by 21stcenturywoman 29 Replies latest social humour
There was an intense hype about 1975. For me personally, I couldn't accept it. We have been taught that no man knows the day and year the end would arrive, so how could the organization know? I went about my life the same as I'm doing right now.
1975
I think I may have said the following before.
It is my hypothesis only.
I think this is what happens to people whose lives are intensely preoccupied by fantasy to the exclusion of reality.
Devout religious people, fans, fanatics and such get to a place in their mind and their personal psychology when SOMETHING REAL MUST HAPPEN to
keep doubt from creeping in.
The pressure for PROOF of some sort practically explodes inside of them.
This is when they make a fatal mistake.
Jehovah's Witnesses such as Fred Franz (or any of the Bethel crew) create a scenario in which they WILL FORCE the thing they believe to happen!
How? They PREDICT IT!
Charles Manson believed the Beatles were sending him messeges in their music (Helter Skelter) telling him a race war was about to begin. Manson sent out his followers to murder people and leave bloody writings on the doors and walls which would be attributed to blacks. Why? TO MAKE HIS PREDICTIONS COME TRUE.
The Watchtower printed chronology charts, interpretations of events and leading commentary building world wide interest in 1975? Why?
BECAUSE IF ENOUGH PEOPLE EXPECTED IT TO HAPPEN JEHOVAH' WOULD BE FORCED TO COMPLY!
Radical Muslims believe they are beloved of Allah among all religions on earth. But, when they look at the progress of the Jewish state, the democracy, the farming in previous desert land and equality among the citizens THEY SEEK TO DESTROY ISRAEL to PROVE it is all a lie which would leave
them as the heirs of god's favor! Forcing the thing they believe about themselves into reality takes cataclysm, war on the west, exploding bombs, suicide missions, etc. BUT IT WILL PROVE THEIR RELIGION ALONE is the true one....so it is worth it.
All these examples are what comes of cognitive dissonance. The balance between what one person devoutly believes and what reality tells them is true becomes a CRITICAL TEST of their sanity and the slip off the edge.
So?
So, this is how an organization such as the Watchtower Society from top to bottom can promote a DEFINITE DATE as though it were true when the sane person inside of them knows full well it is bunk!
FORCING THE ISSUE lets off the pressure........then denial sets in once again...
The split with reality is a cry for help..for proof...for an end to the agony of a double life.
Jehovah's Witnesses such as Fred Franz (or any of the Bethel crew) create a scenario in which they WILL FORCE the thing they believe to happen!
How? They PREDICT IT!
Charles Manson believed the Beatles were sending him messeges in their music (Helter Skelter) telling him a race war was about to begin. Manson sent out his followers to murder people and leave bloody writings on the doors and walls which would be attributed to blacks. Why? TO MAKE HIS PREDICTIONS COME TRUE.
The Watchtower printed chronology charts, interpretations of events and leading commentary building world wide interest in 1975? Why?
BECAUSE IF ENOUGH PEOPLE EXPECTED IT TO HAPPEN JEHOVAH' WOULD BE FORCED TO COMPLY!
You mean they were trying to re-create another 1914 - in a way?
The year 1975 possibly represented 6000 years of history since the creation of the first man Adam. The faithful and discreet slave took this matter under consideration with perfect balance:
w68 8/15 p. 494 Why Are You Looking Forward to 1975?
What about all this talk concerning the year 1975? Lively discussions, some based on speculation, have burst into flame during recent months among serious students of the Bible. Their interest has been kindled by the belief that 1975 will mark the end of 6,000 years of human history since Adam’s creation. The nearness of such an important date indeed fires the imagination and presents unlimited possibilities for discussion.
After much of the mathematics and genealogies, really, of what benefit is this information to us today? Is it not all dead history, as uninteresting and profitless as walking through a cemetery copying old dates off tombstones? After all, why should we be any more interested in the date of Adam’s creation than in the birth of King Tut? Well, for one thing, if 4,026 is added to 1,968 (allowing for the lack of a zero year between C.E. and B.C.E.) one gets a total of 5,993 years, come this autumn, since Adam’s creation. That means, in the fall of the year 1975, a little over seven years from now (and not in 1997 as would be the case if Ussher’s figures were correct), it will be 6,000 years since the creation of Adam, the father of all mankind!
