Posts by Cold Steel

14

Angels and Jehovah's Witnesses

by Cold Steel in

what would happen if a jehovah's witness claimed to see an angel or have an angelic experience?

what would the reaction of the church be if one of the governing body claimed to have seen an angel or have an angelic experience?

by "angelic experience" i mean being shown future events by an angelic presence.

Cold Steel

Wish you boys could go find these for yourselves instead of me doing the searches, but what the heck. Thing about apologetics is that it's a whole lot easier throwing out the objections than reading the answers.

The Book of Mormon and DNA Research by Daniel C. Peterson

62

Enemies Of Reason -Richard Dawkins

by frankiespeakin in

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcs751gcp10.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52j5stxkbkq.

Cold Steel

Cold Steel - Ask Qcmbr what religion he was up until relatively recently - go on, ask him - go on!

Well, brother Cofty, it don't really matter much what he was and what he is. I can generally tell what they've been a readin' by the way they couch their questions! Unfortunately, I've seen some people leave the LDS church for some mighty strange reasons. If he lived in the U.S. and I could talk things out with him, I'd guess I'd find out if he was deceiving himself or whether he just wanted out for other reasons. Honesty and integrity in one's objections goes a long way with me, and when people start tossing out cow pies instead of well thought-out objections, I pretty much know where they're gettin' it -- and it ain't from their own intellects.

63

The "Flood" in Noah's day--why wasn't that Armageddon enough?

by Terry in

the great day of god the almighty certainly is a fit description for the destruction of men, women, children, grandmothers, infants and puppy dogs in the days of noah.. why didn't destroying everybody on earth except a remnant of 8 count as armageddon?.

i mean, if you are starting all over by genocide--shouldn't it count for more than bad temper?.

what are we missing?.

Cold Steel

...The "nephilim" is a fanciful story and did not refer to angels at all.

I always find it interesting when an apologist argues for God and the Bible...then dismisses some portion of it they don't agree with.

If this person can dismiss the story of the Nephilim as "fanciful", then why can I not reject the entire account as absurd?

It’s not dismissal, it’s exegesis. The story isn’t about monsters, and it isn’t about angels. It’s about the people of God, the “sons of light,” and the children of men, the children of darkness. In short, members of God’s ancient people intermarried with outside cultures whose dedication to Jehovah was greatly in question. The resultant children were men of great renown, and were honorable people of the earth in ancient standards.

One can believe what one will, but angels are not capable of generating bodies and having sexual intercourse with the children of men. As it was in the days of Balaam, the sons of God were usually the recalcitrant ones, mixing their seed with the promiscuous daughters of the heathen.

The angels and giants stories that have popped up over the years come mostly from corrupted extrabiblical works as the purported Book of Enoch, and are laid in the foundation of sensationalism. The best way to approach this topic is to do Internet searches and see what’s out there. My own view is that this was forbidden intermarriage, but between consenting humans.

Where are you getting this stuff from -- the Book of Mormon?

Nope. Although it appears that Lehi had a copy of a Book of Enoch, he never covers the nephilim one way or the other. He did name one of his sons Nephi, who tells us that he was “large in stature” — however, this seems only to be a coincidence.

6

Was Jesus slacking so that a Governing Body had to step in and do his job?

by Terry in

let's go down a checklist of worthwhile accomplishments through the history of the watchtower bible and tract society.. 1. self styled "pastor" c.t.russell used dispensation charts, pyramidology and his own scripture interpretations to locate the date in the flow of time when jesus christ would return and begin ruling over mankind.. was russell successful in correctly identifying jesus' return?

no.. were his charts and computations accurate or embarassingly wrong-headed?

wrong-headed.. 2. russell continued "adjusting" his dates up until he died.

Cold Steel

In your opinion are these Governing Body members fully complicit in the scam or do they think they are God's representatives in your opinion? As far as I can tell, God has never actually talked to any of these guys. It's one thing to say, "We're just like any other church, trying to make it on our own as we see it." It's another thing to say, "Hey, we're God's primary go-to people on Earth...you're either with us or against Jehovah."

