Yes, most of us at one time or another have wondered out loud what each
ERA (under a particular President) what say to the next era as teachings morphed, dissolved, reappeared in various exotic interpretations : each TRUTH.
It's mere vanity to think Truth evolves or grows brighter.
Who asks the simple question: BRIGHTER? BRIGHTER THAN WHAT?
If the last "Truth" was dark: who transmitted it from heaven?
Posts by Terry
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24Ask current Jehovah's Witnesses if they KNOW what happened in 1954 (SHOCKING)
by Terry in(referred to below: watchtower bible and tract society presidents: russell, rutherford, knorr, franz )did you know that from 1879 until 1954 ... ... the writings of c.t.russell, j.f.rutherford, nathan knorr, and the watchtower's own charter... ... agreed ... that jesus christ was to be worshiped?this fact has been cleverly and dramatically hidden by manipulation of older quotations.
______________________________________________________________________pastor charles taze russell answers the question for us.
see below zion’s watch tower 1898 jul 15 p.216“question: the fact that our lord received worship is claimed by some to be an evidence that while on earth he was god the father disguised in a body of flesh and not really a man.
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Terry
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17
Can we really talk about BEAUTY?
by Terry incan we really talk about beauty?
(first, a necessary preamble.
bear with me, please.
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Terry
CAN WE REALLY TALK ABOUT BEAUTY?
(First, a necessary Preamble. Bear with me, please.)
In my 73 years, I’ve had a writing goal:
“Understand the differences and distinctions of words.”
I am a writer.
I can’t write without words.
It becomes necessary for me to understand words in order to write effectively.
Unless I truly distinguish what I say and think accurately when using words,
- I am just making sounds that tickle the fancy.
What can we agree about words?
Some words describe real things. (Horse, dog, people).
Other words describe feelings about non-things. (Truth, Beauty, Courage.)
Still, other words create imaginary worlds in which deuces are wild.
Mixing those three very different categories leads to CONFLATION of “meaning.”
Define Conflation: Conflation is the merging of two or more sets of information, texts, ideas, opinions, etc., into one, often in error.
Mixing categories leads to Fallacy in our discussions.
Define Fallacy: “A fallacy is the use of invalid or otherwise faulty reasoning, or "wrong moves" in the construction of an argument. A fallacious argument may be deceptive by appearing to be better than it really is.”
We don’t want to contradict ourselves by writing errors, confusing readers, misleading people with vagueness and empty opinions. Of course not!
But - (this is vitally important) if the speaker or writer doesn’t realize conflation has happened - the writer is bloviating and misleading others - especially if the writer has talent and skill or credibility otherwise.
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This brings us to why the tool and skill of Logic was invented in the first place.
LOGIC: the art of non-contradiction
We don’t have to be stuffy to be logical.
We just need to exercise care and precision as a matter of deliberate habit.
True Statements do not contradict reality.
If we give an opinion, we should fly that flag outright.
A careful writer who understands what he writes and avoids conflation, illogic, and fallacy does no damage to the thinking of the reader.
A confused and indoctrinated writer is dangerous at worst, persuasive and misdirecting at least.
End of Preamble (whew!)
Sorry about all that. It was absolutely necessary, however.
_______________________
Finally, CAN WE TALK ABOUT BEAUTY (without confusion)?
I wish to write accurately by distinguishing my thoughts from my feelings.
Let’s go!
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May I begin a discussion of BEAUTY by referencing the human face?
Every person with eyesight has an opinion about the human face - whether a particular face is ugly / beautiful or in-between. Agreed?
In a beauty contest, the Judges determine by vote who IS and who is NOT. (Winner).
Aha!
We are onto something!
A Comedian who doesn’t make people laugh is being JUDGED by his audience.
He isn’t funny until he makes them laugh. The practical test exemplified.
Careful! Be cautious before you say, ‘Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder.”
This can only mean no standard is possible except by consensus.
A different set of judges, a different audience, a different Critic often arrive at startlingly
contrary pronouncements.
What yesterday’s Experts declared to be GREAT - may be decried by today’s Experts.
What then?
Take a deep breath. This gets deep.
Ready?
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PLATO (428 B.C.)The Philosopher Plato was very, very influential for thousands of years (even today)
Plato’s influence, like parasites in drinking water, has infected everybody who drank.
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What did Plato teach?
Plato's Theory asserts that the physical realm is only a shadow, or image, of the true reality.
Meaning?
The abstract, perfect, unchanging concepts or ideals that transcend time and space
TRANSCEND everyday contact with objects.
(*see below for an even more boring exploration)
So what?
Follow this trail of breadcrumbs with me …
Plato was Greek. He was the teacher of Aristotle.
Aristotle was the tutor of Alexander.
Alexander the Great (the greatest Greek!) conquered the world
taking Aristotle/Plato’s ideas to Jews and the Jew’s religious writings absorbed them.
New Testament Jews writing about Jesus founded the Neo-Platonic Greek view into Jesus’ and Paul’s teachings, concept-wise.
You may balk at this!
You may be offended by this. Or you may shrug it off.
Doesn’t matter. The evidence is there in text.
PLATO ruined objectivity by conflating it with Subjectivity.
Western Judeo-Christian minds had (unaware) accepted PLATO’s view - which is conceptually self-contradictory.
The consequence is HUGE!
Our greatest teachers, thinkers, religious writers CONFUSE non-reality with reality and inject immaterial “spirit” into concrete things - all the while insisting (Plato would be delighted) the physical realm is only a shadow, or image, of the true reality.
