Posts by Doug Mason

44

Does your product contain blood? 1960/70's twottery!!

by punkofnice in

back in the 1960's early 70's i remember my congregation going on a witch hunt and making a list of products, ice creams, confectionary or anything that might contain blood!.

i remember one zealous brother asking an ice cream vendor if the ice cream contained blood.

the vendor just looked gone out!.

Doug Mason

What about vaccinations?

"As to the use of vaccines and other substances that may in some way involve the use of blood in their preparation, it should not be concluded that the Watch Tower Society endorses these and says that the practice is right and proper. However, vaccination is a virtually unavoidable practice in many segments of modern society, and the Christian may find some comfort under the circumstances in the fact that this use is not in actuality a feeding or nourishing process." (The Watchtower, November 1, 1961, page 670)

So injecting is not "feeding or nourishing"?

In the case of snake anti-venene, a horse has several litres of blood taken at a time.

Doug

I am looking for audios with Julius Mantey

by Doug Mason in

as i was going through stuff i have collected, i noticed a couple of audio cassettes advertised in "the scholastic dishonesty of the watchtower" (which i presume you all have).. one cassette is called, "the scholastic dishonesty of the watchtower", with michael van buskirk and julius mantey, while the other is of a 90-minute radio talk program with michael and julius interacting with the audience.. a very quick search located the following, but does not bring me any joy: http://www.worldcat.org/title/scholastic-dishonesty-of-the-watchtower/oclc/12118572.

any clues?.

also with michael's "dishonesty" booklet, i understand it is a chapter from his book, "the sandcastle of the jehovah's witnesses".. what can you tell me about that book?

Doug Mason

As I was going through stuff I have collected, I noticed a couple of audio cassettes advertised in "The Scholastic Dishonesty of the Watchtower" (which I presume you all have).

One cassette is called, "The Scholastic Dishonesty of the Watchtower", with Michael Van Buskirk and Julius Mantey, while the other is of a 90-minute radio talk program with Michael and Julius interacting with the audience.

A very quick search located the following, but does not bring me any joy: http://www.worldcat.org/title/scholastic-dishonesty-of-the-watchtower/oclc/12118572

Any clues?

Also with Michael's "Dishonesty" booklet, I understand it is a chapter from his book, "The Sandcastle of the Jehovah's Witnesses".

What can you tell me about that book? Is it available anywhere? Can I borrow a copy to scan it?

Thanks,

Doug

9

MASTER'S THESIS on Charles Taze Russell's sources and ideas

by TerryWalstrom in

http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a226955.pdf.

click on the above link and have a most enjoyable read!.

below, the opening paragraph.

Doug Mason

A great find, Terry!

But to look only at Russell's attitude towards Christianity masks the other dominating feature of his ministry: he was a determined believer in the restoration of the Jews to their home in Palestine. This cannot be overstated.

Russell was absolutely determined that Lev 26 showed that in 1914, the Jews would be restored to become the world's dominant nation, to being restored to God's favour, I recognise, of course, that this lies outside the scope of the thesis you uncovered.

I note that the bibliography includes the book by Horowitz. I have to say that I am somewhat disappointed in Horowitz's book in that he does not provide pages numbers of the sources he refers to.

Good work, Terry.

Doug

16

Rutherford, Knorr or Franz - Who has the most influence on doctrine & process now?

by konceptual99 in

so, i was thinking - who of the above still has the most influence on current wts doctrine and dogma?.

rutherford obviously created the smokescreen around 1914/607 but overall his work has been superseded i would suggest.. knorr created the various schools and they or their offspring still live on.

wasn't it during his tenure that all the blood doctrine, types/anti types (now chucked away of course), transplants etc came along?

Doug Mason

My guess is Rutherford. He utterly changed Russell's ideas in the areas of "doctrine" and "organization". None of the others who followed introduced the massive turnaround that he achieved.

Imagine what it would be like if someone were to take the present "teachings" and "organization" and then return these to those which existed under Russell. That would give an idea of the enormity of what Rutherford did.

Even today, the WTS worships Rutherford's 1919 experience as being "the moment" when Jesus selected them out of all people on earth. It worships Rutherford's inventions, such as: the name "Jehovah's witnesses", the identification of "the Great Crowd", and the "theocratic" arrangement. Who else has made such sweeping changes? Rutherford dropped Russell's key focus on the Return of the Jews to Palestine. Russell was lauded as the most influential Christian Zionist. It was a key plank in his Divine Plan.

Even the "no-blood" doctrine, although opening up in 1945 under Franz, had its genesis in the quackery that existed in the 1930s under Rutherford's watch.

That's my opinion. Known to be wrong before,

Doug

21

Was Jesus a real person?

by Coded Logic in

why didn't jesus ever write anything?

why are there no letters to jesus?

no painting of jesus from that time?

Doug Mason

Very few people could read and even fewer could write.

Jesus (Yeshua/Joshua) was from a rural setting, not from the class that depended on writing. Fishermen such as Simon/Peter would not have been able to read or write even in his own language (Aramaic) and this is one reason we know he did not write the epistles attributed to him, especially as they are written in good quality Greek.

Paul was a different item. He was of the Diaspora, not from Judea, he was a learned person, imbued no doubt with Greek/Roman philosophy and he was a Roman citizen. His writings are the earliest of the NT writings and because his followers came to the ascendancy, his writings and those of his followers dominate the writings that his followers in the 4th century decided were Scripture.

