From "Unorganized" to "Too Organized"? You can please "some of the people, some of the time, but...

(Guest post by Gary)

Scholars who study Jehovah’s Witnesses have often noted their keenness, some might say obsession, to measure activity by numbers. This is most obvious in terms of the monthly field service reports that publishers file with their congregation’s secretary, but also in terms of congregation meeting attendances, assembly and convention attendances and the annual Memorial figures. 

 

In addition, in recording the monthly numbers of publishers Witnesses are markedly different than any other religion in counting active members as opposed to passive attenders. Comparing these figures provides the Society a numerical measurement of progress, of course, and - to some degree - an indication of how well the message is received in various lands. In turn, Witnesses draw encouragement as we read annual reports and see evidence of our ministry bearing fruit.  

 

In contrast, looking back into the earliest Watch Tower history it is noticeable how little interest was shown in collating figures, with only annual Memorial attendances and the number of colporteurs giving indication of growth. Interestingly, Henry King Carroll’s comprehensive book The Religious Forces of the United States Enumerated, Classified, and Described, returns for 1900 and 1910 compared with the Government Census of 1890 records meeting figures for nearly every denomination and sect conceivable with the notable exception of the Bible Students.(1)  So, what caused the situation to change? Strange as it may seem, as will be explained, it was likely the American governmental authorities in World War One who we may thank for indirectly kickstarting this trend. 

 

The Draft Act and ‘not an organized sect’

 

Although the teachings of Pastor Russell were broadly recognised as being ‘pacifist’, one of the criticisms made to justify why Bible Students were not to be granted recognition as conscientious objectors in America during World War One, rightly or wrongly, involved their considered lack of organization.A list of pacifist sects was created in the United States by a Mr Hunt of the Census Bureau in 1917 following the country’s entrance to war and in anticipation of the Selective Services Act (otherwise referred to as ‘The Draft Act’).  The list includes the three traditional peace churches, the Mennonites, Quakers and Brethren, and several others, many known for their premillennialist expectations.  At the bottom of the list, as if reluctantly tagged on, appears the name International Bible Student Association, beside a bracketed explanatory note stating, significantly, that this is “not an organized sect.” (2) Hunt’s list is significant and apparently was relied on by a number of draft boards throughout America. The Selective Service Act allowed provision for conscientious objectors to perform non-combatant service, but only if they belonged to a recognised pacifist sect which fitted certain criteria. (3) 

 

To have satisfied the authorities the IBSA had two problems to overcome: Firstly, they were ‘new kids on the block’, a recent religious ‘sect’ as far as the authorities were concerned.  As such, unlike the Mennonites, Brethren or Quakers, they had with no earlier peace testimony that could be called upon in support. Secondly, while the teachings of Pastor Russell were well known in America and obviously ‘pacifist’, the extent to which they were “organizedprior to May, 1917” was less clear. In the Spring of 1918 Military Intelligence Division agents visited Joseph Franklin Rutherford and requested sight of an IBSA membership list, to which Rutherford replied, “Our only roll of members is written in Heaven.”(4) At the famous United States v. Rutherford et al trial,one Bible Student conscientious objector acknowledged that the IBSA didn’t “keep any record on the rolls as other churches do” (5)while it was acknowledged that an individual could “become a member without communicating with headquarters.”(6)

 

When asked in 1917 how many International Bible Students Association members there were in America, Rutherford answered that “from the names on our Watch Tower list we would answer, there are approximately 75,000 adherents.(7)  But this list, of course, indicated just the number of subscribers rather than active supporters.Indeed, much questioning during the trial involved the use of affidavits sent from the IBSA to those requesting them in support of their claims for conscientious objection and whether these were requests from ‘consecrated members’ or, as the prosecution implied, a large number of slackers who were using the IBSA to shelter under.

 

So, when did the situation change? When did the ‘organization’ first start to become organized? 

 

Dr. George Chryssides gives the general era noting:

 

“It was under Rutherford that house-to-house visiting became organised, and was expected of the Society’s members - a practice that has continued into the twenty first century.  Previously, under Russell, the Bible Students’ message was spread by colporteurs ...” (8) 

 

And historian Zoe Knox linked the greater emphasis on public ministry that gave ‘rank and file’ members a greater degree of visibility to “particularly ... since 1922, when Rutherford intensified door-to-door ministry and initiated a co-ordinated, worldwide campaign that led door-knocking to become Witnesses’ trademark.”(9)

 

