Earnest

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Posts by Earnest

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  10

  Quote Misquote Misleading

  by ZindagiNaMilegiDobaara in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  the latest watchtowel (march 2020) study edition has a question from readers ‘what evidence exists outside the bible that the israelites were slaves in egypt?’ from what i read in the bible unearthed there being nothing to base any claims on.

  the article gives a quote by ‘dr.

  bimson : “the biblical traditions of the bondage in egypt and of the exodus have a firm historical basis.” no links or sources given.

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  Earnest

  In a review of Dr Bimson's Redating the Exodus and Conquest, Alberto Soggin writes in Vetus Testamentum XXXI, 1 (1981):

  Too often the author presupposes the basic historicity of the biblical sources (pp.16, 68, 199, 202, etc.), although sometimes not without some benefit of doubt (e.g. p. 209: "... if these traditions are historically reliable ..."). Now such a thing cannot be presupposed (or believed, as the author has it sometimes), but must be proved. The ancient Near East is rich in historiographical texts such as chronicles, annals, royal inscriptions, introductions to international treaties and the like, and it is quite obvious that almost none of the texts in the Pentateuch and in the first two books of the "Former Prophets" belongs to one of these categories. But even if some did, it would be necessary to examine them critically. The historicity of a legendary text cannot of course be denied a priori, but it must be confirmed in every single case, a task that is sometimes difficult if not impossible....

  He concludes:
  

  If [the author's proposal for redating the Exodus and Conquest is not convincing] this is due first of all to objective factors ... for which he cannot be blamed; but secondly to the fact that the author seems not to have sufficiently appreciated the historical quality of the literary materials involved. With this limitation, the work remains valuable: the student and the scholar alike will find in it a thorough treatment of the archaeological and topographical problems connected with the Exodus and the Conquest. In other words, no scholar dealing with the problem can avoid a critical examination of the literary sources, as A. Alt and M. Noth taught us many years ago.
  
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  10

  Quote Misquote Misleading

  by ZindagiNaMilegiDobaara in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  the latest watchtowel (march 2020) study edition has a question from readers ‘what evidence exists outside the bible that the israelites were slaves in egypt?’ from what i read in the bible unearthed there being nothing to base any claims on.

  the article gives a quote by ‘dr.

  bimson : “the biblical traditions of the bondage in egypt and of the exodus have a firm historical basis.” no links or sources given.

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  Earnest

  Zing, the quotation comes from Dr Bimson's book Redating the Exodus and Conquest which was first published in 1978 and a second edition in 1981.

  In his book Dr Bimson writes (p.10, 2nd edition)

  It is a fundamental assumption of this work that the biblical traditions of the bondage in Egypt and of the Exodus have a firm historical basis.

  He then goes on to say:

  The present writer would express this historical essence of the tradition as follows: A considerable body of people, who were in some way ancestral to the later tribes of Israel, were pressed into a state of servitude in Egypt. They eventually found their situation intolerable, but escape from it only became possible when Egypt's control over them was broken by events which the Bible depicts as miraculous. Then this body of people left Egypt and moved into the area south of Canaan under the leadership of Moses. Subsequently the group entered Canaan itself and took possession of considerable areas of land.

  It seems legitimate to assume that this basic sequence of events is historical.
  

  It is clear Dr Bimson is himself satisfied from his doctoral research that the biblical traditions have an historical basis. I think you are splitting hairs.
  
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  43

  Did You Know Any "Genuine"" Old School Anointed?

  by Number 6 in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  growing up in scotland in the 1970s in scotland the anointed were few and far between, but we had one old dude in our cong who claimed to be one of the anointed.

  in the days when it was taken seriously.. i'd be curious how you viewed them.

  thing is, he wasn't an elder, or even a ministerial servant, just a plain old publisher.. but he was revered like he had a hotline to jesus.. the other week i was talking to a friend of similar age to me but who hung around the wt a lot longer than i did, and he just commented "oh him... he was a doddery old fool who used to just sit and piss himself.

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  Earnest

  We had three in my congregation in the 60's and 70's, all dating back to the 1920's. All very sincere and knew their Bible but none of them seemed to think they were in any way special. In fact, one of them whose husband was not a JW never told him of her calling to be a king and priest in a marriage of 70 years.

  One of them was a bit eccentric inasmuch as she would collect newspaper cuttings every week which in some way suggested we were in the time of the end. I just remember one which spoke of the skyscrapers in New York and she linked it with the giants at the time of the Flood. As a young child I was in awe.
  
