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This is the first major study of the enigmatic religious society. By examining the Jehovah's Witnesses' dramatic recent expansion, Andrew Holden reveals the dependency of their quasi-totalitarian movement on the physical and cultural resources have brought about the privatization of religion, the erosion of community, and the separation of 'fact' from faith.

Jehovah's Witnesses. --- Christian sects

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In 1984 George Orwell described a future theocracy that demanded unity at all costs, and in which all independent thought would be eradicated. According to the authors of this book, such a theocracy now exists. They describe how, in an increasingly restrained 'New World Society', Jehovah's Witnesses busily go about the business of warning the world that their God, Jehovah, will act soon to destroy all who oppose him and his organization. For them 1984 appears to be the current unofficial deadline for Armageddon, for they believe that God promised that the generation that saw the beginning of world distress (starting with World War I in 1914) would not pass away before the end came. A biblical generation is seventy years. 1914 + 70 = 1984. Convinced that the world Is due to end, they have given up their independence to the central theocracy. The Bottings, both Witnesses, can and do answer the questions everyone asks about this sect. They examine its history, the ways in which history itself has been interpreted in the light of bible prophecy, the basic beliefs or 'symbols' in which Witnesses are required to put their faith, and the dynamics of conversion and indoctrination. They also reveal why Jehovah's Witnesses turn away from their calling by the thousands and how the sect effects a 'mental-regulating' of youth as choice is taken away from children at a very young age. The sect is not only subject to forces of dissidence and disaffection from its membership, it has also been subject to a major rift within its headquarters. This event and what was done about it are also described. The authors conclude this serious, concerned, probing but readable study with an exploration of parallels between the contemporary Jehovah's Witness sect and the world described by George Orwell in 1984.

Jehovah's Witnesses. --- Christian sects --- Orwell, George, --- Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania. --- Nineteen eighty-four (Orwell, George) --- Watch Tower Society --- Watch Tower Bible & Tract Society of Pennsylvania --- Jehovah's Witnesses --- Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York --- International Bible Students Association --- Zion's Watch Tower Tract Society --- Orwell's Nineteen eighty-four (Orwell, George) --- 1984 (Orwell, George)

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Schism (from the Greek 'to split') refers to a group that breaks away from another, usually larger organisation and forms a new organisation. Though the term is typically confined to religious schisms, it can be extended to other kinds of breakaway groups. Because schisms emerge out of controversies, the term has negative connotations. Though they are an important component of many analyses, schisms in general have not been subjected to systematic analysis. This volume provides the first book-length study of religious schisms as a general phenomenon. Some chapters examine specific case studies while others provide surveys of the history of schisms within larger religious traditions, such as Islam and Buddhism. Other chapters are more theoretically focused. Examples are drawn from a wide variety of different traditions and geographical areas, from early Mediterranean Christianity to modern Japanese New Religions, and from the Jehovah's Witnesses to Neo-Pagans.

Religion --- Schism. --- Schisme --- History. --- Histoire --- Religious history --- Apostasy --- Heresy --- Sects --- Arts and Humanities --- religious schisms --- religious groups --- religious controversy --- religous traditions --- Islam --- Buddhism --- Mediterranean Christianity --- Japanese new religions --- Jehovah's Witnesses --- Neopaganism --- Japan --- Japanese new religious movements

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The theme of prophecy, the doctrine of the 144,000, end-time calculations, Armageddon, and the Witnesses' denial of hell are all considered in The A to Z of Jehovah's Witnesses, which contains a chronology, an introductory essay, a bibliography, and 250 cross-referenced dictionary entries relating to key people and concepts.

Jehovah's Witnesses --- Christian sects --- History --- religion --- history --- Charles Taze Russell --- the Watch Tower Society --- Franklin Rutherford --- door-to-door Evangelism --- doctrine --- Armageddon --- dictionary --- end-time calculations --- blood transfusion

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In June 1949 the Soviet state arrested seven farmers from the village of Bila Tserkva. Not wealthy or powerful, the men were unknown outside their community, and few had ever heard of their small, isolated village on the southwestern border of Soviet Ukraine. Nevertheless, the state decided they were dangerous traitors who threatened to undermine public order, and a regional court sentenced them to twenty-five years of imprisonment for treason.In To Make a Village Soviet Emily Baran explores why a powerful state singled out these individuals for removal from society. Bila Tserkva had to become a space in which Soviet laws and institutions reigned supreme, yet Sovietization was an aspiration as much it was a reality. The arrested men belonged to a small and misunderstood religious minority, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, and both Witnesses and their neighbours challenged the government’s attempts to fully integrate the village into socialist society. Drawing from the case file and interviews with the families of survivors, Baran argues that what happened in Bila Tserkva demonstrates the sheer ambition of the state’s plans for the Sovietization of borderland communities.A compelling history, To Make a Village Soviet looks to Bila Tserkva to explore the power and the limits of state control – and the possibilities created by communities that resist assimilation.

Government, Resistance to --- Jehovah's Witnesses --- History --- Persecutions --- Armageddon. --- Article 58. --- Bible Students. --- Gulag. --- Jehovahs Witnesses. --- KGB. --- Protestant. --- Romanian. --- Russia. --- Soviet Union. --- Sovietization. --- Stalin. --- Subcarpathia. --- Tisa River. --- Transcarpathia. --- USSR. --- Ukraine. --- WW2. --- Watchtower. --- World War II. --- Zakarpattia. --- Zakatpate. --- archives. --- borderlands. --- collectivization. --- communism. --- evangelism. --- freedom. --- investigation. --- persecution. --- propaganda. --- proselytism. --- religion. --- repression. --- rural. --- scapegoats. --- sects. --- secularization. --- security. --- socialism. --- surveillance.