Anyone who reads WTS publications will frequently come across the word ‘loyal’. It is everywhere. Jehovah’s Witnesses are to be loyal to Jehovah and loyal to his ‘organisation’. He is a loyal friend. They are to be loyal to those taking the lead, to their brothers and sisters, to their spouses. Loyally Submitting to Theocratic Order and Ever Loyal are the titles of two of their songs. However, should you choose to do a word count of ‘loyal’ and its cognates in the KJV you will get ‘nil points’. It is not there. And if you then dive into Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance you will equally draw a blank. If there is no Greek word for ‘loyal’, or at least not one used by the divinely inspired authors, where has this ubiquitous usage by the WTS come from?
If one was to repeat that word count in the New World Translations a completely different picture emerges. In the 1984 Reference Bible ‘loyal’ and ‘loyalty’ appear 46 times, ten of which are in the NT. But then in the 2013 edition those figures balloon to 283 of which eleven are in the NT. So what is going on? The word ‘loyal’ is actually rooted in Latin. It means ‘true or faithful in allegiance’ and its usage in English is relatively modern, dating back to the 1530’s *. It comes from the French word loyal, the Old French loial, leal ‘of good quality; faithful; honourable; law-abiding; legitimate; born in wedlock’. This in turn derives from Latin legalem and lex ‘law; legal’. Its original meaning was to be lawful, obedient to the law and one’s legal obligations. Over time it broadened out to include personal allegiance: 'loyalty to a lord, a sovereign, a cause, or a friend' (Collins English Dictionary). This suggests that it was less about emotion and more about duty and structure. This legacy still carries a sense of obligation, even when it conflicts with one’s personal feelings or beliefs. Therefore loyalty can either be a virtue or a misplaced allegiance. As a virtue, it is a cornerstone of trust and stability. In personal relationships it fosters emotional safety – having someone to stand by you in times of adversity. In community it inspires service, sacrifice and unity. And in personal ethics it can act as a guiding compass. On the other hand it can be abused to control and coerce. It can be a shield for wrongdoing, used to excuse abuse, or injustice. It can be used to override conscience. It can inhibit growth, preventing someone from moving on – in personal relations, jobs or ideologies and beliefs. This side of its personality stems from fear and obligation. It stops someone from walking away, even when they know they should; the guilt of misplaced feelings of betrayal.
Loyalty to a religious organisation is a two-edged sword. Such institutions often provide a sense of belonging, home, shared ideals and support. Moral qualities provide an anchor in life, values such as compassion, justice and humility. Being part of a community provides a sense of identity, tradition and heritage. Yet when loyalty demands silence in the face of doubts and contradictions; when it covers up abuse, prioritises power over truth and marginalises some; when it is accompanied by fear of punishment, shame and exclusion; it is no longer a virtue but coercion. Loyalty has become a very complex concept. It can mean whatever we want it to mean.
As an aside, supermarkets offer loyalty cards. The idea is that by offering points, promotions, discounts and other lures, the holder will be persuaded to be loyal to that particular brand. It falls down in that every supermarket offers their own similar scheme; and if you look into the shoppers’ wallet or purse, you will likely find many or all of these cards. In offering their loyalty to all these brands, by definition the shopper is loyal to none.
If ‘loyal’ derives from 16th century English and the underlying Latin via French, why has it made its way into English translations of Koine Greek and Hebrew if there isn’t a word in those languages with a corresponding meaning? What sort of quality is it? Is it something so amazing that no other word with better provenance could be found?
As we are discovering, loyalty is not necessarily a virtue. One might, perhaps, think of ‘loyalist’ and the political inferences contained within that word. According to that great fount of wisdom, Wikipedia, the word ‘loyalist’ was first coined in 1774 to describe those giving their allegiance to the British Government at a time when the American colonies were causing some trouble for the Motherland. Dig further and it is used for the Republicans of the Spanish civil war. And closer to home it is used of the Unionist, Loyalist, Protestant, defenders of Northern Ireland within the United Kingdom. If its virtuousness can only be determined by the subject of its attachment, then loyalty itself is only as good as that to which it is attached.
How then does WTS define ‘loyal’? The book Draw Close to Jehovah, p281, describes loyalty as:
‘kindness that lovingly attaches itself to an object and does not let go until its purpose in connection with that object is realised. More is involved than faithfulness. After all a person might be faithful merely out of a sense of duty. In contrast, loyalty is rooted in love.’