Doesn't it seem that some would doubt?

Have any GB members ever been disfellowshiped? Or left because they weren't sure the Kingdom was all it appeared?

62

Enemies Of Reason -Richard Dawkins

by frankiespeakin in

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcs751gcp10.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52j5stxkbkq.

Cold Steel

Nothing 'revealed' in Mormonism has been correct in a factual way...with the odd fortunate exception (e.g. no smoking), it has proven ridiculous, dangerous and a distraction from reality.

And how would you possibly know this? If this statement is true, I will immediately admit my mistake and leave the church. Fortunately, you are merely repeating things you’ve read elsewhere without bothering to research any facet of the church. And in what way is it dangerous? I’ve seen nothing that has been hurled at Mormonism that hasn’t already been hurled at ancient Christianity.

Its cosmology is wrong (there is no great star surrounded by lesser orbiting stars, stars do not get light from higher order of stars, nobody lives on the moon in Quaker style dress, planets do not convert into a crystalline non-entropic state etc.)....

No one in the church has ever stated that people live on the moon in Quaker style dress. This fanciful story has its basis in the journal of one early latter-day saint, a man by the name of Oliver B. Huntington, and was nowhere backed up, reported, related, hinted at or taught. If it was a teaching, why is it not mentioned by Wilford Woodruff, our chief historian and a comprehensive journal keeper? As for stars, how could you possibly know everything you claim? Have you been to the center of our galaxy, or any other, for that matter? If not, how did you manage to see past the dust, or peer into other dimensions? Astronomers have found some amazing things, such as stars in the Milky Way’s center that are 200 million times the mass of our sun! We didn’t know that when Joseph Smith was alive. Yet Joseph spoke in grand terms and constantly spoke of the universe, and perhaps others, as much larger than anyone ever expected. Bottom line, you don’t know enough to condemn our cosmology. And do you think that ours is any worse than the Bible’s?

...its history is corrupted (current textbooks decontextualise the history and re-represent it in a whitewashed fashion, small example: I never knew Joseph Smith used a stone in a hat to 'translate' the Book of Mormon; instead I was taught, and our artwork at the time showed, Joseph using the Urim and Thummim as a translation tool directly on the gold plates)....

Joseph Smith did indeed use a stone for translating the Book of Mormon and eventually he didn’t even need that. He also began his translation using the Urim and Thummim, which is just another sort of stone inset into a breastplate. And yes, he put it into a hat where he could more clearly discern what he was seeing. Strange? Perhaps to modern minds, but the Lord has always used devices to bring about His will. Have you ever read H.G. Wells’ “The Crystal Egg”? It’s a short story about a man who buys a beautiful crystal egg in a curio shop. He discovered later that he could detect images in it and he put a dark cloth over his head and the egg so he could more clearly see. According to Hebrew tradition, Joshua used twelve stones, each representing a tribe of Israel. When one tribe would transgress, the correlating stone would glow and a number would show the number of transgressors or transgressions. Also according the ancient tradition, Noah used shining stones to see aboard the ark. Later, when the Brother of Jared was asked by the Lord what He, the Lord, should do to grant the Jaredites light, the prophet produce clear stones he already had prepared. If he knew that Noah had used such stones, doesn’t it make sense that he would use the same solution for the barges his people were building? (See Nibley’s article, Strange Ships and Shining Stones.)

...it's archaeology is absolutely zero — even tiny civilisations leave traces (we find small bronze age houses on remote islands in the British Isles ) — but the million man battles and huge, concrete and city building people's of the BoM have left not one single shred of evidence, its ancient linguistic ability is laughable (Book of Abraham facsimile used has been shown to be a standard finery text not , as mendaciously described by JS, a record written by the hand of Abraham, also the Egyptian alphabet he and the brethren concocted is utter gibberish), its social laws are as racist, sexist, homophobic and explotational as any ever written by any culture (black men and the priesthood/marriage, polygamy, polygany, gay reclamation electro shock therapy, proposition 8, a woman's place is 'in the home' and so on), its geology is absurd (6000 year old Earth), its rejection of evolution and embrace of creationism unfortunate and demonstrably false and its contributions to physics, maths, astronomy, biology, geology, ancient history, genetics , medicine and all other scientific fields ranges from zero to galloping bollock twaddle.

