I still attend meetings (unfortunately), and this point is certainly not stressed or emphasized as much as it once was. Just to illustrate how the average dub just turns off all logical thought...my wife comes home the other night from meeting with her 50 tracts for the campaign. She's all excited and says to me, "I really think that the slave has some kind of knowledge regarding the end of the system...they must because why else would they print this tract?" I couldn't take it, so I politely asked her if she remembers what Matt 24:26 says? She didn't so I got out the bible and showed her were it says NOBODY execpt the father knows the time of the end!!! She answers, "Well I am STILL sure that Jehovah has communicated something to the slave class". No scriptual basis for that feeling, mind you...just her blind faith in this org. So there you have it...when faced with a contradiction between what the "slave" says and what the bible says, you know what way the average dub is gonna lean.
enlightenedcynic,
As "popular" as this was years ago....there MUST be a reason this is overlooked NOW....I guess what the posters on this thread have brought out, would explain the lack of furor and enthusiasm in this prediction as in years gone past!
The assumption that the WTS/GB/FDS "knows something" or is "more-knowledgable-than-the-average-bear", is shared by many JWs. I felt this way myself when I was "in". Your experience does not surprise me.....and a "good" JW will see things the same way as your wife does.
The inner feelings that the WTS has pretty much got everything figured....and is leading its followers into that promised land and fantasy paradise earth....came to a screeching halt once I discovered all its prior "mistakes", lack of honesty and credibility and sneaky behavior hidden from us as JWs.
It HAS to be terribly difficult to live with a JW who swallows AND believes in all the WTS editors write.
hugs,
Annie