How does the Govering Body get enlightenment?

no-zombie

From the earliest of times of the Catholic church's Ecumenical councils were used to make major changes to its doctrinal direction. Decisions were made by Bishops, they were ratified by the Pope ... and it was done. And the laity had to accepted them or not.

And while splinter Catholic religions accepted most of these councils, non-trinitarian faiths which developed latter (of which Jehovah's Witnesses are apart) did not. Because, as to quote Wikipedia, 'They viewed the ecumenical councils ... as attempts to define dogmas (or doctrine) by debate rather than by revelation'.

This is all well and good, and I understant the scriptural argument.

However our Governing Body does not actually believe in the direct revelations from Christ Jesus or God's Holy Spirit. As mentioned many times by their public statements, that the Governing Body is 'neither inspired or infallible'.

So then, how does the Governing Body receive spiritual enlightenment, other than from simply reading the Bible, which any Christian can do?

TonusOH

I always believed that they prayed to Jehovah, and god would use his holy spirit to guide their discussions and influence their decisions. This would happen in a manner that couldn't be detected, you just had to trust that it was happening. One way to know that it was happening was that the guidance from the GB would be reliable and true. Which is why it's such a problem when their guidance is so unreliable that they must state that they are fallible and can get things wrong.

Look, we know that they are 'just fallible men who can make mistakes.' But they claim to be the head of an organization that is led by Jehovah himself and they frequently remind the rank-and-file of the importance of obeying the GB no matter what. If you claim this and you still get things wrong, then there are two possible reasons for it. One: Jehovah is either being deceitful or incompetent. Two: You don't have god's favor and your claims are false.

I'm kinda leaning towards two.

Ding

Someone once said, "The only way to get light out of a Watchtower magazine is to put a match to it."

Vanderhoven7

I believe they have claimed angelic influence, heavenly guidance from Pastor Russell and aid from holy spirit. Of course Jehovah himself, from time to time, has purposefully misled them to keep them humble.

Rattigan350

People like me write to them with clearer understandings.

JW GoneBad

How Does The Governing Body Get Enlightenment?

To be clear it's not "Enlightenment" in the sense that the WT GB get guidance & direction from God Almighty, Holy Spirit, etc.

You can liken the WTBTS to many USA based man-made large corporations such as McDonald's Hamburger Inc, Jack In The Box, Kentucky Fried Chicken...even General Motors to be fair.

A corporation's business and affairs are managed by or under the direction of its board of directors. Although the board has the power to make all decisions on behalf of its corporation, many business decisions are actually made by the corporation's officers and or investors.

By way of summary: The WTBTS is run by a number of business-minded flunkies & knuckleheads!

no-zombie

In the past, I used to believe like what TonusOh said in that "that they prayed to Jehovah, and God would use his Holy Spirit to guide their discussions and influence their decisions". But in time I saw that even that had a flaw, because the facts and the Society's history showed that sometimes Jehovah directed the Governing Body and sometimes he didn't. How could you know, which was which?

Even the claim that God 'influences" their decisions is too fluffy. In that, how does it work exactly? Wasn't that just another kind of 'revelation'? That's what used to get me going. How did anything work exactly? I mean in the first century, the apostles didn't have this problem. Either Jesus, an angle or a miracle directly told them what to do or what to believe and that was it.

I have the same sort problem when people say that Jehovah blessed them. Like really? Did he personally bless you ... or did someone read the Bible and decide to do something nice?

As a result I have my own conclusions about this topic today, but while those in the congregation love to talk about being 'God's special people', I've found that in the end, the actual mechanics of how things works is rather short on detail and sometimes very hard to believe.

LeeMerk

Are you saying Jehovahs witnesses believe Ecumenical councils simply debated and voted without praying and searching scripture?

Does the governing body ever debate before making decisions?

TonusOH

I find it to be similar to how people describe prayer. If you pray for something and it happened, your prayer was answered. If you pray for something and it did not happen, your prayer was still answered. Maybe nothing happened because god is teaching you patience. Maybe something different happened because that is what god saw as the best outcome for you. Maybe you got the opposite because god needed you to learn a lesson. And so on. No matter the outcome, prayer worked.

So the GB will say the same about god's influence on their decisions and statements. It may have been wrong, but it was the right thing to do/say at that time, proving that it was god's guidance. It may have been wrong, but it led to people acting in a way that helped grow the organization, proving that god was guiding them. And so on. Russell or Rutherford once used that misdirection to claim that something they got wrong was good, because it led to a culling of those whose spirituality was weak. That's an insane thing to say about people you were supposed to be saving! But if it got them off the hook, it was good enough.

I've said it before- the most effective liars lie to themselves the most.

nowwhat?

Back in the day I heard that the anointed would write letters to the society and if the same topic came up many times over, the GB would consider it or make it doctrine.

How does the Govering Body get enlightenment?

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