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6

Do you make statements in the form of a question?

by Elsewhere in

jw
friends

ever notice how the wts rarely ever makes a clear statement?

they tend to phrase things in the form of a question allowing the reader to infer the "correct" answer.. i wonder if this is to sidestep responsibility.. .

"as every one knows, there are mistakes in the bible" - the watchtower, april 15, 1928, p. 126 .

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Of course, there's another variation on this rhetorical tactic that the Society loves to use.

It's the one where they ask the question and then HOLLER something at you to tell you how to view the issue.

For instance:

"Do we ever doubt the value of Bible-based counsel from spirit-appointed elders? Never may that prove to be the case with us!"

Or:

"Did the first-century Christians shirk their responsibility of having a full share in the preaching work? Far from it!"

Is not such an approach loving, balanced and reasonable?

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140

since the bible makes it clear that jesus believed in the scriptural account of the flood and since the evidence that a worldwide flood as described in that same scriptural account would have been virtually impossible, why should anyone trust jesus to be man's redeemer and the only begotten son of god?.

farkel

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I am sick and tired of apologists for the Bible who invoke the excuse, "It was written that way because it was more understandable to the people alive at the time, or because the language only had one word to describe a particular phenomenon."

Well, that's great to know. However, why doesn't this wonderful excuse hold true when others argue that prohibitions about the use of blood or homosexuality or whatever should be understood in context as local custom or prejudice of the time?

All of a sudden, in the mind of the same apologist, the Bible reverts to being this great universal text whose sacred prohibitions must be upheld with the same force in 2002 as they were in 20 AD.

What I want to know is: If God inspired the writing of the Bible as his message to ALL mankind, being a God of justice who "does not desire any to be destroyed" (2 Peter 3:9), why couldn't he arrange for these passages to be clear enough to be automatically understood the correct way by people living thousands of years later who are not fluent in ancient Hebrew?

Or couldn't God have picked another nation to be his chosen people if the Hebrews didn't have enough words in their language to make the Bible halfway clear?

There's obviously a huge communication gap if this was in fact some local flood but most people today still read the Bible and conclude that it's talking about a global Deluge.

I also have to roll my eyes at this particular explanation of why Noah and his family couldn't just have departed the region to be flooded:

"If Noah had relocated away from the area that was to be flooded he would have been unable to offer his neighbors a way to escape God's coming judgment nearly as long as he did."

Hmm. Maybe he could have told everybody, "There's going to be a flood here. That's why I'm moving. If you want to avoid the flood, you should move too."

He probably wouldn't have had any worse of a success ratio than he did with the method he chose to use, which resulted in the death of everyone but the eight members of his extended family.

I could go on and on about the logistics of loading the animals on the Ark, let alone all the people, but I won't.

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140

Just As In the Days of Noah

by Farkel in

since the bible makes it clear that jesus believed in the scriptural account of the flood and since the evidence that a worldwide flood as described in that same scriptural account would have been virtually impossible, why should anyone trust jesus to be man's redeemer and the only begotten son of god?.

farkel

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As always, the Bible itself must serve as our guide. That reliable, holy Book has stood the test of time.

Could there be a lack of harmony between the views of God's Son, Jesus, and the inspired Scriptural account of the Flood? Far from it! The Bible's perfect consistency is renowned with good reason. And the Scriptures contain all we need to know on any given subject.

So for clarification, let us consult the record in Genesis 7:22:

"Everything in which the breath of the force of life was active in its nostrils, namely, all that were on the dry ground, died [in a limited area somewhere in the Middle East]."

Truly, God's Word is alive and exerts power!

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12

"Social Retardation"

by Alana in

question for those who were raised as jws.....after you left, especially if as an adult, did you ever feel like you were "socially retarded"?

i was married twice to jws, yet when i was single again as an xjw, i really felt like i didn't know how to get to know someone of the opposite sex, how to date, what to do or not do, what to expect or not expect.

my ex-husband talked to me the other day and he stated the same thing.

comment

Definitely. I still do on many occasions, even though objectively I'm more intelligent than most of the people I end up socializing with. You can feel like a) you're still in junior high b) somebody's still looking over your shoulder to see how you're conducting yourself c) when you do succeed socially, you're just faking your way through and it can't last.

