Faith of Our Fathers: Were the Early Christians Jehovah’s Witnesses? Parts 1 and 2

Listen to this article (51:23 min) 

Part one of this article appeared in the Christian Research Journal, volume 18, number 3 (Winter 1996). Part two of this article appeared in Christian Research Journal, volume 18, number 4 (Spring 1996). For further information about to the Christian Research Journal, click here.

When you support the Journal, you join the team and help provide the resources at equip.org that minister to people worldwide. These resources include our ever-growing database of more than 2,500 articles and Bible Answers, as well as our free Postmodern Realities podcast.

Another way you can support our online articles is by leaving us a tip. A tip is just a small amount, like $3, $5, or $10, which is the cost of a latte, lunch out, or coffee drink. To leave a tip, click here.

Part One

SUMMARY

The Watchtower Society (Jehovah’s Witnesses) claims to be the sole religious group faithful to the teachings of Christ and the apostles today. The Witnesses believe that the Christian church, which they refer to as “Christendom,” fell into a great apostasy after the death of the apostles and became corrupted with the doctrines and ideas of Greek paganism and philosophy. Among the doctrines corrupted was the nature of Christ, whom they maintain was the first creation of Jehovah God. The Witnesses further claim that there has always existed, since the time of the apostles, a group of faithful, anointed men who taught and believed as they do today. They often cite passages from the early church fathers to demonstrate that these men held the same beliefs as contemporary Jehovah’s Witnesses. However, examination of the writings of the early church fathers provides no evidence to substantiate the claim that a great apostasy occurred in the church following the death of the apostles. Moreover, the church fathers refute rather than support Watchtower teachings about Jesus Christ.

From the very establishment of the Christian church by Jesus Christ and His apostles, alternative formulations of the faith have been proposed by countless individuals and sects. Such groups have often adopted the language and concepts of New Testament Christianity, while amalgamating them with ideas and beliefs from secular society, philosophy, or non-Christian religions. This trend manifests itself today in the contemporary scene, much as it did many centuries ago. It is especially evident in groups such as the Mormon church and the Jehovah’s Witnesses, both of which claim to be the only true expression of Christianity in the present age.

In order to validate their claim to be the true bearers of the Christian faith, such sects usually assert that orthodox Christianity lost its way and became “apostate” in early church history. Thus, both the Mormons and the Jehovah’s Witnesses interpret their doctrinal differences from historic Christian teachings as a restoration of the apostolic faith, long ago lost by the apostasy of “Christendom.” They often point to the relatively late development of the doctrine of the Trinity, and the affirmation of doctrine by church councils, as evidence that Christendom lost the true gospel by absorbing Greek paganism and philosophy.

The claim that the true Christian faith has been lost for 18 centuries does pose some rather severe difficulties, however. One significant problem has to do with establishing a historical link between the sect and apostolic Christianity. The Mormons attempt to bypass this issue by claiming new revelation — the angel Moroni revealed the restored Christian faith to Joseph Smith. Jehovah’s Witnesses, on the other hand, try to maintain a historical link with the apostolic church. They hold that since the death of the apostles, there has always existed a “faithful and discrete servant” class — a group of 144,000 anointed Christians (which began with the 12 apostles and reached 144,000 in 1935) who are Jehovah’s appointed channel for understanding and interpreting the Scriptures. This group is now embodied in the rapidly dwindling Governing Body of the Watchtower Society (those who became a part of this class during or prior to 1935 are dying of old age).

The Watchtower Society turns frequently to the Christian literature of the postapostolic period — those writers commonly known as the church fathers — to bolster their claim to be the true restoration of apostolic Christianity. This two–part series will review the evidence for their position by examining the early church literature pertaining to the central doctrines of the Christian faith.

THE CHURCH FATHERS

In the first few centuries after the death of the apostles, the literary efforts of certain esteemed leaders and teachers of the church served to communicate and defend the faith. These writings were held in high regard, often being circulated with copies of the Scriptures themselves. They became an integral part of the spiritual literature of the growing Christian communities, and were frequently utilized in worship. The authors, generally known as the apostolic or church fathers, provide us with valuable understanding of the history and development of Christian life, beliefs, and doctrine in the postapostolic age.

These writings were prompted by a number of circumstances. Some were written to explain and defend Christianity to pagan authorities (e.g., kings) in an attempt to deflect persecution. Others were intended to encourage, teach, and correct wayward churches. Many were written to defend the church against heresies from inside and outside the Christian community.

Some of the most valuable insights from these writings relate to the formation of orthodox Christian doctrine, particularly as it developed in response to heresy. Study of the history and development of orthodox Christian doctrine reveals that several very important doctrines, such as the Trinity and the nature of Christ, were refined over an extended period. These teachings were to some extent implicitly understood by the early church, and later were more explicitly defined. Since false teachers distorted these and other doctrines, church fathers directed much of their attention to refuting them with apostolic teaching based on Scripture. Hence, the writings of the church fathers provide an important resource for determining what Christians believed in the first few centuries after the apostles.

THE ALLEGED “APOSTASY” OF CHRISTENDOM

A recent Watchtower magazine expounds the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ view that orthodox Christianity (“Christendom”) underwent a great apostasy after the death of the apostles: “The death of the apostles removed a restraining influence, allowing a widespread apostasy to develop. (2 Thessalonians 2:7, 8) An organization grew up that unworthily professed to be God’s congregation. It falsely claimed to be the holy nation anointed with God’s spirit to rule with Jesus.”¹

The Witnesses believe that the influx of pagan converts brought in doctrines and concepts from Greek philosophy and religion which were then integrated into the Christian faith, resulting in such “false” teachings as the Trinity, the deity of Christ, the immortality of the soul, and eternal punishment in hell. According to the Watchtower Society, Christendom lived in darkness for 18 centuries after this apostasy. Yet they believe there were always individuals who were faithful to divine truth — a truth more fully unveiled when their founder, Charles Russell, began to study the Bible in earnest in the 1870s. To support this view, Watchtower literature regularly cites passages from the church fathers to demonstrate that, even after the apostasy, there were some who believed as Jehovah’s Witnesses do today.

