Crisis of Conscience

by Raymond Franz

  The Handbook of Biblical Chronology by Jack Finegan (Princeton University Press, 1964) further explains this view on page 279:

  Perhaps [oikodomēthē], which is an aorist indicative passive … meaning literally “was built,” does not refer to a building enterprise that was still going on, as it had been for forty-six years, but to a building enterprise that had been completed long before so that it could be said that the building had stood for forty-six years. On this interpretation the Jews ask Jesus in effect, “How can you possibly raise in three days a Temple which has stood for forty-six years?”

  If this was the intended sense of the words spoken by the Jews to Jesus, it is apparent that they would not have had to have anything more than the innermost sanctuary of the temple structure in mind when referring to the naos. If the priests began to build the naos at the same time Herod began the construction of the entire hierón, the sanctuary had surely stood for those forty-six years so the Jews would again have been perfectly accurate in asking Jesus how he, was going to raise in only three days a structure which had stood for forty-six years. The Handbook of Biblical Chronology makes this same observation on pages 279 and 280:

  In this connection it may also be noticed that there seems to be a clear distinction in the Fourth Gospel between [naos] and [hieron] … … Therefore this reference [at John 2:20] could be specifically to the temple edifice proper. (Emphasis added.)

  Page 41 of Chronological Aspects of the Life of Christ is more emphatic on this point:

  There are two Greek words for temple which are distinguished by Josephus. The first term [hieron] refers to the whole sacred area which includes three courts or enclosures. … The second term for the temple is [naos] which is the sacred building alone. …

  The Gospels make the same distinction. … [I]n 2:19-20 John uses [ho naos] when the Jews were talking about the destruction of temple edifice. Therefore, the Jews were speaking of the temple edifice and not the whole sacred precints.

  In actuality, however, it matters little whether or not the gospel accounts do at times use the word naos in the broader sense the Society would like this term to have (to allow for its interpretation of an earthly “great crowd” serving in the outer courtyard of the spiritual temple according to their explanation of Revelation 7:15). What is important is how the apostle John uses the term in Revelation, and what Scriptural basis there is for even saying that there is such a thing as ‘an earthly courtyard of the Gentiles.’

  It seems apparent that, throughout the book of Revelation, John uses the term naos to refer to the innermost part of the temple, the heavenly sanctuary in its figurative application. Noting verses where this Greek word appears, the 1986 edition of The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology (Vol. 3, page 784) says: “The Apocalypse speaks often of the heavenly temple (Rev. 7:15; 11:19; 14:15ff; 15:5-8; 16:1, 17), clearly on the basis of Ps. 11:4.” One of the Society’s own commentaries on the Apocalypse, Then Is Finished the Mystery of God (1969), states the following on page 260 in its discussion of Revelation 11:2:

  The temple sanctuary or naos occupied only part of the temple area.

  While the location of the temple mentioned in this verse may not be as clear as the numerous other references in Revelation, the Society’s own publication acknowledges that here John uses this term in referring to the sanctuary only and not to the outermost courtyard of the Gentiles where the “great crowd” is said to be serving. This may be one more reason why the Governing Body felt it would be advisable to produce an updated commentary on the book of Revelation. In Revelation—Its Grand Climax At Hand!, it does not point out that naos is the term used at Revelation 11:2 in its comments on this verse, as the previous book does. It would be embarrassing to do so because it is plain in this text that John uses the term in reference to the sanctuary only, and not to the entire temple area.

  Below is the Watchtower Society’s conception of “Jehovah’s Temple Arrangement.” Note the portrayal of the court of the Gentiles as a place where happy worshippers of God render sacred service day and night. This contrasts sharply with the Bible’s use of this courtyard to symbolize a period of oppression by those not numbered among true worshippers at Revelation 11:2. (The February 1, 1998 issue of The Watchtower (see page 21) indicates that the Society associates this courtyard with the outer courtyard of Solomon’s temple instead of Herod’s.)

