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    14. Chapter 11. Point of Decision

    Crisis of Conscience (1983)

    Crisis of Conscience

    Chapter 11. Point of Decision

    But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things.

    — Philippians 3:7-8 New International Version.

    BY THE end of 1979 I had arrived at my personal crossroads. I had spent nearly forty years as a full-time representative, serving at every level of the organizational structure. The last fifteen years I had spent at the international headquarters and the final nine of those as a member of the worldwide Governing Body of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

    It was those final years that were the crucial period for me. Illusion there met up with reality. I have since come to appreciate the rightness of a quotation I recently read, one made by a statesman, now dead, who said:

    The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie—deliberate, contrived and dishonest—but the myth—persistent, persuasive and unrealistic.

    I now began to realize how large a measure of what I had based my entire adult life course on was just that, a myth—“persistent, persuasive and unrealistic.” It was not that my view toward the Bible had changed. If anything, my appreciation of it was enhanced by what I experienced. It alone gave sense and meaning to what I saw happening, the attitudes I saw displayed, the reasoning I heard advanced, the tension and pressure I felt. The change that did come was from the realization that my way of looking at the Scriptures had been from such an essentially sectarian viewpoint, a trap that I thought I had been protected against. Letting the Scriptures speak for themselves—without being first funneled through some fallible human agency as a “channel”—I found they became immensely more meaningful. I was frankly astonished at how much of their import I had been missing.

    The question was, what should I now do? My years on the Governing Body, the things I heard said in and out of sessions, the basic spirit I saw displayed, steadily brought me to the awareness that, as regards the organization, the ‘wineskin had grown old,’ had lost whatever flexibility it might have had, and that it was stiffening its resistance to any Scriptural correction either as to doctrinal beliefs or its methods of dealing with those who looked to it for guidance.1 I felt, and still feel, that there were many good men on the Governing Body. In a long-distance phone call, a former Witness said to me, “We have been followers of followers.” Another said, “We have been victims of victims.” I think both statements are true. Charles Taze Russell followed the views of certain men of his time, was victimized by some of the myths they propagated as “revealed truth.” Each successive part of the organizational leadership has followed along, at times contributing additional myth in support of, or in elaboration of, the original myth. In place of rancor, I feel only compassion for those men I know, for I too was such a “victim of victims,” a “follower of followers.”

    Though each year on the Governing Body, particularly from 1976 onward, became increasingly difficult and more stressful for me, I clung to the hope that things would improve. In time I was obliged to recognize that was a hope which the evidence did not support.

    I was not opposed to authority. I was opposed to the extremes to which it was carried. I could not believe that God ever purposed for men to exercise such all-pervading authoritarian control over the lives of fellow members of the Christian congregation. My understanding was that Christ grants authority in his congregation only to serve, never to dominate.2

    Similarly, I did not object to “organization” in the sense of an orderly arrangement, for I understood the Christian congregation itself to involve such an orderly arrangement.3 But I believed that, whatever the arrangement, its purpose and function, its very existence, was only as an aid for the brothers; it was there to serve their interests, not the other way around. Whatever the arrangement, it was to build men and women up so that they would not be spiritual babes, dependent on men or on an institutionalized system, but able to act as full-grown, mature Christians. It was not to train them to be simply conformists to a set of organizational rules and regulations, but to help them to become persons “having their perceptive powers trained to distinguish both right and wrong.”4 Whatever arrangement there was, it must contribute toward a genuine sense of brotherhood, with the freeness of speech and mutual confidence true brotherhood brings—not a society composed of the few who are the governors and the many who are the governed. And finally, whatever the arrangement, the way to ‘take the lead’ therein must be by example, by holding firmly to the Word of God, passing on and inculcating the instructions of the Master the way he gave them, not “adjusting” these to fit what seemed to be in the interests of a humanly created organization, not by ‘making people feel the weight of one’s authority’ in the way the great men of the world do.5 It must result in the exaltation of Christ Jesus as the Head, never in the exaltation of an earthly authority structure and its officers. As it was, I felt that the role of Christ Jesus as active Head was overshadowed and virtually eclipsed by the authoritarian conduct and constant self-commendation and self-praise of the organization.

    Furthermore, I did not deny the value and need for teaching. But I could not accept that organizational interpretations, based on shifting human reasoning, could ever be made equal in authority to the actual statements found in God’s unchangeable Word. The great importance given to traditional views, the bending and slanting of God’s Word to accommodate it to those views, and the inconsistencies that resulted in double standards were a source of serious emotional upset to me. What I found unacceptable was, not teaching, but dogmatism.

    The convictions I held I tried to reflect during my years of service on the Governing Body. From the beginning I found that this brought me difficulty, animosity. In the end it brought rejection, expulsion.

    In the autumn of 1979, I had an assignment to go on a “zone visit” to certain branch offices in West Africa. Some were in countries where the government had placed an official ban on the activity of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Knowing how easily something could happen that might result in my being detained, possibly imprisoned, I felt an obligation to discuss some of my concerns with my wife. (In view of her previous health problems, including a blood condition that nearly caused her death in 1969, I felt it best to make the trip alone.) Though she could not help but be aware of the emotional strain I felt, I had never discussed with her the actual circumstances that produced that strain, what the real issues were that affected me. I had not felt free to do so. Now I felt not only that it was proper but that I had an obligation to consider with her what I had become aware of, particularly in the light of the Scriptures. How could I let men hold me back from discussing with my own wife truths that I saw in the Word of God?

    By that time we concluded that the advisable course for us was to terminate our activity at the international headquarters. We felt that our peace of mind and heart, as well as our physical health, required it. We also had faint hopes that it might yet be possible to have a child and we had, in fact, talked to two doctors about this, including one of the staff doctors, Dr. Carlton, on a confidential basis.6 I was fifty-seven and I knew that it would be very difficult to find secular employment due to that factor. But I trusted that somehow things would work out.

