Convince me

by Liza 116 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  Liza

  Actaully I think I mistyped it, I meant to say Bible verses, as in Bible verses that deviate a lot from the NWT.
  
  So does Yaweh not appear in the original Bible? How come in does in some non NWT versions in the Online Parrallel Bible?
• 

  LittleToe

  Enlightenment comes from real reasearch and study, not spoonfeeding. If I were to attempt to enlighten you then all I would provide would be my own version of how I see the world and spirituality. The real challenge is to create your own...

  Roughly translated: if you're genuinely interested in Christianity get off your hiney and read another translation of the Bible for yourself.

  I'll offer you a starting point, if you're really feeling stuck, which you can take or leave. Try reading the Gospel of John in "The Message" (its a recent translation that is pretty easy to read, and should be found in most good bookshops including Amazon), and see if you can identify with the main character.

  Then, if you are so inclined, maybe read a few easy-reader textbooks on things like evolution.

  It doesn't take long to start discovering that there's a wide world of knowledge out there that we were once barred from. The hardest part is actually taking the time amd effort to look. The payback is tremendous.

  Good luck
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  LittleToe

  The "Literal Version" by Green uses the name Jehovah in all the appropriate places in the Old Testament, and none in the New Testament (which is similarly appropriate, as it was never used in the Greek). As such it is fairly accurate, IMHO. He also produced a Hebrew and Greek Interlinear that allows you to see it in the original languages as well as English, if you're into that depth of study.
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  AuldSoul

  Hebrews 1:5, 6 ... the angels worship Jesus, but Jehovah's Witnesses don't. They don't even do obeisance to Jesus. They aren't even allowed to speak directly to him, like Stephen did. (Acts 7:59, 60) That last one is another place where they changed the word kyrios (Lord) into the name "Jehovah." The Lord he had just spoken to was "Lord Jesus", why do they believe the person he was addressing changed?

  That is a pretty big difference to me: either Christians can talk to Christ or not. Either Christians can worship Christ or they cannot. What do you say, Liza?

  Respectfully,
  AuldSoul
• 

  sexyk

  Nah, like it was said, you can't love God your own way when you're a JW.

  You play the game Simon Says with them people. You play by their Rules, or get out.

  keith
• 

  What-A-Coincidence

  It distrubs me that even Bethel members and elders have become apostates.

  I know exactly what you mean! Correction: We need to re define apostacy according to scripture, not according to the "Organization". I highly suggest the following so that you can understand how the WT operates unknowningly : http://www.amazon.com/Combatting-Cult-Mind-Control-Best-selling/dp/0892813113

  WAC - x Elder X Bethelite ... sat and ate with Governing Body members at different times...now that my mind has been released ... WOW!!! These people are disturbed big time in the head. Enjoy your ride!
• 

  jwfacts

  That God will commit a massive holocaust? Well didn't he do that when bringing Noah's flood? And dosent' the traditional view of the Apocalypse hold this belief?

  When Russell started the WTS his taught the everyone will be resurrected, including those that died in the flood. He also believed that almost everyone, (not just Bible Students) will survive Armageddon. It was Rutherford in the late 1920's that changed Jehovah into the tyrant that will destroy billions at Armageddon, and not resurrect people from judgement periods such as the flood. For original quotes see http://www.jwfacts.com/index_files/resurrection.htm

  In regards to the word Jehovah, YHWH appeared almost 7000 times in the Old Testament. It never appears in the New Testament. The Watchtower approach is to dishonestly add it into the NWT New Testament because it is more concerned with making the Bible fits what it wants to believe, than intepret the Bible for what it says. A more honest approach would be for the Watchtower Society to ask "Why doesn't the word Jehovah appear in the New Testament? Why didn't Jesus use it?" http://www.jwfacts.com/index_files/Jehovah.htm
• 

  JWdaughter

  HI, welcome to the board! I am probably following in the footsteps of people who say it better, but I wanted to address the first part of your post:

  -So what if C.T Russel was a freemason and dabbled in the occult? Studying the bible may have made him change his ways. Afterall lots of changes to rid the congregation of pagan influence have continued past his death. Jehovah's Witnessses used to use the cross as a symbol, and celebrate holidays and birthdays. But upon discovering that holidays and birthdays originated as pagan celebrations to honor certain false dieties have stopped. The cross is also a pagan derived symbol, and so is the "Holy" Trinity which can be traced from ancient Egyptian and Chinese cults. The only thing that would concern me, is if occult dabbling has effected his interpretation of the Bible.