In light of this line of argumentation, it is worthwhile to examine the writings of the early church fathers. If indeed such writings reveal that early Christians believed as Jehovah’s Witnesses do today, then surely a reevaluation of orthodox Christian teachings is needed. If these writings fail to support Watchtower claims, however, then one must conclude that Jehovah’s Witnesses represent a new religious tradition of the late 19th century, with no historical connection to apostolic Christianity.

The body of literature of the postapostolic church is substantial, and a full review would be outside of the scope of a limited survey such as this. The most critical period is that prior to the Council of Nicea in A.D. 325, because it is historically closest to the apostles. Part One of this series will examine writings from this period that relate to the question of whether the church underwent a great apostasy. It will also investigate what the church fathers say about one of the most critical doctrines of the Christian faith — the divine nature of Christ. Part Two will review other important doctrines of the faith, such as the nature of the Holy Spirit, the soul, and the fate of the wicked.

Did a Great Apostasy Occur?

Was the true faith taught by the apostles lost or corrupted within the first generation after the apostles? If so, then the true faith was not successfully transmitted anywhere in the evangelized world of the first and second centuries — including churches established by the apostles, with leadership appointed personally by them. A “great apostasy” would require an extraordinary event: the simultaneous loss of faith by an entire generation of Christians throughout the civilized world. Included in this apostasy would be disciples of the apostles themselves, as well as those who witnessed the thousands of martyrs who, just a short time previously, refused to deny Christ, either explicitly or by worshiping pagan gods.

A great apostasy, wherein the doctrines of Greek pagan philosophy replaced apostolic teaching, would most likely have begun in areas where the church was accepting a large number of converts with backgrounds in Greek religion and philosophy, such as Alexandria, Egypt. The prominent western churches established directly by the apostles, such as those in Rome and Antioch, would likely have fallen into heresy more slowly. But the historical facts do not support this (or any other) scenario of a “great apostasy.” Had a great apostasy begun immediately after the death of the apostles, as the Watchtower claims, a mixture of “true Christianity” (i.e., Watchtower–type teachings) and “pagan heresy” (i.e., orthodox Christian teachings) would be discernible in the literature of the early church, which was widespread in its geographical points of origin.

Is it possible that all the writings of the followers of the “true faith” were completely destroyed by the paganized church? Such a view is highly improbable. Many manuscripts have survived from Gnosticism (a widespread religious movement of this period which combined elements of Greek paganism and eastern mystery religions), despite several centuries of concerted attack and condemnation by the church. Yet not a single document exists pointing to a group who believed as the Jehovah’s Witnesses do today.

The absence of such early “Watchtower” literature causes one to doubt the existence of the so-called “faithful and discrete servant class.” After all, the stated purpose of these 144,000 anointed servants in Jehovah’s plan is to provide “meat in due season” — that is, literature that imparts “accurate knowledge” about the Bible. If these early Jehovah’s Witnesses were true to the kingdom gospel, handed down to them by the apostles, they would have written sufficiently to provide the faithful with an understanding of the Scriptures. Keep in mind that the Watchtower Society teaches that the Scriptures cannot be properly understood without such aids.² Yet where is the Watchtower literature of the first and second centuries — or for that matter, of any century prior to the 1870s? Its absence is most telling, and highly damaging to the claim of a general apostasy with just a few of the dedicated faithful surviving.

Perhaps the most compelling argument against a universal early apostasy may be found in the commissioning and empowering of the apostles themselves. If a universal apostasy occurred immediately after the death of the apostles, we would have to judge the apostles as incompetent or negligent evangelists who utterly failed to accomplish Jesus’ commission to make disciples. Such an apostasy would reflect poorly on Jehovah God as well, whose “holy spirit” was unable to preserve His followers for even a single generation.

There is, therefore, no reason to believe that a great apostasy occurred following the death of the apostles, with the resulting loss of the “true” Christian faith for over 1800 years. This conclusion seems undeniable in view of the Great Commission, the power of the Holy Spirit, the absence of literary evidence for an alternative group of believers with a gospel similar to that preached by Jehovah’s Witnesses, and the implausibility of the required simultaneous loss of faith by an entire generation of geographically dispersed Christians.

THE CHURCH FATHERS AND THE DEITY OF CHRIST

Jehovah’s Witnesses deny that Jesus Christ is YHWH (or Jehovah) in the flesh, maintaining that he is the first creation of Jehovah. The Witness book used for instruction of potential converts, You Can Live Forever in Paradise on Earth, explains: “Did Jesus ever say that he was God? No, he never did. Rather, in the Bible he is called ‘God’s Son.’ And he said, ‘The Father is greater than I am.’ (John 10:34-36; 14:28)…Thus the Almighty God and Jesus are clearly two separate persons. Even after his death and resurrection and ascension to heaven, Jesus was still not equal to his Father.”³

The Witnesses further claim that Jesus was not raised bodily from the dead, but was raised as a spirit creature who assumed different material bodies after his resurrection when interacting with the disciples: “Since the apostle Thomas was able to put his hand into a hole in Jesus’ side, does that not show that Jesus was raised from the dead in the same body that was nailed to the stake? No, for Jesus simply materialized or took on a fleshly body, as angels had done in the past.”⁴

Watchtower teaching regarding the time and manner of Christ’s return also differs markedly from historical Christian teaching. Witnesses believe that Christ established an invisible “presence” on earth in the year 1914, seen only by those with “eyes of understanding” — that is, those who understand and follow the divine truths and Bible teaching put forth by the “faithful and discrete servant” of the Watchtower Society. We read in Paradise on Earth: “What was the manner of Jesus’ leaving?…The departing Jesus, therefore, became invisible to [the disciples]…Thus his return also would be invisible, in a spiritual body.”⁵

The Watchtower often insists that the church fathers believed as they do on such doctrines. For example, in their booklet Should You Believe in the Trinity?⁶ they cite several early Christian fathers, claiming that they did not believe Jesus was God, but rather was a created being. An examination of the patristic literature (i.e., writings of the church fathers) will reveal whether such claims are true.

