Heaven is NOW FULL!!!

We did it, boys and girls. We made it to 144,000 subscribers. The gates of heaven are now closed.

So, in celebration of this milestone, today we're going to be talking about the anointed. You see, the vast majority of Jehovah's Witnesses have the hope of living forever on paradise earth. But did you know that back in the 1920s, all Jehovah's Witnesses wanted to go to heaven?

So, what happened? Why did JWS change their afterlife hope? Who are these anointed ones hoping to rule with Jesus one day?

And what effect does this doctrine have on everyday members? This is the Panda Tower channel and thank you for joining me. Okay, so let's take things step by step.

Jehovah's Witnesses believe that only 144,000 individuals make it to heaven. These anointed ones are to rule with Jesus, fighting alongside him in the battle of Armageddon and then turning the earth into a paradise. The anointed are always depicted as bearded angels even though women can also be anointed.

So first of all, why 144,000? Where did Watchtower take this number from? This number comes from the book of Revelation, and it only shows up in two verses.

Revelation 7:3 and 4 says, >> "Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees until after we have sealed the slaves of our God in their foreheads. " And I heard the number of those who were sealed, 144,000 sealed out of every tribe of the sons of Israel. >> Revelation 14 says, "Then I saw and look the Lamb standing on Mount Zion, and with him 144,000 who have his name and the name of his father written on their foreheads.

These are the ones who did not defile themselves with women. In fact, they are virgins. These are the ones who keep following the Lamb no matter where he goes.

These were bought from among mankind as first fruits to God and to the Lamb, and no deceit was found in their mouths. They are without blemish. >> So, if you've never heard of the book of Revelation, this is a book that it's packed with symbolism.

Numbers often hold symbolic significance. In the Bible, the number 12 often represents perfection, that which is complete. You have the 12 tribes of Israel.

You have the 12 apostles. The new Jerusalem has 12 gates. You get the point.

So, what the text is doing here is taking the number 12, then multiplying it by 12, and then by a,000. And this number 144,000 symbolizes perfect completion. It's so obviously symbolic.

But what's strange is that the Watchtower takes this number 144,000 literally while claiming that all the other details are symbolic. So these chosen ones are not literally virgins, nor are they Israelites, nor do they have names tattooed on their foreheads. So why would this number be literal while all the other details are symbolic?

It makes no sense. >> Don't ask questions. >> So that is the current doctrine.

But as you will see in a second, this doctrine has changed a lot throughout the years. Charles St. Russell, the founder of the Bible student movement, believed in a three- tier afterlife system.

First, you have the little flock, the 144,000 Christians who receive a special calling to rule with Christ. Then, you have the great crowd, who although not being part of the 144,000, also make it to heaven. Russell said this about the great crowd.

Does the great company receive life direct from God on the spirit plane? The answer, yes. They receive life direct in that they have been begotten of the Holy Spirit.

And when they are begotten, they are just the same way as the little flock. Because we are called in the one hope of our calling. They do not make their calling and election sure, but not being worthy of the second death, they therefore receive life on the spirit plane.

So Russell believed that the heavenly calling ended in the year 1888. By that point, all 144,000 Christians had been selected. Once Armageddon arrived, the earth would be turned into a paradise and the rest of righteous humanity would live forever on the earth.

Russell did not believe in eternal torment in hell. So, everyone who turned their backs on God would simply cease to exist. Once Charles Chase Russell died, Joseph Rutherford became the new president of the Watchtower.

Rutherford also believed in a three- tier afterlife system. This 1927 watchtower said, "All the facts and the scriptures bearing upon the matter under consideration show that those who form the great multitude constitute a spirit class born on the spirit plane. " Okay.

So, first we have the ruling class, the 144,000, which included all Jehovah's Witnesses at that point. Then you had the great multitude who were also going to heaven, just not at the same level as the ruling crowd. And this great multitude included Christians that were outside the Watchtower organization.

And the limit for that group was, get this, 411,840,000 people. Rutherford got that number by mashing a bunch of Bible verses together. He multiplied 144,000* 2,860.

Yeah, he did that sort of Bible math all of the time. Last but not least, you had the other sheep. These were the millions now living that would never die.

Individuals who were not spirit anointed but still cited with righteousness. This unknown number of people would live forever on paradise earth. They were also known as the Jehonadab class.

The 1931 book Vindication said, "Jehonadab represented or foreshadowed that class of people now on the earth who are out of harmony with Satan's organization who take their stand on the side of righteousness and are the ones whom the Lord will preserve during the time of Armageddon, take them through that trouble and give them everlasting life on the earth. " These constitute the sheep class. So it seems that at this point you didn't have to belong to the Jehovah's Witnesses to be saved.

In fact, you could still make it to heaven even as a regular Christian. This more inclusive view of salvation was a legacy of Pastor Russell. But Rutherford, his successor, being a much more dogmatic man, would not remain content with this doctrine.

