by hubert 35 Replies latest watchtower bible
you can't just show up at a JW assembly with swim trunks and say that you want to be baptized.
Isn't it against bible principles if one is not allowed to do this? How about the Ethiopian eunuch in Acts 8? He got baptized only a few minutes after he learned about the good news. Acts 8:36 In light of this chapter in Acts, it seems strange that a person has to go through so much study and questioning before he or she gets baptized.
Re the old material, in a meeting with an elder & others they too suggested that info I got was doctored, or things sent to me could be fakes. I suggested we could have the paper and ink tested and split the cost. Somehow, they then believed that the info I had did look pretty much like the real thing, even the scans. As for how far back should one go, husband keeps saying - "today". What the heck does that mean? Considering their own literature tells you to look back at older issues. Never mentions any cut off dates. Also, I thought "new light" never extinguishes old light, it only enhances it. However, when the new light totally contradicts the old light it can hardly enhance it, can it? carla
Hello Blondie
Actually they do go faithfully to meetings. What I think happens to a lot of them (the general average JW) is that meetings are so darn repetitive that you ?think? your paying close attention to it, but in reality your brain is just glancing at it because you already know (err in this case think you know) what it?s going to say. I think that is how I missed the generation change, and how my parents missed the details of blood fractions, I haven?t got up the courage yet to discuss the generation issue. The blood and old doctrine/apostate issue was enough for one day.
Then again I am just guessing.
Jahna
you know on the Internet there are apostate renditions of them.
lmao
I remember having a return visit on this older lady when I was just a youngster. She was nice and always talked to me. One day she stated that she & her parents used to study with the Bible Students when she was younger and that she knew very well who Pastor Russell was (and I barely knew who he was at that time...ha ha ha). She took me to her garage and showed me the boxes of books and old Watchtower and Golden Age magazines she had...all the way back to the 1910's/1920's. I thought that was real cool. She said that the next time I came she'd have some out and cleaned up for me to look at, etc. I was so excited. When I got back to the car group I told my dad about it and he came unglued! He said that I was NOT to go back to that lady's house and that I was not to look at any literature that she had, because she was obviously one of the Evil Slave class, because she & her family were not JWs. I couldn't understand why the books would be wrong to look at, since they were early literature of the JWs, but later, as an adult, I understood the paranoia. After all, so many of the older books and teachings can be 'weird', as well as possibly conflict with current teachings. As I did research later as an adult, I found those things out. So, according to my dad at the time, the "old light" was EVIL!
My grandmother began studying with the JWs back in the late 1920's, so she had many old WT publications. When she moved into our household, she pretty much gave my parents her extensive WT library. As a result, my siblings and I had plenty of opportunity to read the old literature. Since my two brothers and I were all voracious readers as well as being very interested in all kinds of history, we each spent time reading the old books and magazines. Our parents did not forbid us reading this older material, either.
I remember being astonished by what I learned about the changes in doctrine/beliefs over the years. The stuff written by Rutherford was often convoluted and ventured into the truly bizarre. Grandma also had some very old magazines dating from before she became a JW that were given to her by a fellow JW at some point. My brothers and I were amazed at how the International Bible students were allowed to celebrate holidays, smoke and the males had beards. Also, the women were allowed to be Bible/book study conductors.
I truly believe that the research we did back when we were growing up was a major contributing factor to each of us leaving the JW religion. The many inconsistancies, flip-flops, contradictions and the progression of restrictions on people's personal grooming/dress habits with no clear, scriptural backing....well, it all led up to really feeling betrayed and deceived. I think the GB/WTBS has caught on to the fact that much of their own, older publications are damning proof against them and will probably induce R&F JWs to leave after such discoveries. So, they are making a concerted effort to discourage R&F from reading older WT material they possess in personal WT libraries and are severely limiting the new converts' accessibility to it, as well. I find it pretty humorous, myself, that they are scrambling around and making desperate attempts at "damage control". Kind of like closing the barn door after the horses have gotten out!
On occasion important issues have been clarified, and we have wholeheartedly supported these
decisions.
If something has been clarified, that just means it is restated so it is well understood by the audience. It is not a "decision". A "decision" is what they make when they change rules. Blah.
I went to pioneer school abt. 20 yrs ago. We were all required to stand up and tell our "coming into the troof" stories at lunchtime. I had been forced into the borg during childhood, so I didn't have much to say. Neither did another girl with me. I said I was going to make up a story, and I did. It went something like this:
"....so I decided that, if I was going to devote my entire life to this religion, I thought I'd research things for myself and be sure I knew it my heart it was the troof....so I went to the local library-" <full stop while audience makes a collective noise of shock>
That's how they feel about research.
It's not like they take a roll or something.
Well, they did when I was baptized. They had a list.
I could never understand this "gradually increasing light" doctrine since their new light usually does not in any way add to the old light so as to make it brighter, and often totally negates it.
Apparently being god's sole channel on earth is a very tricky business since the right info never seems to arrive into your head and you have to tuck around in circles ultimately getting nowhere.
One should expect upon reading the god inspired WTS doctrines to see their consistent development over time, instead we see them getting discarded one after another, after having seen many alterations to their content and then.... people should no longer know about them. It's the classic case of the spiritual charlatan.
Well, they did when I was baptized. They had a list.
.........don't know when this came about, but, when I was "dunked" (I cringe at using the word baptised in their case), there was no list. You sat with the candidates, pledged your oath of allegiance to the WT with everyone else, went into the back single file, changed clothes, and was dunked in the highly bleached water without so much as a second look.
I wonder did they compile such "lists" in Jesus' day?
