Posts by seedy3

25

Is the term "sheep" offensive to you?

by pr_capone in

jw
friends

i was thinking about this the other day.

the society likes to call all those who follow their teachings "sheep" or "sheep like ones".

how offensive is that?!?!

seedy3

When I think of sheep I get all tingly and warm fuzzy feelings inside, but I live pretty close to NZ so it shouldn't come as a surprise.

Seedy

26

What's The Worst Thing The WT.Society Has Taught?

by minimus in

jw
friends

out of all the wrong things the watchtower society has taught, which do you feel are the worst?

seedy3

Well, the way I see it, shunning and such is an emotional punishment and soon people get over it, some longer then others, but it is treatable.

The idea that they are gods only channel or only ones that have a direct link, is not so far fetched, I mean even the catholics have their pope.

I really think it is a toss up between 2 items and I feel this way because I am not sure which has caused more deaths.

1: The blood/health policies {I have to include health because they have interfeared in vaccienes, transplants and such as well as the blood policy).

2: Their "No part of this world" attitude twords being totally seperate from the world and not allowing their followers to buy party cards and such things that every one else in a particular country has to do. Malwai, is one prime example but not the only one.

Seedy

108

Why is the Bible wrong?

by StinkyPantz in

this primarily goes out to other agnostics and athiests.

this week i got into two interesting conversations that i will admit that i was ill prepared for.

one was with a jw friend of mine who wanted to know why i thought jw's were wrong.

seedy3

Hey AlanF,

I have read Carl Sagan's Speculation on this before, but even he only offers speculation on explaining the reason they knew of Sirus B Note my highlights:

The Dogon have knowledge impossible to acquire without the telescope. The straightforward conclusion is that they had contact with an advanced technical civilization. The only question is, which civilization -- extraterrestrial or European? Far more credible than an ancient extraterrestrial educational foray among the Dogon might be a comparatively recent contact with scientifically literate Europeans who conveyed to the Dogon the remarkable European myth of Sirius and its white dwarf companion, a myth that has all the superficial earmarks of a splendidly inventive tall story. Perhaps the Western contact came from a European visitor to Africa, or from the local French schools, or perhaps from contacts in Europe by West Africans inducted to fight for the French in World War I.

So really nobody knows where the knowlege came from, but it is their traditions that say they have known about it for a lot longer then sceince did, weather that is true or not {a biblical type of truth so to speak) remains to be seen.

BTW, I really enjoy reading your posts, they are very infomative.

Seedy

108

Why is the Bible wrong?

by StinkyPantz in

this primarily goes out to other agnostics and athiests.

this week i got into two interesting conversations that i will admit that i was ill prepared for.

one was with a jw friend of mine who wanted to know why i thought jw's were wrong.

seedy3

Tower Man,

It's interesting that no one has been able to 'prove' the bible wrong. In fact, it took science years to catch up with the bible. Until 1492, everyone thought the earth was flat. Isaiah said, in 600 BC, that the earth is a circle. He was right!

Ok lets look at this single instance.

First, you are grouping all of euorpe in that statement, not Asia or Africa, in fact most of the world DID know the earth was a "Sphere" (BTW a circle is not a sphere) The Egyptions calculated it's distance around, long before Isaiah was a twincle in his moma's eye. The people Euorpe were thrown in to a dark age of science not becasue they were cluless to the sciences, but becasue the Christian church would burn them at the stake if they disagreed with church policy. This is one case in point there was an educated person ( I forgot his name) long before Colombus sailed the oceans or even was born that stated the earth was round and it was not the center of the universe as "The Church" said it was, He bacame a human BBQ for his statements.

Colombus didn't use the bible to discover the world was a ball shape, he used his wits and understanding of "Science" by looking over the horizon and seeing how the ships dropped off the horizon. The bible part was used to show the athorties that it could be true.

It was not Science that made the thought that the earth was flat, it was the Christians that did.

Astronomers also thought, in times past, that all stars were the same size and magnitude. However, Paul, in 1 Corinthians 15, written in the first century AD, said that each star differs from other stars. Not bad for born-again Jew, eh?

Hmmmm interesting thought, but wrong again, there is a group in west Africa that have known about Sirus B long before science ever knew it existed, because they knew it was hidden by the brilliance of Sirus A......... Not bad for a bunch of natives running around in G-strings (their tradition says they knew this for 1,000's of years). The egyptions, babylonians, persions, most anyone that had any science behind their culture knew the stars were all different. It was the ignorant euorpe people that were christians that beleived this, not any one else in the world.

Science has also, in recent years, been conceeding that the earth can't be millions, or billions, of years old. There is a growing trend of scientists who have had no choice but to come to this concusion and are therefore declaring that we live on a 'young' earth.

Young Earth Creationists are not scientists, any archeologist, geologist will not agree with that statement in any way shape or form. I dunno where you get your info, but it sure isn't from the scientists, sounds kinda watchtowery in my opnion.

And as far a prophecy, it's pretty easy to be prophetic when you write it after the fact, and those that were written prior to the fact have all failed.