  What makes this text at Revelation 11:2, even more disconcerting to the Society is the fact that this verse also uses the courtyard of the Gentiles in a figurative or symbolic sense, and it is the only verse in the book of Revelation which does so in a relatively clear and direct manner. This is not as easily seen in The New World Translation because it uses the word “nations” instead of “Gentiles,” but it is more easily seen in other translations like that of James Moffatt, the King James version and The New English Bible. The NEB renders this verse as follows:

  But have nothing to do with the outer court of the temple; do not measure that; for it has been given over to the Gentiles, and they will trample the Holy City underfoot for forty-two months.

  It is generally recognized by Bible scholars that the courtyard here spoken of as being “outside the temple sanctuary (naos)” in the New World Translation must refer to an earthly courtyard since it seems unlikely that such trampling of the holy city by the nations or Gentiles could take place in heaven. However, it is quite evident that, by and large, the ones occupying this courtyard are oppressors of true worship, not supporters of it. Albert Barnes, a nineteenth-century Bible scholar who has been quoted as authoritative in Watchtower publications (See for example The Watchtower, May 1, 1983, page 3), makes the following comments about Revelation 11:2 on page 1643 of Barne’s Notes on the New Testament (Kregel Publications, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49501, Tenth Printing, 1978):

  There is undoubtedly reference here to the “court of the Gentiles,” as it was called among the Jews—the outer court of the temple to which the Gentiles had access, and within which they were not permitted to go. … In forming an estimate of those who, according to Hebrew notions, were true worshippers of God, only those would be regarded as such who had the privilege of access to the inner court, and to the altar. In making such an estimate, therefore, those who had no nearer access than that court, would be omitted; that is, they would not be reckoned as necessarily any part of those who were regarded as the people of God. … They occupied it, not as the people of God, but as those who were without the true church …

  Commenting on this same verse in the Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, Grand Rapids, Michigan; Seventh Printing, April, 1979) Leon Morris observes on page 146 of his commentary on the book of Revelation:

  The starting-point for John’s imagery is the Jerusalem temple, where the outer court might be used by Gentiles, but the inner courts, including the sanctuary, by Israelites only. The church, the true Israel, is the sanctuary in the vision. … Though they are not permitted to destroy the church, the Gentiles are permitted for a limited time to oppress it.

  R.C.H. Lenski’s commentary on the book of Revelation (The Interpretation of St. John’s Revelation, Augsburg Publishing House, Minneapolis, Minnesota, copyright assigned in 1961) explains Revelation 11:2 in similar terms on page 330:

  The outer court, that of the Gentiles in the Jewish Temple, symbolizes all that is unholy, that belongs to the world! It is … “outside,” John is to “throw it out,” to reject it as profane, is not to measure it, to draw no boundary to mark any part of it as belonging to the Una Sancta [the church]. “It was given to the heathen,” … to whom it belongs, who also freely enter this outside court. … Here we must render “to the heathen,” to all those outside of the church who cannot be accepted as worshippers at God’s and Christ’s altar.

  The same basic understanding of this verse is taught in the 1930 Watch Tower Society publication Light by J. F. Rutherford. Book One of this two-volume work says on page 189, paragraph on
e:

  The instruction is not to measure the court outside the temple but to “cast [itl outside” (Roth.), because it symbolizes those who merely profess to be God’s children but who are not. … Those who merely pretend to be followers of the Lord are represented as in the court and are left out.

  Regardless of whether or not these commentators are accurate in their explanation of the significance of this verse, several points seem apparent:

  1)John uses the term naos in referring to the inner part of the temple only because the courtyard is spoken of as being “outside the temple [sanctuary] (naos)”:

  Although Revelation 11:1-2 are the very next verses in Revelation where naos appears after its usage in connection with the “great crowd” at 7:15, the Society totally ignores and even covers this up in Revelation—Its Grand Climax At Hand!, the plain evidence that John is using this term in referring to the sanctuary only.

