Acts 15:29
Acts 15:2929You must abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals, and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things. Farewell.
JWs cite — "keep abstaining from ... blood" — as the scriptural basis for refusing whole-blood transfusions. The decree is read as a permanent, universal command binding on all Christians. For decades it was also applied to the four main components (red cells, white cells, plasma, platelets); since September 2026 accepting those from another person has been a matter of personal conscience, while the refusal of whole blood is "unchanged." Under the earlier policy many Witnesses, including children with treatable cancers, refused treatments that are now a personal choice.
lists four items: abstain from things sacrificed to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality. Three of the four are food-related — the context is dietary, not medical. A transfusion does not enter the stomach; it is a tissue transplant. Even Orthodox Jews, who take dietary blood laws far more seriously than any Christian group, have no objection to blood transfusions. The Watchtower's 2026 changes rest on the reasoning that the Bible does not comment: in March on "the use of a person's own blood in medical and surgical care", in September on the four main components. That logic applies equally to whole-blood transfusion. If red cells, white cells, plasma and platelets may each be accepted, no verse explains why the four together may not. Before 1945 the Watchtower had no blood policy at all. Vaccinations were "a violation of the everlasting covenant" in 1931 but are now fine. Organ transplants were "cannibalism" in 1967 but are now a personal choice. People died following each version that was later reversed. Jesus said "I desire mercy, not sacrifice" () — refusing blood to let someone die sacrifices the reality (life) for the symbol (blood).