moggy lover

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Posts by moggy lover

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  5

  Errors of Russellism PDF

  by cabasilas in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  came across the book "errors of russellism" the other day.

  it was published in 1915 and is a critique of russell's theology.

  it has quite a few quotes from russell's works and is quite interesting from an historical point of view.

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  moggy lover

  Thanks mate, downloaded and safe in the bowels of my HD.

  Cheers
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  42

  Aus Bethel 06 Annual Report - INCREDIBLE 50% DECREASE in donations

  by jwfacts in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  i just purchased the 2006 annual report for the australian watchtower bible and tract society.

  below are the highlights.

  most incredible is that donations dropped by almost 50%, from 15 million dollars to only 10 million dollars.

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  moggy lover

  I think that we are seeing how the WTS is reaping the whirlwind of what they sowed. By discouraging the pursuit of higher education among their young several years ago, they are now confronted by those youngsters as full grown adults. With a significant lack of acedemic skills, for which many were doubtless capable, those same adults are virtually marginalized in the lower wage bracket. Low wages may make willing sellers of WT literature, but bad donators. In these times when all must count costs, I think donating to a cause that is slowly being seen as lost would rank pretty low on a person's list of things to do.

  Lets see... How many WT followers are there in Aussie? .... 80,000?..... Thereabouts?

  OK, if those 80k WT followers gave 10M to the society, then I reckon that makes, on an average, some 125 bucks a year which comes down to $2.25 a week. Yep... I gues that's about all the average R&F member would think his religious org is worth.

  Rather than be seen as unseemly and make crass demands for more cash, their interests will best be served by revising their policy on higher education. Sure they will lose some to "higher criticism", but they will eventually end up with a better financially enfranchised workforce, who will in turn be better able to donate big bucks. Of course it wont be felt overnight it will involve at least a generation for this to take effect.

  I think that is something the Mormon leadership grasped early. Don't their missionaries get a subsidized college education after serving three years? With a higher-than average income membership they are obviously getting larger donations.

  Anyway, whatever, the point about the WTS is that they must be recoiling in horror at their lost fortunes. Poor Nathan Gnaw, he so loved to see graphs going increasingly upwards in all departments, like sales, donations, increasing membership, leading to more sales, more donations, increasingly more membership and so on. Poor sod must be rolling in his grave or wherever it is that departed WT leaders eventually wind up.

  Cheers
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  27

  Will there be death in paradise?

  by Bob Loblaw in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  so, from what i remember,...after armageddon, those righteous jw's who make it through will have to clean up the utter devestation.

  imagine 9/11 on a world-wide scale.

  they also (from what i remember) will not be miraculously perfect right away.

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  moggy lover

  Evidently paradise will not be the schmaltzy, smashingly terrific place it is made out to be. Remember, that according to WT theology it will also be a "day of judgment" [This is despite the fact that Rev 20:12 describes the Judgment as coming after the Millennium -see vs7] in which "god's judicial decisions" will be exacted.

  The "You Can Live Forever in Paradise on Earth" book says, on pg 178 the following: "So after being given the opportunity to change their ways and to learn righteousness, such wicked ones will be destroyed.Some will be put to death even before Judgment Day ends"

  To support this unbiblical assertion, the same pg cites, but does not quote, Isa 65:20. It becomes obvious why they did not actually quote this text. The chapter, evidently millennial in significance, nowhere describes any one as needing to be executed for wrongdoing during this period. It is merely describing the longevity of those living then. A longevity that is restored to mankind as before the flood.

  Yep, if you don't die of boredom, you will probably be stoned, and I dont mean on drugs either.

  Cheers
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  9

  Who Will Survive---And Why?

  by Sunspot in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  we find where the wts editorial staff has written their opinions:.

  "jehovah is using only one organization today to accomplish his will.

  to receive everlasting life in the earthly paradise we must identify that organization and serve god as part of it.".

