BluesBrother

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Posts by BluesBrother

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  12

  Watchtower Greek where the mumbo meets the jumbo

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  take a look at this photo of a now long extinct publication!ain't she a beauty?.

  around 1976 i got the wild idea i'd like to learn greek.

  gosh - just look at the gorgeous purple book up there!

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  BluesBrother

  The Kingdom Interlinear NWT is not defunct... It is alive and well and digitised on their website.
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  40

  Remember this

  by James Jack in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  this was my elder bag.

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  BluesBrother

  Sure I remember...those enormous “Pilot cases” were the prized possession of a a lot of swanky elders.. Personally I never had one..even as secretary with a lot of stuff I preferred to spread the load in two cases and walk balanced.

  That is one thing that is properly consigned to history.
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  36

  They Are Going To Start Clamping Down With Staying At Home - Local Needs + GB Update #4

  by thedepressedsoul in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  many of us have watched the gb #4 update.

  most of us jumped for joy when they basically said that there will be no meeting in person for a long time to come.. one aspect we overlooked was how hard they hit home the "love of neighbor".

  how this "love" is what makes a true christian and as a result our love for our neighbors will motivate us to stay at home.. well now they released a letter that is instructing all kh's to view this video during their local needs part.

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  BluesBrother

  Ah , come on .... Zoom meetings are easy to fudge. Sister Blues is committed to the faith but finds these meetings tedious. We tune by Zoom, but never with our microphone or camera on . It shows a blank square and her name only. Frequently she is doing something else and I certainly am. Last time I noticed several T shirts too among the others who showed themselves.

  The idea of having to go back to the Hall is not looked forward too among the ones who I know.
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  24

  Bringing Reproach on Jehovah's Name

  by cofty in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  all my jw life i was reminded constantly about the importance of not bringing reproach on jehovah's name.

  decisions on whether or not to disfellowship an individual often turned, not on the seriousness of the sin, but on whether the incident was public knowledge and had resulted in bad publicity for the congregation.

  i recall a middle-aged lady being reported to the elders for shoplifting a sweet worth less than £1- and the elders' insistence that a judicial committee must be formed because the store manager and staff knew that she was a jw (i successfully argued that all she needed was support for her dreadful family life, but that's another story).

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  BluesBrother

  They say, in the Guardian

  “Jehovah’s Witnesses have responded and will continue to respond directly to individual claims for redress in a caring, fair, and principled manner, taking into consideration the unique circumstances of each claim,” they said in a statement.

  The five groups will be banned from receiving federal funding and could lose tax concessions, including charitable status.”

  ............

  That final sentence is a cracker. Let’s hope
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  30

  How Could We Have Been So Heartless?

  by BluesBrother in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i am addressing here those who, like me, spent decades in the organisation that we called “the truth”.

  perhaps like me you were brought up in it from an early age.

  looking back now i wonder that i could have been so heartless as to believe that the mass slaughter of billions of people was “good news”.

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  BluesBrother

  I am addressing here those who, like me, spent decades in the Organisation that we called “The Truth”. Perhaps like me you were brought up in it from an early age

  
  

  Looking back now I wonder that I could have been so heartless as to believe that the mass slaughter of billions of people was “good news”.

  I am not getting at the WTS so much here, we have done that often enough, but rather the individual attitude that we all had towards our fellow men.

  
  

  There was no doubt that the provision of our Paradise came at the cost of the lives of the unbelievers... our classmates and people we saw every day....and you know what? We didn’t care a bit! O K , I would do an hour or so in field service at weekends , to show I had sounded a warning,but we never told them the plain message and I never expected anyone to listen.

  
  

  We used to love those blood curdling scriptures like:

  Zechariah 14:12..

  “There will be a rotting away of ones flesh.......one’s very eyes will rot away in their sockets and one’s very tongue will rot away in one’s mouth.”

  
  

  Ezekiel 39: 17-20.

  “Say to the birds....and the beasts.....you will eat flesh and drink blood ...to satisfaction.

  As for the clergy of Christendom ?nothing could be too bad as an outcome for them.

  
  

  We were not horrible psychopaths, quite normal people believe it or not. So how could we accept it?

