Posts by scotoma

32

JW leadership vacuum - explained!

by sir82 in

jw
friends

jw leadership shows an appalling lack of creativty and originality.. -- meeting attendance down across the board?

let's keep the same 1940's format anyway!.

-- missionaries quitting their assignments?

JW leadership vacuum - explained!

by sir82 in

jw
friends

jw leadership shows an appalling lack of creativty and originality.. -- meeting attendance down across the board?

let's keep the same 1940's format anyway!.

-- missionaries quitting their assignments?

Creativity and innovation went out the window with the initiation of the "elder" arrangement. This may be too subtle if you weren't around under the old arrangement. Some may think that the introduction of a body of "equal elders" would expose local leaders to some original thinking. Not so.

The problem with "bodies" is that they have no "head". Leadership throughout the organization was decapitated. Action based on committee is free of responsibility and risk. A Steve Jobs could never fit into a democracy. Democracy is a formula for mediocrity.

The elders are imbued with the idea that they are all equal. The main difference between the overseer and ministerial servants is that overseers are qualified to teach. Under the old arrangement (Pre-1972) the presiding overseer was usually the best communicator in the congregation. People who are excellent at motivational speaking posess a cluster of psychological traits that are associated with "openness" and creativity.

If you have a creative idea in the current structure who are you going to present it to? Ultimately any idea has to be considered by the "headless body". If you don't have a head you don't need a neck and therefore no one is going to stick their neck out.

Under the old arrangement anyone could approach the Presiding Overseer with an idea. There was no risk. Quite often the overseer was disposed to listen to ideas because his job was always up for grabs. I never had a problem presenting a somewhat novel approach to a presiding overseer. I heard of congregations where there were some ruthless PO's but when the complaints to the Circuit Overseer about these individuals piled up they would be removed. And there was always someone in a nearby congregation that would step in and be glad to take the lead.

Jehovah's Witnesses vilified all those old Presiding Overseers as if they were power mad. But things got done. And JW's had their greatest increases under that old arrangement.

The old circuit assemblies used to be exciting and motivational because the cream was allowed to rise to the top. Under the present system the plain ordinary "elders" feel threatened when someone in their midst is really an excellent teacher. They find ways to knock him down so they can all feel equal. That's why the most gifted among the JW's have become inactive and drifted away.

90

Faith and the Bible

by tec in

jw
friends

for those of us who must walk by sight (for now), there is nothing wrong with using the bible to help learn about christ and god... as long as ... you look to christ first and foremost and over anything else.

otherwise, i do not see the point in saying you follow christ or you are a christian.

he is the truth.

scotoma

Tammy,

I know you are directing your post to believers. My problem is that when you think you need some "spirit" to tell you what to do or inform you there is really no way to objectively verify the accuracy of your information. That's the problem with intuition. Intuition can be right but it is often wrong and you don't know until you start dealing with a particular decision whether it was good or bad.

As a JW I was always presented with these experiences where people made a decision after praying and it proved to be the right course. OTOH you don't hear the horrible consequences when people pray and it turns out wrong. Usually, the person is blamed for not REALLY listening to the "spirit".

What works for me is to gather as much information as the problem merits and time permits. Then I make a decision. It is usually adequate but sometimes failure results. There is no evidence that prayer adds anything to the situation. However, it may be a useful heuristic that opens a person up to more possibilities. Watiing, when you have to make a decision can be very useful to get things in perspective. Sometimes time alone will make the decision for you. Prayer and listening for inner cues may help a person pass time until their more rational nature takes over.

I use a technique where I set up an x and a y axis to represent two possible variables each with two polar opposite outcomes. I then fill in each quadrant with the likely outcomes. It works as well for me as a dialogue with a fabricated person that I imagine to be God.

I didn't mean to steer the thread. I continue to look for unambiguous and extraordinay proof for the extraordinay claims of any religion.

The subtlety of the spirit's voice is about as persuasive as Christ's invisible presense in 1914.

90

Faith and the Bible

by tec in

jw
friends

for those of us who must walk by sight (for now), there is nothing wrong with using the bible to help learn about christ and god... as long as ... you look to christ first and foremost and over anything else.

otherwise, i do not see the point in saying you follow christ or you are a christian.

he is the truth.

scotoma

Tec,

It sound like that small voice is bitching at you. In psychology this is understood as the actual voice of a parent or authority figure that would nag you into doing what's right. It's a sign that a person still hasn't developed a mature perception of their world.

A mature person is aware of the limitations of their fellow man so there is no need of a "parental" voice to tell them to be patient, loving, forgiving. When you have assimilated the human condition you share with all humans then all these things become simple and emerge without the internal reminders or intervention of a parental voice.

And if for some reason you lose it on occasion and behave impatient, intolerant, unloving you are able to quickly achieve equilibrium without the guilt imposed by the internal sadistic bastard.

As long as you obey internal voices you have only made superficial changes and will most likely bitch and torture others thinking its the right thing to do.

