by EXJWBrit 33 Replies latest jw experiences
.....one hundred and forty-four thousand who had been purchased from the earth. These are the ones who have not been defiled with women,.....
This is what never made sense to me. how can 144,000 be a literal number without the fact that they have not been defiled with women also be literal.
part of the verse is literal but the second part is not. hmmmmm
I asked a JW that was at my house about it and the response was...."it must be talking about after they go to heaven" LOL
There was someone from Turky who claimed to be an Annointed in my KH, a woman to boot. Nobody questioned her. She is a sweet old lady, but a little haughty.
Just in the last decade or so scientist and archeologists have found or unearthed evidence of the Hebrew language in North America among ruins of Native American land. Thus the rumors that sprang up about the lost tribe etc etc... Some people laugh at it but it really isn't so obsurd.
I'd be very interested in knowing the source of that information. Frankly, it sounds like it might have come from Mormon sources, since the supposed basis of the Book of Mormon is that Hebrews came to the Americas and lived here for centuries. I know of NO physical evidence that supports such a hypothesis, and the Mormons I have asked about it have been unable to direct me to any. So if you know of such evidence, I'd be interested in seeing it. But it wouldn't surprise me if there were urban legends of this sort among the Mormons, just like the JW's have their stories about demon experiences.
Insofar as WTS policy re: the remaining members of the 144,000 "anointed ones" is concerned, Ray Franz comments (In Search of Christian Freedom, pp. 158-9:
"The Governing Body is said to act as a spokesman for all these anointed ones. One would expect the Governing Body to be keenly and intensely interested in their thoughts on any and all spiritual matters...But what do we find?...no provision is made for communication with the 'anointed' members of the 'faithful and discreet slave' class. Not one's being of the 'anointed,' but organizational position is the factor...When opinions are sought by the Governing Body, they are generally sought from...members of Branch Comittees (sic) or from the Brooklyn Service Department or similar sources. Yet these are sources composed almost entirely of men not professing to be of the 'anointed.'...If one is in any other position...his being of the 'anointed,' a member of the 'faithful and discreet slave' class, will not cause his thoughts to be shown any greater consideration...than would be the case with any of his non-anointed peers." Ftn: "I cannot recall a single one of these ever being invited to express himself to the Governing Body as whole on any topic during the nine years of my being on the Body."
To that I can add my own testimony: In 40 years as a JW I knew many dozens of "anointed" ones, both in the various congregations I attended as well as at Bethel. To my knowledge, not a single one of them was ever asked to contribute to WTS doctrine/policy; they were just "little people" who did their daily duties like any other dub, "feeding" with the rest of us out of the GB's trough.
Also, a simple actuarial calculation shows that, using the number of "partakers" in 1935, there should now only be 200-300 "anointed" ones left on this planet, not the 8,800 now counted. A Brooklyn source recently confirmed to me that this is the "private opinion" of many at Bethel.
This whole doctrinal structure is succumbing to the law of Entropy: Time destroys all things.
Craig
I know of NO physical evidence that supports such a hypothesis,
Actually there is physical evidence that there was the existance of the Hebrew language in North America estimated to be quite a bit prior to the so called discovery of America. There is no proof that it is the writings of one of the Lost Tribes but only that it is Hebrew and it has been here longer then the discovery of America. The writings can be found in a museum somewhere in the Eastern part of the US. Not sure the exact State but I will try to find out.
This is one of the things that archeoligists have used to back up the theory that that is where many of the Native Americans decended from besides China.
There has been OOODLES of research done on this I do not have all of it handy. I will have to do some digging and I don't mind digging as long as I'm not digging just to satisfy my own curiosity regarding this subject because it has pretty much been satisfied.
If you guys really want the info then I'll gather what I can otherwise I wont bother.
* Most of the Lost Ten Tribes migrated to Northwest and Western
Europe and their descendants are now in those areas or in North
America, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa.
* We do not claim that all residents of the said nations are
descended from Israel. We do however affirm that most descendants of
the Lost Ten Tribes are residents of those nations. On the whole
they are unaware of their Israelite Identity. Even so in the course
of history the Israelite origins of peoples in those areas have
influenced national developments and national characteristics.
The Tribe of Joseph was divided into two other Tribes: Ephraim
and Menasseh. People from ALL of the Israelite Tribes congregated in
North America but in general the U.S.A. is dominated by Menasseh.
Britain has characteristics of Ephraim.
* Reuben was important in France, Issachar in Switzerland, Benjamin
in Belgium, Zebulon in Holland, Dan in Denmark, Naphtali in Norway,
Gad in Sweden, the country of Finland was influenced by the Tribes of
Simeon, Issachar, and Gad; Simeon, Dan, and Ephraim were important in
Ireland.
