Could the Moonwalker have sidestepped death?

by Firpo Carr

September 2, 2010

Yes, I know. The saying really goes, "God save the Queen!" And every "John Bull" who visits a "water closet" while away "on holiday" for a "fortnight" knows it; including those who bought tickets for Michael's final performances at London's O2 arena. Well has it been said that England and the US are two countries separated by the same language! Language aside, could God really have saved him? Some think, "Yes, if Michael had let Him." MJ was a staunch believer in God. In his book What Really Happened to Michael Jackson (2010) longtime family friend Leonard Rowe said while on tour Michael would "always" read the Bible.

Rabbi Recommends "Return": To Jews who had abandoned true worship and were suffering the consequences, the Lord God urged: "Return to me, and I will return to you." (Mal 3:7; Ezek 33:11) Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, author of The Michael Jackson Tapes (2009), recorded candid conversations he had with Michael. When did the King of Pop's woes start? When he left the Witnesses according to the Rabbi. "Michael became alienated from his Church," the Rabbi reports. "Michael, in my opinion, never recovered from the loss of his spiritual anchor and most of the bizarre elements that would come to characterize his life began with his exit from the Church." [p. 103] How had Michael become "alienated"?

"The Jehovah's Witnesses Church, Michael explained to me," says the Rabbi, "became increasingly critical of his fame and the adulation shown him. They were aghast at his being treated like a god." And the Rabbi's conclusion? "Michael should have taken their critique to heart." [p. 110] He expounds further: "I repeatedly encouraged Michael to return to the Jehovah's Witnesses Church, and through the ordeal of his arrest I publicly called on the leaders of the Jehovah's Witnesses Church to take him back and offer him the spiritual direction he so badly needed. When Michael was a Witness it grounded him and he flourished. Even after the Thriller album, when he had become the most successful recording artist in the world, he remained a devout Jehovah's Witness and it anchored his life in a spiritual community and spiritual values. Indeed, one can chart Michael's personal decline to the time when he left the church." [p. 111]  

Racism & Religion: Michael Jackson recognized that racism and discrimination are Satanic. These divisive realities are particular egregious when they're cloaked behind the sanctimonious face of "respectable" religion. Such was the case in the recent past in South Africa. The September 1, 2010, issue of The Watchtower, a magazine that the Gloved One loved getting his hands on, states: "In the 20^th century, the Calvinist Dutch Reformed Church presented predestination as a basis for racial discrimination in South Africa. Regarding the government's policy of white supremacy, Nelson Mandela, who became the first black president of South Africa, asserted: ‘The policy was supported by the Dutch Reformed Church, which furnished apartheid with its religious underpinnings by suggesting that Afrikaners were God's chosen people and that blacks were a subservient species. In the Afrikaner's world view, apartheid and the church went hand in hand.'

"In the 1990s, the Dutch Reformed Church apologized publicly for its support of apartheid. In a formal statement called the Rustenburg Declaration, church leaders acknowledged: ‘Some of us actively misused the Bible to justify apartheid, leading many to believe that it had the sanction of God.' Over the years," continues The Watchtower, "the church's stand on apartheid not only contributed to the suffering that resulted from racial prejudice but even suggested that God was to blame!"

A Kingly Conclusion: Michael said that attending meetings at the Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's Witnesses "was a treat in its own right. It was again a chance for me to be ‘normal.'" Furthermore, "The [congregation] elders," he continued, "treated me the same as they treated everyone else." Could God have saved Michael?