Balderdash! If you’re going to criticize the LDS church, don’t just ejaculate your antiquated notions in so doing while pretending it’s something you’ve done on your own. If the Book of Mormon were false, shouldn’t the evidences against it be going up every year instead of dropping like a rock? I’ve actually stood in cement houses in Mesoamerica and seen the ruins of the ancient Mayans. Go to YouTube and do your own research on Mesoamerica and the Book of Mormon and the new evidences for the Book of Abraham. I can’t educate you in a forum such as this as these are things I read about all the time. You’re just throwing dirt and hoping it’ll stick. You have no real idea of what you’re talking about. Why, too, have researchers been able to follow Lehi’s route in the Old World and found not a single contradiction?? We even have a good idea where Nephi built his ship. Also, Nahom, the place where they buried Ishmael, has been discovered just where Nephi reported it was and in 1994 archeologists began discovering mummified bodies, indicating it was, as the Book of Mormon suggested, a burial site. How did Joseph Smith know that? All of your archeological questions can be found answered in two LDS DVDs entitled Journey of Faith (1 and 2). These are beautifully done, professional productions and, in my view, extremely compelling. The Nephi Project also has a quick and dirty DVD that is astoundingly compelling.

Journey of Faith, Part 1

Journey of Faith, Part 2

Nahom in The Book of Mormon

Evidences of the Book of Mormon

Gold Plates

Good Starting Place

14

Angels and Jehovah's Witnesses

by Cold Steel in

what would happen if a jehovah's witness claimed to see an angel or have an angelic experience?

what would the reaction of the church be if one of the governing body claimed to have seen an angel or have an angelic experience?

by "angelic experience" i mean being shown future events by an angelic presence.

Cold Steel

Yes, the LDS faith is the only Christian denomination that claims revelation and divine guidance, and it doesn't apologize for it. In fact, it was the absence of apostles and prophets in today's religious world that eventually led me to it. But unlike Joan of Arc, Ellen G. White and others throughout history, including Islam, "Mormonism" has witnesses to every major foundational revelatory event such as the advent of the Book of Mormon (3 witnesses who saw the plates, the angel and heard the voice of God declaring it was true, and 8 witnesses who saw the plates, hefted them, but saw no angel or vision), the restoration of both priesthoods including Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery, and the vision of the Three Degrees of Glory, which included Sidney Rigdon. Many other witnesses said they felt the plates in the burlap sack Joseph kept them in and, later, when apostles were called and ordained to fill a quorum, these men also had their own revelation and visions. One of these men trekked miles in a blizzard with only a frozen piece of stale bread to suck on. Another was commanded by the Lord to visit Jerusalem and dedicate it for the return of the Jews. He suffered sickness through much of his journey in the holds of a ship, yet was shown in vision that Judah would soon begin its trek to the lands of their inheritance. Then there were the miracles, the healings, the raising from the dead and restoring vision to the blind. These also were witnesses by many believers and non-believers. So too was the miracle of the sea gulls and the crickets in early Utah.

Like the ancient church, the LDS church has no fixed canon of scripture. We leave it open in the event that when the Lord does reveal something new, we don't slam the doors in His face.

Mormonism wasn't built on just one man, but upon many who were called of God as was Aaron. Like ancient Christianity, it, too, was accused of blasphemy and was ridiculed by critics. Yet future events will bear out its story. I would think if God were going to restore His church to the earth, that He would do it through revelation, the same way He's done it in the past. But that's another story.

47

Day One After Armgeddon written by a JW awaiting the Big A w/eager expectation - Warning: LOOOONG!!!

by Eve Deceived in

once we found out we were all witnesses, we all hugged.

now we just had to see if our kingdom hall was still standing.

when we came to the hall we had such a huge shock.. there were so many people there.

Cold Steel

You can learn a lot about a people by stories like this. What one reads in between the lines is every bit as fascinating as the lines themselves.

