Mephis

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Posts by Mephis

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  161

  Court denies summary judgement for Laurel Jehovah's Witnesses congregation

  by OrphanCrow in

  1. watchtower
  2. child-abuse

  court denies summary judgement for laurel jehovah's witnesses congregation.

  a motion for summary judgement is denied in a case against the laurel congregation of jehovah's witnesses and some individuals over child abuse reporting issues.a lawyer for the congregation maintained that elders were exempted from reporting requirements under a state law because of clergy privilege and confidentiality.the case resulted from allegations that elders did not report an unlawful sexual relationship between a woman and a 14-year-old boy, both of whom were members of the jehovah's witnesses congregation.. download the court opinion here.

  http://courts.delaware.gov/opinions/download.aspx?id=235880.

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  Mephis
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  Seeking Source material

  by Doug Mason in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  i am calling on the combined scholarship of this site to help me with my research..

  under the subheading of “who selected the canon?”, pages 27-28 of the watchtower of april 1, 2010 quotes professor oskar skarsaune and professor kenneth berding..

  the watchtower writes:.

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  Mephis

  Glad the Professor was kind enough to check himself Doug. I went through everything I could find that he's published in peer reviewed journals and drawn a blank. He seems to have edited at least one collection of essays, and I'm wondering whether it's possible editor has become author in the mind of the copy/paste drone. Will keep poking about.
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  25

  Has a 'Christian' ever murdered somebody?

  by goddidit in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  a jw made the claim "no christian [jw] has ever murdered anyone".. when i showed examples of such, the goalposts moved a bit with "was he a baptized, dedicated witness?".

  can anyone provide examples of murders committed by "baptized, dedicated" jws?.

  thanks.

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  Mephis

  The problem you may have though is that no matter which example you give, it'll be 'but they obviously weren't true JWs because they killed someone". It'll get circular pretty quickly.

  http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/jehovahs-witnesses-caught-police-after-341490
  
  
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  24

  Reveal News: "Jehovah’s Witnesses fight law on reporting child sex abuse to police" by Trey Bundy

  by AndersonsInfo in

  1. watchtower
  2. child-abuse

  https://www.revealnews.org/blog/jehovahs-fight-law-requiring-child-sex-abuse-be-reported-to-police/.

  jehovah’s witnesses fight law on reporting child sex abuse to police.

  trey bundy, february 1, 2016 .

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  Mephis

  Just wanted to pull out the points the judge raised from the judgement. It's the judicial nature of the process which the judge argues place it outside of it being a confession in Delaware. JWs could have a confession in Delaware, they could have the whole body of elders sat there in clown suits and still be allowed to call it a confession, but the judicial process thing they do is being called out for being outside of the exemption to report.

  The [exemption] applies only when the purpose of the conversation is for penitence. The affidavits supplied by Defendants leaves open certain questions of fact. What was the motivation of Juvenile Member and Mother in bringing the sexual relationship to the attention of the Elders? Was the intention to report misconduct to church officials, or to confess sinful behavior and thus to obtain absolution? The fact that Juvenile Member was excommunicated may indicate that Juvenile Member did not come voluntarily to the meeting, or that Juvenile Member did not reveal the information with the understanding that his repentance might result in the absolution that ordinarily is associated with sacramental confession.

  
  

  The circumstances and motivation of Adult Member also are in question. Defendants' affidavits indicate that the conversation was demanded by the Elders as part of a disciplinary process. If the meeting with the Elders was not initiated by Adult Member, Adult Member may not be deemed to be a penitent. If the purpose of this meeting was for the Elders to investigate alleged child abuse, [the conversation] may not be a sacramental confession.
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  24

  Reveal News: "Jehovah’s Witnesses fight law on reporting child sex abuse to police" by Trey Bundy

  by AndersonsInfo in

  1. watchtower
  2. child-abuse

  https://www.revealnews.org/blog/jehovahs-fight-law-requiring-child-sex-abuse-be-reported-to-police/.

  jehovah’s witnesses fight law on reporting child sex abuse to police.

  trey bundy, february 1, 2016 .

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  Mephis

  The judge in this case picked up on the same thing Angus Stewart noted at the Australian Royal Commission. JWs don't have a sacramental confession. If elders are investigating things, that's not confession. If you're excluded from the religion, then you've hardly been absolved of your sins. Wonder how far they'll fight this one. Got to think they'll take it as far as they can because it really knocks holes through their claims for exemption from reporting laws in the US. And in other common law countries too, even those where toleration for their idiocy is subject to judicial discretion.
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  4

  RIP Terry Wogan

  by LoveUniHateExams in

  1. social
  2. current

  i've just been reading the sad news that terry wogan has passed away after a short illness (cancer).

  he was 77.. i admit that i wasn't necessarily a fan of his but he came across as such a nice, decent, softly-spoken and gentle individual.

  he was also a successful broadcaster and presenter.. i hope his family realize how much he was loved and get the support that they need at this difficult time.

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  Mephis

  I loved listening to his commentary for Eurovisions. And his pirate radio show MC for radio 6 was just incredibly funny.

  Hold tight HTML. It's the renegade sound.

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQ4q80YVdks
  
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  11

  Christianity and the Dead Sea Scrolls-Do the Scrolls Help us Understand Early Christianity?

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i think most scholarship would agree with a positive answer to that question.

  but let's take a look for oursselves.

  geza vermes, in his excellent translation ( the complete dead sea scrolls in english-penguin.

