Who was the founder of Jehovah's Witnesses?

Answer 1

Charles Taze Russell, then Joseph Rutherford began the modern day organizing or Jehovah's Witnesses. Jehovah's Witnesses believe the first witness of Jehovah began with the first human loyal to Jehovah (Abel) son of Adam and Eve.

Answer 2

Jehovah God is our founder, according to Isaiah 43:10-12, which reads (in the ASV) -

"Ye are my witnesses, saith Jehovah, and my servant whom I have chosen; that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I am he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me. I, even I, am Jehovah; and besides me there is no saviour. I have declared, and I have saved, and I have showed; and there was no strange god among you: therefore ye are my witnesses, saith Jehovah, and I am God."

The very first witness of Jehovah in the Bible was Abel. (Genesis 4:1-10) He is named as the first in along line of witnesses in Hebrews 11:4 - Hebrews 12:1.

From the death of Jesus Christ onward, all of Jehovah's Witnesses have been Christian. Jesus is our model for being such, he being the chief Witness of Jehovah and the example we follow. 1 Peter 2:21 tells us we are to do as Jesus did.

Revelation 1:5 & 3:14 refer to Jesus as the faithful and true witness. One of the things to which he bore witness was the name of his Father. (John 17:6) That name is Jehovah. - Exodus 6:3; Psalm 83:18.

Acts 15:4 indicates that Christians would be called by Jehovah's name.

Consequently, since Jesus was one of Jehovah's Witnesses, Christians today likewise are to be Jehovah's Witnesses, just as our founder originally stated as quoted above.

Side note: The word Hallelujah means "praise Jah" (or Jehovah). (Revelation 19:1, 3, 4, 6)

RELATED QUESTION:

Who_is_jehovah's_witnesses_founding_father

Charles Taze Russell is usually acknowledged as being the modern day founder in the 1870's. At that time the group was known simply as the "Bible Students" but later, in 1931, adopted the official defining name: Jehovah's Witnesses.

The modern day history of Jehovah's Witnesses started in 1870 with Charles Taze Russell*, the prime mover of a religiously independent bible study group who went on to be the first President of the Watchtower Society that prints the principle religious bible study journal of Jehovah's Witnesses "The Watchtower" magazine in July 1979. The readers of "The Watchtower" formed more bible study groups and sought to share the things they were learning. Russell died in 1916 but the Bible Students continued, but as Rutherford introduced new doctrine as well as a new kind of organization, by 1930, most of the original Bible Students had rejected Rutherford's new doctrine and his new organization. Rutherford, however, had developed a large following of new converts who knew little of what Russell taught and believed, and Rutherford led his followers to adopt the name "Jehovah's Witnesses" in 1931, in order to distinguish his organization from the Bible Students movement. Thus, because Russell did not believe in an organization such as Rutherford had formed, and since he did not preach the message taught by Rutherford, many Bible Students claim that Rutherford is the real founder of the Jehovah's Witnesses' organization.

*Jehovah's Witnesses do not view Russell as their "founder" or a Prophet but a Minister in a position of leadership during the early days of their modern day organization.

The Jehovah's Witnesses will tell you that they trace their real origins back to 1st Century Christianity - back to the apostles, disciples, and early evangelists that gained their religious beliefs directly from Jesus Christ himself.

Like several other Bible Student sects, they will tell you that they trace their modern origins back to Charles Taze Russell and the International Bible Students that began to form around 1879. They still retain some of the basic teachings of Russell, namely there is no "hot Hell," there is no Trinity, Jesus was actually Michael the Archangel and creator of all things, and there is no "immortal soul," they have relegated most of his teachings to the trash bin and none of his other teachings or any of his books are used in the modern day version of Jehovah's Witnesses.

The one thing that Jehovah's Witnesses have inherited from Russell is the name Watch Tower, which they have changed to Watchtower. This has been the one consistency throughout their entire modern history.

The REAL beginnings of the modern Jehovah's Witness religion occurred shortly after C T Russell's death in 1916. Joseph Rutherford, then the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society's legal counsel managed to get himself elected as Russell's successor as president of the publishing corporation. Even though he was about to be voted out of office by a majority of the board of directors in 1917, he used his knowledge of corporate law to dismiss all directors who opposed him and then have the remaining group vote him into office unanimously. The opposing directors were then labeled apostates and evil doers (later the "evil slave class") and banned from further influence within the organization. Some of these became leaders of the Russellites and the Bible Students, continuing to preach the teachings of C T Russell.

