Do you know anyone who converted from unusual religions ?

[Jwanon]

Most JWs I know were previously from Christendom. Do you know anyone who practiced a peculiar faith before joining the Truth ?

For example, Scientology or Zoroastrianism

 

If so, could you share what made them turn to Jehovah ?

Edited November 11, 2023 by Jwanon

[Brandon]

Off the top of my head, I can think of former Hindu, former Pentecostal preacher, former atheist… These are witnesses I’ve known. 
 

There’s an interesting list of articles titled “I Was A…” here: https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1200024627#h=427

 

among them, Buddhist, Communist, Faith Healer, Voodoo practicer, Rastafarian, Catholic Nun, witch doctor

[jwhess]

Another elder in the Cleveland, OH area was married to a former Mormon from Utah.  They are dead now.

[Cushi]

6 hours ago, jwhess said:

Another elder in the Cleveland, OH area was married to a former Mormon from Utah.  They are dead now.

There’s an older brother in my congregation that’s a former Mormon. He said one time 2 young Mormons knocked on his door and he told them “ya know, I used to be a Mormon. Now I’m a Jehovah’s Witness.” He said they both got really red in the face and very upset. He told them if they could show him some scriptures to prove what they were saying about God, he would leave the truth and go back to the LDS church. They promised to come back with the verses. They never did. 

[jwhess]

11 hours ago, *Jack* said:

There’s an older brother in my congregation that’s a former Mormon. He said one time 2 young Mormons knocked on his door and he told them “ya know, I used to be a Mormon. Now I’m a Jehovah’s Witness.” He said they both got really red in the face and very upset. He told them if they could show him some scriptures to prove what they were saying about God, he would leave the truth and go back to the LDS church. They promised to come back with the verses. They never did. 

Br. Guy Pierce of the Governing Body (now moved on to immortal) was from a Mormon family.  He was the only JW in the family as I recall.  In his memorial brochure, he mentioned going back to a family get-together once.  When he went in to the house, another brother saw him and said, "Well, here is the black sheep of the family."  Br. Guy Pierce replied, "You got the animal right, I don't care about the color."

 

 

Edited November 12, 2023 by jwhess

[Cushi]

1 hour ago, jwhess said:

Br. Guy Pierce of the Governing Body (now moved on to immortal) was from a Mormon family.  He was the only JW in the family as I recall.  In his memorial brochure, he mentioned going back to a family get-together once.  When he went in to the house, another brother saw him and said, "Well, here is the black sheep of the family."  Br. Guy Pierce replied, "You got the animal right, I don't care about the color."

 

 

Thanks. Yeah, I remember reading about him being raised in a Mormon family. I think I read it in his life story.

[Sheep]

13 minutes ago, *Jack* said:

Thanks. Yeah, I remember reading about him being raised in a Mormon family. I think I read it in his life story.

He never had a life story article published. The only article was at his death:

 

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/2014922

 

But it doesn't mention anything about a Mormon background.

Edited November 12, 2023 by Sheep

[Qapla]

My dad was raised a Moron and spent 20 years in the US Navy - when he died in his 80's, he was serving as an elder and a pioneer. 

Edited November 12, 2023 by Qapla

[jwhess]

1 hour ago, Sheep said:

He never had a life story article published. The only article was at his death:

 

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/2014922

 

But it doesn't mention anything about a Mormon background.

Here is the information inside the Memorial Brochure that I pictured above.  This is a partial page (not including the photographs.

 

 

[-Chris-]

Interesting that introduction uses the phrase 'Jack Mormons'. While I've certainly heard them apply it to themselves I wouldn't call anyone that out of a degree of respect. However, my understanding of the phrase was very simplistic, after just some brief research I see the history of it is a little more nuanced.

 

21 hours ago, *Jack* said:

There’s an older brother in my congregation that’s a former Mormon. He said one time 2 young Mormons knocked on his door and he told them “ya know, I used to be a Mormon. Now I’m a Jehovah’s Witness.” He said they both got really red in the face and very upset. He told them if they could show him some scriptures to prove what they were saying about God, he would leave the truth and go back to the LDS church. They promised to come back with the verses. They never did. 

