Have you come across A New Heaven and a New Earth: Reclaiming Biblical Eschatology (2014) by J. Richard Middleton? I was recommended the book by someone and have heard that some JWs are pointing to it as deploying good arguments in favour of JW-style paradise earth as the destiny of obedient humans,
slimboyfat
JoinedPosts by slimboyfat
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114,000, Literal, or Symbolic?
by Wonderment ina poster wrote to me privately, and brought to my attention the following comment below i made a while back in regards to the 144,00 number of revelation.
i had casually conjectured that this number was likely symbolic in line with the book of revelation being mostly symbolic in kind.
he brought up this juicy source:.
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37
114,000, Literal, or Symbolic?
by Wonderment ina poster wrote to me privately, and brought to my attention the following comment below i made a while back in regards to the 144,00 number of revelation.
i had casually conjectured that this number was likely symbolic in line with the book of revelation being mostly symbolic in kind.
he brought up this juicy source:.
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slimboyfat
Romans 11:25 seems to suggest that the number of Gentiles who will join the Israel of God is a limited number.
An additional JW argument is that the spiritual Israelites are said to rule over the spiritual Gentiles. But if the number of the 144,000 spiritual Israelites is really an unlimited number of believers, then who are they going to rule over? What do you do will all the scriptures that say spiritual Israel will rule over the rest of obedient mankind?
Plus the fact John the Baptist seems to be ruled out of the kingdom of the heaven in Matt 11:11. JWs argue this narrows the Israel of God down to a select number of Christians beginning at Pentecost up until the last days.
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45
which Translation Now?
by enoughisenough infor those of you who still respect the bible, which translation/s are you using now?
why?.
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slimboyfat
I had never heard of The Expanded Bible. The only copies I can find online at the moment are quite expensive.
Other versions I often check, apart from those already mentioned, include Moffatt, The Original New Testament by Hugh Schonfield, Robert Alter’s translation of the Hebrew Bible, David Bentley Hart’s New Testament, the 21st Century Version by Vivian Capel, William Barclay’s New Testament, and the Contemporary English Bible.
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173
Is the tide turning against covid vaccines?
by slimboyfat inhave you seen this video about the covid vaccines?
have you got any views on the information?
i find it worrying at least.
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slimboyfat
Riley do you know where we can access that information? The drug companies are not sharing the information about frequency of adverse events. There is widespread suspicion they are not even gathering the information in a rigorous was, because it is against their interest to do so. I’ve had four vaccines and I’ve never been asked or informed about reported adverse events. Have you? I know people who have had strokes, eye bleeds, and a couple who have died. As far as I know none of these have been recorded even as possible adverse reactions. How can we have accurate data if the it is not being gathered?
Countries such as Denmark that do their own checks and record data on reactions are the same countries that are withdrawing the vaccines.
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173
Is the tide turning against covid vaccines?
by slimboyfat inhave you seen this video about the covid vaccines?
have you got any views on the information?
i find it worrying at least.
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slimboyfat
He is a heart doctor and he is talking about heart problems and their causes, so how is his expertise not relevant? If peer review and relevant qualifications are the standard, why are you relying on a piece that was not peer reviewed by someone who is not a heart specialist to discredit a peer reviewed article by a heart specialist?
Like I said, I am not qualified to judge the scientific and medical arguments. But simply as someone who has been paying attention to what has been said by the authorities, there are significant grounds for concern. First we were told the vaccines would stop us catching the virus. That was wrong. We were told the virus would stop us spreading the virus. That was wrong. We were told we would reach herd immunity if everyone took the virus. That was wrong too. It is entirely reasonable, as a layperson, to draw the sensible conclusion that the authorises are not are certain in their knowledge of these vaccines as their pronouncements, and frankly downright coercion over the past two years, would have led us to believe.
It doesn’t stop there either. They said the RNA would dissipate and not spread in the body. That seems to be in doubt now. They said there was no possible harm for pregnant mothers. Now there’s doubt about that too. Some authorities are saying everyone should get the vaccines, even babies. Other countries are saying it’s too risky for children, or in some places, even people under 50 years old. Given all the things the authorities have got wrong about the vaccines in the past couple of years, shouldn’t there be a degree of humility, at least, and a little less name calling of anyone with concerns as “conspiracy theorists”, or the other favourite, “not following the science”. I like the popular retort to that claim about “following the science” - “if you can question it, that’s science, if you can’t question it, that’s propaganda”.
Somebody posted a rebuttal video above from the doctor with the big hair. I had actually already watched that video a while ago, but I watched it again yesterday. Maybe he is right about some things and maybe some of his criticisms are valid. But honestly his attitude stinks. He treats anyone who disagrees with his own view as compete imbeciles or somehow fired by an inexplicable passion for spreading “misinformation”. It’s a far cry from Dr Mahotra who says to treat others with other views with respect and with patience, because he has been in their shoes, and he himself dismissed concerns about the vaccine at one time. To top it all off, in the above mentioned rebuttal video, the doctor, wanting to emphasise how “dangerous” skepticism is, makes the bold statement that “omicron variant is equally as deadly!” That seems to be an ultra position that goes above and beyond the mainstream view that omicron is a milder variant. So is the debunker himself now guilty of lies and misinformation? Where does this stop?