That's why in 1934 he proclaimed that to survive Armageddon and live in paradise, you had to be dedicated to Jehovah. In other words, you had to be a Jehovah's Witness. This change would set the stage for 1935 when Rutherford before an audience of 20,000 witnesses proclaimed that the other sheep are identical with the great crowd.

Now, there would only be 144,000 Christians going to heaven, and everyone else would have to get baptized if they wanted to live forever on paradise earth. Most of those associated with Jehovah's Witnesses prior to the 1930s felt yearnings for heavenly life. Yet, the photodrama of creation had also drawn attention to Bible teachings of a paradise earth.

What was the significance of such teachings? At a landmark convention in 1935, Rutherford would explain that the great multitude of Revelation chapter 7 is an earthly class with earthly hopes. This understanding gave fresh significance to the preaching work >> and this has been the teaching ever since.

Rutherford also changed the deadline for the heavenly calling from 1888 to 1931 without even attempting to provide a biblical basis for it. Watchtower stuck with this date for a few decades until they realized that a lot of new Jehovah's Witnesses were still considering themselves anointed. So they just dropped the date entirely.

Those little weasels. Rutherford's doctrinal changes had a profound impact on the religion. Now only baptized Jehovah's Witnesses could make it to paradise.

Everyone else would be destroyed, even Christians from other denominations. This new revelation infused the movement with a sense of urgency. Jehovah's Witnesses had to warn their neighbors of the upcoming destruction.

Understanding that there would be a great crowd from all sorts of nations and languages put a tremendous responsibility on the brothers instead of focusing just on gathering the remaining ones of the anointed. Now all of a sudden there's this massive task of getting the message out to others who would then join us and help us with the preaching work. >> Focusing on a paradise earth instead of heaven also served to isolate the Jehovah's Witnesses from the rest of the Christian world.

Brotherford had always been critical of the Catholic Church, but now he would viciously turn against all of Christianom, considering all Christians outside his group to be apostates. But this change of doctrine not only separated Jehovah's Witnesses from other Christians, it also divided JWS among each other. Now you had two classes of Jehovah's Witnesses.

The anointed who expected to go to heaven and the other sheep, those who were to live forever on paradise earth. Now on paper, Watchtower claims that all Jehovah's Witnesses are equal before God no matter what hope they have for the future. But in practice, the other sheep are treated as a lowercase.

First of all, only the anointed have Jesus as their mediator. Only they participate in the new covenant. Only they are born again.

During the memorial, which is the JW version of the Eucharist, only the anointed partake from the bread and wine. For Watchtower, the New Testament was written for the anointed and the other sheep benefit from it only as an afterthought. Now, from a Christian perspective, this is incredibly disturbing because it leaves the vast majority of Jehovah's Witnesses without a mediator and therefore without salvation.

If you want to learn more about the two class system and the JW religion and why it makes no sense, I invite you to check out these two videos I made. I'll drop a link in the description below in case you want to see them. >> Affirmative.

>> Dividing Jehovah's Witnesses into two classes also serves as a method of control. The governing body, the highest ranking members of the religion, all claim to be anointed. In fact, you cannot be part of the governing body if you are not anointed.

Oh, but it gets worse because the governing body actually place themselves one step above all other anointed members since only the faithful slave is allowed to determine doctrine. Before it used to be that all anointed around the earth composed the faithful and discrete slave. But in 2013, the governing body changed the doctrine to say that the faithful slave title only applied to them and not to the rest of the anointed, which is a clear way to consolidate power.

So you could say that Jehovah's Witnesses are actually split into three groups still. You have the great crowd or other sheep who expect to live forever on paradise earth. This includes the vast majority of Jehovah's Witnesses.

Then you have the anointed who expect to go to heaven. And as of 2024, there are 23,000 Jehovah's Witnesses who claim to be anointed. Watchtower gets this number from counting the number of people who partake from the bread and the wine during the memorial.

And then you have the faithful slave or governing body. 11 men who get to dictate the beliefs of 9 million Jehovah's Witnesses. Well, dear viewer, you might be wondering, how are they anointed selected?

How does a JW decide if they want to go to heaven or they want to live on earth? Well, they just know in their heart of hearts, the anointed receive a heavenly calling, which is a personal conviction that they have been selected to rule with Christ. >> So, anointed ones don't need confirmation from anyone else.

Their anointing is clear, true, affirmative. So if his powerful Holy Spirit bears witness with a person, he is not going to communicate maybe you have been called to heavenly life leaving the person in doubt, a dilemma, a quandry. No, it is going [music] to be an absolute affirmative communication leaving the person with no question in his mind or heart.

So if a person is wondering if he is anointed or not, the answer is obvious, isn't it? He is not. >> So by means of his holy spirit, God makes it clear to anointed ones that they have this heavenly calling.

Jehovah leaves no doubt whatsoever in the minds and hearts of those who receive his invitation to go to heaven. Anointed Christians do not need anyone to confirm that they are anointed. >> When a person is anointed by God, he or she knows without doubt that it is from Jehovah.

