Might it be because it reduces the kingdom of God to a personal motto that otherwise allows the prevailing world to call the shots? Whereas, if the kingdom of God is “in your midst,” you begin to wonder what it wants. Meeting its requirements becomes more of a concern if it is “among you” in the person of Jesus.
Moreover, it is really only a kingdom of God that has authority (in your midst, among you—but not “within you” that can be said to trigger the turmoil of Psalm 2:
“The kings of the earth take their stand And high officials gather together as one Against Jehovah and against his anointed one. They say: “Let us tear off their shackles And throw off their ropes!” (verses 2-3)
What “shackles” or “ropes” are there when “the kingdom of God is within you,” making it just a personal code? But if it is a kingdom that right now has authority and right now directs people in what to do, the anti-c_lt movement can easily portray that as “shackles” and “ropes” that should be cast off.
“One month after the Court decision, Aleksandr Dvorkin, the anti-cult expert, crowed about the outcome he helped mastermind.13 After several years of maneuvering, the coordinating organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses would be shut down so as “to protect the civil rights of the members of this organization.” He was “absolutely convinced that after a few years, the number of members of the organization will decrease dramatically, two or three times, because, when one cuts off its financial foundation, its ability to freely, without hindrance, recruit other people, to rent large halls and so on, then, in fact, people will lose interest and will very quickly disperse and, in this sense, this decision is very correct and far-sighted.”
“When you cut off someone’s limbs, that person can be expected to die. He champions his role as protector of the individual Witness by severing ties to their organization of choice.”
How is this not “casting off shackles” and “throwing off ropes?” Where would be its counterpart to those who maintain the kingdom of God is “within you?”
Is the Kingdom of God “within you,” “among you,” or “in your midst?”(Luke 17:21)
Prepositions are flexible—in Greek no less than in English. In both languages, context helps determine how they are best translated. Older Bibles are likely to say that “the kingdom of God is within you.” The Wycliffe Bible (1395), the Tyndale Bible (1530) Coverdale Bible (1535), Great Bible (1539), Geneva Bible (1560), Bishops’ Bible (1568), and Rheims New Testament (1582) all render the original word, “entos,” this way. So does the King James Version of 1611, playing ‘follow the leader.’
More modern translators note that this old rendering doesn’t make much sense. The context betrays it. Jesus was speaking to Pharisees. Throughout the New Testament, that bunch is antagonistic to him. If the kingdom of God was “within them,” they sure didn’t do a good job of finding it.
The King James Version was such an expressive work that no one touched for nearly 300 years, save for a renegade or two. Yet, says the preface to the Revised Standard Version, though English-speaking peoples owe it an “incalculable debt,” it has “grave defects.” This is through no fault of its own. It is just that its authors did not have access to much older manuscripts that were discovered after its date of publication. Nor did they have access to secular texts shedding light on just how koine Greek was used in Jesus’ time.
Says that RSV preface: “The King James Version of the Bible was based on a Greek text that was marred by mistakes, containing the accumulated errors of fourteen centuries of manuscript copying.” It sources few manuscripts earlier than the 10th century. Even when it has access to some, it barely uses them, sticking with the rendering of the familiar but more unreliable earlier works cited above.
With benefit of updated scholarship, many current translations lean towards “the kingdom of God is among you” (CEB, AMP, or ISV) or “the kingdom of God is in your midst.” (ESV, NIV, NASB, NET)
By no means is it just the New World Translation that says “in your midst.” Many do. In fact, a tally of Bibles old and new, from a few parallel sites, primarily Biblegateway.com, shows “within you” occurs 33 times. That is the majority, but not when compared to the sum of “among you” 20 times, and “in your midst” 18 times: 38 times. The latter two mean essentiallly the same thing: that Jesus was “among them” or “in their midst” through his personal presence and what it stood for. In short, the king designate of that kingdom was the one addressing them.
So why do so many who identify as Christians today claim the “kingdom of God is within you,” when it is based on outdated scholarship? “Among you” or “in your midst” is what flies today.
An apocryphal story that I believe: You might not, but I do because it was told by someone I consider trustworthy and who was there:
Sometime during the 1980s there were “high-level” discussions at Bethel over, of all things, is it necessary for all Christians to preach.