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  moggy lover

  The WTS has, with the slick use of semantics, been able to hurdle the dichcotmy between perception and reality. They would like to be perceived as a rational, pleasant, and impartial system of belief that sees all people as worthy of being saved through Armageddon. To this end, they indulge in such semantic niceties as suggesting that "All those who truly love Jehoover will survive" or even: "We do not judge who survives, only jehoover does this"

  The reality of course is different. The corollary to the above is significant. The mechanism used to qualify one's love for this god, is neither rational nor impartial, it is purely theological, the detirminative factor being total obedience to the WTS

  One can only truly love jehoofer by being in his organisation. No one outside the WT system is deemed a "true lover" of the WY god. And further, as "spokesmen" for this god, they speak for him. So, what they say is what he says. And they have already judged all those on the outside, ahemm, erm, including us, as non survivors.

  Like lawers, politicians, and other snake oil salesmen, their attempts to deceive are hollow. The only ones who cannot differentiate between perception and reality are the dyed-in-the wool WT stalwarts, who will, of course believe anything they are told. Bless 'em

  Cheers
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  58

  How do JWs explain John 20:28?

  by Zico in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  much is made of john 1:1 in trinitarian discussions and there's a lot of debate over how it should be correctly translated, depending on your particular bias on the jesus god issue, but surely there is no scripture more clear that jesus is god than the one where thomas directly calls him god in john 20:28?

  27next he said to thomas: put your finger here, and see my hands, and take your hand and stick it into my side, and stop being unbelieving but become believing.28in answer thomas said to him: my lord and my god!

  how do jehovah's witnesses deal with this scripture?

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  moggy lover

  I'm not attempting to inject a sense of levity into this thread, but honestly, these are two of the ways older WT followers used to counter this text in my presence:

  1 Thomas said: "My Lord, [and looking up to heaven] and my God"

  But personally this one was always my favourite:

  2 Thomas said: "[Oh] my Lord!! and [Oh] my God!!.... You mean those are real holes???"

  Cheers
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  71

  How'd you pick your Avatar and/or Username? (Share a little bio?)

  by Open mind in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  even though you might think it's painfully obvious, explain why you chose your avatar and/or username.

  it could help us faceless "netizens" get to know each other a little better.

  open mind.

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  moggy lover

  My avatar and alias both come from the same source. She's right here in front of me snoozing on the monitor with her tail swaying gently so that it makes it impossible for me to see my screen.

  Her name is Moggy, she has whiskers, salmon breath and is the spoiltest darn cat this side of anywhere.

  Cheers
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  10

  Are the JW's the only ones not to celebrate Christ's resurrection?

  by JH in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  are the jw's the only christian religion that doesn't celebrate christ's resurrection?.

  this puts them on the same side as unbelievers, who also don't celebrate christ's resurrection..

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  moggy lover

  As Yesidid mentioned, the followers of the WTS may not celebrate the resurrection of Christ, although they do claim to believe in it.

  However there is a problem with this claim. A claim that is merely superficial and cannot be sustained by a close scutinty of WT theology. What exactly do the WT followers believe about the resurrection of Christ?

  Their fundamental belief is that death is a biological finality that results in the total cessation of a person's being. In other words, a person at death is then reduced to nothing, a void. As complete a void as if that person had never existed.

  So, when Jesus died, He too was reduced to oblivion, a condition in which He no longer existed in any form whatsoever. Oblivion, nothingness, void, empty non-existence cannot be "resurrected" You can only resurrect a person if that person has his/her individuality preserved somewhere, and in some form. When you die the Bible assures you that you, as a unique individual that will never be duplicated in the course of eternity, will be resurrected.

  This is not the WT promise. Their belief entails the notion of "recreation" not resurrection. According to WT theology, when a person dies, the impersonal memory of that person is preserved with God, so that, when the time comes, that person is recreated by the creation of another being into which the memory banks of the original are then introduced. This means that the recreated individual is not the same person who has died, since that original no longer exists, but is a clone.

  The same is the case with Jesus. When He died, He went into the WT state of non-existence. But His memory was preserved, and this memory was implanted in another being recreated for the purpose. A Jesus Mk 2, as it were. This Jesus Mk 2, evidently prancing about in heaven and communicating sacred secrets to His loyal associates already there, is not the Jesus who died for you and me. That Jesus, according to WT theology is finished and discarded with, like an old shoe. The Jesus Mk 2, which has done nothing to merit it, will now live for the rest of all existence, being endowed with immortality.

  Probably without personally realizing it, the average R&F WT follower is in fact celebrating the passing into oblivion of a unique individual who no longer exists.