90

Faith and the Bible

by tec in

jw
friends

for those of us who must walk by sight (for now), there is nothing wrong with using the bible to help learn about christ and god... as long as ... you look to christ first and foremost and over anything else.

otherwise, i do not see the point in saying you follow christ or you are a christian.

he is the truth.

scotoma

You can't discover more than the total results of all of the carefully controlled experiments based on the scientific method. Your intutition might be right but it might also be shit. That small voice inside is quite often a spiteful bitch or sadistic self-righteous bastard.

Faith is just an outdated word for inductive reasoning.

9

Fred Franz's words - haunting JWs from beyond the grave!

by sir82 in

jw
friends

as most people on this site have come to know, the "new world translation committee", the group claiming responsibility for the "new world translation of the holy scriptures", consisted of fred franz and a bunch of lackeys who did busy-work.

franz was the only one hwho had even a passing knowledge of biblical hebrew & greek.. the 7/15/11 wt's comments about "mentally diseased" apostates is causing quite a stir in the uk in print and online.

there are numerous threads on that topic on this board today.. the phrase "mentally diseased" in this context is a direct quote from 1 timothy 6:3-4 from the nwt:.

scotoma

Some of the Bible writers were just as vindictive as the Watchtower:

1John 2:18 Identifies the "antichrist" as those who "went out from us, but they were not of our sort;

for if they had been of our sort they would have remained with us."

So, old John, wondering when the end would come figured that all the people leaving the congregations was and indication "it is the last hour."

Rather than trying to rescue those who left as Jesus instructed, it was much easier to put a label on them. Perfect for an old man. If people that leave are antichrist you don't have to shake your bones to help them.

11

Could the JW's survive another 1975?

by i_drank_the_wine in

jw
friends

the only years that i'm aware of in recent history that the jw's lost numbers was after the 1975 debacle.

someone posted on another thread about the damage control they're doing with the new "generation" nonsense with an assembly part where one person explains the "new light" to another that isn't too sure of it.. if they're having to do damage control like this over something relatively minor in comparison to 1975 (just some more "new light" as always), how do you think they would hold up under another 1975-level "oopsy"?

people seem to get less and less willing to be locked into religious systems that just don't conform with the modern world as it is.. if the internet was around, how many more people do you think would have google'd "jehovahs witnesses" at some point in 1976, perhaps while alone on the computer after the world didn't end?

scotoma

1914 is a bigger deal than all their predictions. 1914 is the keystone of their claim to being the "faithful slave" who were appointed after Christ's parousia. No 1914 - no faithful and discreet slave. No "special" governing class and there is no reason to read their garbage.

They have no more dates. They are running on fumes.

In 2015 the centenial of Christs' arrival will be history.

Parking at the KH will not be a problem anymore.

44

Max Larson died today at 96 yrs...Watchtower President since 2000

by williamhconley in

jw
friends

watchtower society of new york president max larson died today at the age of 96.. served in bethel since 1938 (73 yrs at bethel) long before geoffrey jackson & anthony morris of the gb were even born.. http://www.jw-archive.org/2011/09/bro-max-larson-died-today.html.

scotoma

He was a grouch. Typical shop foreman type. His eyebrows were EXTRAORDINARY.

5

Being Annointed

by mankkeli in

jw
friends

few folks have wanted to know how god endows individual with the heavenly status , as a new partaker my self, this is the simple strategy;.

'what u proffess is what god annoints, "what u declare is what god makes clear, what u express is what u will experience.

what you feel is what god sees.. there is no big deal..

scotoma

In the early church holy spirit allegedly gave witness (god's spirit bears witness with our spirit) by means of special gifts.

Speaking in tongues (ecstatic gibberish labeled the language of angels), prophecy (lucky guesses - the more guesses

the lucker the prophet becomes), healing of people with psychosomatic illnesses.

For God's spirit to be a witness it has to give an external visible sign otherwise it's just a person bearing witness to themselves.

Basically, those who think they have been "chosen" because the words of a scripture had some kind of emotional

connection with them are really experiencing a sort of halucination. People who feel out of the norm and want to be special are always looking

for something that will confirm that feeling. Some think they were from another planet. Some think they were famous

people in a previous life. Some, like Oprah, think there is some special magnetic force that draws them toward

success.

In other words, The Watchtower is, at its foundation, led by some pretty crazy folks.

8

Where did the people go?

by N.drew in

jw
friends

i wondered what the avitar was of j. hofer and timothy pointed out it was gerrit loesch so i googled it and came to a page here that was six years old.

but sadly the posts were posted by people who i have not seen post here (for the short time i have been here).

this is the best place on the internet.

scotoma

I used to be on under a different name and dropped off. But, I still come here to get the inside gossip on what

JW's are up to. By checking in occassionally I can keep up with old relatives and acquaintances who are regular faithful

attenders. Some of the rumors are unfounded but most of them turn out to be true.