Posts by Disillusioned JW

13

Why the Watchtower has changed. They actually had no choice.

by pistolpete in

did anyone ever check the doctors who claimed something that backed up the wt society.. .

jw / ex-jw tales.

i remember the watchtower and awake magazines used to have tons of articles on every subject you could think off.. history, medical, science, masturbation, dating, homosexuality, etc.. this was before the internet.

Disillusioned JW

Anony Mous, thanks for the link; it is very helpful!

13

Why the Watchtower has changed. They actually had no choice.

by pistolpete in

did anyone ever check the doctors who claimed something that backed up the wt society.. .

jw / ex-jw tales.

i remember the watchtower and awake magazines used to have tons of articles on every subject you could think off.. history, medical, science, masturbation, dating, homosexuality, etc.. this was before the internet.

Disillusioned JW

truth_b_known, what book do you have in mind as the predecessor to the Creation book? Since you mention a Book Study around the year 1999 I think that by "Creation book" you mean the Creator book of 1998. Do you mean the predecessor to the Creator book (Is There a Creator Who Cares About You?)? Prior to the 1998 Creator book there was the 1985 Creation book (Life--How did it get here? By evolution or by creation?). That book was used in the Book Study. I think you mean that book as the predecessor book.

Prior to the 1985 Creation book there was the 1967 Evolution book (Did Man Get Here by Evolution or by Creation?). Prior to the 1967 Evolution book there was the 1950 booklet called "EVOLUTION VERSUS The NEW WORLD". For the booklet of 1950 see http://www.strictlygenteel.co.uk/booklets/evolution.html .

On what page or at least in which chapter did the predecessor book specifically attack critical thinking? I wish to read that section again.

13

Shunning from different perspectives

by jonahstourguide in

hi folks,.

this interesting article on abc australia covers views of people ex-communicated or shunned by a couple of institutions.

it also includes paul grundy's experience.. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-25/the-australians-who-were-cast-out-of-their-religions/100306930.

Disillusioned JW

That is true waton. Furthermore, I have some fascination with reading some of the tall tales of the fictional mythological accounts of the Bible. Also I get some intellectual satisfaction in reading critiques of those accounts, and of other content of the Bible, and in me writing my critiques of the Bible.

13

Shunning from different perspectives

by jonahstourguide in

hi folks,.

this interesting article on abc australia covers views of people ex-communicated or shunned by a couple of institutions.

it also includes paul grundy's experience.. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-25/the-australians-who-were-cast-out-of-their-religions/100306930.

Disillusioned JW

waton, I agree with what you say about not taking all these stories seriously.

13

Shunning from different perspectives

by jonahstourguide in

hi folks,.

this interesting article on abc australia covers views of people ex-communicated or shunned by a couple of institutions.

it also includes paul grundy's experience.. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-25/the-australians-who-were-cast-out-of-their-religions/100306930.

Disillusioned JW

Though the New Testament claims Jesus Christ was publicly killed, it says there were no human witnesses of Jesus Christ exiting his tomb, not even Mary Magdalene - see Matthew 28:2-7, 11-15 and Mark 16:1-8. [Mark 16:9-20 is not in the earliest extant manuscripts; see the translators' note pertaining to it in the NASB--Updated Edition which says "Later mss add vv 19-20". (The 2013 NWT is thus justified in excluding them.)] Note that Matthew 28:14 (NASB--Updated Edition) says that when guards saw the angel they became "like dead men", which can mean they fell down and became unconscious. That is in harmony with the Jewish elders telling the guards to say that they (the guards) were asleep (as stated in verse 13) when the body of Jesus left the tomb (albeit with the elders telling the guards to say that the dead body of Jesus was removed by the disciples of Jesus).

The New Testament says there were no human witnesses, other than some of Jesus' disciples, of the alleged resurrected/recreated risen Christ being seen prior to his alleged ascension to heaven and likewise during his alleged ascension to heaven.

