Shammatta—"Disfellowshipping" Jewish Style

by AuldSoul 50 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  AuldSoul

  I do not suggest that JWs are worse than others in this thread, SBF. Therefore, your assumption on that score must come from within yourself. I suggest they are worse than they claim to be. Much, much worse.

  I also suggest that what they publicize as an act of love is actually a very powerful weapon for spiritual coercion, and that they admit as much in their own publications when referring to the Jewish community.

  SBF: the innate goodness of many Witnesses actually mitigates much of the usual inhumanity that organization necessarily entails.

  I would say, rather, that the innate goodness of many Witnesses successfully masks the horrific consequences awaiting anyone who dares to have integrity after becoming baptized as one. The inhumanity of that organization is mandated from too high for the innate goodness of the masses to have any effect on it, whatsoever. You have a fantastical view of the organization, SBF. The organization in your brain never existed. The individuals you knew surely did exist, but they did not comprise even a flea speck of the organization.

  AuldSoul
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  slimboyfat

  You did say the Witnesses are worse than the first century congregation. That is not my reading.

  Don't you think the time issue with the GB not giving you a hearing is a fair point?

  Slim
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  AuldSoul

  I do not in any way wish to prevent discussion of this topic, SBF. However, I asked for the experience of elders on an issue they would have a great deal of experience with and I got your inexperienced and conjectured opinion delivered as incensed fact, while counseling me on the content of my topic post.

  Your lack of experience and lack of propriety were called out publicly. You have no basis for challenging my statement except your admittedly scant experience with JWs, and no experience at all with the organizational elite I spoke specifically about in that portion with which you took issue.

  This is a discussion. It just happens not to be your discussion. You are welcome to join in all you like. You are not welcome to turn it into a different discussion, as you are wont to do. You may even feel free to disagree with me, but you are not welcome to step into my thread topic and belittle me with your arrant conjecture.
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  LittleToe

  SBF:

  Really what I object to on this forum and in this thread is the constant insistance that Witnesses are worse than others in how they treat people.

  I concur. Many of the JWs I knew were well-meaning, no matter how misguided. There are also plenty examples of other fundamentalist organisations/religions that hold similar or worse shunning policies (e.g. Islamic, self-styled "Born Again Christian" groups, etc.). People are people, regardless of religious persuasion or lack thereof.

  I would say that the innate goodness of many Witnesses actually mitigates much of the usual inhumanity that organization necessarily entails.

  You might need to rethink this statement, however, Life is not an Adam/Jesus scales of justice thing. If you do wrong you are penalised by society for it, regardless of how charitable you are. A murderer or paedophile doesn't get off just because he's been a good boy ever since his aberrant action.

  I would also contest your statement that the organisation necessarily entails some level of inhumanity. That would be... inhumane...
• 

  LittleToe

  AS:
  Threads get derailed all the time, so why be so anal about it? At least its hit page two now

  To answer your question, my experience as an Elder was that we were fairly low in the food chain. Discussions that I had with the more candid COs and DOs would seem to indicate that they also had feelings of powerlessness. The whole organisation is set up so that each layer feels accountable to someone higher, with the GB claiming God as their superior (NB: rather than Christ).
• 

  AuldSoul

  SBF: Don't you think the time issue with the GB not giving you a hearing is a fair point?

  No, I do not feel it is a fair point. Because appeal always goes to the next higher level in every credible system of legality I know of. The grounds for my appeal to higher authority was the inability of the lower authority to answer my questions. Therefore, your point is invalid. I didn't just request GB audience. I asked for either GB audience or Service Desk audience. Neither were available.

  Instead, I was asked to shut up. That is the exact wording of my brother-in-law's request (Service Overseer) when he and my father (Presiding Overseer) and one other elder stopped by my house one evening to encourage me to come to meetings and pretend to believe.

  SBF: You did say the Witnesses are worse than the first century congregation. That is not my reading.

  Your reading of what I wrote is interpretive. What I wrote is:

  This practice is completely unlike the practice of the First Century Christian congregations.

  You supplied your own comparative moralization to the statement. Especially with the research you have done I sincerely doubt that you even question whether what I wrote is true. You took issue with what you believed I meant, not with what I wrote. You have adopted many of the JW logical fallacies.

  I believe the Witnesses are worse than First Century Christian congregations. I don't require you to agree and didn't state that as fact. Whether or not you agree with that opinion, it is a fact that the practice of "disfellowshipping" among JWs is unlike the disciplinary practices of First Century Christians. I am sure you agree with that statement.

  It was indeed your reading. I did not say what you state I said.

  It is a nuisance to keep having these sorts of sideline discussions with you, SBF. The only benefits I see are that it shows lurkers what the org does to people's reasoning ability and keeps the thread bumped.

  Please answer me this: Do JWs use threat of organizational shunning as a very powerful weapon to coerce conformance, to the end of creating the appearance of unity?
• 

  AuldSoul

  LittleToe,

  There are also plenty examples of other fundamentalist organisations/religions that hold similar or worse shunning policies (e.g. Islamic, self-styled "Born Again Christian" groups, etc.).

  There are also plenty of examples of organizations/religions that hold no organizational shunning policy whatsoever and that do not claim sole divine rights to all spiritual comprehension.

  SBF: Really what I object to on this forum and in this thread is the constant insistance that Witnesses are worse than others in how they treat people.

  The Witnesses are worse than MANY in how they treat people who disagree with their doctrine. They are not worse than ALL, and I never suggested they were. They are FAR WORSE than their prolific propagandized advertisements profess.

  LittleToe, I know SBF is a friend of yours, but he's a pain in the a--, too, sometimes. And you know it. Especially when it comes to apologizing for a religious ORGANIZATION that he never even really got to know all that well.
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  slimboyfat

  AuldSoul, if your purpose was to show JWs are merely "different" but not worse, then I can't object, but also fail to see why you would expend so much energy to show something so obvious. I suspect your original intent was for the more ambitious claim, but you have argued yourself into a corner by being so pedantic. To point out that 'interpretation' is involved on my part smacks of desperation, and perhaps reveals more of your inability to let go of the Witness mindset than mine. Everything is pure interpretation. Posters are free to post what they like within the guidelines, and I don't remember that including anything about conforming to AuldSoul's definition of ontopic. You are in danger of sounding a bit curmudgeonly, with your attempt to police things to your arbitrary standard of 'ontopic'. Rather confusingly your opportunistic quotation from my thread to denigrate my input meets your criteria of ontopic, whereas my attempt to engage you with the idea that the first century congregation was not as rosy as some Christian ex-Witnesses imagine does not merit a response.

  LittleToe, thanks for your input. You obviously have a lot of experience with higher ups in the organization I never had. I wonder whether you think things in the first century congregation were much better though?

  Slim
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  emptywords

  hyjacking the thread for a bit. Littletoe tried to read you're DA or letter on best of , said to go to profile and get the link, however the page doesnt' show, would love to read you're exit have heard it is a beaut.

  Cheers
• 

  slimboyfat

  Here, emptywords:

  http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/6/20680/1.ashx

  http://www.angelfire.com/trek/littletoe/Profile.html

  Some doubted whether the story was true at the time, but I have a relative in the Hall who was there when it happened so I knows it's true.

  Slim