  The Kingdom Interlinear Translation of the Greek Scriptures (1985) (above) makes a clear distinction between the outer courtyard often the (temple and the naos (“temple [sanctuary]” or “divine habitation”). — See photocopy below:

  2)The outer, earthly courtyard of this temple is used to depict a period of oppression of true worship because those occupying it “trample the holy city underfoot.” It is not pictured as a location where a “great crowd” of true worshipers might joyously carry on sacred service day and night, but instead as a place, which does not allow for such complete devotion to be offered.

  3)Those occupying this courtyard are apparently not numbered among true worshipers because John is told to ‘cast out’ or reject this courtyard and not to measure it for the purpose of finding out how many worshipers are in it as in verse one where he is told to measure the sanctuary. The people of the nations or “Gentiles” portrayed in this verse are not ‘non-anointed’ Christians, but, instead, non-Christians, who are separate and distinct from God’s people who have access to the sanctuary.

  So in the Bible’s symbolism, the courtyard of the Gentiles is used to portray a time of oppression of true worship by those not numbered among God’s people. In the Watchtower Society’s made-up symbolism, it is used to picture a place where happy worshipers of God render sacred service to Him day and night, and where “[t]hey will hunger no more nor thirst anymore … [a]nd God will wipe out every tear from their eyes.” (Rev. 7:16-17) It is plainly a case of adding a contrived significance to the Scriptures and ignoring or taking away what they actually teach. I was well aware of the Bible’s warning against this type of thing at Revelation 22:18-19, and this, along with other similar factors, helped me make the difficult decision to leave Bethel in February, 1981. I felt I had no other choice since I knew I could not knowingly be a party to advancing such obviously inaccurate representations of what the Scriptures actually teach.

  Who then, are those who comprise the “great crowd” of Revelation 7:9? In the Society’s publication The Finished Mystery they are identified as being one and the same as the group later described by the New World Translation as “a great crowd in heaven” at Revelation 19:1. (See page 289 of the 1917, 1918 and 1924 editions; also pages 136 and 138) It seems that there is a great deal of evidence which points to this conclusion. Some reference works link quite a number of texts pertaining to those who dwell in heaven with verses which refer to the “great crowd.” Some of these texts are included in the chart on the next page:

  WHERE IS THE “GREAT CROWD”? *

  Verses About Great Crowd

  Verses To Compare

  Out of all tribes and peoples and tongues

  Rev. 7.9

  Rev. 5:9-10

  “before10 the throne”

  Rev. 7:9, 15

  Rev. 1:4; 4:5-6, 10; 7:11; 8:3; 9:13; 11:16; 14:3

  “before the lamb”

  Rev. 7:9

  Rev. 5:8

  dressed in white robes

  Rev. 7:9

  Rev. 3:4, 18; 4:4; 6:11

  great crowd attributes

  salvation to God

  Rev. 7:10

  Rev. 19:1

  washed robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb

  Rev. 7:14

  1 Peter 1:2, 18-19; 1 Cor. 6:11; Rev. 22:14; 1 John 1:7; Eph. 2:13

  * These are but a portion of literally dozens of verses in which characteristics of those associated with the “great crowd” are shared with those who enjoy heavenly residency with Jesus Christ. So some have suggested that the 144,000 and the great crowd are in fact the same group. (See footnote #11)

  Using the terminology common to that time period, page 289 of the 1917, 1918 and 1924 editions of the Watch Tower Society publication, The Finished Mystery, identifies the “great crowd” of Revelation 7:9 as being one and the same as the “great crowd in heaven” described at Revelation 19:1. (See also pages 136 and 138.)

