Bible writer himself admitted some untruths contained in the Bible. (Jsremaiah 8:8)
...and nobody knows which parts are true and which aren't.
Anders Andersen
JoinedPosts by Anders Andersen
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25
Has God preserved His word today?
by JW Answers inhas god preserved his word today?
many people attack, doubt and fault god's word.
yet god has made several promises in his word.he promised to preserve his word unto every generation,he promised that every word would be truth,he promised that we can rely and depend on his every word.satan wants nothing more than to dismiss, and cast doubt on god's word... so the question today is... do we have god's preserved word today?
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Anders Andersen
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Humans only survive for 3-5 days without water...
by purrpurr inand yet today's watchtower and indeed the bible condemns the israelites for moaning about having no water!
it's never occurred to me how unjust this is!
and how could a so called loving god not provide a basic human need?!.
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Anders Andersen
I believe the evidence is overwhelming concerning the accuracy of the accounts about Israel.....and are still proving themselves true.
For instance:I don't see how the examples you present have any bearing on whether the Exodus is myth or history?
Actual historical evidence appears to show that Israelites were never enslaved in and rescued from Egypt; they evolved together with (other) Canaanite people. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Exodus for some pointers.If we're discussing the Exodus, it would be good to present evidence regarding the Exodus.
As for prophecies regarding Jerusalem/Israel: there are so many prophecies written down about both their destruction and rebuilding them, that regardless the actual situation some Bible verses can be interpreted as a fulfilled prophecy.
If tomorrow someone completely nukes Israel you will come up with verses like Ezekiel 33:28 and Deut. 28:45. Either way, you'll always claim that the Bible can be trusted.But, to each their own. It's not my cuppa...
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Humans only survive for 3-5 days without water...
by purrpurr inand yet today's watchtower and indeed the bible condemns the israelites for moaning about having no water!
it's never occurred to me how unjust this is!
and how could a so called loving god not provide a basic human need?!.
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Anders Andersen
The problem was that the Israelites were still thinking like a defeated, enslaved people.
The people had been taken out of slavery, but the slavery had not yet been taken out of the people
Guess what? According to their origin myth they were still enslaved. Their master Yahweh demanded all sorts of services and goods, unquestioning obedience, and would kill them if they ever wanted to get out under their slavery to him. The myth explicitly states that Yahweh is the owner.
From one type of slavery into another. It's a good thing this while story is mythical and not historical.
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Can you help with this?
by vienne ini need a scan of this: the apocalyptic interpretation of history of american premillennial groups, phd dissertation by carl ludwigson, 1944. if you have it, please contact me..
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Anders Andersen
Vienne,
See this link below for a list of libraries that have this publication on their shelves. Might be a help?
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Watchtower disputes $200K tax bill from Newburgh
by Rattigan350 inhttp://www.recordonline.com/news/20180904/watchtower-disputes-200k-tax-bill-from-newburgh.
town of newburgh — the watchtower bible and tract society of new york is challenging nearly $200,000 in fire and other special district taxes assessed for three town of newburgh properties, including two hotels the organization bought to house volunteers helping build its world headquarters in warwick.. in a petition filed in orange county court last month, the umbrella organization for jehovah’s witnesses claimed that the town “either unintentionally as a mistake or intentionally and without lawful authority” miscoded the former hilton on crossroads court and the former hampton inn on route 300 for 2016, 2017 and this year.. with a combined market value of nearly $23 million, the hotel properties were not assessed town, county and school taxes for those years.
but the town assessed $196,000 charges for the orange lake fire district and lighting and water districts during those years.. newburgh also assessed $1,600 in special district taxes over three years for a vacant commercial property watchtower owns at route 17k and route 300.. “petitioner would not be required to pay the resulting unjust charges if its exemption from taxes had been justly, correctly, and lawfully granted and administered,” watchtower’s attorneys wrote in the organization’s petition in county court.. watchtower bought the two hotel properties in 2014 as it built its 1.6 million-square-foot headquarters on kings drive in warwick.
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Anders Andersen
The county might waive the taxes, then burn those buildings down and see how Watchtower would fare without fire dept. ;-p
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Not viewed as a JW if not reported for 6 months?
by kramer inhi, i seem to remember that the society have said that you are not viewed as a witness if you have not reported for 6 months.. does this ring any bells?
someone i know has been called for a judicial, even though she has said she doesn’t believe and is not not attending meetings and hasn’t for 6 months.what she did was 12 months ago when she was a witness.. she is not sure whether she should turn up or not, as turning up shows she thinks she answers to elders still.
but also doesn’t want to be automatically disfellowshipped which may happen if she doesn’t turn up.. if there is an article to quote saying someone inactive isn’t seen as a witness, this would be helpful.. any thoughts?.
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Anders Andersen
No Biahi, they have not.
You seem to be certain...but I thought official policy is to retain the publisher card indefinitely unless a person is confirmed dead?
