Are there any actual Bible Students left? According to my sources the last Bible Student in the UK was called Daniel and died decades ago.
The Date for the Memorial is WRONG this year!
by Kelley959 40 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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Athanasius
Not sure about the UK, but there are still some Bible Students in the USA. He is a link with information on their 2024 General Convention:
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Kelley959
Ok...so the Bible Students have it correct. The Aid book and the Insight Book BOTH talk about Adar II as being a part of the calendar in Israelite times. So the Society can't say it's due to a modern calendar. So what needs to be done in my personal opinion (not that it will happen), is they need to make a correction on this and reschedule the memorial immediately. Starting to wonder if all this crap they have undergone recently, (child abuse, etc) is making the "spirit" retract.
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Anony Mous
There are many issues with the way the JW calculate things.
TL;DR: Jesus died on Nisan 14 (according to Jewish and Biblical sources) or 15 (according to John), the JW claim that was the day the last supper happened.
First, it is not know when the last meal actually took place. The Bible contains 2 separate stories and the entire timeline of Jesus’ last meal, transfiguration, betrayal, trial, execution and death is not exact or chronological between the stories.
There are religious reasons to have Jesus death happen on Passover or Passover-Seder but you can’t have the 2-3 last days of his life which started with the last meal map onto a single day as the JW claim.
If according to JW tradition, Jesus last supper was on Nisan 14 (Shabbat meal, co-inciding with Passover Seder), he could not have subsequently traveled (as Shabbat had started), kept his disciples awake, been betrayed that morning (Shabbat would apply to Judas and the priests), stood trial the requisite 2 days before the Sanhedrin (Shabbat+2), then (Shabbat +3) stood before Pilate, convicted to carry the cross all the way to Golgotha (which happened apparently during the day), been executed and required the legs broken in order to have the execution end before the same Shabbat/Passover we started with although this is required if JWs seem to interpret that the meal preparations were for Passover-Seder.
There is almost an entire week worth of events happening there, they didn’t have cars to drive from Mount of Olives between Herod’s Palace to the Temple twice and then to Golgotha, those are some big hikes to go back and forth.
Most early Christians would have held (as Catholics still do) that the last supper was a Tuesday or Wednesday although the communion happened a lot more frequently, they likely did not attach any significance to the exact time and date of the last supper, the church still holds to date that communion, mass, Eucharist etc should not happen between Good Friday and Holy Sunday (starting Nisan 14/15 after sundown depending on the story if you held to the Jewish calendar). The JWs however hold both “mass” and the sole communion they have in the year on that date.
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scholar
Kelley959
Your belief that the Memorial date for 2024 is wrong based on some YouTube video is simply bunkum. The 'celebrated' WT scholars at least from 1907 have demonstrated competence in establishing the precise date for the Memorial since that time by means of a full disclosure of the methodology used for its determination. The simple fact is that it begins with the month of Nisan with the observation at Jerusalem of the new moon in the spring nearest the equinox either before or after with the full moon coming fourteen days later. This was the ancient method of determining the Passover. This is not the astronomical new moon listed on a calendar or astronomical table because the thin sliver of the new moon is not visible until 18 to 30 hours after the moment of the astronomical new moon.
scholar JW
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KerryHuish
The Jehovah's Witnesses currently revealed method of calculating the date for the Memorial is as follows:
*** w77 6/15 p. 383 Questions From Readers ***
It was on the 14th of the Jewish month Nisan, the date of the Passover, that Jesus directed his followers to commemorate his death. (Luke 22:14-20) Appropriately, the date for the Memorial celebration is arrived at as the Jews back then determined the date for the Passover. They began the month of Nisan when they could first see the new moon in the spring nearest the equinox. Passover came fourteen days later.—Isa. 66:23; Ex. 12:2, 6.
Jehovah’s Witnesses now follow this ancient pattern in determining the Memorial date. Please note that the first thing that needs to be established is when the new moon nearest the spring equinox (about March 21) will be visible in Jerusalem. This is not the astronomical new-moon time listed on a calendar or astronomical table. Why? Because the first thin sliver of the new moon is not visible until eighteen to thirty hours after the moment of astronomical new moon.
*** w11 2/1 p. 22 Are You Prepared for the Most Important Day of the Year? ***
A simple calculation helps us arrive at the proper date. Nisan 1 starts when the new moon nearest the spring equinox (the start of spring in the Northern Hemisphere) becomes visible at sunset in Jerusalem. If we count 14 days from that event, we arrive at Nisan 14. This date is usually the day of the full moon. Using this Biblical method, Nisan 14 this year begins at sunset on Sunday, April 17, 2011.
*** bh p. 206 par. 2 The Lord’s Evening Meal—An Observance That Honors God ***
To calculate that date, the Jews evidently waited for the spring equinox. This is the day when there are approximately 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of darkness. The first observable new moon nearest to the spring equinox marked the first day of Nisan. Passover began 13 days later.
