Posts by Drearyweather

24

How long did it take before you realized that you missed the obvious?

by pistolpete in

remember when the public speaker in the kingdom hall or convention related the ten plagues and the parting of the red sea?.

the finale when jehovah closes the red sea and swallows pharaoh's entire army of egyptian men.. when i was a little kid about 5 years old and listened to this story, i would think---wow jehovah is strong.

when i started school and started learning compassion as early as the first grade i started wondering?????.

Drearyweather

I remember asking a circuit overseer if Adam in the garden of Eden needed a sword for any reason? He said no...So Jehovah invented the Sword, not man then? i asked. He looked confused,

I guess this discussion between you and the Circuit Overseer must have happened before 1994. The following is the answer given in a 94 WT article:

w94 2/1 p. 31

Consider another example from the early chapters of Genesis. After Adam and Eve sinned and were expelled from the garden, Jehovah prevented them from returning. How? Genesis 3:24 says: “He drove the man out and posted at the east of the garden of Eden the cherubs and the flaming blade of a sword that was turning itself continually to guard the way to the tree of life.” Notice, “the flaming blade of a sword.” Did God invent swords?

We need not conclude that our loving Creator was the first one to make what we know as swords. Adam and Eve saw turning in front of the angels something that was blazing. What exactly was it? By the time Moses wrote the book of Genesis, swords were well-known and used in warfare. (Genesis 31:26; 34:26; 48:22; Exodus 5:21; 17:13) So Moses’ words “the flaming blade of a sword” enabled his readers to visualize to a degree what existed at the entrance of Eden. The information known in Moses’ day contributed to the understanding of such matters. And the language Moses employed must have been accurate, for Jehovah had it included in the Bible.—2 Timothy 3:16.

24

How long did it take before you realized that you missed the obvious?

by pistolpete in

remember when the public speaker in the kingdom hall or convention related the ten plagues and the parting of the red sea?.

the finale when jehovah closes the red sea and swallows pharaoh's entire army of egyptian men.. when i was a little kid about 5 years old and listened to this story, i would think---wow jehovah is strong.

when i started school and started learning compassion as early as the first grade i started wondering?????.

Drearyweather

Wondering about all those Egyptian Men!!

Ok, so I read the story again. A group of men with spears and weapons pursing a group of families with children, women, and old people, sick people, etc. If I was among the Israelites, then I would have been happy to see those men drown in the red sea, than see my wife, kids and parents being killed or subjugated by them.

55

Ban on Independent Meetings

by lssjr in

source - march 2021 announcements - - https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5085868283920384/2021-march-147-english-german-announcements-reminders.

this is a sobering reminder of what happened some 40 years ago when raymond franz and others were literally kicked out from the jehovah's witnesses for having pre-arranged private spiritual discussions.lesson: paragraph 7 is another example of the i and t in dr. steven hassan's bite model of the 21st century cult - information and thought control at its best!!!!

"my gosh, there must be a lot of independent meetings these days.

Drearyweather

This announcement is actually a relief to witnesses!

In our congregation, our elder used to conduct a weekly session to understand the Pure Worship (Ezekiel) book, every Saturday, which sometimes used to run to 3 hrs! Ones who didn't attend were even counseled.

In our neighboring congregation, they had a daily 45 min morning worship program to discuss the daily text.

I have attended these with my family and none of these meetings were 'deep research' meetings, but just some energetic overzealot elders taking advantage of the property of gathering everyone over zoom, and which overburdened the publishers.

Good riddance!

15

Do We Get A Clean Slate When We Die? (Watchtower View Examined)

by Sea Breeze in

the watchtower teaches that the opportunity to be born again and enjoy complete justification with god ended in 1935, having been limited to only 144k since pentecost.

so, it is very surprising that the watchtower embraces the death that is described in romans chapter 6, since this is the very death that is required to be born again…… which is denied to watchtower members!

romans chapter 6, verse 7 is about saying goodbye to the old personality, the “old man” in the king james version.

Drearyweather

The Watchtower teaches that the opportunity to be born again and enjoy complete Justification with God ended in 1935

This is old light

19

Teachings "Unique to JW's" They Hide From You Before Baptism

by Sea Breeze in

jehovah can't be your father in this life.

'they [jw members] address him prospectively as "our father.

jesus is not your mediator:.

Drearyweather

How can we say that the JW's hide these teachings, when the references you have mentioned are out in the public domain on their website?