To the analytical mind, there are several problems here. The obvious one is that there are no references to back up that statement about loyalty being rooted in love – no dictionary definitions, no synonyms, no commentary concurrence. It is a unique definition. Linguistically, historically, ‘loyalty’ is rooted in law and legalism, and yet has come to be rooted in all sorts of qualities; indeed some of the most evil deeds in history have been committed by those loyal to whatever cause they decided to attach themselves to. The American war of independence, the Spanish civil war and the troubles in NI are not exactly expressions of love! This raises the stark reality that the adhesive behind loyalty can be anything – blindness, gullibility, fear, selfishness, stagnation – that causes a person to abdicate personal responsibility. Adolf Hitler is held responsible for the deaths of 11 million people, yet he personally, as far as I can tell, did not kill anyone. So who slaughtered those millions? Those who were loyal – loyal to Hitler, his ideals and beliefs, his government, their country, themselves and the benefits they accrued through the power and wealth for those in privileged positions, or the rank and file simply doing their job.
The most egregious part of that above definition is the elevation of loyalty over faithfulness. Where Paul describes the fruitage of the holy spirit in Galatians 5:22-23, loyalty does not feature. Faithfulness does! Yes, it seems that the WTS has deliberately diminished the work of God’s spirit in favour of promoting their own agenda and propaganda, by creating a quality built around a word that does not have a scriptural existence. And this is important. If the quality that is described by the word ‘loyal’ is not found in scripture then lexicons by such men as Strong and Thayer will not give it an alternative definition that will need to be refuted. There will be no commentaries from learned men discussing what loyalty is and is not in a Biblical context. It is a word without a Greek background, that is ripe for appropriation.
How then have they managed to insert this word into the Bible? Many of the instances are the result of the wholesale substitution of loving kindness with loyal love. The Hebrew word is chesedh (Strong 2617) which means ‘favour, good deed, kindly, loving kindness, merciful kindness, mercy, pity, reproach. From chacad; kindness; by implication (towards God) piety, rarely (by opposition) reproof; beauty – favour, good deed(-liness), kindly, (loving-)kindness, merciful (kindness), mercy, pity, reproach.’
‘The Hebrew word checed is a rich and multifaceted term that encompasses the ideas of love, kindness, mercy and loyalty. It is often used to describe God’s covenantal love and faithfulness towards His people. In human relationships, it can refer to acts of kindness and loyalty that go beyond duty or obligation. ‘Checed’ is a central theme in the Hebrew Bible, reflecting the character of God as compassionate and faithful.’ (Berean Strong’s Lexicon).
If checed is mostly translated as mercy and loving kindness, which are both recognisable terms of compassion, why does there arise the urge to replace it with ‘loyal love’? We know what love is. God is love. Love never fails. Love is the greatest of the qualities faith, hope and love. Does it really need an adjective or intensifier? Therefore those translations that render it as mercy or loving kindness, are using terms that align with the definitions provided by many eminent Greek scholars. Where does the desire to change it come from?
The Greek word eleos (Strong 1656) is a direct equivalent of checed and is defined as mercy, pity, compassion.
‘It speaks of God’s compassionate response toward human misery and of the believer’s corresponding attitude toward others. It is more than sentiment; it is love that moves to act and to relieve. Every one of its 27 occurrences carries this note of active compassion, whether describing God’s saving initiative or the believers ethical obligation’ (Topical Lexicon).
In the 2013 edition of NWT, one of those 27 is rendered as ‘tender compassion’ (Lu 1:78). All the others are translated as ‘mercy’.
What we are learning is that although loyalty can be active, it can also be passive. Out of loyalty we can be moved to defend what we believe to be right and proper, but we can equally be motivated to remain silent when we should speak up, stick around when we should walk away. If it can be positive and negative, depending on circumstances or context, how can we tell which is which? In the heat of the moment, faced with a decision, how should we react in loyalty? To whom should our loyalty be directed, given a choice? By contrast, kindness and mercy are always active. Look again at those definitions of checed and eleos. ‘Kindness that goes beyond duty, compassion, love in action, relief.’ Looking at some of those instances in the NT, many refer to gifts of mercy (Matt 6:2-4). Those wanting a cure for themselves or their loved ones requested mercy (Matt 17:15). Debt relief was classified as mercy (Matt 18:33). And when we think of God’s mercy to us in making us alive in Christ by his grace, well, we are just blown away by the enormity of what God in his mercy has done for us (Eph 2:4-5). If these words are more than adequate to describe such a beautiful quality, why introduce another word, of dubious provenance, that does not exist in the original texts, and that can mean different things depending on the way it is being used? It is confusing. It muddies the water. The word ‘loyal’ is simply not needed.