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9

My brief WT article with almost all WT buzzwords

by comment in

jw
friends

fine counsel--how does it benefit us today?.

1. fine, wholesome counsel has a happifying effect.

it educates and benefits the great crowd of overcomers, whose steadfast reliance on jehovah and the spiritual food from his organization truly is a cause for rejoicing.. 2. too, suchlike ones manifest their support for god's arrangement by regularly assembling at christian meetings and submissively acknowledging the headship of spirit-appointed elders.

comment

I think in recent years the writing has become more generic and recycled than ever. If you go back to the start, Russell's style was definitely different from Rutherford's. Then, if you look at magazines from the 1950's, they typically had at least something new or different to say. (For instance, there used to be a Questions from Readers in every issue of the Watchtower, on quite detailed topics of varying scope. Back then, I think they were actually trying to do the spiritual "Dear Abby" thing to some degree, rather just using that column as a soapbox to put the flock straight or to subtly introduce doctrinal changes.)

In the 1960's and 1970's, you had long rants about fulfillment of Bible prophecy and antitypes and whatnot courtesy of Frederick Franz.

But somewhere toward the late 1980's, they started to scale that all down, and most of the Watchtower articles since the 1990's have been rehashes of old material, simple stuff.

That's why we hear these buzzwords constantly. It's geared toward indoctrination through repetition, of course, but it's also an easy way for the writers to put together articles: just string together these familiar phrases in slightly different configurations and the article will be rubber-stamped for publication, and everyone at the Kingdom Hall will just nod along. Try reading what I wrote aloud as if you were the Watchtower reader on Sunday, and you'll see what I mean.

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9

My brief WT article with almost all WT buzzwords

by comment in

jw
friends

fine counsel--how does it benefit us today?.

1. fine, wholesome counsel has a happifying effect.

it educates and benefits the great crowd of overcomers, whose steadfast reliance on jehovah and the spiritual food from his organization truly is a cause for rejoicing.. 2. too, suchlike ones manifest their support for god's arrangement by regularly assembling at christian meetings and submissively acknowledging the headship of spirit-appointed elders.

comment

Fine Counsel--How Does It Benefit Us Today?

1. Fine, wholesome counsel has a happifying effect. It educates and benefits the great crowd of overcomers, whose steadfast reliance on Jehovah and the spiritual food from his organization truly is a cause for rejoicing.

2. Too, suchlike ones manifest their support for God's arrangement by regularly assembling at Christian meetings and submissively acknowledging the headship of spirit-appointed elders. Jehovah's Witnesses are mindful of Bible-based admonition to be diligent in field service, personal study and prayer. Moreover, they seek the Kingdom first in their daily lives, ever alert to conduct themselves in a theocratic manner.

3. Indeed, this is the course of wisdom. Soon now the Great Theocrat, Jehovah God, will unleash Armageddon upon the world of unrighteous mankind. How foolish it would be to get ensnared by bad association! Some worldly individuals may scoff at this, just as they did in Noah's day and Peter's day and Charles Taze Russell's day. But mature Christians know the time is short; therefore, we wisely buy out the opportune time, not neglecting the gathering of ourselves together. We support the worldwide work with our "valuable things." Keeping pace with Jehovah's celestial chariot, we shun apostate propaganda and cling firmly to Scriptural principles. How important it is that we all heed fine counsel!

1) What is truly a cause for rejoicing?

2) Jehovah's Witnesses are diligent in what?

3) With what should we keep pace and what should we shun?

Do You Remember?

* How fine is the counsel Jehovah's organization provides?

* During the life spans of which three outstanding Witnesses of Jehovah was the end closer than ever before?

* How do you personally shun apostate propaganda?

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3

All-time classic phrase from WT literature re: 607

by comment in

from the book "let your kingdom come" (1981), appendix to chapter 14, page 186:.

"business tablets: thousands of contemporary neo-babylonian cuneiform tablets have been found that record simple business transactions, stating the year of the babylonian king when the transaction occurred.

tablets of this sort have been found for all the years of reign for the known neo-babylonian kings in the accepted chronology of the period.".

comment

From the book "Let Your Kingdom Come" (1981), Appendix to Chapter 14, page 186:

"Business tablets: Thousands of contemporary Neo-Babylonian cuneiform tablets have been found that record simple business transactions, stating the year of the Babylonian king when the transaction occurred. Tablets of this sort have been found for all the years of reign for the known Neo-Babylonian kings in the accepted chronology of the period."