After 1920, all teachings and books by Russell were slowly replaced by new books and teachings developed by "Judge" Rutherford, Clayton Woodward, and Fred Franz. Some of these teachings were in direct opposition to those taught by Russell. Although he had no formal religious training, only law, Rutherford took on the mantel of being the Society's new prophet, predicting major events in 1920, 1925, 1936, 1939, and for World War 2 that never happened. In spite of his failure at prophecy, he continued to strengthen his position as leader of the Watchtower Society.

In the early 1930s, the Watchtower still called its followers Bible Students, and was known throughout the world as the International Bible Students Association (IBSA). Rutherford decided that he wanted to make a clear and clean break from all of the other Bible Student groups and any of the remaining followers of Russell. So he renamed his followers "Jehovah's Witnesses." He also completely changed the local arrangements from small, locally run churches to Kingdom Halls, with leaders appointed and approved by the Society in Brooklyn, NY. He changed the names of the churches to "companies." Leaders were known as "Company Servants" and followers were called "publishers."

It was during Rutherford's time that the Witnesses stopped observing religious and national holidays, refused to salute national flags, refused to serve in any military service, and stopped voting or taking government jobs. He also formalized the practice of "disfellowshipping" (excommunicating) errant members.

Rutherford also began the process of increasing magazine and book sales, expanding foreign missionary and branch office growth, and formalizing sermons (public talks) and Kingdom Hall meetings. Although some changes have taken place over the past 70 years, the formats and general operations of local congregations continue to follow the models created by Rutherford.

When Joseph Rutherford died in 1942, his successor, Nathan H. Knorr, continued in Rutherford's guidelines, although not in Rutherford's leadership style. When the Watchtower Society went through major organizational changes in the late 1960s and 70s, power was taken away from the president and given to a board of senior elders known as the Governing Body.

As time has passed, the Governing Body members have seemed to want to regress back to the managerial style of Rutherford (rules, hard guidelines, loyalty to the organization, heavy handed punishment for dissent), while taking on the almost invisible leadership style of Knorr.

Bottom Line: Today's Jehovah's Witnesses can trace their modern origins to the 1917 takeover of the Watch Tower Society by "Judge" Joseph F. Rutherford.

Answer 3

The modern day history of Jehovah's Witnesses started with Charles Taze Russell.

The Jehovah's Witness movement was founded by Charles Taize Russell in the 19th Century who revisited old Arian theology of the very early Church that was deemed heretical even then, by Church fathers who could trace their providence back to the apostles through just a few generations (eg Irenaeus --> Polycarp --> St John, the apostle who was closest to Jesus). Arian theology denies Jesus' divinity, and denies the claims made by Jesus hinself to be God incarnate. Claims made by Jesus to be God in human form are conveniently forgotten as are prophesies to the same effect (such as Jesus' name - Emmanuel - 'God with us' - as just one example). To lay further weight to their claims the JW movement even published their own Bible which was mistranslated throughout to back up the bogus, discredited Arian theology.

Their founder, Russell was a self styled 'pastor' with no qualifications either in scripture or anything else, having attended school for only seven years. He was mixed up in money-making schemes (such as a scheme selling 'miracle wheat' and charged with fraud). However, his counterclaim for libel was thrown out of court as there was too much evidence against him. He was also founder of the Watchtower -the JW magazine - and made a pile in selling it. Hailed by JWs as a wonderful interpreter of scripture, he was forced to admit in court that he had not even a basic knowledge of Biblical Greek, the original language of the New Testament, and could not even recite the Greek alphabet. He separated from his wife, but began a period of womanising. When a libel case eventually went to court, the court found in favour of Russell, but awarded him $1 out of distain for him.

Generally Russell was quite an unsavoury character and yet the JW movement worldwide still adopt his bogus teachings. Two reasons for this are the claim made by the Watchtower society that they alone hold 'Truth' and all doctrine must come from the society, and the other in the fear of being disfellowshipped (shunned by your friends) if you try to leave.

