There is a scripture that discourages competing with others (Gal. 5:26).
It was still a stupid article and application.
Awake magazine 1973 The Dangers of playing Chess!! Why it's Evil.
by Witness 007 21 Replies latest watchtower bible
-
-
Mad Sweeney
You may check, please, my information, but after 1973, the Watchtower has published another article changing its view point on chess game.
I couldn't find an article later than the 1973 Awake! article that discussed the game of chess and how Christians should feel about it. There were many mentions of the game, mostly in "Watching the World" sections of the WT, but nothing describing how Christians should view the game. A 1988 article discussed a computer versus human chess match.
The craziest one was from 4/22/82:
Losing
aChessMatch
The world championship chess matches were staged in Merano, Italy, a few months ago. Korchnoi, described as “a brooding, burly bear of a man who always seemed on the verge of growling,” challenged the titleholder, Karpov, and lost. Why? In the opinion of some of those watching the match, it was not altogether due to his lack of skill as a chess player. His ill temper and lack of self-control were major factors. According to Robert Byrne, special correspondent of the New York Times, Korchnoi attempted to overpower his opponent “by arm-waving rages, evil-eye stares, ego-warping tensions and spates of ungentlemanly insults.” On the other hand, the report says that Karpov “engaged in no bizarre antics, played with quiet determination and . . . stuck to pure chess in this match.” Korchnoi could have learned a thing or two from ancient King Solomon, who once wrote: “He that is slow to anger is abundant in discernment.” “He that is slow to anger is better than a mighty man, and he that is controlling his spirit than the one capturing a city.” “As a city broken through, without a wall, is the man that has no restraint for his spirit.” (Proverbs 14:29; 16:32; 25:28) One wonders if another contributing cause of Korchnoi’s defeat was the fact that he “installed an orange-robed yoga guru in the audience’s front row, apparently to hex the champion.” Such recourse to religious support certainly would be of no real assistance to Korchnoi’s cause.
Interestingly, God’s own view of yoga-style religionists is reflected in his command to his people Israel: “There should not be found in you anyone who . . . employs divination, a practicer of magic or anyone who looks for omens or a sorcerer, or one who binds others with a spell or anyone who consults a spirit medium or a professional foreteller of events.”—Deuteronomy 18:10, 11.