Can you solve the JW puzzle about "soul" and "spirit" ?

by Terry 20 Replies latest watchtower bible

  • Terry
    Terry

    This is a real puzzler.

    For Christendom at large there is no problem in thinking of humans as a body (tent) which houses the soul.

    For Jehovah's Witnesses the human IS the tent. No soul is contained. (They make "soul" the same as body.)

    For Christendom at large the human body dies, corrupts and returns to dust while the soul goes to reward in heaven (or that other place).

    For Jehovah's Witnesses the human body IS the person. Death is end.

    However, in some very creative brain-storming, the remarkable FDS can solve the puzzle of NO SOUL......Jehovah has a GREAT MEMORY!

    It seems a resurrection is not precisely that. The anastasis (standing up) out of the graves will not happen.


    Like Scientology's XEMU implanting Thetans (spirits) inside meat bodies Jehovah will cobble together (from Memory) a new batch of fresh bodies consisting of the replica DNA including already in place MEMORIES, PERSONALITY and IDENTITY.


    Humans aren't really spirits if you are a JW.

    But, PARADOXICALLY..... there ARE such things as spirits!

    Jehovah is a spirit. Man is made in god's likeness. But, I guess, the spirit (which is exactly what Jah is) they are not.

    Confusing? Or, just deliberate interpretational non-conformity?

    Jesus WAS a spirit (he use to be the archangel Michael until the Watchtower gave up on it) TRANSFERRED to the ovum of human MARY.

    So, Jesus BECAME the human that ADAM had been. Except for one important matter: ADAM (according to the Watchtower) HAD NO SPIRIT or soul.

    Isn't this a bit of a problem for their consistency of belief?

    Adam=body with no spirit or soul.

    Jesus (the 2nd Adam) body+spirit.

    The Watchtower Society tries to avoid this problem by saying "Jesus life force was transferred". How is that different from saying "spirit" or "soul"?

    The resurrection of Jesus requires the Watchtower to become creative in order to appear consistent.

    The human body in the tomb vanishes and Jesus (now resurrected) is said to be walking and talking.

    For Christendom, Jesus actual human body is walking and talking. He even has the crucifixion scars to prove it!

    But, for the Watchtower this can't be allowed! Why? It messes up their contrarian explanation!!

    Angels (Demons) who were spirits came down to earth in the days of Noah (according to Watchtower doctrine). They had sexual relations with

    human women. HOW? The Watchtower gives us special effects explanations! Apparently angels have the same CREATOR powers as Jehovah himself.

    They CREATE human bodies! The Watchtower uses the word "materialize" as though they can avoid the implications of creating a human body!

    The penis obviously worked so it wasn't a magic trick or illusion. The testicles worked and the semen worked and their was actual DNA involved OR ELSE HOW DID THE WOMEN BECOME PREGNANT?

    How did Angels possess the exact same creative genius as Jehovah? Sperm that works!! The human genome responded to angel DNA!! Wow!

    When the FLOOD came and drowned the Angel-Demon human bodies the Watchtower tells us what? Their SPIRITS were chained in Tartarus!

    So, for the humanized demons the flesh was a Tent for a Spirit.

    How is any of this consistent?
    I think it is obvious that the contrarian theology has painted itself in a corner.

    How can JW's not believe in the soul and yet believe in the spirit?

    Example:
    A Baptist dies and his soul goes back to Jehovah.

    A Jehovah's Witness ANOINTED dies and what happens? How does what happens to the anointed differ in any way from that of your garden variety Baptist?

  • sir82
    sir82

    Going by memory here, I think this might be in the "When someone you love dies" brochure:

    I think they get around this by saying that the "soul" is actually 2 parts: Living body + something they never define that they call a "life force".

    I.e., before God "breathed the breath of life" into Adam, he was not yet a soul. But when God combined "Adam's body" + "life force", voila! A soul.

    So, at death, this undefined, nebulous, impersonal something called a "life force" returns to God, and the body returns to dust.

    The rest of your post summarizes the JW doctrine perfectly - God creates a cloned body and implants a "memory chip" into it and calls it a "resurrection".

  • Terry
    Terry

    So, at death, this undefined, nebulous, impersonal something called a "life force" returns to God, and the body returns to dust.

    A distinction without a single difference.

    Changing the word does not change the christendom doctrine.

    Deliberate semantic contrarianism is a leftover from the Rutherford non-conformist era.

    Cross becomes torture stake and it is a JW fetish.

    Soul becomes Life Force.

  • jwfacts
    jwfacts

    How did Angels possess the exact same creative genius as Jehovah? Sperm that works!! The human genome responded to angel DNA!! Wow!

    It wasn't exactly the same, it was better. Their children, the Nephilim, turned out larger and stronger, and only slightly more sinful.

  • Pterist
    Pterist

    I believe that the mankind made from the dust of the ground, for this specific mortal environment, became a living soul with the spirit of God.

    I don't believe that scripture before Christ teaches that the soul or spirit Has continued separate life after death. The Christ Life in clay pots is the Life of a born again, new creation after the resurrection.

    Had Christ not come to be the second Adam, this entropic universe and mankind would cease to exist.

    This mortal universe and mankind were killed at the cross in Christ and in His resurrection a NEW CREATION was born, and is still in embryo.

  • myelaine
    myelaine

    dear Terry...

    you said:

    "Example:
    A Baptist dies and his soul goes back to Jehovah.

    A Jehovah's Witness ANOINTED dies and what happens? How does what happens to the anointed differ in any way from that of your garden variety Baptist?"...

    I think the JW anointed are considered part of the "composite Christ"...therefore they each have a share in the Spirit which raised Jesus...they *teach that no one else on the planet has a share in this Spirit except their anointed. I think that's why they teach that only the anointed go straight to heaven.

    I also think that is why the GB insist that you have to be in union with the org. in order to be saved. They are part of the "composite saviour"

    ok...maybe they don't outright *teach that, but I think it was taught at one time and it hasn't been repudiated.

    love michelle

  • Satanus
    Satanus

    Standard christianity makes more sense, than the wt's contorted doctrine. The wt is basically a materialist/mechanistic doctrine. Jehovah is basically a spirit man. As we are made of flesh and bone, jehovah is made of spirit substance. He has a definite location, as we do. Theirs isn't a religion of any spirituality at all.

    S

  • Jeffro
    Jeffro
    he use to be the archangel Michael until the Watchtower gave up on it

    Did they (give up that idea)?? It must have been after 2011.

  • Splash
    Splash

    "Soul" = "Breather". If your body breathes/is alive, it is (not 'has') a soul. No life = body but not soul.

    Adam therefore was a soul.

    Same for animals.

    Splash.

  • kurtbethel
    kurtbethel

    Watchtower god and Watchtower Jesus are so strange to wrap my mind around.

    If Michael transferred his "life force" into the ovum that Mary was carrying, and if life force is impersonal energy that carries no memories or consciousness, then Michael would have been dead, and Jesus would not have the attributes that made Michael an intelligent being. Jesus would have no memory of being Michael, so what was the point of using that particular life force instead of one from a pig or snake or rooster? It's all the same, like electricity. It would also mean that Michael commited suicide, or Watchtower god murdered him. Which was it? Also, when you read the account of Mary conceiving, you have Mary present, God is present, and holy spirit is present, with no mention of Michael. If you follow Watchtower reasoning on this, it would have to be holy spirit who was transferred into Mary to make Jesus. During my study I pointed this obvious state of affairs out and the men insisted it was Michael, so I suspected them of being brain damaged or something, but I kept that to myself.

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