The New Testament provides no testimony at all of the alleged risen Christ (whom many say is God) revealing himself to those not believing in his divinity, with the exception of Saul (later renamed Paul). But, the NT accounts makes it appear that the accounts claim that Paul saw a vision of Christ rather than saw Christ himself.

There are also some contradictions of the accounts recorded in Acts of Paul's alleged encounter with the supernatural risen Christ. Some modern scholars say that Paul instead of seeing and hearing Christ and instead of having a supernaturally induced vision of Christ, was experiencing a temporal lobe seizure and that during that he hallucinated seeing and hearing Christ. They say the accounts of what Paul saw and heard, including his vision of being taking to the third heaven, and of Paul's health problems fit the medical condition of experiences of temporal lobe seizures, including having hallucinations.

13

Shunning from different perspectives

by jonahstourguide in

hi folks,.

this interesting article on abc australia covers views of people ex-communicated or shunned by a couple of institutions.

it also includes paul grundy's experience.. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-25/the-australians-who-were-cast-out-of-their-religions/100306930.

Disillusioned JW

Sea Breeze, I notice that the ABC article quotes Grundy as saying that he is "ignostic" not "agnostic". Ignostic is an actual word and it is different (though similar) in meaning than agnostic. An online dictionary defines ignostic as the following. "One who professes ignorance on the knowledge of whether or not any gods exist, or even what the term means. It is a play on the words "ignorant" (to lack knowledge) and "gnostic," (knowledge pertaining to gods)." The word ignostic thus goes beyond the meaning of the word agnostic.

Folks, the article at https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-25/the-australians-who-were-cast-out-of-their-religions/100306930 is very interesting.

Note that the dismissed Catholic priest, Peter Kennedy, has created a new church. Terry Fitzpatrick was an associate priest at the Catholic church congregation which Kennedy was formerly at. Terry Fitzpatrick says he follows "mysticism and the gnostic Christians, the non-literalist Christians that were persecuted by the literalist Christians in the early church system". That which Fitzpatrick said about gnostic Christians is very important. Some posts on jehovahs-witness.com have said that Gnostic Christianity was probably the original Christianity, or very close to it.

On a different matter, have a look at the people attending the Kennedy's new church and notice how old they are. That age profile is the way many other congregations of Christianity are today. I see it as evidence that Christianity is dying out, at least in western civilization of developed countries (including the USA and Europe). People posting on this site have wrote that today people in the JW congregations are also primarily the elderly and that virtually no one under age 18 in the USA congregations of JWs still believes in the JW religion.

13

Shunning from different perspectives

by jonahstourguide in

hi folks,.

this interesting article on abc australia covers views of people ex-communicated or shunned by a couple of institutions.

it also includes paul grundy's experience.. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-25/the-australians-who-were-cast-out-of-their-religions/100306930.

Disillusioned JW

Even if a god revealed himself or herself nearly 2000 years in one small part of the Roman empire (in Galilee, Samaria, and/or Judea), no god has revealed himself or herself to people living in our modern times, or even since the time of the Enlightenment (the Age of Reason). Certainly neither Jesus nor Jehovah nor a god that unknown to me revealed himself to me - even when I was an agnostic when I asked them to provide to me convincing evidence of their existence if they exist. That lack of complete lack evidence, despite my sincere searching for such, was one of the factors which contributed to me becoming an outright positive/strong atheist (meaning someone who is convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that no god exists) and a philosophical naturalist. That which which philosophers call divine hiddenness is one of the two strongest arguments which they cite for disbelief in the existence of all loving personal gods/Gods, even the biblical god (or gods) - the other being the argument from evil.

I agree with the idea of if (hypothetically) a god exists, then no human knows anything about that god since that god has not revealed himself/herself/itself to any human in the past 300 years. Furthermore many people living today are convinced that no god (even Christ) has ever revealed himself/herself/itself to a human.

