careful

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Posts by careful

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  39

  Email from JW relative/elder

  by Lynnie in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  as much as i enjoy you and pete's company, you also know our understanding of how much we want you to be reunited with jehovah and his people.. .

  we did not set the standards for what jehovah says about our associations with those who choose to not serve him.

  so we will always be there for you and pete, but it is in your hands as to how we can enjoy your friendship.. .

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  careful

  pale.emperor and johnamos:

  NICE FINDS—THANKS!

  
  
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  35

  Not training speakers/teachers any more?

  by eyeslice2 in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  not having attended any meetings since about 2001, for reasons of safety (sounds a bit dramatic but i don't like my wife being out on her own late at night where we live now), i have started accompanying her to the mid-week meeting.. when i was young, the ministry school and service meeting were central to training brothers to take the lead.

  you were assigned instruction talks, then if you cut it, you moved pretty rapidly to public talks - a full 55 mins at the time.

  i was just 18 years old when i gave my first public talk and this was a first step to moving rapidly through the ranks.

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  careful

  Thx, eyeslice2 for the post, and waton for the comment.

  "this week's wt study par 10 refers specifically to training sessions in 'field service' not speaker training"

  Yeah, TRAINING them to hand out a tract that refers the non-Witness to the org's website. That's a whole lot of "training," eh?
  
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  12

  When "all" is not "everyone" or "everything."

  by Wonderment in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  we keep seeing posters bringing col. 1.16 and john 1.3 up as proof that christ is excluded from the creative acts.

  the proof they submit is that the words "all things [gk., pánta]" appear in these texts.

  however, they are missing this important element from the discussion: the word "all" is rarely used in greek, and even in our everyday language to mean literally "everyone" or "everything" under the sky.

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  careful

  Thx, Wonderment for the post. I was reading Acts recently and noted how the "all" in 3:18 certainly does not mean ALL in an absolute sense. There Peter says, "God foretold by the mouths of all the prophets (πάντων τῶν προφητῶν), that his Christ should suffer ..." Of course, some of the prophets never mention the Messiah at all, and only a few of them speak of his suffering.

  As for 1 Tim. 2:4, other factors are likely involved. First, that the plural of πᾶς can indeed mean "all sorts of" is clear from entry number 5 for that word in the 2nd revision by Danker of the Bauer-Arndt-Gingrich NT Greek lexicon (BDAG, p. 784). There are 25 NT examples listed under that definition. 1 Tim. 2:4 is not present but then it is unlikely that the lexicographers meant the entry to be exhaustive. Second, it is likely that Fred Franz was influenced by the earlier context. In verse 1 the writer exhorts Timothy to offer prayers ὑπὲρ πάντων ἀνθρώπων. Does that mean on behalf of all men/people in an absolute sense? Given other statements reflecting Christian doctrines elsewhere in the NT, like 1 John 5:16, Mark 3:29, and probably Matt. 18:17, one must ask whether the author of 1 Tim. wanted Timothy to pray for ALL people in an absolute sense. "All sorts of" here then may make good sense. If that is so, then continuing that thought 3 verses later may be viewed as at work.

  BTW, I'm not defending Fred Franz or the NWT per se here. Rather I'm looking at factors not mentioned by Bobcat that may have been in play, beside the WTS's taking the 144,000 in Revelation literally. Furthermore, just because God wants all to be saved, that does not all will, given the free will that humans possess.
  
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  29

  What does "The disfellowshipping of xyz is now rescinded" mean

  by cognitivedizzy in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  it has happened somewhere i know.

  what is it and what does it mean.

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  careful

  Yes, it is real, whether individual ex-elders here have experienced or heard of it or not. It's done, just like DOC said, when local BOEs and/or appeals committees screw up. It's done from HQ. It means that the DFing never should have happened. It's rare but it occurs. A CO explained it to me back in the 1980s. I know of one case of a high powered elder getting wrongly DFed by his enemies, other high power elders who hated him. The service department at Brooklyn (pre-Patterson/Warwick days) had to step in and rescind the DFing.
  

  It's mentioned in the CO manual for a reason (see SBF's quotation above).
  
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  15

  2019--16 Leaked Videos!

  by Atlantis in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  1-samuel herd-message to accounts servants.

  2-roles and responsibilities.

  3-resolutions4-collecting contributions5-contribution boxes and their uses6-balance of congregation funds7-recording bank activity8-recording the s24 to the accounts sheet9-setting up and maintaining a bank account10-balance of congregation funds11-setting up a cash box and a cash box holder12-setting up a cash agreement13-making payments with a bank account14-how to add a user to a congregation domain15-ldc update-201916-walk on your way in safety-local needshttps://we.tl/t-wuega8kvbn .