    The decision was not easy. I felt torn between two desires. On the one hand, I felt that by remaining on the Body at least I could speak up on behalf of others’ interests, on behalf of the truth of the Scriptures, on behalf of moderation and balance, even though my voice was heard with irritation or ignored. I sensed that the time-span in which I could do that was rapidly shortening, that whatever voice I had in Governing Body discussions would soon be shut out, silenced. The desire to be free from the suspicious atmosphere I saw developing, to be free from participation in an authority structure I could not Scripturally defend and decisions I could not morally condone, weighed equally heavy with me.

    Former hotels now owned by Watch Tower

    Personal room at headquarters

    If security and comfort were my aim, I certainly would have opted for staying where I was, for all our physical needs would have been provided us as part of the headquarters staff. Our long years of “seniority” would give us the choice of some of the better rooms that periodically became available in the Society’s many large buildings.7 Our vacation time would increase to the equivalent of some six weeks a year and, because of being a Governing Body member, it would always be possible to combine this with speaking engagements that carried one to points all over the United States and Canada, or with zone visits that took one to points all over the earth. (Governing Body members can regularly take their vacations in places the average person could only afford to dream about.) In 1978, my wife and I found ourselves boarding planes over fifty times in that one year, and over the years we had traveled to Central and South America, Asia, Europe, Africa and the Middle East.

    If prestige or prominence were what was sought, I could not reasonably have asked for more. I was already declining, on a monthly basis, about three or four invitations for speaking engagements for every one that I accepted. Internationally, if traveling to Paris, Athens, Madrid, Lisbon, Mexico City, Sao Paulo, or almost any other major city, it was only necessary to advise the Branch Office and a meeting would be arranged to which thousands of Jehovah’s Witnesses would flock. It became almost commonplace to address audiences ranging in size anywhere from five thousand up to thirty thousand persons. Practically anywhere a Governing Body member goes he is the guest of honor among his fellow Witnesses.8

    Speaking in Madrid

    As for the Governing Body itself, it was quite evident to me that esteem from one’s peers on the Body could be assured simply by regularly voicing total support for the organization and, with rare exceptions, by noting which way the majority inclined in discussions and speaking and voting that way. I am not being cynical in saying this. Those few others on the Body who on occasion felt compelled to voice conscientious objections to certain traditional positions, policies or teachings, know—even if they do not express it—that this is so.

    Even as it was, I had been assigned to membership on what might be called two of the more influential Governing Body committees, the Writing Committee and the Service Committee. The Writing Committee saw fit to assign me to oversee the development (not to do the actual writing thereof) of a number of publications printed eventually in many languages in the millions of copies.9

    The “formula,” if it may be called that, for maintaining a position of prominence in the organization was easily discernible. But I could not find it conscientiously acceptable.

    I would have had to have been blind not to have seen that my expressions on certain issues, motivated by what I felt were clear Scriptural principles, did not please many on the Body. There were times when I went to Governing Body sessions having decided simply not to speak rather than see animosity build. But when issues arose that could seriously affect the lives of people, I found I could not hold back from making some expression. I would have felt guilty not to have done so. I had no illusions that what I said would carry particular weight—in fact I knew from experience that it would more probably only make my own situation more difficult, more precarious. But I felt that if I did not stand for something, for certain principles that I felt were crucial to Christianity, then there was no purpose in being there, for that matter, not much real purpose in life.

    It has been mentioned that from about 1978 onward a changed climate began to manifest itself in the Body. The initial euphoria that accompanied the dramatic change in the administration had faded. The spirit of brotherly “comradeship” that seemed to prevail for a time, along with its accompanying expressions of moderation, greater flexibility in viewpoint, had also noticeably diminished. The members had settled into their respective positions on the various Committees and after a time there seemed to be some “muscle flexing” shown on the part of certain ones. Fairly discernible lines began to be evident within the membership, so that it was often not difficult to foresee what the vote was likely to be on an issue.

    If for example, the hands of Milton Henschel, Fred Franz, Ted Jaracz and Lloyd Barry went up, one could generally be sure that the hands of Carey Barber, Martin Poetzinger, William Jackson, George Gangas, Grant Suiter and Jack Barr would go up as well. If the hands of the former stayed down, the hands of the latter would generally stay down also. Some others would likely vote with these but their vote was not as predictable. With rare exceptions, this pattern prevailed.

    The pattern held particularly true if any traditional policy or position was under discussion. One could know beforehand those members who would almost certainly vote in favor of maintaining that traditional policy and against any change therein. Even in the case of the “alternative service” issue, already discussed in a previous chapter, though here outnumbered, these members were still able to prevent a two-thirds majority vote from altering the position on that issue.

    In certain controversial cases there seemed to be at least some evidence of “lobbying” on the part of some members. I felt that if anyone wanted to present information apart from the actual session, the better way was to put it in writing and submit copies to all members. Then at least everyone heard the same thing and, in effect, the ‘cards were all on the table.’ But such written submissions were usually quite rare and, when made, were seldom discussed to any extent.

    The Governing Body session of November 14, 1979, was, I believe, a precursor of the traumatic events that violently shook the headquarters in the spring of 1980, resulting in a number of members of the staff being disfellowshipped for “apostasy,” and also my own resignation from the Body and from the headquarters staff.

