in the 2 halls i was in, there were a few.
but the most memorable one was an elderly pioneer who would ask the householder if they wanted to hear about "the truth".
when they quite naturally said ,"no", he responded with, "if you don't believe in jesus, jesus will turn you into a pig"!.
Wow, these are some stories.
Anator, no, I don't really recall anything this crazy. Looking back, I think most people I knew were just normal J-Dubs. And a "normal" J-Dub is the equivalent as a weird "worldly" person. I was young, so maybe I just don't remember because I've tried to block everything out of my mind. I'm desparately trying to recall something.
in the 2 halls i was in, there were a few.
but the most memorable one was an elderly pioneer who would ask the householder if they wanted to hear about "the truth".
when they quite naturally said ,"no", he responded with, "if you don't believe in jesus, jesus will turn you into a pig"!.
I can't believe some of the stories I'm hearing. I've attended three congregations in my day, and haven't heard anything like these stories.
the road less travelled or releasing the bond?
i already read crisis oc, almost done with in search of cf.
and of course, im still reading other bible translations.
Here's a diverse group of five books to round out your education:
1. What Evolution Is by Ernst Mayr
2. The Brothers Karamazov
3. Why I Am Not A Christian by Bertrand Russell
4. The entire Bob Dylan song catalogue
5. Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
i really want to believe it, but, sometimes it is very difficult to figure out how it can be from god.
i mean, in the old testament, he seems horrible in some instances.
the adam and eve thing doesn't make to much sense to me.
Cognac, I can give you some resources if you're interested. When I was a witness, I read extensively on the topics of the historical Jesus, history of the ancient world, and historical and critical analysis of the Bible. I guess I am still interested in these, I just haven't pursued it in recent years. What I found interesting is that even the most "conservative" Bible scholars have views that differ from the WTBTS's teachings. The WTBTS and its rank and file adherents don't know anything about, what I would broadly term, "the historical context of the Bible." Why do you think they don't want you to research outside of their publications?
i really want to believe it, but, sometimes it is very difficult to figure out how it can be from god.
i mean, in the old testament, he seems horrible in some instances.
the adam and eve thing doesn't make to much sense to me.
Well, Cognac, thanks. To reply to your question regarding Jesus' lineage and the fulfilled prophecies, I would argue that the "prophecies" are nothing more than the Gospel writers either deliberately falsifying facts about Jesus' life, embellishing, or misinterpreting such facts. I'm not one of those who believe the Gospels are entire fabrications, but I do believe the writers, whoever they were, desperately wanted to believe that this Jesus of Nazareth was the Jewish messiah, so they wrote the Gospels to that effect. I also hold to the belief that each Gospel was meant for the Greco-Roman world at large, but each had a particular segment of the Greco-Roman population in mind. The writers weren't idiots, and I don't think there was deliberate deceit; I think they meant well, but I think they also took great pains to portray Jesus as a divine figure, i.e. one who performed miracles, one who was resurrected from the dead, etc. Who in the Greco-Roman world would accept a Savior who wasn't divine? There were already plenty of divine or semi-divine figures in the Greco-Roman mythologies. Jesus had to stand out somehow.
As far as his lineage is concerned, I'm not familiar with what current scholarship says about that.
i really want to believe it, but, sometimes it is very difficult to figure out how it can be from god.
i mean, in the old testament, he seems horrible in some instances.
the adam and eve thing doesn't make to much sense to me.
The Witlesses says that the Bible is "inspired of God" because it itself says it is inspired. Fine, but my next question would be, and a question that I have proposed to many Witlesses is "Then why don't we accept other books based on the fact that they claim some kind of divine backing?" I am talking about the Koran, the Vedas, and other writings that claim some type of divine backing. Accepting divine inspiration for any book solely based on its own claim is illogical at best, preposterous at its worst.
