I have thought about this myself: if Jehovah's creatures are "amazingly designed", why is it that carnivores are OBVIOUSLY amazingly designed to kill other animals and eat their flesh (and blood, OH MY!).
How does that fit the idea that all animals were (and will again become) vegetarians in The Paradise(tm)? Well, the official resonse is: DON'T THINK ABOUT IT!!!
They also say that these animals must have been vegetarian inside Noah's Ark (which raises the question: where were the other TEN arks necessary to carry a years worth of vegetarian food??? I guess I'm not supposed to think about that either!
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*** w61 12/15 pp. 766-767 Questions from Readers ***
Questions from Readers
* When, in Genesis 1:30, God says: ?To every wild beast of the earth and to every flying creature of the heavens and to everything moving upon the earth in which there is life as a soul I have given all green vegetation for food,? are we to understand that this absolutely excludes the idea that any animals ate meat at that time or before that? And on this basis are we to conclude that all animals will be vegetarian in the new world? How, then, can we account for the meat-eating birds, insects, reptiles and other animals with their poisonous fangs, hunting prowess, and so forth, apparently given them at creation and admirably equipping them as meat eaters?
Genesis 1:30, as just quoted, does not say that God had given ?all green vegetation for food? to the wild beasts, the flying creatures and everything moving upon the earth in addition to what meat or flesh they could catch by hunting. The verse just ahead tells us that God said to Adam and Eve: ?Here I have given to you all vegetation bearing seed which is on the surface of the whole earth and every tree on which there is the fruit of a tree bearing seed. To you let it serve as food.? (Gen. 1:29) We do not understand this to mean that Adam and Eve could eat animals that lived on grass and other vegetation, and that in eating such animals minus their blood Adam and Eve were eating vegetation indirectly, inasmuch as, to begin with, the animals ate the vegetation and then Adam and Eve ate the animals that lived on such vegetation to convert it into flesh. No! But it is evident that God set the perfect man and woman on a vegetarian diet, without suggesting even dairy products.
First after the flood God specified in so many words that Noah and his family and their descendants could eat bloodless meat or flesh. This indicates that God-fearing men like Abel, Enoch and Noah and his family had not lived on animal and bird flesh prior to the flood. What the ungodly men lived on till the flood we do not know. Abel, Enoch and Noah and his family did not reason in a roundabout manner and violate the Edenic dietary law that God stated to Adam and Eve in Eden, in Genesis 1:29, 30.
Of course, the Bible says a lot about zoology, [HA HA HA HA!!!] but the Bible is no exhaustive treatise on all zoological matters. It therefore leaves in a lower or secondary position the discussing of details about the lower animal creation. It fixes first attention on Jehovah?s superior earthly creature, man, and specializes on that. Hence the facts about wild beasts, domestic beasts, flying creatures and insects are spoken of only incidentally, or in illustrations.
So, if the Bible itself does not give any answer to these questions about those creatures lower than man, it does not mean that there is no answer to the questions that is consistent with the Bible [in other words: even though the Bible doesn't explain it, we here at Watchtower will happily go beyond what is written and give you the acceptable explanation]. It simply means that we are not to preoccupy ourselves with such questions. One big fact we must remember: that we humans are living and all these birds, insects and other animals are living in a system of things that has obtained since Jehovah God legalized man?s eating animal flesh minus its blood. Accordingly, if man has been eating animal flesh and insects for four thousand three hundred years and has teeth that can be adapted to eating such solid food as flesh, it is not strange that birds, insects and other animals should be also living on flesh that they hunt for and catch.
As to the preflood situation on the diet of man and animals, we may take the situation in Noah?s ark as an illustration. Under God?s instructions Noah and his family were to take into the ark wild beasts, domestic animals, flying creatures and birds, two each (male and female) of the unclean kind, and seven each of the clean kind. Besides this, Noah was to take into the ark every sort of food that is eaten to ?serve as food for you and for them.? (Gen. 6:19-22) Now Noah had no deepfreeze unit nor any refrigeration installation to preserve processed flesh foods in the ark. The seven sheep, seven bulls and cows, seven goats, two horses, two pigs, and so forth, that Noah took into the ark would hardly have been enough flesh food for the two lions, two tigers and two of the other wild flesh-eating beasts of today to live on in the ark during the flood. Noah was not instructed to carry on a slaughterhouse in the ark to feed the wild beasts with flesh foods. Nor was he told to enmesh tremendous quantities of flying or creeping insects to provide fresh food for the creatures today devouring insects.
Noah came out of the ark the following year with not less wild beasts, domestic animals, flying and creeping creatures and birds than he took into the ark. It is possible that he had more when he came out, due to the breeding of these lower creatures. Well, then, on what did every living thing in the ark live during those twelve lunar months and ten days, or one full solar year, shut up inside the ark? Certainly not on flesh, nor on one another.
