1975, generation change and New Light - the WTBTS position

by Nickolas 20 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

  • goddidit
    goddidit

    You wouldn't invite a builder with 99 bad jobs for every good one would you, therefore natural selection can't work!

    HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA ROFL!!!!

    I've actually read this in one of the rags.

  • bennyk
    bennyk

    Whenever anyone mentions the "dark room" illustration , I remind the person that this paints a strange picture: Apparently, the Organisation was granted decades to become gradually purified from "Babylonish" teachings and practices (e.g. Pyramidology, Christmas, birthday celebrations), but an individual who converts to the Watchtower religion is required to make all the changes before baptism...

    To refute the Watch Tower Society's "New Light" doctrine, the following are useful:

    All truth is in harmony, whether old or new. What

    was true at any time in the past must be true yet....

    and if it is not true now, instead of being advanced

    light then it was terrible darkness. [...] We have

    sometimes been accused by unbelievers for teaching

    that the true way to advance was to displace the

    truth we learned yesterday by new truth learned to-

    day; but we utterly repudiate the absurd charge. To

    grow in knowledge is to retain the truth we have

    and add to our stock.

    (Zion’s Watch Tower July 1880 WTR p. 119)

    If we were following a man undoubtedly it would be

    different with us; undoubtedly one human idea

    would contradict another and that which was light

    one or two or six years ago would be regarded as

    darkness now: But with God there is no

    variableness, neither shadow of turning, and so it is

    with truth; any knowledge or light coming from

    God must be like its author. A new view of truth

    never can contradict a former truth. "New light"

    never extinguishes older "light," but adds to it. If

    you were lighting up a building containing seven

    gas jets you would not extinguish one every time

    you lighted another, but would add one light to

    another and they would be in harmony and thus give

    increase of light: So is it with the light of truth; the

    true increase is by adding to, not by substituting one

    for another.

    (Zion's Watch Tower February 1881 WTR p. 188)

  • leavingwt
    leavingwt

    Nickolas: I've sent you a PM.

  • leavingwt
    leavingwt

    Jehovah has always led his people to clearer understanding of his will.

    Thes above words are those of cowards and frauds.

    Either they get information from Jehovah or they do not. Jehovah would never give His organization false information. So, when they print things which aren't true, this information did not come from Jehovah.

    "New Light" equals never having to say 'Sorry' for the thousands of lives you've destroyed.

  • leavingwt
    leavingwt

    Q: What type of prophet is the Faithful & Discreet Slave of Jehovah's Witnesses?

    A: They are "evidently" a Spirit-Directed, Uninspired True Prophet. [Oh, that's rich.]

    Don Cameron explains. . .

  • GrandmaJones
    GrandmaJones

    Excellent comments.

  • Mythbuster
    Mythbuster

    In the bible, when god had something he wanted people to do, he was very exact. Noah's ark, the temple, leading the Israelites out of Egypt, ark of the covenant etc. Why now is he so ambiguous with "his people"?

  • MarcusScriptus
    MarcusScriptus

    ‘Truth doesn’t change, but one’s understanding of it does’? Sorry, but that is neither true from the standpoint of faith or reason.

    If one's understanding of an objective truth is subject to change, then one does not have the truth to begin with. It is like saying I understand Latin while I don’t have a correct understanding of Latin. If there are objective truths about God, but one’s concept of them can change at any minute, then one does not recognize these truths to begin with. Objective realities do not change. If one does not see them or their definition of what they consider them to be is subject to change, then they don’t have a true understanding of them to begin with. They don’t have possession of the truth in any form.

    This even differs from the way Christians puts faith in transcendent mysteries like, for example, the Trinity. Christendom claims that the Trinity doctrine is true though not possible to fully comprehend at present. They claim that there is one deity, God. This one deity is composed of three separate Persons. (This illustration is for sake of argument only. I am neither here advocating this doctrine nor should my writing of it here be construed as my belief in it.) While they claim they cannot fully understand how the Trinity works, their understanding of it doesn’t change.