It only took 40 years to reveal that the answer is no.
You wouldn’t think it necessary to qualify “necessary.” But it is. Is it “necessary” to obey the speed limit signs? ‘Only if a cop is around’ will be the answer of many.
So it is with taking part in the ministry of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Is it “necessary?” Check a box saying you have taken some part in it within the month and you are done. The answer is effectively no, from a human point of view. The answer may be yes from God’s point of view, but it is left for each individual to call it as he sees it. Human-wise, the answer is no. I don’t expect Witness HQ ever to say it, but de facto the answer is no, even though it be yes from God. Practically speaking, anything not backed up by human discipline becomes a no.
That’s why the 2005 book ‘The Scandal of the Evangelical Conscience’ said that, to their shame, church members in general live no different from the world. Most of them know it should not be that way. But without human discipline to buttress good intentions, conduct of the two groups, Christians and the overall world, soon becomes indistinguishable.
The preaching activity is no longer a topic of “discipline.” It’s not for one house servant to monitor that activity of another, is the thinking—to his own master he stands or falls. Check a box at month’s end that you engaged in some from of the ministry and the deal is done. You could lie and nobody would know. Probably some PIMOs do lie, but the overall ministry keeps going strong.
Change is okay. You look like an old fart when you start crying about how it’s not like it used to be. When cart-witnessing proliferates, by default, door-to-door will diminish. It’s all good. Every time there’s any change of any sort, the crazies cheering for downfall point to it as proof that the Witnesses are going down. Instead, they just adapt to the times.
Recently, a certain sprawling apartment complex in our territory converted their contact system to make it impossible for Witnesses, or anyone else, to contact residents. Good riddance, as far as I’m concerned. It had become a horrible nuisance, with loud aggravating buzzers, tenants stoked by friends whose zeal and thoroughness, in some cases, outweighed common sense. Good riddance. That’s what the cart work is for, where people interested can approach the Witnesses, and people not are not annoyed.
I don’t see that overall ministry activity among Witnesses has decreased. It has changed, with many making cart work their new favorite, and some letter-writing. But I think the overall ministry remains steady, even if morphed to adapt to changing times. As for me, I take part regularly in the door-to-door ministry, not much in the cart work, and I think the ministry unimpeded by the new non-counting policy.
Unlike Covid, which did impede and from which full recovery has not taken place. That began people writing letters, formerly the method of the elderly and infirm, but during Covid everyone switched to the method, it being one of the few available, and some didn’t come back. I started a few letters then, too, but every time I did I came to reflect I could put something online instead and receive quick feedback, rather than send something into the great void and never hear of it again.
Door-to-door and the Bible study work is still the gold standard. That point was made abundantly clear at the recent convention, but there are now various supplementary methods.
It was irksome when atheists put up their ‘Let Reason Prevail’ billboard right next to that Illinois State Capitol Nativity Scene back in 2009; that much was immediately apparent. But putting my finger on just why it was irksome required more effort. Was it the presumption of the atheists that they held a monopoly on “reason?” Partly. Was it the crassness of plunking it next to the nativity scene, as though it, too, offered a message of *hope*? Closer.
It took a while, but I at last came across an experiment that blew that silly *Let Reason Prevail* slogan sky-high. Reason *cannot* prevail among humans. We are not capable of it. We can muster a fair effort when distractions are few. But add in any significant stress, and human reasoning ability goes right down the drain. It is hard to come to any other conclusion after pondering the cake-fruit experiment of several years back. Alas, it received only the publicity of light fluff news. It deserves more, as it holds unsettling implications for any future based on the veneration of reason.
The cake-fruit experiment unfolded thus: In 1999, Stanford University professor Baba Shiv enrolled a few dozen undergraduates and gave each a number to memorize. Then, one at a time, they were to leave the room and walk down a corridor to another room, where someone would be waiting to take their number. On the way down, however, participants were approached by a friendly woman carrying a tray. “To show our thanks for taking part in our study,” she said, “we’d like to offer you a snack. You have a choice of two. A nice piece of chocolate cake. Or a delicious fruit salad. Which would you like?”
