*** Watchtower 1972 April 1 p.197 ***
They Shall Know that a Prophet Was Among Them
People today can view the creative works. They have at hand the Bible, but it is little read or understood. So, does Jehovah have a prophet to help them, to warn them of dangers and to declare things to come?
IDENTIFYING THE "PROPHET"
These questions can be answered in the affirmative. Who is this prophet? ... This "prophet" was not one man, but was a body of men and women. It was the small group of footstep followers of Jesus Christ, known at that time as International Bible Students. Today they are known as Jehovah's Christian witnesses. ... Of course, it is easy to say that this group acts as a "prophet" of God. It is another thing to prove it. The only way that this can be done is to review the record.
*** Our Kingdom Ministry September 2002***
5 God's Appointed Channel: Bear in mind that our heavenly Father has an appointed channel of communication, "the faithful and discreet slave." That "slave" has the responsibility to determine what information is made available to the household of faith, as well as "the proper time" for it to be dispensed. This spiritual food is available only through the theocratic organization. We should always look to God's appointed channel for reliable information, not to a network of Internet users. — Matt.24:45.
***Watchtower 1964 May 1 - Building a Firm Foundation in Christ***
8 ... It is through the columns of The Watchtower that Jehovah provides direction and constant Scriptural counsel to his people,...
***Watchtower 2/15/1960 - Staying Awake with the "Faithful and Discreet Slave" ***
2 ...The facts show that during this time and up to the present hour the "slave" class has served as God's sole collective channel for the flow of Biblical truth to men on earth. ...
***Watchtower 1/15/1959 - Down with the Old—Up with the New!***
Jehovah’s witnesses are deeply grateful today that the plain facts show that God has been pleased to use them. All the preaching and all the Bible educational work that they have done till now in 175 countries and islands of the sea they confess has been, not by help of a military army, nor by human power, but by God’s spirit, his invisible active force. (Zech. 4:6, AV) It has been because Jehovah thrust out his hand of power and touched their lips and put his words in their mouths. It has evidently been because he commissioned them to be over the nations and over the kingdoms
***Watchtower 6/15/1957 - Overseers of Jehovah’s People***
7a Let us now unmistakably identify Jehovah’s channel of communication for our day, that we may continue in his favor.
7b It is vital that we appreciate this fact and respond to the directions of the “slave” as we would to the voice of God, because it is His provision.
Morocco
JoinedPosts by Morocco
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Governing Body; Old/New Light
by Mikeus ini know that sometime, somewhere the gb has claimed to be "jehovah's channel of truth" and given divine knowledge/revelation directly from angels.
could someone please provide me with some quotes?.
i'm speaking with a jw right now who says they don't care if the gb has made changes/mistakes in doctrine in the past because it's "old light".
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Morocco
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All not in WT are Antichrist article anyone know of it???
by Gordy ini've been looking for a watchtower article that was posted a while ago, stated basically that all those who are not jw's are the antichrist.
it was from one of last years wt mags.
tried search but can't seem to find it.
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Morocco
This is kind of old, and it doesn't explicitly say it, but I just so happened to have this laying around. The first paragraph suggests that all apostates, or anyone who is not inside the congregation, makes up the antichrist.
*** w86 7/15 pp. 13-14 Keep Walking in Divine Light ***
Guard Against Apostasy
20 John now warns against antichrists. (Read 1 John 2:18, 19.) He reminds fellow believers that from the apostles they “heard that antichrist is coming.” The appearance of “many antichrists” proved that it was the “last hour,” the final part of the apostolic period. Although those ‘against Christ’ formed a composite “antichrist,” many individual antichrists pretended to worship God but “were not of our sort” and abandoned true Christianity. We are glad that the departure or expulsion of such ones today prevents corruption of the congregation.
21 Apostate views are rejected by loyal spirit-begotten Christians. Since “an anointing from the holy one,” Jehovah, helps them to understand his Word, ‘all of them have knowledge.’ (Read 1 John 2:20, 21.) They surely know “the truth” as it relates to Jesus Christ, whereas the apostates have erroneous ideas about him. Since “no lie originates with the truth,” all lovers of Jehovah reject such false views and those advocating them.
22 After all, “who is the liar if it is not the one that denies that Jesus is the Christ,” God’s Anointed One? (Read 1 John 2:22-25.) Why, ‘the one that denies the Father and the Son is the antichrist’! Interestingly, when an early associate of Bible student Charles T. Russell denied the ransom, Russell withdrew from fellowship with him and began publishing this journal, which has always declared the truth about Christ’s origin, Messianic role, and loving service as the “propitiatory sacrifice.”
23 Apostates who deny Christ do not have Jehovah as their Friend. (John 5:23) But we who publicly ‘confess the Son have the Father,’ being in an approved relationship with God. (Matthew 10:32, 33) Jesus’ loyal early followers clung to what they had heard about God’s Son “from the beginning” of their lives as Christians. And if the same truth is in our hearts, we will “abide in union” with both God and Christ and will receive “the promised thing,” everlasting life.—John 17:3. -
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This video is what's wrong with the whole world
by Morocco indisclaimer: this isn't a racial thing, i am white but i have african-american friends.
this is a human thing.
to me this video speaks volumes about why war and violence exist.