    That day we handled four minor issues; each motion carried unanimously. Any sense of harmony that might have existed was quickly broken by a jarring note, however. Grant Suiter said he wished to bring up a matter about which he stated there was “considerable gossip.” He said that he had heard reports that some members of the Governing Body and the Writing Department had given talks in which they made comments not in accord with Society teaching and that this was causing confusion. He had also heard, he said, that within the headquarters family staff some were making expressions such as, “When King Saul dies then things will change.”10

    I had never heard anyone in the headquarters family make such a remark. Grant Suiter did not say where he obtained his information or who was the source of the “gossip” he referred to, but he became very intense and both his words and facial expressions reflected strong and heated emotion. And, for the first time, the term “apostasy” surfaced in a Governing Body session.

    Considerable discussion followed, with most members indicating they were hearing such things for the first time. In my own expression, I stated that I had given talks all over the United States and in many countries and that in not one of them had I ever made statements contradicting published teachings of the organization. It was rare that talks by a Governing Body member would not be taped by at least someone and, had anything out of line been said, the evidence would be there. In that case, I pointed out, the Body would surely not have to rely on rumor to know about it, for someone would certainly write in about it, asking questions. I asked if Grant Suiter knew personally of any such case on the part of any member of the Body or of the Writing Department? His comment was simply that ‘these matters were being talked about,’ and that some Branch Committee members attending seminars at the headquarters had said they were “confused” because they had heard some conflicting views from those conducting classes.

    The decision was that the Teaching Committee (which had oversight of the seminars) should investigate. At a later session, they reported that they had found no evidence of the things spoken of, that the only “confusion” among the Branch men was about a point developed in a class conducted by Governing Body member Carey Barber. He dealt with Christ’s kingdom having commenced in 33 C.E. upon his ascension to heaven and some had difficulty in reconciling this with the teaching about 1914.11 The resolution of the matter was an agreement that all Governing Body members would exercise care when speaking on assignments; it was clearly stated in the session, however, that this did not imply any attempt to control private conversations by the members, as among personal friends. This latter stand did not hold up under test.

    I found the discussion significant. Although Grant Suiter had not indicated knowing of any case where a Governing Body member had, when on assignment, made comments contrary to published teachings, I knew that some could have been cited. The Body had already considered the occasion of Albert Schroeder’s visit to some European branches and his advancing the view that the expression “this generation” might have a meaning different from the published one. Word had reached us about this from more than one place. It was also known that the president, Fred Franz, had introduced a new view regarding the “keys of the kingdom” (referred to at Matthew, chapter sixteen, verse 19) when teaching certain classes in the Gilead School, a view that contradicted published teachings of the organization. This had been done without previous consultation with the Body and the view was presented, not as a suggestion, but as the correct view.12 Entire classes of Gilead graduates went to their assignments with this new view that none of the rest of the brotherhood had even heard about.

    None of these cases were brought up in the Governing Body session, however, and I felt no inclination to do so.13 But I sensed that a definite undercurrent was running that sooner or later would come into the open. And I had no doubt that when it did its force would be directed, not against any such persons, but against myself and, outside the Body, Edward Dunlap.

    Due to the sentiment that I could discern on the part of several members, I had already been weighing the advisability of resigning from the Service Committee, thus limiting my participation in committee membership to just the Writing Committee. One day in conversation with Robert Wallen, who acted as secretary for the Service Committee (not himself a Governing Body member), I mentioned that I had about decided to drop off that committee.14 His response was, “You can’t do that. There has to be some balance on the committee.” He urged me to change my mind.

    However, the same adverse sentiment expressed in the November 14, 1979, session, surfaced in another session and, as I had thought, I now came in for specific mention. In the course of the session, Lloyd Barry, who had the responsibility of seeing that each issue of the Watchtower magazine was put together and ready for publishing, voiced strong concern over the fact that I had not placed my initials on a considerable number (he gave the number) of Watchtower articles circulated in the Writing Committee. (Each article due to be published was first circulated among the five committee members and their initials written at the top indicated approval.) While not understanding his reason for bringing the matter up in a full session, rather than speaking first to me privately or at a Writing Committee meeting, I acknowledged that what he stated was true. (I was actually surprised to hear the exact number of articles I had not signed since I had kept no count; he had.)

    I explained that I had not signed in those cases simply because I could not do so conscientiously. At the same time I had made no effort whatsoever to impede the publication of the particular articles (some of them being articles written by the president on the prophecy of Jeremiah and laying much stress on the ‘prophetic role’ of the organization and on certain dates, such as 1914 and 1919), nor had I made any effort to create an issue of the matter. The absence of my initials represented abstention, not opposition. I stated before the entire Body that if this was viewed as a problem, if having someone refrain from signing for conscientious reasons was viewed as undesirable, then there was a simple solution. They could appoint someone else to serve on the Writing Committee who would not feel such conscientious restraint about approving material. I mentioned at that time my thoughts about resigning from the Service Committee so as to spend more time contributing to the needs of the Writing Department. So I placed the matter in their hands and made it clear that whatever disposition they chose to make would be acceptable to me.

    After the session, Lyman Swingle, then the Coordinator of both the Writing Committee and the Writing Department, spoke to me in his office and said: “You can’t do that to me. If they decide on their own to replace you on the Writing Committee, all right. But don’t you offer to resign.” He spoke with considerable force. I told him I was simply leaving it up to the Body, but that I was tired of controversy and would be happy for anything that would lessen some of the strain I felt. He repeated his urging.

    The Body made no change in my assignment.

    Nonetheless I had a strong presentiment of trouble brewing. But I had no way of knowing that within six months I would find myself in the midst of a storm of near fanatical intensity, with the Governing Body reacting with harsh measures to what it viewed as a “conspiracy” of serious proportions, one that threatened the very heart of the organization. Consider, now, what this “dangerous conspiracy” actually was, just how “massive” its proportions were, how great the “criminality” of those involved was, what the justification was for the state of “siege mentality” that developed within the organization and which continues to this day, the events that led up to the “purge” in the spring of 1980.

