MEMORIAL PARTAKERS
JWs WHO GO TO HEAVEN
(Investigator
102,
2005 May)
PARTAKERS AND
NON-PARTAKERS
The Memorial is
the
Jehovah's Witness (JW) commemoration of the death of Christ. It is the
JW equivalent of the Lord's Supper in other religions.
Until 1879
the sect
celebrated the "Lord's supper" every few weeks but since then annually
near Easter. The book Organized to Accomplish Your Ministry
(1983) says:
The date is
determined by
counting 14 days from the new moon nearest the spring equinox, March
21-22, as it would be visible at Jerusalem in the land of
Palestine.
(p. 80)
Only some JWs
partake of
the "emblems" – the wine and the unleavened bread. The majority do not
partake.
Memorial
"partakers" are
members of the 144,000 who, according to JW belief, go to heaven after
they die. Non-partakers are of the "great crowd". These expect
salvation, eternal life, on a future "paradise Earth". Non-partakers
attend the Memorial as observers.
JWs believe that
all
1st-century Christians belonged to the 144,000. More were chosen in the
next 18 centuries and the rest in the 20th century.
Those of the
144,000
currently alive are called the "remnant". The entire 144,000 are
referred to as the "little flock".
Russell estimated
that 20,000 to
30,000 were alive in the early 20th century. (Studies in the Scriptures
Volume 6 p. 95)
Rutherford
estimated in the 1920s that at most 50,000
of the 144,000 were on Earth. (Deliverance 1926 p. 282)
144,000 COMPLETED IN
1935
Most of the remnant
joined
JWs from 1919 to 1931, "This gathering of the anointed remnant from and
after 1919 continues on down more particularly to 1931." (The
Watchtower 1942 March 1 p. 69)
In 1935 JWs
started a new "harvest". They started gathering the "great crowd" who
would not go to
heaven but live forever on Earth:
Their being
identified in
1935 as the great crowd of other sheep was an indication that the
choosing of the 144,000 was then about complete.
(Revelation It's
Grand
Climax At Hand! 1988 p. 125)
In 1935 the gathering of
the 144,000 was finished – except to replace a few who deserted the JW
sect.
How did the
current
doctrine about the remnant and "great crowd" come about?
ASCENT TO HEAVEN
REPEATEDLY
POSTPONED
In the 1870s
Charles T
Russell (1852-1916) started the Watchtower cult that developed into
JWs.
Russell taught
that the
living members of the 144,000 or "little flock" would rise physically
to heaven in 1878:
Based on
Paul's
statement
at 1 Corinthians 15,51, 52 it had been expected ‘that at some time the
living saints would be suddenly and miraculously caught away bodily,
thenceforth to be forever with the Lord.' Believing this would take
place in 1878, some were disappointed. (Jehovah's Witnesses in the
Divine Purpose 1959 p. 19)
After the prediction for
1878 failed Russell tried 1881:
OUR CHANGE
SEEMS DUE. We do
not know the day or the hour, but expect it during 1881, possibly near
the autumn. (Watch Tower reprints 1881 February p. 191)
Wrong again. Therefore
Russell made 1881 the end of God's "general call" to join the "little
flock". (Studies in the Scriptures Volume II p. 235; Volume III p. 217)
This meant that the 144,000 were complete in 1881 except for a few
replacements when unfaithful ones dropped out. But the replacements had
to be converted and dedicated by 1881. (Watch Tower Reprints 1901
November 1 p. 2901; 1900 August 1 p. 2676)
Meanwhile the
date
1878 was
not discarded. It became the date the Kingdom of God started,
Christendom was "spewed out" by God, and the dead members of the
144,000 were resurrected to heaven:
In the spring
of 1878 all
the holy apostles and other "overcomers" of the Gospel age who slept in
Jesus were raised spirit beings, like unto their Lord and Master.