The Fathers and Apostolic Authority

We begin with the recognition that the church fathers frequently pointed to apostolic teaching as the source of their faith. Many patristic writers stressed the importance placed by the early church on gathering and preserving every teaching and saying of Jesus and the apostles. They constantly maintained that their beliefs originated from these sources. Furthermore, such claims did not occur in a vacuum. The early Christian fathers wrote in an environment where many were already familiar with apostolic teaching; many had been taught by disciples of the apostles or even the apostles themselves. Hence, the introduction of nonapostolic doctrine would undoubtedly have raised much opposition from those who knew the truth firsthand.

The preeminence of apostolic authority and teaching is seen throughout the patristic literature. For example, Irenaeus, speaking of Clement of Rome, said, “He had seen the apostles and associated with them, and still had their preaching sounding in his ears and their tradition before his eyes — and not he alone, for there were many still left in his time who had been taught by the apostles.”⁷ Matthetes, speaking to Diognetus, said, “I am not speaking of things that are strange to me…for I have been a disciple of apostles, and now I am becoming a teacher of the Gentiles.”⁸ Irenaeus declared, “Now the Church, although scattered over the whole civilized world to the end of the earth, received from the apostles and their disciples its faith in one God, the Father Almighty…and in one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who was made flesh for our salvation, and in the Holy Spirit.”⁹ Origen affirmed, “The holy Apostles, in preaching the faith of Christ, treated with the utmost clarity certain matters which they believed to be of absolute necessity to all believers.”¹⁰

It is reasonable to assume, in view of the above, that, when it comes to the essentials of the Christian faith, the church fathers are a good source for discerning apostolic teaching and doctrine. Hence, one may look to them for insight as to what the first–century church believed about Jesus Christ. We will now consider the ante–Nicene church fathers’ treatment of Christ as the Author of Scripture, their explicit statements about His deity, their defense of His uncreated and eternal nature, and their beliefs about His return.

Christ as the Author of Scripture

Early Christians took from their Jewish heritage the conviction that the Old Testament Scriptures were inspired and authored by YHWH, through His Holy Spirit. Yet the apostolic fathers often attributed the authorship of Scripture to Christ. By so doing they demonstrated their conviction about Christ’s deity. In 1 Clement, for example, we read, “For this is how Christ addresses us through his Holy Spirit: ‘Come, my children, listen to Me, I will teach you the fear of the Lord.’”¹¹ In 2d Clement we read, “But how do we acknowledge Him?…By honoring Him [Christ] not only with our lips, but with all our mind and our heart. And He says in Isaiah as well, ‘This people honors me with their lips but their heart is far from me.’”¹² Likewise, Irenaeus said, “The Scriptures are certainly perfect, since they were spoken by the Word of God [Christ] and by His Spirit.”¹³ Such attribution would be inconceivable if the patristic writers had not believed that Jesus is God.

The patristic writers also directly identified Christ with YHWH. This they did by interpreting many passages of the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament) that speak of YHWH as references to the preincarnate Christ. Justin Martyr, a converted philosopher of the early second century, exemplifies this approach: “Although the Jews were always of the opinion that it was the Father of all who had spoken to Moses, it was in fact the Son of God…who spoke to him…They who assert that the Son is the Father are proved to know neither the Father, nor that the Father of all has a Son, who is both the first-born Word of God and is God.”¹⁴ Moreover, Justin said, “What was said out of the bush to Moses, ‘I am He who is, the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob and the God of your fathers,’ was an indication that they though dead still existed and were Christ’s own men.”¹⁵ Hence, the early Christian writers not only attributed the words of Scripture to Christ, but specifically identified Him with the YHWH of the Old Testament.

Explicit Statements about the Deity of Christ

As we saw with Justin Martyr above, the church fathers also explicitly declared the divine nature of Jesus Christ. Ignatius, a prominent martyr of the early second century, wrote seven letters to the churches of Asia Minor that are replete with statements affirming that Jesus is God: “The source of your unity and election is genuine suffering which you undergo by the will of the Father and of Jesus Christ our God.”¹⁶ “There is one only physician — of flesh yet spiritual, born yet unbegotten, God incarnate, genuine life in the midst of death, sprung from Mary as well as God…Jesus Christ our Lord.”¹⁷ “For our God, Jesus the Christ, was conceived in the womb by Mary…of the Holy Ghost.”¹⁸

Such direct statements about Christ’s deity were not unique to Ignatius, but can be seen in other early church literature. Polycarp, a direct disciple of the apostle John, declared: “May He grant unto you a lot and a portion among His saints…who shall believe in our Lord and God Jesus Christ and in His Father that raised Him from the dead.”¹⁹ Irenaeus likewise declared, “He is Himself in His own right God and Lord and Eternal King and Only begotten and Incarnate Word, proclaimed as such by all the Prophets and by the Apostles and by the Spirit Himself…The Scriptures would not have borne witness to these things concerning Him, if, like everyone else, He were mere man.”²⁰ Mellito of Sardis similarly affirmed, “The activities of Christ after His Baptism…gave indication and assurance to the world of the Deity hidden in His flesh. Being God and likewise perfect man, He gave positive indications of His two natures…He concealed the signs of His Deity, although He was the true God existing before the ages.”²¹ Hippolytus added, “Only His Word is from Himself, and is therefore also God, becoming the substance of God.”²² And Tertullian affirmed, “God alone is without sin. The only man without sin is Christ; for Christ is also God.”²³

Examples such as these abound. There can be no doubt that the early church, well before the Council of Nicea and indeed beginning with disciples of the apostles themselves, believed that Jesus Christ possessed the very same nature and substance as God.