    The day before I took off for Paris on the first leg of my trip to West Africa (November 16, 1979), the Society’s president, Fred Franz, was presiding at the morning Bible text discussion (that being his week to serve as chairman). In his comments, he stated that some were questioning the Society’s position (set forth in a recent Watchtower) that Jesus Christ is the mediator only for the “anointed” ones and not for the other millions of Jehovah’s Witnesses.15 He said of such ones:

    They would merge everyone together and make Jesus Christ the mediator for every Tom, Dick and Harry.

    I could not help but think of all the Toms and Dicks and Harrys there present in the headquarters family and wondered how those words would sound to them. I knew that there was considerable discussion within the family on this subject, some of it definitely unfavorable.

    The president went on to affirm that the Society’s teaching was right. The one text he referred to in Scripture was Hebrews, chapter twelve, and the words:

    It is for discipline you are enduring. God is dealing with you as sons. For what son is he that a father does not discipline? But if you are without the discipline of which all have become partakers, you are really illegitimate children, not sons.

    He then gave the illustration of a horse whose master uses discipline to teach it to walk around in a circle and he stated, “Sometimes it may take a few lashes with the whip to get it to do this.” He urged anyone who had doubts about the Society’s teaching on this point to hold on, take the discipline and “show that he has the guts to stick with it!”16

    That evening I took off for Paris but for days I felt sickened, not merely by these words, but by the whole approach and spirit I had been witness to for the last few years. For me it was evident from Scripture that Jesus Christ did offer his mediation to bring about reconciliation with God for every Tom, Dick and Harry and that his laying down his life for all persons, his providing the ransom sacrifice and making its benefits available to any and all who might choose to accept them, was the very opposite of the attitude expressed in that headquarters discussion. It seemed that we were hearing “a different good news,” not the good news as it was presented by the inspired writers of the first century.

    In Africa, the next-to-the-last country I visited was Mali. Most of the missionaries there were French nationals. After working my way through a presentation in French of some points I was covering with missionaries in each country, I asked if they had any questions. The second question presented was, “The Watchtower says that Jesus is the mediator only for the anointed, not for the rest of us. Can you clear this up for us? Not even in prayer is he our mediator?”

    If it had been my interest to sow doubts, this would have been an obvious opportunity. Instead I tried to calm them, pointing to the First Letter of John, chapter two, verse 1, which speaks of Jesus as the “Helper” of those for whom he is a “propitiatory sacrifice for sins,” including those of “the whole world.” I said that even if they were not to think of Jesus as their Mediator, they could surely think of him as their Helper. And, that of one thing they could be sure: that his interest in them was as great as his interest in any other persons on earth.

    “Witnessing” in Africa

    I felt that I had managed to keep the matter from becoming a serious issue with them, and I had said nothing that in any way placed in question the Watchtower’s statements.

    However, a few days later, on going to the airport to depart for Senegal, the missionaries came out to see me off. One of the women missionaries approached and asked me, “But not even in prayer is Jesus our mediator?” I could do nothing but repeat and reemphasize basically the same points I had presented earlier in their missionary home meeting.

    Locomotive of derailed train.

    I returned to Brooklyn after about three weeks, the only difficulty encountered in Africa being the derailment of the train on which I was making a twenty-hour, overnight trip from Ouagadougou, Upper Volta, to Abidjan in the Ivory Coast.

    Upon my return, the following morning at the breakfast table a visiting Branch Committee member and his wife were seated next to me. Breakfast had barely begun when the wife wanted to know if she could ask me a question. I replied, “You can ask it. I don’t know if I can answer it.” She said that the previous night they had attended the study of a Watchtower dealing with the mediatorship of Christ, and she then asked virtually the same question that the French missionary in Mali had asked. I gave the same answer.

    That weekend, I went to New Jersey on a speaking assignment and following the talk a woman in the audience came up (an active Witness) and said she had some questions. There were three questions and the second was about Christ’s mediatorship. Once again I gave the same response.

    These incidents are cited because they represent my standard practice when questions arose from such persons, questions involving published teachings of the organization. Any question as to the Scriptural backing for the organization’s teachings that I myself had, I discussed only with personal acquaintances of long association, every one of them (in the case of men) being elders. Up until 1980, aside from my wife I do not believe there were more than four or five persons on earth who knew to any real extent the concerns I had, and none of these knew all the reasons that caused these concerns. It would have taken a book such as this for them to have known that.

    I had not the slightest doubt, however, that many, many others among Jehovah’s Witnesses had a number of the same concerns that I did.17 From my years on the Governing Body I saw no evidence that those concerns would be frankly faced or given the consideration they merited by means of careful, thorough research of the Scriptures, and decided, not on the basis of traditional views long held, but on the basis of the Biblical proof or lack of it.

    The evidence pointed instead to the conclusion that any open discussion of these difficulties was viewed as a great danger to the organization, as disloyal to its interests. Unity (actually uniformity) was apparently counted more important than truth. Questions about organizational teachings could be discussed within the inner circle of the Governing Body but nowhere else. No matter how heated the debate on an issue within that inner circle, the Body must present a face of unanimity toward all those on the outside, even though such “face” actually masked serious disagreement on the point in question.

    I found nothing in the Scriptures to justify this pretense, for those Scriptures commended themselves as truthful by their very frankness, openness and candor in acknowledging the differences existing among early Christians, including apostles and elders. More importantly I found nothing in Scripture to justify the restricting of discussion to such a secretive, closed society of men, whose two-thirds majority decisions must then be accepted by all Christians as “revealed truth.” I did not believe that truth had anything to fear from open discussion, any reason to hide from careful scrutiny. Any teaching that had to be shielded from such investigation did not deserve to be upheld.

