Posts by WontLeave

20

My Encounter with Local Jehovah's Witnesses

by whereami in

the second jw woman is the typical "i'll show you", jw know it all.. .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r45kymualfw&feature=player_embedded.

WontLeave

"He's an apostate. Let's go." is code for "Oh, crap! Somebody who knows how to argue with us."

JWs really believe that without them nobody can know anything. If you're an ex-JW, unbelieving JW's family member, or an ex-study, in their minds, you're an apostate. If you know about the Governing Body, you must have learned it from them. People so programmed against independent research can't fathom anyone knowing anything without the Society to spoon-feed it.

JWs believe they are familiar with the Bible, because they are told they are. They are told they have a scriptural education that rivals and exceeds any college degree. Witnesses are convinced the Governing Body is this group of men who - like the apostles - have the Scriptures opened to them by Holy Spirit. In reality, the only reason JWs gain any headway with the people at the doors ever, is because most people know nothing about the Bible and are completely apathetic.

Nearly every JW I've ever seen in action falls apart if their sales pitch gets side-tracked. It's embarrassing how many elders and pioneers I've had to bail out at the doors because they were making us look like idiots. More often than not, someone who says anything other than answers to their leading and fake "personal interest" questions is labelled as "combative".

Some people take offense to someone knocking on their door and telling them about the Bible. When people say they have their own church and the JW continues, it's obvious that the JW discounts their church. At this point, some may understandably get defensive. JWs, not being able to handle any resistance - because the presentation didn't go like it did at the Theocratic Ministry School demonstration - go to pieces, leave, and talk smack about the person in the car. I've heard so many times how "they're rejecting Jehovah, not me." What? I've had excellent return visits with people nobody could ever get anywhere with. JWs refuse to understand this simple concept: Nobody cares about the stupid Watchtower! Show them something useful from the Bible!

I've discovered JWs are very uncomfortable around anyone who actually is familiar with the Bible; especially if they know you're not obsessing over the Watchtower articles. And most elders hate anyone who obviously has a more firm grasp on the Scriptures, especially if they have decided that one is "spiritually weak" because they don't worship the Society the way they're supposed to.

8

You should go to the memorial!!!

by free2beme in

jw
friends

1992 - car group in service.. 12/24/91.

as i set there for the field service meeting a older sister name bernie asked a very obvious question?.

"do you ever get a negative response from people at the door, beings that tomorrow is christmas and all?".

WontLeave

I like the part where he is "in Jehovah's hands now", as if dying in good standing as a JW is some kind of trump card that supersedes God's opinion of a person. Over and over, I hear how the "organization" is going to make it into the New System and your salvation depends on being in it.

For each will carry his own load. - Gal 6:5

For we must all be made manifest before the judgment seat of the Christ, that each one may get his award for the things done through the body, according to the things he has practiced, whether it is good or vile. - 2Cor 5:10

Obviously, the JWs have found a loophole and can guarantee salvation. Wow, these people are arrogant and stupid.

48

If You Could Choose The Manner Of Your Death...What Would It Be?

by Was New Boy in

jw
friends

most people really don't want to think about it....but if you could choose, how would like to leave the planet?.

going out with a bang could be fun..... dying as a martyr?.

dying as a hero saving someone?.

WontLeave

Quietly in my sleep, never knowing what happened, like my grandfather.

Not horrified and screaming like the passengers in his car.

29

Can someone PLEASE scan the Watchtower dated 7-15-11 and PM me. Im going public. People need to be warned about this CULT. Im done sitting on the sidelines watching

by foolsparadise in

jw
friends

please send me the magazine in its entirety so it looks authentic and credible.

i will be showing this article to all media types and news authorities.

i have lost my family to this destructive cult in the past year.

WontLeave

So, let me see if I have this right:

You intend to expose the Jehovah's Witnesses through their publicly-available media? As for the Shepherding the Flock book, that's already posted all over the Internet for anyone who wants it.