Unbeknownst to each participant, some had been given two-digit numbers to memorize, and some had been given seven-digit numbers. When Shiv tallied up the choices made (for that was the object of the experiment) he found that those students with seven digits to remember were nearly twice as likely to choose the cake as those given two digits! Two digits—you choose fruit. Seven digits—you choose cake. What could possibly account for that?
The reason, Shiv theorized, is that once you weed out the occasional oddball, we all like cake more than fruit; it tastes better. But we also know that fruit is better for us. This is a rational assessment that almost all of us would make. But if our minds are taxed with trying to retain seven digits instead of a no-brainer two, rationality goes right out the window, and the emotional, “Yummy, cake!” wins out! “The astounding thing here,” said the *Wall Street Journal’s* Jonah Lehrer, reviewing the experiment for *NPR*, “is not simply that sometimes emotion wins over reason. It’s how easily it wins.”
Now, this experiment was not taken very seriously by anyone. When the media covered it at all, they treated it as fluff, as a transitional piece going in to or out of more serious news. But plainly, the experiment holds deeper significance. Aren’t world leaders also human, and thus susceptible to emotion trumping rationality? Daily they grapple to solve the woes afflicting us all. Meanwhile, opponents seek to undermine them, and media outlets try to dig up dirt on them. If it takes only five extra digits for emotion to overpower reason, do you really think there is the slightest chance that “reason will prevail” among the world’s policymakers, immersed in matters much more vexing and urgent than choosing between cake and fruit? Has it up till now?
That is what was so irksome about the ‘Let Reason Prevail’ slogan. Reason *cannot* prevail among imperfect humans! It can occur, but it cannot prevail. Humans are not capable of it. Five digits is all it takes for our rational facade to crumble!
Since that Baba Shiv experiment, the term “reason” has been upgraded to “critical thinking,” as though to impress with increased potency. It’s the same stuff. It’s just that the latter was not the buzzphrase then that it has come to be today.
Now, if there is one thing that Jehovah’s Witnesses are known for, it is for their insistence that humans do not have the ability to govern themselves. Nearly everyone else in the field of religion accepts the present setup of squabbling nations as a given and prays for God to somehow bless the leaders running it—often with the proviso that whatever country they are in emerges on top. Of course, it doesn’t matter too much, though, since said religionists are all heaven-bound! Just passing through, you understand. So while one might not like staying in a crummy hotel, you can at least console yourself that it’s only for a night or two.
Who would have thought that Jehovah’s Witnesses were not alone in identifying the archangel Michael with Jesus? That the idea is also found in the writings of Martin Luther and John Calvin? That a host of other theologians have said it too? It was news to me.
Really enjoyed this exhaustive article. Were it not for the Michael/Christ identification running afoul of trinitarian concerns, I think few would care about how JWs define this. It would just be a relatively insignificant quirk of the faith. That’s why I was surprised to see Luther, Calvin and others also make the connection and am not quite sure how they did so without arousing those concerns. It must be they have changed over time?
On higher criticism, I noted separately how Luke Thomas Johnson likened it to a sort of Trojan Horse. Under the historical-critical method, he said, the theologian cannot talk about miracles as Jesus’ resurrection or virgin birth, therefore that restraint has a way of becoming an implied denial.
Both Socrates and Jesus had a way of buttonholing people, prodding them to think outside the box. Both attracted a good many followers in this way. Both were outliers to the general world of their time. Both were looked upon askance for it. Both infuriated their ‘higher-ups’—so much so that both were consequently sentenced to death. Their venues were different, and so we seldom make the linkage, but linkage there is. As a result of auditing a certain Great Courses lecture series, I found more parallels than I ever would have imagined. Nearly all subsequent points are taken from the lecture “Jesus and Socrates,” by J Rufus Fears.
They were both teachers, Jesus of the spiritual and Socrates of the empirical. They both refused pay, a circumstance that in itself aroused the suspicion of the established system. (Victor V. Blackwell, a lawyer who defended many Witness youths in the World War II draft days, observed that local judges recognized only one sort of minister: those who “had a church” and “got paid”—“mercenary ministers,” he called them.)