    From the time of the writing of the reference work called Aid to Bible Understanding, I had had close association with Edward Dunlap. I first met him in 1964 when attending a ten-month course at Gilead School. He was then the Registrar of the School and one of its four instructors. Our class (the 39th) was composed of about one hundred persons, the majority of them men from Branch Offices. It can be truthfully stated that most of them considered Dunlap’s classes by far the most instructive as regards gaining understanding of the Scriptures.18 Originally from Oklahoma, of somewhat rough-hewn appearance, Ed was of ordinary education but had the ability to take very difficult, complex subjects and put them in understandable language, whether it was the functions of the Mosaic Law or a scientific study of genetics. However, more important to me was his unpretentiousness. Aside from a penchant for loud ties, he was a basically low-key, low-profile person, in appearance, demeanor and speech. No matter what responsibility was assigned him, he stayed the same person.

    One incident that typified for me his personality was a remark he made to me in connection with a semestral exam. We were going through the various letters of Paul in our classes and each week there was an exam on points studied. Among the points there were generally questions about the likely time and place of writing for each letter. Taken one letter at a time this was not difficult to remember. But when time came for exams at the end of the semester, I realized that now we would have ALL the thirteen Pauline letters involved, and how to remember the different suggested times and places of writing posed a fair-sized problem. They followed no chronological order in the Bible canon. I worked for a long time at it and finally came up with a mental system for recalling these.

    The exam came, with a two-hour period for completing it. I finished somewhat early and on leaving the classroom I met Ed coming in. He asked, “How was it?” I replied, “Oh, it wasn’t bad. But I’ll never forgive you.” He asked what I meant. I said, “I worked and worked and worked to develop a system for remembering the times and places of writing of each letter and then you didn’t ask a single question on that.” Taking my remark somewhat more seriously than it was intended, he said, “You know the reason I don’t put questions on that in the semester exams? I can’t keep that stuff in mind myself.” There were four instructors for the school, Ulysses Glass, Bill Wilkinson, Fred Rusk and Ed Dunlap. I think it is fair to say that of the four only Ed would have made the reply he did. It was typical of his unassuming personality.

    Edward Dunlap

    He had always been thoroughly devoted to the organization; his full-time service record equaled mine in length. Another circumstance that tells something about him relates to an illness he developed in the late 1960s. Commonly called tic douloureux (a French term meaning “painful spasm”), the medical name for it is trigeminal neuralgia, the inflammation of a large, three-branched facial nerve that produces one of the most painful ailments known to humans. The stabbing, blinding pain can be provoked by anything, a slight breeze, a touch, anything that excites the nerve, and as the ailment worsens the victim can hardly do such ordinary things as comb his hair, brush his teeth, or eat, without risking an attack. Some so afflicted are driven to suicide.

    Ed suffered with this for seven years, having some temporary remissions and then worsening. During this time, the president, Nathan Knorr, somehow acquired the opinion (based perhaps on others’ comments) that this was something emotional on Ed’s part, not genuinely of physical origin. One day he talked with Ed, questioning him about his married life and other matters in relation to this ailment. Ed assured him that that had absolutely nothing to do with the problem, that he could be thoroughly enjoying himself on vacation and yet the attacks could strike without warning. The president did not give any weight to Ed’s explanation, however, and informed him that he had decided to send him over to the factory for a while to give him more exercise. He was to work in the bindery department.

    Ed was then in his sixties, for some time had been taking strong medication prescribed by the staff doctor designed to suppress the painful attacks, at times had been bedridden for days or a week with the ailment. But he was now sent to the bindery and was there assigned to feed a machine on the bindery line. He did this for months and quietly endeavored to make the best of this “theocratic” assignment. But as he confided to me, it made him realize for the first time the absolute control the organization exercised over his life. His attempts at explaining were ignored and, contrary to all good sense, he was placed in the least desirable situation for one with that kind of ailment.

    It was some years later, when he was at the point of absolute despair, that he learned of a neurosurgeon in Pittsburgh who believed he had discovered the cause of this age-old ailment and had perfected microsurgery to remedy it. Ed had the operation (involving the removal of a portion of the skull and remedial operation in connection with the main artery to the brain, which artery runs parallel to the inflamed nerve). He was thus finally cured. He expected no apology from the organization for its serious error in judgment in its viewing and handling of his agonizing problem. He received none.

    Since our places of work, both during the Aid project and thereafter, were never more than an office apart, we conversed regularly, sharing with each other any interesting items we came across in research. The Writing Committee of the Governing Body assigned us to work together on a number of projects, such as the Commentary on the Letter of James. In our conversations we did not always agree on all points, but this did not affect our friendship or mutual respect.

    I mention all this because Edward Dunlap was one of the few persons who knew how deep my concerns ran as to what I saw in the organization and particularly within the Governing Body. He shared that concern. Like myself, he did so because he could not harmonize much of what he saw, heard and read with Scripture.

    Though associated with the organization since the early 1930s, during most of that association he did not count himself as among the “anointed.” I was talking to him about this one day in the late 1970s, and he related that when he began associating in the 1930s the Watch Tower then taught that there were two classes who would inherit heavenly life: the “elect” (composed of the 144,000) and the “great company” (or “great crowd” of Revelation chapter seven). The “great company” were said to be Christians of lesser faith than the elect and hence, though likewise destined for heavenly life, the “great company” would not be among those who would reign with Christ as kings and priests. Since, of the two classes, one was clearly superior and the other inferior, Ed typically assumed that he must be of the inferior class, the “great company.”

    Came 1935 and Judge Rutherford, at the Washington D.C., assembly, announced the “revealed truth” that those of the “great company” were Scripturally destined to live, not in heaven, but on earth. As Ed stated, he had always had the hope of heavenly life, felt there could be nothing more wonderful than to serve in the presence of God and in company with his Son. But because of the announced change in organizational viewpoint, he subdued those hopes and accepted what he was told should be his hope as part of the “great company.”

    It was not until 1979 that he clearly arrived at the decision that no human organization could change the invitation found in Scripture, as by setting a date for a change in the hope the Bible presented as open to any person embracing that hope, whether his name was Tom, Dick, Harry, or Ed. So, forty-four years after 1935 he began to partake of the emblems, the bread and the wine, at the Lord’s Evening Meal, something only the “anointed” among Jehovah’s Witnesses do.

    When a Witness or any one else asks, “How does one know whether he or she is of the ‘anointed’ class with heavenly hopes?” the standard response is to refer to Paul’s statement at Romans 8:16-17:

    The spirit itself bears witness with our spirit that we are God’s children. If, then, we are children, we are also heirs, heirs indeed of God, but joint heirs with Christ, provided we suffer together that we may also be glorified together.

    The official teaching has been, and is, that only those of the 144,000 “anointed” can have such ‘witness of the spirit,’ and that this would tell them that they were of the select group of 144,000 who alone could hope for heavenly life. All others could only be classed as “prospective” children of God and their hopes must be earthly.

    In reading the context, from the very start of the chapter, it was evident to Ed that the apostle Paul was indeed writing about two classes. But not two classes divided by their hope of either heavenly or earthly life in the future.

    The two classes instead clearly were: those guided by God’s spirit, on the one hand, and those ruled by the sinful flesh, on the other.

    The contrast the apostle set forth was not between hope of life in heaven or of life on earth, but between life and death themselves, between friendship with God or enmity with God. As verses at Romans 8:6-9 state:

    For the minding of the flesh means death, but the minding of the spirit means life and peace; because the minding of the flesh means enmity with God, for it is not under subjection to God, nor, in fact can it be. So those who are in harmony with the flesh cannot please God.

    However, you are in harmony, not with the flesh, but with the spirit, if God’s spirit truly dwells in you. But if anyone does not have Christ’s spirit, this one does not belong to him.

    There was no question about heavenly or earthly life in Paul’s discussion but simply whether one was living by God’s spirit or was instead living according to the sinful flesh. Paul made it clear that it was one thing or the other: Either one had God’s spirit and produced its fruitage or he was at enmity with God and did not belong to Christ. Without that spirit there could be no “life and peace,” only death. If the person did have God’s spirit, then he was a son of God, for Paul states (verse 14):

    For all who are led by God’s spirit, these are God’s sons.19

    As Ed noted, Paul says, not some, but “ALL who are led by God’s spirit” are his sons, his children. Those led by that spirit would have the “witness” of the spirit to that effect, including the evidence of its fruitage in their lives, somewhat similar to the way the Bible says that Abel, Enoch, Noah and others had “witness borne to them” that they were pleasing to God.20

    The relevance of these points will become evident as later developments are considered.

    Suffice it to say here, that Ed Dunlap shared with me the same basic concerns and particularly the concern over the dogmatism and authoritarian spirit being manifested. His view, like mine, was that human authority, when pushed beyond its proper limits, inevitably detracts from the role of Christ Jesus as Head of the congregation.

    Not long after my return from Africa, a longtime friend came by our room at the headquarters. His name was René Vázquez and I had known him for about thirty years. I had first met him in Puerto Rico, in the town of Mayagüez where he lived with his father, who had remarried. René was then a high school student in his teens. Both his father and his father’s wife strongly opposed René’s studying with Jehovah’s Witnesses. Their opposition became so intense that one evening, after having studied at the home of some Witness missionaries, René felt he could not endure any more. He spent the night on a park bench in a public plaza. The following morning he went to the home of an uncle and aunt and asked to be allowed to live with them, to which they agreed. Though not in favor of Jehovah’s Witnesses, they were tolerant people. Upon graduation from high school, René immediately took up full time “pioneer service.”

    Attending an assembly in New York in 1953, he decided to remain in the United States, married, and he and his wife “pioneered” together. They were invited into traveling work among Spanish congregations in the western United States, later attended Gilead School and were sent to Spain. René was soon assigned as District Overseer in that country. The work of Jehovah’s Witnesses was under official ban and he and his wife traveled all over Spain, having to be on constant watch for the police and conscious of the danger of being discovered and arrested or deported. All meetings held were clandestine. After years of such “underground” activity, René’s nerves had worn thin to the point of breaking. By now he and his wife had been in Spain seven years. Due to his health and some needs within his wife’s family, they returned to the United States, paying their own way and arriving with virtually no funds.

    On his return, the only job René could find was in a steel mill, lifting heavy loads. A small person, his frail frame gave way the second day, putting him in the hospital. He later found other work and once they had settled their financial problems, he and his wife were right back into “pioneer” service, then into Circuit and District work and finally were asked to become part of the Brooklyn headquarters staff where René was given supervision of the Service Desk caring for all the Spanish congregations in the United States, composed of about thirty thousand Witnesses. He served there until 1969 when his wife became pregnant, requiring them to give up their “Bethel service.”

    René told me he would try to remain in New York, not because he liked the city, but with the thought that, should his circumstances allow, he could be of some service to the headquarters organization. It turned out that way, and in a few years he was donating his time two days a week to help out, doing Spanish translation, directing the taping of Spanish-language dramas for conventions, as well as doing part-time Circuit and District Overseer work among the scores of Spanish congregations in the New York area. He had spent some time in Portugal and when Portuguese congregations developed, he brushed up on the language and served them also.

    In his thirty some years of association with the organization, I seriously doubt that anyone in Puerto Rico, Spain or the United States ever found cause for complaint about René’s service. Of a quite gentle nature, he was at the same time a person of principle; he had learned the art, however, of being firm without being hard or harsh. Even given his later situation, which will be presented farther along, I doubt that any of those persons who worked with René Vázquez in any of the places he served would deny that the above is an honest assessment of him as a person. If he had a notable fault, it was, as he himself acknowledges, that he was perhaps too compliant when asked to do something for others, particularly by the Society. He feels today that his family life suffered unnecessarily because of this.

