There are certain people who regulate the lives of millions of our fellow-humans with their commandments and their rules.  And although one would at least expect honesty from their part towards those who revere them to the death and await their guidance, on the contrary, these people willfully disorient them.

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Fear of the truth

Certain religious leaders are fully aware that if their followers ever learnt the truth, they would shake off the yoke of servitude that has been imposed on them. This fear has made them strive to stifle the truth with every possible means.   Mostly, they strive to isolate their “victims”, by keeping them as far away as possible from former followers who had discovered the Organization’s deception and could therefore expose its deceit to others.

Reference here is to the religious organization “Watchtower”, where – even though its leadership knows it is relying on false dogmas – it continues to preach them and in fact even terrorizing and excommunicating any of its followers who doubt those (already proven false) dogmas.  However, because those who are “outside the Organization” are usually ignorant of its vulnerable “Achilles’ heel”, the Organization’s fears are mainly focused on those who abandoned the Organization after having identified the falsehoods and are in a position to expose them by presenting proofs of the deception to others.

To avoid this exposure, the Watchtower organization has invented yet another misinterpretation of the Holy Bible, for the purpose of persuading its followers to not speak with those who have abandoned the Organization, whom it has labelled as “apostates”.

In this study, we shall reveal how the Watchtower organization deceives its members in order to convince them that they should never talk to the “excommunicated” members – that is, to those who have decided to cease being its members.  We shall do this, by showing how it has distorted a specific verse by Saint John 2:10-11.

It is the “most convincing” excerpt that they use, in order to persuade their followers they must not talk to “apostates” of the Organization.

So, when a follower becomes convinced of their deceit using that verse, they are be able to seek further information from those who have left the Organization, in order to discover its other deceits, without fearing that they have committed a sin in doing so.

The 8 misinterpretations of the Holy Bible

The text of the Epistle  2John 10-11 that the Watchtower has misquoted is the following: 

"If someone comes to you, and does not bear this teaching, do not take him into the house, and do not greet him, saying “Rejoice”. For the one who says “Rejoice” to him,  communes in his wicked works.” 

“See?” (Watchtower says to its followers) “The Holy Bible says that if an excommunicated member, an apostate comes to you, who does not bear the organization’s teachings, you should not even say ‘hello’ to them – let alone listen to them analyzing their apostate views!   And if one of you does this and talks to them, then you become a communant in their wicked works and you too must be cut off (excommunicated).”

A careful reader will of course immediately notice that the original Apostolic verse says nothing that can accommodate the Watchtower to misinterpret the truth. So, let’s now examine the words of this verse very carefully, to see the deceit very clearly:

    (1)  There is no mention of the word “excommunicated” in this verse. John clearly says: “If someone comes to you, and does not bear this teaching…”

The organization has therefore arbitrarily altered the verse's words, by claiming that it is referring only to its excommunicated members. 

If the Watchtower wanted to be precise in its guidelines, it should logically be prohibiting its members from approaching anyone who believed something different to its own beliefs; but this prohibition would obviously not benefit them, inasmuch as it would be literally hindering its followers to knock on the doors of all people of other beliefs, to introduce them to the organization.

    (2) There is no mention in this verse of the “organization’s teaching”.

It speaks of “Christ’s teaching”, according to verse 2:9.  “Every one who contravenes and not remaining in the teaching of Christ, has no God; the one who remains in the teaching of Christ, he has both the Father and the Son”.

Given that the teaching of Christ is always true, and that the truth never changes, it cannot therefore be referring to the Watchtower dogmas (which are known to change every now and then).   After all, every religion claims to possess the truth; so, based on Watchtower’s own logic, the followers of every other belief system should not accept any “infidel” at their door - which includes the Watchtower’s followers, who are not bearing the teaching of Christ (albeit believing that it is His teaching).

     (3)  The verse says: “…If someone comes to you" (albeit not bearing Christ's teaching)... It does not say "if someone happens to pass by you in a public space". Subsequently, the Watchtower organization is not justified in arbitrarily instructing its followers that they must never speak - under any circumstance - to excommunicated members, given that this instruction does not comply with the verse’s specific wording - according to which, a follower is supposed to personally go to an excommunicated member or any other person, to bring them a teaching (that is not even Christ’s...).

      (4) One cannot possibly know another’s religious teachings, until they have first heard something indicative from them!  And this too is clarified, in the preceding verse 7:   “because many deluded ones have come forth into the world, who do not confess Jesus Christ having come in the flesh. Such are the deceiver and the antichrist.”

     So, this is the false teaching that we must avoid. The verse does not speak of the bearers of whichever false teaching, but of those “who do not confess Jesus Christ having come in the flesh”.  This is the clarification that a Christian must first ask from “anyone who comes to him”, and it is on this criterion that a Christian should judge whether he will accept them in their home or even cordially greet them.   Watchtower’s generalization that “whoever does not believe in its dogmas” is therefore an entirely arbitrary one.

