Some of you will remember that back in January we reported on the latest example of a Watchtower publication misquoting an academic to get its anti-science views across. Biologist Rama Singh was quoted in the January 2015 Awake! magazine with comments that seemed to suggest he was a denier of evolutionary theory, when in actual fact he is anything but.
“JW has indeed misquoted me and I do not agree with their article and its anti-evolution stand,” he said on being alerted to the matter.
In an open letter to Awake! magazine editors, Singh made this request (bold is mine):
“So I am asking you first to remove the misquotation from your article immediately and second print an unconditional apology for what I consider is a deliberate damaging action on your part to my reputation.”
Well… it seems Awake! has done the first part. Digital versions of the January 2015 Awake! magazine, including the PDF download, no longer feature the Rama Singh quote as the following images show…
BEFORE…
AFTER…
The only thing that is conspicuous by its absence is the second part of Singh’s request – namely a printed, unconditional apology from Awake! editors for misquoting him. Unfortunately for Singh, who has since written about the incident in the Hamilton Spectator, it is extremely doubtful he will receive any such thing.
Despite professing “Christlike humility,” the “spiritual men” who work on the Governing Body’s Writing Committee are not renowned for their willingness to issue apologies or print retractions.
Needless to say, the whole affair smacks of hypocrisy. A religion that is the first to point the finger at others for deception and subterfuge is not above stooping to such methods if it means duping people into embracing their backwards views.
The scandal also makes a mockery of this quote from page 13 of the 2011 Yearbook:
“In summary, the Writing Department insists on using only material that is accurate and truthful, even regarding seemingly insignificant details. As a result, ‘the faithful and discreet slave’ can consistently supply spiritual food that brings honor to ‘the God of truth,’ Jehovah.—Ps. 31:5.”
Further reading…
- JWsurvey: Watchtower AGAIN misquotes scientist to argue against evolution – and this time, it’s personal!
- Hamilton Spectator (by Rama Singh): Religion, science driven by reason
- INQUISITR: Biology Professor Says Creationist Magazine Misquoted Him To Perpetuate Lies Against Evolution
- Friendly Atheist: Jehovah’s Witness Publication Cites Professor Who Doubts Evolution… but Professor Says He Was Unfairly Misquoted
- JWsurvey articles on evolution and creation
Unfortunately we will never see an apology because they would have to admit they were wrong, which would never happen.
How true!
I used to think it was just the local elders that I had to deal with that would never apologize. The ‘stink’ goes all the way to the head.
It’s outrageous! They should be forced to apologise. I suppose the only thing they can plead is stupidity.
It be interesting if he tried to sue them over this. If the media reported on it, it might make others wonder if the Society had done this elsewhere.
I wish I still had the emails I received from scientists who were misquoted in the Creation Book. That could have been added to evidence for their deceptive practices. :)
I do hope they do sue, Isaac. The more they are exposed for the liars they are, the better!
Hi Cedar,
for electronique edition : english, french or spanish : it’s ok.
for paper format .pdf, today in english, yes change, but in french and spanish : NO
best regards
More deception and without the backing of the cited authority
namely Mr, Rama Singh.
Their greatest deception is that they are God’s Organisation
a claim that’s made without a shred of support or credibility
save the monotonous and continual repetition of it in their
publications.
“It would not be Impossible to prove with sufficient REPETITION
and a psychological understanding of the people concerned,
that a square is in fact a circle.”—Joseph Goebbels.
“The most brilliant propagandist techniques would yield no success
unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind. Constantly
and with unflagging attention, it must confine itself to a few points
and REPEAT them OVER and OVER ” — Adolph Hitler.h
The problem is that the damage had already been done. Millions of their followers had read the original deceptive quote, and barely anyone will ever learn about how their organization once again blatantly misquoted a scientist. Clearly their argument for creation is weak as they again resorted to twisting the truth to back up their faulty reasoning. As for an apology or a retraction, they are far too proud for that.
the GB of the WT inc are deceptive and should have been sued, this seems to be a practise of theirs, I really hope some of those that have been misrepresented come forward, one can only hope. sickens me how this org gets away with so much poop!
Nice quote from the 2011 Yearbook, although in my copy it’s on page 13 not 9. Has there been some re-writing of this book going on?
Well spotted John! I’ve fixed it! :)
Very interesting. Basically the GB lie ALL THE TIME.
interestingly, in the Spanish version we still see the original text (at least until now). The GB body did not correct it yet. May be it will remain because they think that the latin community ignores this stuff.