And that one accepts Jehovah's choice with gratitude. Instead of feeling proud or hotty, anointed one strive to imitate Jesus' example of humility. >> So pretty clear, right?

If you have any doubts that you are anointed, that means you are definitely not anointed. So that means that every JW that partakes from the bread and the wine has convinced themselves that they have been handpicked by God to rule over everyone else. Just imagine the level of hubris you need to have to be anointed.

And yeah, this kind of power can get to your head very easily. Several governing body members have fantasized on what they will do once they rule in heaven with Jesus. Like Samuel Herd who expressed his desire to destroy the enemies of Jehovah.

>> So when the anointed are called to heaven, one of the first assignments is to fight. Now that's interesting. Some of us were fighters before we became true Christians.

Some even served in various branches of the military. But then we became Christians. We learned the way of peace and we let go of such warfare.

But in heaven, we will be mighty immoral spirit creatures fighting alongside our warrior king Jesus Christ. Believe me, we can and will do you significant more good in heaven than we ever could as imperfect humans here on this earth. Boom.

>> Wow, Sammy. Very Christlike behavior. I think I met like two or three anointed individuals when I was still a believer, and they seemed relatively normal.

But I heard a lot of stories on the internet of anointed JWs, usually old people, being batshit crazy. So, let me know in the comments below. Did you ever meet anyone who claimed to be anointed?

I'm going to be honest with you. When I was still a believer in my most indoctrinated state, sometimes I felt a sort of conviction that I could be anointed. And it troubled me deeply because I did not want to be anointed.

I wanted to be with my family in paradise. So I would pray to Jehovah to take these feelings away from me because I felt like I was blaspheming against the Holy Spirit. This doctrine can cause a lot of mental anguish, especially with spouses of anointed ones.

I knew of an elder that was anointed and his wife wasn't. So everyone would feel kind of bad for her because she knew she wouldn't be in paradise with her husband. It's super messed up.

Just makes me so angry. The January 2016 study edition of the Watchtower instructs anointed ones how they should view themselves. >> Modestly, anointed ones acknowledge that they do not necessarily have more Holy Spirit than those with an earthly hope.

They do not claim to have special knowledge or revelations. Neither do they try to prove that they are in some way superior. They would also never suggest to others that these two have been anointed and should start partaking.

Rather, they would humbly acknowledge that it is Jehovah who does the calling of anointed ones. This paragraph does not reflect the reality of how this religion functions. Only the governing body composed of exclusively anointed members are allowed to interpret doctrine and establish new dogma.

This privilege would never be extended to someone who is not anointed even though the paragraph just told us that all JWs are blessed with Holy Spirit. Interestingly, in the same article, Watchtower claims the number of partakers includes those who mistakenly think that they are anointed. Some who at one point started to partake of the emblems later stopped.

Others may have mental or emotional problems that lead them to believe that they will rule with Christ in [music] heaven. If this is the case, then how do we know that the governing body is not mistaken in their calling? What gives them the authority to determine doctrine?

How do we know that it's not a mental problem that tells them that they're going to be ruling in heaven with Jesus? The governing body is more than willing to throw the rest of the anointed under the bus, casting some of them as mentally ill, but their own heavenly calling can never be put into question. Yeah, sorry, but the ramblings of Steven Le don't exactly scream mental stability.

>> Mom, I'm pregnant. >> We also get this paragraph which shows us the absurdity of taking the number 144,000 literally. It claims that basically all Christians during the first century had the heavenly calling.

But once the original apostles died and Christianity fell into apostasy, Jehovah could only find a handful of individuals that were worthy of the heavenly calling. Okay, so let's say there were around 10,000 Christians by the end of the first century. Just an estimation, right?

And by the year 1935, over 52,000 Jehovah's Witnesses considered themselves anointed. So, you want us to believe that between the first century and 1935, God could only find around 80,000 Christians that were worthy of the heavenly call. It's just really insulting to just cast the vast majority of Christians that have ever lived as being false apostate Christians.

To the Watchtower, the vast majority of Christians living during this time period will not go to heaven. At best, they may be resurrected in the future and get a chance of living forever on the earth. You see all the issues that arise when you try to take this clearly symbolic number as literal.

Maybe one day Watchtower will have the common sense to admit that the number is symbolic, but I don't see that happening anytime soon. [music] Putting a limit to the people that can go to heaven is a useful control mechanism for the governing body. Of the eight billion people on Earth, God has handpicked them to lead the one true religion.

It's a boy club. The anointed are a special boys club that um also accepts women, but those women will have to grow beards once they're in heaven. Um none of this makes sense.

>> A dilemma, a quandry. >> So guys, I want to thank you once again for 144,000 subscribers. It really means a lot to me.

What should our next milestone be? 200,000 a million. H, why not?

We got to dream big, right? So, smash that subscribe button if you haven't already. If you would like to support my work, please head on over to Patreon or become a channel member.

It's only $1 a month and you gain early access to all my videos. As always, thank you for watching. Take it easy, guys.

Have a wonderful day and stay away from the tower. Goodbye little sheep.