My belief is that if the Old and New Testaments were divinely inspired, then there wouldn't be any evidence to the contrary and, trust me, there is plenty of evidence to the contrary.
it came on the car radio this morning, and reminded me that this was probably the big single of 1977 - just about the beginning of the end time for me with the jehovah's witnesses.. now, you might understand that as a doubting elder with many deep issues at hand (it was the ray franz era of disenchantment for many elders)...i never heard much from them about the lyrics.. however - listening to it today, i can see where a "good" dubbie might find it to be at least as demonized as the smurfs cartoons.. and yet, very ironically, looking at them then and now, i always viewed it to be a sort of pop-social commentary on the california celebrity scene.. stretching it a little, you could almost compare the traveler's nightmare experience to getting trapped into the jehovah's witnesses - thinking it was a safe haven but then finding out that "you can never leave".. "we haven't had that spirit here since 1959".
"in the master's chamber they gathered for the feast".... yes, i can apply a lot of this to the cult entrapment experience..
In a 2009 interview, Plain Dealer music critic John Soeder asked Don Henley this about the lyrics:
On "Hotel California," you sing: "So I called up the captain / 'Please bring me my wine' / He said, 'We haven't had that spirit here since 1969.'" I realize I'm probably not the first to bring this to your attention, but wine isn't a spirit. Wine is fermented; spirits are distilled. Do you regret that lyric?
Henley responded,
"Thanks for the tutorial and, no, you're not the first to bring this to my attention—and you're not the first to completely misinterpret the lyric and miss the metaphor. Believe me, I've consumed enough alcoholic beverages in my time to know how they are made and what the proper nomenclature is. But that line in the song has little or nothing to do with alcoholic beverages. It's a sociopolitical statement. My only regret would be having to explain it in detail to you, which would defeat the purpose of using literary devices in songwriting and lower the discussion to some silly and irrelevant argument about chemical processes." [ 11 ]
In response to the above, I always thought "we haven't had that spirit here since 1969" meant "spirit" in the sense of "that's a good spirit," like a positive, playful attitude, not in "spirit" as in alcohol.
so my husband dragged me to the meeting this morning.
i brought my new bible that i bought instead of the nwt and he didn't say anything about it.
in the public talk, the speaker opened to matt.
"And of coarse he gives a list of what those deeds are: meetings, preaching work, conduct, dress and grooming, entertainment, speech, ect... "
It looks like they covered the basics, i.e. doing everything the WT says. That's basically what they mean. It's sad that they don't include helping the poor, taking care of the seniors, unless of course. To hell with all of them unless they can report 10 hours of field circus or more.
it came on the car radio this morning, and reminded me that this was probably the big single of 1977 - just about the beginning of the end time for me with the jehovah's witnesses.. now, you might understand that as a doubting elder with many deep issues at hand (it was the ray franz era of disenchantment for many elders)...i never heard much from them about the lyrics.. however - listening to it today, i can see where a "good" dubbie might find it to be at least as demonized as the smurfs cartoons.. and yet, very ironically, looking at them then and now, i always viewed it to be a sort of pop-social commentary on the california celebrity scene.. stretching it a little, you could almost compare the traveler's nightmare experience to getting trapped into the jehovah's witnesses - thinking it was a safe haven but then finding out that "you can never leave".. "we haven't had that spirit here since 1959".
"in the master's chamber they gathered for the feast".... yes, i can apply a lot of this to the cult entrapment experience..
My parents tried to censor my music quite a bit, and although I had this album, there was never any objection. My mother was hard core about entertainment, so go figure, probably because it doesn't have any obvious "demonic" themes.
i know some jw's who only watch movies with specific ratings.
some will watch only pg and g. others will watch pg-13.
but i know which ones i can watch these with and which ones not to.
I watched R-rated movies all the time, but never told anyone about it. I went to see Gladiator at the theater and casually mentioned it to a friend who was not hung up on things like that. I remember telling him to see how he would react, which he didn't. Another time, about a year before the above incident, I ran into a sister at Blockbuster video. It was kind of awkward. She was around 50 or so at the time, and although she was single, and not an elder's wife or anything, she was respected in the congregation. If I recall correctly, she had asked me for a recommendation, and I happened to recommend The Insider. It was R-rated, but for language, as I recall. I don't think she knew it was R-rated, and if she did, she didn't act like it. Nothing happened as a result of this encounter.
But like I said, I watched R-rated movies from the time I was a kid until I left. I never told anyone, including my parents.
