Posts by Half banana

27

For me the worst thing is not having a helper anymore

by John Aquila in

one of the things that gave me confidence in life was that i believed i had the almighty creator/god watching over me, directing me, guiding my every step, protecting me from harm, and answering my prayers.

i now know that is not the case anymore.

i finally stopped praying.

Half banana

It is more charitable to believe the scientific evidence of evolution than to attribute the indifference to suffering, as shown by the hyenas, to a creator god who made his creation eat one another. And don't anyone say there was a perfect world before Adam sinned; we have evidence of Hyena tooth marks on human bones dating back hundreds of thousands of years.

As regards the lack of heavenly help John, it was only an illusion in the first place. JWs are taught DEPENDENCY, in real life we become self reliant which ultimately is more grown up and satisfying.

17

The Road To Paradise Is Paved In Stupidity

by freemindfade in

at the special assembly day (sad) imitate the desert god.. here is a word for word quote from the co during the baptism talk .

"an intellectual approach to the truth will not lead to everlasting life"....

Half banana

Get rid of your brain and become a "loving", brainless, loyal JW zombie. "God's spirit directed organisation" hates people who think because Jehovah hates people who think...just OBEY or you will be lovingly killed in "God's loving provision" at Armageddon.

24

STAY ALIVE 'TIL 2132! -- Generation (X′+X″) <= (1914+λ[A′]-α[A′]+λ[A″]-α[A″]-x) <= 2132

by Gilgamesh in

generation x+x=generation why?

already bringing "great tribulation" on watchtower readers.

the watch tower society has got some splane-ing to do.

Half banana

Not to belittle your entertaining efforts Gigamesh but of course there is no sensible purpose in deriving dates from emotionally driven religious hopes.

A wrong foundation year of 607BCE plus Jesus' failure of prophetic fulfillment in "this generation" as he plainly meant: "his OWN generation", leaves us with such an attenuated piece of speculation, it is an exercise as useful as stretching dead dodos. It is as practical as a hippopotamus on tall stilts for as we know the WT paradise and Armageddon are not real things.

24

STAY ALIVE 'TIL 2132! -- Generation (X′+X″) <= (1914+λ[A′]-α[A′]+λ[A″]-α[A″]-x) <= 2132

by Gilgamesh in

generation x+x=generation why?

already bringing "great tribulation" on watchtower readers.

the watch tower society has got some splane-ing to do.

Half banana

The answer is very easy. When the writers put the words into Jesus' mouth it was meant to be his own generation. Jesus was supposed to be thirty three when he died, about the normal length of a modern generation; between grandparent and grandchild (it would have been shorter back then).

Jesus failed miserably in his prophecy as have all subsequent notions of extending further dates to it. Calculations are a total waste of time when dealing with fairy tales.

Why not do something else instead? Like... enjoy your life!

45

Who or What is the Holy Spirit?

by FusionTheism in

tradition within christianity has long been that any time the phrases holy spirit, holy ghost, or spirit of godare used in the bible (especially in the new testament), it always refers to the mysterious third divine person of the trinity, who is fully god, co-equal to the father and son, yet somehow distinct.. i want to present a simplified alternative view: let the context determine the meaning!.

(one thing to keep in mind is that the meaning of the bible words used for spirit basically is unseen force or invisible presence.).

the holy spirit as the mind and personality of god.

Half banana

Caleb in F: critical reasoning demanding evidence and based on evidence

Paradisebeauty: conventional assertions without any evidence

34

Blurring of genders

by Saltheart Foamfollower in

as sometimes happens at elders meetings with the co, he has a letter from the branch to read out.

this rarely is made available later so any policies have to be acted on from memory.

this visit a letter was read about blurring of the genders and in particular brothers dressing in a metrosexual style - tight clothing was mentioned again.

Half banana

If they are so concerned with the unequivocal determination of the sexes, why not make beards compulsory for men?

And what about persecuting elder's wives who have moustaches?

74

That's it! The Jesus stories are most reasonably explained as myth. History makes this obvious.

by Island Man in

a careful examination of the historical pagan religious context existing at the time of the genesis of christianity leads any reasonable person to conclude that jesus is just another one of several similar myths.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn7teoa9ark.

