"Religion was invented when the first priest met the first Gullible Fool" , Mark Twain.
Posts by Phizzy
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77How would you define RELIGION, and why?
by Fernando in"judge" rutherford defined or classified all religion as "a snare and a racket" in his books "religion" and "enemies".. after rutherford's death in 1942, his protege, watchtower vice president, and aclu darling, hayden c. covington, in the early 1950's, for reasons of legal expedience and supremacist aspirations, suddenly converted the watchtower into a religion.. this was done alongside one of the most audacious, spurious and longstanding swindles of the us legal system.
this involved twisting philippians 1:7 and misrepresenting the watchtower's true nature, objectives and activities.. .
this meant that it became necessary for the watchtower to suddenly reclassify and redefine religion (w51 1/15 p. 43 new legal booklet well named; w51 8/15 p. 511 questions from readers; yb75 p. 161 part 2 "for gladys bolton...").. two new watchtower classifications were suddenly created: "true religion" and "false religion".. now "true religion" meant "true beliefs" whilst "belief" in ever changing watchtower doctrine was equated with the one "faith" of scripture.. all this while the watchtower increasingly and maliciously truncated, obfuscated and hid the liberating full "good news" (or unabridged gospel) of scripture, which it lyingly claimed (in court) that it was actually "defending and legally establishing".. how would you have defined religion before learning ttatt?.
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60
The Evolution of Judas Iscariot
by Leolaia inthe story of judas iscariot in the gospels provides the reader with a fascinating picture of how the plot and details of the narratives were gleaned from the ot and embellished in different ways.
the evangelists and the tradents that preceded them looked to the ot (and other affiliated literature) for information on what happened to jesus, employing a haggadaic method of biblical interpretation similar to how rabbis and authors of pseudepigraphs in the second temple era expanded the brief stories of the patriarchs in genesis with reams of new detail and legendary episodes -- through the means of exegesis aimed to penetrate beyond a plain reading of the text to "fill in the blanks" of what must have happened.
the authors of the gospels also scoured through the ot to discover what was supposed to happen to jesus and wrote their stories accordingly.
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Phizzy
Oh dear, an Ad hominem attack ! P.S. you just lost all credibility as far as I am concerned,and trumpeting your qualifications is not impressive.
A good number of Scholars have come to wrong conclusions in the past, and often because without realising it, they were looking at the Texts with believer's eyes. Or they were just plain wrong.
Just address what you disagree with, and back it up with more than mere opinion, and you may regain some credibility.
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Comedian Katt Williams Wrongly Disfellowshipped By Jehovah's Witnesses!!!
by Golden4Altar incomedian katt williams wrongly disfellowshipped by jehovah's witnesses!!!.
here is the link: https://jehovahstruth.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=59.
golden 4altar.
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Phizzy
"wrongly" is redundant ", well yes, as the whole Disfellowshipping thing the Org. does is unscriptural in every feature, as we here know.
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Oh boy: 1,000 Jehovah’s Witnesses reach out to Super Bowl fans in Las Vegas
by Tahoe inhttps://www.fox5vegas.com/2024/02/09/1000-jehovahs-witnesses-reach-out-super-bowl-fans-las-vegas/ .
1000 lit-up carts at 50 strategic locations near the stadium and on the strip.
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Phizzy
" What will be the result? None. "
I agree Gorby, not a single convert from that Public Relations exercise I bet, but the Org. does not care, they know JW's will not go D to D hardly at all in any meaningful way.
So this is to keep the J.W's busy busy, and to persuade the gullible J.W's that they are "Preaching the Good News", when zero actual preaching is involved !
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2
Lost Gospel Series
by peacefulpete ini thought it would be fun to take a brief look at various gospels in use by christians of the first few centuries ce.
one each week.
a few weeks back i posted regarding the egerton gospel which i cleverly misspelled edgerton gospel.. for now consider the oxyrhynchus gospel 840:.
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Phizzy
Thanks PPete ! fascinating !
The Oxyrhynchus Papyri is a huge collection, much of it yet to be transcribed, and translated, a job that will not be completed in our lifetimes. It is hugely important because of all the secular stuff in the collection, of huge interest and use to Historians, and the Biblical stuff, of interest to Scholars, and us of course !
