Their new title linked them with Biblical heros.

Rutherford, as an able executive, seized a new name for the followers of Russell. The International Bible Students Association, now, became the Jehovah's Witnesses. It gave them blood relationship to Abraham, who was prepared to slay his own son in order to testify that he was a faithful witness. Their new name identified them with Noah,Moses, David, Daniel, and Isaiah. Wherever the word "witness" appeared in the Bible, they saw their prototype. Associated with such a group of immortals, Rutherford's edict built a religious organization that claimed to rule with divine authority. At his headquarters in Brooklyn, New York, he established a Bible College with dormitories, dining rooms, bookstores, and a printing press operated by a staff without salary. The new organization laboured day and night, witnessing and fighting against time, calling out God's anointed people before the fearful day of Armageddon. They canvassed all over the country. Not a single house was missed. Every family could expect a rap on the door. Slammed doors and other insults were signs of a promise that there would be persecution for righteousness sake. They believed ridicule was proof that the Lord wanted them to be punished as verification of his love, and, that people feared "the truth." Rutherford's apostles relentlessly continued witnessing without salary and any form of reward. They only excepted that the end of the world will endorse their claims. On that day it is believed, they will stand up boldly before Jehovah and say, "we have been obedient to the heavenly vision." Slowly against great odds, the Witnesses were accepted by the institutionalized churches as a contemporary movement which was here to stay.They called their meeting places "Kingdom Halls" so as not to be defiled by the word "church" or "chapel." Their services consisted of a thorough study of lessons prepared and published at the Brooklyn headquarters where a president and a board of directors worked with Biblical scholars to construct the teaching. Every moment of the day the Brooklyn presses piled up staggering production figures of millions of books and magazines bearing as their dedication: "To Jehovah and His Messiah." They believe Jehovah's people must be different from the rest of the world. No one can outquote them when it comes to Scripture. Their references from the Holy Writ comes from their own Biblical teachings which must be received without question and with eager passion. Peter in his second epistle stated "...the heavens shall passaway with a great noise, the elements shall melt with fervent heat; the earth also, and the works that are therein, shall be burned up." The new witnesses were given this warning. "You, therefore, beloved ones, having this advance knowledge, be on your guard that you may not be led away..." So say 2 Peter: 17, and so say the Jehovah's Witnesses today.