Half banana

Island Man, are you asking Perry about Christus or Chrestus? The meaning of the the words are different, The 'anointed' versus the 'good' one, see my explanation above. The savior god-men heroes traditionally were Chrestus (the good one) but is got conflated with Christus (anointed one) perhaps for the reason I suggest; to create the illusion that the new first and second century Jesus myth was to fulfill Jewish prophecy to satisfy the messianic hopes of Jewry.

74

That's it! The Jesus stories are most reasonably explained as myth. History makes this obvious.

by Island Man in

a careful examination of the historical pagan religious context existing at the time of the genesis of christianity leads any reasonable person to conclude that jesus is just another one of several similar myths.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn7teoa9ark.

Half banana

We cannot in good conscience treat as true all the handwritten texts about Jesus, the temptation to slap the name Jesus on the ancient God-man saviour story, was an irresistable urge of the literate clerics at a later time to further their own interests. The illiterate and gullible would never know, they thought...and they still don't.

The Greek word 'chrestus' does not mean Christ as asserted in Perry's extracts. It is the normal title of the God-men such as Dionysus and Orpheus and means simply 'good'. This tradition was later subtly altered by Jesus-cult apologists to the more elevated and familiar word 'christ' probably to assume fulfillment of Hebrew texts.

This getting the words right leads me to a most important point that modern Christianity interprets the past in the light of a glorious divine epiphany in the first century and that any mention of "christian" means a follower of Jesus. This is simply not true.

In the first century the Bible writers hardly knew the name Jesus, and Christianity whatever Paul said, existed for centuries before the idea of Jesus. Christians or Crestians (good men) were very well known to the Roman authorities as a nuisance but these sects and messiahs had nothing to do with later Roman Jesus Christianity which is the channel from which modern Christianity has arisen. So the references to "christians" or "crestus" are not about the imagined sacred and pure origins of the first Jesus cult but the long tradition of pagan holy God-men, some of them threatening the peace in the Roman market place...(as depicted in Life of Brian).

110

Just had a former elder friend tell me, “This Overlapping generation is crap.

by John Aquila in

last night i ran into a former elder friend, he is in his late 70s.

he asked how i was doing and i asked how he was doing.

then out of the blue he tells me; .

Half banana

Vinman, that was a stonking post!

I wonder how many are waking up to the realisation that the WT have no answer to the fact that they simply were wrong about their cherished dogma of the 1914 generation?

The fall-out from this error is enormous.

Firstly, their trade mark god either does not exist or he does not care about the WTBTS. (I can see no further option). Secondly, they have hideously mislead millions and millions of loyal followers up the proverbial garden path. The accumulative mental suffering and wasting one's life on a religious scam is hard to calculate.

The GB must understand and feel the catastrophe that they were completely and utterly wrong about 1914.

Instead of apologising they got the most benign and trustworthy member John (Jack) Barr to announce their hopelessly inadequate new doctrine of "evidently" overlapping. The poor man died not long after, I'm sure he must have known it came out of the rear end of a male bovine...but he was loyal.

It has to be said the real test of a Jehovah's Witness is not knowledge or humility or dogged determination or hours in service or anything other than blind loyalty to the governing body's demands which counts. To do this is beyond reason. There must be some masochism involved in such slavish obedience because the JWs instinct is to cling on to their hope whether right or wrong.

So here is my point: Why would Jehovah mislead "his own people" for a hundred years?.......................... Are you listening Brooklyn?

My hope is that lurking in the hearts of some of the GB there exists some reason and compassion trying to burst out and admit they are not guided by God and shut up shop for good. Some hope hey!

20

Faulty Reasoning to Promote God's "Name"

by Dissonant15 in

as i am newly awoken, i am daily having epiphanies & revelations now.

i've been casually wondering to myself since the propagandist broadcast about the name "jehovah" if it would be more proper to call him "yahweh" to myself.

well tonight the answer suddenly came to me: it doesn't matter.

Half banana

Hi Dissonant, well done for waking up! The time comes when we realise that everything that we were taught from the JW org is entirely irrelevant for a real and free life outside the cult. I was going to say "almost everything" but no, everything, because all that the JW org says or teaches is only to have control over flock.

When you find out that Yahweh began as an ox-headed idol with a human body shape placed in the upright sitting position just like all the Egyptian gods... and that he was the son of a greater god called El...and that he had a female consort called Ashera...the religious enthusiasm drains right away!