Posts by Half banana

58

baptised nearly 51 years

by Phoebe in

jw
friends

been reading this site for awhile now.

i have had a long and often tragic life as a jw.

my story is so long because i'm pretty old :) i feel sad i've been locked in fear and guilt for my entire life.

Thank you so much for having the courage to come here and post your sorry tale. You have indeed suffered. The scriptures tend toward keeping people subservient and put upon...this is not living a fulfilling life, it is cultism and imagining some future reward which never comes.

The pressure is off now that you have no obligation to the religion which keeps you down. When I left I felt an enormous relief from not having to listen to the organisation ever again.

I hope you find friends outside of the org who are sympathetic human beings and that you can live a normal and happy life with your family---you deserve it!

22

How Do JWs Reconcile Contradictions Between Mt. and Lk. and Their Birth Stories?

by Saename in

does anybody know how jehovah's witnesses reconcile the contradictions between the stories of jesus' birth as found in matthew and luke?

when i was a jehovah's witness, i wasn't even aware of this contradiction; i simply thought that all of it happen—namely that there was a census (luke 2) and the slaughter of the innocents (matthew 2) simultaneously.

but at the time i didn't know that the census took place in 6 ce and that herod the great died in 4 bce, thus placing those birth stories 10 years apart in time.

Half banana

As far as I am aware (and I'm happy to be corrected) there was never a census in the Roman world at that time, before and after perhaps. The Romans kept very good records and there is none.

Since the primary documentation of the Christ events were first written in the book called the Gospel of Mark, Luke and Matthew had been included as corroborative evidence although perversely as you point out they are much at odds with each other!

Luke and Matthew seem to be incorporating their own independent threads of variations on the traditional virgin birth based on pre-christian stories of the "saviour figure". These include the Mithraic legends of Persian origin, based on ancient astrological lore of the birth of the Son of God in the East who were visited by the three wise men (magi or persian astrologers). May I add that the astrological basis for this was that the three stars on the belt of Orion (the three wise men) point down towards Sirius the brightest star, hovering just over the horizon in the east at the winter solstice. I checked the night sky at Christmas and happily confirm this is still the case!

The "slaughter of the innocents" has no historical record or basis and not even the opponents of Herod subscribed to it. Josephus, a writer of Herod's life and would most certainly have spelled it out, never mentions it. There are however precedents in a number of the earlier saviour myths. Luke's account for example recalls (for a Roman audience) the legend of Romulus and Remus where their births were subject to a Herodian type of decree to slaughter all of the new-borns to deny the heroes a life.

Whatever the biased Watchtower says in an attempt to synchronise these dubious events; do not believe the Bible as literal truth. It is myth layered upon myth.

45

Are there any doctrines which all Christian religions follow.

by jwfacts in

i cannot think of a single doctrine that is so clearly laid out in the bible that every christian sect teaches the same point.

are there any doctrine where there is total consensus amongst all christian religions, including jehovah's witnesses?.

Half banana

Birdie, putting the history of god into the long context of human beliefs; the late Old Stone Age, evidence would appear to indicate from the "goddess" figurines, that She was female ---and fat---and fertile. Probably the ideal for both sexes at the time.

For millennia now, God has been a psychological projection of a supercharged male parent, since that is how humans have viewed authority in the past; that is entirely masculine. Roman Christianity having been a prime mover and flag bearer for patriarchal religion.

As humanity grows in understanding and shakes off faulty former assumptions I trust we will downplay the significance of Biblical fairytales, understand why the human imagination needed to create God and develop a proper equality of the sexes.

63

Life is changing for me: no pioneering, got a job!

by Skepsis in

jw
friends

a month ago i decided to register in this board.

i had decided to step down pioneering but was frightened about the consequences.

i had finished my university degree some months before (despite disaproval from brothers in my congregation) and i had to choose: continue pioneering and working in jobs with no future or starting a career, working full-time.. i was thinking to postpone the decisiton but... i was fed up with preaching.

Half banana

Well done skepsis for getting an education, and well done for ending your pioneering career. You can bide your time and step down from being an MS in the coming months, indeed you can say how depressed you are (depressed that you have wasted your life on such an unworthy organisation).

You have your life ahead of you, don't be subservient do what is best for your interests. If god actually had an organisation it would not need our help.

45

Are there any doctrines which all Christian religions follow.

by jwfacts in

i cannot think of a single doctrine that is so clearly laid out in the bible that every christian sect teaches the same point.

are there any doctrine where there is total consensus amongst all christian religions, including jehovah's witnesses?.

Half banana

I think there is something more universal than those things found only in Christianity. This would be primarily the incentive for good social behaviour driven by a spiritual reward and some form of censure or punishment if you fail.

However the thing which got up the nostrils of the Roman authorities was the fact that chrestians (sic) that is "good" men or street preachers, in the first century began to teach that the saviour character of traditional (pagan) religious drama had magically come to life as a living man. This absurdity was beyond the pale for educated people but was the defining and mind boggling belief for those who later were called christians.

The NT is in part an apologia or defence for this doctrine, notably as is found in the Letter to the Hebrews. So perhaps the universal Christian belief is that Jesus or technically the Saviour character, became flesh. Consequent to this, as the story goes, he also died and was resurrected. . . justifying the equal absurdity of a universal but qualified resurrection for all.