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Morocco
Think about what this kid will teach his own children when he grows up. I just hope that both of those children will one day realize that those "adults" were terribly wrong in their actions and they won't pass it on to their kids. This kind of stuff is a virus that, through education, needs to be exterminated with extreme prejudice.
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This video is what's wrong with the whole world
by Morocco indisclaimer: this isn't a racial thing, i am white but i have african-american friends.
this is a human thing.
to me this video speaks volumes about why war and violence exist.
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Morocco
DISCLAIMER: This isn't a racial thing, I am white but I have african-american friends. This is a human thing. To me this video speaks volumes about why war and violence exist. I want everyone's reaction to this video. I want to let others know that this kind of child abuse goes on right under our noses and nobody is doing anything on a national level to stop this insanity. If children are our future, and we don't stop this, we won't have a future.
http://www.videosblog.be/index.php?itemid=805 -
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Dualism in the Bible -- How The Hebrews Saw Good and Evil
by Morocco ingood and bad .
by: jeff a. benner .
very few sermons in our western synagogues and churches would include the passage "i [god] form the light and create darkness, i make peace and i create evil, i am the lord who does all of these" (isaiah 45:7) as our western mind sees these two forces as opposing opposites while the eastern mind sees them both as equals and necessary for perfect balance.
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Morocco
Narkissos: Dualism suits the default binary "logic" of our minds. Yes or no. Either / or. Unfortunately it hardly suits anything else and the more we indulge in it the more it makes us blind to reality as an endless flow of shapes and colours and differences.
I disagree. I think that since good and evil are so polarized that they would better suit binary logic. Good, evil. Black, white. 1, 0. I think dualism, not only in god but also in nature or the universe would be ill-suited for a binary logic because it is the between space, the fractional matters, that hold the truth. It's the interaction of two separate things, not those things themselves.
Just out of curiosity, how do you come to the opinion that a sense of dualism fits binary thought and doesn't suit anything but that? -
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Dualism in the Bible -- How The Hebrews Saw Good and Evil
by Morocco ingood and bad .
by: jeff a. benner .
very few sermons in our western synagogues and churches would include the passage "i [god] form the light and create darkness, i make peace and i create evil, i am the lord who does all of these" (isaiah 45:7) as our western mind sees these two forces as opposing opposites while the eastern mind sees them both as equals and necessary for perfect balance.
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Morocco
Good and Bad
By: Jeff A. Benner
Very few sermons in our Western synagogues and churches would include the passage "I [God] form the light and create darkness, I make peace and I create evil, I am the LORD who does all of these" (Isaiah 45:7) as our Western mind sees these two forces as opposing opposites while the Eastern mind sees them both as equals and necessary for perfect balance. In the Western mind, God is only good and therefore unable to create evil. The Eastern mind sees God as a perfect balance of all things including good (tov in Hebrew) and evil (ra in Hebrew).
It should be noted that the English word "evil" has no Ancient Hebrew equivelant, while most English translations will use the word "evil" it is usually the Hebrew word "ra" which simply means "bad". In the Ancient Hebrew mind there is no such thing as an "evil" person or thing. To understand the words "good" and "bad" from a more Hebraic understanding these words should be understood as "functional" and "dysfunctional". God is both functional (such as seen in the Creation story of Genesis one) as well as dysfunctional (such as the destruction of the flood).
Our western mind classifies all things in two categories, either it is "good" or it is "bad". One is to be sought, cherished and protected, the other is to be rejected, spurned and discarded. Let us take light and darkness as an example. We see light as good and darkness as bad. The idea of light brings to mind such things as God, truth and love. Darkness on the other hand invokes Satan, lies and hate. To the Orientals, including the Hebrews, both are equally necessary as one cannot exist without the other. In the Bible God is seen as a God of light as well as darkness “And the people stood at a distance and Moses approached the heavy darkness where God was.” (Exodus 20:21). If you stare at the sun, which is pure light, what happens? You become blind. If you are standing in a sealed room with no light, what happens? You are again blind. Therefore, both light and darkness are bad and yet, both are good. In order to see we must block out some of the light as well as some of the darkness.
The two poles of a magnet are north and south. These two poles create balance, they are not morally good or bad, but necessary ingredients of physics that compliment each other. Good and bad are more like the north and south poles of a magnet than our Western conception of good and bad.
Can good exist without the bad? Absolutely not, how could you judge something to be good if you cannot compare it to something bad? The same is true for all other concepts. Cold cannot exist without heat, or short without tall, far without near, or large without small. Our western mind usually ignores these extremes and seeks to always find the "good" or the “bad”. The Eastern mind is continually seeking both the "good" and the "bad" in order to find the balance between the two. Even Solomon recognized this when he said “Do not be overly righteous” (Ecclesiastes 7:16).
