Why do Jehovah Witness?

I disagree with the answer above. The Jehovah's Witness people who visit me tell me Jesus was crucified on a stake - not on a cross. The say that the modern translation for the Greek word was wrong. We really should have translated it as "stake" instead of "cross." I agree with the asker, all of my studies in history say that the Romans used a cross to crucify prisoners.

Some people have been executed by being impaled on crosses. However, the Romans often put individuals to death on posts having no crossbars. Could that have happened in Jesus’ case?

If a contemporary artist had stood before the dying Jesus on Golgotha, he might have left us an authentic portrayal of that highly significant event. But no artwork of this kind is in existence, and certainly later tradition is not conclusive. Nevertheless, we do have the recorded words of an eyewitness. Who was he?

As Jesus looked down from that implement of torture and death, he saw “the disciple whom he loved,” the apostle John. To him Jesus committed the care of his mother, Mary. (John 19:25-30) So, John was there. He knew whether Jesus died on a cross.

To designate the instrument of Christ’s death, John used the Greek word stau·ros′, rendered “torture stake” (John 19:17, 19, 25) In classical Greek, stau·ros′ denotes the same thing that it does in the common Greek of the Christian Scriptures—primarily an upright stake or pole with no crossbar. Interestingly, John Denham Parsons wrote in the book The Non-Christian Cross: “There is not a single sentence in any of the numerous writings forming the New Testament, which, in the original Greek, bears even indirect evidence to the effect that the stauros used in the case of Jesus was other than an ordinary stauros; much less to the effect that it consisted, not of one piece of timber, but of two pieces nailed together in the form of a cross.”

The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible states, with reference to stau·ros′: “Literally an upright stake, pale, or pole . . . As an instrument of execution, the cross was a stake sunk vertically in the ground. Often, but by no means always, a horizontal piece was attached to the vertical portion.” Another reference work says: “The Greek word for cross, stau·ros′, properly signified a stake, an upright pole, or piece of paling, on which anything might be hung, or which might be used in impaling [fencing in] a piece of ground. . . . Even amongst the Romans the crux (from which our cross is derived) appears to have been originally an upright pole, and this always remained the more prominent part.”—The Imperial Bible Dictionary.

It's all part of the control over the JW. The JW believe that Christ was hung on a tree, not a cross because their bible, which was edited in 1969 to conform to what they believe, says so. JW are confused and brainwashed, but man are they loyal.

the original texts prove it was a tree or stake...