This story begins right after Armageddon, so the writer apparently didn't feel comfortable describing what Armageddon would be like. Presumably, this would be the beginning of the Millennium, correct? There's also no reference to non-believers. Are we to assmume that regardless how righteous or well meaning others may be, that they will all be found wanting and be condemned? I'd been told by Witnesses that when everyone was "resurrected" -- if they'd taken up Jehovah's cause when given the opportunity -- that they would be spared. What of the Seventh Day Adventists? They're fairly close in beliefs to the JWs. Will they be fried?

Now, as time progresses and people begin settling down into their new lives, will new cities be built? How long will be human life? Will the people be translated or resurrected? If you're alive at the time, are you immediately resurrected? And when your resurrected dead wife pops into town, will you still be married or are all bets off?

Finally, once the Millennium is over, what happens then? How do things change? In the resurrection will there be any glory?

14

The absence of DUE PROCESS and the threat of the "invisible" gun

by Terry in

the watchtower society is a monolithic power invested by its own self with power of attorney representing the supreme being in his dealings with mankind.

the watchtower represents itself as the "mouthpiece of god".

it speaks for jehovah.. but, does it treat the persons it deals with fairly and with due process?

Cold Steel

Ha! Never heard the "shun gun" thing before.

Just what's so scary about being destroyed at "Armageddon"? You'll be no worse off than you were before you were born (if they're right).

I just had surgery about a week ago. I've been under anethesia before, but I asked the doctor to please let me know when he began to inject the sodium penethol into my tube. "Oh," he said, patting me on the shoulder. "I just did. You ought to be feeling it in just a few...."

The lights above just began vibrating a little and I didn't hear the end of his sentence. The next thing I knew it was as though I had taken a long nap and was awakening, but I was disoriented as hell. A nurse walked up to me and said, "Hello, Mr. ---. How are we feeling? You're in the recovery room at the --- Hospital. Your surgery went well and your doctor will be dropping by in a few minutes. I'll notify your wife that you're awake and I'll be right back. Is there anything I can get you? Soft drink...water?"

I'd heard that drill before. I didn't think of it then, but so what if man doesn't have an immortal spirit (he does)? What would be the big deal about blipping out and just not coming back to see how the ship sank? (A Titanic reference.)

Am I going to let some self-appointed elder from a manmade church whose leaders have never seen an angel or received revelation of any sort, cow me into submission?

Let's pretend we're all WRONG about religion. Let's say you die and wake up and cows are running the universe. You've got a bunch of bald guys wearing pastel chiffon getups offering everyone else bee pollen. Meanwhile, a guy with horns and a red skintight outfit comes up and shows you a photo of you eating a cheeseburger. Okay, you know you're in deep. The only way it could get worse is if onion rings could sit in judgment of you. But now you've got a lot of holy cows looking to settle old scores. How bad would it be to just go back to non-existence. Even if the cows forgave you, is this really how you want to live?

Apparently, few people who are JWs really ever question whether their gig is legit if they risk being toast. Shoot, I don't know of anyone in the Society that really even knows what the Bible says about Armageddon! They know what the Watchtower says, but not the apostles. And corret me if I'm wrong, don't you get a clean shot at resurrection when you come to and are conscious again? Doesn't matter what you did on Earth...it's whether you choose Jehovah when you come to in the Recovery Room, right?

Either way....

63

The "Flood" in Noah's day--why wasn't that Armageddon enough?

by Terry in

the great day of god the almighty certainly is a fit description for the destruction of men, women, children, grandmothers, infants and puppy dogs in the days of noah.. why didn't destroying everybody on earth except a remnant of 8 count as armageddon?.

i mean, if you are starting all over by genocide--shouldn't it count for more than bad temper?.

what are we missing?.

Cold Steel

Yep, even if one dismisses everything in the Old and New Testaments, the stories should be told in their proper context. Whenever people begin accusing God of genicide, I know they're only reading what they've read elsewhere. Some parts of religion are horrible, but those parts invariably take place when God is no longer speaking and men have fallen into apostasy. Take the Inquisition for example. Once the Christian church became the vassal of Rome, and after the seven eccemunical councils, there was little of the original church left. "They teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof."

