They actively change the language from time to time, so that current JWs are confident in recognizing one another - and outsiders or spies are kept away. It took years for me to lose some of the phrases. I got very interested in language as a result, which was a very helpful thing in my graduate studies. My faves: Satan..the Devil (as opposed to Satan the Donkey?) Jehovah God (as opposed to... Jehovah Hamster?) Slave class, overseer, etc - the language of slavery, not service "Grey area" - to talk about "matters of conscience" where the "guidance" wasn't mandatory, but still served as a community signal. I associated the development and use of my personal sense of ethics as a kind of leprous dying thing for years.
Does our language betray us?
by Mysterious 23 Replies latest jw friends
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Narkissos
Welcome Virushead
"Jehovah God" and "Satan the Devil" always sounded as names of cartoon characters to me...
The French translation of the former, Jéhovah Dieu, is even worse than the English inasmuch as French lacks a syntactical pattern of juxtaposing nouns/names. The only thing that comes to mind is the pattern "name / surname" -- Jehovah God as John Smith...
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Gretchen956
Speaking of cartoon characters, I quote myself from another thread:
This email is despicable.
Can you tell me how many years since I last watched a Bugs Bunny cartoon?
Whats up
DocMysterious! (Actually I think now the phrase is: Whatup Dog)Sherry
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wednesday
Just in case anyone's trying to keep up with the "pure language", did you know dubs in general don't say "The Society" any more? If you're talking about some new policy or piece of correspondence you say "The Branch". If you're talking about doctrine, you're supposed to say "The Bible says" or "my study of the Bible says". That way the Borg puppet strings moving your lips won't be as visible to the outside world.
Open Mind
I noticed this over 10 yrs ago, while I was still occasionally attending. They know the apostates watch everything they do(according to them) and they are fighting back. They will never win (disguising Big Brother by saying "the Bible says instead) -not since the advent of the Internet.