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You will not find this sort of support in the New System: JC Elder
by Diogenesister inso that statement was made by an elder to a disfellowshipped brother, during a reinstatement meeting.. this statement is made here at around 4.
10 mins in.. the full story of this man is incredibly sad.
in fact i've rarely listened to an exjws story that has affected me quite so much.
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Anders Andersen
Fyi Watchtower does indeed expect execution for sinners in Paradise, but claims it's highly unlikely that people who survived the 'final test' will ever want to sin again.
https://wol.jw.org/nl/wol/dsync/r18/lp-o/r1/lp-e/2006607#h=1
Of course even highly unlikely events will eventually happen given enough time (eternity).
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You will not find this sort of support in the New System: JC Elder
by Diogenesister inso that statement was made by an elder to a disfellowshipped brother, during a reinstatement meeting.. this statement is made here at around 4.
10 mins in.. the full story of this man is incredibly sad.
in fact i've rarely listened to an exjws story that has affected me quite so much.
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Anders Andersen
Afaik official stance is that in paradise (after 1000 years) any sin = instant death penalty.
No need for a JC or trial even, as perfect people cannot hide behind imperfection and thus willingly choose to sin. They wouldn't be repentant anyway. The sinner knowingly and willingly rebelled against God and this deserves to die.
Of course nobody ever explored the details of this idea. Nobody looked at the huge grey area.
Assume alcoholic beverages to be still in use...would everybody have a built in breathalyzer so they know when to stop drinking?
I know that sometimes I have 3 beers without any effects, and other times 1 and feel it.
Would I be executed in such a situation?
Would it really be impossible for someone to miscalculate their reaction to alcohol sometimes?
If not, people could sin unwillingly even in Paradise.
If so, how would that even work?
Or similarly, how about lusting for someone you're not married to? Where is the line between seeing a person and admiring their physical and inner beauty, and lusting for them? It's easy to describe the difference between the extremes on this scale, but what about the middle?
I'm afraid the ideas JW have about how justice would work in paradise are untenable. Of course they'll just "wait for Jehovah (tm)"...
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Interpretation often takes you away from truth
by Ireneus inyesterday, my classmate was giving an example from her homeland on how people can give various interpretations which have nothing to do with truth.
though studying in the us, she was closely monitoring what was happening in kerala (a small southern state of india), her birth place.
last month saw unprecedent heavy rains wreaking widespread havoc in this small state with huge population (which is much more than australia’s population).
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Anders Andersen
This explains why we find many interpretations on Biblical subjects with the possibility that none of them could be be true.
As you described people already come up with different interpretations for a single, unchallenged fact (heavy rains).
It only makes sense that interpretations of someone else's convoluted fantasy or nightmares (e.g. Revelations), folk lore and origin myths (e.g. Exodus) and other such legendary stories that we don't even know to be factually correct, are going to be completely arbitrary and completely useless.
It's also noteworthy that your example about the Kerala rains shows very clearly that people come up with interpretations that fit their pre-existing worldview.
Very few of the women who wanted entry have interpreted the situation as their gods telling them to drop the case.
Very few of the men who denied women entry have interpreted the situation as their gods telling them to allow women in the temple.
None of the scientists accepted the interpretation that those floodings are the wrath of a god.
They all interpreted according to their already existing worldview.
And that is exactly the point I tried to make in one of your other threads. Anyone who reads the Bible will interpret it according to their own preexisting ideas and beliefs.
Someone who believes God is loving, kind and patient might interpret that some parts of the Bible are written by 'false friends', and that their depictions of God as jealous, angry, vindictive or violent are to be ignored. That interpretation is however entirely arbitrary, according to that person's preexisting beliefs.
If someone else were to claim the exact opposite (God is impatient, violent, vindictive, and every Bible verse that says otherwise is written by a 'false friend'), that interpretation would be just as valid/invalid and useful/useless and the favorable interpretation.
Just like the Kerala rains, people generally interpret the world and religious ideas just the way they want. They construct their own god(s)/God and make the world and the texts conform to that.
Worse, the texts themselves are the result of people having preexisting religious ideas and interpreting their world according to those ideas.
Building your reality on those means interpreting the (incomplete record of) someone else's interpretation of the world.
Can't get much unstable than that....(well unless you add another layer such as JW who interpret the JW leaders' interpretation of Bible writers' interpretation of the world.)
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Sisters handling mic's
by I Faded Twice ini saw a topic on another forum where a sister was supposedly carrying the mics.
i was curious if this was even possible?
is it new light or just a lie?.
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Anders Andersen
Can you imagine Rosa Parks or M.L. King saying something like:
I'm from a small town. There are not enough White people to fill all the positions in the White school. I have been assigned to clean the hallways. Assisting the White teachers to care for the White school needs is a great privilege and I am very thankful for it.
Yeah it takes a special kind of blindness to be thankful for repression and discrimination like this sweet mic carrying sister...