Why is it so offensive to a JW when a person mentions the cross?
JW's and the Cross
by Honesty 35 Replies latest watchtower bible
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Chimene
I think becuase the cross is a symbol, so it's like idolatry.
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greendawn
It all has to do with the JWs claiming that everything innovative the early church did after the apostles died was wrong evil and apostate. They think the cross is a pagan symbol because the pagans used it but many religious things the Jews used, coincided with pagan ones eg having altars and offering incense in the temple.
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slugga
The cross was also the symbol of Nimrod, who was a Babylonian ruler and an apostate in opposition to Jehovah.
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jgnat
Because they are supposed to be paaaaagan.
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ezra
because the symbole of the cross originates with pagan worship,like the ankh
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Hellrider
And of course, the stake/pole is even more used in pagan worship than the cross ever were, both before and after the cross entered the scene, in many cultures, all around the world, including the middle east. In the Americas it was referred to as the "totem pole".
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drew sagan
I might be wrong, but I think the Watchtowers rejection of the traditional cross comes more from Rutherford(?) trying to make his religion "differant" and finding ways to distance themselves from the more mainstream churches. One only has to look at many of the stances taken on things like Holidays, voting, blood, ect. to see that these are used as things that make the Witnesses "differant" and thus correct.
They get offended mainly because they feel they are correct in their view, and the one speaking of the particular doctrine in question is ignorant of the facts, or simply just ignorant of spiritual things in general. -
Deputy Dog
Honesty
Phi 3:18
I have often told you, and now tell you with tears in my eyes, that many live as the enemies of the cross of Christ.That's why!
D Dog
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Hellrider
One more thing, which JWs has never understood: Why should Jesus not have been crucified on a cross? Because it was pagan? Well, I hardly think the Romans who crucified him would take any consideration to that.
Roman soldier to Pilate: "Eh ..(cough cough)...we can`t use the cross, sir...
Pilate: "And why is that?"
Roman soldier: "Well, it`s a pagan symbol"
Pilate: "??? What the hell are you talking about? Why should we give a flying Julius Cesar about that! He`s a jew, you can nail him up on a damn fruit basket for all I care. Now, go and get the dirty job done so we can all go home and have an orgy".
...the point is: "Pagans" crucified him. I don`t think they would take any consideration to the beliefs of the one they were crucifying in the first place, and the fact that they were killing a person that was considered, by the people who wanted him to be crucified and instigated that whole blood-orgy, the jewish religious leaders, to be a heretic, what more suitable instrument than a "pagan" symbol? That is, if...
...the jews had considered the cross to be a "pagan symbol" in the first place, but they didn`t. This whole distinction "pagan" vs "non-pagan/christian" is a much later invention, noone in Palestine at the time of Jesus Christ or in the following...18 centuries...would even (or did) think of coming up with such a distinction.
What`s wrong with taking a pagan symbol and turning it into a non-pagan symbol? I can`t see anything wrong with this. That this is to considered "wrong" is a much, much later invention.And in the first decades of Christianity, the fish (greek: ichthus) was also used as a christian symbol. And, like the cross, this symbol was oridinally pagan, among other things, a symbol of the goddess of the moon.