Posts by OnTheWayOut

16

Thinking of writing a book about jw's, what should I put in it?

by purrpurr in

jw
friends

i've just finished reading alan miller's "fade from the truth", i enjoyed it and i love that it's freely available.

so i was thinking of writing a book of my own.

not an account of my life but more a simple step by step look at jw's and what they are really like?

OnTheWayOut

I've just finished reading Alan miller's "fade from the truth", I enjoyed it and I love that it's freely available.

First, a big thanks for reading that. I will say a few things about "FADE" and maybe it will help you with your desire to write. I didn't make it available to get rich, I would have needed to keep my day job no matter what.

I read Kyria Abraham's I'M PERFECT, YOU'RE DOOMED while I was writing a horrible and bitter book about my thoughts on JW doctrine. I knew it was such a negative work that I had to abandon it. I didn't even want to read it, certainly nobody else would. I was very much inspired by Kyria and her way of simply stating her story.

I was going through therapy and started just telling my personal story for my own personal therapy. I actually started with a profound event in my life (a suicide attempt) that led to me becoming a JW as an adult, then needed to back up to my childhood introduction to JW's via my mother. Then it only seemed natural as I processed the outcome for therapy to write out the outcome of my journey.

Along the way, I debated with myself about making that personal story into a public story. I finally decided that if I could help a single person on their journey, it should be public. I googled some things about how long a book should be and got the Zen answer that it should be no longer than needed to complete the story. But I also learned that a published work should be close to a minimum 50,000 words. My story was shorter than that and seemed to accomplish the Zen goal, but to get to that minimum, I added a short chapter called ANAMORPHOSIS which was my meditations that came from an epiphany on how I, at a low point in life, needed to believe in the illusions created by Watchtower.

I shared my story with Barb Anderson and she posted it to her webpage. Later, I put it on Amazon as a very low priced ebook and as a print book. I have met a few people who say it has made a difference in their lives, which is way more precious to me than any profits. I think every writer of JW stories can tell you it's not the way to get rich.

I hope that helped.

26

My mom died at 96 (without a visit from her granddaughter)

by BONEZZ in

jw
friends

don't get here much anymore.

my mom, if you remember, really wanted to see her granddaughter before she died.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcpuj96a8lg.

OnTheWayOut

Very sad. So sorry for your loss.

25

Update - Talk # 6 THE FLOOD OF NOAH’S DAY AND YOU

by ttdtt in

instead of scraping this talk they updated it.. so they still try and make this look like it happened, and that there is plenty of evidence.to do that they refer to the (w08 6/1 8) found at http://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/2008411the main evidence is that floods have happened in the past, including.... geologists studying the landscape of the northwestern united states believe that as many as 100 ancient catastrophic floods once washed over the area.

one such flood is said to have roared through the region with a wall of water 2,000 feet [600 m] high, traveling at 65 miles an hour [105 km/hr]—a flood of 500 cubic miles [2,000 cu km] of water, weighing more than two trillion tons.

similar findings have led other scientists to believe that a global flood is a distinct possibility.. i could not find such an event, except for remembering one of those "disaster" shows on discover about that.

OnTheWayOut

With only 7 minutes allowed to mention the historical records backing up a global flood just a few thousand years ago, it just doesn't matter. It's still a case of "The Bible says so, and we must believe."

21

My sister who is still in is going to Costa Rica as a missionary

by time2keepmoving in

jw
friends

i left the organization in 2011 and never look back.

i left behind my sister and her two daughters by mid 2015 both her daughters (both are in their early twenties) were disfellowshipped and left the organization.

she has decided to go to costa rica as a missionary (i guess that's what they are still calling them, unless that has changed, been gone so long i don't know if they came up with a new term for it).

OnTheWayOut

I feel for you. There's probably nothing others can say to talk her out of this. Her reward will be in her mind- a good name with Jehovah so that He will resurrect her.

