Amos 9:11
Amos 9:1111“In that day I will restore the fallen tent of David. I will repair its gaps, restore its ruins, and rebuild it as in the days of old,
— "In that day I shall raise up the booth of David that is fallen … and I shall certainly rebuild it as in the days of long ago" — functions in JW eschatology as part of the background to their restored-Kingdom narrative, with the Governing Body picturing itself as the administrative continuity of that restoration. Curiously, is the verse James quotes at the Jerusalem council (), but that procedural role is rarely emphasised.
is the Old Testament text James opens to settle the entire Gentile-circumcision question at Acts 15. Read slowly — James says "the words of the Prophets agree with this, as it is written" and then quotes Amos's promise that David's rebuilt booth will bring "the men who remain and all the people of the nations" to seek Jehovah. James reasons from the prophetic text to the council's conclusion. The authority is not the council's decree; the authority is Amos. That is the biblical pattern — leaders submit to Scripture, the congregation discerns through the text. Raymond Franz, who served nine years on the modern Governing Body, recorded that in their sessions the Bible played remarkably little part; decisions came from policy precedent. If Acts 15 is the model, the modern practice has inverted it.