In the apocryphal Gospel of Thomas, which purportedly contains a number of genuine sayings of Jesus, Jesus taught:

"The kingdom of the father is like a certain woman who was carrying a jar full of meal. While she was walking on the road, still some distance from home, the handle of the jar broke and the meal emptied out behind her on the road. She did not realize it; she had noticed no accident. When she reached her house, she set the jar down and found it empty."

The idea is that as the church progresses, it would gradually lose the spiritual gifts that made it so unique. So gradual the process, no one would notice until only the shell, or empty form, was left. So the early church fully expected the apostasy, and as it later was fulfilled, church leadership kept pushing these prophecies into the future until they no longer understood they had come to pass. Some Catholics thought they were fighting the predicted apostasy by holding the Inquisition. Instead, they were actually fulfilling it!

63

The "Flood" in Noah's day--why wasn't that Armageddon enough?

by Terry in

the great day of god the almighty certainly is a fit description for the destruction of men, women, children, grandmothers, infants and puppy dogs in the days of noah.. why didn't destroying everybody on earth except a remnant of 8 count as armageddon?.

i mean, if you are starting all over by genocide--shouldn't it count for more than bad temper?.

what are we missing?.

Cold Steel

What are you missing?

Quite a bit, actually. First, you have no idea how wicked and degenerate people had become in the days of Noah. According to one extrabiblical account, Enoch beheld the Lord weeping and asked, "How can you, the great God of Heaven weep?" The he was shown the flood in vision prior to its happening. Like Abraham, he reasoned with the Lord and sought the Lord that he should turn away his anger. But then the Lord showed Enoch the people themselves, what was in their hearts and what went on in secret. After that, Enoch was wroth with the wickedness he saw and in essence said, "You should wipe them from the earth!"

Things aren't always as they appear in polite society. It's difficult to imagine intelligent beings burning and sacrificing their own infants to idols and giving way to gluttony, bebauched sexual practices and practicing the basest villiany possible to the point that they're beyond any hope of repentance. The legend of the flood is one that is had among all the nations of the earth, and it represented the baptism of the earth by water. Armageddon is the battle that will take place just before Jesus returns to the earth with fire, representing the baptism of the earth by fire and the Holy Spirit. Even so, the Lord will spare one-sixth of the enemy troops because they lacked complicity in the attack of Jerusalem.

One professor of theology I know was one time the Number 3 man in the FBI. While in that post he was struggling with how the Lord could destroy an entire people. He told me that one night he was having dinner with some friends when there was a knock at the front door. It was several FBI agents with a critical matter that required his attention. He joined them in an adjoining room and was subjected to details, photos and testimony that made him so physically sick that he went into the bathroom and threw up. That night, on returning home, he wrote the segment covering the flood and man's ability to resort to the most disgusting and sickening behavior in the books he was writing on the Old Testament. Over the years, he's never forgotten that night and the effect that paperwork had on him.

It's easy to second guess God, but it's not generally a good idea in my book. This doesn't mean God didn't love the people He destroyed; they are His children, just as we are. But they didn't cease from being. Instead, when their bodies died, they were put in sort of a penalty box, where they stayed until the crucifixion of Jesus. Peter writes:

For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit: By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison, which sometime were disobedient when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water. (1 Peter 3:18-20)

He later explained: " For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit. (1 Peter 4:6) In other words, they will be judged as men in the flesh even though they live as spirits. The prison corresponded also to "Paradise" (a place of rest, or more precisely, a place of "the king's rest"). Thus the thief on the cross also became one of those who was preached to.

Not all were equally as wicked in Noah's day, but my point is the God "wipes out" no one. He just...ummm...changes their scenery. Even those destroyed at Jesus' coming will be very much alive in spirit. And though they may be punished, it will not be forever. Some believe that Hell is both temporary and remedial. And ultimately men will be their own tormentors.

(P.S. -- The "nephilum" is a fanciful story and did not refer to angels at all. This issue of "giants" is an interesting topic and one for another topic.)