    (5) The verse does not say "nor speak to them”!  It tells us “…and do not greet him, by saying ‘Rejoice’!”. The Watchtower’s addition of the word “nor” (greet him) was added, to  also include not talking to them.  As such, this verse clearly forbids only two things: 

        a.  that we must not allow them to enter our home and

        b.  that we must not extend the greeting of “Rejoice!” .

      (6) Here the verse does not state just any kind of greeting. It specifically prohibits the greeting word “Rejoice!” The reason for this prohibition, is that the disparaging of the Gospel makes the enemy of the Gospel happy; so, by extending this happy greeting to a member who knocks on the door, it is as though the homeowner who is approached is wishing the follower that everything may turn out the way that will make them happy…

       Also, in order to denigrate the true meaning of the verse, the Watchtower says that “Rejoice!” ("Χαίρε!")  is just a cold and typical greeting – as opposed to “hailing” ("ασπασμός") which is a far warmer one;  Subsequently, according to the Watchtower, not even a simple “Hello” should be extended to those approaching one's door. 

      But this reasoning is also not valid, given that in the Holy Bible these two (Greek) words are related, as seen in Luke 1:28-29, 40-41 and 44, where even a simple greeting is also referred to as an embrace:

      “²⁸ and upon the angel approaching Her, he said “Rejoice, ("Χαίρε!") o Grace-endowed one; the Lord is with You. Blessed are you among women. ²⁹ She, seeing him, was troubled by his words and wondered to herself what kind of greeting  ("ασπασμός") that was…”

     ^“40 and She entered the house of Zechariah and greeted ("ασπασμός") Elizabeth. ⁴¹ and as soon as Elizabeth heard the   greeting ("ασπασμός")of Mary, the infant frisked joyously inside her belly, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit..”

      ^"44 for behold: as soon as the voice of your greeting  ("ασπασμός") reached my ears, the infant frisked joyously in my belly…”

     (7) The verse does not point to fornicators, murderers, thieves, etc.; it clearly says only those who do not have Christ’s teaching.  Therefore the  Watchtower organization is again acting arbitrarily when specifically prohibiting its followers to speak to the people who have left the  Organization for whichever reason.

     (8) MOST IMPORTANTLY: This verse does not apply to those who are not bearers of Christ’s teaching; it refers to a specific category – the category of False Prophets.

Prophets and False Prophets

Let us examine this point in more detail, beginning with verse 7 of the same Epistle:  “because many deluded ones have come forth into the world, who do not confess Jesus Christ having come in the flesh. Such is the deceiver and the antichrist.”

The Apostle John had written these words before, only slightly differently, in his Gospel 2John 4:1-3:

“My beloved, do not believe in every spirit, but test the spirits whether they are of God, for many false prophets have come forth in the world.  In this you shall recognize the Spirit of God : Every spirit that confesses Jesus Christ as come in the flesh, is of God.  And every spirit that does not confess Jesus Christ, is not of God; and that one is of the antichrist, of whom you have heard that he is coming; and who now is already in the world.”

Both in this passage as well as the previous one, we notice that the Apostle John is speaking of the same detail : of  the false prophets.  For the Apostle John, the criterion that discerns between a true Prophet and the False Prophet, is if he  “confesses Jesus Christ as come in the flesh”.   

He names these individuals as “deluded”, “antichrists” and “false Prophets”.

But who were the Prophets, and who were the False Prophets?

During the apostolic era, there existed the Order of the Prophets.  These were the charism-bearing ministers of the Church, who were ordained by the Apostles, having previously been selected by the Holy Spirit.  These were the successors to the Apostles, who traveled from Church to Church, vested with authority.  They could ordain, they could perform the Divine Eucharist, and could convey the Apostles’ instructions.   When visiting a certain Church, the Christians of that district would offer them hospitality in their homes for as long as they remained there.  Also, until such time as they remained there, they had full authority over that Church.

Now we can understand why John was so absolutely opposed to the category of False Prophets.  Those individuals would appear at various Churches claiming to be “Prophets”, and the Churches would welcome them as ministers authorized by the Holy Spirit and the Apostles.  BUT, whenever someone would present himself to a Church as a Prophet, according to the words of the Apostle John, the local Christians had to ascertain whether that person confessed “Jesus Christ come in the flesh”.

This was a sound criterion, because during that period, those who were frauds were Gnostics, who intentionally travelled about with the purpose of misleading the Church.  Gnostics did not confess that Jesus came (and will come) in the flesh.  Christians therefore had to ask them, in order to ascertain if he was a true Prophet or a Gnostic False Prophet.

Therefore it was about the deceivers (“who should ever come to them”) that were not allowed to enter their homes for hospitality, nor were they to be greeted with the wish of  “Rejoice!”

Given that these verses are specific to circumstances of that era, it is arbitrary to apply them to anyone else today - unless it is someone who claims to have apostolic succession and comes to our door as a Prophet - and not confessing “Jesus Christ (always) come in the flesh”. 

One is therefore justifiably curious, as to what exactly are the wandering “bishops” of the Watchtower organization confessing, when they claim that Christ will come as a spirit, and not “in the flesh” ?

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Text by: N.M.

Greek Text

Translated by K.N.