Seedy

19

They just came to my door!

by 4christ in

jw
friends

eek...... i just had a visit from 2 lady jws!

i was totally caught off guard.

my dogs barked at em so i had to put them out before i could answer.

seedy3

They always show up on a saturday or sunday morning after a good party the night before....... then I really get caught off guard LOL

Seedy

38

Christ and OT prophecy

by SwedishChef in

prophecy: ps 72:10. fulfilled: matt 2:1,11. .

prophecy: ps 2:6. fulfilled: matt 27:37. .

prophecy: ps 78:2. fulfilled matt 13:34. .

seedy3

The writings of Tacitus that this refrence is made was written in or about 115 ad, so it really was about 80 years after the supposed death of Jesus.

Now the interesting thing is the misspelling of Christus as Chrestus. Did anyone ever think that it is spelled correctly?? This is not the first time in writings that the NAME Chrestus has come up as it is a Greek name. It is highly likely that the Chrestus may have been an actual person, and in fact if you read the portions of his (Tacitus) writngs it is almost as though he is refering to a single person and not a group, and surly Jesus was not living in the days of Tacitus, so he would not have been sturring up problems in Rome.

Also, evenif this is a misspelling of Christus, it still does not give confirmation to Jesus, it only relates the movement of the day. Now on the subject of Tactius mentioning Pilate and him putting Jesus to death, it should be noted that Jesus was nothing more then a Itenerant carpenter and why would any records concerning him have ever been sent to Rome? It is highly likely that Tacitus used Christian myth as his source for this writing, if he wrote it at all. ion the book "Tactius" by FRD Goodyear it is said of Tactius

One feature very damaging to Tacitus's credit is the manner in which he employs rumores. Of course, a historian may properly report the state of public opinion at particular times, or use the views of contemporaries on major historical figures as a form of 'indirect characterisation' of them. But Tacitus often goes far beyond this.
He implants grave suspicions which he neither substantiates nor refutes. Their cumulative effect can be damning and distorting.... Time and again Tacitus is ready with an unpleasant motive, susceptible neither of proof nor of disproof.

So in otherwords, this is unreliable as a source for historical data concering Jesus.

Seedy

23

Did Jesus Die on a Cross or Stake

by Tommy Boy in

i have been research the topic of how christ died and have read many articles (most interesting of them was at the url http://www.freeminds.org/doctrine/cross.htm) which indicate that he died on a cross, so i contacted the wt and they told me to look at vine's expository dictionary of new testament words, and this is what i found.

topic: cross, crucify

<a-1,noun,4716,stauros> .

seedy3

Actually, I find it hard to beleive that questioning if it was a cross or a steak errr stake would make for a hill of beans for salvation for a Christian.

However on the note about it being a pagan symbol it is interesting to note that the cross was not used a a christian symbol until about or soon after the time of Constentine. The WTS and many others try to tie the cross into the God Tamuz and rightly so, but the way it really crept into christian symbolism was through the Cult of Mithras that was booming during the first few centuries of the new era.

When Constentine let the christians practce in the open a clergy system was established and one thing needed to show the clergy from lay people. They took the idea from the clergy of Mithras. The mithras Clergy wore robes with a long sword on the front draped down twords the sides of the robe. Interestingly enough it looked much like the robes used today in the orthadox churches with the VERY long cross in the same position.

Just an interesting note

Seedy

38

Christ and OT prophecy

by SwedishChef in

prophecy: ps 72:10. fulfilled: matt 2:1,11. .

prophecy: ps 2:6. fulfilled: matt 27:37. .

prophecy: ps 78:2. fulfilled matt 13:34. .

seedy3

Realist,

I assume you mean "written with in 50 years of Jesus death?? If so the real problem is and the contorversy is that there are none, well none that have any verification, there are many that have been forged. The first real reference to any Christ named Jesus was written by Josephus and was not until around 90 ad or later, but even that is VERY highly suspect of forgery and added later after Josephus had died.

Seedy

38

Christ and OT prophecy

by SwedishChef in

prophecy: ps 72:10. fulfilled: matt 2:1,11. .

prophecy: ps 2:6. fulfilled: matt 27:37. .

prophecy: ps 78:2. fulfilled matt 13:34. .

seedy3

Is that the 2 volume set "New Evidence that Demands a Verdect"? I have read some of this book, it is pretty much a remake of his earlier works with some updated topics.

Seedy

38

Christ and OT prophecy

by SwedishChef in

prophecy: ps 72:10. fulfilled: matt 2:1,11. .

prophecy: ps 2:6. fulfilled: matt 27:37. .

prophecy: ps 78:2. fulfilled matt 13:34. .

seedy3

"You" in verse 14 is plural.

Umm SwedishChef, where do you get that information?

In reading the prior verses, God asked Ahaz to ask for a sign and Ahaz refused.

7:10
Moreover the LORD spake again unto Ahaz, saying,
11.
Ask thee a sign of the LORD thy God; ask it either in the depth, or in the height above.
12.
But Ahaz said, I will not ask, neither will I tempt the LORD .

Looks to me like he is speaking directly to Ahaz and not to any plural group.

I tired to look up the usage of the word "you" but the lexicon does not describe it.

So I would be interested to know where you got your info, that the "you" is Plural here.

However I do notice that verse 13 does go into a plural saying "O house of David", But that still does not address that he was speaking to Ahaz.

Seedy

Edited by - seedy3 on 20 January 2003 22:44:24