When I think of the Bible from a Bible believer perspective instead of an atheistic nonreligious perspective, I think of deadly plague (including Covid-19) as having to do with plagues (and bowls of God's wrath) mentioned in the book of Revelation and in Luke 21:10-11 (and Luke 21 is a tie in to Matthew 24). Vanderhoven7, note that although Matthew chapter 24 doesn't mention pestilences, Luke chapter 21 does and Revelation does. Furthermore, I think of wildfires and the scientific predictions of the eventual effects of Global Warming (unless humans prevent the worst of Global Warming) as having to do with the bowls of God's wrath (poured out from heaven) mentioned in the book of Revelation, and Luke 21:11's mention of "fearful sights and from heaven great signs".
Disillusioned JW
JoinedPosts by Disillusioned JW
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Pandemic as part of Bible prophecy?
by truthseeker ini was thinking that since russell started the movement in 1879 which became jehovah's witnesses in 1931 never has there been a period in time when all their activities just - stopped.
especially the preaching work.. do you think they will find some obscure verse in daniel that talks about this period of time and try to make a greater fulfillment?
like the 70 weeks of years or the 42 months?
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Disillusioned JW
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2034 - A Future History of Jehovah's Witnesses
by slimboyfat ini don't know what i am talking about... read this post at your peril.
back in the 1960s there was, seemingly, a brief period of relaxation in authoritarianism among jehovah's witnesses.
those who have read raymond franz's 'crisis of conscience' will have heard the story about dan sydlik's remark about the need to 'open some windows to let some air in here'.
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Disillusioned JW
Regarding 1975 I was shocked to learn (from reading ex-JW books by Franz and Penton) that the 1975 date first began to be taught in 1966 (in the Life Everlasting - in Freedom of the Sons of God book). I had long assumed it began being taught much earlier, since it was based up when the 6th creative day supposedly started. But I remember that in the Proclaimer's book the WT said they added about 100 years to when the 6th creative day would end (teaching in Russell's time that it ended in 1874), to discovering a problem (they claim) with the KJV translation of a verse. Long before then Rutherford had moved the teaching pertaining to 1874 to 1914 (or he had dropped the 1874 date and after Rutherford died the WT began substituting the 1914 date for the 1874 date) - but my memory is fuzzy on the details about this.
Rather than the year 2034, the years 2030 and 2033 make more sense to me. That is because it is commonly taught that Jesus began his preaching in the year 30 AD (CE) and was crucified in 33 AD (CE), and if we converse the WT date of when Adam was created as a result of thinking of biblical years of a 360 day prophetic calendar (instead of an approximately 365.2524 day solar calendar), then we get the date of about 3968 BCE as the date of Adam's creation and that is about 4000 years before 33 CE! That means Christ would return about 6000 years after that year, namely in about 2033. [4026 x 360/365.2524 = 3968.105, hence 3968 BCE for Adam's creation date instead of 4024 BCE; 3968 BCE + 6000 solar years +1 solar year [due to no year 0] = 2033 CE).
It is interesting to me that the 2033 CE date is very close to the date which some calculated as 1914 CE plus 120 years (= 2034 CE).
Usher had calculated the creation of the world and of Adam as being 4000 years before the birth of Christ (which I think he believed was on December 25, 1 BC) and he thus got the year of 4000 BC as the creation date. Some people then added 2000 years to that and got 2000 AD/CE (or 2001 AD/CE0, but I (and ideas I read of someone on the internet) think it makes more sense to add 2000 years from the year Christ began his ministry or to the year Christ died - instead of to his year of birth.
The dates of 2030 and 2033 are ones I came up while I was an independent Christian (somewhere around the year 2007). Though I am now an atheist I sometimes hypothetically wonder that if I am wrong in thinking there is no heavenly Jesus Christ, will Christ appear in judgement in the year 2030 or 2033. Along those lines I wonder if the tribulation will begin in 2030 and if Christ will come in judgement 3.5 years later and if something supernatural might take place in 2036 (or 2037).
Keep on the watch for the years 2030 CE - 2036 CE.
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Resistace to going back to meetings
by truthseeker inlot going on.
i had a covid divorce last year over zoom.
not pretty but i got a good deal.. anyway,.
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Disillusioned JW
I hope most JWs in the USA and Europe stop going to the kingdom halls,stop donating to the WT and the congregation, and do no more than a token amount of field service.
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Levels of dependency both inside and outside of the JWs
by joe134cd injust been looking at posts over on reddit, with people bragging of attending the memorial under the influence.
ok fair enough i guess.
but it got me thinking.
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Disillusioned JW
joe134cd in this topic thread you seem to be excluding joining (whether physically, mentally, or both) a non-JW religion as being a type of POMO. Is that the case? Many people when they become physically out of the JW religion and mentally out of the JW religion join another religion. Thus such people are PIMI in regards to a non-JW relgion (such as Baptist, SDA, Mormon, Catholic, or nondenominational Christian or religious Buddhist) and thus not secular, even though they are POMO of the JW religion (and thus outside of the JWs). Likewise a person can be PIMO of the JW and POMI a non-JW religion. Do you wish to include those categories of people in your analysis?
For a two or more years when I was POMO of the JW religion and at the same time not yet secular I considered myself an independent Christian. While an independent Christian I believed in most of the teachings of the Church of God (Abrahamic Faith) and most the teachings of the Church of God (Seventh Day) as well as some other religious ideas, including the belief that according to the Bible women should be allowed to be deacons and elders, and that Mary Magdalene was an "apostle to the apostles".
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Levels of dependency both inside and outside of the JWs
by joe134cd injust been looking at posts over on reddit, with people bragging of attending the memorial under the influence.
ok fair enough i guess.
but it got me thinking.
