The teaching of the WTS is that the Kingdom was set up invisibly in 1914 and that by its expulsion of Satan from heaven this precipitated the worsening of world conditions that have occurred throughout the last 95 years.
However, this does not fit the biblical picture of events, nor are these claims made by the Watchtower in accord with reality.
The WTS Idea is based largely on Psalm 110:2 and Revelation 12:7-9,Psalm 110:1- 2:
“The utterance of Jehovah to my Lord is: ‘Sit at my right hand until I place your enemies as a stool for your feet.’ The rod of your strength Jehovah will send out of Zion, [saying:] ‘Go subduing (“rule” in other versions) in the midst of your enemies.’”
Jesus will be at Jehovah’s right hand in heaven only until the time comes to begin placing his “enemies as a stool for” his feet. This is proved by the second statement that Jesus is then, from literal Zion, to “‘Go subduing (“rule” in other versions) in the midst of [his] enemies.’”
“I have installed my king upon Zion my holy mountain ... You will break [or “shepherd”] them [the nations] with an iron sceptre ... And now, O kings, exercise insight ... and YOU may not perish from the way” (Ps. 2:6, 7, 10, 12).
So Jesus, after being established on his throne can go out of literal Zion to “Go subduing in the midst of” his prime enemies - the wild beast, the false prophet and “the rest” i.e. their armies (Rev. 19:12-21), and Satan during the earliest stage of the Millennium.
WORLD DISARMAMENT
“And it must occur in the final part of the days [that] the mountain of the house of Jehovah will become firmly established...and to it all the nations must stream ... And he will certainly render judgement among the nations and set matters straight respecting many peoples; and they will have to beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning shares. Nation will not lift up swordagainst nation, neither will they learn war any more” (Isa. 2:1-4).
The WTS explanation of this passage is that it refers to those people who, before the Millennium, come out of the nations to become JWs and who will not take up arms. However, most of these individuals were not armed and never planned to take up arms anyway. Rather obviously the passage refers to whole nations who will be judged and cease to operate any kind of war machine. It is they, and not Christians, who will break up “their swords and their spears.” This situation evidently has yet to happen and according to Isaiah 2 God will bring it about “in the final part of the days” of the short transitional time of transfer of world power to Jesus. So the WTS interpretation of a 1914 establishment of the kingdom fails because the world’s governments still have full control of earth’s affairs and are fully armed. Jesus clearly has not been ruling in the midst of his enemies during the last 95 years. However, the placing of the enemies under Jesus’ feet is not something which is absolutely completed until the end; but is a “subduing (ruling)” of them throughout the Millennium as his kingship widens (Dan. 2:35):
“Next, the end, when he [Jesus] hands over the kingdom to his God and Father, when he has brought to nothing all government and all authority and power. For he must rule as king until [God] has put all enemies under his feet. As the last enemy, death is to be brought to nothing.” (1 Cor. 15:24- 26).
Revelation 12:7-9:
“And war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels battled with the dragon, and the dragon and its angels battled but it did not prevail...so down the great dragon was hurled...he was hurled down to the earth, and his angels were hurled down with him.”
“And I heard a loud voice in heaven say: “Now have come to pass the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ ...On this account be glad you heavens...Woe for the earth and for the sea, because the Devil has come down to YOU, having great anger, knowing he has a short period of time”
(Rev. 12:10-12).
As shown in earlier studies Jesus has not returned. The biblical scenario is that Satan will be thrown out of heaven and cause intense persecution of Christians for about 3½ years (the Great Tribulation) immediately after which Jesus returns and establishes the Kingdom.
Because of the statement “Now have come to pass...the kingdom” in Revelation 12:10-12 the WTS explanation is that the kingdom was indeed established at exactly the same time Satan was thrown out of heaven to cause woe for the earth. However, after the narrative of verses 1-9 the next passage is an anonymous prayer of praise to God concerning what will happen in the relatively near future. As with many of the statements in the middle of the book of Revelation so, too, the passage in 12:10-12 is proleptic (anticipatory). This is proven by noting:
· “And the seventh angel blew his trumpet. And loud voices occurred in heaven, saying: ‘The kingdom of the world did become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he will rule as king forever and forever’” (Rev. 11:15).At this point in the events of Revelation there is only an anticipation of the establishment of the Kingdom and so the Hebrew prophetic past tense (proleptic) has been used. The Word Biblical Commentary says:
At this point the author inserts a hymnic passage consisting of vv 10-12, which comment on the significance of the expulsion of Satan from heaven...The temporal verb arti “now,” together with the aorist verb egeneto, which has perfective value,...indicates that the ascriptions of deliverance, power and kingship to Godare grounded in the specific temporal occurrence of Satan’s expulsion from heaven narrated in v 9...If God’s kingship has already become a fact in 11:15, what can the duplicate statement in 12:10 mean? The answer must be that in the present text the coming or occurrence of the kingship of God is describedproleptically.
Bible Commentator George Eldon Ladd states in his commentary on Revelation that with reference to Revelation 12:10:
This announcement, like that in 11:15, is proleptic and looks forward to the consummation which has not yet occurred; but it has occurred in principle, for Satan is already a defeated foe...This defeat leads to the establishment of the authority of the Messiah of the world.