For information about the concept of divine hiddenness see https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/divine-hiddenness/ . It says "However, “divine hiddenness” refers to something else in recent philosophical literature, especially since the publication of J.L. Schellenberg’s landmark book, Divine Hiddenness and Human Reason (1993). In this context, it refers to alleged facts about the absence of belief of God, on the basis of which one might think there is no God. For example, Schellenberg argues that, since there are nonbelievers who are capable of a personal relationship with God and who do not resist it, there is no perfectly loving God, while Stephen Maitzen argues that naturalism better explains the “demographics” of nonbelief than theism and Jason Marsh argues that naturalism better explains “natural nonbelief” than theism. Understood in this way, divine hiddenness constitutes putative evidence for atheism."

See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_nonbelief , it says "The argument from reasonable nonbelief (or the argument from divine hiddenness) was first elaborated in J. L. Schellenberg's 1993 book Divine Hiddenness and Human Reason. This argument says that if God existed (and was perfectly good and loving) every reasonable person would have been brought to believe in God; however, there are reasonable nonbelievers; therefore, this God does not exist."

Schellenber promotes something he calls Skeptical Religion and Evolutionary Religion. Regarding them https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._L._Schellenberg says "Schellenberg's Evolutionary Religion (Oxford University Press, 2013) aims to be a more widely accessible account of his arguments in the trilogy.[17] It seeks to place these arguments into an evolutionary framework and maintains that skeptical religion provides a new way of responding to the science and religion debate.[18] "

47

The Evidence of Human Evolution keeps getting stronger and stronger

by Disillusioned JW in

despite the wt's and young earth creationists' teachings against human evolution (namely macroevolution from non-humans) being a reality, the evidence of human evolution keeps getting stronger and stronger.. consider for example two science news articles and one other science article, each pertaining to the fossil that is nicknamed "little foot".

below are links to three science articles, listed in order of the articles from oldest to newest (except i don't see a date for one of the articles).

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2187639-exclusive-controversial-skeleton-may-be-a-new-species-of-early-human/.

Disillusioned JW

Regarding the evidence for biological evolution there is a useful article by the National Center for Science Education (NCSE) at https://ncse.ngo/review-evolution-what-fossils-say-and-why-it-matters .

At https://ncse.ngo/genesis-knows-nothing-scientific-creationism the NCSE in an online issue of their "Creation/Evolution Journal" (Issue 12) makes an argument based upon the Bible and the archaeological discoveries of ancient writings that claims young earth creationism is incompatible with the Bible's account of creation. It makes the argument that Genesis 1:1 - 2:4 was not meant to be interpreted literally. The article is very interesting and it makes me now seriously question the idea of interpreting Genesis chapter one from a literal (fundamentalist style) point of view.

This article is by far the best presentation I have read that represents something similar to the theological liberal interpretation of theologians and biblical scholars, but in a way which also integrates a lot of scientific facts. I am surprised to learn that it is written by a science education organization - one which I highly respect. If its views are correct then I need to abandon most (maybe all) of my specific criticisms of the creation account of Genesis 1:1 - 2:4.

https://ncse.ngo/about-issue-0 says in part the following.

'Issue XI was devoted entirely to exposing the difficulties in creationist attempts to render scientifically plausible the story of Noah's Ark. ... But debunking the efforts of pseudoscientific biblical literalists by pitting their claims against the facts of nature is only one way to reveal the bankruptcy of their case. Another, and perhaps more basic, approach is to challenge their biblical literalism itself. Do "scientific creationists" read the Bible correctly? Is their biblical scholarship credible, or is it as outdated and superficial as their science?

In this issue, Conrad Hyers demonstrates how the matters dealt with in Genesis have nothing to do with the current creation-evolution controversy. The great religious issue that the biblical writers sought to resolve was one of a very different sort-one that proved to be more basic to modem Western religious belief than creationists suspect.

In future issues of Creation/Evolution, we will feature articles discussing Genesis from further angles. Although we remain a journal that focuses upon the scientific errors creationists make, it is important that we not miss the fact that they make errors in biblical scholarship as well-lest some accept the creationist claim that one must choose between evolution and the Bible.'