Nobody cares. The US is trillions of dollars in debt; nobody cares. People are dying in 3rd-world countries from starvation, AIDS, war, curable diseases; nobody cares. The police falsely arrest, beat, and murder people with impunity; nobody cares. Girls in the Middle East are getting their clits cut off and being stoned to death in the streets for being in the company of the wrong boy; nobody cares.

The average person doesn't care enough about their own kids to keep them off drugs, keep them from getting pregnant, or make sure they go to college. The average person doesn't give a pile of dingo's kidneys about their own church, much less anyone else's. Pretty much everybody in the English-speaking world who cares at all about the failings of Jehovah's Witnesses is on this forum.

20

My Encounter with Local Jehovah's Witnesses

by whereami in

the second jw woman is the typical "i'll show you", jw know it all.. .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r45kymualfw&feature=player_embedded.

WontLeave

The Bible isn't monotheistic. The "only one god" theory is false. Someone can only have one God, but that doesn't preclude the existence of other gods. The confusion occurs because people fail to comprehend the various meanings of God/god. Anything that influences and controls your life is a god: Men in authority, our own obsessions, powerful spirits. Fundies believe they can trap JWs into saying something blasphemous because they are under the erroneous impression there is only one god. Witnesses fall into the trap, because they also are under the erroneous impression there is only one true god. Basically, you have the pot calling the kettle black, in this example.

81

New simplified Watchtower

by alanv in

beginning with the july 15th 2011 edition of the watchtower, the society are producing a simplified version of the study copy.. this is apparantly for the many people whose first language is not english, and yet they live in a predominantly englsih speaking county.. the normal study edition will still be produced but it looks like the cong.

will be able to ask for a supply of the simplified version each month.. this simplified version can be downloaded from the watchtower site.. http://www.jw.org/index.html.

WontLeave

I see this "simplified" English WT as a good thing. The straight-forward sentence structure and smaller vocabulary allow less nuance. The duality of doctrine in the less-dumb WT is only obvious to JWs who are aware of what is going on. There is no reading between the lines in the dumber version. The very nature of it betrays "the abundance of the heart", with no wiggle room for back-pedaling when confronted with their beliefs. The vague suggestions which are read as direct orders from Jesus, the wishy-washy demand for obedience while feigning humility, the ambiguous wording intended to be used as a club in the back room yet allow plausible deniability to outsiders; these are all lost in the "See Jane run." version. They are forced to come right out and say what they mean.

Perhaps their ghetto-combing ministry and non-existent success rate with anyone intelligent or educated has forced their hand. Let's face it, when your congregation is looking more and more like a motor skills class, how can you expect to make them conform to subtle implications? The new breed of JWs can't even read the lines, much less read between the lines.

Interestingly, you'll notice any straight-talk "The Governing Body is your overlords" message still fails to appear in the public editions. Just for fun, I searched the newest idiot WT and the public WT from jw.org for the term "slave". In the context of the fds, it appeared 10 times in this one issue. That's not including "Governing Body", "anointed", or any other terms used interchangeably. Meanwhile, in the public edition, it appeared a whopping zero times.

Did John the baptist sweep Jesus under the rug until the people he preached to were nice and indoctrinated? No, he led with that message and was proud of it. The GB and JWs in general hide this jagged little pill in hopes nobody can taste it until it's too late. This one doctrine - the Governing Body - is their downfall; their Achilles' heel. No matter how you feel about any other doctrine of JWs, the GB one is what makes the others mandatory.

Without human dictators, every other doctrine is optional for each person to exercise his or her own Christian, Bible-trained conscience. "But solid food belongs to mature people, to those who through use have their perceptive powers trained to distinguish both right and wrong." - Heb 5:14 But, it's impossible to train our consciences as JWs, because every decision is made for us. Every situation, every interaction, every possible variable in our lives has some Watchtower article about it. The GB tears at our confidence with their self-promoting and condescending literature, to keep us convinced we are babies and must rely on the "mother" organization for everything. They want us to believe we are helpless without them - not Jesus, not Jehovah - them.

