TD

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Posts by TD

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  10

  Need reference for pic in JW publication...

  by TheApostleAK in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i'm after that pic with the shrieking clergyman with the church in background being blitzed.. the pic is shown in the witnesses of jehovah video..

  help!!.

  from ak.

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  TD

  The Watchtower November 1, 1979 page 23

  Do you need a scan?
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  21

  ORGANIZATION ADMITS TO A FALSE PROPHESY!

  by new boy in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  "are we to assume from this study that the battle of armageddon will be all over by the autumn of 1975, and the long-looked-for thousand-year reign of christ will begin by then?

  possibly...it may involve only a differrnce of weeks or months, not years.".

  truth from the wt [8/15/1968,p.499].

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  TD

  Maybe I should have been more specific. Most seem to be overlooking the "escape hatch" built into this particular quote.

  The statement:

  "It may involve only a difference of weeks or months, not years."

  ...was specifically made only in reference to the chronology designating 1975 as 6,000 years since the creation of Adam.

  When it came to whether the next 1,000 years of human existence (the 7th millennium, ostensibly beginning in the fall of 1975) would actually correspond to the 1000 year period of Revelation 20 or not, the quote openly hedges, stating "If these two periods run parallel..."

  Without this necessary synchronization the, "...difference of weeks or months, not years" phrase cannot be directly tied to Christ's reign --and this is not hairsplitting, it's simple English.

  Please understand that I am not trying to defend the WTB&TS/CCJW here. I was a gung-ho Witness in my early 20’s at the time, and I know what was said from the platform as well as anyone. Further, it's certainly true that they made quite a number of statements that strongly implied that these 1000- year periods really would coincide.

  Like this:

  “This seventh day, God's rest day, has progressed nearly 6,000 years, and there is still the 1,000-year reign of Christ to go before its end. (Rev. 20:3, 7)”

  “Does God's rest day parallel the time man has been on earth since his creation? Apparently so. From the most reliable investigations of Bible chronology, harmonizing with many accepted dates of secular history, we find that Adam was created in the autumn of the year 4026 B.C.E. Sometime in that year Eve could well have been created, directly after which God's rest day commenced.” Awake! October 8, 1966 p19,20

  ……and this

  Therefore, God's seventh day and the time man has been on earth apparently run parallel. To calculate where man is in the stream of time relative to God's seventh day of 7,000 years, we need to determine how long a time has elapsed from the year of Adam and Eve's creation in 4026 B.C.E. “

  After 6,000 years of misery, toil, trouble, sickness and death under Satan’s rule, mankind is indeed in dire need of relief, a rest. The seventh day of the Jewish week, the sabbath, would well picture the final 1,000-year reign of God’s kingdom under Christ when mankind would be uplifted from 6,000 years of sin and death. (Rev. 20:6)” The Watchtower May 1, 1968 p271

  
  ……and this

  “In order for the Lord Jesus Christ to be "Lord even of the sabbath day," his thousand-year reign would have to be the seventh in a series of thousand-year periods or millenniums.” The Approaching Peace of a Thousand Years p.26)

  
  Nevertheless, it takes a Watchtoweresque use of ellipses to prove the charge of “False Prophecy” with one quote alone.

  Tom
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  21

  ORGANIZATION ADMITS TO A FALSE PROPHESY!

  by new boy in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  "are we to assume from this study that the battle of armageddon will be all over by the autumn of 1975, and the long-looked-for thousand-year reign of christ will begin by then?

  possibly...it may involve only a differrnce of weeks or months, not years.".

  truth from the wt [8/15/1968,p.499].

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  TD

  There’re way too many conditional statements in the omitted material for the “prophecy” label to stick.

  “Are we to assume from this study that the battle of Armageddon will be all over by the autumn of 1975, and the long-looked-for thousand-year reign of Christ will begin by then? Possibly, but we wait to see how closely the seventh thousand-year period of man’s existence coincides with the sabbathlike thousand-year reign of Christ. If these two periods run parallel with each other as to the calendar year, it will not be by mere chance or accident but will be according to Jehovah’s loving and timely purposes. Our chronology, however, which is reasonably accurate (but admittedly not infallible), at the best only points to the autumn of 1975 as the end of 6,000 years of man’s existence on earth. It does not necessarily mean that 1975 marks the end of the first 6,000 years of Jehovah’s seventh creative “day.” Why not? Because after his creation Adam lived some time during the “sixth day,” which unknown amount of time would need to be subtracted from Adam’s 930 years, to determine when the sixth seven-thousand-year period or “day” ended, and how long Adam lived into the “seventh day.” And yet the end of that sixth creative “day” could end within the same Gregorian calendar year of Adam’s creation. It may involve only a difference of weeks or months, not years.“
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  14

  Bloody good argument, if bled properly

  by SixofNine in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i have seen references to the bible verses which describe saul's army, after a long drawn out battle, eating unbled meat.

  often, i see this described as an action they took to keep from starving.

  in my view, to infer this was done to keep from starving is just silly, and weakens the argument because it is so ridiculous.