Particularly interesting to me is the language of Colossians 2:17, which reads:
“These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.”
This language of “shadow” (σκιὰ) and “substance” (σῶμα) mirrors the precise language used by Platonists (and later, neo-Platonists) to describe the human condition, imbued in shadows and seeking the true substance that can only be revealed by the enlightened.
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Where would Paul / Saul of Tarsus, absorb Neo-Platonic thinking?
The Apostle Paul was born in Tarsus.
The undefeated Grecian military leader Alexander the Great traveled through Tarsus with his massive army in 333 B.C.
Tarsus was a “free-city” without Roman interference.
It was well-known for its culture of Greek philosophy, literature and wealth. Its schools of learning rivaled and excelled even those found in Athens and Alexandria. Around 171 B.C. the city's library held 200,000 books, including a huge collection of Plato and Aristotle’s works.
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BUT WAIT!
What does this have to do with BEAUTY?
___________________________
ART
ART may carry with it the exact intentions of the Artist - but - without the Viewer
Who agrees, the Critic who nods, the collector who buys, and the AGREEMENT of those who write - where is the BEAUTY?
To argue that BEAUTY is “there” (Art for Art’s sake) echoes Plato.
"Art for art's sake" is the usual English rendering of a French slogan from the early 19th century, "l'art pour l'art", and expresses a philosophy that the intrinsic value of art, and the only "true" art, is divorced from any didactic, moral, politic, or utilitarian function.
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FINE ARTCertain phrases in German or French that are used to categorize the works of art that in English are called works of fine art. In German the phrase is schone kunst; in French is beaux arts. Where, then, does the phrase "fine art" come from?
Works of fine art are final in the sense that they are not to be used as means to ends beyond themselves, but rather to be enjoyed as ends in themselves.
The useful is always a means; the enjoyable is an end.
The fine arts are the arts productive of the enjoyable.
When a Sheraton chair is put on a platform and behind ropes it is viewed as an enjoyable work of fine art. In addition to having originally been made as a useful means for sitting down. (Practical).
ABSOLUTES in BEAUTY or ART
In the final analysis, if we strip away any Platonic notions (insidious propaganda) that outside of the real world a shimmering IDEAL exists casting its Shadow, we are able to separate our Intellect from our Emotions for a few seconds.
BEAUTY is a representative word standing in for our conceptual hunger for the topmost enjoyment of Life, the finest exemplification of talent, a crowning achievement of human effort. After all that - we step away from the real world and into a Poetic, Spiritual, Religious use of the word standing in for overwhelming emotions, strong feelings we can barely contain.
FINALLY, we have the lower shelves, bottom of the rung, ground level use of BEAUTY to mean something any person of any talent INTENDS for others to regard has somehow SIGNIFICANT if only abstractly, politically, or as a charitable shrug of the shoulders “ Nice try, Dude.”
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My apologies for all these distinctions.
I couldn’t talk about Beauty or Art without them at my low level of skill :)
(*Hebrews 8-10 Plato’s Allegory of the Cave)According to Plato’s “Theory of Forms” non-material ideas have a more fundamental reality than objects available to our senses. The idea of the chair is more real than the chair itself. You might even say that the physical chair is a “copy” of the idea of the chair.
This philosophy is illustrated in Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave.”
In the allegory, prisoners are chained in a cave, forced to look at a blank wall.
Enough light shines into the cave to show shadows of the world outside the cave.
These “shadows” are the only experience of reality that the prisoners have.In the allegory, the philosopher is the prisoner who escapes the cave to gain access to the real world, that is, the world of ideas.
They can then return to the other prisoners and free them, allowing them to see the world as it really is, not just as it is perceived by their senses.The goal of the Greek philosopher was to understand the universals in the world of particulars.
The Jewish philosopher Philo harmonized Jewish and Greek philosophy, applying the concept of forms, ideas, and allegories to Old Testament text and his exegetical method (the way he interpreted the Bible) was fundamental to some of the early church fathers.
How influential was Philo? Could his philosophy have impacted any of the Biblical writers?
This question comes to bear on Hebrews 8 – 10. In it, the writer says “[The priests] serve at a sanctuary that is a copy and shadow of what is in heaven. This is why Moses was warned when he was about to build the tabernacle: ‘See to it that you make everything according to the pattern seen on the mountain” (8:5). He also says “When Christ came as high priest of the good things that are already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not man-made, that is to say, not part of this creation” (9:11). And again, “It was necessary for the copies of the heavenly things to be purified with these sacrifices, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ did not enter a man-made sanctuary that was only a copy of the true one, but he entered heaven itself, now to appear before us in God’s presence” (9:23-24).
So how did the writer of Hebrews use the language of “copy,” “shadow,” “true,” and “heavenly?” Was he making a distinction between the physical world of particulars and the more enduring realities of ideas?
PLATO had unduly influenced the intellect of the writer. Otherwise, we must accept that Plato’s guesswork was equally inspired by God four hundred years before Christ.
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All of the above amounts to a Philosophical discussion of implications
in language, thought and - cough cough - meaning when combined with Religion. -
24
Ask current Jehovah's Witnesses if they KNOW what happened in 1954 (SHOCKING)
by Terry in(referred to below: watchtower bible and tract society presidents: russell, rutherford, knorr, franz )did you know that from 1879 until 1954 ... ... the writings of c.t.russell, j.f.rutherford, nathan knorr, and the watchtower's own charter... ... agreed ... that jesus christ was to be worshiped?this fact has been cleverly and dramatically hidden by manipulation of older quotations.