  Incidently, nowhere did Jesus command His followers to celebrate His death. He commanded His followers to "do this" - that is, the Last Supper. The significance of this was not to celebrate His death, but to proclaim it. We will do this, not in celebration of His death, but in anticipation of His Coming again [1Cor 11:26]

  This is not to say that the death of Jesus is unimportant. God fordid, because we as believers proclaim His death. His death brought about the rconcilliation of an estranged humanity with Deity. We can now have access to God, thanks to the death of Christ.

  But the richness of spiritual truth, of infinite joy, of celebration, in fact is the theological importance and the implications of, the Resurrection of Jesus. It is the Resurrection of Christ, not His death which releases a new power for Christian living.[Phil 3:10]

  It was the Resurrection, not the death of Jesus, that empowered early Christians to testify to their beliefs with a message that was worth taking to the ends of the earth.

  It is the believers hope still. Because Jesus Himself [and not some clone] was resurrected, we can rest assured that so will we. Now that is something worth celebrating.

  Cheers
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  18

  Question for my friends on the other side of the pond

  by loosie in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  is wanker a bad word in the uk?.

  or is it like telling someone there are a goober?.

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  moggy lover

  I have it on the highest authority, [ie my uncle Solli] that poiticians everywhere in the world are, collectively, mass debaters.

  Cheers
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  10

  Seola 1878--download!

  by Atlantis in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  in 1924 it was revised by a bible student (jw) and published under the title angels and women.

  it was recommended by the watchtower society in two golden age magazines.. according to the watchtower's view of how the book was written, angels and women is an automatic writing book.

  the foreword states that the woman who wrote it was "impelled to write it after listening to beautiful music.

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  moggy lover

  Thanks Atlantis for this rare find. I hav'nt read through the whole book yet, but I have glanced through it, and I must admit I find it oddly fascinating. Sort of part DaVanci Code, part Book of Mormon, but mostly fastasmagorical fiction, it does give us an insight into Rutherford's mental state if he could have endorsed a Bible Student version of it.

  I often wondered what the original plot for "Angels and Demons" was. Well, now we know.

  Apparently the "Seola" of the title was the wife of Japheth, hence she was Noah's daughter-in-law, and one of the original flood survivors. Her adventures through that tubulent time, where she meets up with, among others, the Devas, angels who materialized into human form, ought to make a page-turning read.

  By the way, anyone know if Steven Spielburg has read this? I reckon it would make a terrific special effects movie that only he could attempt. I mean just the flood scene would make Cecil B DeMille's "Ten Commandments" and the Red Sea parting look tame by comparison.

  Thanks again, mate.

  Cheers
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  7

  Do you recall?

  by link in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  do you recall?.

  can anyone remember when the date of 607 b.c.e.

  for the destruction of the temple at jerusalem first appeared in the societies literature?

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  moggy lover

  It was between the years 1879, when the society began, and 1944, that they officially taught the destruction of Jerusalem in 606 BC

  The last official mention of that date found in WT literature is in the WT magazine of 1st July 1942.

  There was a hiatus of two years when no further mention was made.

  Then with the publication of "The Kingdom is at Hand", in 1944, the date was officially changed to 607 BC [see pgs 168,169, 176, 183]

  The present publication being studied at the book studies "Revelation Its Grand Climax", makes a half-true statement on pg 105, when it asserts, wih apparent confidence, that this adjustment was made a year earlier in the book The Truth Shall Set You Free" This is only partly true because that same publication split the dates for Jerusalem's destruction in 607, and the start of the Gentile Times in 606 BC, as two seperate dates.

  It was only in the next year with the "KIngdom is at Hand" book that the two dates were finally reconciled into the current dating system.

  Oddly enough, the "Revelation Climax" puts this adjustment down, not to divine intervention, but to "providence" Come now. Do they believe, like the "pagans" believe, in "providence" ?

  Summary: 1879 - 1944.................................. 606 BC.......................... 65 years

  1944 - today..................................607 BC..........................63 years

  So they have been teaching error for a longer period than they have been teaching "truth" !!!

  This same "providence" that the WTS apparently relies on, would have disfellowshipped the first two Presidents of the WTS for teaching error.

  Hope this helps

  Cheers