I have noticed that french and portugues versions of Awake still have the questioned text in page 3.
Kinyarwanda version of Awake! we call in our language “Nimukanguke!” still has the questioned quotation, too ( http://wol.jw.org/rw/wol/d/r127/lp-yw/102015002 )
Let us hope Awake! writers will AWAKE! and remove the quotation even in my mother tongue. It is annoying!
Of course, many of us know that this certainly isn’t the only occurrence of this sort of thing when the Watchtower is involved. I had read letters from Mantey claiming that the Watchtower took his comments out of context and used the Grammar to support their view of translating “a god” for the Word in John 1:1. So, I got out my copy of Mantey to see if that was correct.
Regardless of one’s theological leanings toward the actual meaning of the passage, a careful reading of their reference (A Manual Grammar of the Greek New Testament) in full context shows that Mantey did not hold the view that such a translation was correct. He, in fact, stated what he regarded as the correct translation, and he translated it as: “and the word was deity.” In addition, the context contains a fuller discussion relative to the meaning of anarthrous nouns used like in John 1:1 being qualitative in meaning rather than indefinite, and that careful examination of the syntax clarifies the meaning on a case by case basis.
Worse for the Watchtower misuse of the quote, the translation the very author of the Grammar thinks to be correct is to be found on the very page that they cite from the Grammar to make their case! I do not think they ever apologized to him, either, even though he also asked them for a retraction and apology.
They also did the same thing for their longtime misuse of De Cruce. Of course, that author is long dead, and could not ask for either apology or retraction, but that misuse is quite telling. It also explains why they used to use a fuller scan of the page containing the woodcut (one of 18 or 19) in De Cruce in the 1969 Kindgom Interlinear and then changed it to only showing the woodcut (which they reverse!) in the 1985 Kingdom Interlinear and 1984 Reference Edition of the New World Translation.
Around the woodcut is a discussion, in Latin, of the impaling of Ceres and a portion of a quote from Tertullian drawing a comparison to the stake used in the death of Ceres to the cross of Jesus. The full quote of Tertullian (I’m paraphrasing here) speaks of the defectiveness of the stake used for the pagan gods and other characters, whereas the one used for Jesus was perfect because it was complete and had both parts of wood! I think that some people were starting to figure out what the quote said so they had to eliminate it from the 1985 edition, and other Watchtower publications, and use only the woodcut lest more people figure it out through curiosity. (You know what they say about curiosity killing the cat!)
And so it goes… Needless to say, the Watchtower Society have done this a lot more than people realize. And, yet, they continue to be touted as dispensing truth and proper spiritual food, etc.
Perhaps this man can sue for defamation of character?
And I wonder who is Gerard this other respected scientist?
Could Gerard be fictions?
When you go to college and your writing articles on the subjects your taking you ABSOLUTELY need to show where your quotes came from by showing references to that effect.
If you don’t then it is considered not a completed assignment and will adversely affect your grade.
So my question why does not the watchtower society adhere to these common sense and typical protocol’s?
This is a Billion dollar a year publishing company that should not be mis-quoting famed Scientists in order to push their own philosophies.
They are printing LIES!
Let me quote from the Bible yes you can verify it here at John 8:44 where it talks about the father of the LIE as being satan the devil.
So is this professed slave class really Gods sole channel on earth now if their lying in their publications like they have so many times?
According to their direct proclamations and failures of those things to come about and lying about what other renowned people say, one can only come to one conclusion and that is they ARE NOT GODS CHOSEN RELIGION!
Good catch on the misquotes of living scientists, but you should also catch this group on misquotes of Early Christian Fathers, too.
The audio copy has not been altered, so they haven’t even fully complied that that part of the request!!!!!!
For a group that consistently tells you to be meek and humble they certainly are resistant to making a simple apology.
They make such a big deal of their “humility” that it is shameful. I remember brothers at assemblies used to really lay it on thick during the prayers, “Ohhhh, deeeeeaar Jehooooooooovah! (*long pause*) We are nothing….nothing….but…dust!” I would be so second had embarrassed for them because it was so obviously phoney and artificial. Then afterward someone would always say something like, “Wasn’t that such a wonderful prayer? That brother must’ve been one of the anointed because they have such deeper love for God.” *Eye roll* Looks like some things will never change.
That is hilarious questionall451! “Secondhand embarrassed” is exactly right.
