by EndofMysteries 92 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
Then again, how do we KNOW that EOM ISN'T the Devil, trying to throw US off track (me, by extricating myself from my miserable atheistic hell hole existence) by planting "false flags", making the religious type to appear to be fruit-loops?
Is Satan trying to reinforce my non-belief!?!
And where the heck is YHWH while all this is happening!?!
I am still with you.
Loz x
i have a couple of problems with these comments...one...wether the god was Baal or shamash...wasn't it still sun worship?
The point isn't whether the ancients worshipped the sun. The point is Hislop's bad scholarship. Baal wasn't a sun god. The Canaanite sun goddess was Shapsh. The Babylonian sun god was Shamash, corresponding to the Sumerian god Utu.
Believe me, what Hislop says about ancient religion is wrong through-and-through. Part of that was because he was relying on late Classical sources instead of genuine ancient sources from the ANE (much of which were discovered after he wrote), part of it was because he had no respect for scholarship and freely associated things that had nothing to do with each other (including medieval artistic motifs), part of it was because he had an agenda and a conceptual framework he wanted to squeeze everything into. Bottom line, it's about as reliable as the Book of Mormon is about Pre-Columbian native American prehistory.
...another ...why is it so difficult to comprehend that Egypt adopted religious concepts from other nations? was Egypt the cradle of civilization?
There were many cradles of civilization, as there were many independent civilizations. Egyptian culture in the Pre-dynastic and OK eras had little contact with Mesopotamia. The cultures were clearly independent and the mythologies had little in common beyond expected achetypes. And Babylonian mythology in the 1st millennium BC was partly derivative of both older (3rd millennium BC) Akkadian polytheism and even older (4th-3rd millennium BC) Sumerian religion.
...and leolaia...have you ever trully attempted to confirm if Satan is real? or are you saying that satan is not real because until now i havent seen proof of it, but if proof was presented..thereby allowing the possibility that he COULD be real?
How would one confirm that Satan is real? What would count as proof?
BTW I didn't say that Satan isn't real. I said that Satan (as a figure in Jewish-Christian mythology) is an idea....that's a fact everyone can agree on, whether or not there is "a Devil behind the idea". To make things simple, I'll say that I don't believe in the ontological existence in any divinity from any mythology. And that is not to say that I am against the idea of mythology....I love mythology. But I don't accept the claims of any mythology as reflecting an outside reality beyond the culture and ideas that shape it, unless there is good empirical evidence to think otherwise.
Let me give an example. Jiljamish is a demon in Islam. This demon can be traced back to a Gilgamesh in Judaism, who is a giant and demon in the Enochic Book of Giants (third century BC). That demon, in turn, can be traced back to a demigod in Babylonian religion, Gilgamesh, the hero of the Gilgamesh Epic. Does that mythical figure rest on any sort of empirical reality? Yes! Gilgamesh was a king of Uruk in the 3rd millennium BC and there are ancient inscriptions that show that he was a historical figure. But nothing confirms that he was A) a god B) a demigod C) a giant and D) a demon. Rather it is more likely that Gilgamesh was a real king who then was deified and then became part of a mythology that then influenced Jewish mythology that then influenced Islamic mythology, with the figure of Gilgamesh evolving and changing through the centuries. I can do the same sort of analysis with Satan and show how the concept of Satan changed and evolved, but the idea originates from certain ANE polytheistic and later henotheistic ideas about the divine council ("the satan" was originally a prosecutor type figure in the council). Can it be shown that Satan is more than an idea? What would count as proof? I can prove the sun exists. I can make observations, take measurements, make predictions. That doesn't prove the existence of a sun god. But it does prove (setting aside nihilistic or idealist objections to positivism) that there is an object that has an ontological existence that we call "the sun". Can Satan be observed in any objective way that demonstrates that this idea from literature and mythology is based on a real "entity" or being? Or how about any other figure from world mythology?
The 66 books of the bible we have now is ONLY since the 1800's. Look up the history, it used to be like 84 books. When printing press began, they found they were able to get away with not printing the least popular books, so that's how we have 66 books.
Baal means Lord, Baal was a title, there were many Baal gods. So it is interesting that Baal just means Lord. So does Lord mean Baal? lol
Templeofelijah -
you are the perfect example of one trying to change and twists things to follow what he WANTS to believe vs the truth. Rutherford immediately said holy spirit was ceased. For 30 years there was no holy spirit and he was involved in spiritism. Even promoting books they thought were inspired by demons. But you are teaching a false doctrine that 1991 must be the year JW's went corrupt, so you are unable to accept that at the very latest, when Rutherford took over was the very latest they would have ever had holy spirit and God's favor, if not even years before that.
If you are pure of heart, I suggest you examine it. Are you really seeking the truth or are you turning into another trap by Satan to catch those who got out of the trap of JWs.
Do you direct others to put a faith in the true creator and let his holy spirit instruct them, or are you alone one who can teach and others can't?
How would one confirm that Satan is real? What would count as proof?