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Disillusioned JW
"Is a pot-smoking JW really a JW ... "? Provided the person still considers herself/himself/itself a JW and is considered by the congregation to be a JW, then the answer is yes, in the same sense that a JW elder who sexually abuses his child is still a JW elder - until the religion designates him as no longer a JW elder.
Likewise a JW who habitually fornicates (unknown to the congregation) and who habitually smokes tobacco (unknown to the congregation) and who steals (unknown to the congregation) and secretly has some doctrinal beliefs which the WT considers apostate, but who thinks of herself/himself/itself as a JW, is active in field service, and attends JW meetings, is still a JW - until the religion designates the person as no longer a JW.
Yes in these examples the person is breaking major rules of the WT/JW religion, but by the definition of the religion (and also in the mind the person claiming to be a JW) the person is still a JW.
If someone answers "No" to the question of "Is a pot-smoking JW really a JW ...?", then that person is committing what is called the "No true Scotsman" fallacy. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman for more information.
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James Beverley's book on Penton's expulsion now on Abebooks
by MrMonroe in"crisis of allegiance" is a slim, but excellent book written by a professor of religion on the events in lethbridge, alberta, around 1981, that led to the expulsion of jim penton, a jw who believed he was anointed but also happened to think the wts had some doctrines wrong.. it's a great read that ties in quite closely with the campaign to get rid of ray franz, showing the dirty tricks used by the society to rid themselves of someone who dared to question them.
penton was an academic who the society loved when he wrote a book on their human rights legal challenges ... but when he expanded his research and decided to do a book on their history, pow!
they began regarding him with great suspicion.
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Disillusioned JW
I didn't start reading books which JWs label as apostate until after I began seriously doubting the JW religion as a result of me noticing problems in the WT's own publications and in their policies.
I very recently checked out from the library M. James Penton's book called APOCALYPSE DELAYED: The Story of Jehovah's Witnesses (copyright 1985). Yesterday I noticed that on page 106 it says the following. "Jehovah's Witnesses in the Divine Purpose and Alexander H. Macmillan's Faith on the March presented false history, in particular with respect to the Watch Tower schism of 1917." I own both the JW books and while I noticed that Macmillan's book makes false claims (in addition to half truths) [which thus caused me want to get rid of it by selling it for a profit] and that Jehovah's Witnesses in the Divine Purpose also makes some half truths (or made some misleading statements and left out major faults of the WT), I didn't think that the latter book made outright false claims. I am thus shocked that Penton says the WT book "presented false history, in particular with respect to the Watch Tower schism of 1917". I will have to research that claim of Penton.
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Ok...so then here is my 'proper' intro ;)
by Rubyvixen ini actually have been reading these forums for about two years now and just decided to finally register.
where does one go to make a proper intro post?
edit: alrighty then, i guess i will do my little intro here.
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Disillusioned JW
Hello Bernadette and hello joao. Welcome to the forum.
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Jw's sending me invites and letters, I don't get it.
by Foolednomore infirst off, i have made it real clear with jw's my thoughts on being a jw.
i'm out, there is no coming back.. second, i'm on their " do not call list" .. so why now all of a sudden my mailbox is getting bombed 💣 by their memorial invites and letters?.
don't they follow their do not call list?
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Disillusioned JW
The enclosed WT published invitation to the Memorial includes a request for people to go to jw.org to watch a video to "See a preview of the wonderful future that the death of Jesus makes possible." I wonder how much time is allotted in the video's depiction of a wonderful future and I wonder how emotionally stirring that depiction is. Maybe I will watch that video the next time I go to the public library. Though the depiction will be of fiction (to me), it still might be entertaining to me.
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Memorial Weirdness
by Ding inthose of us with a watchtower background probably see the memorial as normal.. at least, we're used to it.. we can forget how weird it seems to an outsider.. it's like inviting a group out to dinner, having meals placed on the table, and then explaining to them why no one present should be partaking of any of it because it's really intended for someone else..
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Disillusioned JW
In contrast many years ago when I visited a nearby Reform Judaism synagogue on a Sabbath day (merely to see what it was like), during the service the Rabbi urged me (a non-Jewish stranger to him), to partake of the bread of wine. Since I was already an atheistic Secular Humanist by then, I refused to do so (because I didn't want to give the impression of participating in worship).
At another time when I was already an atheistic Secular Humanist, I was attending a service of a nearby congregation of Humanistic Judaism. During part of the service the bread and small paper (or plastic) cups of wine (which had secular humanistic meanings in the service) were passed around to everyone present (including to young children), including to me, and I partook of them. Each person received their own bread and their own small cup of wine (unless they didn't want the wine; I think there was an option for water instead of wine).
During the service emblems were passed around at multiple times, each serving received had a somewhat different meaning (I think each pertained to a different blessing and a season of the year or each month of the year, but I don't recall for certain). But I didn't like drinking the wine because I could feel the alcohol effecting me adversely (I could feel it starting to intoxicate me) from the multiple small (possibly one ounce) servings of wine, thus at some point I stopped accepting more servings of wine (which was permissible to do).
By the way, years ago I stopped fully identifying as a Humanist (since I don't agree with all of the precepts of Humanism), though I still identify as an atheist. I now prefer to identify as a scientific/philosophical (or even metaphysical) naturalist instead of as a Humanist.
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Memorial Invite Letter
by RULES & REGULATIONS inhave you received your 2022 memorial invite?
here is one sent to my friend from his witness neighbor!
what are the odds that after receiving this invite, someone will attend the memorial?.
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Disillusioned JW
I also get the impression they are frantically trying to bring people back into the religion and to bring new people into it.