It's hard to believe that for years as a faithful Witness, I read these lines and simply nodded and read on:

"From a secular viewpoint, such lines of evidence might seem to establish the Neo-Babylonian chronology with Nebuchadnezzar's 18th year (and the destruction of Jerusalem) in 587/86 B.C.E."

"Might seem"? Hmm. Let's look at those two previous sentences again, this time with key words capitalized:

"Business tablets: THOUSANDS of contemporary Neo-Babylonian cuneiform tablets have been found that record simple business transactions, stating the year of the Babylonian king when the transaction occurred. Tablets of this sort have been found for ALL the years of reign for the known Neo-Babylonian kings in the ACCEPTED CHRONOLOGY of the period."

"Accepted chronology," of course, means the chronology that virtually everyone except the Society accepts.

This is the equivalent of a businessman who argues when audited: "Well, yes, it might seem that I have thousands of receipts for my earnings in this year. But actually, even though the date, month and year is indicated on all these thousands of bills, if you'd only look at them with eyes of faith, Mr. IRS Man, you'd realize that they actually come from twenty years ago and I shouldn't have to pay tax on them."

And the Society admits this in a book they published.

comment.

6

SAD BS

by comment in

jw
friends

i just noticed the following thread from manoftruegod on purelanguage.net, entitled "sharing a sad sunday":.

http://www.purelanguage.net/forums/showthread.php?s=ba96522e1fa6b4970dd6715ad20b4d90&threadid=1169.

"sad" stands for "special assembly day.".

comment

I just noticed the following thread from ManofTrueGod on PureLanguage.net, entitled "Sharing a SAD Sunday":

http://www.purelanguage.net/forums/showthread.php?s=ba96522e1fa6b4970dd6715ad20b4d90&threadid=1169

"SAD" stands for "Special Assembly Day."

If you're a Witness, doesn't this take the concept of catchy acronyms a little too far? At first, I thought his post was going to be about giving the talk at someone's funeral.

It then occurred to me that if you were to attend the Special Assembly Day and then return home and conduct a Bible study to round out your day of wholesome spiritual feasting, what would this be?

SAD BS.

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10

JW shunned after refusing transfusion for daughter

by comment in

i found this while surfing around this morning:.

http://www.canada.com/calgary/story.asp?id={fde11d22-c569-45a5-a315-f8620681162b}.

gives a pretty good sense of what can happen if you go against the society.. comment

comment

I found this while surfing around this morning:

http://www.canada.com/calgary/story.asp?id={FDE11D22-C569-45A5-A315-F8620681162B}

Gives a pretty good sense of what can happen if you go against the Society.

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8

Style of assembly/convention speakers

by comment in

jw
friends

what precisely are the instructions that are given to assembly or convention speakers about the manner in which they are to deliver their talks, especially the manuscript ones?.

the reason i ask is that i was always irked by the strident, hectoring tone of the speakers at these events.. you'd have brother mild-mannered from your home congregation on the platform, someone you knew gave talks at the kingdom hall in a (relatively) low-key "i'm a normal person" voice, but get him up there at the doers of god's divine godly fear kingdom district convention and he'd be snapping out those long boring rhetorical questions and thrashing his hands around like some dictator wannabe.. it made me think that if you wanted to turn people on to the organization, the district convention sure wasn't the place to start.. comment

comment

What precisely are the instructions that are given to assembly or convention speakers about the manner in which they are to deliver their talks, especially the manuscript ones?

The reason I ask is that I was always irked by the strident, hectoring tone of the speakers at these events.

You'd have Brother Mild-Mannered from your home congregation on the platform, someone you knew gave talks at the Kingdom Hall in a (relatively) low-key "I'm a normal person" voice, but get him up there at the Doers of God's Divine Godly Fear Kingdom District Convention and he'd be snapping out those long boring rhetorical questions and thrashing his hands around like some dictator wannabe.

It made me think that if you wanted to turn people on to the organization, the district convention sure wasn't the place to start.

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