Is eating maple syrup showing disrespect for life which god gave trees?
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Life Force in Plants never mentioned by Watchtower
by VM44 24 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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ithinkisee
Screaming Trees was a good band.
-ithinkisee
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Leolaia
hehehe, "I Nearly Lost You", on my "1993-1994 Favorites" mixtape...
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urbanized
I know. Mark Lanegan is awesome.
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VM44
Leolaia,
Yes, the whole concept of "spirit" or life force of the OT hebrews is based upon human or animal life. Humans and animals breathe while alive, and the ancients created a belief that tied this periodic motion displayed by living humans and animals to a "spirit" of life provided by God.
It also sounds very profound.
While plants were certainly considered to be alive by the OT hebrews, the really do not move on a time scale comparable with humans. Hence the omission of the spirit or life-force concept being applied to vegetation.
--VM44
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VM44
Plantlife was never held in esteem by the OT hebrew story tellers.....look at the Cain and Abel story.....Whose offering was approved, and whose offering was not? Hmmmmmm?
--VM44
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VM44
Seriously, I believe there is a problem with the following association of ideas:Living things <--> Spirit <--> Life Force
The first association does appear in the Bible, but I am not clear as to what the Bible writers really meant by the word "Spirit"
The second association of Spirit with "Life Force" is something the Watchtower has taught for at least the last 50 years, possibly more. I do not recall Charles Russell using the term "life force" which to me sounds very much like a "New Age" term.
Could "life force" been introduced when the Watchtower was promoting strange ideas about disease being caused by the atoms of the body vibrating at the wrong frequency, and that the miracles of Jesus were made possible because Jesus had an excess amount of electrons?
--VM44
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VM44
Could it simply be the case that the Biblical word for "Spirit" should be translated as "Breath"?
This would make more sense, as animals and humans certainly have a body, and the outword indication that either is alive is the physical observation that theya re breathing!
So James 2:26, "For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also" would simply mean that the body without spirit [or breath, the physical demonstration that it is alive] is dead, so that faith, without the visible demonstration of it by works, is also dead.
This makes sense to me. What do you people think?
--VM44
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VM44
It is confirmed..."Life Force" does not appear in The Watchtower Magazine during Russell's time, 1879 to 1916.
I did a search for the phrase appearing in the online Watchtower pages hosted at agsconsulting.com. It does not appear once! So it's use did not originate with Russell.
Most likely "life force" was introduced during the Rutherford years, possible by Fred Franz, but I am only speculating about this right now.
I think this might be meaningful discover. Just what it means though, I don't know! :)
--VM44
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VM44
Checked all of Rutherford's books, together they make up what has been called "Rutherford's Rainbow".
The phrase "life force" does not appear in any of his books.
--VM44