“Asa got a foot disease that became progressively worse. Instead of asking the Lord for help, he went to doctors.”

(2 Chronicles 16:12, GWT)

The Bible condemns King Asa because when he was sick, he did not turn to Jehovah but rather to physicians. “Jehovah’s Witnesses often turn to doctors or surgeons,” too. (The Watchtower, November 15, 1977, page 686) Why is this wrong?

Turning to doctors during illness is futile because “the germ theory has never been proven” and is only “a leftover superstition of a past age … Germs do not cause disease.” (The Golden Age, March 18, 1931, page 404) But also “we do not attribute … our diseases and ailments to direct intervention of the Devil.” (The Watchtower, August 1, 1973, page 476) No, diseases have a different reason.

King Asa should have known where diseases really come from, since Moses had told his ancestors: “Jehovah will cause the disease to cling to you … Jehovah will strike you with tuberculosis, burning fever, inflammation, feverish heat … Jehovah will strike you with the boils of Egypt, piles, eczema, and skin lesions … Jehovah will strike you with madness and blindness … Jehovah will strike you with painful and incurable boils on your knees and legs.” – Deuteronomy 28:21, 22, 27, 28, 35.

So, neither germs nor the devil are causing diseases, but Jehovah God. He even promised: “I … shall certainly make you sick.” (Micah 6:13) This is the real reason why turning to a doctor in case of diseases is futile. Diseases are part of God’s purpose; if we would try to heal them we would walk “in opposition to Jehovah” like Nimrod. (Genesis 10:9) And since God causes them, no one besides him can heal them.