birthday rules?

Question

are Jehovah Witness's allowed to go to other people's b-day?
my b-day is coming up and i was about to invite this new kid at school.i was going to invite him but he send he was Jehovahs Witness.i didn'yt nko if he was joking or not b/c he was laughing when he said it.

btw-i havn't sent the invites yet

Answer 1

Each individual or family among Jehovah's Witnesses decides for itself what they will do about details surrounding birthday celebrations. However, Jehovah's Witnesses are quite well-known for their general refusal to celebrate birthdays; it's impossible for answerers here to determine whether an the questioner's classmate actually is a Witness or not.

Regarding birthday celebrations, bible students are encouraged to consider:
: 0% of faithful biblical Jews celebrated birthdays
: 0% of first century Christians celebrated birthdays
: 100% of birthdays celebrated in the bible were by debauched enemies of God (See Mark 6:17-29; Gen 40:19-22)

Bible historians (M'Clintock, Strong, and others) have noted that faithful Jews of the bible did not celebrate birthdays, and that ancient pagan birthday celebrations were at least partially intended to honor the patron gods of the particular day.

By comparison with such paganisms, the bible does not even tell us the birthdates of Jesus or ANY of his apostles!


Since such celebrations are not required in true worship, and can easily become a distraction, so Jehovah's Witnesses focus their attention elsewhere. In particular, they are focussed on the preaching work which *IS* a requirement for Christians:

(Luke 10:1-17) [Jesus] the Lord designated seventy others and sent them forth by twos in advance of him into every city and place to which he himself was going to come. 2 Then he began to say to them: “The harvest, indeed, is great, but the workers are few. Therefore beg the Master of the harvest to send out workers into his harvest.

Learn more:
http://watchtower.org/e/20050101a/article_01.htm
http://watchtower.org/library/rq/article_11.htm
http://watchtower.org/library/w/2000/12/15/article_01.htm

Answer 2

It is not so much "Are we allowed to go" as it is "Do we choose to go."

Knowing as we do the history of birthdays (Pagan in origin) as well as the fact that the only two celebrations in the Bible were by those who did not worship Jehovah AND at which deaths occurred, we generally choose not to participate in these things.
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With the introduction of Christianity the viewpoint toward birthday celebrations did not change. Jesus inaugurated a binding Memorial, not of his birth, but of his death, saying: “Keep doing this in remembrance of me.” (Lu 22:19) If early Christians did not celebrate or memorialize the birthday of their Savior, much less would they celebrate their own day of birth. Historian Augustus Neander writes: “The notion of a birthday festival was far from the ideas of the Christians of this period.” (The History of the Christian Religion and Church, During the Three First Centuries, translated by H. J. Rose, 1848, p. 190) “Origen [a writer of the third century C.E.] . . . insists that ‘of all the holy people in the Scriptures, no one is recorded to have kept a feast or held a great banquet on his birthday. It is only sinners (like Pharaoh and Herod) who make great rejoicings over the day on which they were born into this world below.’”—The Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913, Vol. X, p. 709.

Answer 3

Well, if we were back in the 1940's it would be okay because Witnesses used to celebrate them.Since then, however, Jehovah "changed His mind" and shed "new light" to His followers....so the answer to your question is no. However, recently they have received new information from the Society stating "if it is very obvious that a custom has no current false religious significance and involves no violation of bible principles,each Christian must make a personal desicion as to whether he will follow such a custom."

Answer 4

Invite the new kid anyway. If they aren't allowed to come they'll let you know. I've learned that even though people can't do something they like to know that they were thought about. This way they don't feel so left out.

Answer 5

When I had my 24th birthday party last year, I was at a Ground Round with two dozen of my friends. One of my friends ordered me dessert secretly, and asked the waiter if they could sing Happy Birthday to me. They told her that since one of their co-workers was a Jehovah's Witness, none of them were allowed to do it.

My friends just sang for me instead.

Answer 6

Invite him,

If he cannot come he will tell you.

If he cannot because of his religion, do not invite him next year.

You can still be his friend though!

Peace and Good Luck!

Answer 7

Birthdays are pagan? wtf? Good luck telling a kid that "sorry, we're not going to celebrate the day you were born because it's pagan and we're not."

Go ahead and invite him, and make an effort. What's the worst that'll happen, he can't make it, and you invite someone else. No biggie.

Answer 8

Nope, they don't go to such parties. When I had a baby shower my sister didn't come because of her religion.