(Studies in the Scriptures Volume 3 p. 234)
Russell now predicted
that
the ones still living on Earth would rise to heaven soon after 1914:
That the
deliverance of the
living saints must take place very soon after 1914 is manifest.
(Studies in the Scriptures Volume 3 p. 228)
Once again, wrong!
Russell then died.
The Watch
Tower
Reprints
sum up Russell's ascent-to-heaven doctrine:
Brother Russell expected
the church to go beyond the veil in 1878, 1881, 1910 and 1914.
(Watchtower Reprints 1918
April 15 p. 6237)
ASCENT TO HEAVEN 1918
&
1925
The cult's
new
president was Judge Rutherford (1869-1942). He predicted 1918 for the
ascent:
The seven
days
before the
Deluge may represent seven years, from 1914 to 1921, in the midst of
which "week of years" the last members of the Messiah class pass beyond
the veil.
Our proposition
is
that the
glorification of the Little Flock in the Spring of 1918 A.D. will be
half way (three and one-half years each way) between the close of the
Gentile Times and the close of the Heavenly Way, A.D. 1921. (The
Finished Mystery 1917 p. 64)
That
the
harvest began in
1878, there is ample and convincing proof. The end of the harvest is
due in the spring of 1918. ...
During the
entire
forty
years of the harvest the sealing of the saints progressed. ...
If the harvest
has
ended,
then the sealing is complete. The evidence strongly suggests that all
the saints are sealed. (Watch Tower Reprints 1918 May 1 p. 6243)
However, all the
"saints"
were not "sealed" after all and they did not ascend. Why? Because again
a few replacements were needed:
Many
of the
dear friends
think that "the door is shut," and that opportunities for service are
at an end, or nearly so.
The Society does
not share
this opinion. It is quite probable that the harvest, in the sense that
no more will be spirit-begotten, ended in the spring of 1918, except as
some will fall out or be rejected, and others take their places. (Watch
Tower Reprints 1918 December 1 p. 6358)
As
heretofore
definitely
set forth in THE WATCH TOWER, the harvest of the wheat class covered a
period of 40 years; that it had its beginning in 1878 with the
resurrection of the sleeping saints; ... that the forty-year period
would end, and did end, in the Spring of 1918. (Watch Tower Reprints
1919 May 1 p. 6426)
At this stage the
cult's
famous message "Millions Now Living Will Never Die" commenced. The
"Millions" message stated that ancient Bible heroes like Abraham,
Samson and Daniel would rise physically from the dead and take over the
world in 1925. The cult members believed they would then not be needed,
their work would be finished, and they could finally go to heaven.
Yes, wrong
again.
It all
proved false. The Bible heroes did not appear in 1925 and the Watch
Tower cult – the so-called "wheat class" and "saints" – did not go to
heaven.
NEW INTERPRETATIONS
FROM
1928
In 1928 came the
new
interpretation that the dead members of the 144,000 rose to heaven in
1918 as "spirit creatures". Those still in the flesh on Earth would go
to heaven individually at death.
Judge
Rutherford,
the
president of the JWs from 1917 to 1942, now divided the remnant of the
144,000 into two subcategories:
1.
Those
who joined the cult by 1918 he called the Naomi class and Mordecai
class;
2.
Those
who joined the cult from and after 1919 he called the Ruth class and
Esther class.
In the book Preparation
(1932) Rutherford presented this interpretation in detail. (Pages 22,
45, 46, 78, 157, 164-166) The two groups, the pre-1919 and post-1919
converts, together constituted the remnant of the 144,000.
Some of the remnant then
alive, when Preparation was published in 1932, would live to
survive
Armageddon. (pp 158-166) Preparation implies that the
Armageddon
survivors would even include some of the "Mordecai class" – the
converts who joined up prior to 1919.
Frederick
William
Franz
(1893-1992), the fourth president of JWs, was baptized in 1913 and was
therefore of the "Mordecai class". Franz wrote:
A
number of
these should
survive still longer to see and go through the war of Armageddon… (The
Watchtower 1970 January 15 p. 52)
This, like
everything
previously in this doctrine, proved false. When Franz died in 1992 the
pre-1919 converts were virtually extinct.
