Objection · Case 12 · Jehovah’s Witnesses
Revelation 7:4 does say 144,000, and Revelation 7:9 describes a separate great multitude. The Witnesses are reading the text. Why is 144,000 symbolic and the multitude not a second class?
One objection from the free evidence repository at apologetics.pro.
Response
The 144,000 are described as twelve thousand from each tribe of Israel, all male, all virgins (14:4), which even the Witnesses do not take literally, so the number is being read literally while every detail around it is read symbolically. In Revelation 7 John hears the number and then sees the multitude, a hearing-then-seeing pattern Revelation uses elsewhere (5:5 to 6, where he hears of a Lion and sees a Lamb) to present one group under two images. And the other sheep of John 10:16 are Gentiles joined to the one flock, not a lower class within it.
About this exhibit
This objection is to Watchtower teaching on the 144,000 and the “other sheep”.
Watchtower literature identifies the 144,000 of Revelation as a literal heavenly class and the “great crowd” or “other sheep” of John 10:16 as an earthly class. It says of the Memorial emblems that…