Moses wrote that one river was “the one going to the east of Assyria.” But the land of Assyria derived its name from Asshur, Shem’s son born after the Flood. (Genesis 10:8-11, 22; Ezekiel 27:23; Micah 5:6) Evidently, in his accurate, inspired account, Moses simply used the term “Assyria” to refer to a region that was familiar to his readers.
The question is moot since after the flood, we have no idea whether the ark even came down where it embarked. The rain came for 40 days and 40 nights, but the water kept rising for a total of 110 days and was most likely driven for months before the waters began to recede.
By the time the water subsided, the land had changed dramatically. Lifespans also began going down from nearly a thousand years to what we have today, though it happened incrementally. The landscape Noah and his family knew before the flood most likely was completely alien from that after the flood. In fact, the ark may have been launched in the Western Hemisphere or what is now Australia for all we know. To think it would come down in the same place it embarked from is a bit unlikely at any length. The wind blew furiously upon the ark until the waters began to recede and came to rest in the mountains in or near Turkey's Mount Ararat. So the location of the Garden of Eden could have been anywhere where the waters of the flood were.
Regarding swords, how are we to explain the swords used in heaven in the Apocalypse of John? Are we to suppose that man invented swords and that God began producing them in heaven? The Watchtower writers are exceedingly narrow minded, as usual in that they assume that this Earth is the only one that God ever created. Some early apocryphal texts not discovered until 1947-48 speak of the works of God being eternal, including the creation of other inhabited worlds. If there were, and are, other such worlds, it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to think that swords would be weapons devised by the inhabitants of these worlds — worlds that came into being long before this one. And even if this world is the only inhabited creation of God in all the centillions (10600) of eons (which is only the briefest of moments when discussing eternity), I can't believe the Watchtower is talking about who came up with the idea of swords!
Talk about stoopidity (duh!)….
Why would that language be used if before the Flood, animals ate only vegetation?
Well, if that’s true, why did God give Adam and Eve “skins” following their transgression: “Unto Adam also and to his wife did the LORD God make coats of skins, and clothed them. And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever.” (Genesis 3:21-23)
After Adam and Eve sinned and were expelled from the garden, Jehovah prevented them from returning. How? Genesis 3:24 says: “He drove the man out and posted at the east of the garden of Eden the cherubs and the flaming blade of a sword that was turning itself continually to guard the way to the tree of life.”
Doesn’t God know all things from the beginning? Are not all things one eternal round to God? Where did Adam and Eve get their first suits of clothing? And if the Watchtower’s going to answer all such questions, are all those who are resurrected to an eternity of life in a Garden Setting going to be clothed, or are they going to be naked, which was their original states? If Adam and Eve were naked and unashamed, what of the “great crowd” who are going to have to endure eternity picking flowers and having family reunions? Indeed, how is man going to find fulfillment in a world without swords? And what of the anointed? What will they do for the rest of eternity? They will rule those on Earth, we’re told, but if they are resurrected spirits, why not are all righteous people similarly resurrected? And what will they, as spirits, do to fulfill the measure of their creation? Will they help create other worlds?
John said that those who are resurrected will be “co-heirs with Christ.” Tertullion wrote: “For we shall be even gods, if we shall deserve to be among those of whom He declared, ‘I have said, You are gods’ and, ‘God stands in the congregation of the gods.’ But this comes of His own grace, not from any property in us, because it is He alone who can make gods.” And Paul writes, that Jesus, being in the “brightness of [the Father’s] glory, and the express image of his person” who, when He had purged our sins, exercised “all things by the word of his power.” (Hebrews 1:3) If He is the heir and the anointed are his co-heirs, then the power of the anointed is going to be virtually limitless when compared to that of the “great crowd.” For the latter pales in glory and dominion in comparison to the former.
Jesus, says John, speaks with the power of a “two-edged sword,” meaning power. And note His description of Jesus, who had a physical resurrection and was NOT a spirit, a point He repeatedly made to His disciples, but which was lost to the members of the General Body: “His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire. And his feet [was] like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and his voice as the sound of many waters. And he had in his right hand seven stars: and out of his mouth went a sharp two-edged sword: and his [face] was as the sun [which] shineth in his strength.”
This description is clearly of a being who is not a spirit; nevertheless, whether it is or isn’t, one wonders how it is that swords now seem to be in full production! If it were a revelation given in our day, would John write, “…and out of his mouth went a fully loaded AK-47”? The imagery somehow would seem…lacking.
My point in all this is that eternity is a very long time, and the General Body seems to have a very limited outlook. The declaration that “we need not conclude that our loving Creator was the first one to make what we know as swords” is patently absurd as is most of the Watchtower’s corny observations. And the one that sticks in my gullet is the doctrine of the “great crowd.” An eternity living in a garden. Why wouldn’t most people prefer being super spirit beings [presumably like Jesus] to trillions of years having bake sales and family reunions? Do they not see the inherent problems with that kind of theology? Maybe God didn’t intend for Adam and Eve to spend eternity in a goldfish bowl. If I were an investigator interested in joining the Organization for some reason, I’d have no desire to be in the great crowd. I’d want to know how to become a being of power and glory.
Advantages of The Resurrected Classes
The advantages of being a member of the Anointed Ones are obvious: Faster than light travel, the ability to go through walls and ceilings, inter-dimensional migration, ability to levitate and to command the elements, limitless ability to learn, power to visit faraway kingdoms and places, and ability to learn about and visit stars and galaxies, helping to create other inhabited worlds and act as angels, to name just a few. Advantages of being a member of the Great Crowd: Power to plan family reunions, ability to hike, bike and visit various places on the Earth, ability to learn musical instruments, sing, paint, bungee jump, parachute, ski, learn Photoshop, bike, mountain climb, photography, cliff climbing, learning astronomy through telescopes, and mastering all those recipes you've been dying to try out. You can also read all the books the anointed ones approve and especially all those back issues of the Watchtower and Awake! You can also visit all the charred bones of the wicked ones that Jehoval slew. That would include all Catholics, Protestants, Mormons, Seventh Day Adventists, Scientologists, Muslims, atheists, agnostics and, of course, those who apostatized from the Organization. And you have all eternity to do these things. Trillions of years of family reunions and religious meetings. Oh, and you can sleep in any day you want. Who could ask for more than that?
