...Bible chronology also fixes the time for Christ's second presence and the assuming of his right to rule as at 1914; this date was published in The Watchtower as early as 1879, 35 years before 1914. (p. 3)
As is quite usual with the WTS, when it wishes to lie, no specific information relating to the 1879 Watchtower's (WT) issue date, page number, paragraph etc., is provided. (In similar vein the WT of January 15, 1993 p. 5 states that "The Watchtower has consistently presented evidence...that Jesus' presence in heavenly kingdom power began in 1914."(Emphasis added.))
A letter was sent to the WTS at Brooklyn in which a requested was made to provide the details of date, month and page of the 1879 WT in which the 1914 date was mentioned, as it would relate to Jesus' second presence in that year. The WTS, realizing that their lie was nailed, kept silent and did not reply in spite of a reminder.
To confirm that the WTS was indeed lying, all WT's of 1879 were reviewed for the 1914 date, but of course no such information as claimed in the tract was found.
The fact is that the WTS did not even embrace the 1914 date for Jesus' second presence until 1943, so the WTS could not have published the 1914, date for Jesus' second presence, 35 years back in 1879.
Following are some quotations from WTS's own publications which further reveal that the WTS could not have published the 1914 date for Jesus' second presence in 1879, because they believed, up to 1943, that Jesus' second presence started in 1874.
It is true that the editor and publisher of Zion's Watch Tower and Herald of Christ's Second Presence calculated that the "presence" or parousia of the heavenly bridegroom began in the year 1874 C.E. ...In the year 1943 the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society published the book "The Truth Shall Make You Free." In its chapter 11, entitled "The Count of Time" it did away with the insertion of 100 years into the period of the Judges and went according to the oldest and most authentic reading of Acts 13:20, and accepted the spelled-out numbers of the Hebrew Scriptures. This moved forward the end of six thousand years of man's existence into the decade of the 1970's. Naturally this did away with the year 1874 C.E.
(God's Kingdom Of A Thousand Years Has Approached. 1973. pp. 206, 209.)The Scriptural proof is that the second presence of the Lord Jesus Christ began in 1874 A.D. This proof is specifically set out in the booklet entitled
Our Lord's Return. (Prophecy 1929 pp. 65-66.)Surely there is not the slightest room for doubt...that the Lord Jesus is present and has been since 1874.
(WT 1924 January 1 p. 5.)
One wonders what prompts this self-proclaimed "prophet of Jehovah" to utter such lies, as in the tract quoted above, which can be easily exposed by informed persons.
Perhaps it is last-ditch attempt of a false prophet to impress the unquestioning Jehovah's Witnesses with its feigned foreknowledge. The rank and file Jehovah's Witnesses do not have access to older WTS's publications as the same have not been made available to them in their Kingdom Hall libraries.
The above is by no means an isolated example of dishonest statements made by the WTS. In fact the WTS's latest history book, Jehovah's Witnesses Proclaimers of God's Kingdom (1993), contains many sugar-coated versions of embarrassing episodes in WTS's chequered history, and includes statements which contradict historical accounts printed in their earlier publications.