Posts by Bobcat

58

How did you long-timers do it before the internet / Ray Franz books / abundant information?

by irondork in

jw
friends

with all the tools and information at the disposal of newly awakened ones, it's still no easy task coming to terms with the magnitude of it all.

it still takes a lot of gut-wrenching time and effort to get to the point where you are sure you made the right decision to leave.. .

how did you long-timers (old-timers, respectfully) manage it without crisis of conscience, christian freedom, jwn, jwfacts, freeminds, access to thousands of fellow survivors with stories just like yours?.

Bobcat

Chariklo asked: What is this story, please?

2 Samuel 6:1-10

31

My nine grievances against the Society from BEFORE I had ever visited a single apostate website...

by cedars in

i mentioned on a recent thread by irondork that my wife recently showed me a handwritten list of grievances i had against the society from before i had ever visited a single apostate website (apart from wikipedia).

the thread is below:.

http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/jw/friends/226934/1/how-did-you-long-timers-do-it-before-the-internet-ray-franz-books-abundant-information.

Bobcat

Cedars:

Very interesting list and interesting too to be able to look back at where one was at a certain point in the past.

I had written the Society some years ago about a Bible question I had and it is interesting now to see how I wrote it. Not just the question, but my whole attitude in the letter. I was definitely a 'captive of the mind' at the time. The response I got was one of the things that began my awakening.

Just as an observation about some of your points:

Getting a better understanding of Jesus' parable of the faithful slave has revolutionized my thinking in connection with some of your questions above. It has been like toto in the Wizard of Oz pulling back the curtain on the Wizard from Nebraska. The great smokey image of the Wizard (the so-called 'slave class') no longer had any meaning. Now I can see that it's just the GB and the R&F. It's amazing now (and sometimes annoying) to listen at how others speak glowingly of 'the slave class' (and other variants of that).

The prophecies of Daniel are also of great interest to me. I can tell you this about their most recent "light." (That the Anglo-American power will still be THE dominant world power when the end arrives.) They are going to have to get some "newer light." (Maybe they should see WTWizard's thread here.)

Incidentally, in Dan 11:44, just before the great tribulation starts, the king of the North 'hears reports out of the sunrising and the north that disturb him and cause him to go forth in a great rage.' I theorized that if the coming great tribulation and the 1st century great tribulation upon the Jews were parallel to each other, then, Dan 11:44 would have a parallel in the first century. If you have access to Josephus, here is what I found: Wars of the Jews 3.1.1-2. (Or you can go straight to it here.) (In the 1st century, Rome was the king of the North.)

In connection with evolution, I think CT Russell allowed for the idea that the animals may have evolved some. But definitely not humans since that would rule out the idea of a first sin by the first man. To me, the great ability of animals to adapt makes it hard to get a handle on this. Adaptibility and the idea of Evolution seem to overlap a lot.

At any rate, take care.

15

1st & 2nd Class Christians?????

by The Searcher in

the insight book explains the matthew 24:45 this way;.

"faithful and discreet slave - those forming the christian congregation are referred to by the apostle paul as "members of the household of god" (eph 2:19; 1ti 3:15), and the same apostle shows that faithful stewardship among such household members involved the dispensing of spiritual truths on which .

those becoming believers would feed.

Bobcat

Searcher:

Good points about who Jesus' brothers are. The Society always goes to Hebrews chap.2 to define this rather than stick to Matthew which would provide the closest context for the wording of the parable of the sheep and goats.

In that parable (Mt 25:31-46), Jesus called his disciples, "the least of these my brothers" (v.40) and "these least ones." (v.45) "Least" (Greek elachistos) is the superlative of mikros, translated "little ones" in Matthew and Mark. It is interesting to see how "little ones" are described:

Mt 10:42 "disciples"

Mt 18:6 "who put faith in me"

Mk 9:42 "that believe"

Another point of note is that the Society says the "brothers" can't be the same as the sheep since they are both referred to in the same context. Yet just a few verses earlier they say that the 'faithful slave' is the same as the "domestics," even though they are similarly used in the same context. (Mt 24:45-47) Their logic is whatever it needs to be to maintain their 'flashes of light.'

A good counter verse is Hebrews 6:10 where those Jewish Christians "have ministered to the holy ones." Using the Society's logic, that would mean that those Jewish Christians could not themselves be "holy ones" since they "ministered to them." Same with Matthew 10:42 where anyone who 'gives a cup of water to someone because he is a disciple' would not lose their reward. By the Society's logic, giving a cup of water to one of Jesus' disciples would prove that the giver was not a disciple. Pure nonsense.