So how, we might ask, does NWT get ‘loyal’ into the New Testament eleven times, given that they have remained truthful to the definition of eleos as mercy? The way in is through Revelation 15:4 which says, according to NWT: ‘Who will not really fear you, Jehovah, and glorify your name, for you alone are loyal?’ Now, if we are all expected to be loyal then how can it be said that Jehovah alone is loyal? The Greek word here is hosios (Strong 3741) which is defined as righteous, pious, holy, and distinguished from hagios which refers to human statutes and relations - holiness which is conferred, assigned, pursued. If we were to cross-reference the fifty or so translations available in BibleHub, NWT stands out like the proverbial sore thumb, as they all go with ‘holy’. Putting aside for now issues regarding the use of the divine name in the NT of the NWT, we can say that God alone is intrinsically holy without fear of contradiction. We all aspire to those lofty heights such that those who are in Christ are frequently referred to in the NT as holy ones (hagios) or saints. But we remain sinful creatures and however we might try, we cannot attain such levels of holiness. Nevertheless, this word, hosios, and its cognate hosiotes, have been hijacked by WTS and magically transformed into ‘loyal’ and ‘loyalty’. Ta dah!
But why? This is impossible to answer with certainty as few, if any of us, are privy to the processes behind the decisions made, hence I am entering the realm of supposition. What we do know is that the governing body of Jehovah’s Witnesses demands absolute loyalty. Having appointed themselves as the faithful and discreet slave, the one and only channel through which God and his holy spirit operates, they apparently feel authorised to control the beliefs and activities of all who want to survive Armageddon and gain salvation.
That Jehovah has an organisation was a radical new doctrine propounded by Rutherford in his seminal article ‘Birth of the Nation’ in 1925. Accordingly, the earthly part of this organisation is known as the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society. Salvation is only possible by loyalty to Jehovah and his organisation. Therefore we must be loyal to those taking the lead, be they the local elders, the governing body or those in between. Another way of putting this is:
1. We cannot be saved if we do not fully understand the Bible
2. We cannot understand the Bible correctly without Jehovah’s organisation
3. Therefore we cannot be saved without believing all the teachings of the WTS
In this context ‘loyal’ is a useful word. It falls short of worship which many people would strongly object to. After all, if John was reprimanded for attempting to worship an angel, offering proskuneo to humans should be quite unpalatable and inappropriate. Faithful is a different concept and has a clear scriptural definition. Faith is the assured expectation that what we hope for will come true, based on firm evidence. Faithful means living our life in the absolute conviction of the truth of this definition. But loyal?
Let us return to that WTS definition – kindness that attaches itself to a cause – and consider the adhesive.
Love. The Hebrew word checed is active. Kindness and mercy are positive actions expressed towards others in less propitious circumstances than ourselves. It beautifully expresses Jehovah’s love for his children, Israel. Yes, of course he loved them, yet his kindness and mercy moved him, time and again, to rescue them from the consequences of their own failings. Exodus 34:6 describes him as ‘merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abundant in loving-kindness and truth’. In this instance, the adhesive was the covenantal relationship between him and the offspring of Abraham, concluded at Sinai when the people whole-heartedly agreed that they would do all that Jehovah commanded. Of course, they failed repeatedly, and ultimately paid the price, but when one considers the innumerable times that Jehovah rescued them, pardoned them, forgave them, we see that Jehovah’s checed is quite extraordinary, although not without limit. If we compare this mercy and kindness with ‘loyal love’, considering the history and etymology of the word ‘loyal’, we find a love of things that are lawful and legal. A good citizen abides by the law of the land. A policeman enforces that law. In times of national emergency, the good citizen feels obliged to do his duty to ‘king and country’ out of a sense of loyalty. It can be a fine quality that brings order, unity and cohesion, but it is not that active quality that is compelled to stand up for and intercede on behalf of the disadvantaged and marginalised.
