Posts by joey jojo

77

A question about the contemporary generation teaching following a conversation with a JW apologist

by Giles Gray in

i would like to ask the ex-jws on this site to put their ‘apologists hat’ back on for a moment, so that i can go through the overlapping generation teaching in an attempt to make sense of it.

i apologise if these points have already been addressed on this site.a quick background for the reason for my request… having never confronted a jw apologist on the topic, i recently engaged with a jw regarding the official understanding of a ‘generation’ and unfortunately he didn’t have an answer to the points i was making.

i was left a little confused as to what the official jw response would/should be.so i was hoping that my thoughts below might be considered from an apologist’s perspective.the point in question relates to this section of the watchtower article below from 2008, as well as the jw.org video explanation of the overlapping generation:---:w08 2/15[box on page 25] can we calculate the length of “this generation”?the word “generation” usually refers to people of various ages whose lives overlap during a particular time period or event.

joey jojo

It's believed by JW's because they are conditioned to believe what they are told as coming directly from God himself.

Trying to reason with a jw will leave you frustrated and unsatisfied. A bit like going to a brothel for a hug.

126

Overlapping Generation

by pandorasbox1914 in

the september 2015 broadcast had david splane explain matthew 24:34 “truly, i say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place”.

his explanation of this scripture was by means of a chart to indicate an overlapping generation.. .

no scripture was used to show the overlapping generation concept, and as a result it makes no sense.. to illustrate how crazy this concept is, look at the lyrics of the song my generation.. my generation.

joey jojo

If you were born after an event occurred, then you didn't witness that event and cannot call yourself a member of the generation that saw the event.

Knowing people that saw it isn't the same.

37

Lloyd Evans exploitation videos.

by phoenixrising in

i used to watch his videos on the monthly gb talks.

he has went over the top a few times doing one video on why being liberal idiot is a good thing.

he has made comments on the usa not knowing shit about what he was desperately trying to talk about.

joey jojo

Phoenix, I haven't seen the video you are talking about yet, so I cant really comment about that at this time.

I just wanted to say that some of my American friends that I have made over the years are really surprised by the amount of news the rest of the world gets about American subjects. I'm in Australia and there is something about the US every day in the news. It isn't just because Trump is in office, its always been this way. Some people probably feel they know a bit about American life and your politics because we hear so much about it.

Your politics affects the decisions of your allies, like the UK, so people take an interest.

9

Jehovahs Dodge Claim

by smiddy3 in

"victims say cash moved offshore".

i just thought you might be interested in how widespread this article has been taken up by the media in australia.. west australian newspaper , herald sun sunday victorian newspaper ,the daily telegraph n.s.w.

newspaper,.

joey jojo

https://www.acnc.gov.au/charity/db994d2f8dec3cdfdbca01e8c8e28da9#overview

This is a link to the orgs charitable details in Australia including financials. Looks like each congregation is separately registered as a charity.

60

Is it me or is John Cedars channel becoming a self important circle fest

by phoenixrising in

i still like the commentary on the jw.org monthly’s, i can skip through some parts.

but it seems like he is pushing too hard to put out videos and the quality is getting very low on the content..

joey jojo

I find his videos interesting. He seems to put a lot of thought into them. Maybe they could be a little shorter but you can always skip forward.

Also, if he is making a few bucks off an organisation that has taken a lot from him personally, then good for him.

44

Do You Think We Will Ever Get Back To “Normal”?

by minimus in

jw
friends

i hope that within the next several months we will get back to some type of normalcy.

will restaurants ever get filled again?

will you ever be able to sit at a bar or go to a concert or broadway show?.

joey jojo

Hopefully this will teach us to do things better. If it's normal to sit in congested traffic for hours a week just to get to a job to spend another 50 hours a week, well maybe the old normal wasn't that great.

I'm reminded of the saying, 'you see who has been swimming naked when the tide goes out'. This pandemic has exposed a lot of weaknesses in society that will be painful to overcome, but there has also been plenty of creativity.