Fears may be a bit too much influenced by evolving Christian ‘theology’—he speaks of Jesus being God, for instance, and the kingdom of God being a condition of the heart—but his familiarity with the details of the day, and the class structure and social mores that both Jesus and Socrates’ transgressed against, is unparalleled. Jesus reduces the Law to two basic components: love of God and love of neighbor. This infuriates the Pharisees and Sadducees, because complicating the Law was their meal ticket, their reason for existence. After his Sermon on the Mount, “the crowds were astounded at his way of teaching, for he was teaching them as a person having authority, and not as their scribes.” Depend upon it: the scribes didn’t like him. Socrates, also, did the Sophist’s work for them, the paid arguers who ‘made the weaker argument look the stronger’ He did it better than they. They were jealous of him.
Neither Jesus nor Socrates encouraged participation in politics of the day. Jesus urged followers to be “no part of the world.” Socrates declared it impossible for an honest man to survive under the democracy of his time. Both thereby triggered establishment wrath, for if enough people followed their example, dropping out of contemporary life, where would society be?
Jesus and Socrates –the Parallels , Part
Both Jesus and Socrates were put to death out of envy. Both had offended the professional class. Both became more powerful in death than in life. Both could have avoided death, but didn’t. Socrates could have backtracked, played upon the jury’s sympathy, appealed to his former military service. Jesus could have brought in witnesses to testify that he never said he was king of the Jews, the only charge that make Pilate sit up and take notice.
Both spoke ambiguously. In Socrates case, he was eternally asking questions, rather than stating conclusions. His goal—to get people to examine their own thinking. In Jesus case, it was “speak\[ing\]to them by the use of illustrations” because “the heart of this people has grown unreceptive, and with their ears they have heard without response, and they have shut their eyes, so that they might never see with their eyes and hear with their ears and get the sense of it with their hearts and turn back and I heal them.” He spoke ambiguously to see if he could cut through that morass, to make them work, to reach the heart.
What if Jesus were appear on the scene today and enter one of the churches bearing his name, churches where they don’t do as he said? Would they yield the podium to him? Or would they once again dismiss him as a fraud and imposter, putting him to death if he became too insistent, like their counterparts did the first time?
If Jesus is the basis of church, Socrates is no less the basis of university. His sayings had to be codified by Plato, his disciple, just as Jesus’ sayings had to be codified by some of his disciples. Thereafter, Plato’s student, Aristotle, had to turn them into organized form, founding the Academy—the basis of higher learning ever since. Professor Fears muses upon what would happen if Socrates showed up on campus in the single cloak he was accustomed to wearing, “just talking to students, walking around with them, not giving structured courses, not giving out a syllabus or reading list at the start of classes, not giving examination” at the end. Would they not call Security?
Jesus and Socrates—the Parallels: Part 4…And if by some miracle, Socrates did apply for faculty, which he would not because he disdained a salary, but if he did, you know they would not accept him. Where were his credentials? Yes, he had the gift of gab, they would acknowledge, but such was just a “popularity contest.” Where were his published works?
Similarly, where were Jesus’ published works? Neither Jesus nor Socrates wrote down a thing. It was left for Jesus’ disciples to write gospel accounts of his life. It was left for Plato to write of Socrates’ life. If either were to appear at the institutions supposedly representing their names, they would not be recognized. Shultz, the chronicler of early Watchtower history, recently tweeted that when he appends a few letters to his name, such as PhD, which he can truthfully can, his remarks get more attention than when he does not. He says it really shouldn’t be that way, but it is what it is. Both Jesus and Socrates would have been in Credential-Jail, neither having not a single letter to stick on the end of their name. It wouldn’t help for it to be known that each had but a single garment.
Today people are used to viewing “career” as the high road, “vocation” as the lower. Vocation is associated with working with ones’ hands. Fears turns it around. “Vocation” represents a calling. Jesus was literally called at his baptism: the heavens open up, and God says, “This is my son in whom I am well-pleased.” Socrates had a calling in that the god Apollo at Delphi said no one is wiser than he. Socrates took that to mean God was telling him to go out and prove it. “Career,” on the other hand, stems from a French word meaning “a highway,” a means of getting from one place to another, considerably less noble than “a calling,” a vocation.
We who are Jehovah’s Witnesses are quite used to pointing out that religion has run off the rails. What is interesting from these parallels is the realization that academia has no less run off the rails. Both have strayed far from their roots, and not for the better. Both have devolved into camps of indoctrination.
