Doctrine
Based on various biblical texts, such as Genesis 9:4, Leviticus 17:10, and Acts 15:29, they believe:
- Blood represents life and is sacred to God. After it has been removed from a creature, the only use of blood that God has authorized is for the atonement of sins. When a Christian abstains from blood, they are in effect expressing faith that only the shed blood of Jesus Christ can truly redeem them and save their life.
- Blood must not be eaten or transfused, even in the case of a medical emergency.
- Blood leaving the body of a human or animal must be disposed of, except for autologous blood transfusions considered part of a "current therapy".
- A baptized Witness who unrepentantly accepts a blood transfusion is deemed to have disassociated himself from the religion by abandoning its doctrines and is subsequently subject to organized shunning by other members.
Certain medical procedures involving blood are specifically prohibited by Jehovah's Witnesses' blood doctrine. This includes the use of red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets and blood plasma. Other fractions derived from blood are not prohibited. Watch Tower publications state that some products derived from one of the four primary components may be so similar to the function of the whole component and carry on such a life-sustaining role in the body that "most Christians would find them objectionable". For procedures where there is no specific doctrinal prohibition, individuals are to obtain details from medical personnel and then make a personal decision.
Read more about this topic: Jehovah's Witnesses And Blood Transfusions
Famous quotes containing the word doctrine:
“But his Lordship [tells] ... us that God is wholly here, and wholly there, and wholly every where; because he has no parts. I cannot comprehend nor conceive this. For methinks it implies also that the whole world is also in the whole God, and in every part of God. Nor ... can I find anything of this in the Scripture. If I could find it there, I could believe it; and if I could find it in the public doctrine of the Church, I could easily abstain from contradicting it.”
—Thomas Hobbes (1579–1688)
““I tell you the solemn truth that the doctrine of the Trinity is not so difficult to accept for a working proposition as any one of the axioms of physics.””
—Henry Brooks Adams (1838–1918)
“I have found little that is “good” about human beings on the whole. In my experience most of them are trash, no matter whether they publicly subscribe to this or that ethical doctrine or to none at all. That is something that you cannot say aloud, or perhaps even think.”
—Sigmund Freud (1856–1939)