Now, introduce an entire generation of followers with no money, no education, no life, and the intellectual prowess of canned goods. The Society obviously realizes the quality of the current newcomers to the religion and are directing the message to them; the useful idiots. The recent radical "fundamentalism" has given the US a new lease on "Christianity" and the JWs are obviously trying to ride this wave or at least adopt the methodology of extremists.

Stupid people are quicker and easier to train as robot zombies. They don't get bored as easily and will perform for much less reward. They don't do research or ask too many questions. They're certainly not going to pose difficult issues that cause others to doubt. Basically, the Society is amassing an army of retards who will unquestioningly do their bidding.

Just like medieval serfs or kids on the playground, anyone who's perceived as different will be attacked and excluded without a thought. The Armageddon and demon phobias, along with Governing Body idolizing, will increase exponentially as voices of reason are marginalized and become a dwindling minority. The Watchtower will be able to make larger and larger leaps from Scripture to doctrine, make more outlandish claims, cite more outrageous "some names are changed" examples, claim more authority, and demand more blind obedience. Anyone who's ever had someone at the door confront them with the Russian well "screams from Hell" story knows exactly the type of blithering idiot the WT is trying to attract and keep. There will soon be precious little difference between the Kingdom Hall and Westboro Baptist Church.

17

How big is apostasy?

by Knowsnothing in

jw
friends

in the short time i've lurked and been on here, i've seen a couple of new people join, and tell their experiences.

my question is, how big is apostasy in numbers?

could we take a rough guess?

WontLeave

This question should be qualified as "How big is apostasy to the Governing Body?"

In their minds, the Bible is for them, to them, and about them. They are God's mouthpiece and Jesus' roadies whom we have to get through to hang with the band backstage. I mean, come on, they listed JW conventions as fulfillment of the trumpet blasts of Revelation. These guys believe everything in the world revolves around them.

Some country levies a tax on them and it's fulfillment of a prophesy about persecution. But if they win a court case, it's God protecting his organization. They are convinced no matter what happens to JWs, it's earth-shattering and it "means something". Meanwhile, a large portion of the planet has never heard of Jehovah's Witnesses. The rest just see them (ugh, us - now I need to go gargle with something) as an annoying cult who wake people up on Saturday to give them magazines to throw away.

Of course, the Society tries to make apostasy seem like a major plague on the earth. Why not? They've taken a passing remark by Jesus - faithful and discreet slave - and made a whole religion around it. Their messiah complex, narcissism, and total indulgence in their own fantasy world cause them to believe some universal spotlight is on them and every person and angel are holding their collective breaths waiting to see what will happen next in the unfolding saga of Jehovah's Witnesses.

Every newspaper headline, they direct back on themselves. Every natural disaster, every crime statistic, every time a church pastor (except for their own) is caught molesting a child - everything - is perceived as "This is what we've been prophesying about." Since they don the name of "Jehovah", they feel that the Creator is now bound to them and forced to take responsibility for them. I guess if they can write about what time for Armageddon would be "appropriate", that's not shocking.

138

July 15th WT out - Coming out Swinging at Apostates Hard

by LostGeneration in

this is one of the most aggressive watchtowers i think i have ever read.. four study articles on not "following the crowd" not following unrealities(page 13) not following false teachers, meaning apostates of course(p 15).

avoiding false teachers means "refusing to read their literature, watch tv programs that feature them, examine their web sites, or add comments to their blogs.

(para 7, pg 16).

WontLeave

With the dumbing down of the literature (this time overtly), the hard-line attitude against education, the Internet, "apostates", and independent study, it appears the Society understands the changing demographic of their target audience. The truth has never been popular, throughout the Bible. The way to get followers is extremism and catering to the less-intelligent.