Community-wide communicating by writing is a modern phenomenon.

Doug

10

The Watch Tower Society reveals itself

by Doug Mason in

over time, the watch tower society has completely changed many of its beliefs.

for example, until recently, the wts said that the emblems of the memorial represented the church, the 144,000, that the emblems did not symbolize jesus.. at times, the wts changes the name of a belief while it continues the teaching, for example, the wts used to say that jesus and the 144,000 together were the "the christ".

today, the wts denies this teaching but the name "anointed" means "christ".. do you want to see what the watch tower reveals about these things and more?

Doug Mason

Thank you for your kind comments.

The fact is that it started out as something very different: I wanted to study Isaiah 43. It is a poem written around the time of the Babylonian Captivity. The Study then took itself into two parts: firstly, looking at the chapter in the Bible, the second part was looking at how the Watchtower introduced it into their methodology. Gradually, it became clear that with the second I was discovering more than I had anticipated. I wrote to someone that I was writing but I did not know what it is. The Study grabbed my hands and took me on a journey where I discovered things I had never known. Still I was concerned at where this thing was taking me. The last mental struggle was to understand how a democratic society could become autocratic without having conducted a democratic election. It became clear that they were gradually pummeled into submission, with a process that took more than 20 years.

I suspect that every reader will, as it proper, see things that I had not even imagined; I do not have their experiences.

Perhaps the Writing Department at HQ will find it useful?

I hope you like the cartoon at the end.

Doug

10

The Watch Tower Society reveals itself

by Doug Mason in

over time, the watch tower society has completely changed many of its beliefs.

for example, until recently, the wts said that the emblems of the memorial represented the church, the 144,000, that the emblems did not symbolize jesus.. at times, the wts changes the name of a belief while it continues the teaching, for example, the wts used to say that jesus and the 144,000 together were the "the christ".

today, the wts denies this teaching but the name "anointed" means "christ".. do you want to see what the watch tower reveals about these things and more?

Doug Mason

Thanks Smiddy,

I do not see it as something to be read from page 1 but as a reference source.

I tried to get internal hyperlinks to work but Word failed me in a most frustrating fashion. Sorry about that.

Doug

10

The Watch Tower Society reveals itself

by Doug Mason in

over time, the watch tower society has completely changed many of its beliefs.

for example, until recently, the wts said that the emblems of the memorial represented the church, the 144,000, that the emblems did not symbolize jesus.. at times, the wts changes the name of a belief while it continues the teaching, for example, the wts used to say that jesus and the 144,000 together were the "the christ".

today, the wts denies this teaching but the name "anointed" means "christ".. do you want to see what the watch tower reveals about these things and more?

Doug Mason

Over time, the Watch Tower Society has completely changed many of its beliefs. For example, until recently, the WTS said that the emblems of the Memorial represented the Church, the 144,000, that the emblems did not symbolize Jesus.

At times, the WTS changes the name of a belief while it continues the teaching, For example, the WTS used to say that Jesus and the 144,000 together were the "The Christ". Today, the WTS denies this teaching but the name "Anointed" means "Christ".

Do you want to see what the Watch Tower reveals about these things and more? Then read:

http://www.jwstudies.com/The_Watch_Tower_Society_Reveals_Itself.pdf

Doug

14

The Kingdom of God -- Simplified Suggestion

by FusionTheism in

depending on the context, the phrase "kingdom of god" can have a few different simplified meanings:.

1: the authority of god manifesting itself through miracles, love, or judgment.. 2: the authority of god in people's lives.. 3: the lord jesus, the 12 apostles, and others who will sit on thrones and wear crowns in the new heavens and the new earth.. 4: the 1,000 year reign of christ on earth (if that is literal instead of symbolic).. 5: (in the old testament:) the nation of israel under godly kings such as david or josiah.. there are a few passages of scripture i can think of which could support the idea that the kingdom is made up of those who rule in heaven, as opposed to those who live on earth.

these are matthew 11:11-13, john 3:13, 31, acts 2:34. delving into those scriptures will be the subject of a future post.. as always, the immediate context of a passage, and the context of that particular book as a whole, helps determine the meaning of the phrase..

Doug Mason

The word "kingdom" does not mean territory or people. For example, when the Babylonian kingdom ended, the territory was still there, the people still existed.

A better idea of the Biblical concept of "kingdom" is to recognise its meaning in older English. You would need to look at a comprehensive multi-volume OED, where you would see that "kingdom" includes the concept of "kingship", of the exercise of power of the king. In other words, the "kingdom of God" is God's rulership, which belongs to him. The church is not the kingdom of God but it is produced by God's kingship. Thus the true church is not bounded by human regulation, human structures, or position. The true church transcends denomination, religion, beliefs, but is "written in heaven" because the kingdom/kingship is God's and not man's.

I suggest that "googling" for: kingdom kingship

Doug

88

Damned if they do, Damned if they don't

by FusionTheism in

jw
friends

i see an attitude among some people here which is not very helpful.

i can understand it, but still, it's not constructive or helpful.. if you condemn the society for not changing, but then you also condemn them when they do change in a positive way, what incentive or motive does that provide for the people at the society to ever want to change for the better?.

also, what does that attitude look like to current witnesses who are having doubts?.

Doug Mason

Finkelstein,

The WTS has not always been a top-down theocracy. It was a democracy for a long time.

Doug