Why does the Watchtower leadership slap its own defenders in the face?

by slimboyfat 63 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

  • Clambake
    Clambake

    TD

    Robert King is does make some good points and you can tell he has been obviously hurt by the borg but the deeper you get into his stuff he is not enlightened, he is just mentally ill.

    I really wonder how many JWs have a special room in the basement with bible verses pasted on the wall with tacks and strings trying to connect everything together. It reminds me of that movie a beautiful mind expect they are not very smart.

  • TD
    TD

    If you had asked me 15 years ago if I'd ever be nostalgic for the days of "Babylon the Great has Fallen" or "Life Everlasting in the Freedom of the Sons of God" I'd have laughed in your face, but there you go.

    Yes! This.

    Even a work of fiction requires continuity. If, for example, you're writing a story about vampires and in your fictional world, sunlight kills them, then obviously they can't be out in broad daylight later on in your book.

    FF may have been a loon, but he wove his lunacy together with an internal harmony that was oddly satisfying.

  • TD
    TD

    Robert King is does make some good points and you can tell he has been obviously hurt by the borg but the deeper you get into his stuff he is not enlightened, he is just mentally ill.


    You mentioned Stafford and King. I was referring to the former, not the latter.

    Stafford struck me as idealistic, but not "mean" at the core. I remember him being exceedingly polite in private conversation. And unlike Furuli, (Or King) Stafford did realize that he was wrong on some things and attempted to make amends. .

    King is a little more polished today than he was in the mid to late 90's when his participation on JW discussion forums consisted of alternately predicting Armageddon and telling us how the birds of heaven were going to eat our eyes out, but that misanthropy still seems to lurking under the veneer.





  • Vidiot
    Vidiot

    Vidqun - "...Franz was quite knowledgeable and had a good grasp of languages. But the Society leaned heavily on his expertise since N. H. Knorr. After his death in the nineties, things went downhill fast..."

    Yeah, Freddy left no protégé.

    What would be the point, after all? The Org never expected "This Old System" to last long enough for them to need one.

    Plus his End-Times script was highly tailored to the Cold War, and they never expected that to end on its own.

  • slimboyfat
    slimboyfat
    Do you think Robert King should be considered as having been a JW "apologist" along with Stafford, Furuli and he rest?
  • TD
    TD
    I don't think King stuck closely enough to JW theology to have been considered an apologist. (Even when he was a JW..)
  • slimboyfat
    slimboyfat
    Thanks, I never thought of him as an apologist really. He was YouKnow wasn't he? Just an Internet troll really. I've never taken him seriously. It always surprises that some leaving the JWs do seem to take him seriously.
  • careful
    careful
    Wow! What a thread, like Blues Brother has put it, this is like SBF's old threads. Thanks SBF for coming back in your old mode and posting insightful and intriguing material. Just curious: do you have a rich wife or are you retired? How do you find the time to do all this research?

    Vidquin's observation is also spot-on: "Now their theology is driven by seven simpletons that have no clue." No wonder they are in theological and financial trouble!

    While the thread seems to have gone off on several tangents, SBF's original thought is worthwhile. People like Furuli probably see no contradiction in their behavior regarding things like this because their overall theological belief is that the WTS leadership as embodied in the GB trumps everything else. He may not feel any hurt or any sense of lost validity over his defense having been cast aside, but he may indeed view the whole thing as God's direction, as done "at the proper time." Unless Furuli would ever begin to question that overriding key assumption of the F&DS, I doubt that he would feel any betrayal here. In fact, in some way that may seem strange to us, Furuli may feel blessed by having been used by Jehovah because "that was the thinking then, brother"!

    Now on this tangent of the revised NWT:
    Does anyone know if Edgar Foster and/or Max Wörnhard were/are on the revised NWT committee? They are supposed to have formal training in biblical languages as well as university positions.

    http://fosterheologicalreflections.blogspot.com
    http://www.kps.unibe.ch/forschung/
    https://ch.linkedin.com/in/max-wörnhard-24b48917
  • slimboyfat
    slimboyfat

    Interesting how you imgine Furuli would react careful. I have wondered how he would respond to this thread. Not that he ever would, but if he did what might he say?

    Maybe he would start by disputing the premise. He would point out that some of the verbal curiosities he approves of are preserved in the 2013 edition, and say that I've overstated my case and that his work was not in vain.

    He might bamboozle me with science, claim I've misunderstood the case he makes around Hebrew verbs, or generally defend his technical position rather than tackle the actual point about the NWT's u-turn and the redundancy now of his apologetic on its behalf.

    But reflectively on his own, I'm sure he must be a bit disappointed about the 2013 revision. Maybe somewhat annoyed that they apparently didn't take his expertise on board. There have been credible reports on here that Furuli is in open disagreement with the GB about the merits of higher education (how could he be otherwise?), and that it may have got him into some trouble locally.

    I have never heard of Max Woernhard - can you tell me about him?

    Foster is a very intelligent fellow who would be well capable of advising on the translation of NT Greek and other matters. But I'm doubtful the GB would have consulted him. Unless you know otherwise?

  • Vidqun
    Vidqun
    Slimboyfat, think how different the landscape would have been: 1) If they had encouraged secular education; 2) If they encouraged input from the brothers and sisters by reviewing their books in the Watchtower, inviting comments from the brothers. I know for a fact their chronology would have changed for the better with the help of Carl O. Jonson; 3) Having had a department at Bethel, filled with highly qualified, young and men and women, analyzing advancements in scholarship and Bible translation, and assimilating the input of the brothers. Yes, here even Rolf Furuli, with his unusual ideas on language and linguistics, would have given valuable input. If only... Yes, I know, farfetched indeed, but one is allowed to dream here on the outside, without the theocratic shackles of the demigods.

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