I questioned whether Jehovah’s Witnesses are polytheists in a previous post, and the more I’ve thought about it, the more pivotal I believe that question is. Their version of Isaiah 9:6 is pretty much the same as any accepted translation. It says that Jesus is a mighty God; I believe they will acknowledge that Jesus is a mighty God, but not God Almighty. They believe that Jehovah is God Almighty, and Jesus is a different, but nevertheless mighty God. So, apparently, they believe in two gods, making them polytheists.
There are a lot of verses that say there is only one God, so they have a huge problem here right? I believe that as they go door to door, they are often asked about John 1:1. Their standard reply (I’ve personally heard JWs say this more than once) to the objection of inserting an “a” into the verse is that a lot of translations say, “The word is a god.” (I’ve looked through about 20 different translations, some of which may or may not be any good, and I’ve never seen it translated that way.) But if there is only one God, the mistranslation seems to be a side issue. If they believed there’s only one God, even their translation of John 1:1 would be good enough to show that Jesus is that God.
The next time I get a chance to talk to a Jehovah’s Witness, I’m going to ask him or her about their polytheism. It seems like a fairly simple way to shake the person’s understanding and confidence in their religion and begin to open their eyes to the truth.
August 3, 2007 at 9:25 am |
[...] (though truthfully Mormons are either pantheists or henotheists rather than true polytheists). From Jehovah’s Witnesses’ Polytheism on billphillips.wordpress.com: “I questioned whether Jehovah’s Witnesses are polytheists [...]