Jesus Not Created, Nor an Angel

The Jehovah’s Witnesses’ idea that Jesus was a created being and an angel was common to pagan and Gnostic religions, and the early Christian apologists made a point of explicitly refuting it. For example, in The Epistle of Barnabus we read, “God himself, who from heaven established the truth, and the holy, incomprehensible word among men…Nor, as one might suppose, did he do this by sending to men some subordinate — an angel, or principality…Rather he sent the Designer and Maker of the universe Himself…God sent him to men.”²⁴ Athenagorus likewise affirmed, “The Son of God is the Word of the Father…the Father and the Son being one.…The Son…is the First-begotten of the Father, not as having been produced — for from the beginning God had the Word in Himself…”²⁵ Irenaeus in like manner said, “[The Gnostics] transfer the generation of the uttered word of men to the eternal Word of God, attributing to Him a beginning of utterance and a coming into being in a manner like to that of their own word. In what manner, then, would the Word of God — indeed, the great God Himself, since He is the Word — differ from the word of man, were He to have the same order and process of generation?”²⁶ Tertullian similarly wrote, “‘But Christ,’ they say, ‘also bore the nature of an angel.’ For what reason? And why did He take human nature?…Christ bore human nature in order to be man’s salvation.…There was no such reason why Christ would take upon Himself angelic nature.”²⁷ And Origen declared, “Although He was God, He took flesh; and having been made man, He remained what He was, God.…For we do not hold…that some part of the substance of God was converted into the Son, or that the Son was procreated by the Father from nonexistent substances, that is, from a substance outside Himself, so that there were a time when He did not exist.”²⁸

While Witnesses assert that pagan influences produced the doctrine of Christ’s deity so forcefully stated at the Council of Nicea, it was in fact the pagans, not the Christians, who claimed He was created. The origins of Watchtower Christology are found not in apostolic teaching, but rather in Gnostic speculation.

The Return of Christ

There is likewise no support in early Christian literature for the idea that Jesus would return in some invisible, spiritual manner. As with the idea that Jesus was a created angel, the notion of a “spiritual” postresurrection body of Christ was prominent in Gnosticism. The Gnostics viewed the flesh as inherently evil. The fathers, in contrast, expressed the hope that the church held from the time of the apostles, that Jesus would return in the flesh, in a glorious and triumphant manner. The Epistle of Barnabus, written shortly after the fall of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, expressed this common hope of all Christians: “Set your hope on Him who is about to be manifested to you in the flesh, even Jesus.…For they shall see Him in that day wearing the long scarlet robe about His flesh, and shall say, ‘Is this not He, Whom we once crucified and regarded as nothing and spat upon; verily this was He.’”²⁹

The patristic literature makes no mention of an invisible “presence” of Jesus — a central doctrine of Witness theology and chronology. This Watchtower teaching does not derive from the writings of the early church, and must be judged as originating far outside of apostolic Christianity.

The Fathers Denied That Christ Is a Created, Lesser God

Witnesses often attack the doctrine of the Trinity, asserting that the belief in three Persons in one God goes against reason. While Christianity holds that the Trinity accurately describes the self-revealed nature of God, the tension between the distinctness of the Persons and the unity of God has always presented a challenge to those who reason about the nature of God. The early Christian apologists frequently had to explain and defend the fact that Christ is divine by nature and yet personally distinct from the Father. Those who challenged them — both those coming from the polytheistic background of Greek philosophy and religion, and those whose amalgamation of philosophy and Christianity led them astray — often resorted to a formulation in which Christ was a created, lesser god. Hence, in many ways the early Christian writers faced a similar situation as those evangelizing Jehovah’s Witnesses today.

The early postapostolic church strongly held that Christ was of the very substance of God, and was not a lesser, created god. Athenagorus, a Christian philosopher of the second century, addressed this issue in a manner typical of many of the early fathers: “If, moreover, it is claimed that, just as hand, eye, and foot are constituent parts of a single body, so God’s unity is made up from two or more gods, this is equally false.…But God is uncreated, impassible, and indivisible. He does not, therefore, consist of parts.”³⁰ Moreover, “The Son…is the first offspring of the Father. I do not mean that he was created, for since God is eternal mind, he had his Word within himself from the beginning, being eternally wise…Who, then, would not be astonished to hear those called atheists who admit God the Father, God the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and who teach their unity in power and their distinction in rank?”³¹ As with other aspects of the Watchtower doctrine of Christ, there is no support in the literature of these early Christian authors for a Christ who was a lesser, created god, the first creation of Jehovah.

An Absence of Evidence

The Watchtower Society has selectively quoted the literature of the early church fathers in an attempt to demonstrate that, while the church fell into apostasy at an early date, nonetheless many early Christians believed as they do today. When the literature of this period is examined in depth, however, it becomes clear that there is virtually no evidence that a great global apostasy occurred immediately following the death of the apostles. Furthermore, there is no evidence that a group preaching the preeminence of Jehovah’s name went door–to–door distributing the writings of a small body of anointed men, while proclaiming the invisible presence of Christ and a coming earthy kingdom. The Witnesses’ claim to be the sole bearers of true apostolic Christianity does not stand.

The writings of the early fathers explicitly and repeatedly refute the Christ of the Watchtower, and confidently assert His deity and uncreated nature. The created angelic deity of the Watchtower bears much resemblance to the speculations of Gnosticism and Greek paganism, but has no resemblance to the incarnate Word of God preached by the apostles.

What of the other important teachings of the faith? In Part Two I will examine such doctrines as the Holy Spirit, the nature of the soul, the Resurrection, and the destiny of the righteous and wicked. As in the present article, Watchtower teachings will be compared and contrasted with those of the ante-Nicene church fathers to test their validity and historical accuracy.

Robert U. Finnerty, M.D., is a practicing physician in Tacoma, WA and is the author of Jehovah’s Witnesses on Trial: The Testimony of the Early Church Fathers (P&R Publishing, 1993).

