“Now, I am a free and accepted mason. I trust we all are. But not just after the style of our masonic brethren.” He further develops this idea: “true Bible believers may or may not belong to the masonic fraternity, but they are all masons of the highest order, since they are being fashioned, chiseled and polished by the Almighty to be used as living stones in the Temple Built Without Hands. They are free from sin, and therefore accepted by the God of Heaven as fit stones for the heavenly Temple.”
Obviously practicing Freemasons were welcome to belong to the WT organization.(And of course they gain control of everything they can.)
“true Bible believers may or may not belong to the masonic fraternity, but they are all masons of the highest order,
“If he movement toward Palestine should get the impulse that the Hirsch committee is able to give it, an imaginative person can conceive of the country’s doubling or trebling its Jewish population before the close of our century, and of its having a larger Jewish population fifty years hence than it had in ancient times, when its census ran up to three millions. Should the restoration be accomplished, all hail to the New Jerusalem!” C.T. Russell
“There are now in the world more than ten million Jews, about three-quarters of whom are in Russia, Poland, the Balkan States, and Turkey. If the movement toward Palestine should get the impulse that the Hirsch committee is able to give it, an imaginative person can conceive of the country’s doubling or trebling its Jewish population before the close of our century” – Zion’s Watchtower 1892, Nov.
Russell’s mother died when he was nine years old. At 11, Charles entered a business partnership with his father, the youngster himself writing the articles of agreement under which their enterprise operated. At 15 he and his father were running a flourishing men’s clothing chain with shops in Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and more.
Russell’s formative years were colored by the devastating Civil War that ravaged America from 1861 to 1865, followed by an era of rapid industrialization. In 1869 the first transcontinental railway was completed. Come the the 1870’s, electric light and the telephone came onto the scene. The electric streetcar would arrive in the 1880’s, and by the century’s end, a few automobiles would be noisily proclaiming their presence.
On the intellectual front, Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution, described in his 1859 book “On the Origin of Species,” had for the first time seriously challenged the Roman Catholic Church’s version of history, giving rise to spin-off churches and creds.
Early advocate advocate of Zionism
On August 18, 1891, now in Jerusalem, Russell wrote to the philanthropists Baron Maurice de Hirsch and Baron Edmond de Rothschild, or as he puts it “the two leading Hebrews of the world.” No less, he put forward a practical plan for Zionism.
It involved purchasing all government-owned land in Palestine, i.e., land not held by private owners, from the impoverished Ottoman Empire. Years later Herzl would make similar proposals. (A copy of the letter is published in “Zion’s Watchtower and Herald of Christ’s Presence“, December 1891, pp. 170-171.)
“As you will see from my books, we find the testimony of the prophets to be, that your nation will be greatly blessed and return to divine favor between now and the year 1915, A.D.,” Russell wrote. The persecutions that Jews were suffering in Russia were “a mark of divine favor rather then the reverse,” the pastor suggested – and it would only get worse because the Lord’s purpose was to drive the Jews “out of all lands whither he has scattered them.”
In his letter, Russell delicately gibes at alternative “Jewish homeland” ideas touted at the time in places other than Israel, though Baron de Hirsch was actually involved in resettling Jews elsewhere: “But please note, my dear Sir, that the sacred Scriptures predict the return to Palestine, and not a further wandering to the ends of the earth—to America or elsewhere. And, therefore, it is my humble opinion that Israel will find no rest for the sole of his foot until he finds the land of promise; and I pray you, therefore, not to waste your efforts in assisting emigration elsewhere, but concentrate them in the direction where God has indicated success…”
Why would a devout Christian minister invest so much in advocating the idea of a national homeland for the Jews?
In May 26, 1911, Jacob De Haas, editor of the Boston Jewish Advocate and a personal confidant of Herzl, published an article in the Jewish Advocate praising Russell as a “Philo-semite” with no desire to convert the Jews.
