Thursday 2 February 2023

From Zion's Watch to The Watch Tower - Why?

Guest post by Gary

First produced in July 1879 as Zion’s Watch Tower and Herald of Christ’s Presence, on January 1, 1909, the magazine’s title was changed to The Watch Tower and Herald of Christ’s Presence. But why was this?

The book Jehovah’s Witnesses – Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom explained that the name of the magazine changed “in order to focus attention more clearly on the objective of the magazine.”(1) But more can be added which it was not necessary for the passing mention in the Proclaimers book to include.

Popular religious ideas in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century featured the thought, still held by many today, that the Jews who had become dispersed throughout the nations would eventually return to the Holy Land under the slogan of “Zionism.” Indeed, Pastor Russell shared such a belief which is apparent in his writings and perhaps reflected in the name originally chosen for the magazine he published. But it was not until the 1930s that Jehovah’s Witnesses adjusted their perspective from the natural nation of Israel to “Spiritual Israel.”(2) So why was it that reference to Zion was dropped from the name of the magazine as early as 1909? 

The answer is provided in the magazine’s last issue of 1908 which explains that some members of the public were wrongly assuming the magazine was related to John Alexander Dowie, who in 1900 had founded the city of Zion, Illinois, 40 miles north of Chicago.  To quote:

“With the New Year we expect to drop the word "Zion's" in the title of our Journal, because many of the friends inform us that the word is objectionable, having been so much used by Mr. Dowie and his followers. They report that our Journal is frequently cast aside under the supposition that it is published under Dowie's auspices, or in some manner affiliated with Zion City, which he founded. The new name, THE WATCH TOWER, is the one by which the Journal is usually mentioned.”(3)

So who was Dowie and why did Russell see need to distance from him?  Dowie was a Scottish-Australian immigrant who, like Russell, believed in an end-times restoration of true worship. Unlike Russell, Dowie believed this restoration necessitated a return to apostolic gifts including faith healing. In contrast, Russell believed that “the necessity for miracles as introductions to the Gospel message is no longer manifest” and that, consequently, “We are inclined to look with suspicion upon miraculous healings of the present time, whether done by Mormons or by Christian Scientists or by Christian Alliance people or by Mr Dowie and his followers or others.”(4)

A charismatic figure, Dowie had settled in Chicago and in 1893 gained considerable attention at the World’s Fair.  He launched his own publishing house, Zion Publishing, and started a weekly newsletter, Leaves of Healing which ran until 1909. Between 1894 and 1901 Dowie founded the Christian Catholic Apostolic Church which is said to have attracted some 6,000 adherents by the start of the twentieth century, some of whom were keen to invest money in Dowie’s new city, founded in 1901, and its Zion Bank which, of course, was controlled by Dowie. In 1899, Dowie claimed to be "God's Messenger" and, by 1901, was considered by followers to be Elijah the Restorer.  

Dowie taught adherents to abstain from tobacco, alcohol, pork, doctors, medicines and “apostate churches.”

Additionally he welcomed African-Americans into his new city which had only one church.  All seemed to be going well with this utopian city, but as it grew in size and prosperity, Dowie adopted an increasingly lavish lifestyle, building himself a 25-room mansion and adorning himself in ornate ecclesiastical robes modeled after those worn by Aaron, the high priest of Israel.

Picture of Dowie from Wikipedia

Unsurprisingly perhaps, Dowie proved spiritually and financially untrustworthy as the entire structure of Zion soon fell into debt, and eventually crashed with Dowie becoming unable to handle his affairs. By 1905, he had suffered a stroke and left Zion to recuperate. While absent he was deposed from his business affairs and religious leadership by a colleague whose investigators claimed huge amounts of money were unaccounted for. A splinter group rejected the new leadership and left Zion with some embracing the budding Pentecostal movement.  Meanwhile Dowie attempted to recover his authority through litigation, but ultimately retired and accepted an allowance, which was paid until his death in 1907.

Evidently therefore, the deletion of the word “Zion’s” shifted focus away from a disreputable competitor, as Russell was keen to distance his magazine from even the slightest semblance of Dowie.  In so doing, the magazine could “focus attention more clearly on its objective” as Herald of Christ’s Presence.

References:

(1) Jehovah’s Witnesses - Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom p.724

(2) In discussing Jeremiah 31:31-34, for instance, the book Jehovah, published by Jehovah’s Witnesses in 1934, stated conclusively: “The new covenant has nothing to do with the natural descendants of Israel and with mankind in general, but . . . is limited to spiritual Israel.”

(3) Zion’s Watch Tower December 1908, p.372, R4294. Another concern, at the time, was that African churches and papers used the word ‘Zion’ extensively, which led some to inquire whether the magazine was written for black people when, in fact, the Watch Tower aimed for a multiracial audience. 

(4) Zion’s Watch Tower January 1904 p.14, Reprints p. 3301.                               

(5) For further reading on Dowie, see From Sect to Cult to Sect: The Christian Catholic Church in Zion, Ph.D dissertation by Warren Jay Beaman, Iowa State University, 1990.

8 comments:

  1. It is interesting that the word Zions was removed from the name of the Society as early as 1896. That is several years earlier. The state of Pennsylvania, which was the headquarters of the Watch Tower Society until 1908, is much closer to New York than the state of Illinois, where Mr. Dowie was headquartered. Pennsylvania is even closer to Illinois than New York. So if Mr. Dowie were to harm C. T. Russell, he would have done so before 1909 in his former pastoral environment.
    Secondly, Mr. Dowie died in 1907, so he was no longer as important as before to damage the popularity of C. T. Russell, who was reported to have had his sermons published in thousands of newspapers some 20 years before the year 1916.

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  2. In fact C T Russell's Sermons were still being printed in "The Tasmanian Mail" in Tasmania up until 1920. July 15 being the last one.

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    1. Perhaps the publishing of these sermons until 1920 was paid for privately by the brothers. The Society did not?

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    2. *** kr pp. 69-70 ***
      In 1916, two key events caused those taking the lead to reassess the use of newspapers in spreading the good news. First, the Great War that was raging at the time made printing supplies difficult to obtain. In 1916, a report from our newspaper department in Britain highlighted the challenge, saying: “There are just over 30 papers publishing the Sermons at the present time. It is quite likely that this number will be greatly reduced shortly owing to the increasingly high price of paper.” The second event was the death of Brother Russell on October 31, 1916. Thus, The Watch Tower of December 15, 1916, announced: “Now that Brother Russell has passed beyond, the sermon feature [in the newspapers] will be discontinued entirely.” Although this avenue of preaching came to an end, other methods, such as the “Photo-Drama of Creation,” continued to have great success.

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  3. Do not know, but the first one was June 11 1914 until July 15, 1920. Very unusual I admit since it took me by surprise when I printed them off microfilm at the state library in the 1980s.

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  4. CTR in volume 6 (1904) on page 631 mentioned "Dowieites":
    "Mormons, Christian Scientists, Christian Alliancists, and Dowieites all use these arguments in a most telling manner, to mislead and captivate—"if it were possible the very elect," to turn their attention away from the truth".

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  5. I thought that maybe CTR did not want him to identify him directly with Zionism. Yes, he taught Zionism, but he wanted his movement to be identified with Christianity. The word Zions could mislead people by indicating Judaism or Zionist movement.

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  6. Interesting Article on the front page of The Fargo Forum And Daily Republican Newspaper, January 28, 1907. It refers to Zion City and Dowie and how Russell was experiencing considerable trouble being accused of trying to seize Zion City

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