NOTES

1. The Watchtower, 15 June 1992, 19.
2. The Watchtower Society, while claiming to use the Bible alone, actually teaches that the Bible cannot be understood without the aid of the “meat in due season,” the literature provided by the Society — its interpretation of Scripture being the only valid one. See The Watchtower, 15 September 1910, 298; 15 August 1981, 28.
3. You Can Live Forever in Paradise on Earth (Brooklyn: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, 1982), 39–40.
4. Ibid., 144.
5. Ibid., 145–46.
6. Should You Believe in the Trinity? (Brooklyn: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, 1989).
7. Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 3.3.3, in Cyril C. Richardson, Early Christian Fathers (New York: Macmillan, 1970).
8. Ibid., 11.
9. Ibid., 1.10.1.
10. Origen, Fundamental Doctrines, 1. Pref. 3–4; 1.2.1; 4.4.1, in W. A. Jurgens, The Faith of the Early Fathers, vol. 1 (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1979).
11. Ibid., 22.
12. Ibid., 3.
13. Ibid., 2.28.2.
14. Ibid., 63.
15. Ibid.
16. Ignatius, Ephesians, 1. In Richardson.
17. Ibid., 7.
18. Ibid., 18, in J. B. Lightfoot and J. R. Harmer, The Apostolic Fathers (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1984).
19. Ibid., 12.
20. Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 3.19, 1–2, in Jurgens, vol. 1.
21. Melito, Guide, 13, in ibid.
22. Hippolytus, Refutation of All Heresies, 10.33, in ibid.
23. Tertullian, The Soul, 41.3, in ibid.
24. The Epistle to Diognetus, 7, in Richardson.
25. Athenagoras, Intercession on Behalf of the Christians, 10, in Jurgens, vol. 1.
26. Ibid., 2.13.8.
27. Ibid., 14.1.
28. Origen, Fundamental Doctrines, 1, pref. 3–4; 1.2.1; 4.4.1, in ibid.
29. Epistle of Barnabas, 6.7, in Lightfoot and Harmer.
30. Ibid., 8, in Richardson.
31. Ibid., 10, in Richardson.

Part Two

SUMMARY 

Jehovah’s Witnesses believe the Holy Spirit is an impersonal force and deny His deity. They further deny that the soul survives physical death and that hell is a place of conscious eternal punishment for the wicked. Moreover, the Witnesses imply that the early church believed as they do about these doctrines. Examination of early Christian literature, however, refutes these claims. It demonstrates that the early church believed in the full deity and personality of the Spirit. It also reveals that they believed in a soul that survives death and in a place of conscious eternal punishment for the wicked. There is no historical evidence from the earlieat years following the apostles for any group believing as the Witnesses do today. The absence of such evidence provides an opportunity for Christians to undermine the legitimacy and authority of the Watchtower Society, a necessary step for leading Jehovah’s Witnesses to Christ.

Part one of this series examined two important doctrinal premises of the Jehovah’s Witnesses: (1) the idea that a great apostasy occurred in the Christian church after the death of the apostles, and (2) the claim that the early Christians believed Jesus Christ was a created being. The literature of the early postapostolic period reveals no evidence that a great apostasy occurred and demonstrates convincingly that the early church, beginning with disciples of the apostles themselves, believed Jesus Christ possesses both the nature of God and the nature of a human being. On this basis alone one can refute the claim of the Watchtower Society to be a contemporary restoration of the true Christian faith.

The Watchtower Society also diverges markedly from the orthodox church on the nature of the Holy Spirit, the nature of the soul, and the existence of a place of conscious eternal punishment for the wicked. Yet, despite their differences with Christendom, the Witnesses are convinced that their teachings are harmonious with the teachings of the apostles and the early church. To resolve this issue, it is important to seek evidence for the beliefs of the early church from the testimony of history.

THE HOLY SPIRIT AND THE POST APOSTOLIC CHURCH

Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that “holy spirit” is neither God nor personal, but rather is an impersonal force or energy sent forth from God.¹ The Witnesses assert that the orthodox teaching about the Holy Spirit — that He is personal and a member of the Trinity — was an apostate church innovation that became official church dogma from the fourth century. This challenge raises serious questions about this fundamental teaching of the Christian faith. What did the early church believe about the Holy Spirit? Did they consider the Spirit to be a person or an impersonal force? Did they consider the Spirit to be equal to God Himself?

An examination of early church literature reveals that little attention was paid to the specific issues of the nature and personality of the Holy Spirit. Thus it is difficult to be dogmatic about the beliefs of the early church on this subject. The literary motivation of the patristic authors generally falls into several categories, the most common being the defense of the faith against pagans, pastoral concerns, and the refutation of heresy. This last category — the defense of the faith against heresy — served as the strongest incentive for the development of formal Christian doctrine. In the centuries before the council of Nicaea (AD 325), the principal heretical challenges to the faith focused on the nature of Christ and His relationship to the Father. Except for the work of Origen in the latter part of the third century, no formal, systematic Christian theology was attempted during this period. Because there was little controversy about the nature and personality of the Spirit, a strong motivation to develop formal doctrinal positions on this issue was lacking.

Nevertheless, it is possible to discern from this literature the broad outlines of the early Christian understanding of the Spirit, and to compare and contrast this picture with the teachings of the Watchtower Society. The Spirit is mentioned frequently in early Christian literature, most commonly in contexts describing the baptismal formula or other contexts that do not clearly demonstrate a definitive understanding of the Spirit’s nature. But some common threads are evident. The principal themes pertaining to the Holy Spirit found throughout the patristic literature are described below.

The Indwelling of the Holy Spirit

The church fathers make frequent mention of that which they believed to be at the heart of the Christian life — the rebirth of a sinful person through the indwelling of God within the human heart by faith in Christ. Emphasis on this as the central experience of the Christian faith is seen outside the Scriptures as early as the first century, during which time many disciples of the apostles, and even some of the apostles themselves, were still alive.

