Posts by Lore

16

What so bad about having a "clergy"?

by Mr. Falcon in

note: again, i apologize if this topic has been already discussed previously.. among the many practices and professed beliefs that i have been indoctrinated into believing my entire life, there is a few in particular that have really made me scratch my head.

and this would be the claim that jehovah's witnesses do not have a clergy.

if i'm correct i think this is printed outright in a recent public edition of the watchtower regarding the beliefs of witnesses.

Lore

I think most of time they would say that they don't have a "paid clergy"

They're not exactly claiming not to have a clergy. Just that it is not paid.

Which, I'm guessing, does not include the compensation the COs get.

*** w03 8/1 p. 20 “You Received Free, Give Free” ***

By way of contrast, Jehovah’s Witnesses endeavor to imitate Jesus and his early disciples. They have no paid clergy. Each Witness is a minister charged with the responsibility of preaching the “good news of the kingdom” to others.

*** w01 6/1 p. 16 par. 15 “If God Is for Us, Who Will Be Against Us?” ***

Who uphold Bible standards of conduct, at the risk of being considered old-fashioned? What group is noted for having no paid clergy, all of its members being preachers?

*** w94 8/15 p. 10 Why Do the Witnesses Keep Calling? *** In contrast, the Witnesses have no paid clergy, and often their Bible literature is offered without price to sincere seekers of truth

27

What's Your Worst/Best Quality About You?

by minimus in

jw
friends

i'd say my worst is sometimes i don't like to deal with important things and don't unless necessary.. my best quality (and there are so many that this may be difficult.

what aboutchoo?.

Lore

My best quality is that I refuse to allow my emotions to influence my actions.

My worst quality is that I refuse to allow my emotions to influence my actions.

30

Content is King- Why the Meetings Fail

by LostGeneration in

one of the big sayings for those that run websites is that "content is king" it makes perfect sense, as sites like this one have entertaining content for the targeted audience.

even better, more content is added everyday bringing users back repeatedly.

poptular tv shows and movies are loved because they entertain customers for a low cost or free.. on the other hand, you have the content provided by the watchtower bible and tract society, delivered though the pages of the watchtower and through weekly meetings.

Lore

It's my opinion that the meetings have always been REALLY boring. But for some reason for the past 2 years they have just become so incredibly dull that even my super righteous family can't help but moan when it's time to go to another meeting.

This last watchtower study was just horrid. We spent what felt like 3 hours, but was actually only 20 minutes, on 3 or 4 paragraphs just defining the word 'zeal'.

Nothing else, just 20 minutes of looking up various scriptures that include the word 'zeal' and inserting different words in it's place to explain what the bible actually means. . . WHY?!?!? WHY DO WE CARE? Can't you just take 1 sentence and say: "The Biblical word for zeal is a greek word taken from the latin phrase 'assid refluqs' and indicates your heart is burning in jealousy or passion" and then MOVE ON. Do you have to have a 20 minute discussion of this word?

It's just. . . So. . . Boring. . .

38

2012

by free2beme in

jw
friends

some here know, i am a firm believer in 12/21/12.

so i asked, can you deny it?

it started in 2007, comes to a height in 2012 and ends in 2018. enjoy the ride, your screwed.

Lore

Some here know, I am a firm believer in 12/21/12. So I asked, can you deny it?

I deny it.

141

Is there a Logical explanation for the spooky things happening at my daughter, Ali's house?!?!!!!

by coffee_black in

jw
friends

ok.... looking for some logical explainations.... my daughter, ali, who i've been posting about on the forum...who has developed congestive heart failure.... has had some spooky experiences lately in her house.

here are a few of the things that happened:.

about a month ago, ali and her son david, heard noises from the attic above ali's bedroom...that sounded like something was being dragged across the attic floor.

Lore

Set up high definition video cameras in every room in the house.

I see 4 possible outcomes:

1: Ghosts aren't real, you'll find out you have rats in the attic and we can all stop living in the dark ages.

2: Ghosts are real but they are afraid of cameras, in which case your problems are solved as long as you keep the cameras on.

3: Ghosts are real but they are not afraid of cameras, in which case you will become a millionaire for proving the paranormal.

4: Ghosts are real but cameras tick them off and they'll destroy the cameras and kill everyone in the house.

In any case calling in some quack will, in the long run, be far more expensive than good cameras and won't get anything accomplished.