A liar is sooner caught than a cripple…
If they do not apologize in this case, I hope they will apologyize for having misquoted their god Jehovah in Jeramiah 5:8.
The verse used to read (Jeremiah 5:8) . . .Horses seized with sexual heat, having [strong] testicles, they have become. They neigh each one to the wife of his companion.
and in the Version 2013 of their Bible it reads (Jeremiah 5:8) . . .They are like eager, lustful horses, Each neighing after another man’s wife.
You see, they have removed “Strong testicles” from their god’s word. It/he/she was misquoted.
Good article, solid information.
Thank you.
Who is Gerard? Why are we not allowed to know his surname?
The “Gerard” they refer to is actually Gerard Hertel, one of Jehovah’s Witnesses (a fact they conveniently omit from the article). See this link for details:
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2015/01/18/jehovahs-witness-publication-cites-professor-who-doubts-evolution-but-professor-says-he-was-unfairly-misquoted/
“Gerard” is Dr. Gerard Hertel and he was not misquoted–he is one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. He is a retired entomologist/dendrologist (bug/tree scientist) with the USDA forest service and adjunct faculty with West Chester University of Pennsylvania. He has published several (20 or so) peer-reviewed scientific papers. I found his last name in the spanish translation of the magazine, as WT had removed it from the English translation for some reason. I emailed him to confirm his identity and he confirmed he was the subject of the article. Link to his credentials: http://darwin.wcupa.edu/faculty/hertel/Main/HomePage
I don’t know how we all got here but here’s a simple example of how creatures adapt to their environment. If my cat is an indoor cat and doesn’t have to stay outside in the winter, she doesn’t develop a “winter” coat of fur. Animals who have to stay outdoors in the wintertime, develop a really thick coat of fur and as soon as the weather warms up, all the winter fur falls out. Many animals have 2 colors of fur, one color for winter and another color for summer. It all helps them to survive the environment. Animals who develop white fur in the winter and their 2nd coat is brown in the summer, makes them harder to be seen by their enemies. If polar bears lose all their ice and the temperatures warm up, they probably won’t have as thick of fur. Who can explain this, except that species adapt to their surroundings, which sounds like evolution to me.
Does the Watchtower ever bring up stuff like that? It’s always the simple answer that we couldn’t have evolved from a one-celled amoeba so evolution is just a theory and the Bible’s account has to be right but many people believe in God in that he made everything that evolved into what it is today. So, they can still believe in God and evolution.
I remember years ago, there was an article in the Awake on how if you put a live sponge in a blender and put it back in the water, the thing will glue itself back together and be alive and the very same animal. What is that, except evolution? Could any human be put in a blender and glue itself back together to be the same person they were before? I don’t think so.
So, if God was making us “perfect” in his image, why didn’t he make it so that if our bodies are put in a wood chipper, that afterwards, we could glue ourselves back together? It seems that the sponge is much more highly evolved then us humans but us humans take that live sponge and kill it and then use it to wash our floors with and use it make sponge paintings on the wall.
Most animals have better eye sight than humans. Some turtles live hundreds of years. Even clams can live to be 500 years old. Parrots can live 200 years. Some trees live thousands of years. Something’s amiss if a loving God made us to be lower than the sponge because we can’t be glued back together and with worse eye sight than almost any animal.
It would make more sense not to blame all that on a God.
Anonymous, I’m gonna have nightmares tonight
at the thought of being put into a wood chipper
Ted, the Awake article about the sponge being blended, reminded me of the movie Fargo, which I will never watch again because of the wood chipper scene.
Nothing more than a P.R. exercise by the Governing Body, let’s call it damage limitation….! They won’t admit of course to being wrong, or dishonest, that could never happen, just that the ‘Light keeps getting brighter’
One has to question the mindset of these writers. How do they
square a Christian conscience with deliberate deception ?
Mis-quoting sources, taking a couple of lines out of context from
a complete article, shifting punctuation about to give a different
meaning, etc etc.
They may fool the trusting but gullible JWs, but they must know
It’s fraudulent, dishonest journalism. It’s sheer pharisaical
hypocrisy to hold ordinary JWs, to such a high standard while
they lie through their teeth.
As for giving apologies, sometimes when backed into a corner
having made fools of themselves. through a failed prediction
they may do so. But it always comes with an angle attached.
“The errors are JHVHs way of refining us, of sifting out the
unfaithful.”
“How do they square a Christian conscience with deliberate deception?”
