Information Control
“This issue is most clearly seen in the extreme case of Zechariah in Sus. Not only did he use his position of responsibility in training to spend so much time in libraries (Eccles. 12:12), he accumulated the evidence he desired to come against the anointing about the Cham teaching. He filled up his children with a steady stream of knowledge…. This made them feel superior… Libraries are concentrations of the world’s knowledge where it is possible to ingest lethal doses of it. Zechariah is now reprobate, one whom the righteous are to despise (Psalm 15:4).” Literature Meeting, 3/5/92,
p. 8.
“It is a proverb among us that whoever studies Church History will go off.” – Literature Meeting, 3/5/92, p. 8.
“Knowledge of good and evil is the thing that drives one to go outside the anointing for teaching. This is a profoundly evil way of thinking. It is like a child checking up on his father as if he had anything in him to judge his father.” – Sent Ones, undated, p. 6
“As a community, our favorite sources of information are the spiritual people who comprise the Community and who have the Holy Spirit, because each of us can judge and is accountable for what we pass on, however we have received it….The spiritual are those who have enough spiritual power to abide, to remain in Him and to preserve the work of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”
Later on they say, “People in the Community choose not to receive information from worldly books, television, or radio. It is a conscious choice. The Community is a group of individuals who have a free will to choose how they want to live. To us this is freedom – not information control.”
Then there is this teaching on Proverbs 17:14, “They all alike pay attention to wicked lips, in order to get a good story. The one who reads a newspaper is a liar for they also pay attention and give heed to its information reported as ‘fact.’ Anyone who has a desire to read a newspaper has a desire to break God’s commandment. An evil spirit in them compels the one to pay attention to its perverted report.”
If to read a newspaper is to make oneself a liar, and evidence of a desire to break God’s commandment, then it seems disingenuous at best to state that people in the Communities have the freedom to choose what they read. What is acceptable reading or hearing is what is the Communities write or approve.