by the truth is mine 36 Replies latest watchtower bible
I quite liked the 100 million died in wars in 100 years line.
A quick look at WW1 and WW2 gives us 80 million of those.
So in the first 30 years or so four-fifths of all the war dead occur and in the last 70 years "only" 20 million.
By any standard that is a huge improvement.
BluesBrother: Right on.
Though I would like to mull over a passage mentiond.
Years ago, when the above verse in Luke ( 4:6) was pointed out to me, it was during the time when I was taking instruction at home on account of my then fiancée's intent to return to the JW fold. Confronted with this verse and my instructors' insertion of its truth, my first reaction was to look for the other accounts in the Gospels. Matthew had neglected to mention that Satan owned everything. Mark never mentions the incident in the interval between John the Baptist's proclamation and selection of the four first disciples, though enough demons appear in the narrative to seem to substantiate the claim in Matthew. John doesn't mention it either.
I guess that to the other three Gospel writers this matter of ownership wasn't that important. Or they didn't believe the claim in Luke. Or they weren't there to verify the story. For a total package document that's entirely inerrant, it makes you wonder.
My instructors seemed to like the idea that that it entailed though. Everything in the world was worth nothing ( except what they already had or could obtain) and if they played their cards right, they would also inherit everything after the world's rightful owner came back to make His claim. Another leap or two over several decades of JW "thought" and you can get to the F&DS.
Looking at the two incidents of the Temptation, Matthew and Luke differ in other respects.
In Luke, first the world is offered by its keeper, and then Satan asked Jesus to throw himself down from the parapet of the Temple.
In Luke at this point, Satan unceremoniously leaves after exhausting his wiles and Jesus returns to Galilee, subsequently to read the scrolls of Isaiah in the synagogue.
In Matthew, Jesus is first asked to throw himself down at the parapet of the temple and THEN he is taken to a high mountain and given an offer. Matthew does not say how he left the mountain, but angels appeared and looked after Him. Curiously, in both accounts, it is Satan which recites Psalms about the roles of the angels to guard Him.
Ironically, it is Matthew which invokes the Magi at Christ's birth, wise men from the East who we come to realize are originators of much that is dualistic in western thought. Luke has shepherds arriving at the site instead.
So, it all goes back to whether God loves the Creation or not. Theodicy as it were. Why is there suffering? I don't know. And looking at Biblical verses such as the above which seem to contradict each other on key points about key issues, ... Why should I assume that a Satan owns anything, when he makes no appearance in OT and the accounts differ so much in the 4 Gospels if they exist at.
But if we were simply to rely on the remaining values of antiquity, we all might act like Cicero or like Caligula. The lesson is incomplete. As a result of what is recorded in the Bible and what our ancestors did in response, I am confident that our role on Earth is to make it a better place than it was when we arrived here. This would be the case whether the End is ten minutes from now or ten billion years.
Imagine living in a world where religious leaders don't tell you what to believe.....
Slidin Fast: You had to sit on the platform as the WT reader for that study??
Oh yes, I remember those recent days too!
It makes me wonder just how many WT readers AND conductors feel the same while going through the motions??
I know of another elder who openly told me that when he conducted the studies, he just viewed it like being a character in a stage play....
The Watchtower God is the abusive, dead-beat husband who does nothing, yet loves to say, "You see what happens around here without me!! Well, do yah??! Things go to shit!! You would be nothing without me!! Now make me a sandwich!!"
"And remember, I LOVE YOU. And you had better damned well love me, and obey me or I will prove my love for you by KILLING YOU!"
Ridiculous statements ??
These people should change their name to Ridiculous Statements-R-US. In fact I am fully prepared for 2016 to be the year of increasingly ridiculous statements from WT.
Well Sparrowdown, remember the classic WT quote:
"We must be ready to obey all directions no matter how STRANGE OR UNUSUAL they appear..."