Absolutely, Ted! They could never plead ignorance in a court of law because what they’ve done is so blatant. As I said earlier, the only thing they could plead is stupidity. They’ve done it for so long and got away with it, so why stop now? They’ve clearly forgotten we live in the Internet Age.
I notice that even the emended version of the Awake article still bears the date “January 2015”, though it has actually been doctored at a later date. There is no indication that anything has been omitted or altered. Quite on the contrary, I believe they have very skillfully expanded the illustration at the top of the page, so that there would not be a telling blank space where the unfortunate quote once appeared.
I have to think of a passage from George Orwell’s “1984”, describing how the omnipotent Party under Big Brother shamelessly rewrites history as it sees fit:
“A number of The Times which might, because of changes in political alignment, or mistaken prophecies uttered by Big Brother, have been rewritten a dozen times still stood on the files bearing its original date, and no other copy existed to contradict it. Books, also, were recalled and rewritten again and again, and were invariably reissued without any admission that any alteration had been made.”
As for “mistaken prophecies”, one may consider the January 1, 1989 Watchtower Magazine. As originally published, it stated that Christian missionary work begun in the first century will “be completed in our 20th century”.
Yes, they were unreservedly predicting Armageddon before the end of the 1900s, certainly not for the first time, but possibly for the last time: With little more than a decade to go before this prophecy could be proven false, they finally got cold feet. When this and other issues were republished in bound volumes, the text had magically changed from “in our 20th century” to a rather less specific wording: “in our day”.
But of course, this is still presented as the January 1, 1989 Watchtower — in George Orwell’s words, “bearing its original date … reissued without any admission that any alteration had been made.”
Unlike the Big Brother Party of Orwell’s novel, the Watchtower is luckily not quite powerful enough to shred all copies of the original issue.
The entire JW religion is based on misquoting.
We are in 2015, this alone proves that they are interpretations have been and will be squarely wrong!
But they will not rectify this, they will keep ruining people families until they’ll be shown for what they really are.
Keep up the good work. I wrote to the Society after they published their new Bible, asking for names of scholars who supported their translation. They told me it was too soon after its release but sent me a list of names of those who supported earlier versions including one Alexander Thomson of Britain whom they also described as “under appointment to the queen for material regarding the Bible”. I checked this out with Buckingham Palace and they replied that “there is no record of his ever having had any connections with the Palace”. I rest my case.
Thanks for that information James. Would you be able to send me scanned copies of this correspondence?
Scanned copy on its way.
Quote has not been deleted from the Serbian and Italian versions. Maybe this will be done in the next few days. We’ll see!
Why the open letter written by Rama Singh dissapear from http://evol.mcmaster.ca/~brian/evoldir/Other/Awake.letter ???
There’s another copy of the letter here, Elsa.
http://jwalumni.org/2015/01/17/rama-singh-awake/
Sorry, Elka, I misspelled your name.
Charles, I wonder if Rama got an agreement with the WT and took off the letter.
El Kato
Who knows, Elka? I suppose only time will tell.
Religion is the bane of man. Too bad the 911 terrorists did not target the watchtower headquarters in Brooklyn. Let the terrorists kill each other. Take out the 7 governing body and shoot them.
Here here! Bury the gb, the pope and all the ayatollahs with their watchtowers, bibles and qurans! The bible is the worst book ever! The Jesus story is a story about a Father torturing his own son to death! God needs no ritual sacrifice to forgive mankind! Even so, did it need to be such a gruesome and agonizing death? A sadistic man-made fantasy!
I noticed this change a few weeks ago. At the time the attached audio was not updated which amused me greatly.
It’s also funny how they replaced the dishonest text with just some more dishonest text.
notanapologist,
Your comment needs some thinking through.
You do realise that innocent people were on those planes, don’t you?
Do you have any evidence that the WTBTS has engaged in terrorist activities? How would you define terrorist acts?
Would the governing body of the Jehovah’s Witnesses receive any free and fair trial before they were shot?
I agree with your as to the ends, but I utterly reject the means.
It’s good that you care so deeply about the victims of the WTBTS. We can work together to hold the wtbts to account legally and peacefully, and I look forward to doing so with you.
Peace be with you, Excelsior!
Of course in true Watchtower style, rather than appologise (the way a true journalist would be made to), they prefer to lie some more to cover their tracks. Sadly the majority of my ‘in’ family will never accept there is anything amiss in this, because how can Gods channel be held accountable, they are afterall just imperfect men. Im getting quite dizzy from all their circular reasoning!
