Posted by WTS QUOTES ON.. [Bibleman] on November 04, 1999 at 09:08:58 {yxewwqp4aAMRXA6xmpscslyACFuF8c}:
In Reply to: BTG-RUTHERFORD-JEWS LINK posted by Selected quotes on November 04, 1999 at 01:54:13:
Below are quotes from the WTS regarding "Freemasonry", the most notable aspect of which is how little is actually said about it. Only one article dedicated to the topic occurs in 1958 (not on CD) in the Awake! magazine.
Highlights are that the builder of the Statue of Liberty was a Freemason and she has Freemasonry symbolism. That Negroes are not admitted nor their lodges recognized, underscoring the racist background of Freemasonry. And this is curious, that some who were Freemasons in the early days (around 1900) left the Lodge when they became a witness, which is mighty strange since the Watchtower covers back then and all the "Studies in the Scriptures" had Freemasonry symbolisms and the doctrines of Russell were full of pyramidology concepts. ??
Here are the WTS official quotes. Again, they don't say much which seems suspicious in and of itself:
*** g86 6/22 13 The Statue of Liberty-A Promise Fulfilled? ***
Full of enthusiasm, Bartholdi pushed ahead with his plans for an imposing statue. As they crystallized, it became evident that he had incorporated Freemasonry symbols into his design—the torch, the book in her left hand, and the seven-pointed diadem around her head are some examples. This perhaps was not so surprising since he was a Freemason.*** yb94 81 Greece ***
Vasilis Avgerinos was a schoolteacher in Eleftherohori when he first met the Bible Students back in September 1927. “As soon as I arrived,” he recalled, “I was told that in the village a ‘Freemason’ named George Papageorgiou was disturbing the community with false teachings. Being a teacher, I was to ‘put him in his place.’”
*** yb91 74-5 Hawaii-1991 Yearbook Report ***
From Freemason to Witness During World War I, Brother Fox worked as manager of a local business. One Sunday morning, at his home in Honolulu, he received a call from David Solomon. Mr. Solomon, operating a garage at a local military post, requested supplies and inquired if Ellis would open the store to fill his order, and this Ellis consented to do.Brother Fox recalls: “As he drove me to the store, he remarked that I must be a Mason to be so accommodating. On being informed that I was a minister with the local Bible Students, he asked, ‘Do you ever give talks outside your own church?’ I answered, ‘Yes, if invited.’ Then he informed me that he was the master of the Masonic lodge at Fort Schofield and invited me to speak there. Of course, I did not tell him that I had never given a public talk. I prepared and used a chart similar to the one found at the front of Volume I of the Studies in the Scriptures. Preparing for and giving that first public talk gave me a chance to put into practice some of what I had learned from Walter Bundy.”
David Solomon thereafter met regularly with the small group of Bible Students. In spite of stiff opposition, he later resigned from the Masonic order and was baptized by Brother Fox.
*** yb78 156 Spain ***
To illustrate the problems of those days, let us consider the case of Nemesio Orús, a married man with three small children living in Huesca. A few days after the war started, he was visited as a suspected Communist or Freemason, and his visitors tried to obligate him to applaud the soldiers as they were going off to war. Pressure also was applied to get him to join the local Fascist group. When he refused to do these things, he ended up on the “blacklist” for future reprisals.
*** g81 10/8 3 The Brotherhood of Man-Just a Dream? ***
Down through history, fraternities (brotherhoods) and sororities (sisterhoods) of many types have flourished. But they have lacked the characteristics of a true universal brotherhood. For example, Freemasonry, a well-known international brotherhood, is secretive and open only to men.*** yb71 114-5 Country Reports (Part One) ***
“I tried to find the truth in various religious organizations but can now see that they did not have it. Then I became a member of Freemasonry in the belief that thereby I could fill the need of every human to worship a Supreme Being that some call the Great Architect of the Universe. The Bible identifies him as Jehovah in Psalm 83:18 and also at Isaiah 42:8, which says, ‘I am Jehovah. That is my name; and to no one else shall I give my own glory, neither my praise to graven images.’
“In Freemasonry I found very good friends and sincere persons, but I did not find there the truth that I looked for. I have really found it among Jehovah’s witnesses.*** g74 10/8 28 Faith in God's Care Affects Lives for Good ***
Later, they gladly accepted the offer to study the Bible with Jehovah’s witnesses. On the basis of increased Bible knowledge, the man, despite his being a thirty-second degree Mason, severed his connections with the Masonic Lodge and she with the Order of the Eastern Star.*** yb70 203 Country Reports (Part Two) ***
The man, though, had some cleaning up to do. He was a Mason, and it was difficult for him to give it up. It was patiently explained to him that his organization was religious and part of Babylon the Great and that for him to publish and dedicate himself to Jehovah he must “Get out!” Just a short time ago he got together all his things pertaining to the Masons and told the brother that he would appreciate it if he would burn all of them. He broke off all associations with them, and he, too, is now a publisher along with his wife and three children, aged thirteen, fourteen and fifteen. He and two of his children hope to get baptized at the coming “Peace on Earth” assembly to be held here in October.