Answer 4

The modern day history of Jehovah's Witnesses started in 1870 with Charles Taze Russell*, the prime mover of a religiously independent bible study group who went on to be the first President of the Watchtower Society that prints the principle religious bible study journal of Jehovah's Witnesses "The Watchtower" magazine in July 1979. The readers of "The Watchtower" formed more bible study groups and sought to share the things they were learning. Russell died in 1916 but The Bible Students continued. They adopted the name "Jehovah's Witnesses" in 1931.

*Jehovah's Witnesses do not view Russell as their "founder" or a Prophet but a Minister in a position of leadership during the early days of their modern day organization.

Answer 5

The "modern" movement was started in the 1870's by a group of several men from various religious backgrounds, including the businessman Charles Taze Russell. These ones spent many hours in serious Bible study and prayer, attempting to discern scriptural truths apart from any denominational traditions. Later, Russell started publishing the monthly journal "The Watchtower, Announcing Jehovah's Kingdom" and was eventually elected president of the official organization, then called The International Bible Students. (In 1931 this name was officially changed to Jehovah's Witnesses.)

If you want to go waaaaay back, you may agree that the very first witness of Jehovah God was Abel, and that the list goes on and on right up to our day. (Hebrews 11:1 - 12:1)

Answer 6

Truth be told:

As the name indicates, only Jehovah God would be the founder of his own Witnesses. Other than that, there is no 'founder'; (not even Jesus is our founder. Jesus is the founder of Christianity; although we're pretty sure he had a hand in our name also, since Jesus is the 'head' of his congregation.)

History lesson on this subject:

The Bible in Revelation calls Jesus 'the faithful witness'. (Of course, Jesus was a witness of Jehovah God.)

The Bible in Isaiah 43 calls the Israelite nation, Jehovah's 'Witnesses'.

The Bible in Hebrews 12 calls all previous worshipers of Jehovah God as 'a cloud of witnesses' starting from pre-Christian, even pre-Israelite, even pre-patriarchal times; in listing Abel as the first one.

Of course, Abel had no founder for being a Witness of Jehovah God. Jehovah himself was his founder, religiously and secularly. Likewise, even though Abel was the first Witness of Jehovah God, he was not the founder for Enoch, or Noah. They were worshipers of Jehovah God, without the need for a founder.

The concept of being a Jehovah's Witness has no other founder than Jehovah God himself.

Here's how it works:A person learns about Jehovah God; perhaps from a parent (like myself); or from someone who witnesses to them by visiting their home. Each individual Witness; after learning about Jehovah God, decides to worship Jehovah. They 'belong to' Jehovah; that's what the apostrophe 's' means, 'belonging to'. Since there are MANY people that worship Jehovah, our name is in the plural form 'Witness-es'; which means 'more than one'.

In modern times, the designation 'Jehovah's Witnesses' was available to anyone before 1931. But no one wanted to be identified by that word 'Jehovah'. That's their choice. Perhaps because they prefer to worship Jesus, or a triune god.

But in the 1920's, a group of people known simply as 'Bible Students', became increasingly aware of the deep significance of God's name, Jehovah. It bothered them that God's most holy name had been deleted from most Bible translations; causing most people to worship Jesus instead of Jehovah; not even knowing the significance of that name. Then, in 1931, a resolution was adopted by 'Bible Students' who already worshiped Jehovah.

But if the question wonders who founded our 'printing and publishing' arm; a solely legal entity; it was probably Charles Russell. Charles Taze Russell (February 16, 1852 - October 31, 1916) But he certainly is not the founder of Jehovah's Witnesses. (The truth now told.)

Answer 7

The Jehovah's Witnesses were founded by Joseph Rutherford. Rutherford created the Jehovah's Witnesses organization by rejecting the central Biblical teachings of Russell and the Bible Students. Russell was not the founder of that in which he did not believe, and which he spent nearly his entire life preaching against. https://rlctr.blogspot.com/p/jws.html

Answer 8

The modern day history of Jehovah's Witnesses started with Charles Taze Russell.

Answer 9

The modern day history of Jehovah's Witnesses started with Charles Taze Russell.