not a society apologist!!
just wanting to know what you all think.
does this "sound" fair & balanced, you decide.
thirdwitness is obviously a typically deluded JW. As is usual, he puts up a strawman and then tries to knock it down.
The simple fact is that elders are instructed to see to it that rank and file JWs who know that someone is a molester keep their mouths shut to non-elders. A JW can and will be disfellowshipped for gossip and slander if he talks to non-elders about a molester who has not been disfellowshipped.
AlanF
not a society apologist!!
just wanting to know what you all think.
does this "sound" fair & balanced, you decide.
The article is typical WTS-defender bullshit.
The author acknowledges knowing that critics state that the Society often speaks out of both sides of its mouth on the issue of child molestation. This is demonstrably true, but the author dismisses it without any evidence at all. What he does is to quote official policy -- completely ignoring the fact that written policy is often ignored when the Service Department gives oral instructions to elders. Indeed, the basic instruction to elders is this: "Don't handle abuse cases on your own! Refer all cases to the Service Department." Why is this so? So that the Society can directly control what happens with the case, without leaving a paper trail.
At the 2001 Kingdom Ministry Schools for elders, a new policy was announced: elders should never suggest to an abuse victim or her family that they should not go to the police. This was followed up a few months later (February 2002, I believe) with a letter to Bodies of Elders stating the same policy. Now think about this: if there never was a policy, unofficial or otherwise, to suggest that victims not report abuse to the proper authorities, then why was it necessary for the Society to state it?
An excellent illustration of the Society's doublespeak is the case of one Daniel Fitzwater from Nevada. He molested a lot of girls in the 1980s. On the verge of being exposed by victims, he moved to Florida until the statute of limitations ran out. Then he moved back to Nevada and started molesting JW girls again. By the late 1990s, many girls had complained, and the elders and even a Circuit Overseer reported this to the Society, which did nothing. Eventually four girls filed a criminal case, the guy was convicted and spent about seven years in jail. He was released in 2005, I believe. All of the girls who brought the charges were harassed by the Society and are no longer JWs. Nothing was ever done about the many other girls who were molested. While the perpetrator was never disfellowshipped, his daughter-in-law was threatened with disfellowshipping for talking about the case to other JWs. While in prison, the perp carried on "Bible studies" with other prisoners and was regularly visited by local elders. Last I heard, he's still a JW in good standing in Nevada.
A lot more could be said to debunk that JW defender's bullshit, but I'll leave it at that.
AlanF
just got this link sent to me by my sister in law and i just keeping staring at it trying to decide where to start.
i know that arguing with a jw is like throwing miracle wheat in the wind...but i want a comeback!!!
http://www.2001translation.com/587_or_607.htm
The nonsense on the site is easy enough to debunk in principle, but it takes a great deal of time to go through it item by item. Since much of the debunking information is already available in Carl Jonsson's The Gentile Time Reconsidered, as well as a great number of scattered references, and the JWs who put the site together are deliberately ignoring it, it's obvious that they woudn't be affected by a debunking article. Nevertheless, it would be nice to have one available.
AlanF
a quote from this site - http://www.2001translation.com/jerusalem's%20destruction%20587%20or%20607.htm says that 'most historians agree that 539-b.c.e.
is the date of the overthrow of babylon, for there is much evidence pointing to this.
so, it is called an absolute date.
Jeffro wrote:
:: Now, it might be argued that Josephus' claim is wrong, i.e., that the Temple foundations were not laid in Cyrus' 2nd year. Indeed, I am not aware of any independent confirmation of his statement.
: What about the book of Ezra itself? Ezra 1:1 mentions the 1st year of Cyrus; the narrative continues, and says that in the 7th month the Jews were in their cities. Though no year is explicitly stated in that verse, it is evident from the context that it is referring to the same year; indeed if a different year was meant, it would likely have been stated in Ezra's historical account. There is absolutely no reason to assume that Ezra 3:1 does not refer to the same year as Ezra 1:1. Ezra 3:8 obviously refers to the year after that for the laying of the temple foundations, which was 537.