 

My wife was a Mormon before becoming a Witness. She won't identify herself as ex-Mormon to the ones we encounter in the ministry because as she puts it "to them I'm an apostate, they have the same reaction we would if an ex-JW came to our door".

[Cushi]

11 hours ago, Sheep said:

He never had a life story article published. The only article was at his death:

 

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/2014922

 

But it doesn't mention anything about a Mormon background.

Must have been someone else. I just could have sworn I read something about a Governing Body member being raised Mormon. I think it was a link someone posted on here in a Mormon thread.

[Dages]

14 hours ago, Qapla said:

My dad was raised a Moron and spent 20 years in the US Navy - when he died in his 80's, he was serving as an elder and a pioneer. 

cough cough, is that a typo ?

[Esined]

@Dages you beat me to it! 🤣 I was going to say @Qapla, I’m so sorry to hear that and glad he was able to overcome that upbringing 😂

[Esined]

My mom was raised Jewish and learned the truth in her late teens. She had a lot of questions about what she was taught. She was also a teenager in the 1960s and was seeing a lot of troubling things around her - friends dying or getting in trouble because of drugs. I don’t know if that counts as “unusual.” I only know one other sister in my hall who was Jewish before becoming a witness. 

Edited November 13, 2023 by Esined

[Witness1970]

18 hours ago, Qapla said:

My dad was raised a Moron and spent 20 years in the US Navy - when he died in his 80's, he was serving as an elder and a pioneer. 

I have been known to forget the second 'm' when I am talking about Mormons.  I have done that more than once.  Totally by accident, of course.

Edited November 13, 2023 by Witness1970

[Witness1970]

Not another religion exactly.  I have known more than a couple of Witnesses who were drug addicts when they started studying.  Two brothers I know very well, when they started studying, their wives left them.  They apparently wanted their drug-addict husbands back. 

 

One couple I knew at a former congregation were into drugs,  They named their dog, 'kilo'.  They were actually high on speed when the Witnesses called.  They accepted a Bible study and I met them at the Kingdom Hall.  

 

This really isn't a religion as the topic suggests, but it was interesting.

[Qapla]

4 hours ago, Dages said:

cough cough, is that a typo ?

 

Yes, that was a typo ... sorry for any confusion it may have caused

[Brandon]

4 hours ago, Witness1970 said:

Not another religion exactly.  I have known more than a couple of Witnesses who were drug addicts when they started studying.

 

4 hours ago, Witness1970 said:

when I am talking about Mormons.

The first we call the “LSD church,” it’s easy to confuse with the LDS (latter day saints) church. But they probably have some things in common…

[Julsey]

10 hours ago, Esined said:

My mom was raised Jewish and learned the truth in her late teens. She had a lot of questions about what she was taught. She was also a teenager in the 1960s and was seeing a lot of troubling things around her - friends dying or getting in trouble because of drugs. I don’t know if that counts as “unusual.” I only know one other sister in my hall who was Jewish before becoming a witness. 

Esined, did she ever say whether there was a ‘best’ way to witness to someone who is Jewish? A friend of mine who knew a brother who had been Jewish said that one thing we could do at the start was express appreciation for the way the Jewish people preserved the Hebrew Scriptures through the centuries. Obviously, it depends on the person and, I would think, the branch of Judaism that they are a part of. 

[Esined]

@Julsey there isn’t one best way. What you mention may work with some people. Some good things to be aware of are that:

 

1. If you’re going to share a scripture, it is better to share from the Hebrew scriptures and avoid references to Jesus in any initial conversation. The sister in my hall loves to use Jeremiah 29:11 & 12. I like to share scriptures from Psalms and Habakkuk. 

 

2. Many if not most Jewish people in the U.S. are very secular, unless they are part of an Orthodox community. So you may find more opportunities for a conversation if you put the the person at ease by establishing common ground first before opening the Bible, by speaking about more broadly spiritual topics like peace, happiness, family life, health, etc. or allowing them to express themselves about current events.
 

