by minimus 40 Replies latest jw friends
I'm with cruzanheart on this one. Not only did I buy it, I believed it fervently and taught it well.
When I got up on the platform, I could debate the esoteric meanings of the greater fulfillment of the parable of the talents versus the parable of the minas. I was a JW encyclopedia, a mini-Freddie in training. Wow, I'm so lucky I'm out and can turn my brain to peaceful pursuits, like poontang.
CZAR
Minimus, I quite agree with you, although I must say that my attitude, described above, was also shared by a lot of JWs, even and maybe especially long-time Bethelites, right up to Brother Knorr; thoughts like this were discussed discreetly, mostly in private conversation. We kinda all agreed not to raise a fuss, but to ``wait and see." Of course, at the time most of us in this camp were rooting for Freddie and the boys to be right, but the unfolding of time and events (including the 1989 collapse of the Berlin Wall and the Soviet Union) have dented the Society's credibility, irreparably for most of us.
For some, yes. For others, no - but I decided to "wait upon Jehovah" for the light to get brighter and give me a better understanding. What a jerk!
Dansk
Some of you, like Room 215 are really old-timers, aren't you? I know that I was born in the 50's and for most of my young years 1975 was the thing that everyone hoped for. I never believed all of it because JC said, "No one knows the day or hour". But I did think that it was possible that the end could come within a few years after that.....you know, some math error.
I agree with Room215 when he mentions that there are prophetic interpretations that for jws are to be held in as high esteem as central doctirnes - the 1914 belief, for example, is actually as much a part of their doctrine as any other teaching.
There were many interpretations I questioned, as did my wife (privately, of course....friggin Gestapo), like the interpretations involving the trumpet blasts in Revelation, 1290 and 1335 days in Daniel, and stuff like that.
Not really, but a lot was not important for me.
"That the end is coming soon" is in the Bible too, and mankind is waiting for "the end" for more then 2000 years now. I suspect that it won't come during my lifetime.
What is more, there is written that nobody knows the time or the hour, so why should we expect it in a certain period.
+ I was always irritated when old prophecy's gained a new explanation for this time.
I didn’t believe any of it, but I thought it was because I was not smart, and that I didn’t love god enough. I never realized that the reason non of it made any since , was because it just didn’t make any since. I remember my mom screaming at me because I asked Why, Why did we add all these days together, and then count each day as a year. Where was the instruction to do that in the bible? And if it were in the bible, why didn’t Jesus know about it?
I believed in the explanations of jw prophecy with all my heart and I would try to defend it the best I could, but I didn't understand the majority of it. I just figured that if it was taught by the fds it must be true. I just let others do my thinking for me without really trying to understand what was being taught. It wasn't until after leaving the jws and researching the religion that I began to understand the beliefs. Boy, what an eye-opener.
Hapgood
I was never a dub but to be honest I think the WT is the only one that even tried to interpret all those passages . I don't think I've ever heard anyone else try to explain the Revelations to a degree that it made any sense of most of it . It seems to me that most religions tend to focus on the trinity and hell fire or the rapture than to really look into the writings for any form of prophetic fullfillment in todays world .
I believed the JW prophecies. And I understood some of them. For example, if someone gave me the series of scriptures that gave us the 1914 date and I know the starting date of 607 BCE (which, of course, most of us now know is not accurate), then I could probably explain it. Just a little math there and make sure that you know there is no zero year. One thing I did always wander was how they connected the scripture in Numbers that says "a day for a year" with scriptures in Isaiah or Daniel which gave prophecies in days. But then I thought, well the dates work out and I suppose this is where the holy spirit is guiding the Governing Body, so I accepted it as one of the things that came through those guys from Jehovah. Now, of course, I'd wonder why does God have to speak in a code that he only deciphers for a few people.
Other prophecies I never had any grasp on. Just before I left we were going through the first Isaiah phrophecy book, which claims to explain that book of the Bible verse by verse. I haven't looked at that for some time, but it's kind of dizzying how it attempted to juxtapose actual kings in human history over beasts and over the explanation of the king of the north and the king of the south. And also interesting was how the king of the south and the king of the north were always changing and the many shifts in power between those two. I've forgotten what the point of all that was. Maybe there never was a point. Just something to keep you impressed that the GB had some kind of direct line with God.
