Talk:Persecution of Jehovah's Witnesses

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This article is extremely limited in comprehensiveness. --BEN

This article suggests towards the end that, in Canada during WWII, Japanese and Chinese citizens were interned in concentration camps. I know for a fact this is true of Japanese-Canadians, but I have never heard of Chinese-Canadians suffering the same persecution. Unless anyone has evidence that this happened somewhere in Canada, I think it should be removed.

I removed the last website, as it was mostly reductio ad hitlerum, and unrelated to the topic of persecution OF, when it would more likely need to go into an article on persecution FROM, Jehovah's Witnesses. 63.113.199.109

Contents 1 Persecution By Jehovah's Witnesses 2 Persecution in Germany 3 Ernste Bibelforscher 4 Persecution in the Soviet Union 5 What's wrong with this article? 5.1 The "Link of Links" 6 Disputed section? 7 How many JW's in Concentration Camps? 8 Could not take it any longer 9 POV edits 10 corrected but dont try to hide the document 11 document words 12 you are hiding the document meaning by hiding its word 13 we are not talking about users but about documents 14 Cleanup of the Intro 15 Declaration of facts 16 About the citations in the article 17 Declaration of facts deleted without any discussion 18 rm: "declaration" box 19 Weasel words 20 Malawi 21 Persecution of/by Christians

[edit] Persecution By Jehovah's Witnesses

It's nice to see that the persecution of Jehovah's Witnesses is being faithfully documented by impartial editors however, if the persecution of Jehovah's Witnesses is to be documented then the persecution by Jehovah's Witnesses should also be documented.

For example

1/ Jehovah's Witnesses themselves who expose flaws in doctrine are persecuted by Jehovah's Witnesses.

2/ It is very hard to find any Jehovah's Witnesses being persecuted for Jesus Christ's name sake except in recent circumstances where Jehovahs Witnesses themselves have pointed out that Jesus Christ's laws and commandments are being undermined by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society and it's Governing Body. These people are being excluded (persecuted - Mt 5:11) from the organization through a formal announcement in their Kingdom Halls that; "insert name here is no longer one of Jehovah's Witnesses". This in turn fullfills the bible prophecy at Romans 9:26- "and in the place where it was said to them, ‘YOU are not my people,'"

3/ The Watchtower Quotes Web site was forced to shut down by Watchtower legal entities in Canada. It was a site which simply put short quotes from the Watchtower Publications on it's web pages. The Watchtower themselves have fought very hard for the right to talk at almost everybodies doorstep on the earth and yet fought equally as hard to stop the Watchtower Quotes Web site from publishing just small snippets of what it is they told them to say at those very same doorsteps. In this instance the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society have persecuted the owner of the Watchtower Quotes Web Site for telling the truth. The exact same kind of persecution the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society claims to receive. To fully appreciate how insidious the persecution of this courageous web site owner was, please carefully consider the following quote from the August 15th, 2005 Watchtower Magazine on page 15 paragraph 6:

"Suppose you were called to testify in court against a ruthless criminal. You know that the criminal has a powerfull organization and will use every means to prevent you from exposing him. For you to bear witness against such a criminal would require courage."

There should be plenty to publish regarding persecution by Jehovah's Witnesses.

The other side of the story should not be witheld from the Wikipedia audience.

Separate listing for "BY"

That would be a completely separate topic that would need another listing in Wikipedia. None of the above fits the article here and would come dangerously close to violating Wikipedia guidelines regarding articles regarding religious topics Airelon (talk) 21:17, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Persecution in Germany

1) It says "The Nazi government gave detained Jehovah's Witnesses the option if they were to submit to the state authority, serve in the military and renounce the Bible as "false doctrine" they would be free to go." - that seems weird, did the Nazis really ask anybody to "renounce the Bible as false doctrine" ? Wasn't it something more like "renounce their doctrines" ? Seems to me the nazis still tried to keep the appearance of being christians, or at least not anti-christian. Any sources on that (I found nothing looking rapidly through the links)