3. Being Jewish is a cultural and ethnic identity as much as, or for some people, even more than a religious one. Most (but not all) Jewish people in the US are Ashkenazi Jews, meaning they are from the diaspora that lived for centuries in Central and Eastern Europe. Depending on when their family immigrated to the U.S. (could be years, decades or centuries!), they may be more likely to know words in Yiddish than Hebrew. They have specific cultural foods, traditions, etc. Because of this, because of the Holocaust, and because of Christendom’s long history of antisemitism and persecution of the Jewish people, some Jews are wary of any Christian proselytizing and may consider it disrespectful or offensive.
 

We have a lot of Jewish people in our territory and I try to make a point of saying that we are talking to all of our neighbors of all faiths and traditions. 

[Julsey]

1 hour ago, Esined said:

@Julsey there isn’t one best way. What you mention may work with some people. Some good things to be aware of are that:

 

1. If you’re going to share a scripture, it is better to share from the Hebrew scriptures and avoid references to Jesus in any initial conversation. The sister in my hall loves to use Jeremiah 29:11 & 12. I like to share scriptures from Psalms and Habakkuk. 

 

2. Many if not most Jewish people in the U.S. are very secular, unless they are part of an Orthodox community. So you may find more opportunities for a conversation if you put the the person at ease by establishing common ground first before opening the Bible, by speaking about more broadly spiritual topics like peace, happiness, family life, health, etc. or allowing them to express themselves about current events.
 

3. Being Jewish is a cultural and ethnic identity as much as, or for some people, even more than a religious one. Most (but not all) Jewish people in the US are Ashkenazi Jews, meaning they are from the diaspora that lived for centuries in Central and Eastern Europe. Depending on when their family immigrated to the U.S. (could be years, decades or centuries!), they may be more likely to know words in Yiddish than Hebrew. They have specific cultural foods, traditions, etc. Because of this, because of the Holocaust, and because of Christendom’s long history of antisemitism and persecution of the Jewish people, some Jews are wary of any Christian proselytizing and may consider it disrespectful or offensive.
 

We have a lot of Jewish people in our territory and I try to make a point of saying that we are talking to all of our neighbors of all faiths and traditions. 

Esined, I actually converse daily via email with somebody in MA. We bonded over a common interest. She has never had a friend or acquaintance who was a Witness, so it allowed me to share a little with her. She keeps kosher, but is somewhere between Reform, Conservative, and Reconstructionist. I was aware of the things you mention, so I was very careful. She said that a lot of what I shared with her sounded much like Judaism. I did focus mostly on the Hebrew Scriptures, and made it very clear that the Christian Greek scriptures do not, unlike Christendom, teach that God is a Trinity. Hopefully, we will discuss more, but I will not get my hopes up, as I know it’s very uncommon for a Jewish person to convert or even consider it. <sigh> I think one of the biggest roadblocks is the Talmudic teaching that if Jesus was really the Messiah, he would have liberated Israel and not died.

 

Thank you for the feedback! 

Edited November 14, 2023 by Julsey

[rocket]

My great grandfather was a Protestant preacher. He went up the ranks in Salvation Army, Captain to Division Commander.  Great grandmother started studying first in 1898 and baptized in 1902. Great grandfather was content as a preacher in various churches after he left Salvation Army before the turn of century. He learned the Truth gradually as he would get fired from one church for hosing hell and then get hired in another. His last protestant church he was hired as assistant pastor to help clean up the wife swapping but that failed. Finally he accepted the Truth and was baptized in 1913 along with grandfather and his sisters.  He died faithful the same year I was born.

[jwhess]

1 hour ago, Julsey said:

as I know it’s very uncommon for a Jewish person to convert or even consider it.

Sr. Jules, when I think of those who were Jewish but converted, my mind recalls Max Liebster.  His story and his later marriage to Simone Arnold tells a very touching story.  Well worth researching and reading.

 

*** g93 9/22 p. 19 “Oh, Jehovah, Keep My Young Girl Faithful!” ***

When I became 17, I went into the full-time service as a minister of Jehovah’s Witnesses and then to Gilead in the United States, the Watch Tower Society’s school for missionaries. At the Society’s world headquarters, I met Max Liebster, a German Jew who had become a Witness in one of Hitler’s concentration camps. We married in 1956, and with the help of our God, Jehovah, we have kept on until now in full-time service as special pioneer ministers here in France.