22

For those that read the bible, does the true message of scripture still come through in NWT?

by NikL in

jw
friends

my active and in jw wife is up for reading bible together.

thing is she wants to use nwt.. i have problems with that translation as you my imagine.. just wondering if you thought the true message of the bible will shine through the deliberate tampering of the nwt?.

i know many people here don't like or want to read the bible and think it's rubbish anyway, so if that's you, you can save your comments :-).

Half banana

NikL, I am not nit picking when I say that perhaps you ought to re-think your question.

It contains an assumption that there is a message in the Bible and that there is a correct interpretation of this message.

Think laterally; ask why are the writings there in the first place, why were the texts retained. The wrong primary question to ask is; what do they mean.

As we know the Bible first began with the Roman Church in the fourth century from an anthology of texts suited to the unifying goals of the Roman Empire. By choosing texts which brought together all of the important pagan cults, it satisfied both the secular and religious aims as represented in the Roman functionary who was called Pontifex Maximus (literally, the great bridge maker i.e. between heaven and earth). He was also known as the Pontiff or Pope or Papa, these very names were borrowed from the leader of the Mithraic cult. From this same pre-Christian source we get the notion of a heavenly reward after life, the memorial supper and most of the NT eschatology ("last things").

Nearly all of the Bible texts are borrowed and blended from yet earlier literary borrowings, the originals never claimed to be inspired of God because they were mainly folk stories told and retold for entertainment and transmission of their respective tribal culture lore.

So why should the Bible have a message other than the Roman demand for an empire wide Catholic faith?

65

Short stay

by midnight in

after much research and prayer i am returning to being a jehovah's witness i can find nothing that eliminates them from being god's directed people , in the end they will reach the end of there journey despite mistakes and errors just like the israelites entered the promised land , thanks for your input and all the best on your personal journey ☺.

midnight..

Half banana

Midnight, good of you to visit here but how on earth could the Watchtower organisation be used by God if they never in one hundred and thirty seven years have got any prediction or original information right?

If I was god and had "my own people" I would make sure they got my message correctly and without constant revisions needed. The governing body are forced to make it up as they go along.

Let me tell you about the wonderful freedom outside of the old religion.

We have freedom to learn deeply and with EVIDENCE about life's reality without perpetual indoctrination from a biased religious authority.

This includes waking up to the total unreliability of the Bible; Adam and Eve, Noah, Moses, Isaac and Jacob: all myth. Enslavement in Egypt and escape to the promised land: pure myth. The central teachings of the Greek scriptures including the saviour of mankind, the son of God: a universal myth of great antiquity from before Jesus' time.

Then there are the hypocritical actions of the JW leadership who for example, publicly and roundly condemned the UN for years and then joined it as a NGO (Non Governmental Organisation) . . . as the world and the Guardian newspaper knows but not rank and file JWs!

Rejoining JWs can only offer you the ILLUSION of defying death. This after all is why religion is so successful! Sorry friend, death and taxes are inevitable.

Life is very precious, do make best use of what is left of your your life and enjoy it!

26

Data for Partakers from 1935-2016. Latest number wasn´t this high since 1954!

by ILoveTTATT2 in

jw
friends

i gathered the data for the memorial partakers every year since 1935 (the first year they had data) until now.. the latest figures haven't been that high since 1954!.

this stat looks very bad in watchtower land because the decreasing # of partakers was given, for decades, as proof that the end was near!.

.

Half banana

Tepidpoultry, I do think flippancy is the right response to all this stupid talk of heaven and sacred emblems.

Holiness resides only in people's minds. Going to heaven, hell or paradise are irrelevant and naive myths. Nobody goes anywhere except to extinction and if someone disagrees, I would love to hear of your evidence for an alternative.

26

Data for Partakers from 1935-2016. Latest number wasn´t this high since 1954!

by ILoveTTATT2 in

jw
friends

i gathered the data for the memorial partakers every year since 1935 (the first year they had data) until now.. the latest figures haven't been that high since 1954!.

this stat looks very bad in watchtower land because the decreasing # of partakers was given, for decades, as proof that the end was near!.

.

Half banana

Interesting thought Pete Zahut, there is also the possibility that when people are confronted with options, at the first time of hearing them, they will choose or see themselves taking one ‘destination’ or the other without thinking it through. JW teaching levels are low so perhaps now these preachers are unwittingly giving their new hearers a choice?

So as you say, it would be useful to know in which parts of the world the new partakers are living to analyze the reasons.

Aside from this it is worth remembering that the taking of the emblems of body and blood started way before Jesus. Notably it was borrowed directly from a Mithraic ritual celebrating the death of the Saviour and Great Shepherd Mithras with cakes and wine after 400 BCE.

13

Do You Believe in Fairies?

by pale.emperor in

before you start, i don't!!.

http://www.healyourlife.com/do-you-believe-in-fairies.

but i stumbled upon this article.

Half banana

Simon, I have just calculated there actually is a JW born every two minutes, which in itself is a horrifying thought (260,000+ and 525,000 minutes in a year) which would mean that half of the suckers in the world are JWs

Sorry folks useless information