The religious sect, which bears the name "Jehovah's Witnesses", is actively promoting its views among the population of various countries. However, even the adherents of this movement themselves cannot always answer the question of how this community was formed, which united those who consider themselves to be true followers of Jesus Christ.
The history of Jehovah's Witnesses began in the 1870s. Around this time, a movement arose in the United States of America with the goal of comprehensive Bible study. Charles Taze Russell was at the origin of this religious trend.
Russell, already at a young age, under the influence of his parents, was interested in issues related in one way or another to religion. Raised in strict Protestant traditions, the young man showed himself to be a talented missionary. However, he was embarrassed by the position of the traditional church that sinners should experience eternal torment in hell. Can God, who allowed such a thing, be considered loving, wise and just?
Even in his youth, the future founder of a new religious movement got acquainted with the teachings of Adventists and, to some extent, even fell under its influence. In the mid-1970s, Russell's worldview was turning. The reason for this was the Adventists' prophecy that Jesus Christ had already descended to a sinful earth and was watching the lives of people, although no one would recognize him. The news startled Russell, who donated nearly all of his funds to support an Adventist magazine.
However, for some reason, there were no signs of the long-awaited second coming of the Savior in everyday life. Having cooled off to the ideas of Adventists, Russell began publishing his own religious journal, which was called The Watchtower. The future religious leader decided to determine the exact date of the coming of Christ himself, for which he studied the Bible in depth. A few years later, his work was published, devoted to the study of the Holy Scriptures.
Russell's literary activity attracted like-minded people to him, who formed the backbone of a new trend, which received the status of society and the rights of a legal entity. The Bible Students chose Russell as their president. The focus of the future sect "Jehovah's Witnesses" was the calculation of the timing of the "last days", which the members of the society were to witness.
In the early years of the last century, the movement of Bible students, led by Charles Taze Russell, ceased to be a narrow circle of those who studied a religious source, and acquired an international character. The organization was named Jehovah's Witnesses in 1931. Orthodox Catholics, Protestants and representatives of Orthodoxy consider the society of Jehovah's Witnesses a harmful sect and heresy, which is subject to condemnation and uprooting.
