Shanagirl

Shanagirl

Joined

Posts by Shanagirl

  • Witness 007
    42

    Is the "Watchtower Study" = Question and answer a form of brainwashing??

    by Witness 007 in
    1. watchtower
    2. bible

    on sundays study we were always told to keep answers brief and from the paragraph as some brothers would add "other meterial" to their comments.

    the "correct" answer is right there in the paragraph.

    read question --------find answer in paragraph------underline/highlight------read related {not] scripture-----raise hand---give answer from paragraph as though it's your own thought.

    1. NVR2L8
    2. keyser soze
    3. Billy the Ex-Bethelite
  • Shanagirl
    Shanagirl

    In my opinion All the meetings are a form of brainwashing. First they are very long, and repetitive, and I feel that after a time, you can tune out mentally during the talks and disassociate. Probably a lot of JW's have some sort of disassiative tendencies related to the long meetings. They've been burdened with all the meaningless busy work the WT puts on them, along with guilt, sleep depravation from late meetings for children and babies, constant JW conversation from meetings, service, bible studies, "gatherings", not being allowed to read or look at any outside literature, and friendships. Yep, definitely brainwashing.

    Shana

  • sabastious
    6

    The Genetics of Good and Evil [article]

    by sabastious in
    1. jw
    2. friends

    http://www.thulasidas.com/2008-09/genetics-of-good-and-evil.htm.

    genetics of good and evilposted onseptember 9, 2008bymanojgood is something that would increase our collective chance of survival as a species.

    evil is just the opposite.

    1. Band on the Run
    2. snare&racket
    3. Shanagirl
  • Shanagirl
    Shanagirl
    Gnosticism as Anti-Religion - The Negative Old Testament God

    Common to almost all schools of Gnosticism were four of what one could say were moral judgments:

    1. The God of the Old Testament is evil. He keeps the divine sparks or Spirit enslaved in matter.
    2. The cosmos is likewise evil or negative; as it is the evil god's creation of chaos
    3. The Good God is a transcendent Spiritual being, who is utterly alien to this world, and had nothing to do with its creation
    4. TheSavior either Christ, Seth, the Thought (Ennoia) of God, or some other figure - is an emissary of thetranscendentGod who has descended into this lower world to confer gnosis on those able to receive it (the gnostic race).

    The three latter points follow normally enough, if you accept the premise of the Gnostics that this world is bad (the anti-worldly mystical tendency). But the first point seems rather strange. Why should the God of the Old Testament be considered evil?

    Well, there are perhaps three ways of answering this question: the psychological, the theological, and the literal. Obviously, not all these explanations were what the early Gnostic writers had in mind

    Psychologically, the God of the Old Testament is the metaphor for the ego, the part of psyche that considers itself all-important, and doesn't like to face the fact the cosmos is a lot of bigger than it is, and that there is more of relevance than just its own small needs.

    Theologically, the God of the Old Testament is quite like the God of the religious fundamentalist: a supernatural dictator who keeps the mind (= "spirit") enslaved with dogma, and demands absolute belief. Anyone who doesn't believe him goes to hell (the supernatural equivalent of the concentration camp).

    Literally, that is, biblically, the Old Testament God does appear to be a rather shifty character. As one very early Gnostic writing - surviving as a fragment in the much later Nag Hammadi tractate The Testimony of Truth - explains in a commentary on the biblical God:

    "He envied Adam that he should eat from the tree of knowledge. And the fact that he said "Adam, where are you?" shows that he did not have foreknowledge.
    He cast man out of the garden because he did not want him to eat from the tree of life and live forever.
    He said "I am a jealous God, I will bring the sins of the fathers upon the children for three or four generations" [Exod. 20:5]
    And he said "I will make their heart thick, and I will cause their mind to become blind, that they might not know nor comprehend the things that are said" [Isa. 6:10]
    And all this mind you to those who believe in him and serve him!"
    [John Dart, The Laughing Savior , p.63]

    Significantly, the style here is typical of certain Jewish literature (the Midrash or commentary) from around the beginning of the Christian era. The writer was familiar not only with Jewish Scriptures but also with the terminology and speculations of early Rabbinic circles. Except that this was written from a Gnostic rather than a Jewish perspective. What was wrong with Adam eating from the tree of knowledge? And wasn't this God angry because he was envious of Adam's knowledge rather than because Adam had disobeyed him? [Dart, Laughing Savior , pp.63-4 (out of print)]. According to Gnostic scholar Birger Pearson this is actually a gnostic midrash utilising Jewish traditions, and dating perhaps from the first century B.C.E. of Palestine or Syria [ Ibid , p.64].

    The Battle for the Spiritual Light | The Gnostic Dramaturgy - Creation and Redemption

    Kheper Home | Gnosticism main page | Topics Index | New or updated | Search

    shana

  • raxxxx
    64

    Confused...

    by raxxxx in
    1. jw
    2. experiences

    .

    hiya and... i do not really know where to begin... currently a jw... slightly starting to fade... got a girlfriend baptised... i am baptised also... my head is a mess... i do not know what to believe anymore... never really fully trusted elders as it comes to 'leading the flock'... got burned a few times with their ... decisions etc.

    read a few articles in here about their alleged false beliefs... do not really know what to do... wondered if any of you felt like that at any point... when something that you trusted and followed most of your life... does not seem to be what you thought it was... .