______________________________________________________________________pastor charles taze russell answers the question for us.
see below zion’s watch tower 1898 jul 15 p.216“question: the fact that our lord received worship is claimed by some to be an evidence that while on earth he was god the father disguised in a body of flesh and not really a man.
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Terry
caves :10 hours ago
Maybe a stupid question, but was Rutherford just a man that really was searching for meaning within the bible and thought he found it? Or was he just as manipulative as Knorr and his lot. Or does it just boil down to a long line of WT elites that kept a publishing company going off the backs of members knowing full well what they are doing?
____________SORRY ABOUT THE LENGTH OF THIS REPLY
Here goes:
_________First, Pastor Russell had joined Adventist bible students in their enthusiam for End Times chronologies.
Next, Russell teamed up with leading Adventist thinkers like George Storrs and Barbour to publish these chronologies and apologies.
Finally, Russell used his private wealth to cut and paste ideas from all over the religious map into his own peculiar name-brand version of Adventism which included pyramidology.
Local congregations kept autonomy. Russell would have it no other way. But, Russell had died in 1916.
Judge Rutherford crept in to wrest control of the Watchtower for himself and begin a new agenda which would transform local congregations of bible students into a cult of mind-controlled salesmen serving a religion of Business Organization.
This is what happened.
Rutherford's key strategy succeeded in wresting a personality cult (Pastor Russell) away from "creature worship" and transforming it into a business concern or Organization which could claim and demand loyalty in terms of statistical productivity (preaching and book sales.)
If you produce you get more responsibility. If your productivity wanes, you get fired. (Disfellowshipped.)
ORGANIZATION to Jehovah's Witnesses is serving a faceless corporation headed by God himself who keeps them on permanent probation whereby they may be fired (destroyed at Armageddon) if they don't keep their productivity at maximum and loyalty as unquestionable.
The transformation was dramatic and sinister, taking these former Adventists from being cast-off apostates of mainstream christian churches to followers of a charismatic ex-clothing store owner and, finally, captives of a man hellbent on creating a cult of complete and utter mind control.
Under Adventism, after the failures of William Miller's predictions and other johnny-come-lately end times guessers, sincere christians with a knack for believing seemingly ironclad chronologies found themselves in local congregations with autonomy beyond the control of any central authority.
Indeed, Pastor Russell would have it no other way! He himself experienced an evolution of sorts from Presbyterian to Congregationalist to Adventist and, finally, inventor of his own domain.
Russell would brook no central organization! Like the other Adventists who followed his writings, the Pastor identified the Roman Catholic Church with the "whore of Babylon" and would have no authoritarian organization such as it was invading his christian freedom.
But, Russell died and J.F.Rutherford squeezed himself in gradually to Russell's shoes under Russell's teachings...just long enough to secure himself and begin changing everything he could lay his hands on!
In 1932, Rutherford finally did away with the local, elected elders. For a time, many elders had been opposed to the growing emphasis on the preaching and book-selling work that took up more and more of the movement’s focus. Even though Rutherford had weakened their positions by centrally appointing special ‘service directors’ responsible for magazine sale, in theory a congregation was still independent and chose its own pastors, or elders. The main articles in The Watch Tower for August 15 and September 1, 1932 should put an end to that. The elders were for a time replaced by a special service committee still elected locally, but in 1938 this arrangement was also replaced by one in which the leadership were centrally appointed. While the JWs reestablished a form of elder arrangement again in the early 1970s, these were – and are – centrally appointed.
When the Bible Students group began to form around Russell and his teachings, Russell made clear his opposition to creating any Central Governing Body.
Each congregation of Bible Students, Millennial Dawn fellows or Russellites elected their elders and leaders locally by vote and not by appeal to Russell.
This continued until 1938!
Russell died in 1916 and J.F.Rutherford commenced a long range effort of consolidating power under himself alone as leader.
Rutherford's scheme for control was in three parts.
1.Get himself elected to the Board of Directors and make other administrators mere puppets and rubber stamp committees.
2.Appoint travelling "service directors" as organizers, sales trainers and magazine promoters. (Much like later Circuit Servants.)
3.Replacing local election and control with a centrally appointed leadership and elder arrangement.
Russell's faithful followers were united in hatred for the Roman Catholic church and its central authority and organization. Previously, as Adventists, they had railed against the RC church as "the whore of Babylon".
For J.F.Rutherford to go against Russell's view of central authority and "organization" he had to overcome a huge built-in abhorrence in the local congregations.
This began in earnest in 1938 (the year before WWII commenced in Europe.)
Rutherford’s control of the headquarters and publishing arm had been undisputed since the early 1920s at latest. Now he also had a direct control into the lives of every Jehovah’s Witness. Rutherford decided what they should learn at the meetings – less devotional and more commercial than ever – and what they should sell and say.
Rutherford also told JWs that ‘character building’; emphasis on personal Christian qualities, virtue and morality was quite unimportant and indeed a form of ‘creature worship.’ It is very illustrative to look up the word ‘adultery’ in the Watch Tower Publications Index 1930-1985.
(Here you will not find a single reference to sexual adultery anywhere in the WTS literature before 1947. Later, in the 1950s, and until this day, articles denouncing all sorts of sexual sins flourished. In Rutherford’s vernacular, the word ‘adultery’ was reserved for his opponents’ religious sins.)
Under Rutherford a crackdown on controlling the personal behavior of local congregations began after the embarrassment of 1925 failed to produce a resurrection of "ancient worthies" as Rutherford had predicted.
Rutherford's obsessive preoccupation with tightening the screws on every person involved in his empire ratcheted up from 1926 onward commencing with the eradication of birthday celebrations (denounced as pagan).
******* ****** ********
Birthdays and practically all religious celebrations were condemned as of ‘pagan origin.’ The Bible Students celebrated Christmas for the last time in 1926 (Proclaimers 200; Yearbook 1975, 147-9). The cross, until then an almost universal symbol for Christianity, was rejected as a pagan symbol. The Watchtower Society has since then insisted that Jesus was executed on an upright ‘torture stake’ without a crossbeam.
Rutherford could bend non-ambiguous scriptures into corkscrews in order to enforce his personal interpretation of how things should be done.
This trend towards a growing alienation & hostility towards the world culminated in Rutherford’s reinterpretation of Romans chapter 13, published in The Watchtower, June 1 and June 15, 1929. Here Rutherford insisted that the "higher authorities" to which Christians should subject could not be the earthly authorities. These "higher authorities," he argued, had to be God and Christ. This only increased the Bible Student’s hostility towards the secular state, which was now openly denounced as demonic (Penton 1985, 65).
Clearly and forcefully J.F.Rutherford had taken a small group of Adventist bible students enamoured of Pastor Russell's chronology and pyramidology and compacted them into a mind-control cult obsessed with proper behavior and adherence to rules, regulations and quirky interpretations from a central authority.
Under Rutherford, the almost "universal salvation" beliefs and teachings of Pastor Russell darkened into a vicious and vindictive ideology of blood and destruction.
Perhaps the most striking turnaround in JW doctrine in this period was Rutherford’s view of salvation compared to Russell’s. Russell was very close to teaching universal salvation and was not at all eager to condemn people to destruction (the existence of hell, we remember, he dismissed). Rutherford, perhaps partly due to the persecution he had experienced in the war years, should take a much stricter view of salvation. Gradually he came to argue that only Jehovah’s Witnesses had any real chance of surviving Armageddon, Jehovah’s war against Satan and – in effect – mankind. A part of this was Rutherford’s new doctrine about "The Vindication of Jehovah’s Name," still a central tenet of JW beliefs. Unlike Russell, who held that the redemption was the central doctrine, Rutherford preached that God’s vindication, by wiping out his enemies Old Testament-style in a large battle, was more important than individual salvation.
Between Rutherford and his crony C.J.Woodworth, the Watchtower and the Golden Age (Awake!) began publishing anti-medical anti-science articles fomenting radical faddist notions and downright crackpot denunciations.
(There was a limit, however. Woodworth, the eccentric editor of The Golden Age, found that limit when he, in 1935, tried to persuade Rutherford and the JW community to abandon pagan month and day names. Rutherford harshly censured and ridiculed Woodworth in front of the whole ‘Bethel family,’ a spectacle that shocked many who may nevertheless have agreed with the sanity of Rutherford’s decision to not force such a radical change (Penton 1985, 66-7).
Woodworth was second only to Rutherford as an important influence on the JWs in this period.
One oddity about him was his burning hatred for medical professionals. He considered the compulsory vaccination programs a Satanic and commercial conspiracy to weaken Christians by introducing animalistic tissue into their veins, and he even rejected the germ theory of disease, preferring strange ‘electronic’ and ‘radio’ based apparatus instead. Actually, the Watchtower Society at one time marketed and sold alternative ‘medicine’ through The Golden Age. The only part of these ideas that remain in the JW organization and culture is the blood prohibition – which still gives the movement tragic headlines in the press worldwide – and perhaps a tendency among JWs today to be preoccupied with homeopathy and other ‘alternative’ quasi-medical procedures.
The downward spiral of madness, cult control, anti-science and hatred of other religions mark the Jehovah's Witnesses of this period as followers of lunatics who, themselves, were anti-social misfits hellbent on putting their thumb in the eye of every OTHER authority on earth!
Further, the doctrinal changes Rutherford ordered were often based on whim, personal animus and pressure from reality threatening to disprove the Judge's theology.
For example:
Under Russell the 144,000 little flock were glorified resurrected christians who went to heaven along with non-glorified Great Crowd christians who also went to heaven.
Rutherford saw his membership figures climbing beyond 60,000 and threatening to exceed 144,000.
This would be embarrassing. Consequently, a doctrinal change or "new light" emerged making the Great Crowd an earthly group of Jehovah's Witnesses distinct in kind and nature from the heavenly anointed.
Now, in 1935, Rutherford changed this doctrine and started to teach that the members of the ‘Great Multitude class were all followers of the Watchtower movement, but they would be saved to live eternally on paradise Earth. It was the duty of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, then, to preach to all people and ‘harvest’ this ‘Great Multitude class.’ That there was any possible salvation outside the Watchtower movement was thus finally denied. Somewhat later, the term ‘Jehovah’s Witnesses’ should come to include this secondary class as well.
What does this signal? The CULT was fully formed as an "Only JW's will survive Armageddon" group of True Believers!
Pastor Russell took personal pride in self-financing his preoccupation of publishing due to his private fortunate. Rutherford, however, had no such money at hand.
Rutherford schemed to control local congregations and turn the membership into salesmen collecting funds from householders and passersby through peddling his books (of which there was an unending stream.)
Thus, the worldwide evangelizing work began in earnest as a way for Rutherford to establish cash flow and make his megalomanical empire financially sound.
Russell’s productivity of publications was no match for Rutherford’s. The first major bestseller, The Finished Mystery, was marketed as Russell’s posthumous book. Already in 1920 Rutherford managed to create his own first major international bestseller, the booklet Millions Now Living Will Never Die. Already the next year came The Harp of God, a book that would eventually reach a circulation of 5,819,037 copies in 22 languages.
As a lawyer steeped in legalism and terminology, Rutherford chose the name witnesses to construe a testimony in a Universal court on behalf of Jehovah. But, his worldwide witnessing was for cash which began flowing into the coffers of his enterprise with himself in sole control.
Rutherford's key strategy succeeded in wresting a personality cult (Pastor Russell) away from "creature worship" and transforming it into a business concern or Organization which could claim and demand loyalty in terms of statistical productivity (preaching and book sales.)
If you produce you get more responsibility. If your productivity wanes, you get fired. (Disfellowshipped.)
ORGANIZATION to Jehovah's Witnesses is serving a faceless corporation headed by God himself who keeps them on permanent probation whereby they may be fired (destroyed at Armageddon) if they don't keep their productivity at maximum and loyalty as unquestionable.
( The above information is distilled from the Master's Thesis of Jan S. Haugland http://home.broadpark.no/~jhauglan/rutherford.htm )
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16
I met an Exorcist
by Terry ini like to ride my bicycle to starbucks.
when weather permits i sit on the patio and write in the sunshine.a pesky crow i call edgar usually arrives to beg (or steal).that's all you need to know before we begin._____________________.
location exterior : the patio of starbuckstime: 11 amcast:lou : media / news analyst, religious fundamentalistterry: crow magnet and know-it-alledgar: spawn of satan________________.
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Terry
I like to ride my bicycle to Starbucks.
When weather permits I sit on the patio and write in the sunshine.
A pesky crow I call Edgar usually arrives to beg (or steal).
That's all you need to know before we begin.
_____________________Location Exterior : The patio of Starbucks
Time: 11 am
Cast:
Lou : Media / News analyst, religious fundamentalist
Terry: Crow magnet and know-it-all
Edgar: Spawn of Satan
________________Our scene begins with two men at separate tables working at their laptops.
Lou is a man of about 60.
He recently moved from New York to Texas to start his own
Videography business.
He is shooing flies away from his laptop screen with a disgusted expression.
A few feet away, Terry begins waving his arms and scowling.Terry: Thanks. They all came over to me now!
Lou: Oh, Sorry. They need to provide fly swatters for people who sit out here.
Terry: You’re obviously not a Republican Conservative!
Lou: Um what? Actually--I am. Why do you say that?
Terry: I’m being facetious. Conservatives preach personal responsibility rather than getting others to provide for them.
Lou: Ahhh, I see. I see. That’s funny. Are you a Republican?
Terry: You don’t want to know. Trust me.
Lou: What--why not?
Terry: It’s like asking Jack Nicholson to tell the truth on the witness stand.
Lou: I’m sorry--I don’t understand.
Terry: What did Nicholson answer when Tom Cruise asked him to tell the truth?
Lou: (Blank expression)
Terry: (Quoting Colonel Jessup in A Few Good Men) “You want the truth? You want the truth? You can’t handle the truth!"
Lou: (Face brightening. He ‘gets it’) Okaaay. Okaaay. Why though? I’m serious.
Are you Liberal, then?Terry: There are two things civilized people don’t discuss. One is Politics and the other is --”
Lou: (Jumping in) Religion! Haha, okay sorry. I understand. It’s just that I produce many religious videos and I’m a Website owner who provides commentary on news events with a biblical and Christian viewpoint.
Terry: I’m sorry to hear that. That means it’s impossible for us to have a civilized conversation.
Lou: You’re a pretty funny guy. What do you do?
Terry: I write. Among the things I write are analyses debunking religious fundamentalism.
Lou: Sure. Sure. No really. Do you write books or what?
Terry: Books, blog essays, CD liner notes, Short stories, poems, bathroom graffiti.
Lou: I don’t know when to take you seriously.
Terry: Welcome to my ex-wives’ world!
_________________From offstage a crow flaps down on to the patio and begins foraging near the two characters. Terry opens his backpack and removes a bag of corn chips.
He proceeds to toss them at the crow with deadly accuracy.
__________________Lou: You two know each other?
Terry: Let’s just say there is an interpersonal dynamic at play here. If I don’t feed him, there are consequences.
Lou: Sounds like the Mafia!
Terry: (Looking furtively left and right, raising his index finger to his lips) Sh-h-h-h. OMERTA!
Lou: Haha. What kind of accidents?
Terry: (Relates two bloodcurdling tales of Crow payback.)
Lou: Are you being serious?
Terry: Keyser Soze with feathers--that’s what we’re dealing with here.
Lou: (Clueless) I’m sorry?
Terry: (Quoting Verbal Kint in the Usual Suspects)
"The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist."Lou: Actually, I have performed actual exorcisms on people!
Terry: Of course you have.
Lou: You can hear another person’s voice coming out of the possessed. And when you finally liberate them, their voice changes and a great relief comes over their body.
Terry: (Knowing it’s time to go off the cliff) Is the voice coming from the person’s vocal chords or someplace else in the room?
Lou: It’s the person’s vocal chords--but a foreign voice. Very frightening unless the power of Jesus Christ is there to protect you.
Terry: (Sighing) I have a question about Demons.
Lou: Sure, go ahead.
_________________
(And now we begin)
_________________Terry: How big are Demons?
I’m guessing they must be fairly tiny for a bunch of them to fit inside a human.
I’m thinking of the one in the book of Luke called LEGION.Lou: Beg your pardon?
Terry: A Roman Legion was from three thousand to five thousand plus soldiers.
That’s a lot of Demons to cram into a person!Lou: Uh--well. . . Nobody ever asked that before. You do realize they are Spirits, right?
Terry: What does that actually mean?
The word Spirit--it’s a conceptual label rather than an actual thing, right?
If I say the word “Chair” you know what I mean but only vaguely. A REAL chair is specific, has
color, size, shape, design. I'm not asking a vague conceptual question. I'm asking about reality.
Lou: Well. Um. There are spirits. God is a Spirit. They are real but. . .
Terry: If something is real--as in reality--rather than imaginary--it exist with some magnitude, number, dimension, size--or else--why give it a name identity and number? I’m just asking what the point in possessing a person is--getting inside them? Why cram inside like clowns in a Volkswagen?Lou: (Lost) Uh. Well.
Terry: “The difference between Science and Religion is the difference of thousands of years of human development. Right?”
1. Ignorance and Superstitions
2. Religious myths
3. Philosophy
4. Scientific method
5. Technology and modernityDemons are a part of mankind’s first efforts to understand phenomena without Science or the scientific method of testing and measuring. We now know a thing cannot actually exist if it is not measurable, quantifiable, and testable.
Lou: You must believe in Evolution then, rather than the Bible.
Terry: Forty-thousand Christian denominations tap into that same source and -at the same time- DISAGREE each with the other.
That, my friend, is not only chaos - it is a contradiction.
LOGIC is the art of non-contradictory communication.
No Truth self-contradicts.Lou: God is in charge. I let Him worry about that.
Terry:
BACK TO MY QUESTION: how big did you say a Demon is?Lou: (Trying to figure out where he’s going) Oh, I was saying: demons are Spirits and um---(lost in thought). . .
Terry: Demons are Spirits without any size who can fit inside a human-- making it necessary to extract them by a ritual of exorcism? Is that what you are saying?
Lou: Yes. I have performed exorcisms.
(Terry is temporarily stunned at his good fortune)Terry: Single occupancy or multiple occupancy?
Lou: (Wheels turning) I. Um. What?
Terry: Never mind. It’s non-testable in any scientific sense.
Lou: Well--you can measure the effects. You can prove Spirits by their effects.
Terry: That’s like me saying to a Comedian--I’m not laughing, so you aren’t a Comedian.
Lou: (Suddenly chuckling) That is funny. You are a funny guy.
Terry: You see my point, then?
Lou: Well, let me think about it.
(A brief moment of regrouping)Terry: Did you ever hear a little story about a cowpoke known throughout the Badlands as the most accurate pistol shooter in all the land?
Lou: I’m all ears.
Terry: Dead Eye Dick, that’s him. He spent all day practicing target shooting.
At the end of the day, folks would come out of hiding.
“What’s he shooting at?”
Then - astonished -The Townsfolk saw targets--very tiny chalk circles barely larger than the bullet hole--hundreds of them and NO MISSES!
That’s how Dead Eye Dick achieved his legendary status.Lou: That’s pretty good shooting. So what?
Terry: Don’t get ahead of the story.
One day the town Blacksmith sneaks over to watch Dead Eye shooting at the barn.
Suddenly he smacks himself on the side of the head.
In town, that evening, he tells all the men in the Saloon what he saw.“We’ve been wrong all this time!” The Blacksmith shouts.
“Why is that, Smithy?”
“He shoots a hole in the barn FIRST and draws the circle Afterward.”(At this, Terry pauses and stares at Lou the Exorcist and waits…)
Lou: (Thinking. Thinking.) Oh. OH, hahaha, that’s good. That’s good.
(Pause ... and then ...)Terry: You, my friend, are Dead Eye Dick.
______Lou: I guess I better not feed him or I’ll incur a debt and end up like you.
Terry: If only. If only.
Lou: So, do you believe those Crow stories or not?
Terry: I believe what I’ve seen. The other stuff is opinion, scuttlebutt and hearsay.
Lou: Do you believe in Evolution?
Terry: We are going in a circle, you realize?
Lou: I guess its my turn to miss your answer.
Terry: I accept the evidence of Science to the exclusion of the opinions of Genesis.
Lou: Terry, the Bible is an infallible source of truth.
Terry: Did God create Eve by taking Adam’s rib from his side or is that a legend?
Lou: Fact.
Terry: Then it was really Adam’s actual rib?
Lou: That’s what the Bible says. Yes. It is a fact.
Terry: That would mean Eve was created by cloning and was, in fact, a duplicate Clone of Adam--and therefore, a man! Now that is Science.
Lou: Wuh-wuh-wait a minute--no it doesn’t? No, it isn't.
Terry: If the story is just a made up story you can’t expect ancient writers and storytellers to know about DNA. But--if it is the infallible word of God--you’ve got a problem!
Lou: Eve was a Woman--not a man. That’s proof she wasn’t a Clone.
Terry: Which came first, the rib or the woman?
Lou: The rib--but what--?
Terry: Adam was a male. His rib contained his chromosomes and DNA. If they didn’t, Adam was a woman too.
Lou: I--I, that’s. . .God could miraculously change Adam’s DNA into female DNA.
Terry: The Bible is literally correct?
Lou: Infallibly correct. Yes.
Terry: How many animals does the Bible say Noah placed on the Ark?
Lou: Two of each kind.
Terry: You shall take with you seven each of every clean animal, a male and his female; two each of animals that are unclean, a male and his female; Which statement is factually true?
Lou: Oh. Well. That’s--it’s a matter of perspective.
Terry: If you’re renting out a one bedroom apartment and 14 people show up instead of two--is it a matter of perspective or room capacity?
Lou: Hahaha. You’re pretty funny. I enjoy talking to you. I have to go now--I’ve got an appointment. Here’s my business card. I’m sure I’ll see you around.
Terry: My pleasure. Oh--don’t forget your crow!
_______
End Scene
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24
Ask current Jehovah's Witnesses if they KNOW what happened in 1954 (SHOCKING)
by Terry in(referred to below: watchtower bible and tract society presidents: russell, rutherford, knorr, franz )did you know that from 1879 until 1954 ... ... the writings of c.t.russell, j.f.rutherford, nathan knorr, and the watchtower's own charter... ... agreed ... that jesus christ was to be worshiped?this fact has been cleverly and dramatically hidden by manipulation of older quotations.
______________________________________________________________________pastor charles taze russell answers the question for us.
see below zion’s watch tower 1898 jul 15 p.216“question: the fact that our lord received worship is claimed by some to be an evidence that while on earth he was god the father disguised in a body of flesh and not really a man.
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Terry
_____________________DO YOU KNOW?
(Referred to below: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society Presidents: Russell, Rutherford, Knorr, Franz )
Did you know that from 1879 until 1954 ...
... the writings of C.T.Russell, J.F.Rutherford, Nathan Knorr, and the Watchtower's own charter...
... agreed ...
that Jesus Christ was to be WORSHIPED?
This fact has been cleverly and dramatically hidden by manipulation of older quotations. Jehovah's Witness in 2020 would never believe this to be true!
______________________________________________________________________
Pastor Charles Taze Russell answers the question for us.
See below Zion’s Watch Tower 1898 Jul 15 p.216
“Question: The fact that our Lord received worship is claimed by some to be an evidence that while on earth he was God the Father disguised in a body of flesh and not really a man. Was he really worshiped, or is the translation faulty?
Answer: Yes, we believe our Lord Jesus while on earth was really worshiped, and properly so. … It was proper for our Lord to receive worship in view of his having been the only begotten of the Father and his agent in the creation of all things, including man."
Judge J.F.Rutherford also taught that Jesus was to be worshiped:
“Jehovah God commands all to worship Christ Jesus because Christ Jesus is the express image of his Father, Jehovah, and because he is the Executive Officer of Jehovah always carrying out Jehovah’s purpose (Heb.:3–6).”
Watchtower 1939 Nov 15 p.339.
Nathan Knorr continued the policy of teaching that Jesus was to be worshiped by all:
"Since Jehovah God now reigns as King by means of his capital organization Zion, then whosoever would worship Him must also worship and bow down to Jehovah’s Chief One in that capital organization, namely, Christ Jesus, his Co-regent on the throne of The Theocracy.”
Watchtower 1945 Oct 15 p.313
___________
WATCHTOWER CHARTERFrom the 1945 Charter where it states to worship Christ Jesus.
Not until 1999 that worship of Jesus was finally removed to simply state "arrange for and hold assemblies for religious worship;"
In 1945 Knorr amended the Watchtower Charter. Included within the new Charter is the statement that the purpose of the Watchtower Society is to promote the worship of Jehovah
"and Jesus."
This charter is a legal document that continues to be the Watchtower Charter to this day.
______________________________________________________________________
WHY is this unknown to today's Jehovah's Witnesses?
They believe a lie about their own history.
They have been taught they were selected among all other religious worshipers in 1918 because of their teachings.
Current "TRUTH" standard--marks those earlier teachings as both
apostate and blasphemous!
But wait! It is referred to merely as OLD LIGHT ... not blasphemy.
Yipes!
How have Watchtower leaders been able to keep this fact a secret?
Is it the insidious strategy of avoidance, misquotation, substitutions and omissions?
The quote in the 1971 Watchtower only changes one word ...
... but this is significant as ithides the true meaningof the sentence.
NOTICE THE ... [word in brackets] leading the reader to theincorrect impression.
“…for public Christian worship of Almighty God [through] Christ Jesus: to arrange for...” Watchtower 1971 Dec 15 p.760
_________
The Yearbook of 1969 p.50 leaves the words‘and Christ Jesus’out altogether.
HOW?
____
Ellipsis (… or . . .), indicates an intentional omission of a word
_____
“ ... for public Christian worship of Almighty God ... ”
______________________________________________________________________
IMPORTANT QUESTIONS
Why the change?
Why stop the worship of Jesus?
The answer comes from the release of the New World Translation by Fred Franz and other secret committee members in 1954.
Franz insisted that contrary to most other translations, this new Bible for Jehovah’s Witnesses translate the word proskuneo as obeisance rather than worship whenever it referred to Jesus. This is despite the fact that in almost every other place the New World Translation translates proskuneo as worship.
Proskuneo occurs 55 times.
Of the 15 times it applies to Jesus it istranslated15 times asobeisance!