What a great idea ! bringing to us a chunk each week ! Thank you for your work, I wonder what new treasures will surface as the work of studying the Papyri continues !
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8
Do or Do not Do
by peacefulpete in" (greece; 4th century bce)
" (greece; 5th century bce)
2nd century bce.
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Phizzy
Just to repeat what PP said at the end of his O.P, as this surely is the best version of the Golden Rule :
" "Do Unto Others as They Would Have You Do Unto Them."
... take time to learn about your neighbor's tastes, their mood, their needs, their principles before you start "doing" things "unto them." Treat others the way they want to be treated."
Well put, P. Pete !
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48
2024 when will Witnesses admit they are wrong???
by Witness 007 in1914 generation is long gone.
1975 was a joke 40 years ago.
i know of many witnesses still hanging on for armagedon but when will they give up?
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Phizzy
The G.B and its predecessors never admit they were wrong, they may only have a "clarified understanding", according to them.
Individual older J.W's now suffer from the "Sunk Cost Fallacy" and allied false reasoning, and also many have an ingrained sense of Pride.
It takes humility to admit you have been wrong all your life.
1914 will become "The Elephant In the Room" for the G.B, gullible J.W's will follow that lead. I do not expect a mass waking up, even less a mass exodus. But soon, only those older ones, over 50's etc. will be in the majority by a long way. The young will continue to leave as they have done, the young that remain will not be there because of belief, but only for family and social reasons.
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Were JW Celebrities Ever An Asset To The Organisation?
by NotFormer injust wondering if the rich celebrities that occasionally were aligned with the wt gave enough to the 'tower to be a worthwhile presence within the organisation?.
my gut instinct is: "no".
i imagine that the jackson family gave a fair bit, but it was obviously never enough to buy michael the right to be held as being in good standing.
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Phizzy
I have never joined in with the idea that Celebs, are something special, but even the Org. as has been pointed out in this thread I guess, thought they were, special enough to mention them, as some kind of validation at least.
My old man set me on that road to reasoning they were not special,or superhuman or something, when I was very young.
He spoke out against the practice of when a G.B member took to the Platform at a big Convention, the audience would clap them vigorously , before they had spoken a word, dad said that was idolizing them.
Later in life I saw first hand how J.W's sucked up to, and fawned over, prominent Bethel guys, and how those guys, and the G.B are the same, absolutely LOVED the adoration !
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"Beast" Memories
by NotFormer ini've been crapping on the wt a lot lately, which sometimes seems a bit unfair to me, especially since i was never in, therefore i don't really have a dog in the fight.
to provide a bit of balance, i'll reminisce about the rampant prophecy speculation going on in mainstream christianity (i refuse to use the wt's pejorative term: "christendom", especially since by definition, they're part of that classification 🙄) in the 70s and 80s.
to be fair, the churches themselves had been around long enough to realise that end times interpretations are like arseholes, everybody has one.
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Phizzy
Is " hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia " ( an irrational fear of the number 666) the longest word in the English language ? It is certainly the longest word to ever grace the pages on here !
That fear runs deep in Society, they had to change the number on a local 'bus from 666, people complained, thought it would bring evil down on the 'bus, but it ran for many months, until some wag at the 'bus company added an emoji to the sign displaying the number, the emoji was a Devil face, complete with horns ! LOL.
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Observations/Questions from forum newbie
by Obrien ini joined about 5 days ago and have some observations/questions.. does anyone notice the profile update doesn't seem to work?
i like reading some of the profiles, most accounts don't have them and maybe that's because the tool doesn't function anymore?.
also i've been noticing a diverse number of subjects which made me think of the categories of people on here.
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Phizzy
" you have pity for people still there " I have pity, and empathy for those still there, to a degree, as it took me until I was virtually an old man to wake up, due to having been born in.
But really, anyone still in must be experiencing Cognitive Dissonance at a much higher level than I was all those years ago, and yet that level I had back then moved me to use the Internet to research , and wake up properly,
It is the usual thing that Cult member do, with those still in, you make a feeble excuse, and put those nasty thoughts way to the back of your mind, and say you will "wait on Jehovah" or some such, a crying shame, because Freedom of Mind awaits, and is just a few clicks away on your computer or phone.
I still have hopes for some of those I love, family and old friends, that they WILL wake up soon !
Maybe we will have some more newbies like O'brien soon ?