  The unlikelihood of the number 144,000 referring to a literal number of “spiritual Israelites” or members of the Christian congregation can be seen by the context in which this number first appears at Revelation 7:4-8. The number 144,000 is first presented as the total of twelve twelve-thousands. Each of those twelve-thousands are said to come out of one of the tribes of Israel. By pointing out that this is not the usual listing of these tribes and that James refers to anointed Christians by the expression “the twelve tribes that are scattered about” at James 1:1, the Society endeavors to establish that this is not referring to literal Israel on pages 117 and 118 of Revelation—Its Grand Climax At Hand!:

  Could this not be a reference to literal, fleshly Israel? No, for Revelation 7:4-8 diverges from the usual tribal listing. …

  The Christian congregation is “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation.” (1 Peter 2:9) Replacing natural Israel as God’s nation, it becomes a new Israel that is “really ‘Israel.’” (Romans 9:6-8; Matthew 21:43) For this reason, it was quite proper for Jesus’ half brother James to address his pastoral letter “to the twelve tribes that are scattered about,” that is, to the worldwide congregation of anointed Christians that in time would number 144,000. — James 1:1

  In establishing that the comments regarding the 144,000 at Revelation 7:4-8 are not “a reference to literal, fleshly Israel” however, the Society is acknowledging that this is to be taken in a figurative or symbolic sense. Those who believe it applies to a multiracial group of Christians and not to natural Israel have no choice but to admit this because there simply is no Christian tribe of Judah, or Reuben or Gad or Asher, etc. But if these 12 tribes of 12,000 are figurative or symbolic elements, it would seem only logical that their total (144,000) is also figurative or symbolic.11

  Whatever conclusions our personal study of the Scriptures may lead us to concerning the identities of the “great crowd” and the 144,000, we must be careful to always let the Bible speak for itself. We must not let preconceived notions cause us to arrive at forced explanations, which actually misrepresent its teachings, as has the Watchtower Society. The concluding part of this fascinating book assures faithful ones who handle God’s Word properly of grand blessings. But to those who add to or subtract from it, it promises the most serious of consequences. — Rev. 22:18-19.

  Summary

  The Watchtower Society explains the “great crowd” of Revelation 7:9-17 to be an earthly class even though they are spoken of as being in God’s naos in verse 15 of this chapter. Although the Society (like other commentators) acknowledges that naos refers to the sanctuary of the temple which represents heaven in the Bible, Jehovah’s Witnesses try to justify this explanation by saying that this term can also refer to the outermost portion of the temple—specifically, the courtyard of the gentiles. (The Watchtower February 1, 1998, changed this teaching, to the outer courtyard of Solomon’s temple.) However, the only verse in the book of Revelation which is recognized as using the outer courtyard of the temple as a symbol is Revelation 11:2, and it is obvious in this verse that those occupying this portion of the figurative temple are mainly oppressors in
stead of supporters of true worship. Additionally, this verse plainly states that the courtyard is “outside the temple [sanctuary]” (or naos), so it is impossible to conclude that naos could refer to more than the sanctuary or innermost part of the temple in John’s usage of the term here.

  Hence, it is unscriptural to teach that the “great crowd” could be serving in “the earthly court of the spiritual temple” of God.

  Concluding Notes

  In the years since the events at Watchtower headquarters in 1980, the Society’s publications seemed understandably reluctant to link the location of the “great crowd” with the courtyard of the Gentiles. While still placing this group in “the earthly courtyard of [God’s] great spiritual temple” (Revelation—It’s Grand Climax At Hand!, page 126) it seemed that efforts were being made to disassociate the “great crowd” with a specific location of the typical temple which was once in Jerusalem. (Thus, page 107 of the 1983 publication United In Worship of the Only True God placed this assembled multitude “in God’s temple, or universal house of worship,” but did not specify which part of the temple they are in.)

  However, in an article entitled, “The Triumph Of True Worship Draws Near,” the July 1, 1996 issue of The Watchtower reaffirmed the teaching that the “great crowd” is serving in the antitypical, earthly courtyard. Page 20 states, “Since they are not spiritual, priestly Israelites, John likely saw them standing in the temple in the outer courtyard of the Gentiles.”12 Page 23 refers to “the earthly courtyards of Jehovah’s temple.” Then, in a surprising doctrinal shift, only nineteen months after The Watchtower restated this doctrine, the February 1, 1998 edition of The Watchtower changed this teaching. Page 21 of this issue says: