THE SHADOW OF '75

by Terry in

few of your are old enough to have been there, i suspect.

i had been in prison two years as a jw conscientious objector when the exciting news about 1975 spread like wildfire.. .

i was paroled from prison in 1969 and immediately began pioneering.

Terry

Few of your are old enough to have been there, I suspect. I had been in prison two years as a JW conscientious objector when the exciting news about 1975 spread like wildfire.

I was paroled from prison in 1969 and immediately began Pioneering. The pressures began mounting throughout the organization. You could only conduct a Bible Study for six months. If your study didn't get baptized--you had to cut them loose; time was too precious to waste!

I married and had little kids to worry about feeding on minimum wage from a part time job. It almost gave me a nervous breakdown. So, I moved the family from Fort Worth to California.

I met non-JW's who were much nicer and more caring about me and my family than the Witnesses. Everybody was relaxed and enjoying life.

I suddenly woke up!

________________

My wife, on the other hand, was a nervous wreck. This was 1974 and she could practically hear the countdown clock ticking inside her head.

When 1975 came, the kettle was boiling.

Every JW on planet Earth had bug eyes.

And then. . . it got very quiet.

____________________________

Then. . .It was over.

The word you are looking for is a short and simple one: STUNNED.

Dubs were simply stunned.

Why?

Their religion had suddenly been tested for truth and proved FALSE.

Stop and think about that for a second. It was like your Mom and Dad suddenly telling you that you weren't their kid--you were adopted.

It was like finding out your best friend was a serial killer.

People were heartbroken, shaken, upset and finally depressed.

But, what happened next was truly terrible!

You know what it was?

Of course, you don't--not unless you were there.

Instead of an angry mob of disillusioned JW's demanding a hearing and statement of accountability they just shut up and shrugged and went about their business like good little robots!

Did you ever see a documentary about the Holocaust when Nazi soldiers marched a group of condemned Jews to a pit and had them kneel down next to an empty pit? A soldier with a pistol went one by one and shot them in the back of their head while the others down the line waited and waited. . .

Did you ever wonder why they didn't try to run or all rush the soldier and stop him?

Wel,l folks, it was that sort of resignation.

JW's were defeated, dispirited, and depressed and they just gave up.

Those people have swallowed the whole thing and shit it out and flushed it away like it never happened.

There. That's your answer.

Cognitive dissonance.

My wife became an alcoholic.

She died coming home from a bar, drunk--chased by cops because she had been stopped and her driver's license had already been taken away.

She tried to escape and drove off at top speed and crashed into the back of a parked car.

This was the legacy of the religion she so loved and trusted and believed for so long.

The shadow of 75 still hangs over us all . . .

66

THE LINGERING SHADOW OF '75

by Terry in

none of you are old enough to have been there, i suspect.

i had been in prison two years as a jw conscientious objector when the exciting news about 1975 spread like wildfire.i was paroled from prison in 1969 and immediately began pioneering.

the pressures began mounting throughout the organization.

Terry

None of you are old enough to have been there, I suspect. I had been in prison two years as a JW conscientious objector when the exciting news about 1975 spread like wildfire.
I was paroled from prison in 1969 and immediately began Pioneering. The pressures began mounting throughout the organization. You could only conduct a Bible Study for six months. If your study didn't get baptized--you had to cut them loose; time was too precious to waste!
I married and had little kids to worry about feeding on minimum wage from a part time job. It almost gave me a nervous breakdown. So, I moved the family from Fort Worth to California.
I met non JW's who were much nicer and more caring about me and my family than the Witnesses. Everybody was relaxed and enjoying life. I suddenly woke up!
My wife, on the other hand, was a nervous wreck. This was 1974 and she could practically hear the countdown clock ticking inside her head.
When 1975 came, the kettle was boiling.
Every JW on planet Earth had bug eyes.
And then. . . it got very quiet.
. . . . . . . ____________________________.
It was over.
The word you are looking for is a short and simple one: STUNNED.
Dubs were simply stunned.
Why?
Their religion had suddenly been tested for truth and proved FALSE.
Stop and think about that for a second. It was like your Mom and Dad suddenly telling you that you weren't their kid--you were adopted.
It was like finding out your best friend was a serial killer.
People were heartbroken, shaken, upset and finally depressed.
But, what happened next was truly terrible!
You know what it was?
Of course, you don't.
Instead of an angry mob of disillusioned JW's demanding a hearing and statement of accountability they just shut up and shrugged and went about their business like good little robots.
Did you ever see a documentary about the Holocaust when Nazi soldiers marched a group of condemned Jews to a pit and had them kneel down as a soldier went one by one and shot them in the back of their head? Did you ever wonder why they didn't try to run or all rush the soldier and stop him?
It was that sort of resignation.
JW's were defeated, dispirited, and depressed and they just gave up.
Those people have swallowed the whole thing and shit it out and flushed it away like it never happened.
There. That's your answer.
Cognitive dissonance.
My wife became an alcoholic. She died coming home from a bar, drunk--chased by cops because she had been stopped and her driver's license had been taken away. She tried to escape and drove off at top speed and crashed into the back of a parked car.
This was the legacy of THE TRUTH.

Sorry--I meant, "the Lie."

12

A very short short story

by Terry in

jw
friends

i wanted to see how short i could make a story and it still would be effective.

you be the judge.

did i succeed?.

Terry

SAME STORY WITH ADJECTIVES REMOVED

_____________________________________

He sat on the bed and wept.
Her head rested on the pillow. A halo of hair shone illumined by the moon.

His hand clasped the woman's wrist. Her arms were arranged across her chest. He choked and sputtered his words.

"Mother, I'm so sorry. I know I've been a disappointment to you. . ."
The young man's words trailed off into a whisper.

Outside, the storm scattered splashes against the window panes; rattling as though hell itself were breaking loose.

"I know you don't wah-want me spending time with strangers. . .um wuh- .women. . ."

He stuttered and kept his eyes downcast so as not to confront his mother's face.

" I hoped you wouldn't think. . .I would dis-disobey you. . on purpose."

A flash and thunder punctuated his confession. All at once the rain subsided until the only sound was that of his own sobbing.
Minutes passed.

Finally, he lifted his hand and dried his tears and stood to full height beside his mother's bed.

"Don't worry. I won't talk to her--that woman-- again unless it's about business."

He turned toward the door of the bedroom and remembered the light switch, flicking it on and wincing at the expression on his mother's face.

"Don't be ang-angry mo-mother. . I'll behave like a gent-gentleman."

He was about to exit the room when he whirled suddenly around. . .

He cocked his ear and the leak next to the hall banister made itself known.

"Wha-what did you say, Mother?"

He listened in the way priests listen for the voice of god.

"Oh--her. . her name?"

He froze in place and forced a smile.

"She said it was Crane. Marian Crane. . . sort of like, um the bird."

He stole a glance at the taxidermy owl he'd given his mom for Mother's Day all those years past.

Silence filled the room as he fidgeted and darted his eyes about.

Finally, the young man shrugged.

He entered the hallway and skipped down the staircase toward the door where he paused and took in a breath, slowly exhaling--then proceeded into the night toward the motel office.

There were things which must be done.

Mother would be pleased.
_______

End

12

A very short short story

by Terry in

jw
friends

i wanted to see how short i could make a story and it still would be effective.

you be the judge.

did i succeed?.

Terry

Ha! Thank you. A writer learns nothing from praise--only from the reader.

I appreciate the feedback. I do.

66

What's the point?

by punkofnice in

jw
friends

i mean, i don't want to be miserable or anything, but what's the bloody point of it all?.

since i left the watchtower cult, i have come to realise that god cannot possibly exist...and if a god exists...god is indifferent to humankind as the least.. in 100 years time i'll be gone.

kaput.

Terry

If I do anything good for the benefit of those that come after me, they'll die too. Eventually, I see the human race as becoming extinct one way or another.

Since leaving the watchtower (and I'll never go back), I am living hand to mouth, day to day with nothing to hope for.

______________

Why wash your hands? They'll just get dirty again.

Why brush your teeth? You'll just get old and die.

This is despair talking--not a healthy intelligent human being born in the age of technology.

Despair is a natural result of sudden self-awareness; especially when you've been spoon fed myths about somebody who loves you being in charge of the Universe.

Now, He is not there.

Oops!

Mourn the loss, certainly. After a good sniffle and a few curses, pick yourself up, dust yourself off and take inventory.

1. You have eyes. So use them to look at beautiful things. Why? It feels wonderful. Look at beautiful women. (Naked ones if you like :)

2. You have ears. So use them to listen to beautiful music or to hear the song of leaves rustling on a summers day and the whisper and sigh as it flows through the grasses on its way toward a poet's heart.

3. You have a sense of touch. Grab something wonderful and hold on to it; perhaps a lover's flesh and rejoice in the sensations of being alive! Feel the tickle of a beloved pet's tongue as it kisses you or the gentle weight of a butterfly on your fingertip.

4. You have a sense of smell. Learn to cook--sniff the fresh-baked bread, walk through fields of flowers and lift your heart with the delight of honeysuckle and lilac. Visit the ocean and sniff the brine as you long for the faraway shores of distant and mysterious land you can visit.

5. You have a sense of taste for succulence and spices and sweet chocolates and lemonade and---well, you get the idea. Take a wine-tasting class. Learn something.

You see, this is YOUR LIFE. You can build it into a palace or squat in it like it's a horrid hovel of cardboard. It is up to you.

You can learn and you can teach. Be a mentor or a musician or an artist or just a helluva fun fellow who makes other people see the exciting possibilities in life.

It is all up to you. This Life is no longer SOMEBODY ELSE'S game with you as a mere token moved about against your will.
Your brain builds your sense of things.

Will you waste it on cynical bitterness?

Or will you pull your shit together and laugh out loud that your prison wardens screwed the pooch and let you out where you can live and love and laugh as you please?

IT IS so SIMPLE: One step follows another.

Take it slow. Be confident you'll find your way.

Good luck!

98

OKAY, GAME OVER! The number one reason the New Testament amounts to bunk

by Terry in

for me, the dead giveaway is this.

jesus wrote nothing.. stop and think about that.. if jesus were the authentic messiah, his ministry would not simply be local.. his instructions, his mission, the details of his teachings would be too precious to risk leaving it in the hands of "men unlettered (illiterate) and ordinary (blue-collar yokels).".

jesus, were he the one and only hope of mankind, would be absolutely certain to write down with great simplicity and specificity the exact owner's manual necessary to rescue mankind.. never happened!.

Terry

island Manan hour ago

What are you talking about, Jesus did leave writings - they just weren't included in the heavily cherry-picked NT cannon. Do you seriously believe that there aren't any actual books purportedly written by Christ?
____________________________________

I see no reason to speculate upon the existence of further books when the ones we have are problematic already.

I take the same position on books written by Jesus as I do on UFO Alien kidnapping. I need more than conjecture.

Jesus was probably illiterate in all likelihood.
__________________________________________

http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2013/08/01/was-jesus-illiterate-author-reza-aslan-thinks-so/
________________________________________

Was Jesus Illiterate? Author Reza Aslan Thinks So

"Author Reza Aslan believes that Jesus probably lacked the education to read a book like the Bible. Or the Torah, or any other written text for that matter, no matter the language.

Aslan’s new book “Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth” is a revisionist take on the life of Jesus, arguing that his message of love was aimed more at a Jewish audience than a global one, that his attitude toward violence was “far more complex” than is generally thought, and that he was “very likely” illiterate.

All of these claims appear to be directly contradicted by passages in the New Testament, but Aslan argues those lines are mistaken, misinterpreted, or deliberately misleading.

Aslan, the author of the bestselling book “No god but God: The Origins, Evolution, and Future of Islam,” was born in Iran and grew up a Muslim before converting to Christianity and then returning to Islam. His background has prompted some critics to focus on Aslan’s personal history instead of directly grappling with the historical and theological points raised in his work.

“Zealot” has landed with a splash, sparking debates on television, and rocketing up the book charts. Speakeasy talked with Aslan about some of the claims in his book. Here’s one excerpt from that longer interview.

You’ve said that you were obsessed with Jesus. Why?

Reza Aslan: I converted to evangelical Christianity. I began preaching the gospel to everyone I met. I was told [Jesus] was fully God and fully man. Well I became more interested in the man part. The illiterate, uneducated, poor peasant from the backwoods of Galilee, who in the name of the poor and the dispossessed and the outcast, took on the religious and political powers of his time and became far more real and far more accessible to me than the Christ of the evangelical church was. And so although I left Christianity, ironically, I became more interested and more devoted to finding out who Jesus really was.

In the book you say that Jesus was “very likely” illiterate, and there’s “no reason to think” he could read or write. But a lot of Biblical scholars disagree. In Luke 4:16, we see Jesus reading. [“And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up: and, as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the sabbath day, and stood up for to read.”] So where do you get that from, saying Jesus is illiterate when in the Bible he is seen reading?

Well, first of all, it may sound shocking to some people, but just because the gospels say something doesn’t mean it’s actually factual. The Gospel of Luke was written 60-70 years after Jesus had died, when Christianity was quintessentially a Roman religion and no longer a Jewish religion and the gospel writers were very interested in making Jesus someone who would appeal to a non-Jewish audience. But the facts of history speak for themselves. And I would say the vast majority of Biblical scholars would agree that the illiteracy rates in Jesus’s world were somewhere around 98 percent. 98 percent of Jesus’s fellow Jews could neither read nor write. The notion that a tekton, as Jesus is referred to in the Bible, a woodworker, which would make him the second-lowest rung on the social ladder in his time just above the slave and the indigent and the beggar, the notion that he would have had any sort of formal education, let alone the kind of education necessary to debate theological points with the scribes and the Pharisees, is difficult to reconcile with what we know of the history of the time.

But examining the broad sweep of historical trends of a particular time doesn’t necessarily tell you anything about an individual person.

It tells you everything about an individual.

It doesn’t necessarily tell you anything about an individual person. More than 99.999 percent of human beings can’t run as fast as Usain Bolt. You might conclude, given those trends, we couldn’t have a Usain Bolt. And yet we do.

What you are asking me is, is it conceivable that as a poor peasant from the backwoods of Galilee, who grew up a woodworker, a day laborer really, an artisan, in a village that was so small and so poor that it didn’t have any roads, or bathhouses or synagogues, and its name did not appear on any maps, could he have nevertheless been so well educated that he could not only read and write but debate the scriptures, is that possible? Sure. But is it likely? No. It’s the job of the historian to talk about what is most likely."

98

OKAY, GAME OVER! The number one reason the New Testament amounts to bunk

by Terry in

for me, the dead giveaway is this.

jesus wrote nothing.. stop and think about that.. if jesus were the authentic messiah, his ministry would not simply be local.. his instructions, his mission, the details of his teachings would be too precious to risk leaving it in the hands of "men unlettered (illiterate) and ordinary (blue-collar yokels).".

jesus, were he the one and only hope of mankind, would be absolutely certain to write down with great simplicity and specificity the exact owner's manual necessary to rescue mankind.. never happened!.

Terry

ttdtt3 hours ago

How about that Slavery is never condemned by jesus or any of his "disciples" nor are women talked about as being equal to men.

I wonder if a few words from the son of god on those issues may have had any impact on the future suffering of billions of people?

__________________

If Jesus had carefully written about GERMS and BACTERIA in such a (divine) way any person could understand it---think how many lives would have been saved through personal hygiene--how many children would not have died.

After all Folks, Jesus built this old house and knew ever nail and timber, right? :)

Slavery and women's rights and a host of practical social remedies never would enter the head of an itinerant Jew would-be Messiah UNLESS that man really came from heaven and possessed the secrets of the Universe.

Nope. Not buying it. Sorry.

98

OKAY, GAME OVER! The number one reason the New Testament amounts to bunk

by Terry in

for me, the dead giveaway is this.

jesus wrote nothing.. stop and think about that.. if jesus were the authentic messiah, his ministry would not simply be local.. his instructions, his mission, the details of his teachings would be too precious to risk leaving it in the hands of "men unlettered (illiterate) and ordinary (blue-collar yokels).".

jesus, were he the one and only hope of mankind, would be absolutely certain to write down with great simplicity and specificity the exact owner's manual necessary to rescue mankind.. never happened!.

Terry

I agree entirely with your conclusions, but a trifle heavy on "would's"

Like Hansel and Gretel, sometimes I too get lost in the "would's" :)

98

OKAY, GAME OVER! The number one reason the New Testament amounts to bunk

by Terry in

for me, the dead giveaway is this.

jesus wrote nothing.. stop and think about that.. if jesus were the authentic messiah, his ministry would not simply be local.. his instructions, his mission, the details of his teachings would be too precious to risk leaving it in the hands of "men unlettered (illiterate) and ordinary (blue-collar yokels).".

jesus, were he the one and only hope of mankind, would be absolutely certain to write down with great simplicity and specificity the exact owner's manual necessary to rescue mankind.. never happened!.

Terry

if Jesus wrote the book of Jesus people would complain of circular logic as if it was important only because it said so itself. Instead, there were three separate accounts.

_____________

As Bart Ehrman once remarked, if we look at the 3 separate accounts of Jesus as witnesses testifying in a trial, and then compare (side by side) each and every detail, we don't find corroboration so much as we find irreconcilable variation. This is explicable as wear and tear on oral transmission, but it makes discovery of any "true" account painfully troubling and problematic unnecessarily.

However, is the object to pass a bucket of water from generation to generation with a drop or two remaining? Should we flash a grin full of "gosh" and be happy we have anything at all? Or have we a right to demand the King of Heaven be a little bit more scrupulous in planning and carrying out of a task so easily accomplished by having the Son of God Himself do the writing?

98

OKAY, GAME OVER! The number one reason the New Testament amounts to bunk

by Terry in

for me, the dead giveaway is this.

jesus wrote nothing.. stop and think about that.. if jesus were the authentic messiah, his ministry would not simply be local.. his instructions, his mission, the details of his teachings would be too precious to risk leaving it in the hands of "men unlettered (illiterate) and ordinary (blue-collar yokels).".

jesus, were he the one and only hope of mankind, would be absolutely certain to write down with great simplicity and specificity the exact owner's manual necessary to rescue mankind.. never happened!.

Terry

The barrier to objectivity in looking at all-thing-Bible is the fact that we have been steeping in total acceptance by family and peers and society all of our lives.

The Bible, at least in the West, is a "given." It isn't up for grabs. Only deplorable, lost people would dream of being skeptical.

So, where is the incentive to pull the rug out from under ourselves?

There isn't one.
And then one day. . .

you suddenly find yourself standing in just the right spot to where the sun hits the dark side of the moon. . .
Once you gain an objective vantage point you CAN QUESTION the validity of Bible lore and it all quickly falls apart.

Terry

Posts by Terry

island Manan hour ago

What are you talking about, Jesus did leave writings - they just weren't included in the heavily cherry-picked NT cannon. Do you seriously believe that there aren't any actual books purportedly written by Christ? ____________________________________

I see no reason to speculate upon the existence of further books when the ones we have are problematic already.

I take the same position on books written by Jesus as I do on UFO Alien kidnapping. I need more than conjecture.

Jesus was probably illiterate in all likelihood.__________________________________________

http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2013/08/01/was-jesus-illiterate-author-reza-aslan-thinks-so/________________________________________

Was Jesus Illiterate? Author Reza Aslan Thinks So

"Author Reza Aslan believes that Jesus probably lacked the education to read a book like the Bible. Or the Torah, or any other written text for that matter, no matter the language.

ttdtt3 hours ago

What are you talking about, Jesus did leave writings - they just weren't included in the heavily cherry-picked NT cannon. Do you seriously believe that there aren't any actual books purportedly written by Christ?
____________________________________

Jesus was probably illiterate in all likelihood.
__________________________________________

http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2013/08/01/was-jesus-illiterate-author-reza-aslan-thinks-so/
________________________________________