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  TD

  I agree with you sixofnine,

  A man in such a state of starvation that the extra 20 minutes it would have taken to properly bleed the carcass would have been an issue is unable to even get up, much less "greedily dart" after the spoil.

  The contrivance of an emergency" is simply a cheap trick to associate the account with the blood issue in the minds of the target audience.

  The Questions From Readers in the April 15, 1994 issue of The Watchtower is interesting, especially when contrasted with page 4 of the 1990 brochure How Can Blood Save Your Life. It shows what drastically different spins can be applied to the situation depending on what point the publisher wanted to make.

  Tom
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  6

  Fetus receives blood from Mother?

  by TheStar in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i have heard that although the the wtbts admits that plasma proteins transfer from mother to fetus, blood also transfers from mother to fetus and of course they don't admit to that.. .

  does anyone know if this is true and if so where i can go to get more information on this?

  i have already looked at the twins case but is it only in the case of twins or always?

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  TD

  In 1992 a female lab tech who had donated a blood specimen for analysis was found to have "Y" DNA circulating in her blood stream. Researchers were baffled until it was disclosed that she was 6 weeks pregnant. The source of the "Y" DNA was her unborn son. Cells in the blood stream including fetal nucleated red blood cells, were crossing the placental barrier. This was reported by Diane Bianchi in Johns Hopkins University Press Week. Since then, fetal erythroblasts, trophoblasts, granulocytes and lymphocytes have all been isolated in maternal blood. In 1995 it was demonstrated that a woman can still have fetal cells in her blood stream more than 30 years after her last pregnancy. This has been reported in a number of medical and scientific journals since then. . (See for example Science News 2/10/1996 p. 85)
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  6

  "abstain from blood"

  by TD in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  as most everyone here knows, when it comes to the propriety (or lack thereof) of blood in medicine, one of the most familiar and timeworn expressions in the jw vernacular is abstain from blood.

  jws, both here (the most recent of which being mavman/yoyo) and elsewhere routinely invoke this phrase as an independent construction apparently with little understanding of what they are doing wrong .

  abstain and its synonyms (e.g.

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  TD

  As most everyone here knows, when it comes to the propriety (or lack thereof) of blood in medicine, one of the most familiar and timeworn expressions in the JW vernacular is “Abstain from blood.” JW’s, both here (the most recent of which being Mavman/YoYo) and elsewhere routinely invoke this phrase as an independent construction apparently with little understanding of what they are doing wrong

  “Abstain” and its synonyms (e.g. refrain, forebear) all negate action. The fundamental meaning is to “...keep or prevent oneself from saying or doing something.” They are acts in and of themselves only in the sense that they could be said to be acts of inaction.

  Exactly what the inaction is can be conveyed to the audience in several ways. The most obvious, of course, would be the explicit stated thereof:

  “Abstain from drinking alcoholic beverages.”

  This is probably the most precise usage of this construction as it leaves little room for doubt as to what shouldn’t be done with the object in question

  The negated action can also be implicit inasmuch as we automatically associate some acts with some objects:

  “Abstain from liquor”

  This is not quite as precise a phrase, but since all of us know what liquor is and what one normally does with it, the act of drinking, while not specifically stated, is still understood.

  The negated action can also be supplied by the surrounding context:

  “Her obstetrician said, “Pregnant women should abstain from alcohol.””

  This usage is even less precise and consequently more dependent upon the knowledge and perceptions of the intended audience. Note for example, how the meaning of the phrase “abstain from alcohol” changes entirely with a different context:

  “His dermatologist said, “Persons with sensitive skin should abstain from alcohol.””

  Even though the phrase “abstain from alcohol” appears in both instances, it clearly does not negate the same action in both. While we would understand the former to be a reference to drinking beverages containing it, we would understand the latter to be a reference to the topical application of alcohol. In these two examples, the man’s abstinence is therefore completely unconnected with and to the woman’s.

