The Jehovah’s Witnesses’ Changing Hymnody

Abstract

The worship music of the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society (better known as Jehovah’s Witnesses) has developed considerably since the organisation’s inception. The author discusses the importance of singing in worship, and demonstrates how the Society initially drew on mainstream Protestant hymnody, but progressively distanced itself from Christianity, eventually producing songs that were exclusively and distinctively its own. The Jehovah’s Witnesses found problems both with words and music that derived from external sources, and the discussion explores the underlying rationale behind the changes that have entered successive song books, to accommodate the Society’s “adjustments in viewâ€, so that congregations are always “singing the truthâ€, rather than paying tribute to any past tradition apart from Jehovah and the Bible.