Hello Leolaia, I know the question was directed at someone else, but I would like to give my answer. I think the proof of Satan that we can see is in the evolution of the human ego. I don't think it's unreasonble to assume that the Serpent of Genesis should be considered a required cog in the creation of all things by the LORD God as per Torah doctrine. In fact he was said to be not only needed, but indispensable as the most cunning of all of the LORD God's creation of "wild animals." Many times is the "Devil" represented by some sort of beast real or imagined throughout the 66 book Holy Bible.
The character of the Serpent in the Torah is only briefly mentioned in the beginning, but serves as a foundation for the whole 5 books. I believe we the readers are supposed to identify HOW the Serpent MANIFESTS within the subsequent texts, even to the point of affirming the position of each character as with the LORD God or with the Serpent. Characters like Cain would be with the Serpent and characters like Abel would be with the LORD God. It's important to take the entire story arch of each character introduced.
It seems apparent to me after reading the Bible that the writers seem intuitively aware of our connection with the beasts of the world. In no way did they allude that we CAME FROM them, but they seemed to understand the level of connection we have. When you sit back and think about all the woes that humans have today and in our past they all stem from things we picked up in the process of evolution. Therefore, the "evil" is actually inside all of us, and it is something that we all have to fight against if we are to consider ourselves "greater" than the animals and therefore children of a greater purpose.
To me this is the best way to represent Satan the Devil as a visual:
Satan is the "Beast Within."
-Sab
there are 73 books in the catholic canon. Just what I heard was that it was due to printing being expensive that in USA atleast it became 66.
I wonder though........this is a thought I just had.....other then coincidence, let's say since our bible has 66 books now that it was partially a sign that it's man/incomplete/666 along those lines. If original canon had 73....I wonder if books like book of enoch and such, if all the books were in if it would equal 77. But this is just a thought and it can never be proven and I won't waste time on it either. But if 77 meant it's the complete word and 66 is more then coincidence.
Either way though, until recent times, all bibles from 300AD till 1500 to 1800's had more then 66 books.
Well, "evil" has an existence within a system of morality that is a fundamental part of human society and culture; evil is what we humans call violations of that moral order, whether at a more universal human level (e.g. violations of human rights), or within a more socially-dependent/constructed level (e.g. violations of specific laws). I don't think it means much outside that system. Nature is amoral and indifferent to moral concepts. But we humans view nature in moral terms, because it affects us. An earthquake-tsunami disaster is a great evil because it kills people and ruins lives. Theism often works nature into that moral order, e.g. God/the gods/Satan/etc. bring(s) destruction on a people on account of their sins (the Flood story being a classic example of this). But that is motivated by theodicean concerns; if there are supernatural beings who have power over nature, THEN there must be some moral context for how nature operates. I don't see a compelling reason to see nature that way. Nature just is. Black holes, colliding galaxies, asteriod impacts....the universe is a dangerous place and entropy is the universal drive leading from order to disorder; its mindless, its violent, its amoral. Humans are not mindless and we recognize value and worth and a whole host of other concepts (thanks to our intelligent brains) that accord meaning to things like good and evil. The Eden narrative is a pretty good fable illustrating this point. It takes knowledge to perceive good and evil. But if the sun explodes in a supernova and destroys our planet, that would be a horrible evil to us, perhaps the worst evil of all time. But the sun isn't evil; its a physical system that has both beneficial and detrimental effects and it could give life as well as destroy.
If you want to call what we evil a name, personify it and even better, hypostasize it as an entity called "Satan", then that's a well-worn theistic approach; I don't see that as much different from conceiving of a "god of evil". We can observe the sun but evidence that the sun exists isn't evidence that a sun god exists. Likewise about evil. My 5ยข.
leolaia-
on the first point...I believe that Rutherford's assertions were being questioned DUE to errors in names and attributing references to the wrong writers...the problem is ...Rutherford's point was the presence of sun worship, NOT who wrote about sun worship...
on the second point...you stated the following-
The cultures were clearly independent and the mythologies had little in common beyond expected achetypes. And Babylonian mythology in the 1st millennium BC was partly derivative of both older (3rd millennium BC) Akkadian polytheism and even older (4th-3rd millennium BC) Sumerian religion.
...thereby admitting there are common similarities however fundamental or 'expected' ...you also point to 'derivatives'...your own language indicates a point of origin and assimilation in regards to the subject...
...on the third point , you wrote-
BTW I didn't say that Satan isn't real. I said that Satan (as a figure in Jewish-Christian mythology) is an idea....that's a fact everyone can agree on, whether or not there is "a Devil behind the idea". To make things simple, I'll say that I don't believe in the ontological existence in any divinity from any mythology. And that is not to say that I am against the idea of mythology....I love mythology. But I don't accept the claims of any mythology as reflecting an outside reality beyond the culture and ideas that shape it, unless there is good empirical evidence to think otherwise.
...in other words...just because you, as an individual doesn't believe in Satan, doesn't mean Satan isn't real?...
...what about the idea or concept of the word EVIL?...would you agree that EVIL exists?...