11

Could "this generation" simply be the generation of fleshly humans

by DJPoetech in

i was thinking about that and the crazy confusion of generational rangling being handed over by the gb.. maybe jesus simply refered to fleshly humans as a whole generation knowing he would be the first fruits of a "new generation" of spiritual creatures.. the gb have tried to rework the generational mess but it doesn't improve the outcome.. it would make more sense if we considered that the great crowd (new generation) were in heaven instead of on earth.. again just kicking things around!.

what yall think?.

.

Lore

So 'this generation' is the entire human race? Meaning his 'prophecy' was that: "The entire human race will NOT go extinct before these things occur."

While I don't think that's what the writer had in mind when he wrote those words, I do believe your explanation has better odds of never being proven wrong than the JW excuse. (And that's the goal right?)

56

This blew me away"The distant between Egypt and the promise land"

by jam in

i was reading a article about a national acclaim charles lummis for.

his poetry.

in 1884, while working at a newspaper in ohio, he was offered.

Lore

And the WTBTS still says the records of the exodus were destroyed from Egyptian history because they were embarrassed about the whole thing?

Actually I don't think they've said a single thing about this topic for decades. It's easier to pretend the problem doesn't exist.

But I'm guessing the Egyptians also destroyed the evidence that they lost all their firstborns, their entire military force, all their livestock, their king and his heir, their crops, the entire workforce and basis for their economy, a good portion of their population to thirst and disease and had their gold "stripped" from them by their slaves.

And they recovered SO quickly, that those silly historians are under the false impression that Egypt was in the middle of one of it's most prosperous dynasties at the time.

56

This blew me away"The distant between Egypt and the promise land"

by jam in

i was reading a article about a national acclaim charles lummis for.

his poetry.

in 1884, while working at a newspaper in ohio, he was offered.

Lore

What is the number of 3,000,000 escapees from Egypt based on?

I'm sure exactly where the 3,000,000 comes from. But according to Genesis 12:37-38 there were "about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children"

And that number does not include any non israelites.

So if you figure 600,000 adult MEN. You can probably assume about 600,000 adult Women.

And since most families tried their best to have as many children as possible, you might be able to assume about 2 children per adult male. (I'm pulling numbers out of the air here fyi.)

So by my crappy calculations you got 600,000 men, 600,000 women, and 1,200,000 children. And that does not include the non israelites who came with them, which are just called a 'mixed multitude'.

Some people in an effort to explain the absurdly large number away make the claim that this scripture actually meant 600,000 FAMILIES, thus negating those extra women and children and bringing the number down from several million to several hundred thousand.

But as was stated, there is NO evidence outside the bible that this even happened so we have nothing to go on to get accurate numbers that what is included in the bible itself.
We can't, for example, find a pile of human feces in the desert that indicates a camp of 3,000,000 people slept there for a night, because no such pile of feces has ever been found.

18

Were the Jews ever in Egypt?

by VM44 in

what evidence is there that the jewish people actually resided in the land of egypt at one time?.

Lore

I'm guessing he's referring to BEFORE the Babylonian exile. . . Them being slaves in Egypt which was supposed to be like 900 years before that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Exodus

118

"Look it wasn't a global flood.."

by Qcmbr in

i've heard the statement from bible apologists so many times that the global flood story of genesis was not a global flood but was probably a local flood.

this seems problematic.. this directly disagrees with the bible.

everywhere the bible internally references a global flood of worldwide scale (i'll throw in matthew 24:39 as a nt example and genesis 6:17 as a ot example.

Lore

The case about a global flood is this: Jesus believed in it and spoke of it. If I reject the flood, then I reject Jesus.

Well, ignoring the fact that this is a horrible reason to believe the flood. It's not necessarily true, even if you believe that what the bible quotes Jesus as saying is somehow reliable.

You are, probably, referring to Matthew 24:36-40

36 “But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son,[a] but only the Father. 37 As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 38 For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; 39 and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 40 Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left.

First of all, I make references to movies pretty often. For example I might say to my family: "I set my phone up so I can track it online, just like Sherlock did with that murder victims phone."

I can safely use that example with my family because I know they saw that episode. And I don't have to point out that I don't believe it actually happened.

Jesus could easily have used the Noah story as an example because he knew his audience would be familiar with it. That doesn't have to mean that he believed it actually happened. He also doesn't mention anything about it being global.