20

Bible canon conundrums

by joey jojo in

this is a topic that i find really interesting- how the bible, in particular, the new testament was compiled and how the jw organisation strives to negate, scoff at and diminish the influence of the catholic church in its development.. here is the official stance of the org: .

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/library/r1/lp-e/all-publications/watchtower/the-watchtower-1963/april-15.

'the roman catholic church claims responsibility for the decision as to which books should be included in the canon, and reference is made to the councils of hippo (a.d. 393) and carthage (a.d. 397), where catalogues of books were formulated.

joey jojo

DW,

If you are saying that the catholic church retrospectively slapped the title of bishop onto very early overseers in an attempt to tie them to the catholic church, maybe you're right. I don't know.

The earliest mention of the word catholic that I could find was 110 ad, so that's actually quite early and there would have been people alive that may have been contemporaries of some of the disciples. The muratorian fragment also mentions the word catholic.

What would become the catholic church was responsible for compiling letters of the apostles and letters of correspondence between early congregations, preserving and copying them. The church claims an unbroken line of successors of the apostles. So I guess the sticking point for you is, at what stage did Christians become catholics?

The article I linked was another example of the disingenuous writing style of the wt. They tell part of the story so that reader is never presented with the full picture.

20

Bible canon conundrums

by joey jojo in

this is a topic that i find really interesting- how the bible, in particular, the new testament was compiled and how the jw organisation strives to negate, scoff at and diminish the influence of the catholic church in its development.. here is the official stance of the org: .

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/library/r1/lp-e/all-publications/watchtower/the-watchtower-1963/april-15.

'the roman catholic church claims responsibility for the decision as to which books should be included in the canon, and reference is made to the councils of hippo (a.d. 393) and carthage (a.d. 397), where catalogues of books were formulated.

joey jojo

Eusebius lived during the 4th century, after Christianity was legalised and the church was in full swing. I understand your point about the earliest overseers, or bishops, the generation that 'overlapped' (tm) with the apostles of Jesus.

However, the argument could be made that further contemporaries of those men and the ones that came after led to the formation of the catholic church, which then was responsible for, among other things, canonising scripture.

If the wt has referred to these men as apostolic fathers in the past, why not do the same in this article?

20

Bible canon conundrums

by joey jojo in

this is a topic that i find really interesting- how the bible, in particular, the new testament was compiled and how the jw organisation strives to negate, scoff at and diminish the influence of the catholic church in its development.. here is the official stance of the org: .

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/library/r1/lp-e/all-publications/watchtower/the-watchtower-1963/april-15.

'the roman catholic church claims responsibility for the decision as to which books should be included in the canon, and reference is made to the councils of hippo (a.d. 393) and carthage (a.d. 397), where catalogues of books were formulated.

joey jojo

Drearyweather, the research I did names all 4 of the men I mentioned as bishops, in various cities. Are you saying that being a catholic bishop today is a far cry from those guys in status, power and privilege? If so, I'm sure you're right, but they are still given the title of bishops today, and at the very least, were not merely commentators as the wt would have us believe.

20

Bible canon conundrums

by joey jojo in

this is a topic that i find really interesting- how the bible, in particular, the new testament was compiled and how the jw organisation strives to negate, scoff at and diminish the influence of the catholic church in its development.. here is the official stance of the org: .

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/library/r1/lp-e/all-publications/watchtower/the-watchtower-1963/april-15.

'the roman catholic church claims responsibility for the decision as to which books should be included in the canon, and reference is made to the councils of hippo (a.d. 393) and carthage (a.d. 397), where catalogues of books were formulated.

joey jojo

Cheers,

It's so frustrating the way the org takes a stance on a subject and then cobbles together a story to fit their narrative.

The wts writers are at their devious best; misquotes, out of context quotes, diminishing or overstating the qualifications of quoted people as they see fit and of course, their absolute favourite, the use of ellipses.....

They also manage to avoid the use of the word 'catholic' throughout the whole article, except to say, 'the catholic church had nothing to do with it.'