For ex- (or current heh heh) bethelites...

boa

Hi all you former (or still in lurkers heh heh) bethelites.My question to you is: Was your time in Bethel the turning point in your jw life? If so, what was it that started you on your way out? boa 'bethel life was my key to the real life'

boa

The formatting for posting seems to be all messed up so I'll put my story in a new box. To the first question, my answer is, Yes, bethel was a turning point in my association with the jws. I suppose the seeds of change were developing before we went there, but I didn't recognize any such change for what is was, until now, five yrs later. My answer to the second question is that I (we, wiffy and I) went to bethel with a pie-in-the-sky view of the org and really knew so little about anything outside of the story published in the watchtower. So naturally, going there and seeing reality, not so much anything scandalous, but realizing these people were all just that, people, with real world problems and concerns, was quite a surprise - jeece I was SSOOOOOOOOO naive! Anyway, the bethel requirement to read the whole bible from genesis to revelation was a 'revelation' to me since I had never done it before. It got me thinking about many things in it which were so difficult to understand by wts doctrine that one either rejects it all or rolls over with the idea that you NEED the fds to help you understand the 'sacred secret'(s) of the Bible. Especially though, was the reading of Ecclesiastes a critical crossroads in my future with the dubs. Since that point subtle changes occured in my thinking and basically we couldn't wait to finish our 1 yr stint which we agreed to fulfill before leaving for 'family' reasons. If anyone attended the canadian bethel within the last 10 yrs, and is now out of the org officially or fading, please pm me if you wish to talk some more. boa

got my forty homey?

It defintely was for me. After my year was up and really stopped all activity within two months. Pioneering, meeting attendance, associations, everything.

It is a common expression in bethel, that upon leaving it will make you or break you. and that those who leave under bad terms usually never recover from it. This was told to me by a Bethelite I served with in 1987 who is now serving at the Farms in Walkill who knocked on my door one Sunday Morning. We spoke and I told him I was DF'd. He came back several more times and that was that.

I knew upon leaving Bethel that my "career" was over. No MS for several years, and such. It amazes me that even a slacker like myself was concerned about titles and such.

Satanus

I worked on construction of the canadian bethel in 1979-80. I didn't find it easy, but it didn't turn me off on the wt.

SS

sunshineToo

Years ago I visited the Bethel. Those Bethelites in the factories didn't seem to be happy at all. At that time our gang thought, "maybe because the work is so hard."

Nadsam

Dear Boa

What drove me insane about Bethel....in South Africa (1985-90):

Waking up with the a bell at 06h00 (some awfull hooter sounded like prison alarm)
Monday evening Study (which would go on and on for hours)
Friday evening "Movie" night ...happened only once a month usually it was study, study , study !
Saturday afternoon "Social Barbeque"..basically the only time you could have 2 hrs to yourself
Laundry day...not getting your socks back
Never ending construction !!!!!
Boring semi psycho room mate who listened to depeche mode and kept grabbing his crotch !LOL
Daily Cleaning Sisters rumaging through my closets looking for booze , porn or apostate lit.
Elder at the head of the breakfast table looking how much I ate
Lengthy prayers and daytext pomp and ceromony.
Obsession with "allowance day"
Knowing married couples had sex (I wasn't). The lived next door, but always looked happy???
Perky Elders wanting to shake your hand
Even worse perky ugly sisters (really ugly) who just loved to talk and talk and talk
Money borrowers & lenders
Car pools
Being a work overseer on the construction site on weekends with a bunch of kids !!
Moving between various temporary accomodations while working
Eating convention left overs....two days after the convention ended.
Lunch at one of the local congregation elders homes on Sundays (trying to marry you off to one of his nasty daughters or a MS hoping he'd score points for having a Bethalite over.)

However none of this made me leave. I actually made friends with an old "Anointed" brother who was kind and easy going but has long since passed away.

I left the borg in 94 due to their excessive hypocrasy and no longer agreeing with their endgame plan.

Nadsam

Narkissos

Bethel (in France, 1981-1985) was certainly a turning point for me. I had been baptized at 13 when part of my family became JWs. I left high school at 16 to pioneer. At 18 I was a special pioneer, at 20 a MS, and so on. For years I didn't read anything except the Bible and WT literature.

When I came to Bethel I was surprised to find many young people there who had been "born in the Truth" and who were actually much more open-minded than I had been. Some of them were reading a lot and had a number of interesting hobbies (such as astronomy or mountain-climbing). Another good thing is I had to preach and teach much less and was obliged to think a little more.

I soon was assigned to the Translation dept. To enhance my writing abilities I felt the need to read good (i.e. not-WT) French, and I started reading a number of novels and essays (some of them, pretty good, recommended to me by other Bethel members). Dealing with the details of WT literature as a translator also made me aware of a number of logical flaws -- they were, in fact, a common joking subject among translators.

I translated the Watchtower during several years and a large part of the Aid book (in a censored edition as Raymond Franz had recently been disfellowshipped). As I was very interested in the Bible, I started studying Hebrew and Greek by myself. We also had a small group studying the weekly TMS Bible portions using non-WT Bible commentaries.

One day when I was working in the Bethel Library a good friend of mine started a discussion about the "ransom" doctrine. She was a DO's daughter and had been "raised in the truth", but she just couldn't understand why it was necessary for Jesus to die for us. I was quite shocked and began rehearsing the common WT crap, at the same time feeling how meaningless that was. This was the start of a series of incredibly free discussions, involving several persons in Bethel. I started to read the NT with different eyes. A few weeks later I submitted my resignation. And another few months later I was disfellowshipped for "apostasy"...

Had I not been in Bethel I would perhaps still be a good pioneer today...

Elsewhere

Dealing with the details of WT literature as a translator also made me aware of a number of logical flaws -- they were, in fact, a common joking subject among translators.

I would love to hear what a few of these are.

Narkissos

Elsewhere: the most common jokes were rather harmless, about farfetched interpretation details or typical WT (actually Fred Franz's) phraseology... but not always.

One case (not quite a joke, actually, but somewhat funny anyway) I well remember is about a 80's Watchtower commenting John chapter 10. M., the brother in charge of the Translation dept., was visiting the oldest member of the team, E. (who had translated the NWT into French and had learnt the Biblical languages for that task), who worked in a different place. Here's the conversation as M. related it to me later:

M.: "By the way, E., there's something new in the last Watchtower about John 10."

E.: "You don't say? So the "other sheep" are the Gentiles at last?"

M.: "Oh no... not yet."

E.: "Well, next time maybe..."

I also remember when M. translated the Creation book and had to check many scientific references in extant French translations. He very often complained that the quotations were curtailed and taken out of context, and did show me quite outrageous examples.

When I resigned from Bethel, I had a long conversation with M. I also met him when I was eventually disfellowshipped and came back to fetch the few things I had left in Bethel. Both times I felt he perfectly understood me, and even looked at me with some envy. I can still hear his words: "Anyway, all that I am and have, I owe it to the organization, so I stay loyal to it."

I heard he later became the president of the national WT. A very nice and intelligent man though.

For ex- (or current heh heh) bethelites...

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