their fundamental beliefs are much like jehovah's witnesses sans the paranoia, authoritarianism, stifling rules, and end-times enthusiasm.
you don't even have to become a bible student to be saved, you could be an idol worshipping heathen and still get resurrected in the milenium.
if i still believed in the divine inspiration of the scriptures, i would be a bible student.
Wow there are still congregations in the UK? That would be interesting to see. Do you have any details of meeting times and places?
There's an interesting history of UK Bible Students here. They seem to have fizzled out mostly after the Second World War.
http://www.ukbiblestudents.co.uk/John%20Edgar/BIBLE%20STUDENTS%20IN%20BRITAIN.pdf
at a 3-day convention in nairobi, kenya this week 12-2-16 through 12-4-16, they had 70,000+ attendance, and there were 792 baptized (i presume the baptism was yesterday).
i was amazed to hear this; i guess now we know where the wt's growth is coming from..
Zambia is the most JWfied country on the planet. Something like 1 in 20 people attend the memorial there. If that happened in the UK there would be over 3 million at the memorial, more than ten times the number that actually attends.
their fundamental beliefs are much like jehovah's witnesses sans the paranoia, authoritarianism, stifling rules, and end-times enthusiasm.
you don't even have to become a bible student to be saved, you could be an idol worshipping heathen and still get resurrected in the milenium.
if i still believed in the divine inspiration of the scriptures, i would be a bible student.
Do Bible Students actually exist as local congregations? Or are they largely a collection of online ex-JWs? I've never found evidence that they still have any kind of organisational or community structure left in the UK at least. Maybe there are still Bible Student groups in the US worth speaking about.
at a 3-day convention in nairobi, kenya this week 12-2-16 through 12-4-16, they had 70,000+ attendance, and there were 792 baptized (i presume the baptism was yesterday).
i was amazed to hear this; i guess now we know where the wt's growth is coming from..
I didn't know they still held conventions as large as this. In Europe it seems to be around about 10,000 normally.
at a 3-day convention in nairobi, kenya this week 12-2-16 through 12-4-16, they had 70,000+ attendance, and there were 792 baptized (i presume the baptism was yesterday).
i was amazed to hear this; i guess now we know where the wt's growth is coming from..
I don't think there are that many JWs in Kenya. Was this an international convention?
i attended a sunday meeting today after missing a couple due to a bout of chronic apathy.
out of 74 publishers we had a grand total of 33. wonderful.
for those that attend, how are you finding the numbers?.
I've only been to a couple of meetings in the last 5 years. There seem to be around 55 at the meetings from a similar number of publishers. From what I hear, the congregation peaked in the 1980s when there were around 80 at meetings. Meeting attendance, in the time I was there, has fluctuated between 40 to 60 for the past 20 years or more. In the early 2000s was probably the lowest when it was nearer 40. At that time there were 3 elders and a neighbouring congregation sent elders to take some of the meetings. Now there are 11 elders, I think, 1 ministerial servant, and 10 pioneers. So it improved slightly in numbers and a lot I terms of number of elders.
https://twitter.com/revolutionsyria/status/772234488353058816.
i could not post video.
this was the best i could do.. paul.
I don't know, JWs have never had a big reputation for converting "rice Chrisrians". Frankly they're too cheap for that.
i've been doing personal research on this for quite some time.
what do mystical experiences have to do with it.
what is this thing they call liberation?.
Was ist aufklaerung?
I like Foucault's reply.
for your information, i'm absolutely not in the virtual reality (vr) headset business, but take it from me, you should get one.
soon all the press will be using vr to tell stories, so get prepared for extraordinary experiences using your vr headset and your smart phone.
“virtual reality!
I don't even know what this involves. A headset - is that like goggles?
I remember Ray Kurzweil predicting that we would all use a Internet glasses by now. That didn't happen - yet. Is that like this?
The singularity may be postponed rather than cancelled.
https://books.google.at/books?id=ttnrzxcvggyc&pg=pa162&lpg=pa162&dq=p38+papyrus+michigan&source=bl&ots=iwzmjy4bmu&sig=lpsfa1rd31f4d-olxunuztjhuqg&hl=de&sa=x&ved=0ahukewiek-eh3cvqahvcfhokhzkgdagq6aeistak#v=onepage&q=p38%20papyrus%20michigan&f=false.
i recommend to read the introduction (free preview) at google preview containing stuff about.
- early text and original text p3- papyri and early text- classifying early papyri readings- text quality - earl text a free text?- transmission quality- public and privat copies- textal and scribal culture- book trade in the roman empire.
Thanks for the video. I can understand some German but the German in this video is quite difficult for me probably because of the technical language.
You are right JWs have no good explanation why they accept the canon of the fourth century church without accepting the authority or validity of the church. They don't mention here either (maybe they do elsewhere) that it was Athanasius who is regarded as supplying the first complete canonical list as now accepted in his Easter letter 367 AD.
What draws you to textual criticism? Personally I find it fascinating, also the nomina sacra and books on paleography and the codex.