  *****Nothing in the bible speaks against holidays or birthdays. Certainly it can be extrapolated from the Bible, but forcing a girl to marry her rapist could be too, and with much less scripture twisting to do it!

  Also, the first time you see a child worshipping Santa or a bunny or a cupid, I will agree with all the pagan business about holidays. Until then, it means nothing, when those symbols mean less than nothing to folks.

  I won't touch the trinity with a 10 foot pole. That one can be argued both ways and it makes my head hurt.

  -Watchtower is a pagan symbol? Please. Watchtowers were used by the Isrealites to watch out for incoming enemies. Similarly, the Watchtower magazine helps strengthen the faith of those who find the truth against it's enimies.

  *****I don't think you will find this something that many former JWs are dwelling on-in fact all the mason nonsense is pretty much interesting historical tidbits. Ex-JWs generally have bigger fish to fry.

  -The idea that the ressurection is "too good to be true" or is "nonsense" is a mere opinion. For one thing Jehovah's Witnesses don't believe that only they would be saved. Other mainstream churches think they are the only ones that will be saved. Most of the moral restrictions are on the 144,000.

  ****I never heard the resurrection described as too good to be true . The JW idea of the resurrection after armageddon is a little fluid. The conditional resurrection (as I understand it) is NOT too good to be true. It sounds like as much a scare tactic as hell ever was. Conditional salvation. OOOH, thanks god for that gift. (please excuse my irreverence, but on that subject I am *very irreverant*.

  -The true religion does not preach hate, only hate to what is bad, but not who is bad. Other mainstream churches preach hate toward muslims and gays. Don't forget the Spanish Inquisition and the Crusades. They did not listen to "Thou shall not murder".

  JWs teach that you should hate with a righteous hate those who leave the organization. They are also, whether they like it or not, as much connected to the religion of the inquisition and the crusades as an baptist, catholic, seventh day adventist or methodist. All of these religions ultimately came out of the catholic religion-which was, for centuries (a millenia even) keeper of the faith-flawed as it was. The JWs came out of the adventist movement which came out of the millerite movement, and Miller was a baptist. . . so there you have it. They have the same origins as the rest of mainstream religion. I don't know of any christian church which says to murder. Do you? OTOH, the WT has mentioned, with some regret, that when folks leave the WT, even family members are prohibited from stoning them to death-as happened in the OT. Not such a loving remark, and it shows where their hearts are.

  -If people are going to go to heaven and hell when they die, how come even mainstream church bibles always speak of a ressurection too? How come even Jews and Muslims recognize that a new paradise will come to Earth?

  ****Bible teaching is often confused and confusing-even by JWs. Have you ever asked a christian pastor your questions after their teachings on life after this one? There are a lot of urband myths by JWs about what mainstream religions teach, when many JWs have never stepped foot in a christian church and/or have never went to a bible study in one.

  -Jehovah's Witnesses use an edition of the Bible that is translated directly from Hebrew and Greek to modern English. Other churches use one that has been courrupted through centuries of Catholic papacy and censorship.

  ****I don't know how much you know of other translations or of the WT translation. You might want to go on something other than WT hearsay on that one.

  -Jehovah's Witnesses always quote the Bible to back of their belifs.

  ****MMmmmmmm, kinda. Sometime they can find one scripture that seems to support a teaching, but there is no body of teaching to support their ideas-such as 144K, birthdays, blood transfusions, etc. I can find random verses to say all kinds of ridiculous things. I don't generally try to do that, but the WT makes it a practice.