52

If a year is really 365 1/4 days why 360 days to calculate 1914

by blondie in

jw
friends

doesn't that throw off the date?.

*** w51 6/15 p. 383 questions from readers ***.

in establishing the length of the seven times of the gentiles, a time or year of 360 days is used, to give 2,520 days, which become 2,520 years when ezekiel 4:6 is applied.

OnTheWayOut

OH, and if Watchtower needs to do so, they will come out with new light that a Bible year is 365 days or even adding in the Leap Year days if need be. Or they can add in the 13th month stuff.

They already made the 1975 stuff up when they needed to build a whole new empire with new printing presses. They made up the overlapping generation stuff. They will make up some new crazy nonsense in the distant (or not so distant) future when they need to. They will just vote on it, and God will contact 2/3rds of the Governing Body.

52

If a year is really 365 1/4 days why 360 days to calculate 1914

by blondie in

jw
friends

doesn't that throw off the date?.

*** w51 6/15 p. 383 questions from readers ***.

in establishing the length of the seven times of the gentiles, a time or year of 360 days is used, to give 2,520 days, which become 2,520 years when ezekiel 4:6 is applied.

OnTheWayOut

Blondie, you know I love you. Thanks for pointing out what WT says and allowing us to see them talking out of both sides of their mouths.

Here's my take on the whole thing:

Here's the real simple version of the complicated doctrine of when Jesus supposedly returned and the last days arrived/ended/started.

William Miller said that Jesus' Return would be in 1844. (See The Great Disappointment athttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Disappointment ) People who believed what he said were known as "Millerites." It (Jesus' return) didn't happen. This return of Jesus was also known as his second advent, and believers came to be known as Adventists.
Adventist Jonas Wendell suffered in his faith at the Great Disappointment, but later carried the same type of "Millerites" talk in a sermon where Wendell had picked the new date of 1873 or 1874 for Jesus' 2nd return (after studying Bible chronology and being wrong about 1868). 18 year old C. T. Russell heard Wendell in 1870 speak of such a date. Wendell had already published The Present Truth, or Meat in Due Season highlighting such dates. So Wendell invented those terms that would haunt the WT organization and morph into New Light and food at the proper time.

Wendell died in August of 1873, probably confident that his 1873 to 1874 date was correct. When Jesus didn't appear as expected, Russell still believed it (or at least wanted to keep selling pamplets that explained it). He taught that Jesus must have returned invisibly, meaning that Jesus was ruling from Heaven starting in 1874. He taught that 40 years later, a literal application of how long a "generation" was, in 1914, Jesus would take power on the earth. That would mean an end to the Gentile Times in 1914 and an end to the last days- destruction and death and stuff.

Because World War One (coincidentally) started in 1914, Russell used that as a sign that he was correct in his complicated doctrines. He was already good at reinventing understanding rather than admitting he was wrong.

All the rest is just calculated backwards- the stuff about 607 BCE and the 2520 years and the Seven Times.
All of it was just made to fit that understanding. When things didn't work out as planned (again) the people in charge just reinvented the understandings and adjusted the math to fit whatever they wanted it to fit to sell more pamphlets/magazines/books. The end of the last days became the beginning of the last days. 1874 was forgotten. They just kept changing the end-date. They even made terrible errors and just changed the math to fit- they forgot there was no "Year Zero" and changed 606 BCE to 607 BCE.
They kept 1914 because it was so well-known to the followers and they already said "See, we were right" when World War One started. Everything about Nebuchadnezzar and the destruction/building of the temple was just made to fit the math. You can find anything if you work backwards. It's like writing a Sherlock Holmes story. Just work backwards from what a great detective would expect to find and make him look like a genius in discovering those things.

It is so unnecessary to understand the ridiculous theories of WT's present understanding when you can see what it was based on and how it changed to suit their need to get a following and sell pamphlets/magazines/books. It saddens me that I bothered to understand it at one time.