  
  

  I can only think the answer has something to do with the psychology experiment by Stanley Milgram. The one where he fooled people into believing they were giving painful,even torturous electric shocks to others . Why did they go along with it? Because they were told it was “alright “ that the authorities had agreed it .....so they did it ......repeatedly.

  
  

  What higher authority could we trust than God Almighty? If he said it was right (as we believed) then it must be right, mustn’t it?

  
  

  At least that is my theory.

  
  

  
  
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  12

  Inconsistencies is the Preachng Work

  by LetTheTruthBeKnown in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  with the shutdown of the public preaching work.

  some take it to mean all preaching in all forms.

  other take it to mean it only includes door to door and cart witnessing, but you can do phone witnessing.. what is interesting is that depending which country you live in the direction that was given what to do is different.. two countries (malta and ireland) that i know of were told explicitly not to do phone witnessing.

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  BluesBrother

  From the O/post

  "What is interesting is that depending which country you live in the direction that was given what to do is different.

  Two countries (Malta and Ireland) that I know of were told explicitly not to do phone witnessing. I believe it has to do with tel-marketing laws and fines associated with it.

  So I guess it all comes down to money."

  ............

  I think it would have more to do with the requirement to obey the law than the risk of a fine.

  In the U.K telephone witnessing has never been popular , even though the old Kingdom Ministries used to suggest it. Brits dont like being phoned on spec. Tele marketing is hated. Right now, around here the Ministry can be letter writing to those you know, or e mails or phone calls but only to established "calls' or studys..
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  15

  Well Englanders, you have been warned!

  by BoogerMan in

  1. social
  2. current

  naughty, naughty little children - going to beaches on a sunny day.. "health secretary matt hancock has "made clear we do have the powers to go back in and act"".

  https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-53190209.

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yr5apyxku-u.

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  BluesBrother

  Isn’t that what has happened in Florida , Texas and other states... People flout the rules , more cases of Coronavirus and a spike in numbers.. Authorities close things down again.

  What is more important? You going for a swim and next week sinking a pint ? Or watching your Grannie die of Covid because of selfish fools?
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  168

  Awesome Video on debunking 1914!!!!! Follow it carefully to the end!!

  by Beth Sarim in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i don't know if anyone has stumbled across this video, but it just blew may away.

  omg!!!

  just goes to show why in dubland they adhere to the 2 witness rule so adamantly and are so anal about it.

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  BluesBrother

  That is a cracking great video! I love the calm, measured way in which it is done. No histrionics or triumphalism. Steadily the narrator tells her story and builds her case, leading to a solid conclusion.

  The fact is that people in the Org. just do not think about such matters , and they get little opportunity to debate deeper things in Field Service these days. Elders just teach what they are told.... they are “Company Men” . As one said to me....” I just go with the flow”.
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  39

  Expectation vs Reality

  by joey jojo in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  .

  just wanted to put this out there for any lurkers.. as someone that grew up during the 70s and 80s, we were promised that we would be in the first picture long ago.

  if you are still on the fence, please let this sink in for a while..

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  BluesBrother

  Sadly, oldies like us came to discover that the Paradise Earth is like the carrot dangling before a donkey, or the fruit and water offered to Tantalus... it is always just a little way ahead but it never, ever comes.

  The brave face up to this fact and accept it. Sadly, too many cannot do that and just carry on the same routine

  In that old film ‘The Matrix ‘ , was it a blue or a red pill that they accepted in order to just keep their comfortable existence and never know the real truth?
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  21

  JW Response to COVID

  by optimisticskeptic in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i haven't been on here in quite some time so i apologize if i missed a similar thread already (i did look for one :) ) anyways, just to be clear i think the jw response to covid in general has been really positive and proactive and they've done really well trying to educate people on covid, doing zoom meetings, etc to prevent spread within the congregations.

  the part that i find interesting is how compliant and non-apocalyptic the branch has been during all of this.

  even as someone who's a bit of a skeptic i found myself wondering if this might be the beginning of the end between covid, economic upheaval, and blm.

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  BluesBrother

  I agree with opening comments of the o/p . I must say that the G B have acted in a proactive way to safeguard the congregation. They lost no time in closing K/Halls and stopping public field service. A new vid on the website says they will not rush to reopen halls even if the Governments say that they could. A Morris 3 implied it could be next year before tbey reopen.

  I do not fail to criticise when it is due, but tbey have handled this well.