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Keeping the Organization of Public Servants Pure, ChasteThe Watchtower—1964 | November 15
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of their personal family, then they will not morally injure these younger women of the Society any more than they will their own fleshly sister. Committing fornication with one of the younger women of the congregation would be just as abominable as committing incest with one’s own fleshly sister.
34, 35. (a) To what other persons did Paul need to give moral instructions, and with what end in view? (b) In that behalf, what must the older women do in behalf of the younger women?
34 On the other hand, moral instructions needed to be given also to the women of the Christian congregation. To another fellow missionary named Titus, Paul wrote the following words: “Let the aged women be reverent in behavior, not slanderous, neither enslaved to a lot of wine, teachers of what is good; that they may recall the young women to their senses to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sound in mind, chaste, . . . so that the word of God may not be spoken of abusively.”—Titus 2:3-5.
35 What must older women do to recall the younger women to their senses, that these may love their own husbands instead of some other woman’s husband, and may be chaste toward all of the opposite sex? The aged women must themselves set the example of personal chasteness. Chasteness on the part of a woman in the New World Society can help another person to take up the Christian course of life.
36. How did the apostle Peter emphasize this fact to Christian wives, with what reflection on God’s Word?
36 The aged apostle Peter emphasized this fact by writing to Christian wives: “You wives, be in subjection to your own husbands, in order that, if any are not obedient to the word, they may be won without a word through the conduct of their wives, because of having been eyewitnesses of your chaste conduct together with deep respect.” (1 Pet. 3:1, 2) The more corrupt that a community is outside the congregation and outside the home of a Christian wife, the more the chastity of the faithful wife shows up to good effect, with greater impressiveness. It reflects well on God’s Word.
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How the Organization Should View ChastenessThe Watchtower—1964 | November 15
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How the Organization Should View Chasteness
1, 2. (a) How is human sex to be viewed, and why so? (b) How does Genesis 1:27, 28 explain the origin and the purpose of sex?
CHASTENESS takes sex into account. In the light of God’s holy Word sex is sacred. Sex did not spring from blind, unintelligent, unmoral, accidental evolution operating toward a selfish end. Human sex, as well as the sex of animals, fish, birds, insects, and plants, is of God. Is God immoral because he created sex? No! He did not purpose the great wave of sex madness that is sweeping the world, resulting in all kinds of terrible social diseases or unhealth. He purposed that sex should serve a miraculous purpose, that of propagating life in its various forms on earth, including human life. In very simple language the first chapter of the Holy Bible explains to us the origin and the purpose of sex in mankind. Ge Chapter one, verses twenty-seven and twenty-eight, of Genesis (the first book of the Bible) says:
2 “And God proceeded to create the man in his image, in God’s image he created him; male and female he created them. Further, God blessed them and God said to them: ‘Be fruitful and become many and fill the earth and subdue it, and have in subjection the fish of the sea and the flying creatures of the heavens and every living creature that is moving upon the earth.’”
3. In harmony with this, what purpose were the sex organs to serve, and why is there a sacred aspect about them?
3 The male sex organs and the female sex organs were to cooperate in fulfilling this God-given command. Thus the sex organs are not playthings to have a lot of fun with, for such fun does not serve the divine purpose. It results in injury not alone to the sex organs but to the whole individual who tries to have fun in this way. The sex organs, rather than being toys, serve a most serious purpose. For that reason the sex organs, male and female, have a sacred aspect or way of being looked at. They have to do with life, especially the life of a coming generation of humans.
4. Is the life of the coming generation to be considered sacred, and how can the sixth of the Ten Commandments be violated regarding that generation by one’s sexual conduct?
4 Is not life, to begin with, a gift from God, and is it therefore not sacred? The life of every human creature now breathing the air is to be considered sacred. Is not the life of the coming generation also to be considered sacred? It is. Remember the sixth and seventh of the Ten Commandments, as given by God to his prophet Moses for the nation of Israel: “You must not murder. You must not commit adultery.” (Ex. 20:13, 14) Do you want to kill or even cripple the coming generation, a baby, a child? You can do so by tampering with the sex organs, by using them in a way contrary to God’s purpose and law regarding them, hence in an immoral way that produces loathsome diseases that affect human offspring, fatally.
5, 6. (a) How is the seed of life that is put in man and woman to be considered, and how is a life in the female womb to be considered? (b) How was this fact borne out in God’s law in Exodus 21:22-25?
5 Life, as a gift from God, is sacred. So the seed of life that God put in man and woman is sacred and is meant to serve the noble divine purpose. For that reason, when the life of an individual of the coming generation was started in a woman’s womb, that life was considered sacred. Killing it deserved punishment by taking the life of the killer. In God’s law through Moses the unborn child, the fetus, in the womb of the woman was considered a life, with the right to live through a birth from its mother.
6 In the very next chapter after the one that sets forth the Ten Commandments, God’s law said: “In case men should struggle with each other and they really hurt a pregnant woman and her children do come out but no fatal accident occurs, he is to have damages imposed upon him without fail according to what the owner of the woman may lay upon him; and he must give it through the justices. But if a fatal accident should occur, then you must give soul for soul, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, branding for branding, wound for wound, blow for blow.” (Ex. 21:22-25) Thus life had to go for life in this case.
7. (a) Consistent with this, how do some Orientals date their age? (b) How is the human embryo to be viewed and so the destruction of it means what violation?
7 Quite consistently with this fact, some Orientals like the Koreans date their age in life from the time of their being conceived in the womb of their mothers, not from the day of their birth. This points up the fact that the human embryo is a living creature and should not be destroyed at
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