2) I read somewhere that the "German Bible Students Association" split off from the Watchtower Society when, after the war, they finally got wind of the changes that occured. If that is true (and we'd need some better sources), it'd be worth mentioning here. Flammifer 05:03, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Ernste Bibelforscher

"Ernste Bibelforscher" is a derogatory term of Jehovah's Witnesses, and they didn't accept this term. So, you can understand that Nazis hated them. 61.22.157.95 15:41, 24 August 2005 (UTC) a little something extra-the Nazis did trust the Witnesses enough though to let some of them do personal work for the soldiers such as-cutting their hair, preparing their meals for them and other things that regular Jews weren't aloud to do. so i guess my point would be that even though the Witnesses hated what the Nazis stood for and did, the Nazis still knew that they wouldn't (and didn't) do anything to hurt them.

[edit] Persecution in the Soviet Union

Jehovah's Witnesses suffered persecution also in the Soviet Union. The most interesting example is the deportation of 9,400 Jehovah's Witnesses from the Baltic States, Moldova, Belarus and Ukraine in 1951. This should be included in this article too. It seems that these also were given the option to renounce their faith to avoid the deportation. Soukie 09:33, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Yes, this should be added. Solzhenitsyn mentions meeting some Jehovah's Witnesses in 'The Gulag Archipelago' as well. Lisiate 04:39, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] What's wrong with this article?

I notice its had many tags added to it, such as NPOV and needs attention. The article, as I see it, needs to be referenced properly before it can move forward. I will attempt to do this later.. but I just wanted to open up the discussion about what we can do with this. joshbuddy 18:24, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Just was checking up on articles relating to the final solution when I came across this article. What seems very striking is the section about Nazi persecustion where the term "Jehovah's witnesses claim" appears again and again. I might have to do some digging, but I have some pictures from Dachau concentration camp which support these claims. Agathoclea 17:08, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

This is the work of a contentious editor named Central. I've reverted this, though this article does need some better referencing. joshbuddy^talk 17:11, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Well that looked like a big edit - The link to that Ewald Vorsteher is still there whose account you deleted. Seems he was not a JW in the time in question. - At least I don't have to dig through a ton of pictures now, but I just read an article on concentration camps in history today and it references JW's as well, see if I can find the ref. Agathoclea 17:59, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Joshbuddy Please stop making personal attacks on me, and learn to respect and follow Wikipedia policies regarding civility and personal attacks. Thank you. Central 10:03, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

If you are looking for an non-JW source that looks at JW in the Naziperiod. Dr Detlev Garbe [1] is your man. You might have to learn German, but no-one in Germany today doubts that JW's were persecuted - unless they belong to the minority that even doubt that Jews were killed in Conzentration Camps. Agathoclea

Agathoclea, no one doubts some were incarcerated in concentration camps, it's the details that are in dispute, i.e., the reasons, the numbers and their ability to get out if they revoked their membership to that religious sect. Specific numbers have been put in those claims on the page by JWs, which have no independent verification from respected historians. I note you and Joshbuddy have made no response to my clean up or any of my edits, you both instead just vandalised my post! If you have a specific point in an edit, then bring on your proof and independent verifiable reverences, otherwise leave it alone. Thank you. Central 09:07, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Duffer 10:13, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Very interesting site. A pity there were no references at all to check the claims, and that it is all posted on one of the most biased left-wing Zionist sites you can imagine, not exactly objective! Central 10:48, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Excuse my bad english, i wrote for it-Wiki, this is a complete documentation from holocaust Purple Triangle in Italian my nickname is Gizetasoft 151.38.176.179 08:37, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The "Link of Links"

An exhaustive list of resources in english can be found at: http://www.standfirm.de/english/publications.htm George 00:25, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Disputed section?

Who is disputing the scholarly sources cited in this article? The only people who 'dispute' the information in the article are people who have religious/doctrinal differences with JW's. This would hardly qualify them as objective or reliable in this context. I am going to remove the tag and the links to ".randytv.". A site which is definitely not based on any objective research, rather it is a smear site against JW's. George 00:25, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm not so sure about that. This seems more like revisionist history to me. The only documents about this claim seem to come from JW and are all based on a publication after 1982. Jeff Carr 10:45, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] How many JW's in Concentration Camps?

