The publication The Truth that leads to Eternal Life was first published in 1968 by Jehovah’s Witnesses. Inside the cover, they include the following dedication:
Dedicated to the God
Who Is Gracious to
All Those Who Seek
His Life-giving Truth
The first edition of the book had an initial print run of 10,000,000 copies. When it was revised in 1981, total books printed of all editions came to a whopping 106,800,000 copies. This publication, now out of print, was probably Jehovah’s Witnesses’ best selling book.
Herein we provide a comparison between the 1968 edition and its 1981 revision.
Famine!
In the 1968 edition of The Truth that leads to Eternal Life, it provided the following quote from the 1967 publication, Famine – 1975! on pages 88 & 89:
Hunger is rampant throughout country after country, continent after continent around the undeveloped belt of the tropics and subtropics. Today’s crisis can move in only one direction – toward catastrophe. Today hungry nations; tomorrow starving nations.
By 1975 civil disorder, anarchy, military dictatorships, runaway inflation, transportation breakdowns and chaotic unrest will be the order of the day in many of the hungry nations.
– Famine 1975! America’s Decision: Who Will Survive? pp 52, 55, 61
Needless to say, the argument of the book proved false. It is now 2020. Granted, there are countries today having to deal with famine, but nothing on the scale that William and Paul Paddock described. As Jehovah’s Witnesses used this false prophecy from the Paddock brothers in their 1968 edition, it was necessary to replace the quote with something that wouldn’t prove as great an embarrassment for them when their prophetic hopes prove false. So, in the 1981 edition of The Truth that leads to Eternal Life, they included a quote from the London Times:
There have always been famines, but the scale and ubiquity of hunger today is on a totally new scale … Today malnutrition is said to affect more than a thousand million people; perhaps as many as 400 million live constantly on the brink of starvation.
– Malnutrition now afflicts a thousand million people The Times June 3, 1980, p. 10 (Click here to view full article)
It should also be noted that 1975 was a key date in Jehovah’s Witnesses’ beliefs. They felt that the end of the world was going to happen in that year. Needless to say, nothing of the sort happened. Their prophecy was as fruitless as the Paddock Brothers’.
In the 1980’s there was serious famine in many parts of Africa. Indeed, the Jehovah’s Witnesses latched on to that crisis in their literature to use as proof that they were living in the last days. What we should be asking the Jehovah’s Witnesses as a religious group what they did do to help with the famine crisis in Africa during the 1980’s. It would be safe to assume that rock stars did more to help the famine crisis than the Jehovah’s Witnesses.
In Conclusion
At the end of the 1981 edition of The Truth that leads to Eternal Life, it says the following:
The ‘coming’ of God’s kingdom will mean more for mankind than any other event in history. That is why all of us need to be fully informed concerning the Kingdom.
The Truth that leads to Eternal Life, p. 191
Jehovah’s Witnesses will be happy to discuss this vital topic with you, free of charge, on a family or an individual basis. Just write to Watch Tower at the appropriate address listed on the next page of this book, requesting such a Bible discussion. Arrangements will be made for a qualified Witness to call on you and help you to come to a clear understanding of the Kingdom.
Millions of persons in all parts of the earth have already been benefitted by this free service. You, too, may obtain the satisfying answers that will help you to build faith in God’s kingdom.
Would you like to read God’s Word in easy-to-understand, accurately
translated English? More than 60,000,000 copies of the “New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures” have already been printed. You may request your copy by writing Watch Tower, using the appropriate address on the next page.
In the 1968 edition of the same book, they spoke about pressing on to maturity:
“PRESS ON TO MATURITY’!
Now that you have considered some basic Bible truths, you need to continue in spiritual growth. So you will want to do as the apostle Paul advised: “Now that we have left the primary doctrine about the Christ, let us press on to maturity.” – Hebrews 6:1.
These practical Bible-study aids will help you to press on to maturity, as they bring you, among other things:
Advanced knowledge and a richer understanding of God’s Word of truth.
A delightful synopsis of the entire Bible.
Answers from the highest Authority to many of today’s perplexing problems.
A chart of Bible chronology revealing that few years remain for this present system of things.
At the end of the 1968 edition of The Truth that leads to Eternal Life, they claimed “that few years remain for this present system of things”. This was a false claim because 52 years have passed since that claim was made and “this present system of things” continues to exist. Is it any wonder then that 13 years after the book was first published, which is in itself more than a “few years”, they re-issued this book removing this false claim?
The book Life Everlasting in Freedom of the Sons of God includes a four page chart (pages 31-34) indicating that 1975 was a notable date in ‘Bible chronology’:
If you as a Jehovah’s Witness were honest with yourself and compared the teachings in this book with the current beliefs of Jehovah’s Witnesses, would they align completely? If not, wouldn’t you have to agree that the book The Truth that leads to Everlasting Life is no longer ‘the truth’ that leads to everlasting life?
If the teachings of Jehovah’s Witnesses were not ‘the truth’ then, who can confidently claim that the Jehovah’s Witnesses have ‘the truth’ today? Yet, Jehovah’s Witnesses are still putting absolute trust in men who continue to make the claim that ‘the end of this system of things’ is very ‘soon‘ and that they are ‘living in the final part of the last days undoubtedly the final part of the final part of the last days, shortly before the last day of the last days’:
(A short clip from a video released March 18, 2020)
Download copies of The Truth that leads to Eternal Life: 1968 | 1981