by booker-t 80 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
Apognophos: One could say the same thing about Jesus! Why was he resurrected in 29CE and only made king in 1914?!
Maybe because Jesus WAS approved.
Maybe because Jesus had to fulfill prophecy?
Maybe because he expected to sit at God's right hand?
Dunno.
Splash
100 years Splash? With the overlapping generations (but only one overlap of course) it could be 140 or more!
So, either all the dead anointed are still to be resurrected or they are in heaven EXCEPT the ones that were on the GB since surely the F&DS could still fail to be appointed over all the belongs and anyone that was part of that failed slave surely could not qualify as an anointed one. It doesn't make sense to resurrect a GB member such as Freddy only to tell him that the F&DS can't be appointed over all the belongings and he's toast!
Surely the GB cannot have been so presumptuous to assume that their version of looking after the domestics now automatically will entitle them to look after the belongings in the future? mmmm.....
The more I think about the holes in trying to square this circle the more I wonder if there is someone doing a massive face palm in Brooklyn now...
Perhaps they popped the cork on this "new light" shortly after it occurred to them and only afterwards did they realize the full ramifications? At the very least, its being a new idea at the time would explain the delay in an attendant "new light" article in the WT.
There's one more element to this which we haven't picked up on yet.
The famous Mt 24:45 verse says "Who really is the FDS...". This, we are informed, is a reference to the GB. The FDS is the GB alone, not the full number of anointed.
Read on in vs 46: "Happy is 'that' slave if his master on arriving finds him doung so." We assume in this verse "that slave" is also referring to the same FDS/GB group, and not the full number of anointed.
Last verse 47: "He will appoint him over all his belongings". Here we learn Jesus will appoint that slave.
But note, verse 47 has suddenly changed to ALL anointed, not just the GB. ALL anointed are suddenly, in the space of 1 verse, included in the definition of the Slave!
How can the FDS mean 8 men in NY in one verse, then in the very next verse mean 144,000 men and women?
Don't forget that verse numbers were added later, this should read as a flowing narrative.
Splash.
Splash: How can the FDS mean 8 men in NY in one verse, then in the very next verse mean 144,000 men and women?
There you go again, trying to make sense outta' nonsense.
I thought you knew better!
They're just making it all up.
I agree totally with 00DAD.
Splash, you did a great analysis - I hope you can stay on top of this and keep these questions in front of everyone, including JWs!
This reminds me of a song, the Society's teachings are "just like a maze, where all of the walls all continually change."--John Mayer, 'Daughters'.
The reason the original poster might have been confused is, well, probably most JWs thought this was already the case anyway, that the Governing Body was the 'faithful slave' in its entirety. This seems to overlook the technical details of it and the problems it causes.
I especially like how the 'evidence' and 'facts' are pointed to in such clear, reasonable, scriptural detail! It seems that facts and evidence are pretty much like a magic crystal ball that shows you whatever you want to see. You just speak it and it becomes factual and supported by evidence. I wonder who spoke into the 'speakwrite' to make that article, anyway?
What's particularly odd is something that creates another conundrum. If the 'faithful and discreet slave' is preparing the spiritual food, why is the 'slave' always referred to in the third person? Clearly, the writer of the articles in the literature is not a member of this 'slave', or else they'd be saying 'wisely, you should submit to our authority' instead of 'wisely, we should submit to the slave's authority'. Or perhaps the real truth is that it would be much more obvious that something is up if they said 'you should submit to our authority'. 'We should submit to the slave's authority' makes it sound like they're on your side, and we're all obeying this entity over there, rather than just you and the rest of the drones obeying them.
The other thing is, why even do this? Their authority has been absolute for a long time. Nobody's made a Reformed JW org, dissenters and deserters are hunted down and shot. Is there some invisible power struggle between the other 12,000 anointed and the Governing Body so that they felt a need to make themselves exclusively the 'slave'? It makes no sense.