*** w93 12/15 pp. 15-16 pars. 20-21 Trust in Jehovah! ***

²⁰ Max Liebster, a natural Jew who by a seeming miracle survived the Holocaust, described his journey to a Nazi extermination camp in these words: “We were locked in carriages that were transformed into many tiny cells for two persons. Kicked into one of them, I faced a prisoner whose eyes reflected serenity. He was there because of his respect for God’s law, choosing prison and possible death rather than shed the blood of other people. He was one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. His children had been taken away from him, and his wife had been executed. He was expecting to share her fate. The 14-day journey brought an answer to my prayers, for it was during this very journey to death that I found the hope of everlasting life.”

 

[Esined]

3 hours ago, Julsey said:

Esined, I actually converse daily via email with somebody in MA. We bonded over a common interest. She has never had a friend or acquaintance who was a Witness, so it allowed me to share a little with her. She keeps kosher, but is somewhere between Reform, Conservative, and Reconstructionist. I was aware of the things you mention, so I was very careful. She said that a lot of what I shared with her sounded much like Judaism. I did focus mostly on the Hebrew Scriptures, and made it very clear that the Christian Greek scriptures do not, unlike Christendom, teach that God is a Trinity. Hopefully, we will discuss more, but I will not get my hopes up, as I know it’s very uncommon for a Jewish person to convert or even consider it. <sigh> I think one of the biggest roadblocks is the Talmudic teaching that if Jesus was really the Messiah, he would have liberated Israel and not died.

 

Thank you for the feedback! 

 

Don't make any assumptions, just be patient and keep praying about it! It sounds like you've already been able to find a lot of common ground. My mom currently has a progressive Bible study with a Jewish woman in her 80s. 😊 

 

When my Jewish grandma was still alive, out of the blue she asked to come to a meeting with me. I was going to the Spanish congregation at the time so I took her to visit an English congregation's public talk. The talk was about forgiveness and the whole time she kept nodding in agreement and elbowing me and whispering things like, "I wish your brother was here to hear this!" My grandma was a heavy smoker and had a deep, raspy voice. The speaker and his wife happened to be sitting in the row in front of us, and when the speaker sat down after giving his talk, my grandma tapped him on the shoulder and whispered loudly, "I'm Jewish and I'm not changing. But I agree with everything you said up there!"

 

His eyes got big and he just said, "Okay," like he didn't know what to make of that. But that was an extremely positive comment coming from my grandma.

 

There were a lot of things she admired about our beliefs. So you really never know. I still have hope to see her again!

Edited November 14, 2023 by Esined
overuse of the word "very"

[Julsey]

On 11/13/2023 at 9:05 PM, jwhess said:

Sr. Jules, when I think of those who were Jewish but converted, my mind recalls Max Liebster.  His story and his later marriage to Simone Arnold tells a very touching story.  Well worth researching and reading.

 

*** g93 9/22 p. 19 “Oh, Jehovah, Keep My Young Girl Faithful!” ***

When I became 17, I went into the full-time service as a minister of Jehovah’s Witnesses and then to Gilead in the United States, the Watch Tower Society’s school for missionaries. At the Society’s world headquarters, I met Max Liebster, a German Jew who had become a Witness in one of Hitler’s concentration camps. We married in 1956, and with the help of our God, Jehovah, we have kept on until now in full-time service as special pioneer ministers here in France.

*** w93 12/15 pp. 15-16 pars. 20-21 Trust in Jehovah! ***

²⁰ Max Liebster, a natural Jew who by a seeming miracle survived the Holocaust, described his journey to a Nazi extermination camp in these words: “We were locked in carriages that were transformed into many tiny cells for two persons. Kicked into one of them, I faced a prisoner whose eyes reflected serenity. He was there because of his respect for God’s law, choosing prison and possible death rather than shed the blood of other people. He was one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. His children had been taken away from him, and his wife had been executed. He was expecting to share her fate. The 14-day journey brought an answer to my prayers, for it was during this very journey to death that I found the hope of everlasting life.”

 

Thank you, bro. I’m going to have to go back and read more on these brothers and sisters. I know that I have read their stories before!