The Epistle of Barnabas, written by an unknown author shortly after the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70, makes frequent reference to the importance of this spiritual transformation: “Behold then we have been created anew, as He said…’Behold, says the Lord, I will remove from them…their stony hearts and will put into them hearts of flesh.’ For He Himself was to be manifested in the flesh and to dwell in us. For the abode of our heart…is a holy temple to the Lord.”² We also read, “By receiving the remission of our sins and hoping on the Name we became new, created afresh from the beginning. Therefore God dwells truly in our dwelling within us.…He Himself [is] dwelling in us.…For he that desires to be saved looks not to man, but to Him that dwells and speaks in him.”³

Ignatius, a revered martyr of the early church who clearly proclaimed the deity of Christ in his epistles, also testified to the indwelling of God the Father and Jesus Christ in the temple of the believer. While he did not specifically mention the Spirit in such a context, his testimony bore witness to the fundamental conviction of the early church — God is present in the heart that is newly created through faith: “I realize that you are not conceited; for you have Jesus Christ in yourselves.”⁴ “Let us, then, do everything as if He were dwelling in us. Thus we shall be His temples, and He will be within us as our God—as he actually is.”⁵

While both Barnabas and Ignatius emphasized the indwelling of God and Christ, other early authors stated that God dwells within the human heart through His Spirit. The Shepherd of Hermas, a second-century allegory esteemed by the early church, speaks often of the Spirit and His sanctifying work in the human heart: “Love truth, and let nothing but truth proceed out of thy mouth, that the Spirit which God made to dwell in this flesh, may be found true in the sight of all men; and so shall the Lord, Who dwelleth in thee, be glorified.”⁶ “For if thou art long-suffering, the Holy Spirit that abideth in thee shall be pure…[He] shall rejoice and be glad with the vessel in which he dwelleth.”⁷ “Take heed therefore, ye that serve God and have Him in your heart…”⁸

The early church proclaimed the same good news that Christians rejoice in today — that we may be reconciled with God through faith in Christ and transformed through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. And it is very clear from the language they used that they considered this indwelling Spirit to be personal and identified Him as God.

The Holy Spirit Is the Author of Scripture

Frequent references to Christ as the author of Scripture demonstrate the early church’s belief in His deity. Likewise, the patristic writers attributed the voice and authorship of Scripture also to the Holy Spirit. For example, Hippolytus (who according to the Watchtower believed that the Spirit was an impersonal power⁹) said this of the Spirit: “Neither does Scripture falsify anything, nor does the Holy Spirit deceive His servants, the prophets, through whom He is pleased to announce to men the will of God.”¹⁰ “For either they do not believe that the Sacred Scriptures were spoken by the Holy Spirit, in which case they are unbelievers, or, if they regard themselves as being wiser than the Holy Spirit, what else are they but demoniacs.[sic]”¹¹

Many such instances are seen in early church literature. Since the fathers believed the author of Scripture to be God, their testimony about the Spirit speaking through the written Word provides substantial evidence that they understood the Spirit to be personal, and they attributed to Him the nature, words, and will of God.

The Holy Spirit Is Described in Personal Terms

The Watchtower Society argues that the use of terms of personality to describe the Holy Spirit is not evidence that He is a personal being, but rather represents the literary technique of personification. Their reference book Insight on the Scriptures asserts that personification does not prove personality: “It is true that Jesus spoke of the holy spirit as a ‘helper’ and spoke of such helper as ‘teaching,’ ‘bearing witness,” ‘giving evidence,’ ‘guiding.’…it is not unusual in the Scriptures for something that is not actually a person to be personalized or personified. Wisdom is personified in the book of Proverbs.”¹²

This weak defense is contradicted not only by Scripture, but by the postapostolic literature. With the exception of the allegorical Shepherd of Hermas, the church fathers rarely employed the literary technique of personification, yet they repeatedly spoke of the Spirit in personal terms. They believed the Holy Spirit has an active and dynamic role in the church, not as an impersonal power, but as a personal being with an independent will and ministry. For example, Ignatius des-cribed the Spirit as Preacher.¹³ Likewise, Justin Martyr referred to Him as Teacher: “The Holy Prophetic Spirit taught us this when He informed us through Moses that God spoke….”¹⁴

The early fathers recognized that the Holy Spirit possesses all the attributes that we associate with personality. In the following passages note how the Spirit manifests emotion, functions as an intermediary between two personal beings (God and humans), exercises endurance, accuses sinners, and proclaims the truth of God without deception: “The doubtful mind saddens the Spirit….Put away therefore from thyself sadness, and afflict not the Holy Spirit that dwelleth in thee….”¹⁵ “The Jews…were rightly censured both by the Prophetic Spirit and by Christ himself, since they knew neither the Father nor the Son.”¹⁶ “The Holy Spirit [does not] deceive His servants, the prophets, through whom He is pleased to announce to men the will of God.”¹⁷

It is not plausible to claim that such references involve the literary personification of an impersonal power or force. To see such a consistent personification would be most unlikely given the wide spectrum of authors and literary styles evident in the writings of the fathers. There is no support in the writings of the early church for a doctrine of the Spirit as an impersonal force or energy of God. Whatever the origins of this Watchtower teaching, it did not come from the teachings of those who were disciples of the apostles.

The Spirit Is Functionally Equated with the Father and the Son

The patristic writers frequently spoke of God and Christ in equivalent ways, often interchanging “God” and “Christ” in the same sentence or paragraph. They treated the Spirit in a similar manner: “He that has the Spirit…giveth no answer to any man when enquired of, nor speaketh in solitude (for neither doth the Holy Spirit speak when a man wisheth Him to speak); but the man speaketh then when God wisheth him to speak.”¹⁸ “The Spirit and the Power from God cannot rightly be thought of as anything else than the Lord, who is also the First–born of God.”¹⁹

God, Christ, and the Spirit are spoken of in an equivalent manner throughout the patristic literature. While distinguishing different roles in their relationship with humankind and with the church, the apostolic fathers treated the Holy Spirit as the functional equivalent of the Father Himself. They believed that the Spirit was God dwelling within the heart of the believer, teaching and admonishing the church, manifesting the emotions and will of God. They did not believe He was simply an impersonal energy or force.