    1. Balaamsass
    2. raxxxx
    3. InterestedOne
  • Shanagirl
    Shanagirl

    raxxx, trust your gut feelings. Your inner voice is saying uh oh, this doesn't feel right to me. Use your critical thinking, and read everything. WT is no more different than an abusive parent. Threatening members that they will be shunned and be killed by their god is abusive. It's a spiritually abusive religion that uses cult tactics to keep members in line.

    Shana

  • d
    35

    How do you feel about Occupy wallstreet

    by d in
    1. social
    2. current

    i feel that people are expressing their anger in a constructive.how do you feel about the protests..

    1. designs
    2. designs
    3. apostatethunder
  • Shanagirl
    Shanagirl

    They need to find a leader to be a spokesperson for them. To say "they are not there to follow the rules" Really lifestooshort? Don't we all have to follow rules in a civilized society? I am all for protesting and exercising the right to protest and freedom of speech and all that but to trample on the rights of other citizens by ruining property and causing violence is not the behavior anyone should have to tolerate.

    Shana

  • man in black
    2

    17 stages of Evil

    by man in black in
    1. jw
    2. friends

    my son recently was reading a book for one of his college classes titled, "why we believe what we believe" written by andrew newberg md.. it seems to be a very balanced book, the material is written from the medical / psychological viewpoint, ( so far i have found no specific religion-bashing here).. i was just skimming through the last few chapters and one subject on page 150 really caught my attention, as i really think it applies to the jw religion,.

    i hope you all enjoy reading this :.

    seventeen stages of evil.

    1. Shanagirl
    2. tec
  • Shanagirl
    Shanagirl

    Yep that sounds like WT and their god. Scary!

    Shana

  • NewChapter
    29

    Are you sure joining or staying is a wise decision? Lurkers think twice. Part 1

    by NewChapter in
    1. jw
    2. experiences

    i'd like to call lurkers attention to the need of being discreet when contemplating joining or staying in the the jw religion.

    my general observations on active jw's and how their lives are going.

    the majority of them relate many beautiful ways their lives have turned out after joining but they refused to mention how rough and tough the journey truly is., here in america, we have received reports of many jws who terminated their lives because of the difficulty of coping with the cultish shunning and abandoment of those they love.

    1. noni1974
    2. wasblind
    3. ziddina
  • Shanagirl
    Shanagirl

    NC, Thank you for this topic. WT truly is a religious cesspool. I walked away after being in for 30 years and raised my family in it. Thankfully, we all got out as an intact family, yet the cesspool tried to pull us back into their murky "waters". I could tell you some of the worst stories.. but I want to remain anonymous and free of their evil.

    Shana

  • Snoozy
    37

    I don't believe there is a heaven...

    by Snoozy in
    1. watchtower
    2. beliefs

    i don't believe there is a heaven that so many religions teach, do you?

    it all sounds like a fairy tale made up to make dying easier or as a threat to make someone have a conscience... i got into a discussion about it with my jw converted to catholic daughter and she just couldn't believe anyone could feel like i do.

    i am glad she threw away the jw teachings and glad she believes in something so wonderful but i for one just can't.

    1. Snoozy
    2. Neon Bible
    3. JAFO
  • Shanagirl
    Shanagirl

    Hi Snoozy, I've always felt there is many heavenly realms outside the Pleroma of where True God source of All exists within the Heavenly Light. Even when I was a JW I always thought of God this way within his realm of Pure Light, and how we are all connected to this True Source of Light and Love. The more I explored this, the more I knew30 somehting years in this JW cult was not for me in that I could not connect to this WT Destroyer god. But getting back to Heaven, I've read in the extra aprocrypha books about the many heavens out there in the universe spoken of as Aeons of angels and godlike ones., who later continued to emanate from the God Source down into some of the lower heavenly realms away from the Pleroma where the Godhead resides. So many heirarchies of angelic creations and dwelling places fo heavens. The Source God, Ivisible Spirit, spoken of in the Apocryphon of John, because True God is Androngenous, emanated from himself a feminine aspect in his light. This perfect holy feminine spirit

    The Spirit then look in the spring of life, and by the power of His thought, brought forth a feminine being, whose light was like His, and her power was also like his. She was the emanation of Him, His feminine counter-part. She was known as the forethought of all, and the perfect Aeon.

    This is the first thought, his image; she became the womb of everything, for it is she who is prior to them all, the Mother-Father, the first man, – The Apocryphon of John

    The Spirit bestowed upon her the followingfive powers:- the image of the invisible Spirit (first man or human), foreknowledge, indestructibility, eternal life and the truth.

    From the pure light that emanated from her and surrounding Him, a spark ignited from him and she conceived another pure light –the "Only-Begotten Child" of His, or the divine Autogenes as the text called him. The divine Autogenes was the aeon Christ - the "Anointed One".

    Like his father and mother, Autogenes (Christ) was pure and holy. Everything the Son (Autogenes/Christ) have done, he work for the glories of his Father (Spirit) and (Mother ). Here are the Gnostic holy Trinity – Father, Mother and Son, like the Orthodox concept of the Trinity – Father, Son and Holy Spirit; the three perfect aeons

    Shana