Studying with JWs - Confused, Conflicted ...

by RebelliousSpirit 278 Replies latest members private

• 

  RebelliousSpirit

  Can you believe that you spent four months on that thing? Take another look inside. You should have been able to get thru that thing in a few afternoons - there is nothing deep in there. But you spent all that time learning how to look at an elephant from four inches away. That paragraph-and-an-answer mode is just a way to keep you from seeing the overall themes of the scriptures. Seriously, take another look inside that book. You didn't learn what you think you leanred.

  4 months only because I kept being told to "slow down". We recently started the Worship book and my conductor said we will go "much slower" through this book. I asked her if she was trying to bore the heck out of me. I proceeded to study the first 5 chapters of the Worship book (which I was told is "so much more difficult to understand") in 4 days with my MIL, which totally ticked off my conductor. Oops.

  So tell me ... if I didn't learn what I think I learned ... What did I learn? My husband doesn't understand why the more I study and read scriptures, the more I am questioning everything. He thinks it should be the other way around, but it's not. And even I am not sure why. I read certain scriptures and look at my conductor and say, "Are you sure that's what that means???"

  That damnable organization already wants to start indoctrinating your 10-month old. If you stick around, you'll see their reaction when your youngest cannot sit still. They willl expect you to take him to a back room and discipline him.

  I have seen it countless times and I cringe. Mothers dragging their misbehaving toddler into the back room, smacking them, the child screaming for 1/2 hour or more ...some of the children scream the entire 2 hours in the bathroom. And I think the thing that really gets me are the times I see the parents covering their screaming child's mouth so they can't be heard. I practice attachment parenting with my boys, and I don't believe in "corporal punsihment" either. ::sigh::

  My in-laws are such wonderful people, and so is my husband. I want to make them happy, and I don't want to believe that they are so mixed up with such a bad thing. My husband is there to stay this time ... and I will never walk away from him. So then what?
• 

  Ratboy

  You hit a good point thinking about asking your conductor if he's sure it means what he says. When any witness disagrees with ANYTHING in the watchtower magazine it is considered going "against the light." Witnesses are required to listen to anything the watchtower says WITHOUT QUESTION. This is why it is so hard for you to understand why THEY don't understand why you have so many questions. You still have some sort of free thought about interpetation. Nevermind that witnesses freely admit the watchtower has been wrong in the past. Find something wrong, you can be excommunicated as a danger to the congregation. Even if you were right to begin with. Congratulations, you're discovering the effects of brainwashing.
  
  
  Not sold yet? Ok, let's look at your 10 month old. My daughter is exactly the same age, so I have some grasp of what she can and cannot retain. Of course it is unreasonable to force a ten month old to learn religeous doctrine. Forcing a ten month old to sit still and be silent for two straight hours is MENTALLY DAMAGING to a ten month old. Would you force your 10 month old to sit still silently watching something he is even interested in? Of course not. They do this to indoctrinate them early on.
  
  
  Now let's say you raise that 10 month old the way Jehovah's Witnesses would have you raise them. Let's say they get baptized as teenagers. Mind you, they for their entire lives have learned not to look up sources for the material the watchtower puts in front of them. You have effectively facilitated the brainwashing of your own children. Then, for whatever reason, let's say they are disfellowshipped. This is a decade or so from now. If you go down that path of Jehovah's Wintesses, you are going to believe and act EXACTLY the way your husband's family treated him. If you start to believe and go to every meeting you will. You may not believe you would ever treat a family member like that, but of course, you still have questions.
  
  
  Not to harp on your children or get off the subject, but you should be aware, that if there are any child molestors in your congregation, you will never know about it until it is too late. Thought you should know, as this type of stuff isn't in your latest copy of the awake. http://www.silentlambs.org
  
  
  You obviously have some questions about doctrine that aren't getting answered. Can you share any of them? Perhaps someone here can help you the non-jw rebuttal.
• 

  AlanF

  : My husband is there to stay this time ... and I will never walk away from him. So then what?