*** yb77 242-3 Panama ***
This was about the year 1900.There was a close connection between the spread of God’s truth on the island of Jamaica and in Panama, for many West Indians came here to work on the canal. First, interest was shown by a few persons in Colón, on the Atlantic side. One of those interested in the good news of God’s kingdom was Hubert L. Walker, a Freemason from Panama City who had moved to Colón because of employment. In 1910 the Society’s representative in Kingston, Jamaica, sent two colporteurs or full-time workers—Brothers Morgan and Laing—to publish the good news in Panama City and vicinity. They were received into the home of Mr. Walker before he moved to Colón. The brothers also had a room for the meetings and another room for the storage of literature. Already thousands of Bibles and the Watch Tower Society’s volumes Studies in the Scriptures had been distributed among the English-speaking people, largely canal construction workers. In that same year, a Christian congregation was established in Panama City and the number of persons associated with it came to be nearly fifty. [NOTE: Did this Freemason become attracted to the WTS because of Freemasonry symbolisms on the Watchtower and winged-disk symbolism on the Studies in the Scriptures? Any Freemason should have recognized these symbolisms! Did they think the WTS back then was a secret Freemasonry order?]
Awake, March 22, 1958 on "The History and Nature of Freemasonry"EXCEPTS HIGHLIGHTS:
"What did Frederick the Great, Voltaire, George Washington and King George VI of England have in common? Freemasonry. And what do King Gustav VI of Sweden and Dr. G. Fisher, archbishop of Cantebury, have in common? Freemasonry..."
"Throughout the world there are more than six million Freemasons today. Ninety percent or more of these reside in English-speaking lands, with four million in the United States alone. These Freemasons associae in lodges and have been authorized by the Grand Lodge of their country, or state, if in the United States; the original authorizing agency being the Grand Lodge of England. In addition thereto there are well over a million who claim to be Freemasons but belong to lodges not recognized by these Grand Lodges. Among these are the atheistic Masons of France and the Negro Masons of the United States.....".
[Freemasonry connected with ancient Babylonish pagan mysteries beginning with Nimrod per WTS:]
"Origin of Frternal Society - Freemasonry is also the oldest fraternal order. However, in considering its history one must ditinguish between its history as a fraternal soceity and the legendary history of its beliefs, symbols, rituals and principles; the one going back but 241 years, to A.D. 1717, whereas the other goes back more than 4,000 years to the time of Nimrod. As a fraternal society Freemasonry has its prototypes in certain medieval religious knights and perhaps even more closely in the guilds of freemasons of the Middle Ages...."
"Its Religious Sources -- Further sources of Freemaonry, especially as regards the higher degrees, are the ancient pagan religions. Thus Pike's work, Morals and Dogma abounds with references to the Druidical, Egyptian, Eleusinian and Mithraic mysteries and to the pagan gods Ormzd, Osiris, Isis, Mitras, etc. The Encyclopedia Britannica tells of research being done into the origins of Freemasonry and that "the facts so far disclosed suggest that in modern Freemasonry we may have an intellectualised survival of the cult of the Dying God and of the Fertility rites...."
[Freemasonry condemned as un-Christian, but thisis the only full article on Freemasonry and none sense 1958. Rather suspicious!]
"Is It For Christians?"--We cannot escape it. As the inspired apostle Paul shows, "the things which the nations sacrifice they sacrifice to demons, and not to God, and I do not want you to become sharers with the demons. You cannot be drinking the cup of Jehovah and the cup of demons." Truly, in ever so many respects, the contrast between Biblical Christianity and Freemasonry could scarcely be greater.--1 Cor. 10:20, 21"
[Racist Freemasons discrimination against blacks pointed out.]
*** w63 4/1 196 Would Jesus Do It? ***
Or would Jesus Christ, who came to earth to give his life for all the races, manifest racial prejudice? Yet today racial prejudice is rampant, and that especially in the part of the world known as Christendom. Thus a World Baptist Fellowship group congratulated the governor of Mississippi, Ross Barnett, for trying to keep a Negro from enrolling in the state university and even urged him to die if necessary in order to prevent this! Certain fraternal orders that make high professions regarding principles, such as the Masonic Order, refuse to admit Negroes, obliging Negroes to form their own segregated lodges. The Prince Hall Masons are a case in point. Do you imitate the example Jesus set in this matter or do you believe in the motto, ‘When in Rome do as the Romans do’?[Interesting symbolic link with the "mason" bricklayers of Babel and concept of modern fraternal masons. Not much has changed from fundamental concepts for masons trying to climb highter and highter to reach "heaven":]
*** bf 26 2 Babylon Arises ***
However, those early bricklayers and masons had lost interest in God’s mandate to man; they wanted the more settled life, with more ease and convenience. Their being all of one language and of one set of words made it very easy for them to build together. There is no Bible record that they formed a masonic lodge, but they had great building ambitions. They would make their city outstanding with a special piece of masonry, “a tower with its top in the heavens.” This though, was not for them to get nearer to God.
END
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