The article states that there were 10,000 in the camps with 2,000 dying, however consider the following quote from their yearbook:

"A total of 6,019 had been arrested, several two, three or even more times, so that, all together, 8,917 arrests were registered. All together they had been sentenced to serve 13,924 years and two months in prison, two and a quarter times as long as the period since Adam's creation. A total of 2,000 brothers and sisters had been put into concentration camps, where they had spent 8,078 years and six months, an average of four years. A total of 635 had died in prison, 253 had been sentenced to death and 203 of these had actually been executed. What a record of integrity!" (1974 Yearbook of Jehovah's Witnesses, p. 212)

If noone objects I will alter the articles figures. I got this information from http://corior.blogspot.com/2006/02/ghost-witnesses-in-nazi-concentration.html

It is possible that the figures quoted above were only for Germany and not for other countries where there may have been concentration camps. Theusername 17:15, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Judging by the earlier discussion I would say a) 1974 is way before an outside source took a closer look at the matter at hand. I think the book by Detlev Garbe were published late 80s early 90s - so those figures are more relevant for us. b) I believe that JW yearbooks deal with 1 country at a time. Agathoclea 18:47, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

The Yearbook of Jehovah's Witnesses does not specify those were only German victims of their sect, therefore you have no reason to assume they were. Why is it that newer sources are considered more reliable? If a source cited a lower number it would either be ignored, considered revisionism, or the article would state something contradictory like "between 500 and 4,300 are believed to have died." It seems no one can ever agree on the figures. Even the main holocaust article quotes a different figure than this article does. --Nazrac 23:48, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Could not take it any longer

My head hurts whenever I see all the Bold letters all caps and !!!!!'s. So I deleted them. The discussion has been patent nonsense anyway. George 19:14, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't know if that's necessarily helpful until any kind of mediation or dispute resolution takes place (they'll want to see the conversations). I don't really know why it's come to that, but ç·est la vie! - CobaltBlueTony 19:29, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Well the diffs are still there if needed. Agathoclea 20:20, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] POV edits

Slowly we are seeing a style improvement in the edits of Truthwanted, but nevertheless the overlong quotation of the Declaration of Facts can not be part of the article. Its implications and Pentons view of its meaning and the mainstream opposing view are already refereneced in the article anyway.

Apart from the Declaration there are just too many POV edits.

• Section title not needed as already in the In Nazi Germany (1933-1945) caption
• Article is about the persecution of JW not about their political views.
• Because of the evident hostility - JW hold conventions even when there is no hostility - I had an invitation to the one in Cardiff through the door a few weeks ago. Fact is that the convention was held dispite the ban that was already in place.
• The position in favor of the regime - Historical researchs that JW did not favour any regime - but in the declaration pointed out why they were no danger to the state and that the shared certain ideals professed by the Nazi regime. Ideals that are still held by many other countries.
• An accurate research Accurate by whose definition? Not by the definition of other historians quoted in the article.

What puzzles me most though, is why is there always a line at the top of the article. Agathoclea 22:45, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] corrected but dont try to hide the document

Ive corrected the article. please stop deleting the document Declaration of facts from the article, and stop giving an explanation to the document based on your personal research. the document speaks by itself. --Truthwanted 12:00, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

• Truthwanted- 1) No one is trying to hide information. It is already accuratly presented in the article. Johanneum 12:54, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

• Indeed, the link is there for anyone to read. They don't need your selective POV-motivated highlighting of the words which highlight your barely academic view. - CobaltBlueTony 12:56, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] document words

What I present are documents word, no opinions and no accademic views. please stop trying to hide the document and its meaning giving personal explanations. The document speaks by itself. please stop deleting the document and stop trying to vary history facts and historical documents. --Truthwanted 17:29, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

By highlighting the text that supports your opinion, you are assigning it meaning that was not intended by its authors and not accepted by most scholars and educated people, including the ones here. The document is not deleted. It is whole, intact, in the link below. You are hiding the real intent of the document by not reproducing the portions which disprove your hypothesis. - CobaltBlueTony 20:41, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