Knox, no doubt, has in mind the ‘Advertise, Advertise, Advertise the King and his Kingdom’ rally call at the Cedar Point, Ohio, international convention on September 8th, 1922.But did the start of this organized “worldwide campaign” commence even earlier in America itself?  Can we be more precise? The Watch Tower for August 1 and 15, 1919 published the two-part article “Blessed Are the Fearless”, which was re-emphasised at the eight-day general assembly at Cedar Point, Ohio, that followed on September 1-8, 1919, in which Rutherford delivered the ‘The Hope for this Distressed Humanity’ talk. Hence it was in 1919 that the public witness was resumed.  As the Society itself later described the period:

 

“Figuratively speaking, it was a climb to organize all the restored spiritual Israelites for preaching the Kingdom message from house to house.” (Italics are mine) (10)

 

Interestingly, the Proclaimers book states that “Through the service director, the field service of those associated with the congregation, or class, was to be reported to the Society each week, starting in 1919.”(11)Indeed, as a consequence, the very first field service report compiled for the United States in 1920 showed there were 8,052 “class workers” out in service, along with 350 colporteurs.(12)

 

Is it a coincidence that the IBSA moved in this direction following Rutherford’s release from the Atlanta Penitentiary?  Rutherford apparently saw need to record the activity of members as a reaction to his court experience, with the intention of protecting Bible Students in case authorities repeated such arguments in any future confrontation. If so, what better way of measuring active membership than to allow adherents themselves to file regular field service reports? These enabled Bible Students, and later Jehovah’s Witnesses, opportunity to show their willing support for both the Kingdom message itself and the organization being used to promote this message. 

 

Too organized?

 

Unaware of this background, modern critics of the Society ironically believe it is somehow evidence of a dictatorial leadership imposing their will over uncommitted followers! In fact, having been muted and suppressed during the war, by 1919 most International Bible Students responded enthusiastically to the opportunity to publicly witness and report their activity, seeing their situation in Biblical terms:

 

“At that time the lame one will climb up just as a stag does, and the tongue of the speechless one will cry out in gladness.” (13)

 

This remains the attitude of zealous Witnesses today. Whatever criticisms opposers may throw at them, their scrupulous reporting and recording of figures ensures that they may never again be accused of being unorganized!

 

As Zoe Knox notes:

 

“The Society is remarkable, however, in two important ways: it defines every baptised adherent as an ordained minister and makes public ministry a requirement for every adult in the community.” (14)

 

 

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References:

 

(1) H.K. Carroll, The Religious Forces of the United States Enumerated, Classified, and Described, returns for 1900 and 1910 compared with the Government Census of 1890. Published by Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1912. A search here for the terms ‘Russellites’ and ‘Millennial Dawnists’ also revealed no results

(2) A copy of the list appears in Mark A. May’s 1919 article entitled “The Psychological Examination of Conscientious Objectors”, The American Journal of Psychology 31, April 1920, 155

 

(3) The Official Bulletin: Monday, July 9, 1917, Information for Persons Registered under the Selective Service Law, 6, column 3, point 13

 

(4) Lon Strauss, A Paranoid State: The American Public, Military Surveillance and the Espionage Act of 1917, 2012, 84. Per Strauss, “Rutherford interpreted the act to mean the organization had to have been recognized in existence prior to that date, not necessarily that an individualmust have been a member at that time. In other words, individuals might still join afterMay 18and thus become exempt to the draft law.” This seems the most obvious reading of the legislation.However, Rutherford’s letter To the Secretary or Clerk of the Local Ecclesia, dated 8 August 1917, argues against this interpretation. In this Rutherford explicitly stated that “such affidavit will be made, of course, for only those who are members of the INTERNATIONAL BIBLE STUDENTS ASSOCIATION and in good standing and who were such on and before the 18^th day of May, 1917.”

 

(5) Quote from Hans Insberg, an IBSA conscientious objector, questioned in the The United Statesv Rutherford trial, 253

 

(6) Quote from William E. Van Amburgh during the United States v.Rutherford trial, 1212

 

(7)Watch Tower, 1 December 1917, reprints 6181, in article entitled ‘In Re Military Service’

 

(8)George D. Chrysiddes, Jehovah’s Witnesses – Continuity and Change, Routledge Taylor and Francis Group,2016, 91

 

(9) Zoe Knox, Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Secular World, Palgrave Macmillan, 2018, 109

 

(10) Man’s Salvation out of World Distress at Hand! 1975, Watch Tower Bible & Tract Society, 150

 

(11)Jehovah’s Witnesses – Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom, Watch Tower Bible & Tract Society, 1993, footnote, 212

 

(12) The Watch Tower and Herald of Christ’s Presence, December 15, 1920, 372

 

(13) Isaiah 35:6 – see application, for example, in Man’s Salvation out of World Distress at Hand! 1975, 151

 

(14) Zoe Knox, Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Secular World, Palgrave Macmillan, 2018, 108