While the religious beliefs of many religions are well-known, people may wonder what are Jehovah’s Witnesses and what are their beliefs? Even though a Jehovah’s Witness identifies as Christian, several practices set the religion apart from other Christian religions. Like many religions, though, Jehovah’s Witnesses tend to deal with societal issues such as child sexual abuse within their own realm.

What Are Jehovah’s Witnesses?

Jehovah’s Witnesses are followers of a specific set of Christian beliefs that include both the Old Testament and New Testament of the Bible.

“We strive to adhere to the form of Christianity that Jesus taught and that his apostles practiced,” says the Jehovah’s Witness website.

Even though the religious members accept the entirety of the Bible, a Jehovah’s Witness is not a fundamentalist because it’s recognized that some parts of the Bible are meant as symbolic lessons and not to be taken literally.

What Do Jehovah’s Witnesses Believe?

Followers of Jehovah’s Witness believe that Jehovah is God. The name Jehovah is derived from the Hebrew name for God, which is written as either YHWH or JHVH, usually translated as either Yahweh or Jehovah.

Jesus Christ is recognized as the Son of God and the Savior, but is not seen as being on an equal level with God. A Jehovah’s Witness does not believe in the Trinity doctrine that God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are as one.

They believe that people can be delivered from sin and death through the sacrifice of Jesus, but in order to be saved, members must follow their faith in Jesus and become baptized.

If you wonder what are Jehovah’s Witnesses beliefs regarding heaven, the followers believe the Kingdom of God is a real government that exists in heaven and that Jesus is the king there, where he began to rule in 1914. They believe only 144,000 people will be resurrected to live in heaven with God, Jesus and angels.

Despite believing that Satan, also known as the devil, is a fallen angel, a Jehovah’s Witness does not believe in hell. Instead, when a person dies, they simply no longer exist, but they could be brought back through a resurrection by God. Jehovah’s Witnesses say that an individual is not able to earn salvation, but should live a life that proves his or her faith is true. Salvation itself is only available through “the undeserved kindness of God.”

The devil does not preside over hell, but does bring evil and suffering into the world of humans, which God allows to resolve moral challenges posed by the devil.

Who Was the Jehovah’s Witness Founder?

Charles Taze Russell founded the International Bible Students Association, which eventually became the Jehovah’s Witnesses movement.

Born in 1852, Pastor Russell was raised Presbyterian and Congregationalist, but he didn’t believe he could believe in both an eternal hell and in the mercy of God. At around the age of 20, he happened to run into some Adventists who told him that the Bible held the key to knowing God’s plan for salvation and how the world’s demise was tied to this salvation. Russell was captivated.

Russell studied Hebrew and Greek to delve deeper into the Bible. In 1877, he published two religious texts, Three Worlds and the Harvest of the World.

The Watch Tower publication began as a Bible journal in 1879. In order to reach more people, Russell reportedly put a lot of his own money into a publishing company.

Russell promoted his Jehovah’s Witnesses movement by spouting his own calculations of when the world would end.

According to Russell, the last days began in 1799 and Jesus in invisible form came back to earth in 1874. Jesus was crowned king of heaven in 1878, and the end of the world was going to occur in 1914. When that date came and went, the end of the world was rescheduled for 1975.

After that date went by, the Jehovah’s Witnesses movement lost followers, but remains a presence in many parts of the world with a total of around 8.47 million active followers.

Do Jehovah’s Witnesses Celebrate Holidays and Birthdays?

No, they do not even celebrate Christmas or Easter because Jesus is not placed at or above the level of importance of Jehovah God.

They do not celebrate their own or anyone else’s birthdays nor national holidays.  Jehovah’s Witnesses believe the celebration of birthdays originated with pagan beliefs because even birthday candles were supposedly possessive of magic for granting the celebrant’s birthday wish. The Bible does not approve of such magic. Also, the first Christians declined to participate in any type of birthday celebration because such a celebration was affiliated with paganism.

The inclination to avoid national celebrations has been seen as one way the religion helps insulate members from the outside world.

Have Any Jehovah’s Witnesses Been Accused of Child Sexual Assault?

In February of this year, the BBC reported nearly two dozen former members of Jehovah’s Witnesses had filed a lawsuit in the United Kingdom after saying the church elders helped cover up sexual abuse the members had suffered as children.

Despite child sexual abuse being a crime, Jehovah’s Witnesses as a religious organization does not believe a perpetrator should be punished unless the perpetrator confesses or there’s another witness to the abuse. Still, elders are instructed to notify local authorities in order to comply with local laws regarding the reporting of child abuse even if the only witness is the victim himself/herself.

The BBC’s Victoria Derbyshire program spoke with John Viney, who said he survived being sexually abused from ages nine through 13 by a Jehovah’s Witness who was also distantly related to him.

Viney told the BBC, “The way that Jehovah’s Witnesses handle matters within the congregation, it’s a closed shop. I know for a fact now that there are parents that haven’t done anything about the abuse of their children by others because they don’t want to bring reproach on Jehovah’s name.”

Sadly, Viney’s daughter also was sexually abused as a child, but after she spoke out about the abuse, Viney said he disowned her. At the time he broke ties with her, he said he was a Jehovah’s Witness elder who had not yet faced or reported his own sexual abusive child history. He finally reported his own traumatic events to police in 2019, but found out the perpetrator abused other children and had eventually died in prison.

What are Jehovah’s Witnesses doing about the allegations of protection child abusers? According to the BBC report, a Jehovah’s Witness spokesperson said that when a church member has been found guilty of child sexual assault, the responsibility to protect the children from that person falls on the parents, who are to be informed by church elders of the congregant’s history.