  The point to all of this is that without some means of defining the negated act or acts, an “abstain from…” construction is meaningless because, casual conversation not withstanding, technically we “abstain” from acts done in connection with objects, and not objects themselves. This may sound counterintuitive, but anyone who doubts this simple fact need only attempt to express the thought as a finite negative without inserting additional verbs or verb phrases.

  For example, expressed as a “Do not”, what does it mean to “abstain from alcohol?”

  Do not -----what?

  As you can see, the thought cannot be finitely expressed without defining an action or range of action. In the absence of a prior context, the phrase “abstain from alcohol” could mean one thing to an obstetrician, another thing to a dermatologist and something else again to an aviation mechanic teaching an apprentice to flush a hydraulic system.

  The situation is the same with JW’s and blood. Quoting the phrase “abstain from blood” as an independent construction conveys the idea of a simple and direct command, but only at the expense of requiring the reader to definitely tie the intransitive “abstain” to the object, blood. This is the sort of semantic legerdemain that WTB&TS/CCJW writers are so fond of.

  Unlike JW's, the Bible writer does not invoke the phrase without first establishing a context. The context of the discussion was whether Gentile converts to Christianity should be circumcised and follow the Law. Therefore the eating of blood as forbidden in the Law is unquestionably the Biblical context of this reference.

  Now if any JW here wants to demonstrate that the consumption of blood is in some way physically or morally equivalent to the transfusion of blood; ---Fine--- Let’s hear it.
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  20

  JWs and Blood Transfusions

  by MavMan in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  these are some excellent links for those that are investigating the pros and cons of blood transfusions.

  the bloodless medicine & surgery institute .

  the nj institute for the advancement of bloodless medicine and surgery .

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  TD

  Mav,

  A word of advice:

  Try to rise above the JW tendancy of reducing the entire issue to only one of red cells in scheduled surgery Besides the fact that blood loss can be catastrophic enough in trauma cases and emergency surgery that the attendant medical personnel are left with little other choice besides let the patient die, there are many other common uses of blood in medicine.

  My daughter for example needed to be hospitalized a few years ago because a common prescription medication had attacked her platelets, reducing her count to < 2 in one weekend. A normal platelet count would have been somewhere between 180 and 400.

  In your research, have you come across any preparations that will duplicate the function of platelets? You’re not likely to.

  They do have a scriptural basis for abstaining from blood.

  If by “Scriptural basis” you are referring to the fact that the phrase apechesthai.....to hematos does appear in the book of Acts, bear in mind that unlike you, the Bible does not invoke this phrase as an independent construction in the absence of a prior context. Besides the fact that abstinence from an object (and an integral part of your body, no less) is a meaningless concept, it would be blatantly ungrammatical.

  You do realize this don’t you?

  Tom
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  22

  1926 book "The Harp of God" scanned

  by apostate man in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  here are a few pics from this book.

  it basically tells why jesus returned and what to expect.

  the preface sums it up.

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  TD

  A little clarification:

  Although the slogan probably did become embarassing, IBSA/JW's did not dicard the belief that "Millions now living will never die" with the 1925 failure. There has been no point in their history when they did not think that the end was right around the corner, and if you stop and think about it, Witnesses still believe essentially the same thing today with one important difference.

  It's important to remember that at the time their viewpoint on who would live and who would die at armageddon had not yet become exclusivistic and would not become so until the doctrine of the "great crowd" reached the form by most of us know it today some years later in 1935. At the time, it was taught that millions of "good" people not necessarily associated with the IBSA would survive. Witnesses still believe that "millions now living will never die" with the caveat that these "millions" will be almost exclusively Witnesses.
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  22

  1926 book "The Harp of God" scanned

  by apostate man in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  here are a few pics from this book.

  it basically tells why jesus returned and what to expect.

  the preface sums it up.

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  TD

  Dungbeetle is correct.

  All of Rutherford's books are available on CD in PDF format complete with covers and illustrations. The CD is produced by Research Applications International and can be purchased either from Witnesses Inc. or Free Minds I think.
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  22

  1926 book "The Harp of God" scanned

  by apostate man in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  here are a few pics from this book.

  it basically tells why jesus returned and what to expect.

  the preface sums it up.

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  TD

  Very nice. The cover and Preface are identical to my 1921 first edtion.

  The interesting thing about pre-1927 editions is that they teach in no uncertain terms that C.T. Russell fulfilled the office of "wise and faithful servant" (pp. 235-241)

  When this teaching was changed, a whole section of the chapter "Our Lord's Return had to be rewrtten for obvious reasons.

  Tom