Old Goat

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Posts by Old Goat

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  33

  Just Curious About Something

  by EmptyInside in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  sorry,couldn't think of a better title for this post,without it being long.. i was thinking this morning,if ex-jws, who were born into the group less likely to join another religion after leaving.

  vs. the witnesses who belonged to a church before joining the religion.. from my own prespective,being raised a witness,i have no intention of joining any religion.

  and it seems that born-ins are less likely to join a religion after leaving the cult.. in my own experience,i think it's religious burn-out to tell the truth.

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  Old Goat

  I wasn't born in. I won't join another religion. I'm tired of self-serving religions.
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  22

  Pioner book 2014

  by abner in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  sorry my bad englich i need the new book for pioners , edition 2014 !

  in pdf or doc, please!

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  Old Goat

  The Pioneer School textbook won't answer your questions.
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  Christian Mysticism and Russell?

  by Old Goat in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  see the new post here http://truthhistory.blogspot.com/.

  what an interesting thought.

  i want to know more.. .

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  Old Goat

  See the new post here http://truthhistory.blogspot.com/

  What an interesting thought. I want to know more.
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  29

  WTS one step closer to "1984" - JW literature rewritten in online versions

  by sir82 in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  likely everyone here is familar with the novel "1984" - "he who controls the past, controls the future.

  he who controls the present, controls the past".. take a look at wol.jw.org, insight book, topic "faithful and discreet slave".. current online wording: http://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1200001485.

  jesus trained the apostles for the role they would have after pentecost 33 c.e.

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  Old Goat

  This is unethical by anyone's standards.
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  11

  Jehovahs Witnesses and New Light

  by smiddy in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  charles taze russell was chosen by god jehovah to reveal to mankind the way to salvation in this time of the end.. charles taze russell embarks on a public speaking program that takes him all over the world with him giving lectures in many countrys .. my question to jehovahs witnesses : was that holy spirit , inspired revelations that he gave ?

  was that new light from jehovah ?

  new truths ?.

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  Old Goat

  As far as I can tell Russell never read J. A. Brown's book. Barbour did. But J. A. Brown did not originate the 2520 year count of Gentile Times. An American clergyman was first. Having ideas similar to someone else is not plagiarism. Plagiarism is the use of another's words without attribution.

  The immedite source of the 1914 date is E. B. Elliott. Barbour read Elliott's Horae. He said so. Russell never mentions Elliott, and I think he never bothered to read his book. Some of Russell's associates did.

  You'll get a better view of the place of J. A. Brown's relationship to Barbour from Schulz and de Vienne: Nelson Barbour: The Millennium's forgotten prophet. It's on lulu.com. ebook is elsewhere too.

  Brown was a silver and gold smith by trade, and very involved in prophetic studies and mission work to the Jews. I tried to trace his education, but while I could trace that of his sons, I could not find where he was educated. His books are a bit prolix, but most religious books from that era are. He wrote a short article for an Anglican magazine about 1810 as I recall. It's much easier to read.

  Better, more accurate history than you will usually find on this board is found here
  http://truthhistory.blogspot.com/
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  4

  George Storrs (early Russell associate) had some class

  by stirred but not shaken in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  from the book "a separate identity" p.248 & 249 by schulz and de vienne there is a quote from storrs that is prefaced this way: this wasn't the first time barbour and storrs had clashed.

  though not naming barbour, after the 1874 failure storrs addressed barbour's dictatorial exclusivity and failed predictions:.

  "teachers who manifest a disposition to exalt self and make it appear that they are something remarkable, are unmistakably false teachers.

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  Old Goat

  Bits such as this one are why I’ve been recommending this book and their history blog. Separate Identity is stellar research. lulu.com, Amazon and B & N all have it. Dr. de Vienne said on their web site that they largely self-fund their research and buying through lulu.com brings them more money than buying from Amazon.

  You can't find most of what they present anywhere else, and it is full of footnotes if you want to explore their sources. Their history blog is here:

  http://truthhistory.blogspot.com/
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  30

  You gray hair ones here, is time moving slowly or can you see the hour hand moving?

  by jam in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  i swear, time is moving so fast.

  the only time i know what.

  day it is, is by looking at the news paper.

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  Old Goat

  Magnum,

  I walked into a Kingdom Hall for the first time in 1944. I was baptized in 1948. Our Hall was a storefront in a shabby part of town. It had a makeshift stage, folding chairs and an American Flag. It was a different religion than it is today.

  Falling out of the religion was a slow possess. I think the first “bump” was in the early 1950s. At the annual meeting (1954 sticks in my mind, but I’m not certain anymore) Knorr ripped the congregations for lack of zeal. His entire talk was based on a misunderstanding of statistical analysis. He did not understand that the larger the number of publishers became the lower the percentage of growth would be. We had polite words. It made no difference.

