Why do conscientious objectors refuse to fight in war?

Answer 1

ANSWER They either believe in the commandment that thou shalt not kill. Or their own conscience

forbids them to kill any human being. They believe that even the enemies life as being sacred.

COMMENTS FROM A CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR I am one of Jehovah's Witnesses. JW's are known world-wide as not participating in nationalistic warfare, thus we will not join the military, even when military service is proscribed by the governmental authority. It is for the reason of our being conscientious objectors that JW's in countries such as North Korea, Armenia, many of the baltic states, and other countries are being thrown into prison, where their treatment in these prisons has been less than humane to say the least. The reason for JW's boils down to the question, who will we give our allegience to, man or God? We believe that based on our understanding of the scriptures, man's governments have been weighed in the balance by God, and found unworthy. In fact, we believe that man's rulerships are actually controlled by Satan the Devil. (Matthew 4:8,9; Revelation 12:9; 1 Corinthians 10:20; 1 John 5:19) We believe that soon God's Kingdom with Jesus Christ as the appointed king and judge will end man's rule. (Daniel 2:44; Matthew 6:10) This will require no action at all on our part. We believe that we will only be sideline observers as God himself, with his angelic forces, will eliminate earthly human governments in his war to end all wars, Armageddon. (Revelation 11:18; Revelation 14:14,16) We believe that the time for Armageddon is very near, since the signs of the end that the Bible gave, are now in fullfillment. (Matthew 24:3-14; 2 Timothy 3:1-4) In the meantime, our position with regard to the political, social, ethnic, and nationalistic affairs of this world is one of complete nuetrality. We obey the laws and pay all the taxes of the governments because, even though we believe that God does not sanction these governments, he is tolerating their existence for the time being, and for now, they serve the greater good. (Romans 13:1, 5-7) But, if one of man's laws violates one of God's laws, then we "must obey God as ruler, rather than men."(Acts 5: 28,29; Mark 12:17) If we were to join in and fight in man's wars, this would be taking sides in man's affairs. We feel that this would violate our nuetrality as well as violate God's laws on the sanctity of life. (1 John 3:10-12, 15) We also believe that by identifying ourselves as a friend of the world, we would become an enemy of God. (2 Corinthians 4:4)For these reasons, we feel that we cannot join and fight in man's wars.