Bible Scholar Robert Govett notes regarding the “short period of time” that Satan has:
This ejection of the devil, then, cannot yet have taken place. For after it he has only 1260 days respite, and those persecuted by him have to endure only 1260 day’s exile: 12:14 and 13:5.
So the passage in verses 10-12 is a praise to God for the expulsion of Satan so that the next part of God’s purpose is opened up in anticipation of the soon establishment of the Kingdom.
It is separate from the preceding narrative and therefore does not occur at the exact time of Satan’s expulsion which precipitates the Great tribulation. Furthermore, the Great tribulation precedes the establishment of the Kingdom.Jesus’ one time return is shown in Matthew 24: 21, 29 as occurring after the Great Tribulation. Please see STUDY 4. It is at Jesus’ return that the Kingdom is set up as he showed in the illustration of the man of noble birth travelling to a distant land to secure kingly power (Luke 19:11-15).
ENEMIES WHO REJECT THE KING ARE DESTROYED SOON AFTER HE RETURNS
· “But his citizens hated him and sent out a body of ambassadors after him, to say, ‘We do not want this man to become king over us.’ ‘Eventually when he got backafter having secured the kingly power, he commanded to be called to him these slaves...”
(Luke 19:14, 15).
It is only after his return that the king orders the execution of these hateful enemies:
· “Moreover, these enemies of mine that did not want me to become king over them BRING here and slaughter them before me” (Luke 19:27).
However, we did not see the slaughter of the Messianic king’s enemies in 1914 or at any time since, and so the scenario is that:
· “...in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom...it will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms...forasmuch as you beheld that out of the mountain a stone was cut not by hands, and that it crushed the iron...” (Dan. 2:44).
The phrase“will set up a kingdom” shows that the kingdom is established at the same time that it strikes the feet of the image and crushes the worldly kingdoms; yet 1914 did not bring the crushing and putting “an end to all these kingdoms”of the world. The stone described in Daniel 2:25 is a symbol of God’s kingdom.
THE OTHER 3 BEASTS SUBMIT
“I kept on beholding until the beast was killed and its body was destroyed and it was given to the burning fire. But as for the rest of the beasts [the other 3], theirrulerships were taken away, and there was a lengthening of life given to them for a time and a season” (Dan. 7:11b).
Evidently, these three co-existing rulers will not be destroyed at the time that the fourth beast is destroyed. Yet, they clearly submit to the rulership of Messiah (Ps. 2:12) because, after having lost their rulership they are allowed to live on “for a time and a season.” Nevertheless, we have not yet seen the destruction of the 4thbeast at any time since the supposed setting up of the kingdom in 1914.
EARLY RESULTS OF THE KINGDOM’S ARRIVAL
· “When the Son of man arrives in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit down on his glorious throne...and he will separate people one from another...sheep and goats...” (Matt. 25:31, 32).
Until the 1990s the WTS taught that the separating of sheep from goats had been in progress since the setting up of the kingdom in 1914. However, since the 1990s the WTS interprets this
separating work as something that will begin in the future. Logically they should also move the time for the Son of Man to “sit down on his glorious throne” to the future because clearly these two events begin to happen at the same time:
· “And as for the stone that struck the image, it became a large mountain andfilled the whole earth” (Dan. 2:35b).
Thisfilling of “the whole earth”indicates that the kingdom will be on earth and that its expansion begins the moment it crushes the feet of the image. There is here no indication of an earlier establishment of the kingdom than on this occasion or ofany decades’ long gap existing between its setting up and the beginning of the crushing of the world’s kingdoms.
RESTORATION BEGINS AS SOON AS JESUS TAKES OVER CONTROL
· “...that he may send forth the Christ appointed for you, Jesus, whom heaven, indeed, must hold within itself until the times of restoration of all things of which God spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets of old time” (Acts 3:20, 21).
This is not the restoration only of pure worship but of the restoration of “things of which God spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets of old time” involving humanity and resulting in “the new heavens and new earth.” So shortly after Jesus returns this restoration begins:
· “Jesus said to them: Truly I say to YOU, In the recreation, when the Son of Man sits down on his glorious throne...” (Matt. 19:28).
The ESV renders “In the recreation” as: “in the new world,” the NLT as “when the world is made new,” and Barclay as “at the rebirth of the world,” thereby demonstrating the fact that improving conditions will begin to exist very soon after the kingdom is established.
GOD’S WILL SOON TAKES PLACE
“Let your kingdom come. Let your will take place...upon earth” (Matt. 6:10).
Again there is no indication of any decades’ long gap between when God’s kingdom comes and when His will takes place on earth. Evidently, God’s will is not being done at the present time by the vast majority of people.
JESUS IS KING OVER THE EARTH AS SOON AS THE KINGDOM ARRIVES
The WTS teaches that Jesus is now the king only over his people even though the Kingdom has been set up. But, as we have already seen, he will have rulership over the whole earth from shortly after the establishment of the kingdom. This being the case it is impossible that Jesus has actually begun his kingdom reign because the WTS still views Satan as being “the god of this system of things” (1 Cor. 4:4).
CONCLUSION
It is entirely logical that after the establishment of the Kingdom and after dealing with his main enemies Jesus would immediately bring into effect the processes to improve conditions in the world. The WTS scenario has an invisible kingdom with invisible rulers who have accomplished nothing toward world improvement over the last 95 years!
