Watchtower Sacrificial Lambs
Publisher: In-Sight Publishing
Publisher Founding: March 1, 2014
Web Domain: http://www.in-sightpublishing.com
Location: Fort Langley, Township of Langley, British Columbia, Canada
Journal: In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal
Journal Founding: August 2, 2012
Frequency: Three (3) Times Per Year
Review Status: Non-Peer-Reviewed
Access: Electronic/Digital & Open Access
Fees: None (Free)
Volume Numbering: 12
Issue Numbering: 1
Section: B
Theme Type: Idea
Theme Premise: “Outliers and Outsiders”
Theme Part: 29
Formal Sub-Theme: None.
Individual Publication Date: November 1, 2023
Issue Publication Date: January 1, 2024
Author(s): Lee Elder
Author(s) Bio: None.
Word Count: 657
Image Credit: None.
International Standard Serial Number (ISSN): 2369–6885
*Original publication here during October, 2017.*
*Please see the footnotes, bibliography, and citations, after the publication.*
Keywords: Advocates for Jehovah’s Witnesses Reform on Blood, Bible, Christian, God, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Lee Elder, organ transplants, Watchtower Society.
Watchtower Sacrificial Lambs
Featured on the cover of the May 22, 1994 Awake! magazine are the photos of 26 children, with the caption: “Youths Who Put God First.” Inside the magazine proclaims: “In former times thousands of youths died for putting God first. They are still doing it, only today the drama is played out in hospitals and courtrooms, with blood transfusions the issue.” View a PDF of this quote.
Because Watchtower Society leaders have ruled that having certain types of blood transfusion is a mortal sin, Jehovah’s Witness children are meticulously indoctrinated to believe that those who accept certain blood transfusions to save their lives will be killed by Jehovah God at Armageddon in the very near future, and worthy of everlasting death.
They are also told that blood transfusions do not really save lives, but pollute recipients, give them AIDS, hepatitis and may even transfer to them the personality of a criminal blood donor. Parents are pressured to hold practice sessions with their children and rehearse answers to typical questions a judge or hospital official might ask to assess their maturity and degree of belief. 1 Not content with fear and implanted phobias, extreme coercion is also employed through Watchtower sanctioned shunning. This means failure to uphold the Watchtower’s bizarre policy will most likely result in their Witness friends being unable to greet them, talk to them or eat with them – not even close family members unless they happen to live under the same roof.
Jehovah’s Witness parents are taught that if they save the lives of their children by secretly accepting a blood transfusion, God may punish them right now by making their children stillborn or kill them in the soon-to-come battle of Armageddon, when they will become manure on the ground. Until 1952, the Watchtower Society used similar rhetoric about vaccinations. Until 1980, they said the same thing about organ transplants. Now these medical practices are permitted. Those who were loyal to these Watchtower rules spilled their blood in vain. If you are a Jehovah’s Witness parent, will you sacrifice your child over this issue? If you answer yes, stop and consider how you will feel when the Watchtower finally abandons this bizarre doctrine – a doctrine that they have already gutted into a shadow of what it once was.
Child sacrifice for the purpose of appeasing a God isn’t something new, and has been practiced in many cultures over human history, to prove how devout a parent truly is. In Bible times the Ammonites offered child sacrifices to the god Baal. Some Bible scholars believe that the laws against child sacrifice found in the Bible (See Lev. 18:21; 20:3 and Deut. 12:30-31; 18:10) are evidence that some Israelites were involved as well. The original intent of the story of Abraham attempting to offer up his son Issac, before being stopped by an angel may well have been to put a stop to this barbaric practice.
“And they built the high places of Baal, which are in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire unto Molech; which I commanded them not, neither came it into my mind, that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin.” – Jeremiah 32:35
Why shouldn’t your child have the blood fraction or component they need to live when so much is already permitted? Where does the Bible explain which blood products or fractions are a matter of conscience and which are not? The simple and obvious answer is that it has nothing to say about the use of blood components. We implore you as a Jehovah’s Witness parent – please do not let your child’s picture end up on this web page as a warning to others. We ask the rest of the Jehovah’s Witness community to please work for reform of this tragic policy and stop the needless deaths of Jehovah’s Witness children.
Bibliography
None
Footnotes
None
Citations
American Medical Association (AMA 11th Edition): Elder L. Watchtower Sacrificial Lambs. October 2023; 12(1). http://www.in-sightpublishing.com/watchtower-lambs
American Psychological Association (APA 7th Edition): Elder, L. (2023, November 1). Watchtower Sacrificial Lambs. In-Sight Publishing. 12(1).
Brazilian National Standards (ABNT): ELDER, L. Watchtower Sacrificial Lambs.In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal, Fort Langley, v. 12, n. 1, 2023.
Chicago/Turabian, Author-Date (17th Edition): Elder, Lee. 2023. “Watchtower Sacrificial Lambs.” In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal 12, no. 1 (Winter). http://www.in-sightpublishing.com/watchtower-lambs.
Chicago/Turabian, Notes & Bibliography (17th Edition): Elder, L “Watchtower Sacrificial Lambs.” In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal 12, no. 1 (November 2023). http://www.in-sightpublishing.com/watchtower-lambs.
Harvard: Elder, L. (2023) ‘Watchtower Sacrificial Lambs’, In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal, 12(1). <http://www.in-sightpublishing.com/watchtower-lambs>.
Harvard (Australian): Elder, L 2023, ‘Watchtower Sacrificial Lambs’, In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal, vol. 12, no. 1, <http://www.in-sightpublishing.com/watchtower-lambs>.
Modern Language Association (MLA, 9th Edition): Elder, Lee. “Watchtower Sacrificial Lambs.” In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal, vo.12, no. 1, 2023, http://www.in-sightpublishing.com/watchtower-lambs.
Vancouver/ICMJE: Lee E. Watchtower Sacrificial Lambs [Internet]. 2023 Nov; 12(1). Available from: http://www.in-sightpublishing.com/watchtower-lambs.
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