Watch Tower Society Makes Jehovah’s Name Known
WHAT really motivated the organizer of the Watch Tower Society, Charles Taze Russell? It was his realization that church dogmas of predestination and eternal damnation were contrary to the Bible’s teaching of God’s love. When he saw this, he determined to preach the truths about God’s loving purposes toward mankind far and wide.
From their continuing study of the Scriptures, he and his associates came to have greater appreciation for God, his name and his four attributes of power, wisdom, justice and love. Appropriately, Jehovah’s name was used in the Three Worlds (published in 1876), as well as in the second issue of The Watch Tower, and it was further explained in the July and August issues of 1882.
Through the years Jehovah’s name has been kept to the fore in the publications of the Society, and its use has intensified, especially after the Bible Students around the world adopted the name “Jehovah’s Witnesses” in 1931.
In 1931 and 1932 a series of three books entitled Vindication I, II and III, was published, dealing with the prophecy of Ezekiel, which prophecy gave prominence to Jehovah’s name. Further attention to this was given in a book published in 1934 with the title Jehovah. Articles in The Watchtower continued to magnify Jehovah’s name and the need for it to be sanctified before all nations.
In harmony with this the Pennsylvania Watch Tower Society decided in 1944 to amend its charter, Article II, to include as its purpose the following: “to preach the gospel of God’s kingdom under Christ Jesus unto all nations as a witness to the name, word and supremacy of Almighty God JEHOVAH.”
The name Jehovah was restored to its proper place in the Bible text 237 times in the New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures, published in 1950. Throughout the New World Translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, completed in 1960, the name Jehovah appears 6,973 times, in every place where the Hebrew tetragrammaton (יהוה) occurs in the original text.
Then in 1961 the Society published the book “Let Your Name Be Sanctified,” containing extensive information about Jehovah’s name as used in the Bible and the importance of making known that name. Again, in 1971, the Society published the book entitled “The Nations Shall Know That I Am Jehovah”—How?, which presented further information on Jehovah’s name and purpose from the prophecy of Ezekiel.
This year (1984), at the “Kingdom Increase” District Conventions, the Society released a 32-page brochure entitled The Divine Name That Will Endure Forever, dealing specifically with Jehovah’s name. The Watch Tower Society, with all its international publishing resources, will continue to make known Jehovah’s name and purpose to the nations.—Psalm 83:18.