One of the biggest things (to me) that disproves the Society's explanation of the sheep and goats parable is the fact that the Society has to dispense with what Jesus said the sheep would do. In the parable, the sheep give personal help to Jesus' brothers. This is definitely doable if the "brothers" are Jesus' disciples. But by identifying these 'brothers' as the 144,000, because there are so few and no one can know for sure who is, it becomes impossible to do what Jesus said the sheep would do. The Society replaces their actions with, 'help in the preaching, obey the elders, and give money to the Society.'

Rev chap.14 puts the lie to the Society's explanation of who the wheat are in the 'wheat and weeds' parable. But I'll save that for another time.

Take Care

39

Paradise earth doctrine - did it strike anyone else as a bit odd?

by sseveninches in

i have neglected to read jwfacts.org since discovering jwn a few weeks ago (remnants of the "apostate" defenses in action), but recently i decided to dive head first into it, and it has been eye-opening.

of course, some of the information i already knew through reading jwn, but one of the pages that really got my attention was the paradise earth topic under "questionable doctrine".. paradise earth caught my eye because way before i started having doubts about jw doctrine, i have always been asking questions about the topic - not to raise doubts (since i didn't have any back then), but just for my personal understanding, and to see how plausible it could be.

in the past i have asked things like:.

Bobcat

TD:

Your post about the pyramid of technology reminds me of the BBC movie "Threads."

36

Mental Illness & Suicide In the Organization

by What Now? in

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this topic has been discussed before ... i just wanted to put my two cents in.. i will start off by saying that of course mental illness exists outside of the organization.

Bobcat

Wha happened:

I can second your point. I know of a former MS whose 9 yr old son tried to hang himself. He has made other attempts on his life. He has been diagnosed and is under treatment, but he is worse some times more than others. (Imagine a 9 yr old who could feel the need to do that!)

At any rate, the father tried to get the elders in his cong. to make a shepherding call on his family. When it didn't happen, he approached the CO about it. The response: 'Shepherds don't shepherd shepherds.' The father eventually decided to resign as an MS to get the attention he felt his family needed.

16

Does the Watchtower still print the "Kingdom Interlinear Translation" book?

by Resistance is Futile in

jw
friends

it was last updated in 1985. does the watchtower still print it?

could a jw place an order for one at the kingdom hall?.

Bobcat

Touche, Wonderment

10

Here Are the Answers - What Are the Questions?

by The Searcher in

examine the scriptures honestly, and reason on what questions they demand of you.. .

a. matt.12:50, 13:38,25:40; mark 3:35; luke 8:21;john 1:12,13, 15:14; rom.

a. acts 10:42; acts 17:31; romans 14:9; 2 cor.

Bobcat

And thanks for your comments. I have no intention of allowing a publishing company to spoil my feelings for God. I see you feel the same.

Take Care, Searcher

20

shaking hands

by man in black in

when i was a witness ( esp.

as a youth) it seemed that whenever i went to a meeting, or assembly.

i would send an incredible amount of time shaking hands.

Bobcat

George, thanks.

39

Paradise earth doctrine - did it strike anyone else as a bit odd?

by sseveninches in

i have neglected to read jwfacts.org since discovering jwn a few weeks ago (remnants of the "apostate" defenses in action), but recently i decided to dive head first into it, and it has been eye-opening.

of course, some of the information i already knew through reading jwn, but one of the pages that really got my attention was the paradise earth topic under "questionable doctrine".. paradise earth caught my eye because way before i started having doubts about jw doctrine, i have always been asking questions about the topic - not to raise doubts (since i didn't have any back then), but just for my personal understanding, and to see how plausible it could be.

in the past i have asked things like:.

Bobcat

Just some thoughts on these:

If Jesus said in the Lord's Prayer: "let your will be done on earth as it is in heaven", how come JWs say that the will in heaven wasn't done until 1914?
This question was dismissed with the remark that Jesus was just telling a prophecy.

The first part of the Lord's Prayer is thought to be distilled from a prayer (the Qaddish prayer) already current in synagogues:

Exalted and hallowed be his great name
in the world which he created according to his will.May he let his kingdom rule
in your lifetime and in the days and in the lifetime of
the whole house of Israel, speedily and soon.
Praised be his great name from eternity to eternity.