  -Much of Jehovah's morals can have secular benifits, for they are his wisdom. For example, it has been discovered that condoms aren't very effective when it comes to AIDS.

  Condoms are not about morals. Aids is not about morals. One can make an arguement for only having sex within marriage, but condoms allow married women to get pregnant or STDs from husbands and Aids can happen to innocents and infants, and married women who DON'T use condoms. So whats the point. You know of many Christian churches who are preaching free love? I don't!

  -The congregation is supposed to be based off the the pre-Catholic Christians.

  Well, that is kind of a stretch, as pre Catholic christians all celebreated the eucharist. And all the stuff you don't like about the catholic religion started BEFORE the 3rd century or whatever when Constantine tried to pull it all together. In fact, there was a lot more 'dissent' in the christian congregations back then, and Constantine, not unlike Rutherford, thought that they should all think and act exactly alike so that they would be in unity. Look what it got them. One group deciding what was true and not, instead of folks coming to any kind of conclusions themselves based on what they studied. Then the church took over their lives. That is not unlike what the WT did when Rutherford took over the WTBTS after Russell died, and later conglomerated the entire operation more fully. The CAtholic church was the first organized religion, and the WTBTS is just another in a long line of them.

  -Even my Catholic relatives recognize that the last days are comming, since a day for God can be a very long time for humans, it may be centuries till the New System comes. The signs are there, the feet of clay and iron that is the last empire. That last empire being the US, and Republicans being iron and Democrats being clay. The blashpemous unity of church and state being represented by the whore that rides the wild beast. And a grea tribulation that may come, and think that maybe the Bush Administration may have something to do with it. Also that in 1914 WWI started, and an event in the middle east there was triggered whose effects still occur today with the constant chaos of the middle east.

  ****For a supposedly non-political group, I have to say, the WTS is the least politically neutral group of folks I have ever met. Just ineffective, since they never exercise their freedom to vote their conscience. Did you know that the world (according to the WT) has ALREADY ENDED??? Do you know that the WT said that it would all be DONE in 1914, not that it would all start then? Do you k now that all that biblical chronology that leads you to buy into the 1914 thing also told them that it started in 1700-somthing, 1874, 1878. . .they have a lot of deadlines before 1914. They got lucky in 1914 that something happened (You throw enough darts, something is gonna stick!!)

  Shelly
• 

  Rabbit

  Liza, I congratulate you for 'looking before you leap'.

  Remember the TV commercial about the 'Roach Motels' ? "...they check-in, but, can never check-out ?" THAT is what happens when you check-in at the Kingdom Hall. Although there are thousands and thousands of ex-JW's here...almost all of us have paid a high price escaping from this very high-control religion.

  I escaped and now have a very peaceful satisfying life -- except for the fact all of my grown children and my other JW relatives shun me, because I left. I am not disfellowshipped, I'm just AWOL from the Kingdom Motel.

  -During a convention when I was about eight years old, I heard about a brother whose mother was sick in the hospital. He and his wife prayed to Jehovah God, and later on his mother got better. Is this a miracle? If so then the congregation has stated before that miracles would no longer happen and any such "miracles" are works of demons and Satan to misguide people from the truth. But Jehovah may have just given his mother the strength to get better.

  There was no miracle for my JW mother whose belief in the Governing Body's dishonest blood transfusion doctrine killed her. That deadly belief is entirely based on "not eating blood", even tho' no "eating" nor ANY kind of digestion takes place during a transfusion. Please research this like you life depends on it -- because it does !

  This deadly belief literally murdered my Mom. It will be expected & demanded of you, your children and your mother, too.

  Your mother has already left the witnesses one time before, right ? What happens if YOU leave or she leaves again and you stay ? Teach your children this hateful religion and you (or them) may be required to treat the other...as a dead person. I promise you, I rue the day I was baptised and the 35 years I spent as a Jehovah's Witness.