THE NATURE OF THE SOUL AND ETERNAL PUNISHMENT

Among the most fundamental questions of religion are those pertaining to human nature, the consequences of evil, and the destiny of human beings after death. There are substantial differences between the teachings of the Watchtower and those of orthodox Christianity on these issues, yet both claim to accurately interpret Scripture and represent apostolic teaching.

The Watchtower Society denies the existence of the soul as a separable entity from the body that survives death. Jehovah’s Witnesses teach that the term soul refers to the whole person, composed of a physical body and an impersonal “spirit” or life force. At death, a person ceases to exist except in the memory of God; the life force does not survive death but its energy returns to God.²⁰ While Witnesses nominally believe in a resurrection of the righteous, it is in reality a recreation, wherein God creates a new person from the pattern of that individual in His memory.²¹

The idea of hell as a place of conscious eternal punishment for the wicked has always been anathema to Jehovah’s Witnesses. They believe the biblical terms for hell (sheol in the Old Testament, hades and gehenna in the New Testament) refer only to the common grave of humankind. Using their ubiquitous yardstick of biblical interpretation — their own human reason — they assert that a God of love would never condemn humans to an eternity of fiery torment. The fate of the wicked is nonexistence, with no hope of resurrection to Jehovah’s paradise on earth.

The Witnesses believe that the doctrines of a soul that survives death and a hell where the wicked are punished eternally arose from Platonic influences within an apostate church, and they are not representative of the beliefs or teachings of the apostles or early Christians. Does early Christian literature substantiate their claim to have a true biblical and apostolic understanding of these doctrines?

Discussion of the soul occurs frequently in the postapostolic literature. There are different meanings for soul depending on the context in which it is used. The fathers sometimes used the term to refer to the entire person. Their understanding, however, was not confined to this use.

Martyrdom was common in the widespread persecution of the early church. The courage of the martyrs was based on their faith in Christ their Savior and their conviction that death would immediately usher them into His presence. Polycarp, a disciple of the apostle John, was one of the early church’s great martyrs. At the time of his death, his prayer expressed a hope not only in resurrection, but also that he would stand in the presence of Christ after his sacrifice: “I bless Thee, because Thou hast deemed me worthy this day and hour, to take my part among the number of the martyrs in the cup of thy Christ, for ‘resurrection to eternal life’ of soul and body…may I be received in thy presence this day as a rich and acceptable sacrifice.”²²

Ignatius likewise manifested this hope at the time of his martyrdom: “I would rather that you fawn on the beasts so that they may be my tomb and no scrap of my body be left. Thus, when I have fallen asleep…shall I be a real disciple of Jesus Christ when the world sees my body no more.”²³

Similar references are common in the postapostolic literature. Typical of the early church’s teaching on the soul is a passage from Justin Martyr, a convert from pagan philosophy who also suffered martyrdom: “Look at the end of each of the former emperors, how they died the common death of all; and if this were merely a departure into unconsciousness, that would be a piece of luck for the wicked. But since consciousness continues for all who have lived, and eternal punishment awaits….All this should convince you that souls are still conscious after death….We look forward to receiving again our own bodies, though they be dead and buried in the earth.”²⁴

In contrast to passages such as those above, there is no literary or historical evidence for any early Christian group teaching soul sleep. The belief in a soul that survives death is ubiquitous in the writings of the early church. It is not credible to say that a theology of soul sleep and an impersonal life force reflects apostolic teaching when such concepts appear nowhere in the writings of apostolic disciples or others in the early church.

As with Justin Martyr above, the punishment of the wicked after death is also a common topic in the literature of the church before Nicaea. There is no indication that the early church believed the wicked were punished by annihilation. Rather, the conscious punishment of those who reject Christ and fail to repent permeates the evangelism of this period. The early church was not reticent about teaching the consequences of sin for the unrepentant.

A few passages speak of the destruction of the wicked. The Epistle of Barnabas, for example, says, “For it is a way of eternal death with punishment wherein are the things that destroy men’s souls.”²⁵ Such affirmations taken in isolation might seem to support the doctrine of soul sleep. Yet when the broader context is examined, the fathers did not believe that “eternal death” or “destruction” meant cessation of existence, but rather a state of eternal separation from God — the antithesis of the perfection achieved when a faithful Christian is joined eternally with God in heaven.

The early church believed the wicked would receive an eternity of torment and punishment. Clement, the third bishop of Rome, said, “It is better for a man to confess of his sins than to harden his heart in the way those rebels against God’s servant Moses hardened theirs. The verdict against them was made very plain. For ‘they went down to Hades alive.’”²⁶ Similarly, the author of 2 Clement, an early Christian homily, said, “But the righteous…when they shall behold them that have done amiss and denied Jesus by their words or by their deeds, how that they are punished with grievous torments in unquenchable fire, shall give glory to God.”²⁷

The author of The Martyrdom of Polycarp describes in detail the death of John’s disciple, and says this of the motivation behind Christian martyrdom: “And giving themselves over to the grace of Christ, they despised the tortures of this world, purchasing for themselves…life eternal. To them the fire of their inhuman tortures was cold, for they set before their eyes escape from the fire that is everlasting and never quenched.”²⁸

Irenaeus, a disciple of Polycarp — described by the Watchtower as one “who boldly spoke out in favor of the inspired written Word of God rather than the traditions of men”²⁹ — said this about the fate of the unrepentant: “The Church…received from the apostles…its faith…that [Christ] may make just judgment of them all; and that He may send the spiritual forces of wickedness…and the impious, unjust, lawless and blasphemous among men, into everlasting fire.”³⁰

It is clear from these and many other references that the early church, citing apostolic teaching as its source, believed that those who failed to repent were destined for conscious eternal torment in hell. They ridiculed the pagan notion that the wicked would be annihilated and cease to exist, asserting that this would be an unjust end for those who pursued wickedness and the pleasures of this world. Just as they believed that faithful Christians would be eternally in the presence of God, they were convinced that the wicked would suffer an eternity of torment apart from Him. The Watchtower teaching on the annihilation of the wicked quite simply has no historical precedent in the early church.

