Why Unafraid to Speak Out
IN RETROSPECT, it could be said that the clash between Jehovah’s Witnesses and Nazism, or National Socialism, was all but inevitable. Why? Because of the Nazis’ unyielding demands that conflicted with three of the Witnesses’ fundamental Bible-based beliefs. These are: (1) Jehovah God is the Supreme Sovereign. (2) True Christians are politically neutral. (3) God will resurrect those who have proved faithful to him until death.
These Bible-based beliefs determined the steadfast stand of Jehovah’s Witnesses against the Nazis’ ungodly demands. Thus, they courageously spoke out and exposed Nazism as the evil that it was.
Jehovah’s Witnesses refused to heil Hitler. They refused because they attribute their salvation to God and have dedicated their lives to him alone. The Bible says of Jehovah: “You alone are the Most High over all the earth.”—Psalm 83:18.
Actually, “Heil Hitler” implied that salvation was by Hitler. So the Witnesses could not be faithful to God and at the same time heil any human. Their lives as well as their loyalty and allegiance belonged to God.
Jehovah’s Witnesses had clear precedents for refusing to obey Hitler’s wrongful demands. For example, when Jesus’ first-century apostles were ordered to cease declaring the good news about Christ, they refused. They said: “We must obey God as ruler rather than men.” The Bible says that for their determined stand, the authorities “flogged them, and ordered them to stop speaking upon the basis of Jesus’ name.” Yet, the apostles refused to obey that God-defying order. “They continued without letup teaching and declaring the good news.”—Acts 5:29, 40-42.
Many early Christians died because they obeyed God rather than men. Scores perished in Roman arenas because they refused, in effect, to heil Caesar by rendering an act of worship to him. But to such persons it was an honor and a victory to prove faithful to God even to death, similar to a valiant soldier’s being willing to die in behalf of his country.
Because Jehovah’s Witnesses advocate only one government, God’s Kingdom, some have viewed them as subversive. But nothing could be further from the truth. In imitation of Jesus’ apostles, “they are no part of the world.” (John 17:16) They are politically neutral. Because of their loyalty to God, they obey the laws of their respective human governments. Indeed, they are exemplary in their “subjection to the superior authorities.” (Romans 13:1) Never have they advocated rebellion against any human government!
There is, however, a line that cannot be crossed under any circumstances. It is the line between the duty of Jehovah’s Witnesses to man and their duty to God. They render to Caesar, or governmental authorities, what belongs to Caesar but to God what belongs to Him. (Matthew 22:21) If anyone tries to exact from them what belongs to God, that attempt will fail.
What if a Witness is threatened with death? Well, Jehovah’s Witnesses have unshakable confidence in God’s ability to restore them to life. (Acts 24:15) So Witnesses have the same attitude as did three young Hebrews in ancient Babylon. When threatened with death in a fiery furnace, they told King Nebuchadnezzar: “If it is to be, our God whom we are serving is able to rescue us. . . . Let it become known to you, O king, that your gods are not the ones we are serving, and the image of gold that you have set up we will not worship.”—Daniel 3:17, 18.
Thus, as noted earlier, when Hitler began to climb onto his pedestal as a self-appointed god, an ideological battle was inevitable. The Third Reich, sword drawn, found itself face-to-face with a tiny band of Jehovah’s Witnesses who had sworn loyalty to the true God, the Almighty God, Jehovah. Even before the battle began, however, the outcome was decided.
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Faithful to Death
WOLFGANG KUSSEROW was one of those put to death because he maintained faithfulness to God and refused to support Nazism. Shortly before he was beheaded on March 28, 1942, he wrote his parents and siblings: “Now, as your third son and brother, I must leave you tomorrow morning. Do not be sad, for the time will come when we will be together again. . . . How great our joy will then be, when we are reunited! . . . Now we have been torn apart, and each of us must stand the test; then we will be rewarded.”
Shortly before his execution on January 8, 1941, Johannes Harms wrote in a final letter to his father: “My death sentence has already been announced and I am chained both day and night—the marks (on the paper) are from the handcuffs . . . My dear father, in spirit I call to you, remain faithful, as I have attempted to remain faithful, and then we will see each other again. I will be thinking of you up until the very last.”