Jehovah’s Witnesses are generally known as the people who go door to door to spread their faith. You can also encounter them in the city or at the station, where they stand with their brochure material. The Jehovah’s Witnesses are actively communicating their faith to others. But despite being well known, many do not know what exactly they believe in. What do Jehovah’s Witnesses believe? What do they think about God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit? What are the similarities and differences with the general Christian faith?
The origins of the Jehovah’s Witnesses
In 1870, a man named Charles Taze began conducting Bible studies. He did this in Pittsburgh, which is located in the American state of Pennsylvania. The Jehovah’s Witnesses emerged from this Bible study group. Charles Taze began to question the traditional views of Christians through his study of the Bible. The Jehovah’s Witnesses were created from his vision of the Bible and faith.
The Bible of the Jehovah’s Witnesses: the New World Translation
There are several Bible translations in circulation in the Netherlands: the New Bible Translation, the Revised Statenvertaling, The Bible in Ordinary Language, the Naardense Bible Translation and the Willibrord Translation. Which Bible translation do the Jehovah’s Witnesses use? The Jehovah’s Witnesses use their own Bible translation. This Bible translation is called the New World Translation. The Jehovah’s Witnesses say about their Bible translation: ‘The New World Translation is an accurate translation of the Bible, which has been published in whole or in part in more than 160 languages. More than 220 million copies have been printed” (www.jw.org). This Bible translation is not used by any other Christian group. The Jehovah’s Witnesses hardly read any other Bible translations.
Jehovah as the name of God
In their faith, the Jehovah’s Witnesses focus on God, the Creator of heaven and earth. In the Hebrew Bible, which is written in the original language of the people of Israel, the name of God is represented by four letters: YHWH or JHVH. These four letters, also called the tetragrammaton, consist of four consonants. YHWH or JHVH is pronounced Yahweh or Jehovah. The name of Jehovah is central to the faith of the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that Jehovah is the only true name of God and that He should only be worshiped by that name.
Other Names for God in the Bible
However, other names for God are also used in the Bible. For example, in Hebrew God is also called ‘Elohim’ (Genesis 1:1), or God Almighty, ‘El Shaddai’ (Genesis 17:1), or Lord, ‘Adonai’ (Psalm 8:1) or Lord of hosts , ‘YHWH Zebaoth’ (1 Samuel 1:3, Isaiah 8:13). Jesus taught his disciples to know God as Father (Matthew 6:9. Mark 14:36, Romans 8:15).
The Jehovah’s Witnesses and belief in Jesus
Is Jesus, as the son of God, also God himself? According to the Jehovah’s Witnesses, Jesus is not equal to God. They assume that Jesus was created by God. So in their eyes Jesus is a creature and not God. Then Jesus is not from everlasting to everlasting” (Psalm 90:2). They take Jesus’ word seriously when he says, ,The Father is greater than I., (John 14:28). Jehovah’s Witnesses only worship the Almighty God and Creator and not Jesus Christ. Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that Jesus was created as the archangel Michael before God created the earth.
The general Christian church believes in Jesus as God
Their position on the divinity of Jesus differs from general Christian teaching. An important document for general Christian doctrine is the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed. This is a text in which for the first time the fundamental truths of the fundamental doctrines of Christianity were recorded. This confession of faith, which was drawn up in 325, expresses the belief in the divinity of Jesus thus: ‘I believe[] in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all ages, light of light, true God of true God, begotten, not made, of one substance with the Father: through whom all things were made.” One of the texts that emphasizes the divinity of Jesus is John 1 verse 18: No one has ever seen God, but the only Son, who is God , who is in the heart of the Father, has made Him known. And in John 10, Jesus equates himself with God the Father.
[Jesus said:] The Father and I are one. When the Jews again picked up stones because they wanted to stone him, Jesus said, “I have done many good things for you through the Father; why do you want to stone me?’ ,We will not stone you for a good deed,, they replied, ,but for blasphemy: you are a man, but you claim to be God!, (John 10:30-33)
Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Holy Spirit
If for Jehovah’s Witnesses there is only one God, what do they believe about the Holy Spirit? According to the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Holy Spirit is a power. The Spirit of God in his active power in the world. They themselves put it this way: ‘The holy spirit is God’s power in action, his active force (Micah 3:8; Luke 1:35). God sends out his spirit by directing his power or energy to accomplish his will (Psalm 104:30; 139:7)” (www.jw.org).
In the general Christian confession, the Holy Spirit is a person
The Nicene Creed calls the Holy Spirit Lord: “[I believe…] in the Holy Spirit, who is Lord and gives life, who proceeds from the Father [and the Son], who is together with the Father and the Son is worshiped and glorified, who spoke through the prophets.” The Holy Spirit, according to the Creed, is not a vague power. He is a person, with a will, mind and emotions. In the first letter to Corinthians chapter 2 verse 11 we read about the mind of the Holy Spirit: ‘Who is able to know man, except the spirit of man? Thus only the Spirit of God is able to know God. In the letter that the apostle Paul sends to the church in Rome, he writes about the feelings of the Holy Spirit, his love: ‘Brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and with an appeal to the love of the Spirit , I urge you to join me in praying fervently to God” ( Romans 15:30 ).
Jehovah’s Witnesses do not believe in the Trinity of God
Belief in the Trinity of God means that one believes in one God. Within this God three different persons can be distinguished, namely God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. The Jehovah’s Witnesses do not believe that Jesus is God. They also do not believe that the Spirit is a person. So they see nothing in the doctrine of the Trinity of God. According to the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the doctrine of the Trinity is an error that has developed throughout the history of the church. They emphasize that the Trinity of God is not Biblical, because the word Trinity is nowhere to be found in the Bible.
The Trinity of God in the Bible
Although The Jehovah’s Witnesses have a point when they state that there is no text in the Bible that contains the word Trinity, there are texts that point to the Trinity of God, for example Matthew 28 verse 19 where Jesus says: ‘ Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Also in 2 Corinthians 13 verse 13 the three different persons of God are mentioned: ‘The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the unity of the Holy Spirit be with you all’.