The NICNT Matthew commentary has this to say about the opening petitions of the prayer: "In the light of the clear sense of [future] expectation in the Qaddish, many interpreters have argued for a similar orientation not only in the opening clauses of the Lord's Prayer but in the prayer as a whole. ... In fact, as we shall see, even vv. 9b-10 deal with matters which should be the constant concern of disciples in the present as well as with a view to the future: they desire to see God's name reverenced, his rule established, and his will done in the world as it is. While the synagogue prayer was necessarily forward-looking, for Jesus and his disciples the kingdom of God has already been announced and is working its way into the world through Jesus' ministry. In the light of that perspective, every clause of that prayer has an immediate relevance to the present situation and concerns of those who are praying." (Qaddish and quote from pp.243-4)

So part of the problem you expressed may be seen as the WT attempt to focus entirely on some prophetic aspect.

Concerning the "as in heaven, so also on earth" aspect, the NICNT (p.247) comments: "The 'aready-not yet' tension is here more explicit, as the situations in heaven (where God's kingship has been eternally honored) and on earth (where it is yet to be fully acknowledged) are compared. The time must come when God's human creatures join his angelic forces in honoring and serving their king."

A person might argue that demons were still present in the heavens as an opposing force. But that might be trying to read more detail into the prayer than Jesus intended.

Between the beginning of time and now, a lot of "faithful" people have lived and then died. Will they all fit on earth?
Dismissed as "we'll see".

Again, WT teaching obscures the possibilities. The WT teaches that only Jesus and the 144,000 are part of Abraham's seed (which is paralled by Paul with the seed of the woman, and being in the New Covenant) in Galatians chapters 3 and 4. (This is one of the reasons Randy, aka Dogpatch, reccomends reading Romans and Galatians w/o WT blinders on.) Throughout Galatians 3 and 4, Paul links these promises to those who put faith in Jesus, not to a few selected only by God's choice.

The original promise to Abraham was that his seed would become like the stars of the heavens and like the grains of sand on the seashore for multitude. The WT attempts to harmonize this with their interpretation by referring to the 'stars and sand' figure as "an unknown number," later revealed to be 144,001. But if you refernce the many verses that use the 'stars and sand' metaphor, the context always compares it with a "multitude" and contrasts it with "a few."

If you take God at his word in his promise to Abraham, it would, at some point require expansion beyond Earth, and it wouldn't necessarily ever require an end to children. Perhaps this is why the Bible never specifically refers to 'life on a paradise Earth' as a specific promise. It does imply what God's purpose for the Earth and humans was/is. But it doesn't specifically say that all human futures are based there. For the 1000 year reign, it would seem that humans would be on Earth. But after that is simply left uncommented on.

I admit that the above is based on little more than accepting God's promise made to Abraham and comparing it with what the Bible doesn't say about the future of humans. Any who want to brush it aside as speculative are welcome. But it does provide a possible answer to several of the points you brought up.

If the earth isn't already full when everyone is ressurected, people will have babies until the earth's capacity is reached, and then what? People will surely not have the desire to have babies anymore, due to God being in control.

See above.

So when the earth is filled, then what happens? The same group of people will forever live on the earth, with no one else getting a chance to see the light of day?
Unanswered.

See above.

When exactly does this "1000-year rule" take place? Since 1914, or at a later date?
Unanswered.

Compare Revelation 20:1 - 7. Satan and the demons are abyssed. (vv.1 - 3) Those who rule with the Christ do so for 1000 years. (vv.4 - 6) After the 1000 years is ended Satan is released. (vs.7) Satan is abyssed following the War described in chapter 19:11 - 21. That should narrow down the answer.

How can Matthew 5:3, 5 be referring to two groups of people when both should be sharing the same qualities? Shouldn't the "other sheep" and the "little flock" share the qualities of being "conscious their spiritual need" and being mild-tempered?
Unanswered.

Matthew 5:3 says nothing about "two groups" of people. It presents the lot of all those described. It's the WT that has redifined the terms "little flock" and "other sheep." So the implication of your question is right. A thinking person rightly says; "How can this be?"

Take Care

20

shaking hands

by man in black in

when i was a witness ( esp.

as a youth) it seemed that whenever i went to a meeting, or assembly.

i would send an incredible amount of time shaking hands.

Bobcat

George, what is a Masonic handshake?