DOOR TO HEAVEN CLOSED
IN
1935 – WHY?
By 1935 JWs had
recovered
from the drastic membership losses that followed their failed
prophecies of the 1920s. Converts increased and their increased number
threatened to refute that:
1.
The
144,000 is a literal number;
2.
The
harvest of the 144,000 ended in 1918 except for replacements.
That's why Judge
Rutherford
invented two new interpretations:
1.
The
call to heaven stopped in 1935 except to replace a few who became
unfaithful;
2.
A new "harvest" was starting – the gathering of a "great crowd"
who would
join JWs but won't go to heaven but get eternal life on Earth instead.
A REMNANT OF FRAUDS
In the
1930s the
majority
who attended the Memorial partook of the wine and bread. Table 1 shows
figures for England:
Table
1
England
| Year |
Partakers |
Attendance |
1938
|
4,853
|
6,366 |
1939
|
4,548
|
8,349
|
The yearly
worldwide
figures are published in the JW Yearbooks and The Watchtower of
January
1. See Table 2.
Table 2 Worldwide Totals
Year
|
Partakers |
Attendance |
Year |
Partakers |
Attendance |
1935
|
52,465 |
63,146 |
1970
|
10,526 |
3,226,000 |
1938
|
36,732 |
69,300 |
1980
|
9,564 |
5,727,000 |
1940
|
27,620 |
96,600 |
1990
|
8,869 |
9,950,000 |
1950
|
22,723 |
511,200 |
2000
|
8,661 |
14,872,000 |
1960
|
13,911 |
1,520,000 |
2003
|
8,565 |
16,098,000 |
American
JWs
provide almost
as many 20th-century candidates for heaven as the rest of the world
combined. See Table 3.
Table
3
USA
Year
|
Partakers
|
Year
|
Partakers
|
1936
|
25,435 |
1991
|
3,666 |
1940
|
15,873 |
1992
|
3,602 |
1941
|
13,889 |
1993
|
3,591 |
1942
|
13,131 |
1994
|
3,535 |
Looking again at
Table 2 –
the worldwide figures – we notice something strange. If the door to
heaven shut in 1935 except to replace a few "unfaithful ones" the
decrease is much too slow.
Comparing the
decrease with
population statistics used by governments and insurance companies leads
to the conclusion that the number of partakers in 2000 AD should be
nearer 500 than 8,600!
For a rough
calculation
assume the average age of JWs in 1935 was 30. This means the average
age of partakers 68 years later – in 2003 AD – should be about 98 (or
slightly less if a few drop-outs were replaced with younger
replacements). However, the proportion of people who reach their
mid-nineties is less than 1% of the population. And 1% of the 1935
partakers is about 500.
Clearly, most of
the remnant who partake of the "emblems" and identify themselves as
going
to heaven are frauds.
DEEP THINGS
OF
GOD
JW Leaders have
amended,
reversed or trashed not just their doctrine of the ascent to heaven but
most of their other doctrines too. Changed interpretations, flip-flops,
by thousands!!
Yet they claim
their
organization is: "the only Organization on earth that understands the
deep things of God." (The Watchtower 1973 July 1 p. 402)
They claim to be
the only
religion with God's approval and: "the religion that is approved by God
must agree in all its details with the Bible." (The Truth That Leads to
Eternal Life 1968 p. 14)
They quote
stooges
who say: "Jehovah's visible organization is a tremendously dependable
source.
Never once has it misled me in any way." (The Watchtower 1984 June 1 p.
12)
CONCLUSION
The JW doctrine
of
the remnant developed out of repeated prophecy failures. Statistics
show
that most of the remnant are frauds.
(BS)
<>"Flashes
of light" about Jehovah's
Witnesses, "Proclaimers of God's Kingdom", on this website:
<>