THE WATCHTOWER VS. THE HISTORICAL RECORD

One avenue for refuting Watchtower teachings is the careful and thorough exposition of biblical texts. Many biblical scholars have solidly refuted the unsound approach to biblical interpretation practiced by the Watchtower Society, yet the fruits of such efforts are often dismissed by the Witness at the door who is unwilling to accept any scholarship — regardless of how thorough or distinguished — that contradicts an organization believed to be God’s sole channel of communication. Faced with this obstacle, the Christian who wishes to lead the Witness to Christ and into the truth of the Christian faith may find his or her commentaries and books on biblical apologetics to be of no avail. The Watchtower has over one hundred years of polemical experience and millions of pages of literature defending their interpretation of Scripture. The Christian who confronts this arsenal directly is facing a most formidable stronghold.

The Watchtower fortress is not invulnerable, however. The Watchtower Society claims to have an unbroken lineage of faithful Christians since the apostles who have believed and taught as they do today. The Governing Body of the Watchtower Society, which represents the defacto voice of God for the individual Witness, derives its authority by claiming to be the “faithful and discrete servant” of Matthew 24:45. They assert that at the time of the invisible presence of Christ in 1914 he chose a group of Christians who alone were faithful to the true gospel. This group of “anointed” Witnesses is said to fulfill Jesus’ prophecy about the servant serving faithfully when his master returns. The Watchtower maintains that there has always been a “faithful and discrete servant class,” appointed by Jehovah God to proclaim His kingdom gospel, even during the 1,800 years between the death of the apostles and the establishment of the Watchtower Society.

These claims present an opportunity for Christians seeking to reach Jehovah’s Witnesses for Christ. The Witness likely will not be receptive to the true gospel or the true Christ until he or she first accepts that the Watchtower Society is not God’s sole channel for truth. By demonstrating through the vehicle of history that the early Christians — the same men cited in Watchtower literature as supporting Witness teachings — did not believe or teach as the Watchtower does today, the Christian may plant seeds of doubt about the truthfulness and reliability of the Watchtower Society.

Unlike topics such as the Trinity or the correct translation of John 1:1, the Witnesses have no prepared answers for such questions. Their literature provides no substantiation for claims of historical solidarity with the apostles, leaving the Witness with a dirth of prepackaged Watchtower answers. This provides a golden opportunity to compel Witnesses to think independently about such issues.

Readily available translations of the early fathers may also be accepted and studied by the Witness who would reject Christian apologetic literature as “spiritual pornography.”³¹ It therefore behooves Christians interested in reaching out to Jehovah’s Witnesses to familiarize themselves with the historical evidence for their own faith so they can contrast it with a latter-day counterfeit preaching another Jesus and another gospel.

Witnesses, who believe they are following the truth, need to be confronted lovingly with the historical fact that, while a few scattered groups over the centuries have held doctrines resembling a few of their teachings, there is no evidence for an unbroken lineage of anointed Jehovah’s Witnesses holding their interpretation of Scripture prior to Charles Russell. Certainly no evidence exists for such a group in the early church.

Those who know Jesus Christ and are born of His Spirit share the same faith with those who defended that faith nearly two thousand years ago. Jehovah’s Witnesses, despite their zealousness, are serving a religious fabrication masquerading as true Christianity. It is the duty of those who serve our Savior to introduce them to the Christ of truth, faith, and history.

Robert U. Finnerty, M.D., is a practicing physician in Tacoma, WA and is the author of Jehovah’s Witnesses on Trial: The Testimony of the Early Church Fathers (P&R Publishing, 1993).

NOTES

1. Insight on the Scriptures, vol. 2 (Brooklyn: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, 1988), 1019.
2. Barnabas, 6; in J. B. Lightfoot and J. R. Harmer, The Apostolic Fathers (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1984).
3. Ibid., 16.
4. Ignatius, Magnatians, 12; in Cyril C. Richardson, Early Christian Fathers (New York: Macmillan, 1970).
5. Ignatius, Ephesians, 15; in Richardson.
6. Hermas, Mandate, 3, 1; in Lightfoot.
7. Ibid, 5, 1; in Lightfoot.
8. Hermas Similitudes, 1; in Lightfoot.
9. Insight on the Scriptures, 1019.
10. Hippolytus, Commentary on Daniel, 4.6; in W. A. Jurgens, The Faith of the Early Fathers, vol. 1 (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1979).
11. Hippolytus, The Little Labyrinth; quoted in Eusebius Pamphilus, Ecclesiastical History, 5.28.15; in Jurgens.
12. Insight on the Scriptures, 1019.
13. Ignatius, Philippians, 7; in Lightfoot.
14. Justin Martyr, First Apology, 44; in Jurgens.
15. Hermas, Mandates, 10.2; in Lightfoot.
16. Justin Martyr, 63; in Richardson.
17. Hippolytus, Commentary on Daniel 4, 6; in Jurgens.
18. Hermas, Mandates, 11.1; in Lightfoot.
19. Justin Martyr, 33; in Richardson.
20. The cessation of a person’s existence at the time of death is referred to as soul sleep or soul death.
21. You Can Live Forever in Paradise on Earth (Brooklyn: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, 1982), 78. Insight on the Scriptures, 1025.
22. Martyrdom of Polycarp, 14; in Richardson.
23. Ignatius, Romans, 4; in Richardson.
24. Justin Martyr, 18; in Richardson.
25. Barnabas, 20; in Lightfoot.
26. 1 Clement, 51; in Richardson.
27. 2 Clement, 17; in Lightfoot.
28. Martyrdom of Polycarp, 2; in Richardson.
29. Watchtower, 15 July 1990, 26.
30. Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 1.10.1; in Richardson.
31. The Watchtower teaches that Jehovah’s Witnesses must avoid any religious literature from Christendom — especially any writings opposing the Society or written by former Witnesses (“apostates”) — and must treat Christian literature as pornography.