Have you ever heard of the illusory truth effect also known as the illusion of truth? It describes how when we hear the same false information repeated again and again, we often come to believe it is true. Troublingly, this even happens when people should know better—that is, when people initially know that the misinformation is false.
This is the case with the Watchtower writers they present false claims in their magazines which by constant repetition are being accepted as truth by their members. The Second Century APOSTATE Church Lie is such a false claim. But whay do I mean by that?
In their latest Watchtower Study Article 5 which will be studied in February 2024 and under the title :" I Will Never Abandon You”! the Watchtower provides examples of God's people abandoning their faith when they found themselves without leadership in the past. One of these examples apparently is the infamous Second century Apostate Church, an idea they have promoted in their magazines for decades. This claim is best explained in paragraph 4 of this article:
The next example is that of the second-century Christians. The apostle John, the last surviving apostle, was a good influence on many Christians, helping them to endure in their service to Jehovah. (3 John 4) Along with Jesus’ other faithful apostles, John had for some time been fighting hard against the apostasy that was spreading. (1 John 2:18; see study notes on 2 Thess. 2:7.) After John died, though, apostasy spread like wildfire. Within a few decades, the Christian congregation became thoroughly corrupted
But is this claim true? And is it based on historical facts? The simple answer is no and here are some historical facts.
Before I delve into this matter, I would like to take the time to thank you for all your love and support, the past month we are hitting over 3000 viewers per video and the more you subscribe, like and share this video the more jws and exjws get to see this content, also you will find this video in its written format on my website, the link of article can be found below
For the first 3 centuries, since its formation, the Church faced intense persecution from the Roman Empire that saw them as a threat to their unity. There simply wasn't enough time between hiding in catacombs, escaping underground or being murdered and thrown into the Roman Arenas to turn apostate. Were there different opinions in Scripture during these first 3 centuries?Yes! Can that be classed as the Great Apostasy the Watchtower teaches that engulfed the Church in the second century? No!
So how did they come up with this false narrative? Well, they didn't come up with this stuff they simply copied it! You see this idea,goes back to the Protestant reformation in the 16th century, when the Protestants claimed that the Church had fallen away from the original teachings of the Bible and that gave them the excuse to break away from the Catholic Church.More recently in the 19h century and especially in the United States this same argument was used by other Christian groups . Here is what Wikipedia has to say on this subjec under the search term "the Great Apostasy":
The Great Apostasy is a concept within Christianity to describe a perception that mainstream Christian Churches have fallen away from the original faith founded by Jesus and promulgated through his Twelve Apostles.A belief in a Great Apostasy has been characteristic of the Restorationist tradition of Christianity, which includes unrelated Restorationist groups emerging after the Second Great Awakening, such as the Christadelphians, Latter Day Saints otherwise known as Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, and Iglesia ni Cristo. These Restorationist groups hold that traditional Christianity, represented by Catholicism, Protestants and Orthodoxy, has fallen into error and thus, the true faith needs to be restored.
If that is not clear enough let the now infamous Proclaimers book explain what things did change during the 2nd century AD in the Church, we read in chapter 4 pages 36,37:
As bishops and elders ascended the hierarchical ladder, they left below it the rest of the believers in the congregation(=reminds you someone you know?). This resulted in a separation between clergy (those taking the lead) (=this is the exact phrase they use for their elders today in their organisation, you just can't make this stuff up!!!) and laity (the passive body of believers)(=you mean like today's publishers?). Explains McClintock and Strong’s Cyclopedia: “From the time of Cyprian [who died about 258 C.E.], the father of the hierarchical system, the distinction of clergy and laity became prominent, and very soon was universally admitted. Indeed, from the third century onward, the term clerus . . . was almost exclusively applied to the ministry to distinguish it from the laity. As the Roman hierarchy was developed, the clergy came to be not merely a distinct order . . . but also to be recognised as the only priesthood.” Thus, within 150 years or so of the death of the last of the apostles, two significant organizational changes found their way into the congregation: first, the separation between the bishop and the presbyters(=elders), with the bishop occupying the top rung of the hierarchical ladder; second, the separation between the clergy and the laity. Instead of all spirit-begotten believers forming “a royal priesthood,” the clergy were now “recognised as the only priesthood.”(=SAY THAT AGAIN??? You mean in the same way you have decided that ONLY the 9 governing body members are annointed and the rest 9 millions jehovah's witnesses are secondary citizens in the kingdom of God)—1 Pet. 2:9.
So they go out of their way to accuse mainstream Christianity for apostatic changes that took place over the period of many centuries when they have done the same exactly apostatic changes within the space of few decades! Their hypocrisy knows no bounds!
So let's put all this aside for the moment, what is the truth here? The Word of God anticipates apostasy to be as an integral development in all Christian denominations, we'll let the apostle Peter explain it best as he did in his letter 2 Peter 2:1 and I will slightly paraphrase the verse to give it a chronological structure:
But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, (...and they will finally reach a point) when they will deny the sovereign Lord who bought them—bringing swift destruction on themselves.
In other words Peter explains 2000 years of Christian history condensed in just one verse. In the same way that there false prophets in ancient Israel but that never disqualified them from bring God's people, in the same way, apostasy is anticipated in the Christian Church including Jehovah's Witnesses as a natural byproduct.Have we not see so many destructive heresies introduced the past 2000 years in so many denominations. There is one final point we have not reached yet and this the denial of Jesus Christ as the head of the Church. This is still future and it will take place when the Antichrist establishes himself as the leader of the Church. For this event I will speak more in a future video. But I want you to see is that the Watchtower is promoting a false narrative of a 2nd century apostate Church because it fits best their agenda. Do not be fooled in believing it!
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