Hi Ding,
I don't believe the account of Lazarus and the Rich man is a parable a la Watchtower. . But neither do I think the literary form is historical narration.
Vanderhoven7
JoinedPosts by Vanderhoven7
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33
Do you think the Watchtower is right about about eternal punishment of the wicked?
by Vanderhoven7 inatheists believe death is the end of personal existence.
but for those who believe there is life after death, what do you think is the nature of final punishment?
in other words do you agree with the atheists and the watchtower society or is there eternal ongoing conscious punishment awaiting the wicked.
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33
Do you think the Watchtower is right about about eternal punishment of the wicked?
by Vanderhoven7 inatheists believe death is the end of personal existence.
but for those who believe there is life after death, what do you think is the nature of final punishment?
in other words do you agree with the atheists and the watchtower society or is there eternal ongoing conscious punishment awaiting the wicked.
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Vanderhoven7
There is a book available on Amazon entitled, "Eternal Torment - Image and Reality". I know the author well. The author goes through the entire Bible looking for eternal torment and here is his summary:
IN PART I OF OUR STUDY WE PROBED FOR ETERNAL TORMENT BY SIFTING THROUGH THE DUST AND ASHES OF:
A. Sheol (Old Testament)
- We found no hard evidence for ongoing torment in any of the 65 Sheol passages.
B. Hades (New Testament)
- We examined all 11 "Hades" passages, 10 of which gave no support for the idea of torment of any duration. Although we found one dramatic passage of scripture (Luke 16:19-31) that spoke very clearly of extreme pain and anguish after death, no clarification was made of the duration of that pain. In addition there was powerful evidence within the text itself that suggested the entire account did not represent historical narration.
C. Gehenna (New Testament)
- We looked at all 12 passages that used the term Gehenna. Although we didn't find any synonyms for pain or torment in any of the passages, we did find some rather perplexing imagery including; Everlasting Fire, Gehenna Fire, Unquenchable Fire and Undying Worms. However, all of these images, if interpreted in the light of other scriptural passages, can be readily explained without reference to ongoing suffering of any kind.
IN PART II OF OUR STUDY WE PROBED FOR ETERNAL TORMENT BY SIFTING THROUGH THE FIRE AND FLAME OF:
D. Old Testament Eschatology
The predominant punishment imagery of the Old Testament is unquestionably that of destruction. Endless torment of immortal souls is simply not found in the Hebrew scriptures.
E. The GospelsWe found considerable "weeping and gnashing" imagery in the exclusion parables of the gospel, which would be expected of the condemned as they are faced with rejection at Christ's coming. Nonetheless, the duration of that weeping and gnashing is consistently absent. Matthew 25, the parable of the sheep and the goats, speaks of eternal fire and eternal punishment. However, this language, by itself, does not designate the nature of that punishment. In order to prove eternal torment from this passage it would first be necessary to smuggle the word "conscious" into the text.
F. Acts and the EpistlesDestruction, rather than torment imagery, is rampant in the Epistles. Certainly, as would be expected, God's wrath will not spare the wicked vexation and distress on the day of judgment, but again, endless duration of such distress is simply not found.
G. RevelationThere is one explicit reference to eternal torment in Revelation 20:10 which is applied to the unholy trinity of devil, beast and false prophet. However, the literal nature of this torment becomes suspect as we consider the verse itself, the surrounding scriptures, as well as similar judgment imagery in the Old Testament.
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33
Do you think the Watchtower is right about about eternal punishment of the wicked?
by Vanderhoven7 inatheists believe death is the end of personal existence.
but for those who believe there is life after death, what do you think is the nature of final punishment?
in other words do you agree with the atheists and the watchtower society or is there eternal ongoing conscious punishment awaiting the wicked.
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Vanderhoven7
This is true. Their religion is not biblical. However even a broken analog clock is right twice a day.😄
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33
Do you think the Watchtower is right about about eternal punishment of the wicked?
by Vanderhoven7 inatheists believe death is the end of personal existence.
but for those who believe there is life after death, what do you think is the nature of final punishment?
in other words do you agree with the atheists and the watchtower society or is there eternal ongoing conscious punishment awaiting the wicked.
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Vanderhoven7
Atheists believe death is the end of personal existence. But for those who believe there is life after death, what do you think is the nature of final punishment? In other words do you agree with the Atheists and the Watchtower Society or is there eternal ongoing conscious punishment awaiting the wicked. This is not really about what happens between death and the final judgment, but bring that up if you wish.
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Family division
by joao inthe worst part of my experience of getting rid of the shackles of wt is not the shunning.
i can live with that.
if people don't want to talk to me, there are many more who do!
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Vanderhoven7
@ Joao
Am I right in thinking you left the organization but still are a man of faith?
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Employee "Preaching " to other employees.
by Foolednomore ini have hired a new employee, he is a good accountant.
has never experienced jw's but i have three employees who are.
one elder, two ms.. the new employee came to me an asked questions about jw's that the elder employee has been preaching to him.
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Vanderhoven7
Invite him to this site if he still wants to learn about Witnesses?
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Have you seen this recent video
by Vanderhoven7 inthis video documentary is worth a look.. https://youtu.be/srqwnjrhh1w.
here is another one worth watching .
https://youtu.be/twtxblzlotg.
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Vanderhoven7
Thank you for such a fine job doing what I should have done UTR.
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What Name Does the New Testament Emphasize - Jehovah or Jesus?
by Vanderhoven7 init seems to me scripturally speaking, that jehovah's witnesses are emphasizing the wrong name.. it should be jesus, not jehovah.
who is the way, the truth and the life?
(john 14:6).
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Vanderhoven7
@Slim
I don't believe that there is sufficient evidence to conclude without reasonable doubt that Trinitarian Christians in the second century conspired to remove the divine name from both the New Testament and the Septuagint....and that they were completely successful in their NT manuscript alterations and partially successful when it came to their efforts to excise the divine name from the Septuagint.
Further I don't see how the inclusion of the divine name 237 times on the New Testament would challenge the full deity of Christ...unless of course one uses these alleged conspiracies to demonstrate the unreliability of the New Testament itself. Then of course we can readily argue for Bultmann's "historical Jesus".
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263
What Name Does the New Testament Emphasize - Jehovah or Jesus?
by Vanderhoven7 init seems to me scripturally speaking, that jehovah's witnesses are emphasizing the wrong name.. it should be jesus, not jehovah.
who is the way, the truth and the life?
(john 14:6).
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Vanderhoven7
@ SlimRegarding the issue of whether the Septuagint contained the divine name you wrote:Can we quit talking about shadowy conspiracies? That is empty rhetoric. The fact is that the divine name was in the Septuagint in the first century but Christians replaced it with “Lord"...If Christians planned and removed the divine name from the New Testament and did the same to the Septuagint; this was obviously done by conspiracy.But you know I don't believe in either of these conspiracies."...we know happened with Septuagint."Do We? Some feel that the presence of the Tetragrammaton in Papyrus Fouad 266 is an indication of what was in the original text, "others see this manuscript as "an archaizing and hebraizing revision of the earlier translation κύριος".You might want to check out -
4
Have you seen this recent video
by Vanderhoven7 inthis video documentary is worth a look.. https://youtu.be/srqwnjrhh1w.
here is another one worth watching .
https://youtu.be/twtxblzlotg.
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Vanderhoven7
This video documentary is worth a look.
Here is another one worth watching