teel

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Posts by teel

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  8

  untitled

  by dgp in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i'm under the impression that the restrictions the wtbts imposes on witnesses to interact with non-jw's ultimately means that a non-jw might find he or she can't really help a faithful witness.

  even if the witness in in real, serious need, or in the common events of every day life.

  you can't ask your witness neighbor to come over to your house and interact normally.

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  teel

  Isolation is one of the tools of thought control. If one would follow the 'spiritual advice' to the letter, indeed he might find himself in just that situation. Fortunately most of them still use some discernement not to cut off themselves completely, reasoning that the neighbour could be 'won over'.
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  52

  Facebook condemned

  by straightshooter in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  my wife told me that at the last meeting, the elders announced that youngsters going to the skateboarding park were no longer to have any privileges in the congregation.

  this is to prevent jw youngs to be rounded up if a drug raid was made at the skateboarding park.. also because of individuals requesting that they be friends on facebook that contain bad pictures, that anyone with a facebook account will automatically have their privileges removed.. sounds like the pharasees protecting the people by adding additional traditions upon them.. .

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  teel

  Facebook is not so popular in this part of the world, but still my wife said that an elder advised youngsters about social networking sites. He said that if you have a profile on a site like that, usually there's a zone to write about your hobbies, what you do, etc., so a wise 'christian' would use that space to talk about his 'sacred service'. Seems people here are rather secretive about that in public.
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  7

  Should I stop beating my wife?

  by Elsewhere in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  http://failblog.org/2009/12/21/wish-granted-cody/.

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  teel

  Lol, this sounds like a WT Bible's Viewpoint article title.
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  13

  Very "timely" WT information for my research of Hebrew and Greek Scriptures...

  by EndofMysteries in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  the nov 1st, 2009 page 20. .

  in summary, it's not needed to understand or compare the ancient hebrew and greek to our translations.

  it can be "a very difficult task", "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing", i suppose so, if finding the mistakes in the nwt.

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  teel

  Perry gere's the original thread discussing this article, with links to scans: http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/watchtower/bible/182081/1/Do-You-Need-to-Learn-Hebrew-and-Greek-WT-11-01-09. It was regarding understanding the Bible.

  "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing"

  From this one thing comes to my mind: take lots of knowledge! Fixed.
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  8

  Anyone ever really read this?

  by EndofMysteries in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  2 peter 2:18-19 - "for they utter swelling expressions of no profit, and by the desires of the flesh and by loose habits they entice those who are just escaping from people who conduct themselves in error.

  while they are promising them freedom, they themselves are existing as slaves to corruption.

  for whoever is overcome by anotehr is enslaved by this one.

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  teel

  Very true. One barely escaping a cult can be very vulnerable, and can be easily sucked into an other cult, because they offer the comfort of familiarity, or misguided by the apparent total freedom of the outside world, after years of shackles.
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  10

  Favoritism within the WT

  by garyneal in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  though my wife does not really see it and i myself am only beginning to actually see it, it appears that there is a lot of 'favoritism' going on in the wts.

  now maybe i should not judge especially since, in my case, i do not have all of the facts.. therefore, i will just let this passage of scripture stand on its own and allow people to comment on what they see as favoritism within the society.. .

  james 2.

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  teel

  Gary if I recall correctly you only visited the KH a couple of times for your wife's sake. If you want to observe the favoritism toward social status, a good time to go is when the CO visits. The witnesses go out of their way to please him. Everyone looks their finest, all meeting's attendance is very high, and the talks and answers are much more thought out than ever. The CO and wife is crowded after the meeting, everyone wanting to shake his hand, congratulate him on the talk, etc.

  Also, this has not happened in my remote congregation, but if a GB member visits, I can imagine the witnesses would simply faint. They're the rock idols of JWs; witnesses go hundreds or thousands of miles just to catch a glimpse of him. Funny thing is, when the pope visited my country, JWs looked down on christians, saying "what's the big deal, travelling hundreds of miles just to see him, he's just a man..."
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  11

  Would Jesus Today be a Democrat or a Republican?

  by Confucious in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  just a thought.... and if this thread has been done?

  i appologize in advance.. and it's real easy to say, "neither.".

  but with how we in america traditionally view dems and republicans.. debate....

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  teel

  http://www.politicalcompass.org - try to answer the questions as Jesus would. Here's my results, it may be heavily skewed, nevertheless for fun: Left wing -5.62 (out of 10), Libertarian -1.54. So that's Democrat I guess.
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  6

  sales and marketing meetings

  by Aussie Oz in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i just read another thread http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/watchtower/beliefs/186235/1/this-one-is-a-doozie about changing words.

  that has some comments on sales meetings starting and thought it (hope it is) worthy of its own thread.

  so let em rip!.

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  teel

  I can only talk of what I read in books (fortunately JW was the only cult I was in) - Hassan describes four type of cults in Combatting Cult Mind Control: religious, political, psychotherapy-educational, and commercial. These mainly differ of the core teachings, but the methods used are strikingly similar. My mother in law was also in Amway for a while, and I can confirm that the similarities are not because the members were JW.
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  11

  WT article on propaganda

  by greenie in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  does anyone want to tackle the hypocrisy in this article?

  here's the link and the text is below.

  also, can any former dubs explain how a jw could read or write this and not see how it applies to themselves?

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  teel

  That piece of article is one of the best written in the WT literatures. It sums up the WT so well, that even an apostate could have written it (except a couple of sentences here and there).

  Let's see:

  Lies, lies! - peacedog summed it up quite well in this thread - the Watchtower published several times that Russel & co. looked forward to 1914 as the beginning of Christs's presence - when in fact they actually looked at that date as the end of this system of things. Also, there's plenty of misleading statements, which can be worse than lies, because they're easier to believe.

  Making generalizations - worldly people are sex crazed, evil, with no true love or friendship. 'Nuff said.

  Name calling - 'worldly', 'apostate', 'fleshly thinking', 'spiritually weak', etc.

  Playing on emotions - fear of the big A and being shunned is the main tool, they also use love bombing, and hatred against anything non-JW, pride because of their 'superior' Bible knowledge and 'superior' morales, overall being part of God's chosen people.

  Slogans and symbols - the JWs use an exceptionally loaded language, to the point where an outsider is completely lost when listening to them. As for symbols, the ever present tie and service bag comes to my mind. No spiritual person is without them...
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  9

  OBEY. a doozie from the 50s WT

  by Aussie Oz in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  5/1 1959 wt.

  taking pauls illustration of the organization as a human body with its great variety of functions, it can readily be appreciated that the head does not do everything, but it does direct.

  it employs the members of the body to do its bidding.

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  teel

  I see the history of the WTS as a great example of meme evolution. By trial and error the Society has perfected the teaching style so as to have the cake and eat it too. Back in those days they were much more upfront with the teaching, but some people caught up with "don't be followers of men". It got refined much, now you don't see such bold statements; the underlying message is the same, but they dance around the issue saying "follow God, who gives his guidance through His slave", so a JW can say he actually follows God, when in fact it's the commands of men he's following.