AIF,
What would happen after you had buried all these religious leaders? Do you think that the adherents of those religions would just take this extreme and illegal act lying down?
Your proposal would lead to brutal war, potentially without end.
Can’t you think of any book that is worse than the bible? I think there are plenty of books that I would consider far worse than the bible.
I agree that the “ransom sacrifice” is problematic. However, JESUS did say that he sacrificed himself for his friends.
I am an atheist, and I would like to see an end to religion. However, unlike your good self and notanapologist, I do not propose violent change.
The only way to see the end of religion peacefully is a long term education programme. Even this method may well prove to be unfruitful.
We should ensure that all religions obey the secular law, and be equal under the law. This can be achieved through political reform and debate, rather than violent action.
I agree with the ends, it’s just that the means would lead, in my opinion, to brutal war and the death of many innocent people whose only crime is to hold a religious faith.
I look forward to working with you to achieve our mutual aims in legal and peaceful ways.
Peace be with you, Excelsior!
Misquoting things really seems to be a problem for the Watchtower.
I was looking at a back issue of an Awake magazine, and there was a quote from “Scientific American”, although the actual issue of the magazine was not quoted in the Awake. So I sent an inquiry to Scientific American asking if they would let me know from which issue that was, needless to say I did not receive a reply, but then from the Watchtower I would not have received a reply anyway.
I am mentioning this because as I speak English and German I compared the German issue of Awake, the Watchtower Society correctly translated the quote, but then claims it to be from a completely different magazine, “Spectrum der Wissenschaft”, which is not a translated Scientific American. So I sent an inquiry to the “Spectrum der Wissenschaft”, they did replay, but could not confirm that the quote was from one of their magazines. They did indicate an article that was discussing the same subject, but kindly pointed out that unless I can state from exactly which issue the quote came from, they could not confirm anything.
So for me the reply means that the Society are certainly not being honest.
This is really dumb, because they could have translated it and simply said that it was a quotation from Scientific American and everything would be fine.
The Awake in question was: October 2012 (The Bible—A Book of Accurate Prophecy—Part 6).
It would be interesting if this also occured with other languages.
When I got involved in the “truth” in the 1960’s, the Watchtower and Awakes and the books used to put where they got their quotes from but as time went on, I noticed that the Society no longer would say where we could verify the information.
When I first noticed it, I remember it bothered me but it took many years later until I finally realized that they don’t put the sources where to find the quotes in the literature on purpose so that we can’t verify the information because they make it all up.
The Society relies on the fact that almost all Witnesses are blindly gullible into thinking that it is run by God himself and therefore they could never lie to them but unfortunately they are a bunch of liars and therefore could never actually be God’s “true” religion.
They are just a bunch of liars, out to cheat Witnesses out of their time, labor and money to line their pockets and buy up more and more real estate.
Misquoting or making up lies to influence gullible people into believing in that religion is just another cult tactic called deceitful recruiting tactics.
When I was in school and wrote up a paper, I had to site my sources and if I didn’t do that, I’d have gotten failing marks on any paper so lame.
Partial U-turn? So its more like an L-turn? I would say a J turn but thats a bit too cool for the society to pull off..
I sold a 1953 NWT to a JW on ebay and he offered me a “bible” study which I refused and told him that I have differences of opinions on various issues. He came back and asked me what they were. I mentioned the Singh qoute and showed him where it was misquoted. His replay was venemous to say the least. Basically he called me a liar and said that he wouldn’t listen if I quoted WT literature. I had to quote the Bible only. Ironic isn’t it as in order to answer any religious/Biblical questions I have, he would use the very publications he told me not to quote in order to answer them.
Beneficie-se dá Escola do Ministério Teocrático página 225 sobre exatidão da matéria: “Além de verificar a confiabilidade das fontes, estude cuidadosamente como usar a informação. Certifique-se de usar citações e estatísticas em harmonia com o contexto do qual foram extraídas. Por exemplo, no esforço de expressar-se com veemência, cuide para que “algumas pessoas” não se transforme em “a maioria das pessoas”, nem “muitas pessoas” em “todas as pessoas”, e que “em certos casos” não se transforme em “sempre”. Superdimensionar assuntos ou exagerar informações envolvendo cifras, extensão ou gravidade de determinado fato põe em dúvida a credibilidade de quem as divulga.”
Atenção às últimas palavras dessa citação: “põe em dúvida a credibilidade de quem as divulga”.