Timeline

Adventist Influence

After a chance encounter with the Adventist preacher, Jonas Wendell, Russell gained renewed fervor to return to faith and study Scripture.

He was particularly drawn to their use of the Bible for prophetic speculation concerning matters such as the millenium, and their rejection of the doctrinal belief in eternal conscious torment.

The Invisible Return

Early in 1876, the now 23-year-old C. T. Russell received an Adventist periodical by Nelson Barbour, claiming Jesus’ invisible presence had begun to reign in 1874 and would return in fully in October 1914.

Convinced by Barbour’s argument after an in-person meeting, Russell began to work with Barbour, publishing a wealth of articles together in a magazine called the Herald.

The Society Started

Zion’s Watch Tower Tract Society, later to be known as the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society on Pennsylvania, was formed for the purpose of printing and distributing religious tracts.

During its first year, over a period of the next four months, 1,200,000 tracts totaling in 200,000,000 pages were said to have been published,.

Settling in Brooklyn

In a strategic move to improve efficiency of communication, the Watch Tower Society moved from Pittsburgh, PN to Brooklyn, NY. Preparations for the move began in 1908 and the move was made early the following year. The new location was named Bethel, meaning “House of God.”

The most notable features of the new location was the on-site printing plant and prime location for literature distribution.

The Unfulfilled Prediction

Despite Russell’s previous predictions of Christ’s earthly return in October of 1914, it came and went without the faithful being raised to heaven.

While Russell encouraged his followers to not lose hope, Studies in Scripture were rereleased with amendments in 1915 to say the resurrection would occur after 1914.

A New President

Judge Joseph Franklin Rutherford was elected as the next President and met with strong opposition Watchtower’s board culminating Rutherford’s replacement of the 4 directors.

Later in the year, the controversial 7th volume of Studies in the Scriptures was released by Rutherford as the alleged posthumous work of C.T. Russell.

“Millions Will Never Die!”

Beginning in 1918, Rutherford began to claim that the earthly resurrection would occur in 1925 along with the return of the patriarchs such as Abraham and Issac.

In preparation, Rutherford had a residence in San Diego constructed for the Old Testament patriarchs’s arrival called Beth Sarim.

After nothing came to pass, the number of Witnesses took a sharp drop from 90,434 attending the annual memorial in 1925 to a staggering 17, 380 in 1928.

The Education Era

After Rutherford’s death, Nathan Knorr was unanimously elected as the third president of the Watch Tower Society.

Knorr had a strong focus on training programs for local door-to-door witnessing and missionaries and the construction of schools, with him putting into place an advanced course in Theocractic Ministry just a month after his election.

Adam to Armageddon

Beginning in 1966, Watch Tower claimed that Armageddon would occur in 1975: 6,000 years after the supposed date of creation. Followers sold their homes and quit their jobs to witness to others.

After 1975 passed without Armageddon coming to pass, roughly 390,000 witnesses left the Watchtower organization.

Redefining a Generation

In the November 1st issue of Watchtower magazine, a core doctrine surrounding 1914 took on a dramatic shift.

Previously, following the disappointment of 1914, the Watch Tower had asserted that some of those who were alive in the year 1914 would live to see Jehovah’s kingdom established, connecting them to the “generation” mentioned in Matthew 24:34.

However, in the 1995 article, President Milton Henschel described Matthew 24’s generation differently : “…the term “generation” as used by Jesus refers principally to contemporary people of a certain historical period, with their identifying characteristics.”

That is to say, the generation refers to wicked mankind in general who share the characteristics of ignoring Jesus’ teachings, completely removing the aspect of 1914 from the generation doctrine.

This was changed again in 2010, where the April 15 issue of Watchtower described the generation to see the start of Armageddon was one which overlapped with the generation of 1914.

Blood Transfusion Controversy

While the Jehovah’s Witness doctrine of refusing blood transfusions was practiced since 1945 due to their interpretation of verses such as Genesis 9:4, the practice was brought into the spotlight of the mainstream media in 2007.

Dennis Lindberg, a 14 year old boy with leukemia, refused blood transfusions on the basis of his faith as a Jehovah’s Witness despite the objections of his non-believing his biological parents. Tragically, he passed away shortly after.