Some questions for the JWs here

by Mickey mouse 13 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  garyneal

  My wife told me one time that I would make a better Jehovah's Witness than she would. It is somewhat of a scary thought that I seem to know their theology better than she does and quite frankly I wish I did not know any of it. But I guess in the end it is good as it helps me to see if there are indeed errors in it and it forces me to look for the truth in a fundamental sense.

  Perhaps the most difficult belief for a witness to prove besides 1914 is the teaching that Jesus is Michael the Archangel. I recall asking my wife to show me where in the Bible does it teach Jesus as Michael and she could not show any definitive proof from the text. I even let her use her material so that she can get the Bible verses referenced. None of it could provide convincing proof.

  JW's like to rail against Trinitarians because they say that the Bible does not really show that Jesus is God in form and substance. Yet the Bible would show more proof text concerning the diety of Jesus Christ than it does Him being Michael the Archangel. Only the WT Bible minimizes the verses proving Christ's deity and the WT publications make the 'leap of faith' to indicate He is Michael.

  The thought of Jesus being Jehovah was pointed out to me on an evangelical christian website. I pointed out the verses that show that a) no one has seen God and lived and, b) no one has seen God at anytime, except the begotton Son. Following this with the reasoning that if no one has seen God expect the Son, who were the old testament saints conversing with? On her own, my wife came up with Jesus. Of course, she backpeddled on it (or so it seems) when it became clear that this contradicts her doctrine.

  One must be called of God, anointed and ordained and commissioned by Christ.

  Ah, but according to the April 1st, 2006 WT, a baptize publisher is an "ordained minister who bears Jehovah's name."

  http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/watchtower/beliefs/181773/1/Our-e2809cBible-Studye2809d-with-the-Jehovahe28099s-Witnesses-Part-2
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  peacedog

  "The great crowd is not 'in' heaven in the book of Revelations."

  Actually......

  After these things I heard what was as a loud voice of a great crowd in heaven (Revelation 19:1 NWT)

  After these things I saw, and, look! a great crowd, which no man was able to number, out of all nations and tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, dressed in white robes; and there were palm branches in their hands....That is why they are before the throne of God; and they are rendering him sacred service day and night in his temple; and the One seated on the throne will spread his tent over them. (Revelation 7:9,15 NWT)
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  garyneal

  Thank you for that peacedog. I was looking for that verse that spoke of the great crowd being specifically in heaven.

  Of course, the witnesses reason that the great crowd in Rev 7:9 are still on earth and that earth is like Jehovah's courtyard or something.

  Anyway...
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  Cold Steel

  The early Christians were always aware of their reading audience. In many NT texts, Jesus is referenced as distinct from God, beginning in the book of Acts and so forth. You can't separate His divinity from him, personally, though, as John (in his gospel and in the Apocalypse) emphatically teaches that Jesus is God. A Greek Orthodox theologian has noted that "God became as we are" so that we might become as he is. Thus it is that our resurrection, like Christ's, is a physical resurrection, not a resurrection of spirit. Jesus announces that He is NOT a spirit, yet the JW teach that this was a deception, and that Jesus appeared to them in the flesh because that's the only way He could appear to them.

  My chief grip with the Witnesses is that they deduce things that cannot be deduced. I could respect this is they claimed to know it because of a revelation or a vision, but they offer nothing but their own opinions.

  The "oneness" of God is a oneness of design or purpose. Christians have always been labeled as polytheists by Jews and Muslims and they do have a point. But the word in the Bible denotes a plurality from the beginning ("let us create man in OUR image, after OUR likeness" and "man has become as one of US"). We think in term of the word "family" and we think, okay, this is a single unit. But family can have many members. In this case Elohim denotes both singleness and plurality, and like the word family, it can have more than one member. This is clearly how the ancient Christians saw it.

  Again, David suggests plurality himself in Psalms 110:1-2.