I dont know if they did teach that vaccinations were wrong. I know about the blood issue and we have it as an issue because Gods law requires that we 'abstain from blood'
His law has been that way from the time of Noah when he told Noah that the blood of the animals must not be eaten. So if you want to take blood in disobedience to Gods law, then do so. But we are following Gods law on the matter and abstaining. If a person dies because of obedience to Gods law, they will have life.
Mark 8;
35 For whoever wants to save his life* will lose it, but whoever loses his life* for my sake and for the sake of the good news will save it.+36 Really, what good will it do a man to gain the whole world and to lose his life?*+37 What, really, would a man give in exchange for his life?
The Watchtower has had a very bad track record regarding changing it's position on medical issues. Take vaccinations for example. The Golden Age Magazine (1931) said that a "vaccination is a direct violation of the everlasting covenant that God made with Noah after the flood." Vaccinations were hence forbidden by the Watchtower Society for 20 years. However the Watchtower dropped it's prohibition in the 1950's. The Augusts issue in 1965 of 'Awake' magazine even acknowledged that vaccinations seem to have caused decrease in diseases. One must wonder how the parents of children who died as a result of NOT being vaccinated felt when the Watchtower Society suddenly reversed it view.
In his excellent book "Scripture Twisting", James Sire tells that the attempt to ban blood transfusions based in Genesis 9:4 and other such passages is a clear example of distortion of scripture." Indeed as he rightly points out that, "a transfusion replenishes the supply of essential, life sustaining fluid that has otherwise drained away or become incapable of performing it's vital tasks in the body. A blood transfusion is not even equivalent to intravenous feeding because the blood so given does NOT function AS FOOD."
Walter Martins agrees, commenting, "when one gives a transfusion, it is not a sacrifice of life, and the eating of forbidden blood, but a Transference of Life from one person to another, a Gift of Strength offered in a Spirit of Mercy and Charity (which is Love)."
Giving blood by transfusion is not 'feeding' as the blood is NOT received into the body as food. Eating is a literal taking in food in the normal manner through the mouth and into the digestive system.
And one final point. In the context of Genesis 9, it is the eating of animal blood that is prohibited, not the transfusion of human blood.
As Walter Martin and Norman Klann have observed:
"This verse, as it appears in Context, has not the remotest connection with human blood, much less blood transfusions. In the previous verse of the same chapter, Jehovah clearly tells Noah that He is speaking on reference to animals and THEIR flesh and that he should not eat THEIR blood. God told Noah that animal flesh was food with but one provision-that he eat not of the blood." Hence this verse does not prohibit the transfusion of human blood.
Sadly again, the Watchtower uses it's position to ban things that have no biblical vases to be banned and therefor a man made tradition just like the Pharisees in Jesus day. As always, please look into these things more for your soul is at stake. Thanks and as always, God Bless.
