i noticed in the latest memorial invitation, the dates for the observance are odd--well far more odd than usual.. what i mean is that forever as i can remember, jehovah's witnesses use to advertise really big that this was nisan 14. they don't tend to do this anymore.. and being jewish, their dates now tend to align with passover, or at least with the second seder night of passover.. 2025: saturday, april 12 (nisan 15).
2026: thursday, april 2 (nisan 15/16).
2027: monday, march 22 (nisan 15/16).
@Duran: As previously pointed out: The day is close (off by one) this year, but on other years it has diverged as much as 10 days (the accumulated error on the lunar cycle could be up to 11 days per year I believe).
Nisan 14 will have ended on the night of Saturday, April 12, 2025, the memorial is supposed to take place at the beginning of that day? Saturday April 12 after sundown is Nisan 15.
i noticed in the latest memorial invitation, the dates for the observance are odd--well far more odd than usual.. what i mean is that forever as i can remember, jehovah's witnesses use to advertise really big that this was nisan 14. they don't tend to do this anymore.. and being jewish, their dates now tend to align with passover, or at least with the second seder night of passover.. 2025: saturday, april 12 (nisan 15).
2026: thursday, april 2 (nisan 15/16).
2027: monday, march 22 (nisan 15/16).
They’re basically using the Gregorian calendar of when the equinox happens and then adjusting that for the lunar cycle.
It is ‘a’ calendar that nobody uses because it is very complex, not impossible to calculate because it is still astronomical, but not something that is easily understood as the other systems that are purely lunar cycle or solar.
The error shifts the day around in the season so the day will appear to jump around, very bad for an agricultural society that needs to plan crops around holidays.
i noticed in the latest memorial invitation, the dates for the observance are odd--well far more odd than usual.. what i mean is that forever as i can remember, jehovah's witnesses use to advertise really big that this was nisan 14. they don't tend to do this anymore.. and being jewish, their dates now tend to align with passover, or at least with the second seder night of passover.. 2025: saturday, april 12 (nisan 15).
2026: thursday, april 2 (nisan 15/16).
2027: monday, march 22 (nisan 15/16).
@Kaleb, you are correct, I verified the calculation and the JWs forgot about the leap year. The other calculations are also correct, the Jewish calendar is not lunar or solar, it is lunisolar. I don’t know how the JWs got to their calculations, but they are off for no reason I can find.
The Metonic cycle was in use during the Second Temple (invented by the Greeks a few hundred years BC) is still in use today by both the Jews and Buddhist, Islam uses a lunar calendar and because in Islam any writings are infallible, it no longer keeps track of the solar system.
The problem if they are going to use a strict lunar system as they claim by astronomical observation of the number of months (although the equinox is related to the sun) and not use leap years, the memorial will have to shift slowly over 33 years and coinciding with the Jewish calendar will happen once every 33 years. However this is not how they calculate, they use a solar calendar with astronomical observation of the lunar cycle, basically, had the ancients done this, they’d be inserting random leap days every year. It would be extremely difficult to calculate anything anywhere in the future without a modern computer, as the earth’s solar equinox drifting wouldn’t be established for over a thousand years. You can’t just decree a new calculation every so often.
https://youtu.be/iur3xnyae3m?si=efr0nsv54atghmi_.
the uk’s independent inquiry into child sexual abuse (iicsa) was supposed to be a moment of national reckoning — a deep dive into how major institutions, including religious organizations, failed to protect children.
it started in 2015 and concluded in 2022 and it was meant to be a bold stand against corruption, secrecy, and systemic abuse.
A broad inquiry into matters where people can air their grievances but there are insufficient resources to take care of the matters does not help anyone.
Here are the laws that need to change to stop the violence:
- Allow people the chance to self-defense. Gangs and violence are prevalent where citizens are too scared, police is non-responsive and people don’t have the means to defend themselves. Try that in a small town, as some may say. The UK has an atrocious 14 hour average response time to these kinds of calls, people need the tools to take care of themselves and their neighbors, you only win if you match or escalate to the level of the offender.
- Strict reporting laws with stiff sentences for non-conformance. Make every adult that is aware of a crime liable if they do not report, enhanced sentences and personal liability for those in a position of power such as parents, community leaders, teachers, doctors etc.
- Set up a blockchain ledger for de-identified reporting of suspected victims and their suspected offenders across organizations. If a de-identifier matches a prior report, the submitter must report non-anonymous to a police.
- Abolish NHS. As with the above, don’t allow doctors and case workers to hide behind stacks of work and state immunity. The NHS funding model has failed, you cannot centrally decide that these cases should not receive sufficient funding because the budget is too bare. Put the money people currently put in the system into private care and as with the above, make that company directly liable.
- Sex offender lists similar to the US - you can be permanently put on the list and depending on your offense are excluded from certain jobs, houses and physical areas like schools and must proactively self-identify. The list must be publicly accessible.
