By: Dr. Jerry Bergman
Montpelier, Ohio
Unfortunately, too many religious movements accept ideas that are without solid Scriptural and scientific foundation.
One example is condemning blood transfusions as a salvation issue. I know of only one sect, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, that condemns taking blood transfusions.
In 1879 Charles Taze Russell began the Bible Student movement. Only in 1931 did they become known as Jehovah’s Witnesses. They published a magazine since 1879 titled The Watchtower; thus, their organization is called The Watchtower Society, or just the Watchtower (WT).
Russell was reared in a strict Presbyterian home in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. His disillusionment with religion, shared by many during his era, led him away from traditional Protestantism and eventually led him to non-belief.
A chance meeting with the Adventists and American Baptist minister William Miller, who is credited with beginning the Great Awakening religious revival, rekindled the religious feelings he learned as a Presbyterian.
This experience prompted Russell to reject all organized religion and undergo an independent study of the Bible. He and his associates founded the Bible Student Movement, which grew worldwide in scope.
Today their 2025 Christ’s memorial attendance was 20,635,015 persons, which included both committed active Witnesses and those who accept many of their beliefs but are not active in the movement.
Witness worldwide influence in 2025 involved 9,205,652 persons actively preaching their gospel from 119,652 congregations in 241 countries.
Today Jehovah’s Witnesses are the most racially diverse Christian denomination in the United States. In the U.S., 27 percent were Black, 32 percent Hispanic, and 36 percent White. They are widely known, even by non-Witnesses, as kind, meek, very knowledgeable about the Bible, and devoted religious people.
Their focus on Bible study in their five weekly meetings is evident today. To the chagrin of persons who have debated them they can quote numerous scriptures to effectively defend their beliefs.
Unfortunately, one belief has crept in that has caused them no small number of problems, which is one reason many have left the WT despite the many attractions of the sect.
While the group allowed blood transfusions for most of their history, even lauding a physician who gave a pint of his own blood to successfully save the life of a woman severely injured by a gunshot wound in the chest (Watchtower magazine, Consolation, December 25, 1940, page 199).
In 1945 the Watchtower Society announced the transfusion prohibition based on their interpretation of Biblical commands to abstain from blood, framing it as a non-negotiable tenet. The Watchtower magazine (July 1, 1945) first declared that blood transfusions were against divine law.
The scriptures they used to defend their position include Genesis 9:4; Leviticus 17:10; Deuteronomy 12:23 and Acts 15:28, 29. No small number of questions were raised by Witnesses about the prohibition.
For example, all of the Scripture references the WT cited refers to animal blood. The WT rule, though, refers only to the transfusion of human blood.
Their WT prohibition includes not only whole blood, but also red and white blood cells, platelets, and even blood plasma. Human blood is, on average, 83 percent water, so would it be wrong to take fluids that came from blood?
The prohibition soon became even more complex when some fractions derived from blood components, including albumin, immunoglobulins, fibrinogen, cryoprecipitate, and clotting factors, were ruled acceptable. One would be hard-pressed for Scriptural support for this rule.
The WT also allows autologous transfusions (storing one’s own blood before surgery). In emergencies, the WT still bans blood transfusion from other donors despite the 2026 SWiFT (Study of Whole Blood in Frontline Trauma) study that documented using whole donor blood at accident scenes significantly improves survival rates for trauma patients.
Willful acceptance of prohibited transfusions is treated as a rejection of their faith, leading to “disassociation” from the congregation. The WT teaches “if a Jehovah’s Witness consciously accepts a blood transfusion, even to save their life or the life of their child, they will likely experience severe guilt, distress, and a burdened conscience.”
My response is that, if they refuse a blood transfusion for their child, and the child dies, they will experience severe guilt, distress, and a burdened conscience for the rest of their life.
Fortunately, courts and hospital ethics committees often override this refusal in life-threatening emergencies for children, acting in the best interest of the child and administering the needed blood transfusion.
The parents will, in this case, not be disfellowshipped, and their child will be alive, a solution the parents may welcome and even encourage.
A major problem is that the Scriptures used by the WT reveal something else than blood transfusions. Genesis 9:4, even in the WT’s own translation, does not condemn eating blood, but rather eating animals with their blood still in it: “Only flesh with its life—its blood—you must not eat.” The NIV translation reads “you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it,” something very different.
The blood must be drained before the meat can be eaten to kill the animal. Although 40 to 60 percent of an animal’s total blood volume is removed during slaughter, a significant amount remains in the carcass, including some in the muscle.
Blood is a specialized fluid connective tissue and, to be consistent, the WT should also prohibit consumption of all life that uses similar specialized fluid connective tissue.
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Dr. Bergman is a multi-award-winning professor and author. He has 9 degrees and has taught at both the graduate and undergraduate level for over 40 years. His over 2,100 publications are in both scholarly and popular journals. Dr. Bergman’s work has been translated into 15 languages. He has spoken over 2,000 times to college, university and church groups in America, Canada, Europe, the South Sea Islands, and Africa. He lives in Montpelier and is available to present in churches and schools. Jerry can be reached at JerryBergman30@yahoo.com Bergman’s website is: https://crev.info/author/jbergman/