And stop logging out to try and circumvent direct communication. You are User:192.117.103.90 and we know it, rpoven by a CheckUser. - CobaltBlueTony 20:43, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] you are hiding the document meaning by hiding its word

please stop hiding the document its clear intentions and meaning. you can not invent a meaning for the document. the document speaks by itself. It seems to me that you did no read all the document along with the letter to hitler. I have all the originals in german do you want them to translate ? please stop hiding enough!!! --Truthwanted 22:01, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] we are not talking about users but about documents

we are not talking about users but about documents! please stop changing the sucject to unrilevant topics this is not relevant who writes is relevant that you do not hide the truth and the document. is relevant that people will know about history and historical facts. stop trying to show intensions that nobody had. My only concern is that people will know the simple and clear truth and will know those important documents. --Truthwanted 22:09, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Who's hiding? I'm not hiding. The simple and clear truth is that you have little to no academic support for your opinion, and do not respect the judgements of the editors here who happen not to agree with you. The declaration is RIGHT THERE!!! It is not academically faithful to add so much weight to your opinion by inflating selected texts, and not all of the document -- add the text of the WHOLE document (not gonna happen), or leave the link as the only necessary reference. - CobaltBlueTony 02:11, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cleanup of the Intro

I removed some of the hand-wringing about why JW's shouldn't be called a cult in the introduction. My edit does take into account that a) some church leaders do consider them a cult, and b) the claim is disputed. I don't think it's necessary to explain that it's unfavorable to be labeled as a cult, and the argument against that claim is NPOV for one thing and shouldn't be in the intro (or the article about persecution) for another. Icewolf34 13:39, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Declaration of facts

Is not true that the accuse made to JW that the declaration shows antisemitics tendences is unfunded. Is not true that there are "some" who think so, es rportend in the words of one researcher. This confuse the readers and let them think this is the true. There are two different opinions, from what I know there are only JW and "some" others that do not accept the view supported by Dr. Penton that JW showed antisemitic tendences and so on. We do not have ufficial numbers of how many support this or the other opinion, so the best thing to do is to report the two opinions, and let the readers read THE WORDS IN THE DECLARATIONS OF JW more than that we have the moral obblige to give the possibility to read THE ENTIRE DOCUMENTS. Just for witnessing: till today all the people I speak with unless JW supported the view of Dr. Penton reaearch and of other accademic researcher of the sme tipe.

To explain the two views, and to present the documents is the better thing to do. --Truthwanted 12:07, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] About the citations in the article

If the citations in the article bother someone I am sorry but those are the article words. to mantain the context are cited paragraphs and not frases. The citations in the article help the reader to understand the kind of document we are talking about, every reader can go on and read the entire document. If someone thinks the citations do not rappresent his view of the document, why do not propose citations he thinks also rappresent the document?. The citations in the article are STRONG UNUSUAL AND CLEAR and are only SOME of their kind in the document, is important for the readers to know that such words are written in that document and are topic of INTENATIONAL DISCUSSION! If any of you prefer, I also propose to make a subject: THE DISCUSSED CITATIONS IN THE DECLARARION OF FACTS.

I am trying to be the more flexible as possible, everytime I come out with a new Idea so that every editor here will agree. BUT PLEASE STOP DELETING THE HISTORY FACTS AND THE HISTORICAL DOCUMENT HERE REPORTED. IS NOT GOOD TO HIDE THE TRUTH! and we all here are trying to contribiute to an encyclopedia. --Truthwanted 12:28, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

We are - you are looking for WikiQuote. Agathoclea 15:08, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Under "Declaration of Facts" this statement is made: "Some have accused Witness leadership of attempts to cover up this history. However, Witnesses have candidly discussed these issues. [7]" This footnote links to a Watchtower.org page that is no longer there. Just wanted to point that out. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.3.26.47 (talk) 17:29, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Declaration of facts deleted without any discussion

I inserted a part about the declaration of facts and widely explained why. This part has been deleted without any discussion so I restored. --Truthwanted 16:57, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

