: I am tempted to ramble on about that, but I fear that I am obscuring the focus on the matter at hand.
:Any comments?
Yeah. You are dumber than a box of rocks.
Farkel
Even after reading Crisis of Conscience, one thing (at least) still puzzled me
by kepler 29 Replies latest watchtower bible
-
-
Fernando
"Franzgate 1980":
Ray discovered that the Watchtower Sanhedrin and Pharisees had stolen the "gospel of grace" from their followers. He and others started to recover it.
There is nothing that the Sanhedrin and Pharisees secretly hate and fear more than the "gospel of grace".
However they cannot attack it directly for fear of revealing themselves to be enemies of God and man.
So they launch a witchhunt to find an alternative and more convenient/expedient reason for getting rid of those starting to follow the "gospel of grace" instead of them.
"Causing divisions" is their usual ploy...
Our family knows this from personal experience...
-
Fernando
For a summary of what really troubled Ray, and what he believed, search the wt lib for "legalism"...
-
Xanthippe
Kepler you mentioned, 'Interspersed in the narrative are accounts of things like the difficulty of constructing a case for 607 BC'. Now it is over 20 years since I read Crisis of Conscience so I may be mis-remembering it, but I thought that this was how it all started.
Wasn't Ray Franz on the writing committee for the Aid Book when during his indepth research he realised that 607 was wrong and hence 1914 must be wrong? Wasn't that what rocked him to begin with? I am sure that other people have read it more recently and can tell me.
I think it is a very good point you make that people think Ray Franz wrote an apostate book and then got disfellowshipped for it when he actually got thrown out because he ate a meal with an old friend who was disfellowshipped. This was after revealing his Aid Book research to the Governing Body and their decision to hush it up.
-
soft+gentle
my impression from reading crises of conscience was that prior to the purge there was a climate of tolerance toward private discussion on such topics as heavenly life for all - one hope for all christians, 33 CE was perhaps when the kingdom was set up not 1914, the parousia had perhaps not begun yet, the faithful and discreet slave parable was not literal etc. Ray does make this clear in his first book in the chapter headed point of decision and indeed if such was the case at the time of the purge and not just in hindsight, then he did remain the same man that he was because his second book In seach of christian freedom shows how close the topics mentioned above were to his own beliefs.
-
darth frosty
I agree with farkel!
-
kepler
Darth, Farkel,
Then I guess you are all done, right?
Xanthippe,
I believe you are right about that. That's one of those things I have gone back to look at many times. And then later Carl Olaf Jonnson gets an interview at headquarters via Ray Franz's intercession. But the funny thing is, since the chapters of the book move from one issue to another, such as predictions of the end or the Mexico-Malawi issue, I get the feeling that the consequences of the 607 are never spelled out. I don't recall Franz saying that someone comes up to him and says, "Look, Ray, we've had enough about this chronicle issue: drop it or else." He first says that he wrote a ringing but empty defense of the doctrine over a couple dozen pages of the "Aid" and when he visited with Assyrianologists at Yale (?), he couldn't find a scintilla of archeological evidence to support it.
What I gather from this is that he did report back, but we don't get to hear the reaction. We are left to draw a conclusion about whether the GB decided to Deep Six what they heard. Deep six it in every possible way.
I got from that was that as far as that GB was concerned, if you were within hearing distance of controversy, you were on a pathway out. In the corporate world I have seen similar successful experiments in the behavior of breeding sheep; but the guys in dark suits should stand in awe of the results I've seen in local congregations and what used to be my household. Disfellowship for association with the disassociated must have helped.
S+G,
Good you mentioned all that. Because as I read that material, it was hard for me to tell where things were and where things had gone. In that sense I am as dumb as a box of rocks since the talking points from my background were different.
-
Vanderhoven7
Is the following official "kindness policy" still in effect towards faders and DA'd ones?
Vander
** w08 11/15 p. 2 Table of Contents ***
Purpose of Study Articles
Study Articles 1, 2 PAGES 8-16
Learn how elders and others can help fellow believers who have strayed from the flock of God. These articles explain what you might do to assist inactive Christians. Note, too, how those who return can expect to be received.
Within this article note:
*** w08 11/15 p. 9 par. 4 Help Those Who Stray From the Flock ***
4 If Christian elders are to help sheep who have strayed, they must bear in mind that the flock of God is a congregation of people dedicated to Jehovah—yes, a precious ‘flock of God’s pasturage.’ (Ps. 79:13) Such dear sheep need tender care, and this means that loving shepherds must take a personal interest in them. Making friendly shepherding calls on them can be very effective. Loving encouragement that a shepherd gives them may build them up spiritually and increase their desire to return to the flock.—1 Cor. 8:1.
Continue to Show Them Love
16 Do the foregoing suggestions really work? Yes. For instance, one young person who started as a Kingdom publisher when he was 12 years old became inactive at the age of 15. He later became active, however, and has been in the full-time service for over 30 years. His spiritual recovery was largely due to the assistance given him by a Christian elder. How much that spiritual help was appreciated!
There is NO article that speaks of sunning such a person and in fact we have even been encouraged to help a DF'd individual if we see them having a problem, even something as simple as a flat tire. -
sd-7
What I gather from this is that he did report back, but we don't get to hear the reaction. We are left to draw a conclusion about whether the GB decided to Deep Six what they heard. Deep six it in every possible way
Having read it myself, I can say with certainty that Ray Franz definitely did mention a reaction. The reaction was that they decided to keep the 607 date. I'm pretty sure he spelled that out. I would recommend reading it again, if you missed that part. A detailed discussion of just what the Governing Body did to Carl Olof Jonsson in response to this issue can be found in 'The Gentile Times Reconsidered'. I don't think any doubt will be left about what the Governing Body decided to do after you read that one.
--sd-7
-
hamsterbait
There was an announcement in the Kingdumb Misery that
"Raymond Victor Franz is no longer a member of the Bethel (beth hell) family" But he was not DF until they rewrote the rules(again).
Interestingly - his wife also attended the meal with Ray's DF boss but was not herself DF...
HB