  Compare THAT "Love" with normal people of other religions or even atheists, before you become surgically attached to the Watchtower. The Watchtower destroys families.

  I wish you success !

  Rabbit
• 

  JWdaughter

  (continued-your post)

  I do not think that humans have been here a mere 6,000 years. I think for example that Noah's flood may have happened 10-18,000 years ago and have triggered the ice age.

  ****Do you feel free to say that in the religion you are planning on joining? Do you have true freedom of thought? Does it matter to you?

  -During a convention when I was about eight years old, I heard about a brother whose mother was sick in the hospital. He and his wife prayed to Jehovah God, and later on his mother got better. Is this a miracle? If so then the congregation has stated before that miracles would no longer happen and any such "miracles" are works of demons and Satan to misguide people from the truth. But Jehovah may have just given his mother the strength to get better.

  ***People get better and people die. It has more to do with their personal health and health care providers than it does with miracles or prayers. Think about it! People of all religions pray, and many people with no religion DON'T pray. . .and some from all of these groups live and some die.

  -I think that, just the way that children can make up wild fantasies and superstions, pagan cults and belifs may not have been entirely inspired by satan. Though they may have been perpetuated by satan to stray the practitioners from the truth. Rather such beliefs were formed by people searching for explanations and spirituality.

  ****And will your thoughts be respected or put down? We all have different ideas, and even people who read the Bible interpret it different ways. Will you be allowed your ideas and convictions?

  -Sometimes my faith in a creation is sometimes blurred when I see the similarities between monkeys and humans. For one I may be a girl but I am also quite hairy. My cousin has a pet monkey and when I went to visit him I almost viewed the monkey as not just looking but behaving very human like.

  )***Not touching THAT one with a ten foot pole either:) - other than to say, monkeys are cute. -The greek words may be misinterpreted or "lost in translation"

  *** Seems to be the case in the NWT more often than they would like to admit-to promote their own personal agenda. -I think that my secular experiences by themselves have made me a better person. And that suffering can indeed improve some and thier outlook in life. Though many people have been reforned by becoming Jehovah's Witnesses, so have people in mainstream churches and even spiritual organizations like Kabbalah.

  ***Sometimes we are ready to change our lives, and a different spirituality is a vehicle we use to do it.

  -If I keep fearing Jehovah all the time, I don't think I will be happy. I have been told that Satan wants us to see God as a totalitarian dictator, but isn't the congregation's constant injection of fear just this?

  ****You think? And you want to be a part of that?

  -The congregation says that homosexuality is unatural. But then why do animals do it too? But then again animals don't always mate for life either.

  ****You know there are healthy and unhealthy relationships all over-and they can involve any combination of sexes. No one has a 'territory' on what constitutes a natural or healthy relationship. There are messed up couples of all persuasions and wonderful couples likewise. -I have heard rumors about a "cult of Mithras". That the story of Jesus was inspired by a greek sun god named Mirthras who also raised the dead, healed the sick, and "walked on water" like the sun, and was "the light of the world". But some say that it was many years after Jesus and was inspired by Jesus instead of the other way around. The Jehovah's Witness publication of "Mankind's search for God" says that "Why would people risk their lives and stand firm against something false?" in response to this speculation.

  ***You can study up on this online as much as you need. There are several schools of thought on the Christian/pagan myth/teachings.

  -What defines a marriage? Isn't a commited relationship enough? Doesn't legally married mean getting a marraige licesce from of all organizations...the GOVERNEMENT?

  **** Good observation. -Why can't I love Jehovah my own way? I want to become a psycology researcher\fiction writer\illustrator when I grow odler and get out of college. But I think my work will promote love toward God and his wisdom.

  **** Do what you want for your future, don't do anything you will be ashamed of and have another look at this religion after you have finished college and begun your life. It will be there or it won't. And you will care, or you won't. Be true to yourself!!!

  ****Best wishes!