33

Christians Know Who God Is

by Loi_241 in

many of us christians have a good question for you to ask, “who is god?” there are more than six scriptures to share with you.

you know the bible itself a true message for all the people on earth.

the bible explains ‘in the beginning god created everything: heaven, earth, animals, people and everything.’ thus, you notice god created humans, adam and eve.

OnTheWayOut

The Bible explains............God created everything.............. If you are an Atheist or worshipper of false god, then how can you be existed in this planet?

I will let the "false god" slight go, but I really shouldn't.

Anyway, there are many creation stories. And there are even non-creation stories. Yours is just one among many.

I like the one from the philosophy of Jainism. I probably won't ever support Jain because the swastika is so prominent in their symbols, and despite it's pre-Nazi existence, I really don't want people thinking I am a Nazi.

Anyway, Jainism does not support belief in a creator deity. According to Jain doctrine, the universe and its constituents—soul, matter, space, time, and principles of motion—have always existed. All the constituents and actions are governed by universal natural laws. It is not possible to create matter out of nothing and hence the sum total of matter in the universe remains the same (similar to law of conservation of mass). Jain text claims that the universe consists of Jiva (life force or souls) and Ajiva (lifeless objects). Similarly, the soul of each living being is unique and uncreated and has existed since beginningless time.

I could go on and on within your thread (and I may do so later) about the creation myths that are almost as strange, sometimes stranger than the myth from the Bible. But they all have this in common- they either say that something came from nothing or that something always existed without being created- all of them.

Many have outgrown Santa Claus and the tooth fairy and many have outgrown creation myth.

19

I'm a Non-JW looking to ask a few questions re dfing

by RocketQueen in

jw
friends

someone close to me has been brought up as a jw since a very early age.

he's now looking to exit.

he was baptised as a teen and is now early 20s.

OnTheWayOut

He can try to fade away quietly without revealing any violations of Watchtower rules to any JW relatives. It is possible that he may fail to fade away because of a number of things- family spying and turning him in, zealous elders seeking to get rid of him, participation in holidays or elections or whatever.

But he may be successful and keep family from shunning him. Whether he succeeds or fails, he will still be out of that cult and free. Or he may choose not to try to hide things. He's still free.

You just never know. I successfully faded and maintain JW family contact, but my JW family is minimal where most are not JW. I am already married and have no kids, so I don't really have to hide things.

Regardless, he will be free of the cult. If he loses family to shunning, he will need others like yourself involved in his life.

23

Drifting what i've feared has started already...

by pale.emperor in

im in the process of drifting out.

my entire family are jw's.

my wife and her family are too.

OnTheWayOut

You call it drifting away. I like that. Most here have called it fading. They probaby want your time from you to prevent your status from going to "inactive" which happens at 6 months with no recruiting reports.

If you want to drift away, sooner or later you must become inactive. If you aren't ready, give them a fake 1 hour. If you are ready, either accept their shepherding visit or not. They cannot take judicial action for inactivity or for avoiding their counsel.

I wish you well.

27

Divisions among ex jw activists

by Truthexplorer in

i just watched a youtube discussion between marc & cora and unwitness.

it was regarding their unhappiness over a few prominent individuals in the ex jw community, one individual in particular.

this individual who on the one hand produces excellent videos highlighting wt issues, yet has been known to peeve a lot of ex jw activists off.

OnTheWayOut

I don't keep up with the latest spewing out of jw broadcasting, so I don't tend to watch any of the videos. I have liked Cedars' videos and very much liked Marc and Cora's videos for the personal touch on issues.

I might tend toward avoiding Cedars and siding with anyone against him because of past issues of outing on facebook, but really don't care to be involved in any organized efforts.

I would have to agree with those that say to appreciate whichever videos help ya and ignore the rest. I get why people felt a need to speak out about issues in the ex-jw community but I hope they all just move on to their own path. A great example in that would be Barb Anderson who moved on to her own agenda and just stays away from divisive activity.