@Witness My Fury:
OK Egg, I gave you one more chance to redeem yourself and you blew it (yet again)
You gave me "one more chance" to do what? Redeem myself? I don't wish to redeem myself in your eyes. If you don't get it together, you're done, toast! Maybe you will get yourself together, maybe you won't, but this I do know: Jehovah's Witnesses presented to you what our interpretations of Scripture were and at no time was it not your choice to either accept or reject what our interpretations were at that time. What is more, you don't now, as someone in fade, get a say as to what is or isn't a "Christlike personality," given the fact that you don't know Christ at all; you are wholly disqualified in my mind from having a voice. As long as you remain on the side of Jesus' adversaries, I'd say you're done; I'd say that you're toast. There is no longer any sacrifice for sins left for those whose sin is wilful. (Hebrews 10:26)
You've now gone off the proverbial reservation in that this thread has devolved into one about your personal gripes and misgivings in your having previously accepted as true the teachings of Jehovah's Witnesses, but you were not forced to become associated with us. You could have joined the Roman Catholic organization or one of the many Protestant organizations that exist today if Catholicism wasn't exactly your bag. Whatever is it I believe as one of Jehovah's Witnesses is neither your concern or any of your business, since I have every right to believe whatever it is I choose to believe, which is the very same right that you have. No one ever took from you this right of yours away; you still have it. Were you to join any organization -- political, religious, whatever -- you would necessarily be subscribing to the mission of that organization, even if at the beginning you didn't quite understand or get the sense of what its mission was or meant, or didn't appreciate the role that you would be expected to play in connection with membership.
It seems to me that now that you know the role that you are expected to play in connection with your membership in the association of Jehovah's Witnesses, you want out, and you have always been in possession of the option of getting out; no one wrested this option from you, so you could have gotten out at any time. The question is, where are you going to go now? Does any other organization offering eternal life on the condition of our exercising faith in the ransom provision that was provided to us by Jehovah God? I don't believe so, but be grateful that your right to leave us, your freedom to get out, remained yours, and was never taken away from you.
As I see it, you've no reason to complain, @WMF, for if anyone is on the fence or in fade, they're really out, so I say: Enjoy the rest of your life!
@Bungi Bill wrote:
djeggnog, if 607 is false, then the events attached to 1914 never [occurred].
@djeggnog wrote:
This is stupid logic. Only someone ignorant would think this statement of [yours] to be logically sound; it isn't.
@Bungi Bill wrote:
No invisible return of Jesus, no subsequent appointment of the WTB&TS as God's organization.
@djeggnog wrote:
What on earth does Jesus' invisible presence, or return, have to do with your belief that the year 607 BC that Jehovah's Witnesses assign to the destruction of Solomon's temple is false? What's the connection between these two events?
I'm still waiting for a response to these questions, @WMF. I don't expect to receive a response, but I'm waiting.
@AnnOMaly:
Actually, I owe you an apology.
No, please don't do that; it is bad form for you. I like you to remain just as you are.
You (deliberately?) missed the point I was making....
Ok.
@TD:
Fair enough. But if you don't accept any of the contemporary documents how do you arrive at 539 BC?
I don't recall saying that I didn't accept "any of the contemporary documents." Did I ever say such a thing? I assume that you've read this thread, at least my posts to it. If you have, then you would know already that I never said this, and you would also know the answer to how it is I came to arrive at 539 BC. I'll leave you to find my answer to your question. This thread is now in re-runs and going nowhere, which is why I'm probably going to be withdrawing from it soon.
The fragments of Diodorus tells us that, "Cyrus became king of the Persians in the opening year of the Fifty-fifth Olympiad." (Diod 9.21.1) He also records the death of Cyrus in battle (Diod 14.23.6) This gives us start and end dates for the reign of Cyrus, but not the year when Babylon fell.
Very good, @TD. Now find the posts where I provide in them the scriptural basis for my conclusion that Solomon's temple was destroyed in 607 BC, which posts explain why it is I believe that "the fulfilling of seventy years at Babylon" by the Jews began in 607 BC, during which "the land paid off its sabbaths ... to fulfill seventy years." (Jeremiah 29:10; 2 Chronicles 36:21)
@djeggnog