An equally powerful motivating factor behind loyalty can be fear. We offer our loyalty, not out of love, but out of a desire to not displease, when we are afraid of disagreeing, if we fear punishment, or being excluded and expelled. This can happen in many aspects of life. An employer could require activities that are dishonest or unethical. Will we comply just to keep our job? Should we have doubts and questions in some aspect of our life, it might seem that the loyal thing to do would be to suppress those doubts and keep quiet. What if we are obliged to cover up wrongdoing? Perhaps when we see institutional abuse, whether physical or where the demands of power prioritises falsehood over truth? Will we remain loyal to that institution or will we speak up? You see, in areas such as this we find divided loyalty. Are we loyal to those in power, or loyal to those who are being abused and marginalised?
Loyalty can also be a symptom of stagnation, when we stick with what we know, possibly due to fear of change or an unwillingness to move towards the unknown. We may be well aware that there is a better way, but we persist with the old because it is comfortable, it is what we know, it is where we feel at home. We have, for many years believed a certain interpretation of scripture, because that is what we were told and at the time we believed it. But personal research reveals inconsistencies in that explanation. Will we bury the subsequent doubts and try to ignore what we have discovered? Will our loyalty mean that we continue to believe the lie because we want to trust the source? Because the source assures us that they are always right and that doubting them is equivalent to doubting Jehovah?
Conclusion: As we have learned, the English word ‘loyal’ is derived from the Latin words legalis, ‘legal, according to law’, and lex, ‘law’, and comes to us via Old French. Its original meaning was to be lawful, faithful to one’s legal obligations. Over time it came to include personal allegiances to a lord, sovereign, religion, cause, friend, etc. Loyalty did not include emotion but was more about duty and structure. Whilst its modern incarnation can be very emotional, it still carries that sense of obligation, even when that conflicts with personal feelings and beliefs. It is not rooted in love. It does not supplant faith. It is not a facet of the spirit’s fruitage. It is not needed in our Bible versions as the original words and their modern translations are quite sufficient. ‘Loyal love’ is not the same as kindness and mercy from the OT and to get it into the NT the word for divine holiness has had its meaning reassigned. Holy and loyal are not synonyms, as far as I can determine. As to why, well, I have already suggested some possibilities and will now allow you to meditate upon that!
*
Bibles from before and around the 1530s that did not, or were highly unlikely to, have the English word ‘loyal’ available to the translators: Wycliffe c1384-95, Tyndale 1526, Coverdale 1535, Great Bible 1539, Geneva Bible 1560, Bishop’s Bible 1568; and we know it is not in the KJV of 1611.
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Appendix - Instances of 'loyal' in the NT of the New World Translation.
In square brackets is the Greek word, and in round brackets is the translation in the KJV.
Luke 1:75 with loyalty [hosioteti] and righteousness before him all our days (holiness)
These two instances in Acts are a quote from Psalm 16:10.
Acts 2:27, 13:35 You will not allow your loyal one [hosion] to see corruption. (Holy One)
Ps 16:10 neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One [chasid] to see corruption (KJV)
thy holy one (ASV)
Holy One (BSB)
faithful one (NIV)
Strong 2623 Faithful, godly, holy, pious, kind.
As can be seen, in order to keep hosios as ‘loyal’ rather than ‘holy’ the translators have been required to change the source in the Psalms from ‘holy’ to ‘loyal’.
Acts 13:34 expressions of loyal love [hosia] promised to David - quote from Isaiah 55:3 in which Strong 2617 checed (holy and sure blessings) has been turned into 'loyal love'.
Eph 4:24 true righteousness and loyalty [hosioteti] (holiness)
1 Th 2:10 how loyal [hosios] and blameless we behaved (holy, righteous, and blameless)
1 Ti 2:8 lifting up loyal [hosious] hands (holy hands)
Tit 1:8 be… righteous, loyal [hosion], self-controlled (holy, and disciplined)
Heb 7:26 high priest who is loyal [hosios], innocent (holy, innocent)
Rev 15:4 you alone are loyal [hosios] (holy)
Rev 16:5 the One who is and who was, the loyal One [hosios] (O Holy One)