Any individual who is studying with the witnesses has access to these publications.

If an individual has not figured out these basic teachings after a year or 2 of studying, then there is something wrong with him.

5

Jwism is social/communism, bad for society.

by Overrated in

jw
friends

working with my brother who is still a jw that jwism is a disaster for it's people and even life threatening by it's rules.

and to live a true free life, the best is to thing to do is leave it..

Drearyweather

WTWizard:

You are seriously hilarious

24

Have JEHOVAH ever supported WARS between his WORSHIPPERS?

by Longlivetherenegades in

jehovah's witnesses used to state other christian denominations go to war and in fact that their religious leaders bless such wars.

they see this as one reason why all other christian denominations are not true christians since they kill one another at war and therefore they don't love one another as stated by jesus in john 13: 34,35.. for example when a roman catholic go to war, he/she is bound to kill a fellow roman catholic in the cause of the war.

therefore roman catholic can't be true christians since its member don't love one another and kill one another at war and as such god cannot be in support of such wars where his worshippers kill one another.. the question that comes for consideration is, has jehovah ever supported wars between his own worshippers?.

Drearyweather

More than a war, the story reads like a case of internal strife and a case of revenge.

So a few men rape a concubine of a homeowner the whole night, who dies in the morning. When other tribes asked the Benjaminite tribe to give out those men to put them to death, they refused, and instead decided to war against them.

In the war, the Benjaminites end up getting killed and annihilated.

God’s arrangement was that each tribe had a group of Older men that were qualified to judge these kinds of cases.

Yes, it was God's arrangement. But what happens if the same judges shield the gang rapists? Remember, rather than punish the rapists, these men decided to wage war against the other Israelite tribes and even killed 22,000 of their men. On the second day, they again killed another 18,000 Israelites. What should the Israelites have done in reply?

What were these Benjaminite 'judges' doing in the city? The case was now not just judging those few rapists, but an entire tribe who was ignoring the existing laws.

Jehovah himself arranged for the justice and punishment to be meted out. The law is not bigger than the lawmaker.

Morally, there is no place in this world for people like Benjaminites who support and shield gang rapists.

8

Jehovah`s Witnesses owe their existence to Christendom`s groundwork.

by smiddy3 in

1.jehovah`s witnesses base their bible on christendoms determination of what books of scripture were to become what is known as the bible today,going back to the third century ad.. there were many ,many other books of scripture in existence at that time that these men decided in their own imperfect wisdom not to include them .. where it suited them the jw / gb would use the research of christendoms learned men who compiled bible dictionary`s and bible concordances.. 2.by far the vast majority of jehovah`s witnesses today are off-shoots of many of christendom`s religions from whom they poached members from and then gave birth to their own offspring to grow in numbers.. with all of there self praise of witnessing in all of the earth ,it is mainly wholly contained in lands where christendom has established the major religion of that land and jw`s have poached the most vulnerable people of that time.. 3.how many thousands of people have they converted in bangladesh ?

pakistan ?

china ?

Drearyweather

Christianity as a whole came into being when Jesus poached followers from Judaism. Each religion starts as an offshoot of another one.

The problem is retention. Christendom has the worst record of retaining members. The growth on an offshoot simply means that the original did a poor job in holding on its members.

10

The Marcionite Hypothesis

by HowTheBibleWasCreated in

i'm still working on the hebrew bible for my book but looking ahead most of my research had fallen into place as i take month off from research., when it come to the nt most people accept what is commonly called markian priority.

this common theory says that mark was written in 70 ad and then a saying gospel of jesus called q was combined with this to make matthew and luke sometimes around 100 ad.

john as later.

Drearyweather

Paul if we assume Acts is true would have been so famous that Josephus would have mentioned him. He didn't. He didn't mention jesus either but that's another issue.

Josephus didn't mention bout Jesus in his writing? Are you sure? Because, I had studied about him mentioning about 'Jesus - who was called the Christ' in his Antiquities

30

Thoughts on JW funerals

by Syme in

i recently had the sad opportunity to attend 2 jw funerals.

the first was a few months ago and the second today.

the first was my grandfather's and the second of an old friend back from my jw days.

Drearyweather

The latest outline dated 10/20 states this in the notes:

Adapt the material to match the circumstances of the deceased and the needs of grieving ones. While not overpraising the deceased, you may use events from his life throughout the talk to show how those in attendance can benefit from his example.