How about we all just slow down and allow a reasonable discussion about this without name calling, ad hominem and so on. My growing suspicion is that the vaccines were rushed out too quickly and a few companies have made a fortune as a result. There is nowhere near enough research into the side effects. I’ve had 4 vaccines now and not once has anyone asked me about any side effects. I know people who have had strokes, an eye bleed, and various other apparent complications. I know a couple of people who have died shortly after the vaccine. I have not heard of any of these being recorded as even possible side effects of the vaccines. Why is that? If possible side effects are not even being recorded and collated, how are we ever going to know? It’s almost as if the drug companies already know, or suspect, higher than anticipated adverse effects, so they don’t want to collect the data and they obstruct others who want to collect the data. That’s not a conspiracy theory, unfortunately, that’s just how capitalism works.
Do you know the case of Pfizer not being allowed to test a new drug on children in the Us so they decided to test the drug on children in Africa instead where the regulations are not as strong. Hundreds of children died as a result. They paid expensive lawyers to fry and cover it up but not even the lawyers could entirely cover it up in the case. That’s the kind of company we are dealing with here. So don’t tell me it’s a crazy conspiracy that they would deliberately sell drugs that harm people, they do it every day. The question is not whether they would do it, because we know they would, the questions is simply whether they have done it in this case of the vaccines or not.
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which Translation Now?
by enoughisenough infor those of you who still respect the bible, which translation/s are you using now?
why?.
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slimboyfat
What does “non JW answers only” mean?
The fullest explanation of the removal of the divine name from the New Testament is in George Howard’s article that you can read here in full.
http://areopage.net/howard.pdf
Also see the explanations in the books by Frank Shaw and David Trobisch
Shaw, F. The earliest non-mystical Jewish use of Iao. Contributions to biblical exegesis and theology, 70. Peeters, 2014.
Trobisch, David. The first edition of the New Testament. Oxford University Press, 2000.
Good post Wonderment 👍
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Ministry in John 3:16
by JW Answers ina lot of false teaching darkens our doors today, especially with watchtower teachings, calvinism and lordship salvation.. latest video below explores the verse john 3:16 and shows forth the truths which christ preached to nicodemus.
the jws also spread fear amongst their followers stating that if the leave the org, then jehovah will strike them down at armageddon.
this video covers this same fear.. feel free to watch below..
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slimboyfat
Jesus said: with God, all things are possible.
1 Tim 2:4 says it is the will of God that everyone will be saved. Who can thwart the will of God? Some will have a rockier road to redemption than others, but the ultimate destination is sure, because it is the will of God.
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which Translation Now?
by enoughisenough infor those of you who still respect the bible, which translation/s are you using now?
why?.
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slimboyfat
I think there’s evidence on both sides and it depends how you weigh the evidence. It’s a bit like the “did grandpa wear a hat?” question. There are photos of grandpa from the 1960s and he’s not wearing a hat in any of the photos, but unfortunately there are no photos of grandpa from the 1930s when he was a young man. Did grandpa wear a hat in the 1930s? Since there are no photos of grandpa wearing a hat you could say “there is no evidence” that he ever wore a hat. But we have plenty of photos of other young men in the 1930s and it seems that they routinely wore hats in that period. You can either dig your heels in and say there is no evidence grandpa ever wore a hat, or you can acknowledge that, while there are no photos of grandpa wearing a hat, men in the 1930s generally did wear hats, and there’s lots of evidence for that, and so it’s reasonable to draw the conclusion that it’s more likely than not that grandpa wore a hat in the 1930s, even if there are no actual photos of him ever wearing a hat.
Similarly, there may not be any New Testament manuscripts with the divine name, but we do know that the divine name was used in Bible texts at the time when the New Testament was written. So it does seem reasonable to draw the conclusion that the New Testament authors would have followed contemporary practice and included the divine name in their texts.
That’s just the starting point. Corroborating that conclusion I would argue that the large number of variants around instances of kyrios in the New Testament, plus the fact that a lot of passages make better sense with the divine name included, add support to the idea that the divine name was in the original. The best example of this is the frequent quotation of Psalm 110 in the NT that probably originally read, “Jehovah said to my Lord, sit at my right hand”, that later led to the confusing rendering when the divine name was removed: “The Lord said to my lord, sit at my right hand”.
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Ministry in John 3:16
by JW Answers ina lot of false teaching darkens our doors today, especially with watchtower teachings, calvinism and lordship salvation.. latest video below explores the verse john 3:16 and shows forth the truths which christ preached to nicodemus.
the jws also spread fear amongst their followers stating that if the leave the org, then jehovah will strike them down at armageddon.
this video covers this same fear.. feel free to watch below..
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slimboyfat
I think if we take scriptures like 1 Timothy 2:4 seriously then it says it is God’s will that everyone will be saved. That presumably includes Pharisees as everyone else.
1 Tim 2 3 This is good, and pleases God our Savior, 4 who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.
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21
Ministry in John 3:16
by JW Answers ina lot of false teaching darkens our doors today, especially with watchtower teachings, calvinism and lordship salvation.. latest video below explores the verse john 3:16 and shows forth the truths which christ preached to nicodemus.
the jws also spread fear amongst their followers stating that if the leave the org, then jehovah will strike them down at armageddon.
this video covers this same fear.. feel free to watch below..
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slimboyfat
I believe it’s God’s plan that everyone will be saved because that’s what scripture says to me and is consistent with the superlative love and power I believe God has to bring about his will. Because 2 Peter says
Jehovah is not slow concerning his promise, as some people consider slowness, but he is patient with you because he does not desire anyone to be destroyed but desires all to attain to repentance.
So the question I would ask is: is Jehovah able to bring about his wishes? Scripture tells us God wants everyone to be saved. If that’s what Jehovah wants to happen then that is what is going to happen. What can prevent the will of God? He is being patient with everyone until everyone is ready for redemption. Every single person. No exceptions.