Humans have been on the earth for 6,000 years?

by make yourself 76 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  cha ching

  Dear MakeYourself,

  Yep, the "Society" has taught, in the past, that there have been only 6,000 years of mankind's existence, Matt 1:1-17, Luke 3:23-38). Add 1,000 years, for "Christ's 1,000 reign", you get a "7,000 year creative day."

  The WT writers have to deal with new evidence of life's existence on earth being older than what the 'Bible/Society' claims (if each day = 7,000 years)

  Here we see the slow insertion of the "get out of jail card" being used. JW's will now be able to quote from either direction: "See? 7,000 years!" "See? the Society said "Thousands of years, not necessarily 7,000"

  Cognitive dissonance at it's best.
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  AndDontCallMeShirley

  If you don't believe in God or the bible, then the earth is old.

  .

  The earth is old regardless of your beliefs. It's a proven scientific fact based on irrefutable evidence. Only massive ignorance leads one to believe the earth is young.

  For centuries many people believed the earth was flat. It didn't change the fact that is was a sphere the entire time. Only massive ignorance led people to believe it was flat.
• 

  cantleave

  JB - how do you account for paleolithic cave art? Examples of this art dates back to over 30,000 years and its realistic execution would indicate that what we see is a culmination of a development of the skill.
• 

  Comatose

  "But, god could make a rock or cave drawing look as old as he wanted. Who knows why god wants them to look older than 6,000 years. He might be testing us. You Debil Worshipper!!!"
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  uriah

  Everything we 'know' we have been told by someone else. And someone else has, in turn, been told by someone else and so on ad-finitum.

  We can conjecture, look at things and make conclusions. We can debate and come to some sort of understanding. But all this is coloured by our conditioning and desires. Which is why there are wars and so many different ideologies of one sort or another.

  We all have our drum to bang and trumpet to blow - "I am right listen to me or be killed" or some such.

  The truth is no-one knows; by which I mean really KNOWS 100% because we were not there 6000; 10000 or a million or more years ago.

  Calling "I read it in a book (so it must be true)"; "I read it in an encyclopeadia (so it must be true)"; "I saw it on a documentary (so it must be true)" is meaningless. They are someon else's ideas and thoughts and you have no idea if they are true. Look at the news (if you do) how much is really true?

  And really, what does it matter what happened billions of years ago or last week? There is no past there is no future; there is just the now; everything is just memory - even what we call the future is the past; because we think about it and thoughts have to have happened and so are from the past.

  Many people live their lives in one of two places, the past or the 'future' and miss out on the NOW. The WT is always to the future and people miss their live totally rushing for some will-o'-the wisp furtur event when everything will be all right. Others stay morbidly dwelling on what happened and might have happened but didn't and also miss being in the NOW.

  Whatever your next step is; it starts from NOW.
• 

  Witness My Fury

  If thats the case then it doesnt matter what you believe or what you force your children to believe. So you may as well waste your live stuck in a cult as it makes no difference.
• 

  Make Lemonade

  make yourself: Would you elaborate on what was said at your meeting that caused you to take notice of the "6,000" years of man's existence? Was it a comment? How old was the person who commented? Etc.. Please feel free to hold back any details that would reveal to much information .

  Other post here have pointed out the background of this teaching. Let me add that the Photo Drama of Creation has a slide that presents each creative day as 7,000 years long. For Watchtower writers to "come clean" that the publications have been in error before and after 1919 would shake core beliefs about the Faithful and Discreet Slave. How could "God's sole channel of comunication" be wrong about the creation of the earth, etc.?

  I remember when the Catholic Church (and others) dealt with this type of contradiction between science and the Bible. Things like saying that the first 5 books of Genesis are myths and not to be taken literal. The Watchtower responded by chargeing those religions with having no respect for the Bible. In Watchtower reasoning the fact that the "slave" respected the Bible, made them the true religion. Science makes progress. Evidence builds up. The watchtower's position is forced to change.

  The question is: "how long will it take for the publication to directly state that Russel, Rutherford, Knorr, Franz, G.B. were all wrong about this matter?

  Recent waffling on the length of the creative days (actually from 1987 to now), I suspect is due to this subject being a threat to the F&Ds credability.
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  redvip2000

  If there is no written record of things then what happened before history has to be based on opinion and conjecture.

  So according to your logic, if there is a murder, once the police get to the scene, they should look for a written record of what happened, because everything else is opinion and conjecture. What nonsense.

  Ever hear of something called evidence? Evidence is history too; just not written. Early humans didn't have languages and therefore couldn't write anything. At best they would draw things as they could, which is exactly what they did.
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  rocketman

  Actually, what Uriah is saying would discourage joining a cult such as Jehovah's Witnesses, since, as he said, they constantly want adherents to look to the future, to the near-exclusion of the now.

  I would say though that there certainly is a need to understand our past and how we got here.

  HIs post kind of reminds me of Spaceballs: "This is now, now"
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  redvip2000

  Everything we 'know' we have been told by someone else. And someone else has, in turn, been told by someone else and so on ad-finitum.

  Who is "we"? This is a terrible way of thinking of this. Not everything "we" know was told by someone else. If an archeologist finds evidence that humans lived at a certain location during a period of time, who told him this information? Well.. no one. He found it based on his own work.

  If a cancer researcher observes a previously unknown behavior of cancer cells, who told him this information? No one. He found it based on his research.

  Now, for many of us, who are not researchers, this information is obtained from others, but in no way does this invalidate the credibility of the people who diligently work to find this information.