Image of Jehovah's Witnesses Drawn By Artist.
I recently read a copy of the Friday, December 23rd Philadelphia Daily News with its article “Not so merry lawsuit”. It seems a former special assistant to City Councilwoman Jannie Blackwell, Tyeisha Boulware, sued the city claiming she lost her job because of her Jehovah’s Witnesses (JW’s) religious beliefs. After reading this, I was not only shocked but thoroughly convinced that it’s about time someone should blow the whistle on the whole Jehovah’s Witnesses Doomsday Cult beliefs vs the city’s charitable principles. And since I was a Jehovah’s Witness for 30 years and am now a strong supporter of anti-cult services in any community, I would like to share with the city a few tidbits which will most definitely make it more prepared for being sued about religious discrimination during the New Year.
Because Christian JW’s are “legitimate” Christians they have rights to freedom of personal religion as an individual. However the name Jehovah’s Witnesses is an adopted name for a cult, defined as a new religious group in 1879 and 1931 that promised messianic-authoritarian government vs worldwide-freedom government. Therefore it doesn’t have the same rights as a personal religion such as Jewish, Christian, Muslim, etc. who are not against a religious freedom within a government. JW’s is not older than the Congregationalist Christian Church which John Brown was associated with, the Salvation Army Christian Church founded by William and Catherine Booth, the Amistad, uprising lead by Sengbe Pieh, the Muslim, or Benjamin Franklin, who was an abolitionist at the end of his life. Each historic person mentioned above was religiously committed to their own principles and charitable works. JW’s are not committed to charitable works but rather they are committed to Kingdom Hall meetings, not voting, and anti-celebrations.
So, the city needs to understand how to have a well prepared official response to new religious groups in defending the legitimacy of the city government against new religious messianic government in court. City leadership should become aligned more with the critics of these groups, but not the individuals, to the extent of distinguishing between "legitimate" religion and their principles.
Jehovah’s Witnesses as the “alternative religion” or “novel religion” has negative principles and usually have real documented precedents in the activities of preaching that certain ethnicities and cultures are subhuman. If particular folks are subhuman not only do they "gloriously" deserve to die in the minds of a JW, the children of the subhuman deserves to be destroyed when doomsday arrives. And the JW’s have used any Biblical-based text (be it Jewish, Christian, or Muslim) to hope that all levels of government (city, state, federal) are completely swallowed up so that only JW members shall experience a new order of paradise Eden-like conditions on Earth.
In his youth Charles Taze Russell who was once a member of the Congregational Church during 1868 was known to chalk Bible verses on fence boards and city sidewalks to draw attention to the punishment of the unfaithful. Russell deeply agreed with the view that Black people were not human; Jews should get out of America and go back to their country Palestine. And Islam was not good enough for anything but discussion.
As a known racist and bigot of those times Russell felt that government was no good unless his principles of a rapture government, in relation to the Memorial of Christ's death, would be established. As 1878 arrived, failure of the expected rapture of the saints just made him more eager to create a new phrase name for whoever accepted his theological messianic-authoritarian arguments. The new name then, before the JW’s name came about, was Bible Students of Bible Governmental Principles.
After Russell’s death his theological arguments continued in racism and bigotry to the point that Jehovah’s Witnesses reversed its support of Jewish people, went anti-Semitic, and compromised with and supported Nazism. The “Erklarung” or “Declaration” published in both German and English versions by the JW’s in June 1933 clearly stated that JW’s supported the aims of the messianic Third Reich government. And the JW’s sent a letter to Hitler on June 25, 1933, supporting Hitler to swallow up all religions in the world but the JW’s government. It would be God’s will for the master race and the JW’s cult to remain after World War II to work at jobs. The 1934 Year Book of Jehovah’s Witnesses also officially stated the same violent position of the JW’s leadership. Having a job would be based on cult principals of a JW’s Faithful and Discreet Slave Class.
The bottom line for the new city council facing the JW’s lawsuit is that the city can refuse to accept peculiar conduct of a doomsday cult, staff or not, that are against government, voting, or staying late after work. Because staying late after work, wearing a shirt that says Christmas on it, or yes, even voting is only being asked to participate in a form of charity work.