179

The Watchtower is NOT a false prophet

by The Quiet One in

regarding what some have said here about the wt being a false prophet.. i would like to make my point regarding the wt not being a false prophet... so please, if you can be patient enough to read this, at least try to understand what i am getting at.. a false prophet is one who, according to deuteronomy, makes a false prediction of the future and claims that the prediction came from god, or in other words claiming that 'god has said he will do a certain thing at a certain time' etc.. for example, hypothetically speaking, if someone had claimed: "god will bring about the end of the world in 2010", they would have been proven to be a false prophet, obviously.

but, as an example, imagine a man who claimed the position of a prophet of god, (as moses did, because although he was not the type of prophet that predicted the future.. he was still a prophet or spokesman for god) and that he had publicised worldwide, according to his interpretation of a (for example) prophecy found in the book of isaiah, that the world would end in 2010.. and he had also stated that he was not saying that god will end the world in that year.. but only that there was biblical evidence that god might do so.

that would clearly have been a mistake.

Disillusioned JW

waton, you made great points in your post about those who existed in 1914 and 1918 and of how many of them are alive today. I also agree with your words of "By supporting, joining wt, you make yourself part of a false prophet entity."

20

"Resurrection" or "Re-Creation of The Soul"? What do really JW's teach?

by EdenOne in

interesting find through a book "inside story of jehovah's witnesses" (1967) by w.c. stevenson, supposedly a former jw circuit overseer.

it's an interesting "apostate" perspective written prior to the wts 1975 debacle.. anyway, at a certain point, there's a quote from a book called "the four cults", by professor anthony a. hoekema (1963, william b. eerdmans publishing company), a calvinist, which makes some sharp remarks about the way jehovah's witnesses teach the dead coming back to life:.

1) in the case of those "resurrecting" for everlasting life on earth, one asks: if the soul is extinct at death, and the body disintegrates and its components are integrated into other forms of life, what is there to "resurrect"?

Disillusioned JW

Yes Phizzy the JW Org's view of being " Spirit Directed" is very muddled. I agree with you about that and about the evidence showing they are not directed by Jehovah's spirit. I remember reading in one article by the WT Society that the WT Society while saying the holy spirit is not a person also says specifically that it has intelligence. When I read that I was thinking "Huh? If it has intelligence doesn't that mean it must be a person, or does the WT mean intelligence in some way like an AI (artificial intelligence) computer program?"

I never thought of using non-WT literature to prepare talks to be given at the Kingdom Halls, and while an active JW I never even owned non-WT books about the Bible or theology. I did notice though that my JW mother and her JW parents both had a non-WT Bible Dictionary (the same Bible Dictionary edition). I suspect that particular Bible Dictionary (and a RSV Bible) was once made available to the JWs through the literature counter (prior to the WT producing the Aid book). It was the one called The New Bible Dictionary, edited by Douglas. I now own a used copy of that book. It is copyright 1962.

After I became inactive and obtained old WT books (most of which I found from a thrift store, though some I bought on eBay) I later noticed in a WT book from the 1940s (the decade that the Theocratic Ministry School was created) that the WT invited JWs to make use of conservative Bible dictionaries and commentaries (though with caution) in preparing talks for JW congregations. The WT also encouraged them to use Bible concordances, including ones which stated the underlying Hebrew or Greek word for the English translation, and to see how the word was used throughout the Bible, in order to see what the Bible teaches on that topic. I recall that it is an approach which the WT says that Russell used in his study groups (before he created Zion's Watch Tower) to learn what the Bible said about the soul and hell and other words used in the KJV Bible.

While Bible commentaries are useful I notice that what they say often conflict with each other. That makes it disconcerting, to me, and challenging when using those commentaries.

Like you, I also am displeased by the WT's "Quote Mining" and by their dishonesty. Their frequent dishonesty it makes me wonder if the people in charge of the WT's writings really think of themselves as faithful true Christians.