    The Witnesses even claim that setting a date for an event while claiming to speak for God is a virtue because it supposedly illustrates that they are not giving up in hoping for the coming of God’s Kingdom. They also attribute their publishing of misleading dates as signs that they are like the great prophets and apostles who had wrong ideas regarding certain things about God (for example, the apostles truly believed at one time that Christ was going to return within their own lifetime ).

    This isn’t the same thing at all. What if I say to 100 people that they must accept my interpretation of the weather or else I will slit their throats, and then I predict that a hurricane will be here in 24 hours? In the course of 10 to 12 hours, 50 people decide they cannot accept my interpretation of the weather. I then slit their throats killing them for their failure to accept my word as truth. But after 24 hours pass and there is no sign of a hurricane, who is really the evil party? Are those who were unfaithful to my interpretation that I murdered evil because they failed to have faith? Or am I the evil one because I played with their lives, claiming that they could only survive by following my weather forecasts, while my prediction of a hurricane was wrong?

    That is what the Governing Body has done with those who do not believe and challenge their interpretations. The Governing Body has invented lies, not hoped in something with a lack of complete understanding. They passed out completely wrong teachings, not acted like the apostles.

    Jesus’ return is true, it will happen. The apostles just did not have a full understanding of this at first. Even though their views were wrong, Jesus’ return is still true (according to Christianity, that is).

    Claiming that 1975 is the end of the world, or that people who saw World War I would still be alive when Paradise is restored to earth—things like this are not true. They did not happen nor will they ever happen. They are not equivalent to the teaching of Christ’s return, something that is promised by God to occur.

    The Witnesses gave false information out, pronounced those who did not believe as spiritually dead, and then pronounced themselves virtuous and imitators of the great prophets of old, nay, declared themselves a reflection, a true model of those inspired with the oracles of God Almighty Himself!

    Sorry, but this isn’t just garbage. It’s a lie. At least animals and bugs can get some use from garbage. But there is no value in a lie.

  • thetrueone
    thetrueone

    Ironic is it not that the spiritual " Light " given by the WTS. puts people into utter total darkness of the world we live in

    along with the understanding of the progressive social awareness of what humanity has gained in the past 2000 years.

    The WTS. leaders are always trying to market themselves as the only true godly directed earthly organization ,

    which has some effect of attracting certain people in society.

    The old light of 1914 and " this generation" is being carefully rubbed off the pages of doctrines of the WTS. never to be

    spoken or written about again by the organization. You really can't expect an organization that is trying so diligently to create this

    superficial self-imposed image, to be woefully full of apologetic regret in regards to previous doctrines that were obviously false.

    It's not going to happen, even if some kind of explanation does come forward, it's usually totally inadequate in relation to the harm

    those proclamations caused to people's personal lives.

    It's a sick religion of exploitation and corruption that with the advent of the inter-net people are really seeing what the WTS has done.

  • Bungi Bill
    Bungi Bill

    The expression "If you can't Blind with Science, then try Baffling with Bull#*%t " comes to mind after reading their explanation of failed prophecy.

    The WTS's idea of "New Light" is this:

    - just a story they have had to concoct only after a promised date has come and gone;

    - and it becomes obvious to even the dimmest of dimwits that the WTS was completely wrong.

    (1914, 1915, ,1918, 1925, 1975; The Generation that saw the Beginning of the Time of The End, etc, etc, etc)

    - then, they can always use Psalm 43:3 as the Catch-All scripture to cover their #%s.

    (Never mind all the lives they have harmed in the process - people's welfare was never high up on the Watchtower Society's priority list).

    This was actually the "final straw" for me in breaking with the JWs.

    I felt that I was increasingly having to try and defend the indefensible

    i.e. Failed Prophecy (not just once, either - repeated failure of prophecy) and then inventing a story after the event, which people were supposed to believe as being "New Light."

    Bill.

    PS: Most bible scholars - i.e. proper scholars (not the WTS psuedo kind) - interpret Psalm 43.3 quite differently to what N.H. Knorr, F.W. Franz & Co. did. They would argue strongly that this bible verse refers to an individual's spiritual development.

    - not the Watchtower Society's attempts to talk itself out of the consequences of having been caught out lying!

Share this

Google+
Pinterest
Reddit