Plum
A couple of things to think about regarding the 144,000.
1) If the WT is right, How can a FIGURATIVE number of 12,000, each from 12 FIGURATIVE tribes of Israel add up to a LITERAL 144,00?
2) If the WT is right, why would Jehovah want 144,000 who by and large believed pagan doctrine while on earth, to rule & reign in heaven? For instance, most of the 144,000 believed Jesus died on a cross, returned in 1874, was not Michael the Archangel, they were taught to worship Jesus. They voted, smoked, took part in government, celebrated birthdays and Christmas. Were allowed to get transfusions, etc, etc,
Why wouldn't Jehovah wait till the end and pick the 144,000 out who had the most pure doctrine?
Tower Man
Well now that you bring it up, you know something that's always bothered me about the 144,000 teaching? How come women are allowed to be included in this anointed class, but are not allowed any position of authority in the congregation? Or for that matter, are not allowed to give talks; I mean real talks, not those demonstration talks. Most sisters I knew of in our hall would have made far better elders than the bunch of spares we had. So according to the GB, God's thinking is this: women are good for bearing babies, cleaning the house and judging billions of people's entry into paradise; but they cannot teach from the platform, or hold positions of responsibility. Why? If a woman is good enough to be included in the 144,000 and judge all of humanity, then why is she not good enough to sit on a Judicial Committee and judge an adulterer?
Sorry for taking this off on a tangent a bit, but this has always kind of bugged me. I've always believed God to be, if nothing else, logical and where's the logic in this teaching? Riddle me that Batman!
Hi, Plum;
OK, so we're talking about British-Israel and not Mormon teaching. Different cult.
The teaching you are talking about is characteristic of the old Worldwide Church of God (Herbert W. Armstrong's group) and the couple hundred groups that split off from it after HWA died. The WCG was every bit as much a controlling cult as the JW's are. Worse, the teaching is also held dearly by the Identity Movement, which is basically your American Nazis. These guys are utterly racist, and they goose-step around with swastikas and the whole bit. The British Israel teaching is the basis of their racism, since they essentially believe that the white races descended from Israel, and all others are at best inferior, and at worst, subhuman.
Now, I'll be the first to admit that the fact that a doctrine is held by undesirable groups does not make it a false teaching. But this teaching has been pretty well refuted, and I will have to get back to you with some references offering such proof, because I'm supposed to be working right now.
Years ago, I read Armstrong's book, The United States and British Commonwealth in Prophecy, and didn't find it very convincing. As I recall, some of his chief arguments revolved around place names sounding like the names of the tribes, e.g. the Dneiper and Dneister rivers were supposedly named after Dan, who he said traveled that way to England, where London was named after him. The word "British" came, he claimed, from the Hebrew words "berith" (covenant) and "ish" (man), hence "British" = "covenant man" or man with whom God had made a covenant, in other words, Israel. These are truly foolish reasonings, and betray utter ignorance of linguistics and etymology.
The material you cited in your post wasn't any more convincing:
Our proofs have never been properly refuted. The
basic claims we have made are irrefutable. If one cannot deny our
claims and there is nobody else who can it follows that one should
accept them.
What kind of reasoning is that? Think about it: I believe that there are little purple men with orange polka dots living on the planet Pluto. No one has ever properly refuted my belief. My claim is irrefutable. If you cannot deny my claim and there is nobody else who can, it follows that you should believe it. So do you believe that there are little purple men with orange polka dots living on the planet Pluto?
It isn't always possible to prove a negative (as my example in the previous paragraph illustrates). But the failure to disprove unusual claims does not make them true. The burden of proof lies on the one making the unusual claims to prove that they are true, not on others to refute them.
I haven't looked into this issue in a while, but I will try to do some research on it within the next few days, and get you more information on it. It's going to be a busy weekend (my wife is leaving for a vacation in Alaska), so bear with me.
There are little purple men, with orange polkadots on Pluto!
...
... ahem, sorry, just cleaned the lens on my telescope.
As you were, people!
Towerman's second point really hits the mark. It also debunks the idea that God found a people that were the best of the best, in 1919.
Facial hair poll: http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/forum/thread.asp?id=33229&site=3
I personally knew one who claimed to be one of the 144,000.He broke up my brothers marriage but still partook of the emblems every year.So yes, I would say some do it for attention.By the way,here's something I've been wondering about-Why did the number of them steadily dwindle away until about the mid-1980's and then seemed to halt at around 8,000 and has been in that range ever since?Anybody got any ideas on this one?