- Strict requirements on people that work with children and people with leadership positions. In the US many churches use the following requirements: anyone in any position where they may be assigned to interact with families (deacon, assistants …) must disclose criminal background and not appear on any sex offender list, people that will be assigned to work with children directly (caretakers, teachers, pastors) must additionally have a clean criminal background and complete an FBI child offender check (which includes fingerprinting). The current best practice is for adults to be at least ‘2 deep’ if ANY parents are not going to be present.
i’m an elder who is pima, i’m amazed how much info is available to all elders.
you can see all private details of every member of the congregation.
i wonder how these sisters feel about their private details being available to these creepy elders?.
@FFGhost - I’m not an alias, but back in the day I published some letters from a few different subject JCs here, so you know I’m legit and yes, those documents were kept digitally and yes, any elder in the congregation had access. Before that they were kept in large drawers full of documents in the library, again, any elder could access, even some MS got access if the BOE weren’t careful.
There was a computer in the library of the KH and I retrieved a number of things after an elder failed (or didn’t know how) to log out.
I understand that now they are told not to keep documents at the KH anymore and elders should not use the KH computer for this kind of business at all. And yes, your documents travelled with you if you moved to a different congregation.
I left too far ago, it wasn’t called JWHub back then. I found login.jwpub.org through JWEvent.org if anyone in a non-extradition country wants to take a stab at seeing what is behind the login.
now that we have the tick-a-box field service reporting method, how are brothers measured fit for an appointment as a ms or elder?
has there been clarification in any of the recent elders schools or in meetings with the co?.
From what I hear these days the questions are: do you have a dick, are you an adult, do you want to do the work. They are seriously short in many congregations and they are burning through those they can coerce into picking up a torch, and once completely burned out, they are practically ‘marked’ for daring to give up the thankless job. In many congregations, sisters are now doing the mikes.
we have a 25 year guy in our hall who is also a pioneer (which means he lives off his parents money), who likes to spend a lot of time with a 16 year old girl in the hall.
it is usually in a group setting but he seems to gravitate toward her.
he even has her auxilary pioneering , which is something i don't think any student trying to make the grades needs.
The elders won’t do anything, if you suspect there is abuse going on, report to the police naming the suspect. Other than that, it is up to her parents, talk to them before it becomes a police report.
https://youtu.be/qn2dewyxlzu.
forget about ufos and orbs darting through the skies of new jersey, or the peculiar fog and bizarre weather gripping parts of the world lately.
none of that is on the watchtower’s radar.
How is Russia today (a far stretch from the Soviet Union and a puppet of China) the KoTN today? They have technologically speaking no advantage to even a small country like Ukraine.
They have a large amount of people to send into the meat grinder (2M active duty military and 2M+ reservists) but the bulk of their battle tanks are now about 50 years old - those were the same tanks Iraq used in Desert Storm in the 90s, a single US troop disabled in 23 minutes about 120 tanks and other armor - in another event a single tank on patrol took out about 12 before they were even in range. The US had ALL of their losses (~20-30 tanks/armor/artillery destroyed or disabled) through friendly fire and other mishaps rather than the enemy (0 total hits, 7000+ losses).
If you were to pit armies against each other today - well, there are plenty of people that have theorized about that: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zshbkU42nWY&ab_channel=TheInfographicsShow
There is no KoTN, Reagan killed them.
so i went to a christmas evening candlelight service tonight and it hit me.
i was primarily doing christmas since leaving the jw for the children.
lots of people do it for family without really thinking of the relevance.
From my current understanding, Jesus in WTBTS is more akin to Jesus in Mormonism or Islam - a great prophet, good advice, but not divine.
so i went to a christmas evening candlelight service tonight and it hit me.
i was primarily doing christmas since leaving the jw for the children.
lots of people do it for family without really thinking of the relevance.
So I went to a Christmas evening candlelight service tonight and it hit me. I was primarily doing Christmas since leaving the JW for the children.
Lots of people do it for family without really thinking of the relevance. During the service I was thinking of why JW does celebrate the Passover/Easter/Memorial whatever you want to call it, and listening to the story, the story of his death does not make sense without the Christmas story.
Jesus is born from human being, he is born in the most humble/poorest conditions at the time, he is immediately placed in severe danger from King Herod. As an infant he is purely dependent on humans despite the fact that he will eventually redeem the world, for pretty much the first half of his life he does not have the capacity to defend himself. That promise is not yet fulfilled at birth and his death cannot be fulfilled without his birth. You cannot think about someone dying without celebrating where they come from and their life and birth.
What the JW do however, is skip that entire first part, something that is part of every single Christian religion and reject it as false, thereby rejecting that Christianity does not come from high borne political or religious leaders or wise men, Christianity can be started and understood from the most basic principles, the parallels of Bethlehem and Nazareth being nothing towns born in the lowest place of that town and the story of his path to Jerusalem is the exact opposite of JW doctrine or various other religions that starts from a big city and self-declared wise men down.
You cannot think of a fulfilled life without celebrating the mother, and the father, and the environment that raised that person. Even if you believe Jesus was just a good person, Mary and Joseph is the one that made him that way, that is why Christmas is important to understanding the Passion.
And in this sense I am now also thinking why Catholics venerate the mother (Mary), it just makes sense deep down… although I am not sure yet of the significance.
These are my ramblings for the night, Merry Christmas!