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  careful

  Thanks, Petra!

  
  
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  7

  2019-6-Files-English!

  by Atlantis in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  these are the english files, the german files will be posted on a different thread in about an hour.. 2019-10-01-s-67-instructions for merging congregations2019-10-21-malta campaign letter.

  2019-10-21-malta information sheet.

  2019-malta application form.

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  careful

  Thx, Petra.

  Does anyone else find it odd that the org is planning a big blitz on Malta, asking for Maltese speakers living elsewhere to travel there to participate, and states that there is a "rapidly expanding population" there? What a minute. Have the native Maltese people suddenly become more fertile so that the native population is growing? Isn't the increased population there due to refugees and people escaping from Africa? Why would they speak Maltese?

  I smell a rat. Are they afraid if they get non-Maltese need-greaters coming in, that the government will send them packing, but if they get Maltese-speakers coming in, there is more of a chance they will be able to stay? Or has the cong there shrunk so much that they cannot cover their territory? Combining congs? Increasing elderly in them? What's up here?
  
  
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  16

  Ray Franz - Why The Watchtower Cannot Reform

  by Anna Marina in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  this is me reading a letter ray kindly sent to me in 2008 explaining why the watchtower was not capable of reform.

  the letter is full of wisdom and is very informative.. ray franz's letter to me - why the watchtower cannot reform.

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  careful

  Thx for this post, AM. I can empathize with you since it was only since after I left the org that I came to realize in a fuller manner how difficult it is for intelligent women to be in it. What a trial for you and for other women!
  

  I generally agree that the WT org will not reform. I respect Ray Franz and his efforts, but I do have some disagreements with him. One is that there exists a single possibility for reform: only a massive crisis will ever cause real change in the org. I find it interesting that so far, at least since Rutherford's day, such a thing has not happened to them. Whether it will occur in the future or not, who knows?

  Since I lived through the Ray Franz episode as an active Witness, your experience here is also educational for me as an example of someone discovering him after it was over. You did it without coming to forums like this one. That seems unusual.
  
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  39

  The real dividing line isn’t between apostates and apologists it’s between...

  by slimboyfat in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  excellent observation from zizek about communist regimes: they didn’t care if people accepted the ideology or took it seriously, so long as people acted as if the ideology was true, that was the important thing.

  in fact the regimes were deeply suspicious people who took the ideology too seriously.

  people who took the ideology seriously were dangerous because they were prone to noticing the inconsistencies and flaws in the system.

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  careful

  A post by SBF that does not tell about his "joining" some minor religious group or the WTS's imminent collapse—wow, the times must be achanging!

  You have point, of course, but let me play devil's advocate and bring up what might be called "loyal success stories" who have spent time learning Hebrew and/or Greek formally, and have remained within the Witness fold: Hal Flemings, Max Wörnhard (who was both a CO and a professor of classics), Rolf Furuli, Edgar Foster, Pavlos Vasileiadis, and Gérard Gertoux. Of course, one could just write these characters off and say "They're an exception." However, given how rare it is to find any JWs who study these ancient languages in a serious, formal manner, such a number should not be so easily swept away. Furthermore, for a theory, like the one you are proposing, to be solid, it should be able to handle contrary evidence, as you well know. Why is it that these types have not crossed the delicate line from apologist to apostate? Obviously they have thought a lot about theology. To them the religion is not just behavior.
  

  Your response?
  
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  17

  The new JW Bible

  by silas hobbs in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i was recently informed that the new jw bible was reviewed by some academic type person who rated it as one of the best translations available.. has anyone heard of this person and if so what is his reasoning for giving it such a compliment?.

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  careful

  Perhaps you heard, or the source you got this info from heard, about comments on the NWT by Jason BeDuhn in his 2003 book Truth in Translation: Accuracy and Bias in English Bible Translations of the New Testament. Since it came out 10 years before the revised NWT, it can't have covered the revised edition. BeDuhn is a religious studies professor at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff. In his book he discusses a number of translations, but he seems to spend an exceptional amount of time defending the NWT against its critics.
  
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  41

  Creepy display

  by neat blue dog in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

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  i dunno about you, but if i walked up to this display at an expo i'd be a little creeped out..

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  careful

  nbg, thx for this. Yes it does look creepy. The leadership and the sheep seem to have no idea how weird they have become.