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we are speaking in a building dedicated to Masonry and we also are Masons. I am a Free Mason. I am a free and accepted Mason, if I may carry the matter to its full length, because that is what our Masonic brethren like to tell us, that they are free and accepted Masons. That is their style of putting it. Now I am a free and accepted Mason. I trust we all are. But not after the style of our Masonic brethren. We have no quarrel with them. I am not going to say a word against Masons, and I can appreciate that there are certain very precious truths that are held in part by our Masonic friends. In fact, some of my very dear friends are Masons, and I can appreciate that there are certain very precious truths that are held in part by our Masonic friends.
Was Charles Taze Russell actually a free and accepted mason? Since it is a secret society, there are many many secrets.
The Anti-Masonic Party, also known as the Anti-Masonic Movement, was the first third party in the United States. It strongly opposed Freemasonry as a single-issue party and later aspired to become a major party by expanding its platform to take positions on other issues. After emerging as a political force in the late 1820s, most of the Anti-Masonic Party’s members joined the Whig Party in the 1830s and the party disappeared after 1838.
Anti-Masonic newspapers flourished in the heated political atmosphere. In September 1831, the Anti-Masonic Party held a national convention in Baltimore, Md., nominated William Wirt for president, and announced a party platform condemning Masonry for its secrecy, exclusivity, and undemocratic character.
As the one and only Catholic President, once stated in a a famous speech, John F. Kennedy stated, “secrecy is repugnant in a free and open society.”
Can you imagine the mischief only four secret masons could cause for two unsuspecting naïve innocents? The potential for evil is unfathomable.
Now where did this Freemasonry come from???
“All truly dogmatic religions have issued from the Kabala and return to it; everything scientific and grand in the religious dreams of the Illuminati, Jacob Boeheme, Swedenborg, Saint Martin, and others is borrowed from the Kabala; all Masonic associations owe to it their secrets and their symbols.”
[ Albert Pike “Morals and Dogma,” 28th Degree p. 747 ]
Albert Pike was the leading Freemason of his time (December 29, 1809 – April 2, 1891)
What is the Kabala?
The Jewish Encyclopedia (under Cabbala, p464, 458) traces the Cabala to the Chaldees, thence to Lucifer in the garden of Eden.
So this would make sense then, if Charles Russell was indeed a freemason, that he would say, “all hail to the New Jerusalem!”
“Now, at Christ’s coming to reign as king in Jehovah’s capital organization Zion, to bring in a righteous new world, Jehovah makes him infinitely higher than the godly angels or messengers and accordingly commands them to worship him. Since Jehovah God now reigns as King by means of his capital organization Zion, then whosoever would worship Him must also worship and bow down to Jehovah’s Chief One in that capital organization, namely, Christ Jesus, his Co-regent on the throne of The Theocracy.” Watchtower 1945 Oct 15 p.313
Wow! Their capitol “organization” is ZION! Not the WTBTS
Nathan Homer Knorr was the third president of the incorporated Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society, becoming so on January 13, 1942,d and here reiterates CT Russell’s idea of New Jerusalem.
A thousand years during which these Knights Templars are to scatter blessings to all the families of the Earth. We may not wear our white feathers now but we will all have white raiment by and by. “They shall walk with Him in white for they are worthy.” Now the question arises, How can we become members of this order? Would you like to become one of these Knights Templar on a heavenly plane. (The Temple of God-Pastor Russell page 122)
I am devoting my lecture in this seminar to a discussion of the possibility that we are now entering a Jewish century…through the forces of anti-nationalism to provide us with a new kind of society. I call this process the Judaization of Christianity because it will be the vehicle through which this society becomes Jewish. Rabbi Martin Siegel New York Magazine, P.32 January 18, 1972.
“The great ideal of Judaism is that the whole world shall be imbued with Jewish teachings, and that in a Universal Brotherhood of nations- a greater Judaism in fact- all the separate races and religions shall disappear.The Jewish world Febuary 9, 1883
The Kingdom of Heaven 