    As one example, he and his wife had gone for some years without a true vacation and he had lined up a trip that would take them back to Spain for a visit. Shortly before the time arrived, Harley Miller, then the head of the Service Department, called and asked René to do some Circuit work at that particular time. René felt that the right thing to do was to accept, for he had never turned down an assignment from “the Lord’s organization.” His wife made the trip to Spain, accompanied by her mother.

    René lived near La Guardia airport and members of the Service Department, Harley Miller among them, when traveling by plane on weekend speaking engagements, regularly arranged for René to meet them and transport them to Bethel on their return. Some of the flights arrived near midnight, others even later. René had insisted on providing such service for me and I had accepted on the basis of our long friendship, until I learned to what extent others were making use of his willingness to be helpful. To my mind, his good nature was imposed upon and with rare exceptions; I sought other means of transportation thereafter.

    I would think that if the view of the Governing Body were obtainable as to whom they would list as the principal figures in the “conspiracy against the organization” that they took such radical action to wipe out, they would point to us three—Ed, René and myself. Yet there was never an occasion when the three of us spent any time together. During the period involved I had extended conversations with René on perhaps two occasions; the same was true of Ed and René.

    What were the supposedly sinister activities we engaged in? Simply this, we discussed the Bible as friends and with friends of long standing.

    The night René came by our room, he had been attending a seminar for elders arranged by the Society. We discussed his impressions, which were basically favorable. At one point in the conversation, however, he said, “It seems to me as if we almost worship figures. Sometimes I wish we would do away completely with reports.” By reports he was referring to the system of having each Witness turn in report slips each month listing what “witnessing” activity was done, including hours spent, literature distributed, and so forth.21

    I recalled some points made in the previous District Assembly program about “faith and works” and we talked about this and the apostle’s statements in Romans on the subject. As I saw it, the apostle’s teaching called first of all for building people up in faith; when that was done the works would follow—for genuine faith is productive and active in the same way that genuine love is. One can keep constantly at people to perform certain works and they may do this as a result of pressure. But where is the evidence that the works are generated by faith and love? And if not so motivated, how pleasing would they be to God anyway?

    It seemed evident that deeds of faith had to be spontaneous, not systematized or made to conform to a certain mold, just as acts of love should be spontaneous, not something performed out of mere compliance with some scheduled activity programmed by others. Orderly arrangements are fine, but they should be for the purpose of convenience, not as a means of subtle compulsion, used to create a guilt complex in any not ‘fitting into the mold.’ The more closely men try to supervise the lives and activity of fellow Christians, the more they actually squeeze out the opportunity for faith and love to motivate and control. I acknowledged that it is more difficult and far harder work to build up people’s faith and appreciation through Scripture than simply to give “pep talks” or make people feel guilty, but, from what the apostle wrote, that harder way seemed to me to be the only Scripturally right and wise way.

    That was the essence of the conversation. The subject of report slips sparked the conversation but thereafter did not figure therein. On meeting up with René in the lobby of one of the buildings sometime later, he said he found that approaching matters in the light of Paul’s writings in Romans made his Circuit and District Overseer work far more enjoyable, his discussion with elders more meaningful.

    Some weeks later my wife and I went to his home for a meal. Though we two couples had been together in the same Spanish-speaking congregation in Queens, New York, during our first years in the city, since then our getting together had been quite sporadic. Both before and after the meal, René wanted to discuss the message of Romans. Though to a lesser degree than with my wife, I felt an obligation to respond to his questions rather than evade issues. I had known him for thirty years; I knew him to be a serious student of the Scriptures. I spoke to him as a friend, not as an organizational official, and in discussing the Word of God with him I felt my prime responsibility was to God, not to men, not to an organization. If I held back from speaking to persons like this on what I saw to be clear-cut teachings of Scripture, how could I say as Paul did in his words to the Ephesian elders, recorded at Acts, chapter twenty, verses 26 and 27:

    I call you to witness this very day that I am clean from the blood of all men, for I have not held back from telling you all the counsel of God.

    Paul knew that it was doing this that had resulted in his being spoken of injuriously within the synagogue of Ephesus.22 I knew, as well, that my speech could produce similar results.

    Among other sections, we discussed the first portion of the eighth chapter of Romans (considered earlier in this chapter of this book). I was interested to know how he viewed verse 14, as to the sonship relation to God, when considered in the light of the context. He had never examined it contextually (as is probably true of practically all of Jehovah’s Witnesses). When he did, his reaction was both spontaneous and stirring. What to others might seem obvious, can strike one of Jehovah’s Witnesses as if it were a revelation. René’s comment was, “For years I have had the feeling that I was resisting holy Spirit when reading the Christian Scriptures. I would be reading along and applying to myself everything I read, then suddenly I would stop and say, ‘But these things do not apply to me, they apply only to the anointed.’”

    I know, he knows and God knows that I used no persuasion to cause him to see matters differently. It was the apostle’s own words in the Bible, read contextually, that did the persuading. His expression on a later incidental contact was that the Scriptures as a whole came alive with far greater meaning to him from that point forward.

    Though it may seem strange, for one of Jehovah’s Witnesses (not of the about 9,100 “anointed”) to come to the conclusion that the words found from Matthew to Revelation are directed to him and do apply, not merely “by extension,” but actually and directly, causes a door to open to a whole host of questions, questions that have often been longing for an answer but which did not dare to be asked.

    When I review what has been done in recent times in an effort to uphold the organization’s interpretations, the manipulation of Scripture and fact, I can only feel grateful that I did not let concern for an organization’s favor hold me back from pointing at least some persons to the Scriptures on these points.