It has been discussed ad nauseum. Agathoclea 20:44, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Is not here reported any discussion about the part added in 29-7-06 so I have to restore the part. PLEASE STOP VANDALISM AND DO NOT DELETE PARTS FROM THE ARTICLE WITHOUT DISCUSSION --Truthwanted 13:39, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

The parts added are essentially the same and therefore have already been addressed by the other editors involved. Since there is no agreement, do you want to engage in third-party mediation or arbitration? - CobaltBlueTony 14:16, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

This is not true, the last time I added that there are two views and is imprtant to present both of them, IS COMPLETELY DIFFERENT FROM WHAT WAS PREVIOUSLY ADDED. this is not true also that I do not respect others views because I left the explanation of that view, the reality is that there are people here WHO do not respect the view I presented and THEY REPEATEDLY DELETE IT!!!, I HAVE RESPECTED OTHERS VIEW AND I DID NOT DELETE NOTHING. I ALREADY ASKED FOR MEDIATION, REPEATEDLY. no answer till now. PLEASE RESPECT THE VIEW I PRESENT BASED ON ACCADEMIC AND WELL KNOWN RESEARCHES AS I RESPECT OTHERS VIEWS. --Truthwanted 20:29, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

• I've edited the daylights out of it to make it more conforming to Wikipedia's standards, and to correct POV and misstatements. Hopefully this makes more sense to you. - CobaltBlueTony 21:04, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] rm: "declaration" box

This is garish and unencyclopedic. Boxes are for highlighting important quotes and bulleted lists and the like, not (poorly rendered) representations of documents. This translation belongs on the image page of a scan of one of these documents, if anybody has one. im saving it here in case one emerges. --PopeFauveXXIII 08:21, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Translation of Declaration That the SS Tried to Force Witnesses to Sign

Concentration camp .......................................
Department II

DECLARATION

I, the ...................................................
born on ..................................................
in .......................................................
herewith make the following declaration:

1. I have come to know that the International Bible Students Association is proclaiming erroneous teachings and under the cloak of religion follows hostile purposes against the State.
2. I therefore left the organization entirely and made myself absolutely free from the teachings of this sect.
3. I herewith give assurance that I will never again take any part in the activity of the International Bible Students Association. Any persons approaching me with the teaching of the Bible Students, or who in any manner reveal their connections with them, I will denounce immediately. All literature from the Bible Students that should be sent to my address I will at once deliver to the nearest police station.
4. I will in the future esteem the laws of the State, especially in the event of war will I, with weapon in hand, defend the fatherland, and join in every way the community of the people.
5. I have been informed that I will at once be taken again into protective custody if I should act against the declaration given today.

.................................., Dated ................
...........................................................
Signature

(Quoted from Jehovah's Witnesses--Proclaimers of God's Kingdom (1993), Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania, p. 661. Original.)

• Fair enough - I think we probably edited over each other. Your marking it as a minor change was the thing that most intrigued me and forced me to revert in the first instance. Cheers!--VS ^talk 08:48, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

problem solved, i found an image of the document online and converted it to a jpg so it qualifies as PD-Nazi. --PopeFauveXXIII 08:55, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Weasel words

I found some weasel wording in this article. For instance, consider this: "The savagery of the attackers in Malawi was such that thousands of Witnesses of all ages and both sexes were physically brutalized by police and citizens alike." Admiral Norton 20:46, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Malawi

The statement: "The savagery of the attackers in Malawi was such that thousands of Witnesses of all ages and both sexes were physically brutalized by police and citizens alike." Most of the sentence is redundant. After removing the redundant parts, what remains is "Thousands of Witnesses in Malawi were physically brutalized by police and citizens." The section should be expanded or deleted.--Jeffro77 (talk) 08:08, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Persecution of/by Christians

Some of the material on this article, as well as some that was previously removed, should probably be at Persecution of Christians#Persecution of Christians by Christians. Specifically, the anti-Catholic sentiments expressed by JWs, particularly early in their history, as well as actions taken by Catholics against JWs, such as mob violence during bans etc.