Franz goes out of his way to remove worship for Jesus and switching worship to Jehovah to bolster his BRAND NAME religion Jehovah's Witnesses.
____
Questions from readers:
“Should we worship Jesus?—G. B., Ethiopia.
" ...the answer to the above question must be that no distinct worship is to be rendered to Jesus Christ now glorified in heaven. Our worship is to go to Jehovah God..." Watchtower 1954 Jan 1 p.31
_____________________________________________________________________
Judge Rutherford had created the title: Jehovah's Witnesses in 1931.
Instead of "Christians" the Watchtower was encouraging identification with a brand name for a newly minted religion distinct from the Bible Students of Russell's day.
Peculiar doctrines were introduced effectively creating martyrs to publicize this new religious Brand.
Almost everything a Jehovah's Witness "stood for" was contrarian and provocative.
Judge Rutherford weaponized his new religion.
Mainstream Christians were mocked, scorned and labeled "satanic' and business and military institutions single out for attack.
Now, in 1954, the transition from Christian to Jehovah's Witness cult came full circle.
_______
THE OLD SWITCHEROO
Publicly changing Christianity's worship from Jesus Christ ...
... and REPLACING Jesus ...
... with a weird newly-minted entity...
... called"faithful and discreet slave" (i.e. governing authority of men) ...
... a switcheroo toppled Jesus from his throne and a substitute religious scheme
with Jehovah and his band of merry frauds were newly installed.
BEFORE: CHRISTIAN
AFTER: JEHOVAH'S WITNESS
BEFORE : JESUS
AFTER : FAITHFUL & DISCREET SLAVE (Watchtower leader/leaders)
Thus, false worship was officially instituted by Fred Franz for Nathan Knorr and later himself.
IDOLATRY
Current Watchtower teaching makes it absolutely clear that Russell, Rutherford and Knorr were (by their new standard) committing idolatry!
BLASPHEMY (Defined: taking what belongs to God and giving it to someone else)
The entire history of Jehovah's Witnesses as "chosen" as a "mouthpiece of God" and guided by The Truth is demonstrated to be blasphemous falsehood!
Nothing Christian remained.
Governing Body became the MEDIATOR between God and man replacing Jesus Christ.Watchtower says Jesus is mediator for just the 144,000 anointed.
"So in this strict Biblical sense Jesus is the "mediator" only for anointed Christians." Watchtower 1979 Apr 1 p.31
"Likewise, the Greater Moses, Jesus Christ, is not the Mediator between Jehovah God and all mankind. He is the Mediator between his heavenly Father, Jehovah God, and the nation of spiritual Israel, which is limited to only 144,000 members." Worldwide Security Under the "Prince of Peace" (1986) pp.10-11
Loyalty to the GB instead of Jesus permeated the organization.
This religion became, in effect, Anti-Christ!
From 1966 through 1975 the entire worldwide work of these Jehovah's (non-christian) Witnesses consisted of warning people of the most important date in human history about to take place in their own lifetime: 1975--THE END of six thousand years of human history!
False Prophecy created by a False Religion that won't even call itself
Christian by title!Ask current Jehovah's Witnesses if they KNOW what happened in 1954.
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12
Whatever became of Marvin Shilmer?
by careful in12 hours ago someone resurrected a post by marvin shilmer from years ago.
it was then that i realized that i haven't seen a post from him for a while.
a check shows it's been 4 years.
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Terry
I FOUND IT!
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B6a8Sp5_PSf-UTdBaXY5ZFhqNms
_________
Note: I don't think I've opened it in seven years. You might as well run it through a virus detector software.
____
There was scuttlebutt he was Bill McAninch (Shelby Star) and that he had died. -
12
Whatever became of Marvin Shilmer?
by careful in12 hours ago someone resurrected a post by marvin shilmer from years ago.
it was then that i realized that i haven't seen a post from him for a while.
a check shows it's been 4 years.
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Terry
Schilmer's site was called (I think) WATCHTOWER QUOTATIONS.
The closing of the site may have followed a 'cease and desist' order.
Somebody once gave me a PDF of his entire stock of quotations but damned if I can find it right now. -
10
1973: MYSTERIOUS LADY (in the back bungalow)
by Terry in1973mysterious lady (in the back bungalow).
me: driving a squad car for a private security service.
me: "warren's night off.
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Terry
Finkle, I was just callow, wet-behind-the-ears and had zero experience with
"worldly" women. A big Nerd. Nothing heroic or even noble about that.
I simply find that - looking back on my post-prison life is either tragically funny or simply absurd until I finally get the hell out.
I had to start from scratch learning how to become a 'normal' human being.
(Spoiler Alert: I'm not very good at it :) -
10
1973: MYSTERIOUS LADY (in the back bungalow)
by Terry in1973mysterious lady (in the back bungalow).
me: driving a squad car for a private security service.
me: "warren's night off.
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Terry
Who was this sophisticated and amorous young lady?
And... did you give what she needed so much that night?
I was a JW Nerd and married; struggling to pay bills.
That lady was less a source of desire or curiosity for me than the glorious grand piano.
I can't exactly remember what was on her list but I do know I refused to buy cigarettes for her. -
10
1973: MYSTERIOUS LADY (in the back bungalow)
by Terry in1973mysterious lady (in the back bungalow).
me: driving a squad car for a private security service.
me: "warren's night off.
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Terry
This is NOT her - but sure looks like the "type" I was dealing with ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alZhl5uSGkY