  Prepare yourself to have him walk away from you. Mentally at the least, physically at the worst. He can do the latter within the JW framework because of a little idea called "absolute endangerment of spirituality". I know from personal experience how that works.

  Problem is, now that you've gotten partly involved with this destructive cult, if you pull away you'll almost certainly be viewed as a wicked person. Perhaps not overtly, but certainly covertly. The nice, warm love bombing will stop, your in-laws will become distant, and those you got friendly with at the KH will turn cold. It's because they'll realize that you've rejected their cult and don't want to be part of it. And of course, if you ever mention a word to anyone other than your husband about why you didn't join, word will get around and you'll be actively shunned, just as if you were disfellowshipped. At least, all this is the experience of many people like you.

  AlanF
• 

  Kenneson

  After a jaunt with Jehovah's Witnesses for nearly 8 years, filled with confusion and doubt, I finally decided to return to the Catholic Church in 1966. You sound like me. I was forever questioning and only stayed because they had better answers than I did. Of course, as I became more knowledgeable about Catholic teachings, all that changed. If I had studied Catholic literature and the Catholic Bible as I did Jehovah's Witness literature I probably would have never become a Jehovah's Witness. Finally, I couldn't stand remaining anymore. Too many contradictions. Too many lies covered up. Today I'm happy and at peace and will NEVER return to Jehovah's Witnesses.

  P.S. WELCOME to the forum.
• 

  AlmostAtheist

  My husband doesn't understand why the more I study and read scriptures, the more I am questioning everything. He thinks it should be the other way around, but it's not. And even I am not sure why. I read certain scriptures and look at my conductor and say, "Are you sure that's what that means???"

  You sound like my wife. I always thought her "faith wasn't strong enough", but she was really just seeing through the doctrinal mish-mash. We are finally both out of the Watchtower. Keep asking questions and don't let JW's be your only source for the answers.

  No blood? Why? Is a transfusion really "eating"?

  No birthdays? Why? Are their any other things formerly practiced by pagans that are considered ok? (Wedding ceremonies and traditions are thick with it)

  Stick around, dig around.

  Dave
• 

  FreedomFrog

  Yeah...and it took AA 6 years to catch on...

  AA's wife

  P.S...keep asking them to "prove"it. That's what got my husband. Aren't I bad??
• 

  RebelliousSpirit

  You obviously have some questions about doctrine that aren't getting answered. Can you share any of them? Perhaps someone here can help you the non-jw rebuttal.

  I have actually never believed in the Trinity, for example, though I never really thought much about it either. Kudos to me since the JWs dont either, right? Wrong. The more they're teaching me, the more I wonder if there really IS a trinty. Isn't that bizarre? The whole John 1:1 thing has been bothering me lately - that little "a" they inserted there for "continuity and grammatical correction" or whatever. "And the Word was God" denotes a trinity, I would think ... until you add that nifty little "a" in there and mess the whole thing up. My MIL and I go around about the trinity all the time lately - she says a trinity just doesn't make sense because "Jesus cannot be with God and be God". And I just think, "God can do and be whatever he wants, can't He?" lol!

  I asked my MIL the other day WHY Jehovah created all things through his son Jesus, why Jesus is the "master worker", and the Word, and the one who provided the ransom sacrifice, etc. Doesn't God do anything for himself? Or does this yet again support the trinity doctrine??? She simply said that Jehovah wanted to appoint his son important responsibilities such as those to show how much trust he was willing to put in Jesus out of his love for him. Or something similar to that. Somehow I have trouble buying it.

  Jehovah identified himself in Exodus as "I AM" ... later Jesus says in John "you will know that I AM" and the JWs insert the word "he" - does this take away from the scriptures intended meaning, which I would interpret to be that Jesus IS God - or is this really the way that scripture should have read?? Again with the trinity problem!

