The Hebrews writer wrote, “Be not carried about with divers and strange doctrines…” (Heb. 13:9). Strange doctrines are doctrines foreign to the Word of God. They are doctrines that originate in the mind of man instead of the mind of God. While there is certainly a lot of false teaching in the religious world today, perhaps some of the strangest doctrines come from among the Jehovah’s Witness cult.
What are some of the things they teach? They teach that hell is the common grave. They advocate that at death those who are not faithful Jehovah’s Witnesses enter into a state of non-existence. They believe and propagate the strange doctrine that the only punishment that will be experienced by those who die in sin is complete annihilation. They also deny that those who die in a right standing with God will go to heaven. (To them only 144,000 select people will go to heaven and everybody else will live on earth forever) Furthermore, they deny such things as the Deity of Christ, the resurrection of the body, and the eternal soul of man.
There is another false doctrine espoused by Witnesses which I consider to be especially strange. It is the idea that receiving a blood transfusion is a violation of the Word of God. The Witnesses take this strange doctrine very seriously. In an article I once read in a local newspaper, a woman was suing a hospital where a doctor performed a life-saving blood transfusion on her. She had six children and a husband who loved her, yet she was willing to die instead of receiving a transfusion. She was a member of the Jehovah’s Witness church.
There have been other even more remarkable reports. I have heard of parents willing to let their children die as opposed to allowing them to receive a blood transfusion. This just emphasizes how serious these people are about their belief regarding blood transfusions. Does this show a great deal of conviction? Yes. In fact, I wish more true Christians had such strong feelings concerning the truth as the Witnesses have regarding error. The bottom line, however, is that this teaching concerning receiving a blood transfusion is false. It is a strange doctrine and has no scriptural foundation at all.
Now, what exactly do the Jehovah’s Witnesses believe and teach? Here is a sample:
“So, whether one eats congealed blood in unbled meat, or drinks it at a slaughterhouse, or takes it by intravenous feeding at a hospital, it is still a violation of a divine restriction that forbids taking blood into the system.” And what do they base this whole thing on? Well, they base it on the misunderstanding of several passages. Here are the passages that Witnesses believe condemn having a blood transfusion.
Gen. 9:4 – “But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is its blood.”
Lev. 3:17 – This shall be a perpetual statute throughout your generations in all your dwellings: you shall eat neither fat nor blood.”
Lev. 7:26, 27 – “Moreover you shall not eat any blood in any of your dwellings, whether of bird or beast. Whoever eats any blood, that person shall be cut off from his people.”
Lev. 17:12 – “Therefore I said to the children of Israel, ‘No one among you shall eat blood, nor shall any stranger who sojourns among you eat blood.’”
Acts 15:28, 29 – “For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things: that you abstain from things offered to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell.”
Now, did any of these passages mention anything about a blood transfusion? No! Regardless of what Jehovah’s Witnesses believe, there is a difference between eating blood and receiving a blood transfusion. The Bible says nothing about blood transfusions. Besides, the passages above made no mention of human blood, which is the type of blood used in transfusions. They all condemn eating the blood of animals.
I am not saying that it would be lawful to eat human blood, I am merely pointing out that the passages used by Witnesses to condemn the transferring of human blood taken from one human and given to another, say nothing about such a procedure. Yet, these folks would stand by and watch their children die instead of allowing them to have a transfusion of blood. If you think this is an exaggeration of their conviction, notice this article found in the New York Daily News:
“ A young father and mother said today they followed God’s will in refusing a blood transfusion on religious grounds while their 9-day-old baby died. The father said, ‘It was God’s will. If I am called a murderer, that is God’s will. We want more children. But if such a thing happens again and the child dies, that will be God’s will too”
Surely, we can see that this is a strange doctrine indeed.