Particularly bizarre was reading a GB member saying that "we love this teaching". As if their feelings about it should matter; if it's true, your feelings one way or the other are irrelevant. And a person who's just changed a doctrine to make sure he's in a position of absolute power over 7,000,000 people is hardly going to hate the teaching, is he? It'd be like a football player hating his $100 million contract...yeah, he'll hate it all the way to the bank, he will.
As I think about it, it's confusing even to me. It addresses some problems in the original teaching, but just ends up creating others. Given how high they are on themselves, one would think they would relish the chance to explain how awesome they are and how great it is that Jesus appointed them despite his not having done any kind of check-in to see if they were providing food at the proper time. You know, the kind of food that doesn't leave masses of people vomiting, foaming at the mouth, and collapsing backwards out of their chairs dead and all.
But really, the 144,000 are left in the same boat they were in before this change in terms of the big reward--you see, all but maybe 40 or 50 of them has never been supplying any kind of spiritual food to anyone, since they weren't working at HQ writing the articles. So they basically get the same reward for doing none of the work that the 'slave' was supposed to do. I guess that's why the Governing Body gave the lazy bums the boot!
And since governing is another word for ruling, a certain 8 men have already begun their rule, really. I don't really recall any Bible verses about Christians governing each other. Here I thought it was just the rulers of the nations that did governing, but we were supposed to strive to be the lowest among brothers, to serve, not demand obedience to rules we just made up.
But this is kind of stupid in the end. Jesus asked one effin' question. A QUESTION! Read it again. This is not about 8 men in upstate New York in the year 2013! Read the context of this verse. Jesus already started making illustrations by the time he got to this verse. I mean, by this logic, the Governing Body could just as easily have been the 'discreet virgin class' (oh, wait, that's my title as Editor of The Beast-Tower) or the 'one man taken out of the bed class' or something.
Well, here's one thing I'm not confused about. There is no faithful and discreet slave class. The word 'class' is not in the verse at all. It's an add-on. Because there is no faithful and discreet slave. No man can declare themselves as such because you have to prove yourself faithful in the eyes of the Master, not just claim you are in the eyes of fellow slaves and then do whatever you want because the Master hasn't done anything to stop you. It's a goal that every Christian aspires to, to be faithful and discreet in carrying out what Jesus wants done--not the knocking on doors or placing of non-Bible literature, but the helping of those in need and the teaching people about Jesus and what he did for mankind.
If this one verse didn't exist in the Bible, C.T. Russell would've just picked another one, and Rutherford would've taken advantage of whatever verse it was, and this would be a totally different discussion about the same ultimate subject: men abusing power and abusing people.
--sd-7
SD-7
Another good catch Splash. This "new light" has got more holes in it than a sieve. I really, really hope they bring a WT out on this just to see how many articles it takes them to try and make sense of it.
Sd-7 said, “The other thing is, why even do this? Their authority has been absolute for a long time. Nobody's made a Reformed JW org, dissenters and deserters are hunted down and shot. Is there some invisible power struggle between the other 12,000 anointed and the Governing Body so that they felt a need to make themselves exclusively the 'slave'? It makes no sense.”
I think Sd-7's question is very valid, “… why even do this?” Sd-7 presents some ideas in response, which are very interesting. I also wonder if it’s because too many JWs just found the previous explanation too confusing. That is, “You have the 144,000 remnant of the anointed on earth and none of them – except the Governing Body – dispenses food at the proper time. Remember too that the Governing Body described the anointed remnant (in a fairly recent Watchtower) as not knowing any more than the great crowd – say what?!?!
So, this could be an attempt to quash the previous explanation of who the faithful and discreet slave class is and all the questions (and confusion) that come up as a consequence. What’s interesting is that the newer explanation causes just as many questions (and confusion) as exemplified by this thread! They just can’t win. What does this tell you about the people running the show at the WTS?
What a bunch of kooks! (Noun: A crazy of eccentric person)
