We all probably know already that JWs don't celebrate Christmas, labeling it a pagan holiday and telling its whole sordid history to anyone who'll listen. However, I found out that wedding rings are pagan in origin. The JWs know it but they include the exchange of rings during the wedding ceremony, explaining that rings are exchanged as an outward symbol to everyone that this couple is married, thus justifying the pagan origin of the whole thing. How come they can pick and choose this way? Is there anything else of pagan origin that they currently partake in either knowingly or unknowingly?
Paganism is ok when we say it is
by zenpunk 27 Replies latest jw friends
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Fredhall
ZenPunk,
You have a good point there. Wedding rings and cakes does have a pagan background. But, Jesus went to a wedding reception and the bible does not forbid marriages and weddings. Personally I think couples should get married soon as possible and get it over with at their honeymoon.
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Room 215
They can rationalize anything, even it it takes a month's worth of pounding a square peg into a round hole if it suits their interests. Just look how they justified Mexico (both the ``Cartilla" issue and the willingness to drop public prayer and status as a religion in order to retain property); how they maintained segregated congregations in the deep South, etc. etc..
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Fredhall
215,
I don't know everything about Mexico, but we did not ask for the Jim Crow Law?
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jack2
Good point zen - for example, in a recent article about the weddings, the Awake! said that rice-throwing was out, and this has been announced at jw weddings, though ostensibly at times because birds evidently consume the rice and suffer ill effects. And yet, yes, wedding rings are seen as a personal choice. I'm not sure of any other examples - maybe that of wedding anniversaries, though I don't think they have any pagan ties.
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dubla
zenpunk-
calendars.
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Imbue
Zenpunk, there is a difference between wedding rings and Christmas. Almost everything about Christmas is a lie. If one celebrates a lie is it Christian? If you wear a wedding ring are there any lies invoved.
This is a topic I've been discussing privately since I think it is hypocritical for atheists to celebrate religious holidays.
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FRUSR8TD
OK...on this issue what gets me is this...
The early church turned a pagan holiday into a christian holiday....the WTS says this is bad
the early christians tuned a pagan practice (baptism) into a christian one....the WTS says this is good.
WILL SOMEONE MAKE UP THERE MIND!!!!....then let jehovah know cause he has a lot of work to do.
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zenpunk
Baptism is pagan? Really? I never knew.
Imbue - I have no plans to take up Christmas this year . I just think there is a double standard here where the WTS can say you cannot do something based on pagan origin, but other things of pagan origin are ok. I realize that Christmas is based on a lie, but does the society really take that into account when making its decision?
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TheStar
The Honeymoon is also pagan. Embalming of the body after death is pagan. The days of the week are pagan, named after pagan gods. Almost everything has a pagan origin.