by Honesty 21 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
We as Jehovah's Witnesses do not allow people to become baptized prior to gaining accurate knowledge of what we believe and teach according to the Bible. If someone wants to join with us in worship and become baptized, they must also demonstrate that they KNOW what they are getting into. That they agree with what we believe and teach.
This is a quote from a JW on a pro-JW site. This JW is trying to convince people that JW's know what they are getting into before they are baptised.
Any comments?
No. Both my hubby and I feel that the elder we studied with flat out lied in some ways. For instance, when I told him that I did not agree with some of the things we were learning he said that they were up to my conscience. LIE! Nothing is up to the individuals conscience in the WT org.
Also - when we said the meeting schedule seemed extreme, he said we could attend only as many as we thought we could. And that you are not required to attend all of them every week if you simply are not able to. LIE! What he did not tell us was how everyone will judge us for not attending all the meetings and the elders will "shepherd us".
Another thing - the whole congregation put on a front on how happy they were when we were not around. Even this elder and his wife portrayed the happiest family life ever. LIE! we found out later that JW's are the most miserable people we know and this elder left "the truth", left his wife and started another family. After he already had a nervous breakdown for depression.
I've often asked people if we can sue for fraud? Lilly
I studied with a very nice woman who was proabably more knowledgable, kind and moral than 95% of the witnesses I've met since. Sadly, I wasn't thinking clearly and didn't ask the right questions, either of myself or of her, when I was studying. I didn't do any independant research to discover the history of this organization that I was being sucked into either. Once the hook was set (and it got set early), I was lost to objectivity.
The truly bad part about studying with this gal is that she gave me an inaccurate idea of what the majority of JWs were really like. I thought she was the norm. That most JWs were intelligent, compassionate, hard working, spirtual people of integrity. I wanted to believe that. I wanted to be one of those people and I refused to see past my own desires.
Of course, she gave me the WTS-skewed view of their past failures. She mentioned briefly and glossed over the early history of the org, the 1975 debacle (some make wrong assumptions ), but she wasn't being deliberately deceptive, just relating what she truly believed.
I often wonder if I would have looked online, if such a resource had been available to me at the time. I really don't know. I mean, I didn't even looking online for information until after I'd been inactive for four years. I was such a complete sucker.
I think they get a reasonable idea of the main doctrines, like blood, the trinity, fs etc.
What no one has any idea about is how controlling the wts hierachy is. The real requirements attached to becoming a jw - no questioning of doctrine, no reading anything but wt publications, no independent thinking etc, - no new convert has any idea of the existence of those rules until they've been dipped, and by then it's too late to back out without personal cost.
JW prospects are most definitely not properly informed about the JW religion and organization before becoming baptized. And most JWs really do know this.
Many years ago I was intensively researching the history of JWs, and I brought up a number of negative findings to my JW parents. My mom always tried to wiggle away from the problems, to the point that I got frustrated and said to her over the phone, "Mom, if one of your Bible students asked the same questions I'm asking, what would you do?" "Well, I'd try to convince them to put off their questions so that they could see the big picture and get baptized," she said. I said, "Ok, and what about answering the questions you had them put off?" She said, "Well, I'd hope that by then they'd have enough sense not to ask them!" I said, "Mom, do you realize what you just told me?" "No," sez she. I said, "You just told me that you'd lie to your Bible students to get them to become JWs." She said, "Oh! OH! I can't handle this!" and she handed the phone to my stepdad.
At the heart of almost every JW lies a core of deception, because most of them have come across many serious challenges to their religion that they've just buried away, telling themselves that there's no problem here. During the conversion process they've done a good deal of burying of facts and problems, and so their acceptance of the cult boils down a purely emotional decision.
The typical JW will deny and deny that things work this way, but when they're seriously challenged with facts, they either deny the facts, or run away in terror.
AlanF
My knowledge about the JWs was based entirely on what JWs taught me from JW literature. No outside material was consulted. Their teachings did not accurately reflect the reality of life in the JW cult. They de-emphasized the effect of shunning. They also de-emphasized the fact that any and all teachings, beliefs, and policies were subject to change without notice, and non acceptance of such changes would result in one's being labeled an "apostate" and shunned. They said nothing about the unscriptural control they would attempt to exercise in each individual's personal life.
W
The JWs are insidious. The P.O. I studied with took us through the Bible with the Live Forever book and showed us scripture to support what he (the book) was saying. It seemed good proof as the Bible appeared to back it up. When it came to 607BCE he said that the date was an archaeologically proven fact. Because my wife and I had been convinced by everything else we just took it for granted that what he said about 607BCE was true. Our bad!
Why do I mention 607BCE? Because THAT was what made me exit, once I had researched properly - 19 years later!
(I hope Scholar isn't reading this or this thread is going to be mighty long!).
Ian
It's no coincidence that all newly Baptised are 'children'. Children believe what they are taught. They don't question. What the WTBTS is doing (in allowing children to be Baptised) is not only unfair, but I believe unscriptual too. Children learn at their own rate...and I think the Bible makes clear distinctions.
11 When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I felt as a child, I thought as a child. Now that I have become a man, I have put away childish things.
I studied from about age 9 along with my parents. They were baptized in 1963, and I was baptized six months later at age 11. I had no idea of the history of the WTS, failed prophecies or wacky teachings. I probably also did not understand the whole disfellowshipping arrangement. I remember I started collecting old JW literature in my teens, and how shocked I was to read some of it, like the 7th volume of the Studies in the Scriptures or the Childrens book. By then I was too committed to let it get to me. Lying by omission was certainly done, and I was guilty of it to when I studied with people. S4
I didn't know there was anything else being raised a witness . When I was a child and a school friend wanted me to attend church with her I was told "No they are false religion , Satan is really behind what they teach " , I beleived it because I thought my mom knew best . As a rebellious teenager I got scared when I fooled around, then had to worry that I might be pregnant . After facing a JC and being humiliated I became depressed and just gave up and gave in .