Are we to assume from this study that the battle of Armageddon will be all over by the autumn of 1975, and the long-looked-for thousand-year reign of Christ will begin by then? Possibly, but we wait to see how closely the seventh thousand-year period of man’s existence coincides with the sabbathlike thousand-year reign of Christ. If these two periods run parallel with each other as to the calendar year, it will not be by mere chance or accident but will be according to Jehovah’s loving and timely purposes. Our chronology, however, which is reasonably accurate (but admittedly not infallible), at the best only points to the autumn of 1975 as the end of 6,000 years of man’s existence on earth. It does not necessarily mean that 1975 marks the end of the first 6,000 years of Jehovah’s seventh creative “day.” Why not? Because after his creation Adam lived some time during the “sixth day,” which unknown amount of time would need to be subtracted from Adam’s 930 years, to determine when the sixth seven-thousand-year period or “day” ended, and how long Adam lived into the “seventh day.” And yet the end of that sixth creative “day” could end within the same Gregorian calendar year of Adam’s creation. It may involve only a difference of weeks or months, not years.
1975 is topic that's exploited by some opposers but these time calculations are not views exclusively held by Jehovah's Witnesses. Jehovah's Witnesses simply reflected what's contained in the Bible and associated means of measuring where we are in the stream of time. Your mother was right when she said that only the spiritually weak left the organization. Jehovah's Witnesses that are spiritually strong don't base their spiritual endeavors on a pivotal date for the end of this system of things.
Maze, why did the WT society publish an apology for having led persons to believe that the end was coming in 1975?
"How appropriate it would be for Jehovah God to make of this coming seventh period of a thousand years a sabbath period of rest and release ... This would be most timely for mankind. It would also be most fitting on God's part... It would not be by mere chance or accident but would be according to the loving purpose of Jehovah God for the reign of Jesus Christ, the "Lord of the sabbath," to run parallel with the seventh millenium of man's existence." Life Everlasting in Freedom of the Sons of God, 1966, p. 30
"Just think, brothers, there are only about 90 months left before 6000 years of man's existence on earth is completed... The majority of people living today will probably be alive when Armageddon breaks out." Kingdom Ministry, March, 1968, p. 4.
"Reports are heard of brothers selling their homes and property and planning to finish out the rest of their days in this old system in the pioneer service. Certainly, this is a fine way to spend the short time remaining before the wicked world's end." Kingdom Ministry, June 1969, p. 3.
How do you think JWs interpreted and responded to such statements from "the faithful and discreet slave"?
How do you think the Governing Body wanted them to interpret and respond to such statements?
Do you think any of this really came from God?
MAZE will have us believe the HOLOCAUST never happened...SHAME ON YOU!!! You pick and choose what you want you make me sick...
Sw
Since you missed it, let me tell you about 1975. I was 22, baptized but pretty much out of the organization. My mother said that the society was warning of the end coming in 1975. I cleaned up my act, married the PO's daughter (he, by the way was one of the anointed) & waited for the end. I was not in love but figured in just a few months I'd be in Paradise & would learn to love her. So I waited, became an elder. Was on numerous committees. Gave district assembly parts. Got called in years later by the CO for not studying with my college age daughter who wanted nothing to do with the truth. Got demoted. Lost all interest. Watched the wife develop a hefty prescription drug habit. 34 years passed. Finally fell in love. Divorced the wife & and left the "Truth". I have never been happier in all my life. Do I blame the WBTS? Sure as hell do. They love analogies so here's one: You can't push an occupied car down a hill & after it plows into a crowd of innocent people claim no responsibility. They should all rot in hell.
All right. I was a college student. The pervailing atmosphere was 1975 and I clearly remember talks about it from the podium at Yankee Stadium. Franz' speech stands out b/c it was big news. The biggest news since creation itself. Maybe they had disclaimers. From my mom's experience, they certainly had enough practice to stick in some disclaimers. So all those people suddenly left the Witnesses for no reason? They heartily encouraged it.
Who can tell me all the terms and conditions of Facebook and itunes right now, without looking?
Imagine all the Witnesses who changed their lives for their ruin based upon this 1975 business. I never believed I would survive Armageddon. Just being human was sin enough. I wasn't a perfect Bethel hotshot. My terror was real. And I was exposed to someone who had gone through this drill before to no avail. I had already studied NT at college. Nevertheless, it was spooky. It was worse than the demons.
Jehovah's Witnesses simply reflected what's contained in the Bible and associated means of measuring where we are in the stream of time.
Oh brother we have a brainwashed indoctrinated JW here.
You should change your name to Haze because your so deluded of facts and information.
The fact is that its impossible to accurately calculate a chronological dating system in years from Adam's existence by use of the bible or any other
means. This date created mostly by F Franz was nothing but cunning and devious marketing scheme used to proliferate more of the WTS. literature.
Sadly I knew of two young JW teens that committed suicide because of all the pent up anxiety and depression, but thats alright isn't
that so Haze or Maze
1975 was just another date/year that the WTS has used to heighten the publics attention to their published works and make
make their pronouncements seem to be with earnest and honest viable intension.
The WTS has alway been a profiteering false prophet, right back to the men who stated this religious publishing house.
If the " Truth " be told.
