All Posts in Category "The God-Men"

Norman Geisler and Ron Rhodes repeated a falsehood that is accepted as axiomatic among some countercult apologists, namely, that the local churches drove SCP into bankruptcy. From source documents this article looks at the actual causes and motivating factors behind SCP’s bankruptcy declaration.

January 1, 2010 false witness, Neil Duddy, Norman Geisler, Ron Rhodes, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The God-Men

The libelous books The Mindbenders and The God-Men shared a common background that involved Jack Sparks and the Christian World Liberation Front (CWLF), an outreach to the radical student subculture at UC Berkeley; the New Covenant Apostolic Order (NCAO), a misguided attempt by Sparks and others to lead evangelicals into Eastern Orthodoxy; and the Spiritual Counterfeits Project (SCP), a CWLF startup dedicated to attacking religions with roots in the Far East.

December 5, 2005 Brooks Alexander, Campus Crusade, Christian World Liberation Front, CWLF, History, Jack Sparks, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The God-Men, The Mindbenders

The Experts Speak contains the testimony of six expert witnesses who studied the local churches and the teaching of Witness Lee. Five of them testified in court in the Lee v. Duddy; the sixth was not asked to testify at the trial but wrote a statement titled “Libel and the First Amendment.”

November 30, 1994 index, The Experts Speak, The God-Men

An index to the testimony in The Experts Speak with links to relevant portions on specific topics.

November 30, 1994 Edwin S. Gaustad, Eugene Van Ness Goetchius, H. Newton Malony, index, J. Gordon Melton, John A. Saliba, Neil Duddy, Rodney Stark, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The Experts Speak, The God-Men

This Preface to the printed volume of The Experts Speak describes the contents of the book and how it is structured.

November 30, 1994 Die Sonderlehre, Edwin S. Gaustad, Eugene Van Ness Goetchius, H. Newton Malony, J. Gordon Melton, John A. Saliba, Neil Duddy, Rodney Stark, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The Experts Speak, The God-Men

The “Meet the Experts” section of The Experts Speak gives basic profiles of the six experts who studied the local churches and the teachings of Witness Lee for the Lee et al v. Duddy et al case concerning The God-Men.

November 30, 1994 Edwin S. Gaustad, Eugene Van Ness Goetchius, H. Newton Malony, J. Gordon Melton, John A. Saliba, Rodney Stark, scholars, The Experts Speak

The “Introduction” to The Experts Speak presents the historical background of Lee et al v. Duddy et al and describes the role of the expert witnesses in the case.

November 30, 1994 Die Sonderlehre, Edwin S. Gaustad, Eugene Van Ness Goetchius, H. Newton Malony, J. Gordon Melton, John A. Saliba, Neil Duddy, Rodney Stark, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The Experts Speak, The God-Men

Dr. J. Gordon Melton, Director of the Institute for the Study of American Religion and author of the standard work Encyclopedia of American Religions, testified that SCP had completely misrepresented Witness Lee and the local churches and had made many false and damaging accusations in its book The God-Men. [Note: Dr. Melton is currently Distinguished Professor of American Religious History at the Institute for Studies of Religion, Baylor University.]

November 30, 1994 J. Gordon Melton, mingling, Neil Duddy, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The Experts Speak, The God-Men

Dr. John A. Saliba, a Jesuit priest and Professor in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Detroit-Mercy, testified that SCP adhered to a principle of attacking and destroying anyone with whom they did not agree and that the accusations of cultic behaviors made in The God-Men were false as regards the local churches and the teachings of Witness Lee.

November 30, 1994 John A. Saliba, Neil Duddy, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The Experts Speak, The God-Men

Dr. Eugene Van Ness Goetchius, formerly Professor of Biblical Languages in both the Episcopal Theological School and Philadelphia Divinity School, testified that The God-Men intentionally misrepresented Witness Lee’s teachings on the authority of the Bible and morality and that the members of the local churches were “extremely family-oriented.”

November 30, 1994 Eugene Van Ness Goetchius, mingling, Neil Duddy, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The Experts Speak, The God-Men

Dr. Rodney Stark, Professor of Sociology and Comparative Religion at the University of Washington and co-author of the model of conversion that Neil Duddy claimed to have used to perform a sociological evaluation of the local churches, testified that Duddy had missed the model’s entire point and had altered it maliciously. [Note: Dr. Stark is currently Co-director of the Institute for Studies of Religion and Distinguished Professor of the Social Sciences at Baylor University.]

