Lots of churches do this though. My wife's pennicostal pastor mentioned at least two urban legends that came straight off of SNOPES. One was about the hitchiker that claims "Gabrial's lips are on the trumpet" before disapraring and the other about Eddie Murphy and the white lady sharing a Vegas elevator.
That being said, no one ever accused the writing department of checking their facts.
Another Urban myth Perpetuated By the WTS
by BluesBrother 17 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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what_Truth?
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Navigator
Most biblical scholars agree that the tale of Jonah is an allegory designed to offset the harsh and cruel policy laid out in Ezra and Nehemiah. It was included in the canon of Jewish scriptures for that very purpose. Some of the returning exiled Jews from Babylon had intermarried with the indigenous females. Those in the second wave were pretty racist and demanded that those women be "put away" even though divorce was terrible thing for women in that day. ;As I recall, the account in Jonah doesn't mention a whale. The need for the WTS to make the bible literally true is an indication that they don't really understand what it is saying.
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blondie
Just after I read this, same day, no kidding, I was flipping through the multitudinous cable channels in the religious section and stumbled on a guy using this same account to prove that Jonah could be swallowed by a whale. So the urban legend lives on.
What is the current WTS guess?
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w93 8/15 p. 32 Did It Swallow Jonah?THE Bible tells us that Jonah, a prophet of Jehovah in the ninth century B.C.E., fleeing an assignment, boarded a ship. During the stormy voyage in the Mediterranean, the crew hurled him overboard. "Jehovah appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah, so that Jonah came to be in the inward parts of the fish three days and three nights."?Jonah 1:3-17.
Some say, ?Impossible! No creature in the sea could swallow a man.? But either a sperm whale or a great white shark could. National Geographic (December 1992) offered another possibility?the whale shark. The largest known shark, it can grow to 70 feet [20 m] in length and weigh 70 tons.
"The whale shark?s unusual digestive anatomy lends itself to Jonah stories. It is easy to imagine yourself being inadvertently sucked into a whale shark?s mouth, which is huge . . . The cavernous mouth of even a small adult whale shark could easily accommodate a pair of Jonahs."
The whale shark feeds on tiny plankton and krill, which "wash down through the esophagus into the immense and elastic banquet hall that is the cardiac stomach." Yet, how could anyone get out? National Geographic says: "Sharks have a nonviolent way of getting rid of large objects of dubious digestibility they swallow . . . A shark can slowly empty its cardiac stomach by turning it inside out and pushing it through the mouth. . . . So, you could come gliding out on a mucus-covered carpet, slimier but perhaps wiser for the experience."
Today whale sharks are not found in the Mediterranean, though they have been found as far north as New York City. Were they present in the Mediterranean in Jonah?s time? Who can say? The Bible does not specify what kind of sea creature Jehovah used, but Jesus himself confirmed that the account of Jonah is true.?Matthew 12:39, 40.
Notice the qualifying phrases and statements in the Insight Book pointing to evidence not evident or existing.
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it-2 pp. 99-100 Jonah, Book of ***What
sort of sea creature could possibly have swallowed Jonah?A favorite contention in the past was that no sea creature could swallow a man. But this argument is not valid. The sperm whale, having a mammoth square-shaped head that constitutes about one third of its length, is fully capable of swallowing a man whole. (Walker?s Mammals of the World, revised by R. Nowak and J. Paradiso, 1983, Vol. II, p. 901) Interestingly, there is evidence that the seaport of Joppa anciently was a headquarters for whalers. On the other hand, it is possible that the great white shark was the fish that swallowed Jonah. One of these that was caught in 1939 contained two whole 2-m-long (6 ft) sharks in its stomach?each about the size of a man. And the great white sharks have roamed all the seas, including the Mediterranean. (Australian Zoological Handbook, The Fishes of Australia, by G. P. Whitley, Sydney, 1940, Part 1?The Sharks, p. 125; The Natural History of Sharks, by R. H. Backus and T. H. Lineaweaver III, 1970, pp. 111, 113) It should be noted, however, that the Bible simply states: "Jehovah appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah," the kind of fish not being specified. (Jon 1:17) So it cannot be determined just what "fish" might have been involved. In fact, man?s knowledge of the creatures inhabiting the seas and oceans is rather incomplete. Noted the magazine Scientific American (September 1969, p. 162): "As it has in the past, further exploration of the abyssal realm will undoubtedly reveal undescribed creatures including members of groups thought long extinct."
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AK - Jeff
Blondie - good points.
I recall when this was being bantered about in the publications. I always wondered -why? Would it be needed to create modern day proofs of the many other miracles in the Bible? The burning bush - the nile to blood - the restoring of Namaan and Miriam from leprosy - the manna from heaven... on and on to infinity?
It is the fundamental mindset - they cannot allow that parts of the Bible are not literal - so they seek proof that is is possible at all, in support. I hold no position on the fundamental or non-fundamental nature of these specifics - and still I can accept that the Father is real and interested in mankind. But they cannot trust their public to have free thought and still stay in bondage.
Just my opinion
Jeff [of the free of fundamental sectarianism bondage class]
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Valis
Wasn't Pinocchio's father Gepeto swallowed by a whale? He even had a little cabin and a camp fire in there. That proves something but I'm not sure what.
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jeanniebeanz
That's neat, Valis! Where did you find those pictures?
Jeannie
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Gerard
UTTER TOTAL BULLSHIT >>stillajwexelder
No living organism's stomach has a pH lower than 1 (and that's only inside some lysosomes). Theoreticaly and mathematicaly, a negative pH is possible. But not experimentaly
If the molarity of hydrogen ions is greater than 1, you'll have a negative value of pH. For example, you might expect a 12 M HCl solution to have a pH of -log(12) = -1.08.
Why don't you hear more about negative pH? There are some complications in high molarity acid solutions that make pH calculations from acid molarity inaccurate:
- Even strong acids don't dissociate completely at high concentrations. Some of the hydrogen remains bound to the chlorine, making the pH higher than you'd expect from the acid molarity.
- Because there are so few waters per acid formula unit, the influence of hydrogen ions in the solution is enhanced. We say that the effective concentration of hydrogen ions (or the activity) is much higher than the actual concentration. The usual general chemistry text definition of pH as -log [H + ] (negative the logarithm of the hydrogen ion molarity) is better written as pH = - log a H + (negative the logarithm of the hydrogen ion activity). This effect is very strong, and makes the pH much lower than you'd expect from the acid molarity.
- If you were to dip a glass pH electrode into the 12 M HCl solution to actually measure the pH, you would get a pH that was higher than the true pH. This well-known defect in glass pH electrode measurements is called the "acid error"; it is sensitive to experimental conditions and difficult to correct for.
Cheers,
Gerry