http://snopes.com/food/rituals/clink.asp
Clinking glasses for a toast is not demonized. We knew this but needed a source with teeth to convince the superstitious JWs. Think it's proof enough?
Proof that Toasts and Klinking Not Demonized
by White Dove 11 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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minimus
I've told JWs the truth about clinking years ago. They looked confused but only the non spiritual ones would thereafter "clink".
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JWdaughter
I didn't know any of that. It makes for a sweet kind of modern custom, doesn't it? The bit about sharing and the loving cup and the way that the clinking is restoring some comraderie(communion, even!) to the custom of drinking out of one's own glass now just kind of warms the cockels of my heart:) (as my mom would say) That and the clink adding to the sensual experience of drinking wine. . . .well, hmmm. thinking on that one.
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White Dove
My elder grandparents (elderette, too) clinked their way through life and taught it to me. They don't pay attention to the superstitious beliefs of it being demonized. My mom sees it and always has some pretentious self-righteous thing to say about it.
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lalaa
Everything is demonized according to the JW's.
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homeschool
I just forwarded this snopes link to about 15 people in my jw family....and then I thought I accidentally sent them the link to jw.net instead. All's good, although I almost just fainted.
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Yizuman
Klinking??
*runs!*
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White Dove
Col. Klink! LOL!
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Kudra
Thanks so much!! I just sent this link to my mom...
She felt SO uncomfortable with all the clinking going on at my wedding... sigh.
-K
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BluesBrother
Just to present the J W comments on this, and their sources, so you know what they will come back with :
"What, though, is the background of the custom of toasting? The Watchtower of January 1, 1968, quoted The Encyclopædia Britannica (1910), Volume 13, page 121: “The custom of drinking ‘health’ to the living is most probably derived from the ancient religious rite of drinking to the gods and the dead. The Greeks and Romans at meals poured out libations to their gods, and at ceremonial banquets drank to them and to the dead.” The encyclopedia added: “Intimately associated with these quasi-sacrificial drinking customs must have ever been the drinking to the health of living men.”
Is that still valid? The 1995 International Handbook on Alcohol and Culture says: “[Toasting] is probably a secular vestige of ancient sacrificial libations in which a sacred liquid was offered to the gods: blood or wine in exchange for a wish, a prayer summarized in the words ‘long life!’ or ‘to your health!’”
Granted, the fact that an object, a design, or a practice has roots or parallels in ancient false religion does not always rule such out for a true worshipper. Consider the pomegranate. A noted Bible encyclopedia reports: “The pomegranate seems also to have been used as a holy symbol in heathen religions.” Nevertheless, God had pomegranates made of thread put on the hem of the high priest’s garment, and pomegranates decorated the copper pillars of Solomon’s temple. (Exodus 28:33; 2 Kings 25:17) Moreover, the wedding ring at one time had religious significance. Yet, most people today do not know that, considering a wedding ring a mere evidence that someone is married."
WT 07 2/15 p30