November 30, 1994 Neil Duddy, Rodney Stark, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The Experts Speak, The God-Men

Dr. H. Newton Malony, Senior Professor of Psychology at Fuller Theological Seminary, conducted a study of local church members to assess the claims of sociological deviance made in The God-Men. He found those claims to be without basis. [Note: Dr. Malony retired from Fuller in 2009.]

November 30, 1994 H. Newton Malony, Neil Duddy, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The Experts Speak, The God-Men

Dr. Edwin S. Gaustad, formerly Emeritus Professor of History at University of California, Riverside, wrote a statement criticizing self-appointed vigilante groups such as SCP and the damage they cause to the reforming impetus inherent in Christianity.

November 30, 1994 Edwin S. Gaustad, First Amendment, Neil Duddy, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The Experts Speak, The God-Men

The full text of Dr. J. Gordon Melton’s booklet An Open Letter Concerning the Local Church, Witness Lee, and The God-Men Controversy, written and published by Dr. Melton after the conclusion of Lee v. Duddy. After giving a general background of the local churches based on Dr. Melton’s research as the leading authority on contemporary American religious groups, this booklet shows The God-Men‘s twisting of Witness Lee’s words in four key areas—propositional revelation, morality, rationality and use of the mind, and personal versus biblical authority. Based on SCP’s blatant misrepresentation of Witness Lee’s teaching, Dr. Melton recommends that The God-Men and any writing based on it be discarded.

November 30, 1985 authority, Brooks Alexander, inspiration of the Bible, J. Gordon Melton, mind, mingling, morality, Neil Duddy, Open Letter, propositional revelation, recovery, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, standards of scholarship, The God-Men

After the end of The God-Men case (Lee v. Duddy) in 1985, Dr. J. Gordon Melton, one of the expert witnesses in the case, wrote and published An Open Letter Concerning the Local Church, Witness Lee and The God-Men Controversy. Dr. Melton demonstrated conclusively that The God-Men had misrepresented Witness Lee teaching and recommended that it, and any other writing based on it, be discarded.

November 30, 1985 authority, Brooks Alexander, index, inspiration of the Bible, J. Gordon Melton, local churches, mind, morality, Neil Duddy, Open Letter, propositional revelation, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, standards of scholarship, The God-Men

An index to material on this site related to Judge Leon Seyranian’s decision in Lee et al v. Duddy et al, the libel case concerning The God-Men.

June 27, 1985 Die Sonderlehre, index, judgment, Neil Duddy, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The God-Men

Key findings in Judge Leon Seyranian’s decision in Lee et all v. Duddy et al.

June 27, 1985 Die Sonderlehre, judgment, Neil Duddy, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The God-Men

A table of contents to the various sections of Judge Leon Seyranian’s written decision in Lee et al v. Duddy et al, outlining the falsity of fourteen accusations, the defendants’ intent to damage the plaintiffs, and the judge’s awarding of both compensatory and punitive damages.

June 27, 1985 Die Sonderlehre, judgment, Neil Duddy, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The God-Men

The complete text of the Statement of Decision in Lee et al v. Duddy et al, the landmark libel case in which Judge Leon Seyranian found The God-Men to be “in all major respects false, defamatory, and unprivileged, and, therefore, libelous.” In his decision he cited deposition testimony from the defendants as well as testimony before the court from expert witnesses and members of the local churches. These citations are linked to images of the exhibits and transcripts in the case.

June 27, 1985 Die Sonderlehre, judgment, Neil Duddy, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The God-Men

At the end of the court proceedings in Lee et al v. Duddy et al, the libel case concerning The God-Men, Judge Leon Seyranian commented on the weight of the testimony that had been presented to him.

June 5, 1985 Die Sonderlehre, judgment, Neil Duddy, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The God-Men

A brief history of the background of The God-Men by Neil Duddy and the Spiritual Counterfeits Project (SCP); of the landmark case, Lee et al v. Duddy et al, in which it was ruled to be “in all major respects false, defamatory and unprivileged, and, therefore, libelous”; and of the aftermath of that decision.

November 30, 1980 Brooks Alexander, Christian World Liberation Front, CWLF, Die Sonderlehre, index, J. Gordon Melton, judgment, Neil Duddy, SCP, Spiritual Counterfeits Project, The Experts Speak