Their arguments lately: We can trust the fds, we must obey the fds to make Jehovah happy, the Bible is for the fds and they will tell us what to believe it says. These are obviously aimed at people who are not qualified to tie their own shoes. This fits the current generation of incoming JWs to a tee. The Governing Body knows full well these people are not going to read the Bible (assuming they even have the ability), so can tell them anything they want without risk of being called on it.

The current power grab is extremely divisive, drawing a clear line in the sand that requires a choice between accepting Christ or men as our leader. I can't figure out how these insane things in the WT for the last few years are not offending the vast majority of JWs, but they're obviously not.

I'm torn among three possibilities. It's possible the GB has systematically filtered out enough who have any respect for God, Jesus, or the Bible to know they can write whatever they want. On another hand, perhaps there are conscious objectors in the Writing Committee who are pushing the envelope to outrageous extremes to alert the publishers to how arrogant and self-idolizing the GB has become, since they allow this kind of stuff to go into print without seeing anything wrong with it. Or, it might be that Holy Spirit is exercising some influence over the literature and hardening the hearts and minds at Bethel to allow these warnings to go out.

For the last couple of years, the human worship in the Watchtower has been the handwriting on the wall to me. In one breath, they'll say how we have no leader but Christ and in the next, how we have to follow the Governing Body. In one article, they'll deny any clergy/laity distinction, then in another how the Bible was written to them and we need them to explain it to us. Now, they print one article about not following the crowd, then immediately follow it with one about being lock-step with "the organization". I'm wondering: If you're a JW, who is your "crowd", if not "the organization"?

Is Jesus warning us: "These guys have totally lost it (their minds, their standing, their faith...) and you'd better keep an eye on what they're writing, because it's insane"? If you haven't taken the time to read the Bible and see for yourself whether the Society is accurately representing what it says, you need to; immediately, if not sooner. Strange things are happening in the "holy place" of Bethel and a "disgusting thing" has lifted "himself up over everyone who is called 'god'...publicly showing himself to be a god."

138

July 15th WT out - Coming out Swinging at Apostates Hard

by LostGeneration in

this is one of the most aggressive watchtowers i think i have ever read.. four study articles on not "following the crowd" not following unrealities(page 13) not following false teachers, meaning apostates of course(p 15).

avoiding false teachers means "refusing to read their literature, watch tv programs that feature them, examine their web sites, or add comments to their blogs.

(para 7, pg 16).

WontLeave

I'm so tempted to comment at the meeting when this rag is studied. I'd like to point out that "Jehovah's organization" was wrong, but Caleb and Joshua did was right in spite of that fact. They didn't follow their "brothers", but had faith in their god, rather than their group. They weren't among the leadership, but lowly messengers; still when they saw everybody around them exhibiting a bad attitude - despite being "Jehovah's people" - they showed no fear for men, but focused on the only one who saves.

129

YHWH a minor pagan god: Ugaritic Texts and the Sons of El

by DoomVoyager in

interesting.. here is the first thing i've found on the subject, though i haven't read much of it yet.. http://faculty.gordon.edu/hu/bi/ted_hildebrandt/otesources/05-deuteronomy/text/articles/heiser-deut32-bs.htm.

pseudo.

WontLeave

@lovelylil

Sorry to copy your link. Believe me when I say I have no illusions of aligning everyone on the Internet with my beliefs. This is just one of those subjects that the very obscurity of the material lends itself to a one-sided discussion. The El>YHWH information is almost exclusively to be found on atheist websites, so it tends to fly under the radar of anyone else. I have looked into the matter and am attempting to offer a different perspective. Once I realized it was a red herring I didn't waste a whole lot more time with it. I'm not really the type to obsess over the intricacies of BS.

While I'm not an "expert" on the subject, I'm also not an expert on the techniques used to transmute lead into gold. Perhaps the explanation as to why it's not a legitimate pursuit are not as extensive and interesting. Some prefer a story that's more exiting than reality, but I guess I'm just no fun.