    On March 4, 1980, I submitted a request to the Personnel Committee of the Governing Body for a leave of absence to extend from March 24 to July 24. My wife and I both felt that our health demanded an extended change. During that period I also hoped to investigate what possibility there was of finding employment and somewhere to live if we were to terminate our headquarters service. We had about $600 in a savings account and a seven-year-old car as our major assets.

    When attending District Assemblies in Alabama, we had previously met and become acquainted with a Witness named Peter Gregerson. Later he had invited us to visit Gadsden, Alabama, on a couple of occasions so that I could speak to the local congregations. Peter had developed a small chain of supermarkets in the Alabama-Georgia area. In 1978, when a “zone trip” took my wife and me as far as Israel, Peter and his wife joined us there and we spent parts of two weeks touring that Bible land.

    At that time Peter expressed serious concern about the effects the 1975 predictions had had. He said he thought it would be a grave error if the Society pushed strongly on their 1914 date; that the disillusionment resulting from 1975 would be nothing compared with what would come if the Society was forced to move away from that 1914 chronology. I acknowledged his assessment as undoubtedly correct but we went no further into the matter.

    When Peter learned of our proposed leave of absence, he urged us to spend some time with them and fixed up a mobile home belonging to one of his sons for us to stay in. He offered to let me do yard work on his property to help cover some of our expenses and at the same time get some of the vigorous exercise that had been medically recommended for me at a recent physical exam.23

    Peter’s father had become one of Jehovah’s Witnesses when Peter was a small child, and from about the age of four he had been taken by his parents to meetings. As a young man he had become a full-time “pioneer” and even after marriage and the arrival of his first child he had struggled to keep on in that full-time activity, doing janitorial work for income.24 He had been sent by the Society into “problem” areas in Illinois and Iowa to help solve difficulties and build up certain congregations. In 1976 he was one of a representative group of elders invited to Brooklyn for discussions with the Governing Body.

    A year or so after this seminar, however, he decided to relinquish his eldership. He had recently turned over the presidency of the grocery company to one of his brothers and had made use of his increased free time to do more Bible study. He was troubled by some of the organization’s teachings and wanted to reaffirm his convictions as to their rightness, reestablish his confidence in his lifelong religion. (He was then in his early fifties.)

    The result was exactly the opposite. The more he studied the Scriptures, the more convinced he became that there were serious errors in the organization’s theology. This led to his decision as to ceasing his eldership. As he put it in talking with me about it, “I just can’t bring myself to stand before people and conduct studies on things that I cannot see have a Scriptural backing. I would feel like a hypocrite doing that and my conscience won’t let me do it.” Although when first hearing his decision, I had encouraged him to reconsider it, I could not deny the validity of his serious questions, and I had to respect his conscientiousness and his distaste for hypocrisy. He had reached his personal crossroads before I reached mine.

    This was the man that organizational policy later categorized as a “wicked man” with whom one should not even eat and my having a meal with him in a restaurant in 1981 resulted in my trial and banishment from the organization.

    It was in April, 1980, while we were in Gadsden on leave of absence that I first began to hear of what seemed to me to be strange occurrences back in Brooklyn. The expected storm had begun to break upon us.

    INQUISITION

    When he left the house, the scribes and the Pharisees began a furious attack on him and tried to force answers from him on innumerable questions, setting traps to catch him out in something he might say.

    — Luke 11:53, 54, Jerusalem Bible.

    An inquisition, in the religious sense, is an inquiry into individuals’ personal convictions and beliefs.

    Historically, its aim has been—not to aid the individual, or to provide basis for reasoning with him—but to incriminate, to convict as heretical.

    The initiating cause for the inquiry often has nothing to do with the individual’s being disruptive, malicious or even being particularly vocal about his beliefs. Mere suspicion is sufficient cause to set in motion the inquisitory action. The suspect is viewed as, in effect, having no rights: even his personal conversations with intimate friends are treated as something the inquisitors have full right to delve into.

    It was not solely the atrocious acts of punishment meted out in the Spanish Inquisition that earned it such a despised name in history. It was also the authoritarian approach and arrogant methods of interrogation employed to gain the incrimination so often zealously pursued by the religious judicial court. The torture and the violent punishment meted out then are outlawed today. But the authoritarian approach and arrogant methods of interrogation can still be practiced with apparent impunity.

    I am reminded here of an article in the January 22. 1981, issue of the Awake! magazine, titled “Searching Out Legal Roots.” It emphasized the superb legal precedents found in the Mosaic Law and, among other things, said:

    This principle was praised in the Society’s publication. In actual practice it was totally rejected. As Jesus said, “They say one thing and do another.”25 The “secret star-chamber hearings” were preferred, as the evidence clearly shows. Only fear of the power of truth prompts that kind of proceedings. Those methods serve, not the interests of justice or mercy, but the cause of those who seek to incriminate.

    The Awake! magazine of April 22, 1986 also relates:

    Anyone—man, woman, child or slave—could accuse a person of heresy, without fear of being confronted with the accused or of the latter even knowing who had denounced him. The accused rarely had someone to defend him, since any lawyer or witness in his behalf would himself have been accused of aiding and abetting a heretic. So the accused generally stood alone before the inquisitors, who were at the same time prosecutors and judges.

    Four weeks after starting my leave of absence, while in Alabama, a phone call came from Ed Dunlap. After some general conversation, he told me that two members of the Governing Body, Lloyd Barry and Jack Barr, had come into his office and had interrogated him about his personal beliefs for about three hours. At one point Ed asked, “What’s the purpose of this ‘third degree’?” They assured him that it was not a “third degree” but that they simply wanted to hear how he felt about some matters.

    …

    Also in this issue