I completely agree with you. However, because Ezra does not explicitly state in which year of Cyrus' reign the events occurred, there is a bit of wiggle room for doctrinaire JWs. Good Lord! We see scholar pretendus and other moronic JWs wiggling around even extremely explicit statements such as Jer. 25:12. I think that the dating implicit in the text of Ezra, combined with Josephus' explicit dating of a crucial event, is unarguable. They reinforce each other. AlanF
i came upon the following link to a complete set of windows media compatible audio recordings of this summer's district convention talks:.
http://www.evanjhoush.com/wtb&ts/2006/deliverance.at.hand.district.convention/.
enjoy!.
I came upon the following link to a complete set of Windows Media compatible audio recordings of this summer's District Convention talks:
http://www.evanjhoush.com/wtb&ts/2006/deliverance.at.hand.district.convention/
Enjoy!
AlanF
a quote from this site - http://www.2001translation.com/jerusalem's%20destruction%20587%20or%20607.htm says that 'most historians agree that 539-b.c.e.
is the date of the overthrow of babylon, for there is much evidence pointing to this.
so, it is called an absolute date.
scholar pretendus here seems to think that readers of this forum are as morally stupid as most JWs. My disproof, using Josephus, of the Society's 537 date is a good illustration of this. The proof is extremely simple and can be illustrated with an analogy of the sort found in basic intelligence tests:
(1) John says he bought a Honda in February, 2005.
(2) George says he bought a Toyota in September of the year before John bought his Honda.
Question: In what year did George buy his Toyota?
The answer is trivally obvious: 2004. Most any six-year-old that is not mentally challenged can figure it out. However, if an adult whose entire life hinged on believing that George bought his Toyota in 2005 were given this question, he would probably do everything he could to avoid answering it.
This is precisely the reason that scholar pretendus refuses to acknowledge that Josephus' information disproves the Society's claim that the Jews returned to Judah in 537 B.C.
Now, it might be argued that Josephus' claim is wrong, i.e., that the Temple foundations were not laid in Cyrus' 2nd year. Indeed, I am not aware of any independent confirmation of his statement. But if scholar pretendus were to make this argument, it would follow that he acknowledges that Josephus' claims that are not backed up by independent information are sometimes unreliable. But because he has often argued that some of Josephus' claims -- in particular those that seem to support Watchtower chronology -- must be taken as gospel, it would follow that this argument is specious, and therefore the Watchtower could not use anything Josephus said to establish any date unless it were backed up with independent data.
Thus we see the sort of feral intelligence at work that results in the massive Orwellian doublethink practiced by JWs, the same doublethink that can be called moral stupidity -- an outright refusal to acknowledge simple facts when such facts are inimical to one's beliefs.
AlanF
a quote from this site - http://www.2001translation.com/jerusalem's%20destruction%20587%20or%20607.htm says that 'most historians agree that 539-b.c.e.
is the date of the overthrow of babylon, for there is much evidence pointing to this.
so, it is called an absolute date.
scholar pretendus goatus buggerus said:
: Readers on this board will notice that you are nothing but a bluff
To a willfully stupid and blind JW drone, anyone who presents inconvenient facts is a bluff, as well as an apostate.
: and your hypothesis for 538 is sheer nonsense because it is simply too short a time.
Utter nonsense. Jeffro and I have repeatedly pointed out to you that the Jews had a minimum of six months to get back to Judah, from the time of the issuing of Cyrus' decree to the beginning of the seventh month, Tishri. With a trip time of 3-4 months, that's plenty of time.
The fact that you repeatedly fail directly to address this point, but pretend it does not exist, proves your willful stupidity.
: You have provided no proof that 538 was the year for the Return and Josephus does not support your nonsense.
The facts contradict you:
(1) Josephus directly states that the temple foundations were laid in the 2nd month of Cyrus' 2nd year. This was incontrovertibly in the spring of 537 B.C.