  And what about this ... Paul said, "... for as often as you eat this loaf and drink this cup, you keep proclaiming the death of the Lord, until he arrives." (1Cor 11:26). If Christ arrived in 1914, why do Jehovah's Witnesses continue to partake of the bread and wine? Shouldn't they have stopped in 1914?

  Also, in Rev 19:1, where does it say that the great crowd will be? Heaven, right? That's not what JW's teach - they teach the great crowd will be on Paradise Earth. And when I asked my husband about that scripture, he said that's not THE great crowd, that's just some random great crowd - or something like that. HUH?? How does the WTS know that doesn't refer to THE great crowd??

  Something else ... Jn 20:25 says "... unless I see in his hands the print of the nails...", indicating that there was more than one nail used to crucify Jesus - how could that be if he was on a stake, versus a cross as "Christendom" teaches? So which is it??

  A good point I came across on another site: Jesus uses the phrase "Truly I say to you,..." over 50 times in the Bible. In the NWT, the comma is placed after the word "you" every time except in Lk 23:43, where the comma is placed after the word "today". Why is the comma placed after "today" instead of after "you" in this verse? If the translation of this phrase in Lk 23:43 was consistent with the translation of this phrase in all the other verses in which it appears, and the comma was placed after the word "you", how would it read?

  Ok so these are SOME of the things that have been bothering me lately. Some people say I think too much. ::sigh:: Anyway, if I think of more ... I will post them. In the meantime, thanks for your time everyone, I really appreciate it.
• 

  RebelliousSpirit

  Hi FF. My husband was out of the "truth" for 8 years and he went back ... I honestly don't think he'll ever leave again. He never really disagreed with their teachings in the first place. He left because he was 19 and rebellious. Now he's 27, still rebellious to some degree, but more comfortable being in than being out - and, he loves Jehovah. Sadly enough, he can't answer most of my questions - he says because he's been out of the truth for so long.
• 

  RebelliousSpirit

  Problem is, now that you've gotten partly involved with this destructive cult, if you pull away you'll almost certainly be viewed as a wicked person. Perhaps not overtly, but certainly covertly. The nice, warm love bombing will stop, your in-laws will become distant, and those you got friendly with at the KH will turn cold. It's because they'll realize that you've rejected their cult and don't want to be part of it. And of course, if you ever mention a word to anyone other than your husband about why you didn't join, word will get around and you'll be actively shunned, just as if you were disfellowshipped. At least, all this is the experience of many people like you.

  Are you trying to scare me, Alan?

  I realize that what you're saying about the others is probably true, that they will see me as "wicked" if I don't follow this through to the end. But my husband has promised me that he will never feel that way, not ever. And as I said before, he's a very liberal JW, which I think helps my case. All that aside ... what exactly am I supposed to do considering the circumstances??
• 

  Why Georgia

  Hi Rebellious,

  My husband had been inactive for almost 10 years when we met and he said he would never go back. And he did....but he is away again and hasn't gone to meetings in almost 3 years.

  I am not a Jehovahs Witness and was not raised that way although I have known people who are my whole life.

  I just wonder this......because I have 2 children who are almost the same age as yours. What will you do if your children are in a trauma type accident and your husband try's to prevent them from having blood products? What about you? Are you prepared to give up your actual life and life of your kids to make him and the organization happy?

  My husband would have let me die without blood products at one point and this caused a huge division in our household.

  I am now responsible for all of our childrens medical decisions and all of the hospitals in my area know of my wishes regarding my childrens and my health.

  And if you think they will stop telling you and judging you how you raise your children you are wrong. I remember sitting in the Kingdom hall with my little baby and when he behaved as babies do the sisters told me to spank him.....its never too young to learn to be obedient.

  I saw horrible beatings at the kingdom hall.

  If that's how you love a child I want no part of it.

  I understand your situation but I would never put my children in so much danger as to ever take them to the kingdom hall.

  The next time your sitting at the hall - look to your left and right. The men near you may be guilty of pedophilia and those lovely elders won't tell you or your husband a darn thing.

  Be careful..