All those creatures, human and subhuman, were able to live without flesh for a whole year inside the ark. Why could not every one of those living creatures live without flesh during 1,656 years prior to the Flood, or back to the time when God specified to Adam and Eve in Eden what he had given to earthly creatures as food? And if they could subsist that way during the first 1,656 years of man?s existence, why can they not return to that way of life and keep living that way during the thousand-year reign of Jesus Christ and then for eternity? During his millennial reign Jesus Christ as King will have control over animal, bird, insect and fish life as well as over human life. He will regulate it according to God?s will and for the good of all creature life on earth. So we should not think only of the post-Flood side of the question and leave out of consideration the pre-Flood side of the question as if it had no bearing. Let us take the Bible position on the subject and not over-occupy ourselves with merely incidental matters to the extent of wasting time, thought and peace of heart and possibly stumbling ourselves into the camp of the godless evolutionists.
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Meat Eating Creatures? Please Don't Think About it!
by Quotes 14 Replies latest watchtower bible
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Quotes
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czarofmischief
Wow. That's stupid, even for them.
CZAR
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ezekiel3
Pure mind control:
"DON"T THINK or it will turn you into a godless evolutionist."
OK, I'll have to ponder that incidental matter.
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truthseeker1
OMFG!!!
This is too funny, its almost unbelievable.
Q: Why do snakes have venomous fangs?
A: I can't answer that, so don't ask it!
Q: How is it that animals who are strictly carnivores ate veggies before the flood?
A: Well, they must have ate veggies on the Ark, because there was no refridgeration on the ark to keep the meat fresh for a year. Therefore they must have eaten veggies. If they can eat veggies for a while year, whats to say they didn't eat veggies before then?
This almost beats the answer I recieved when I asked an elder about the snake venom and fangs. He said thats what we see the snake using its teeth for today. Whose to say what he used them for before. Perhaps he injected the venom into apples to make them fall from the tree so he can eat them. I started laughing.... Needless to say, that was their last attempt to bring me back into the troof.
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Nosferatu
Now Noah had no deepfreeze unit nor any refrigeration installation to preserve processed flesh foods in the ark.
No, Noah had a Ronco Food Dehydrater!!!
Seriously, how the hell are you supposed to put veggies in storage for a year? I highly doubt that Noah jarred a bunch of peaches and pickles. He couldn't have grown the stuff on the ark, since there was no sunlight (unless Noah had a UV light he could run off the ark's battery).
So what did Noah and all the animals eat? Nourishing tree bark.
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toreador
This is an interesting topic. You have to put your mind on eternal hold to questions like these. Hruuuummmppph.
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truthseeker1
Maybe they all hibernated...
But if they were all asleep, how do they know how long they were on the ark? perhaps because they lived for hundreds of years with no tv, they knew how long their hair and nails grew per month and figured out how long they were asleep...
Ahh, there are so many explinations that can be used if you want to ignore the facts to support your own BS ideas.
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Zuko
I often thought about this subject myself when I was still in the truth. It seemed to me things where either black or white in the truth, never gray or mostly white. This used to really bug me about evolution because the arguments both sides make to discredit eath other make sence. The only conclusion I could ever come up with, which of course was dismissed by everyone I told it to was this.
Why is it so unreasable to think god created everything with the ability to evolve on its own? Perfect examples are animals that live in the arctic. If the earth was covered by a water canapy like JW's say then everywhere on earth was warm. So why can penguins survive in the temps they do? I can't fly or run 40 miles per hour because I was not designed too and I dont need to. Why can a penguin due that? What about polar bears? There are fish with an antifreeze like solution running in them so they dont freeze.
Look at man. I stand 6'1'' and 260 pounds(no its not all fat) =) In the 1600's I would have been considered a giant because everyone was 5'4''. The average size of a human has increased dramatily in recent centuries. Why do we have an appendix? Where did our tailbone come from? How many different insect sepices are found each year? And lastly how the hell did Noah fit all that stuff on the ark. I would be willing to bet that based on the size of the ark as given in the bible, based on the amount of different species today you could not fit all the different types of birds and reptiles found on earth today in there, let alone mammals think of the amount of food needed. I used to have more examples back in the day but I cant think of them right now.
Well theres my rant. Sorry for the spelling in am in a hurry.
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truthseeker1
Zuko, to answer all your questions is simple: Noah did it so it must be possible. Just because we don't know how doesn't mean he didn't.
If this isn't good enough for you, you must be counseled!
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Quotes
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No, Noah had a Ronco Food Dehydrater!!!
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Ha ha!!!
And when he got off the ark and was allowed to eat meat, he got himself a George Forman grill!
Sersiously though, althought this article doesn't state it, it comes very close to suggesting that these creatures "changed over time"..... which is, of course, EVOLUTION!!!!!
~Quotes, of the "Naturally Selecting Only Intelligent Religious Leaders" class