(2) Ezra 1-3 directly states that the temple foundations were laid in the 2nd month of the year after the Jews returned to Judah.
(3) Putting (1) and (2) together, there is no conclusion but that the year after the Jews' return was also Cyrus' 2nd year, which began in the spring of 537 B.C.
(4) From (3), there is no conclusion but that the time of the Jews' return was in the summer to autumn of 538 B.C.
: I invite other readers to analyze your nonsense and spot the flaws as an academic test, I will respond only after others have read your nonsense and made a definitive comment.
Although Jeffro has already analyzed the above "nonsensical facts" and come to the same conclusions that anyone with the intelligence of a non-JW would, there is no need for anyone to do so. The facts are clear and incontrovertible.
You obviously have no arguments since all you can manage is ridiculous excuses such as you've displayed here. Readers also know that no matter who chimes in to support my conclusion, you'll still find some stupid excuse to dismiss the facts, so your "challenge" here is an infantile ploy to allow you -- in your own mind -- to dismiss the facts by a form of fallacious argument known as "appeal to authority".
: Is everyone up for the challenge? Let there be proof for 538 and then this material can be published so as to enlighten the scholarly community and Carl Jonsson.
The usual ploy. Yawn.
AlanF
a quote from this site - http://www.2001translation.com/jerusalem's%20destruction%20587%20or%20607.htm says that 'most historians agree that 539-b.c.e.
is the date of the overthrow of babylon, for there is much evidence pointing to this.
so, it is called an absolute date.
Jeffro, I want to point out that Jonsson is convinced that 587 B.C. is the correct date for Jerusalem's fall. For the most part, secularly oriented scholars accept this date, whereas religiously oriented scholars tend to accept Edwin Thiele's conclusions about 586. I think 587 is right, too.
AlanF
a quote from this site - http://www.2001translation.com/jerusalem's%20destruction%20587%20or%20607.htm says that 'most historians agree that 539-b.c.e.
is the date of the overthrow of babylon, for there is much evidence pointing to this.
so, it is called an absolute date.
Participants in this thread will note that, as usual, scholar pretendus completely ignores the proof that Josephus and Ezra together prove that the Jews returned to Judah in 538 B.C., which fact all by itself kills Watchtower chronology. I've provided references and the argument based on them; Jeffro even provided a graphical timeline showing the events.
[edited] AlanF
a quote from this site - http://www.2001translation.com/jerusalem's%20destruction%20587%20or%20607.htm says that 'most historians agree that 539-b.c.e.
is the date of the overthrow of babylon, for there is much evidence pointing to this.
so, it is called an absolute date.
Very good points, AuldSoul!
Unfortunately, as you already know, they'll be lost on our laughing boy because he subscribes to the never-stated-clearly-in-Watchtower-Land doctrine that the Society's leaders' proclamations are to be viewed as coming directly from Jehovah, until such time as these leaders declare that a particular proclamation is "old light". Thus, even though he admits that these charlatans can make doctrinal mistakes, scholar pretendus will pretend that all of their current pronouncements on Bible chronology are directly inspired and therefore unchallengeable until the next time they decide to change the figures, as they did from about 1925 through 1944.
We can see this with the challenges various posters have given scholar pretendus with regard to the length of Evil-Merodach's reign. We know that, back in 1966, he would have been adamant that the Society's figure of 2 years was unquestionably correct, since it was given in Fred Franz's book Babylon the Great Has Fallen. But when later WTS publications fuzzily suggested that perhaps this figure was incorrect, scholar pretendus would have changed his tune in lock step.
Similarly, we know perfectly well that this moral moron would immediately change his opinion on any and all aspects of Bible chronology if the Society's leaders published updated information. This indicates again what all intelligent ex-JWs know -- Jehovah's Witnesses as a people and as a "theocratic" (LOL!) organization are grossly intellectually dishonest. They don't follow the Bible at all -- they follow what Watchtower leaders claim about the Bible.
AlanF
