Official source
What Do Jehovah's Witnesses Believe?
Official JW.org summary of Jehovah’s Witness beliefs.
- Publisher
- Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society
- Tradition
- Jehovah's Witnesses
- Accessed
- 2026-06-16
Where this source is used
- Blood transfusions are forbiddenThe Bible's blood commands forbid eating blood out of reverence for life; a transfusion given to save a life is a different act with the opposite purpose.
- God's Kingdom began ruling in 1914The 1914 date needs links the Bible does not supply, and Jesus warned against hidden comings and against fixing times the Father keeps to himself.
- Jesus died on a stake, not a crossThe New Testament never settles the shape of the stauros, hints at a crossbeam, and puts all its weight on Jesus' death rather than on the wood.
- Jesus is Michael the archangelThe verses used to link Jesus and Michael never identify them, and Hebrews 1 sets the Son apart from every angel, including the archangel.
- Jesus rose as a spirit creatureJesus showed his crucifixion wounds, ate, and said a spirit has no flesh and bones; Scripture describes his risen body as changed, not as left behind.
- Only the 144,000 are born againJesus makes being born again the way into God's Kingdom for anyone, and the New Testament describes one body with one hope, not two classes of Christians.
- The Watch Tower organization must be trustedScripture commends testing every teacher by God's word, and an organization that calls itself fallible cannot make questioning its teaching a test of loyalty.
- Jesus is GodThe New Testament places Jesus inside the identity of Israel's one God, the Creator, while still distinguishing him from the Father.
- The bodily resurrection of JesusLuke, John, Paul, and Acts all tie the risen Jesus to the body that died. Paul's "spiritual body" describes a body made new, not a body left behind.
- The Holy Spirit is a personWhat the Spirit does, and how he can be treated, are things only a person does or suffers. A single pronoun carries little of the weight.