Throughout the scriptures this search for balance is found, yet ignored by Westerners who do not understand the significance of balance.
http://www.ancient-hebrew.org/12_goodbad.html -
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The Earth is not rotating...nor is it going around the sun
by Pleasuredome inthe earth is not rotating...nor is it going around the sun.
marshall hall is a retired high school teacher and president of the fair education foundation, inc. marshall is married to his beloved wife, bonnie.
his organization is committed to discovering truth and exposing deception.
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Morocco
i think i threw up a little in my mouth -- people like him need to be locked up in a crazy ward
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My advice for JW youth
by Junction-Guy inif you are reading this board and are having doubts, then please do not rush into baptism.
wait until you are grown, and only then do it if you honestly feel you need to.
once you are baptized, they own you, and you will most likely be shunned if you are ever baptized.
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Morocco
I wish you had said that to me before I got baptized! You could have saved me a lot of trouble.
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Petition To Make Refusal of Blood on Religious Grounds Illegal
by Kenneson inin montreal, canada in late dec. jean-claude lavoie refused a blood transfusion and died.
his decision has split his family apart--the father respecting his son's decision.
his brother, jonathan, a former jehovah's witness has since launched an internet campaign calling on the government to make it illegal for a person to refuse blood transfusions on religious grounds.
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Morocco
Abbagail said:
"I'm with GILL on this one. Waaaaay too much government interference these days, yet people keep clamoring for more... to MAKE this person do that, or to keep THAT person from doing this and that, etc. Definitely not a good thing to be asking for MORE government rules/regs/laws/interference.
"Government is not reason; it is not eloquence; it is force!
Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master."
-- George Washington
"Giving money and power to government is like
giving Whiskey and Car keys to teenage boys"
-- P.J O'Rourke Parliament of Whores"
Sure the government isn't perfect. They basically steal from us by taxing everything, but at least they tell you. And how else are we going to pay for everything we use? The government can be abused like anything else, but at least the governmental ideas of morality are far above a lot of religious views. There are penalties for murder, there are consequences for "immorality" like having sex with minors. And the morality they impose is pretty basic.
I know what is at the heart of this. This is an issue if the government should impose "morality" on us. Who are they to tell us what we can and can not do with our bodies? With our minds? With our beliefs? Right? I don't think they should take it too far, but face it, religion can kill. I'm not saying the governments should tell us how to eat and sleep, but let's get rid of those disastrous things. It doesn't take the bible or god to tell you that murderous teachings are immoral. So yes, governments; impose that morality. Impose the idea that you can not persuade people to passively give up their lives, impose you can not teach people to hate one another, impose you can not teach people to commit suicide. Impose it because God isn't.
People are calling for more rules and regulations? How about we get rid of some of those rules? How about we do away with the Geneva Convention? Why don't we strike out a few lines in that Universal Declaration of Human Rights? Why hasn't anyone applauded the fact that governmental powers are trying to create a system that marginalizes the inhumanities in warfare? Why hasn't anyone commented on the fact that rules can be good and we need them to help us? -
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Petition To Make Refusal of Blood on Religious Grounds Illegal
by Kenneson inin montreal, canada in late dec. jean-claude lavoie refused a blood transfusion and died.
his decision has split his family apart--the father respecting his son's decision.
his brother, jonathan, a former jehovah's witness has since launched an internet campaign calling on the government to make it illegal for a person to refuse blood transfusions on religious grounds.
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Morocco
This is actually an interesting conversation because I use this same argument with religious people. If God doesn't allow evil then no one is truly free, hence in a paradisaic world where evil is restricted no one has freewill anymore. Because freewill and free-choice includes evil.
I agree that if the blood issue were to be banned that the Witnesses would just use it for their advantage, seeing as how they have before so many times. But you, jinjam, are basically saying (if I'm understanding correctly)that if one can't have total religious freedom then it isn't religious freedom. I believe, that what people should base their belief system on, is evidence. It is evident that some groups of people can not have complete religious freedom without doing each other great harm. So, the best thing for everyone, is to get rid of the parts of religous freedom that hurt. No, that isn't "freedom of religon" since it is bound by laws.
It's interesting to me that it does in fact become so polarized. If you remove one thing, you remove them all. If you take away the ability to believe in one thing, it isn't freedom of religion anymore. On the other hand, in order to marginalize peoples' abuse of religon, you must set certain laws, as the government has. So in order to remove harmful effects you have to remove freedom.
What is the solution? I believe religon should be completely done away with. It's old, unscientific, and we should find new, up-to-date, humane ways of satisfying our desire to be "spiritual" creatures. Is that a real solution? Probably not. But I think it's better than all the deaths peoples' abuse of religion has caused.
The government has to force people not to abuse things. They force us not to speed or we get tickets, they force us not to physically fight or we go to jail, they force us to take care of our kids and if we don't they take them away. They can take away some mother's child because of neglect -- but don't say anything about religon?!
I think the government should force religion to be a certain way, in order to reduce the damage done. Or should the government stay out of your right to drink and drive? Should they stay out of my right to pee on your lawn? Just because something is religious doesn't mean it is above the law.