  Mostly through the 1950s and into the 1960s it was a comfortable religion I believed was the truth. However, comfort is not a measure of truth. In this period I was a Company Servant, later renamed Congregation Servant. I was teaching at a state university. Measuring the pseudo-scholarly, footnoted articles that sometimes appeared in the Watchtower against scholarly standards was a teeth chipping experience. I recall one article (I’m not going hunting for it and don’t remember the date) that was full of footnotes. They were all fake. The writer read only one of the books. All the other footnotes were drawn from it but presented as if each book had been read separately. I’d fail a student who did that.

  Another pimple on the Watchtower’s face was using the name Houghton Mifflin, a text book publisher, as the name of an author. This is careless work. Sometime back in the 1950s, Franz found prophetic applications in Josephus. I shook my head. I didn’t like him. He was a fruitcake. But he could produce sound scholarship. The 1964 articles on Resurrection still stand out, even if current belief is a return to the past. Still, those things were minor to me. I believed we were helping people. Seeing people abandon harmful, unproductive lives for a better life was gratifying.

  I was in various circuits mostly in western states. There were some troubled congregations, but mostly the congregations were friendly, and the members were committed and knowledgeable. They knew their religion. That’s not so now.

  The 1975 prediction was jolting. Watching the new “elders” develop in to self-entitled, abusive, unprepared “princes” was what took me into a years long fade. I’m old and ill. I resigned due to illness, officially. I really quit because I couldn’t work with men who abused their brothers and sisters.

  There was a reservoir of doctrinal questions too. Major prophetic statements seemed to have no basis in anything but imagination. When I read the book New World, a commentary on Job, I was impressed. Two decades later, in the 1960s, I had read almost everything the Watchtower had ever published and was left with the lingering question: “How do they know that?” The answer is, of course, they don’t. They see themselves as inspired, even though they deny that. They know ‘it’ because they want to see themselves as a prophetic movement. They don’t know anything at all. They make it up.

  The organization’s structure fosters authoritarian abuse. That more than anything, even more than my questions, took me out of “the truth.” Men who did not prepare when counsel was needed, who showed up at committee meetings prepared to disfellowship but not prepared to assist someone weak mark this religion. Elders who study the publications in a desultory way and are biblically illiterate are common.

  There is good in the religion, but the good does not rest among elders or other ecclesiastical authority. It rests among the average believer who wants to please God and have his blessing.
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  30

  You gray hair ones here, is time moving slowly or can you see the hour hand moving?

  by jam in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  i swear, time is moving so fast.

  the only time i know what.

  day it is, is by looking at the news paper.

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  Old Goat

  I'm nearly 90, full of aches and pains. Some days don't end soon enough, some go by quickly. I try to keep busy writing or coming out of retirement to occasionally lecture or present a glorified show and tell session. I've become an amateur archaeologist of sorts, walking the river looking for signs of early settlement. I annoy my wife on a regular basis. I'm on a first name basis with most dial a ride drivers.

  I sometimes use a cane. Those days are not fun. I have a large number of email friends. And I spend too much time in front of the computer.
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  26

  Am I a bad person for wishing this??

  by quellycatface in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i have suffered with menopausal symptoms for a few years now.

  hot flushes and facial sweating, the most noticeable to others.. a sister i knew used to laugh and pretty much, mock me.

  i used to say "you wait till you get them" , without being nasty.. i seriously hope she suffers.

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  Old Goat

  Q,

  My wife suffered from menopause symptoms. We thought we'd both go crazy. My greatest sympathy came after a surgery when I suffered from hot flashes for several months. It gave me much greater sympathy for my wife and other women. I hope she suffers too. And yes, she is a cow.

  You have my fullest sympathy.
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  109

  The Complete Scammer's Guide - by "Pastor" Russell (New Light!)

  by Focus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  most of us are reasonably familiar with reports of scandalous goings-on of that old jellyfish lecher, the founder of the watchtower cult, the one and only charles taze russell.. but, are these stories true?.

  this thread is going to be devoted to his allegedly scurrilous activities.

  so, bookmark it, please, bro' focus is in possession of noo light, and we're going to explore russell like you've never seen him explored before.. we're approaching his 100th death anniversary, and for all i know this virtual exhumation may lead to a real one.

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  Old Goat

  one more comment. commit perjury? this didn't make it to court. you don't have the transcript (an original document, no?). you have imagination and a newspaper article. read the transcript. consult the records in Allegheny county. Certainly anyone who can find a few newspaper articles can graduate to real research. Even if it takes them ... how long? Say 20 years. Can't they?

  If one wants to speculate, ask yourself why the Eagle's lawyer didn't raise this issue in court. He's have had to prove it, wouldn't he? Didn't want to have to do that, did he? or it would be in the transcript.