So...why is taking blood essentially viewed as unforgivable by the WT?

by sd-7 42 Replies latest watchtower medical

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  problemaddict

  Blood is a big one for me. The few people I have had the conversation with basically say, "so the word abstain means nothing to you?"

  So that is the simple mind you must embrace to make sense of why people feel so strongly about it. Going into what "abstain" actually meant in context of the dietary measures they were referring to, means very little. They focus on abstain. So the attention has to be drawn to wether since that is the word with weight, if taking fractions, organs, donating blood for testing and what have you, is actually "abstaining" from blood.

  In a true sense of the word, none of us can abstain from it......we all have it!

  In fairness, the episode doesn't really accuarately portrey JW's stance. It basically states they feel only prayer is needed. It was a little silly. Anything that brings attention to the ridiculousness of it is fine with me. Patient dies in the episode so that is good too.
• 

  wolfman85

  TD, Of course some were followers of Jesus, but when I refer to the WT is worse than the Pharisees of Jesus' day, I mean the number 2 of the definition of a pharisee below.

  Pharisee ['fær??si?]
  n
  1. (Non-Christian Religions / Judaism) Judaism a member of an ancient Jewish sect that was opposed to the Sadducees, teaching strict observance of Jewish tradition as interpreted rabbinically and believing in life after death and in the coming of the Messiah

  2. (often not capital) a self-righteous or hypocritical person

  [Old English Fariseus, ultimately from Aramaic perishaiya, pl of perish separated]
  Collins English Dictionary - Complete and Unabridged © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003
• 

  sabastious

  The no blood policy is the most potent of the Watchtower's "deadly doctrines." They get people to believe something that could kill them and when it does, the Watchtower deems them a sacrifice to "Jehovah" and the rank and file eat it up. When in reality it just doesn't make sense, like you say. To the ancient Jews eating blood was considered no different than any other sin. Whenever an unintentional sin was committed one could do what was called a "sin offering" which would absorb their guilt.

  A sin offering (Hebrew: ???? ???? korban khatta'at) is a biblical sacrifice offered to achieve atonement for the committing of an unintentional sin. This offering is brought only for those sins that had they been committed intentionally the punishment would be kareth

  Even the medical community will say that you don't default to transfering blood from one person to the other because there are risks. Yet, it's not like people who require a life saving blood transfusion are intentionally sinning because the alternative is death. They are forced by chance into making a risk vs reward decision with their own life in the balance. Therefore even IF you call blood transfusions a sin, all one would need to do is make a sin offering and it would be attoned for. Because they didn't choose to have a car accident or fall off a roof or whatever. Their circumstance is purely incidental. Yet the Watchtower demands that they die or face Gehenna. They want member death, it's part of their business model.

  -Sab
• 

  tec

  Because they do not understand mercy, or love. Instead they understand rules, and they understand fear. So that they would sooner think that their God requires sacrifice, over mercy... rather than mercy, over sacrifice.

  Peace,

  tammy
• 

  wolfman85

  problemaddict, sebastious and tammy, I agree 100% with you.
• 

  TD

  TD, Of course some were followers of Jesus, but when I refer to the WT is worse than the Pharisees of Jesus' day, I mean the number 2 of the definition of a pharisee below.

  Out of all the various Jewish parties that flourished during the Second Temple period, only the Pharisees survived the Jewish-Roman war as an identifiable continuing entity. The semi-monastic Essenes eventually died out, the Sadducees were all but wiped out in the fall of Jerusalem and the last of the Zealots were crushed at Masada. The Pharisees are in a real sense, the fathers of modern Rabbinic Judaism and this is affirmed without apology by modern Jewish scholars:

  "Pharisaic Judaism became normative Judaism. Its principal features — the synagogue, the rabbi, prayer, Torah study, and belief in the oral law — became the modes of religious expression guiding Jewish life ever since. All Jewish life today, therefore, stems from the Pharisaic tradition and derives its central religious characteristics from it." (Eckstein, Yehiel, What Christians Should Know About Jews and Judaism. Word Books 1984, p. 258.)

  Therefore to a Jewish person, definition #2 is simply religious bigotry. At any rate, I think the real problem with JW's and blood is the fact that they try to be a bizarre hybrid between Christianity and Judaism. Neither faith in its truer forms has a problem with transfusion
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  DATA-DOG

  As 00DAD would say " Let's review, It's a cult! " I don't think there is a logical answer. As bought up on Blondie's WT comments, Solomon died as an unrepentant apostate, yet he is a model of success and seems to be a candidate for a resurrection. If apostasy is not an unforgivable sin, then why would taking blood be one? Especially since the Bible specifically said not to worship other Gods, but never mentions blood transfusions...
• 

  wha happened?

  What was the punishment for breaking one of the laws? That the Jews would be cut off from their people. in that day you could literally be put to death. Since the WT cannot kill you for breaking this law, they have you shunned as if you are dead. That is their way of cutting you off from your people. (Read Leviticus 17:14).

  and yet the mosiac law labeled u as unclean later in that scripture. So is the shunning and death crap really what God wanted? Or was he reinforcing a point about the sanctity of blood, but not to the point of losing a human life
• 

  JWOP

  The Watchtower Society is run by Satan. Satan prefers human sacrifice. Ergo, to allow blood transfusions would be to undo the doctrine of human sacrifice. That's why it's so unforgivable in that satanic religion.
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  kurtbethel

  When ancient Jews would consume blood, an animal had to die so that they could have the blood, and this was prohibited.

  When someone gets a blood transfusion it comes from another person who donated the blood and then got up and walked away, quite alive.

  Comparing the two is apples and oranges, and can only make sense to someone who is unable to distinguish the difference between being dead and alive.

  I suggust some other reasons. The Watchtower feeds off of human suffering and anguish, and what better anguish could they get than human sacrifice? Their legal department found that stoning apostates was unworkable in the current legal environment, but some clever minion found a way to get human sacrifice by confabulating a dietary law concerning blood with a modern medical practice. It worked brilliantly, with the Watchtower having accumulated more human sacrifice than the People's Temple Jonestown massacre.

  You can bet that their bloodthirsty god is very pleased.