by brotherdan 144 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
HI donny
You are right but then they are not making "false" predictions the word "false" is one you use. For witnesses these are just current understandings drawn from harmonising watched for Bible prophecies against the events around us. "Keeping watch" for these signs and fulfillments.
But if the Word of God has flaws then 2Tim 3:16 could not be correct.
Based on your knowledge of biblical history (IOW the history of the bible) what could Timothy have POSSIBLY been speaking about when he said "All Scripture"? Think about his time period, and the context of who he was writing to.
I think a Christian (who does) could explain better why you can accept both - i.e. 2 Timothy is correct, AND the bible is not inerrant. I could go into it but it would probably mean less coming from me.
16 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,
Indeed, of course Paul's view on what scripture was is not clear, since though he was a pharisee he left behind much of their teachings and since the NT wasn't around yet.
Fact is, even where the bible is "wrong", it can be used for educating and training righteousness, even in the ancient times there was issues with what was being written:
From Jeremiah 8:
8 “ ‘How can you say, “We are wise,
for we have the law of the Lord ,”
when actually the lying pen of the scribes
has handled it falsely?
"So how would you respond to my mom?"
First off, you could use what Olin Moyles stated about the prophet Nathan,
then you can go to page 133 in the reasoning book where it states
"If any individual or organizations claim to represent God but decline to use Gods
personal name, and make it a practice to express thier own opinions on matters, are
they mearsuring upto this important qualifications of a true prophet?"
You see, the GB describes themselves as prophets on pg 133. Now turn to pg
380 in the same book under the heading of spirit, look within the definition # 4
says: Inspired utterances originating with an invisible source. Now look on top
of pg 381 the last sentence in their own words prove that being anointed with holy spirit
and having inspiration cannot be separated. Now go back to pg 136, in the middle of the pg
they do not claim to be inspired prophets. So how can they be anointed?
I have a lot of fun with their literature
Superpunk, first of all, Timothy didn't write Timothy. It was written by Paul TO Timothy who was serving as an overseer to various churches.
The context of the chapter is what would happen in the last days. The beginning of the chapter begins with a list of traits that would be manifest by people living before Jesus second coming. People would claim to be lovers of God but they would deny all the power that is associated with that. Vs 6 talks about people (like the WT) and what they would do to weak willed people. In vs 15 Paul speaks EXACTLY of what scripture he is talking about. He says that Timothy, from infancy, knew the "holy Scriptures which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus." Then he takes away all doubt about where these very scriptures came from. They are from God, or God breathed. They make men COMPLETE.
I wish people that throw the Bible away with the WT would examine the Bible before tossing it out. Superpunk, before you throw it all away, examine it and learn from it first. Then say, "It isn't for me." But you don't know the scriptures. I didn't either. How could we with the WT. But since it claims to be what it does, doesn't it deserve a check?
Superpunk, first of all, Timothy didn't write Timothy. It was written by Paul TO Timothy who was serving as an overseer to various churches.
Yeah my bad. Just typing too fast.
The context of the chapter is what would happen in the last days. The beginning of the chapter begins with a list of traits that would be manifest by people living before Jesus second coming. People would claim to be lovers of God but they would deny all the power that is associated with that. Vs 6 talks about people (like the WT) and what they would do to weak willed people. In vs 15 Paul speaks EXACTLY of what scripture he is talking about. He says that Timothy, from infancy, knew the "holy Scriptures which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus." Then he takes away all doubt about where these very scriptures came from. They are from God, or God breathed. They make men COMPLETE.
None of that adresses what I said. Namely that;
Paul was not talking about THE BIBLE. No such thing existed, and would not for hundreds of years.
None of that means THE BIBLE (which Paul was not even talking about in the first place) must be without error. It's filled with errors. Accept it. Then figure out whether or not you are ok with them. But denying that they are there is just silly, and it's just as silly to declare that you must accept it all as inerrant and inspired or none at all. If you know anything about the compilation of the bible you know that not only was alot of what Paul might have considered "scripture" was left out in the compilation, and others were held in after much debate. Revelation made the cut by the skin of it's teeth.
Ok, no Paul was not talking about the Bible as we know it today. But at the time of this writing the church had the gospels and letters of Paul. They also had the entire Old Testament. If you learn about when the OT was put together you would know that this is the "holy Scripture" that he is speaking of. There were no other holy Scriptures that the church used. Timothy learned from these from his youth on up.
We are even more fortunate because we have what they didn't. The complete revelation of God to His people.
You say that the Bible is full of silly stories. There are fantastic stories in the Bible, but if God says it happened, then I believe it happened.
That's really as far as I'm interested in defending the position, bd. I know PSac understands and accepts the bible's flaws but still appreciates it and is a believer, so maybe he can help. I simply know it can be done.
Here's an interesting thread for you.
Written by a believer, posted by a believer (BTS is Catholic I believe). There are plenty of things that the bible says happened that never happened, or were embellished, or whatever.There are plenty of unfulfilled prophecies in the bible, uttered by God's "prophets". None of this means the bible isn't God's word.
You'll notice that Witnesses will try to explain away their false predictions, claiming they're not "prophecies" because they're merely "interpretations of Bible prophecy." Thus, the Watchtower is opens up a giant loophole. As long as you can tie your prediction to a "Bible prophecy" then you run no risk of being a false prophet.
Thus, Watchtower logic excuses hucksters like Hal Lindsey (Late Great Planet Earth) and Ed Whisenant (88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Be in 1988) from being false prophets because those guys tie their predictions to Daniel, Revelation, etc.
So in order to be a "false prophet" under Watchtower logic, you've got to make up something from whole cloth and claim that God gave it directly to you. Every Christian End-Times doomsday predictor from Miller to Russell to Rutherford to Lindsey to Franz to Whisenant has tried to tie his predictions to the Bible. Thus, the Watchtower has absolved all of these clowns of false prophecy. Too funny.
Hi Debator,
It is a false prediction because it is never presented as an opinion. It is always presented as something that must be unquestionably believed and followed until time or incident proves otherwise.
The Awake magazine up until 10/22/95 stated that "Most important, this magazine builds confidence in the Creators promise of a peaceful and secure new world before the generation that saw the events of 1914 passes away." This was not presented as opinion, rather it was presented as the "Creators promise." That is a prediction, not an opinion. If you did not accept this as "truth" then you would be disfellowshipped if you believed otherwise.
If, as you say, this is just "keeping watch", then why does the Society chastise all other groups who engage in this practice? Keeping watch never implies accepting something as fact until otherwide told.