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Regarding the additional month, that was added every so often, in order to keep Passover in the spring.
How it is added, according to the published method by Jehovah's Witnesses:*** w90 2/15 pp. 14-15 pars. 24-25 From Seder to Salvation ***
“If . . . it was noticed towards the end of the year that Passover would fall before the vernal equinox [about March 21], the intercalation of a month before Nisan was decreed.” (The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ, Volume 1) The extra month thus comes in naturally, not being added arbitrarily. 25 The Governing Body of Jehovah’s Witnesses establishes the date for the Lord’s Evening Meal in line with the ancient method._______
Points to keep in mind:
1. The Jews did not switch to a fixed calendar system until the 4th century.
2. In Jesus's day, the date was calculated purely by observance.In view of this, the date given for 2024 is totally in line with this methodology.
I am in complete agreement that this is how the Jews in the 1st century observed things._______
However...
If a person is serious about Christianity and observing the Evening Meal, then they will keep on the watch.
(Matthew 24:42) "Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come.
The Jehovah's Witnesses stopped keeping on the watch quite some time ago and instead started to rely on the Metonic Cycle in working out the day, rather than in actually observing new moons and adding the additional month when needed, in line with the equinox, as they publicly claim to do.
The Metonic Cycle places the moon on more or less the same day every 19 years.
So if you work it out correctly and observe the day for one year, then in 19 years time it should be the same.
This is a very lazy method of calculation and is not keeping on the watch.
It is open to error due to the slight time difference between 19 solar years and 235 lunar months.
This error becomes more exaggerated over time.
In 2000 and 2019, it started to become clear that the Witnesses had stopped keeping on the watch.Check it for yourself, in line with what the Witnesses say they do as published above, with what they actually did in those years.
In 2000, they added the extra month (when there was no need) in line with the Metonic Cycle and not by how they say they do.
In 2019, they added the extra month (when there was no need) in line with the Metonic Cycle and not by how they say they do.In 2038, they will probably do the same.
I have letters from the Society about these issues where they finally confessed to relying on the Metonic Cycle rather than observing, as they claim to do.(Matthew 23:3) So you must be careful to do everything they tell you. But do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they preach.
Kind Regards
Kerry Huish -
Mikejw
So 24 March is wrong?
what is the right date of Nissan 14 first new moon and how do you work it out?
If there are a few possible dates for it surely the important thing is that you are doing your best to get the right one
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KerryHuish
The date for 2024, being March 24th is correct, according to the revealed, ancient method of calculating:
Notice when the 1st crescent is observable from Jerusalem and when the Equinox occurs.
As the 14th day - Passover & Memorial - falls after the Equinox, there is no need to add the 12th month.
The 13th month is only added if Passover falls before Equinox - according to ancient and 1st century way of doing things.
The modern, fixed calendar - which adds the additional month in certain set months, regardless of if it is needed or not - was adopted later in the 4th century and was not how Jesus or the 1st century Christians observed time.
Kind Regards
Kerry Huish
** The torahcalendar.com is based on keeping the 15th day of Nisan in spring - by means of the ancient method. Personally, I feel that this should be the 14th day and adjust accordingly.
Do your own research - Phil 2:12 -
Anony Mous
@Kerry: according to scripture Jesus died on “the day of Preparation of the Passover” (John 19:14). - Nisan 14, Passover was on Nisan 15. According to the Synoptic Gospels Jesus died on Friday Nisan 15. The Lords Supper happened around Nisan 11-12.
Once a year after sundown on Nisan 14, Jehovah's Witnesses observe the Lord's Evening Meal (aka the Lord’s Supper). As they quote “do this in remembrance” and partake of communion. From their website: When Jehovah's Witnesses observe the Lord's Evening Meal, only a small fraction of us partake of the bread and wine. This is so they can align the scripture of the preparation under the JW myth that Jesus disciples were unaware what they were preparing for and thought they were getting Passover meal preparations. According to JW theology Jesus then gets convicted and executed the next morning/afternoon, which is an effort to align John with the other gospels, but is impossible to have been accomplished back then.
JW are celebrating the wrong thing on the wrong day and with the wrong people based on a wrong interpretation.
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KerryHuish
@Anony Mous
The day after Passover, aka Nisan 15, was always regarded as a Sabbath regardless of which day it fell, it was a complete rest:
(Leviticus 23:5-7) The Lord’s Passover begins at twilight on the fourteenth day of the first month. On the fifteenth day of that month the Lord’s Festival of Unleavened Bread begins; for seven days you must eat bread made without yeast. On the first day hold a sacred assembly and do no regular work.
Thus Nisan 14, the day Jesus died, was a day of preparation, as restrictions came into force from sundown on Nisan 14 as Nisan 15 was always regarded as being a Sabbath._______
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In the case of the death of Jesus and its following day, it actually coincided with the weekly Sabbath making this particular Sabbath a Great Sabbath or Special Sabbath - See John 19:31_______
_______Kind Regards
Kerry Huish