Jehovah's Witnesses

On Sunday, Mar. 15, I experienced my first unsolicited proselytizing at my apartment in Bloomington. Two men wearing suits and ties knocked on my door after I returned from church. After a brief discussion, I found that they were Jehovah's Witnesses. We had a rather interesting theological conversation. I do not know much about the Jehovah's Witnesses, so I am only recalling here what we discussed.

While we all claimed to be Christians, we had two main points of theological disagreement. First, they claimed that the battle in which Satan is cast out of Heaven (Revelation 12) took place in 1914. I responded that I saw no evidence to support this claim. They gave me a booklet which explains, among many other things, how this conclusion was reached. I have not had time to read it yet.

The other major disagreement was over the nature of Jesus. They claimed that Jesus is an angel, specifically that Jesus and the archangel Michael are the same person. They supported this claim in part with their translation of John 1, which says "the word was a god" instead of "the word was God," as in other translations. 

In their translation, I turned toHebrews 1, which is an argument, based mainly on the Old Testament prophesies, specifically against the claim that Jesus is an angel. When I pressed this point, the Witness doing most of the talking said, "I will have to think about that some more." Shortly after that, they left amicably. They asked if I would like them to return in the future for another conversation, but I politely declined.