failed, one of the options the Watchtower exercised was to recalculate and reinterpret Scripture.

In this post, I will detail some of the changes they made.

Most Jehovah’s Witnesses are completely unaware of the Watchtower prophecies I have documented so far in this series.

In fact, they have been taught and believe a whitewashed version of Watchtower prophetic history. Continue reading

When 1914 Prophetic Speculation Failed

In an earlier post entitled “When Prophetic Speculation Flops,” I noted that when someone’s “end of the world” prophecies fail, their disappointed followers demand an explanation and threaten to leave.

When that happens, they have a number of options. Continue reading

Disproving the Watchtower’s 1914 Chronology

In last week’s post, I showed how the Watchtower arrives at its 1914 date for the end of the Gentile Times.

As I noted, its calculations are dependent on its claim that Jerusalem fell to Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonians in 607 B.C.E.

If that date is wrong, then the 1914 date is also wrong. Continue reading

The Bible and 1914

The 1914 date is critical to the Watchtower’s claim that its leadership is the “faithful and discreet slave” spoken of by Jesus in Matthew 24:45.

If Jesus didn’t return invisibly in 1914, then he didn’t inspect the world’s religions in 1918-1919, name the Watchtower organization as his “faithful and discreet slave” and give it worldwide authority as the only true religion.

But since the number “1914” doesn’t appear in the Bible, did the Watchtower just pull that date out of thin air? Continue reading

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