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  Mephis

  Just a minor point really, but one thing which really stood out for me the first time I sat down to go through the work done on them was just how difficult the idea of 'a bible' is to pin down. I suppose that was a legacy of the JW belief of there being one fixed divine word which has remained unchanged down the ages. And their claim the Dead Sea Scrolls prove that because all the OT is there unchanged. Well that ain't so.

  Instead what we see in the Dead Sea Scrolls is a group of texts which are passed down with few changes, often none. So the Torah, Isaiah, the Psalms and the twelve minor prophets seem to be fairly unchanging. But then everything else seems up for debate. It's not fixed. It's altered and amended and revised. They add new texts and new stories and new prophetic visions. They even rewrite books to form new books. A new version of the old process we see in what we call the canon with Deuteronomy and Chronicles.

  And one does see the same process within christianity too. Oral traditions get converted into written ones, and not only does the perspective change with the writer but also what actually is said to have happened. It's hard to escape the majority accepted conclusion that the gospels are re-writes from the same source material (probably Mark). Newly discovered letters are merged with older ones (eg the known pseudographical letters which made the canon vs those accepted to have been written by Paul), and then selection from amongst the various visions to get Revelation into the canon. And before the canon process semi-finalised things, what a crazy mix of texts were being used on a regular basis. eg The Shepherd of Hermas.

  Similar processes take place in Christianity as those we see happening with the Dead Sea Scrolls. The OP mentions the shared 'pesher' interpretation of prophesy, and the general atmosphere, but I think one sees a really strong Judaic strand to 'scripture' in its entirety too. And it's very, very different to the idea of a fixed word of God which passes unchanged through the ages.

  (References: Florentino Garcia Martinez is an interesting read on the scrolls generally, but his contribution to Authoritative Scriptures in Ancient Judaism (2010) supports the bulk of the factual assertions I've made here. He kindly shares a large number of his essays and lectures on academia.edu if anyone has interest in learning at that level of detail).
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  16

  Do People Have Spirits? What Do the Early Texts Say?

  by Cold Steel in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  for years adventist sects, including the jws, have believed that the dead sleep at death and remain non-existent until the resurrection.

  its strongest argument seems to be text in the non-escchatological book of ecclesiastes in the old testament.

  although a part of the canon of scripture, the book is not written by a prophet, nor is there any prophecy or recognizable doctrine contained therein.

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  Mephis

  @Cold Steel.

  I'd obviously disagree with parts there, but the point is really that trying to rely on Old Testament Jewish writing to buttress Christian beliefs seems a little flawed whoever does it. Because we know that the Jews themselves did not have a belief system which required the issue to be set in black or white. One can force whichever interpretation one wishes upon the Torah is essentially the point. The Jews did that for a long time,. The adventist movement are just paying the price for going with one interpretation and then trying to harmonise everything in the bible to that interpretation. Sometimes they hit pay dirt (Ecclesiastes) other times it's just nonsensical and they have to try to explain away some of the points you've raised.

  Our earliest christian writings are the letters everyone agrees are Paul's. And we know for sure that Paul's interpretation of doctrine was not shared by every Christian even at the time he wrote them. Something he acknowledges himself. So how far can one push that onto christianity as a whole? I really don't know there is an answer which can't be criticised, so just raising the point. By the late first century, I think we are looking at a gradual consolidation towards what you say. Some people get upset even if I air quote 'orthodoxy', so I'll label it a proto-orthodoxy. The things which can safely said to be in common. I look to the Didache though and I see a group of millenarians waiting for Christ to arrive, with a resurrection of the just just before it. That's not really fitting the story of one idea in Christianity about this.
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  41

  Does Believing in God Make You Dumb?

  by Brokeback Watchtower in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzqaeusdmtk.

  http://jdc.jefferson.edu/jmbcimfp/5/.

  abstract.

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  Mephis

  Of course I assume everyone here is college-educated with a degree

  A lot of us are. And then some. We just don't make a big thing of it other than to encourage others to consider the options which work for them with education, or professional qualifications. Best time on some of the other ex-jw groups are when people post up their graduation pics. Always so cool because we all have some idea of how much it takes to get there. Oh, personally, I have BA (hons), MA, PGCE (ie MA equivalent), plus similarly weighted professional qualifications. Like my privacy, but the universities were Russell Group standard although cost was a bigger factor than anything else in my choices.

  Anyhows, well done on your bachelor degree. Genuinely. If you wish to use education as a very loose proxy for intelligence, I think that's fair enough as long as allowance is made within this particular community for the difficulties around that. It's also worth keeping in mind that in the wider world, an undergraduate degree isn't uncommon. The average secondary school teacher here in Britain will have at least that and, commonly, the MA equivalent teaching qualification.
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  2

  UK report 1in 5 charities misuse more than half of their income!

  by sherrie11 in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  i understand that there is charities commission happening in the uk.

  i have read its really hard to loose charity status.

  how is this affecting the org?.

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  Mephis

  Donations are included under income for WBTS. But the Charity Commission are investigating the polices and procedures related to abuse of children, vulnerable adults and survivors rather than financial affairs of WBTS. Until the Commission reports back on what has happened, it's hard to say what the impact will be. In the past there have been other investigations (eg Mill Hill congregation) and other promises to sort out a proper child protection policy which ultimately led to not a lot changing. They're very, very unlikely to lose charitable status unless they go full derp on implementing adequate policies. I can see a scenario where they'd willingly relinquish it in order to avoid having to have outside oversight on what they're doing but it would be expensive for them.