Minority Religions and Religious Tolerance

The Jehovah’s Witness Test

This book argues that the treatment of Jehovah’s Witnesses is a critical gauge for measuring the level of religious toleration and freedom in any given society. Witnesses’ beliefs and practices exist at the margins of what most modern states and societies deem acceptable. Thus, the ‘Jehovah’s Witness test’ reveals much about the conditions for minority religions in any given state.

The chapters focus on a range of geographic locations, including South America, Rwanda, and South Korea, across the 20th and 21st centuries. Each one highlights what Witnesses tell us about the state of tolerance in that context, focusing on salient issues such as taxation regimes, religious legislation, ethics and law, human rights, medical treatment and gender. The central objective is twofold: to see what insights the analysis of Witnesses offers to our broader understanding of religious tolerance and to determine how Witnesses have shaped the way we regard basic religious freedoms.

The book is a multidisciplinary call for scholars to recognize the Jehovah’s Witnesses as a crucial litmus test for tolerance. Taken together, the contributions demonstrate that the treatment of Jehovah’s Witnesses reveal the extent to which modern societies and governments uphold and respect basic civil liberties.