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  In Defense of Christmas Trees and Dec. 25th as DOB

  by Sea Breeze in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nv-jabacyc4&feature=emb_logo .

  december 25th defense article.

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  Earnest

  Another interesting and pointed comment in the video:

  At 1:40 - "So some people will talk, for instance, about Christmas is ... is not the right date. We know that. That's irrelevant."
  
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  95

  Greta Thunberg...what’s your view of her?

  by minimus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  she certainly is passionate about climate change.

  🤔.

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  Earnest

  Greta Thunberg is inspiring in an age devoid of inspiring leaders. Brave, eloquent, passionate ... what is there not to admire.
  
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  78

  What The Fossils Say

  by cofty in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  the old creation book had a lot to say about the fossil record.

  if i remember correctly it was some lie about all the fossils ever found would fit on a single table.

  the reality is that there is an embarrassment of riches illustrating the evolution of life.

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  Earnest

  cofty, I was most interested to read the Letters to Creationists Blog to which you referred. Regardless of the scientific arguments, I thought his reference to Augustine (On Genesis, Book I, Chapter 19) worth repeating :

  Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the Earth, the Heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the cycles of the years and the seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he holds to as being certain from reason and experience.

  If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about [Genesis], how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason?
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  14

  'Evolution' definition can include 'origin of life'

  by hooberus in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  the popular berkeley evolution site (while responding to the misconception that evolution is just "a theory about the origin of life" does state:.

  "evolutionary theory does encompass ideas and evidence regarding life's origins (e.g., whether or not it happened near a deep-sea vent, which organic molecules came first, etc.

  ), but this is not the central focus of evolutionary theory.

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  Earnest

  As a matter of interest, today (24th November) is the 160th anniversary of the publication of On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection by Charles Darwin.

  A discussion of his life and letters at the time can be found in the Darwin Correspondence Project. Particularly interesting are the reviews of friends and critics.
  
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  49

  A deeper examination of The New World Translation

  by Terry in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  shorturl.at/ouakr.

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  Earnest

  jhine, both of these topics have been discussed ad nauseam on this forum and a brief search would locate multiple threads if you are interested. While I make no scholarly claim, it just takes common sense to answer them.

  In A Greek Grammar of the New Testament, Blass & Debrunner, 1961 wrote (p.160) “ἄλλος [állos] is sometimes omitted where we would add ‘other.’”
  
  Examples are not hard to find.
  
  In Luke 21:29 Jesus speaks of the fig-tree and all (panta) [other] trees. NWT, NAB and TEV include the word "other" which Jesus' audience would have understood.
  In Luke 11:42 Jesus speaks of tithing the mint and rue and every (pan) [other] herb. NWT and TEV include "other" which is what was understood.
  
  Including the word "other" in Colossians 1:16, 17 does not change the meaning. Or would you understand verse 16 to include Christ in all things created by means of him? Words are always added (and omitted) in translation, that is the nature of the beast.
  
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  39

  The real dividing line isn’t between apostates and apologists it’s between...

  by slimboyfat in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  excellent observation from zizek about communist regimes: they didn’t care if people accepted the ideology or took it seriously, so long as people acted as if the ideology was true, that was the important thing.

  in fact the regimes were deeply suspicious people who took the ideology too seriously.

  people who took the ideology seriously were dangerous because they were prone to noticing the inconsistencies and flaws in the system.

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  Earnest

  Magnum : First, as I understand, "classics" does not include Bible (Koine) Greek and Bible Hebrew (classical Greek is different from Bible Greek).

  Half banana : the Koine Greek of the NT is actually the same as the Greek written and spoken in the Late Classical period [400 - 300 BCE]

  Wikipedia has an interesting discussion on koine Greek phonology. Essentially, it says that the loss of vowel length and the spread of Greek under Alexander the Great led to a reorganization of the vowels in the phonology of Koine Greek. There were no longer distinctions of long and short vowels in popular speech.
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  It isn't only the witnesses.

  by Lost in the fog in

  1. social
  2. current

  at last we have a statement that it's not all about the jws because to listen to them you would think that it was.

  u.s. commission on international religious freedom database lists religious prisoners across globe - washington times.

  https://m.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/nov/6/us-commission-on-international-religious-freedom-d/ .

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  Earnest

  You may also like to view the databases of Human Rights without Frontiers. There are two databases of people who are imprisoned for exercising their right to freedom of religion or belief. One for China, and one for other countries.

  There are also archives you can access for the years 2013 - 2018. In 2019 there were 786 in the database for countries other than China. Of these, 145 (18.4%) were Jehovah's Witnesses..