Apognophos

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Posts by Apognophos

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  8

  The Superior Qualities of Ancient Roman Concrete

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. social
  2. current

  these concrete walls in trajan's markets in rome are nearly 2000 years old and survived a major earthquake in 1349 ce.. .

  caption: the concrete walls of trajan's markets in rome have stood the test of time and the elements for nearly 2,000 years.

  they have even survived a major earthquake in 1349.. credit: photo courtesy of marie jackson, berkeley.

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  Apognophos

  The Pantheon is another long-standing tribute to Roman ingenuity and Roman concrete. Its dome is still the largest unreinforced concrete dome in history.
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  3

  When you Create your own Bible, it is Much easier to convince of your Lies.

  by objectivetruth in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  the word in question is the hebrew word mishneh meaning "a double, copy, second" (http://strongsnumbers.com/hebrew/4932.htm) this word is a very specific word, which implies a double portion, or twice as much.. it is numerical and precise.. the new world translation translates this word as double in the below 2 scriptures :.

  isaiah 61:7 "instead of shame you will have a double portion, and instead of humiliation they will shout joyfully over their share.yes, they will possess a double (mishneh) portion in their land.

  everlasting rejoicing will be theirs.

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  Apognophos

  Perhaps it's the lack of sleep, but I'm not sure I get your point, objectivetruth. You're objecting to the translation of Jer. 16:18, aren't you? But then you quote the Society's take on Isaiah's double portion. This is based on a correctly-translated scripture in Isa. 61:7, is it not? I'm not clear on the reason you're giving for the Society translating "mishneh" as "full" in Jeremiah, since you go on to talk about the Society's belief about the "double portion".
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  406

  Goodbye JWD/JWN (my last post)

  by slimboyfat in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  after some considerable thought i have decided that i will no longer post on this forum because i want to return to jehovah.

  thank you for all the kindness and many interesting discussions over the years.

  i wish you all well in the future and the decisions you make.

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  Apognophos

  The best thing we can do for sbf is stop talking about whether he's still here or not. This thread should be closed, in my not-so-humble opinion.
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  102

  Should I attend Kingdom Hall meetings to discreetly "preach"?

  by CrytoJesus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  christians, should i attend kingdom hall meetings to discreetly "preach" to jws about the real jesus and the lies of the watchtower?.

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  i plan to go undercover and plant seeds into them.. .

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  Apognophos

  As never a jw stated, people on here tend to exaggerate the negatives about the Witnesses. If the religion had worked well for them, they'd still be in it. So you're looking at a lot of damaged, angry people here. That being said, you'll encounter more of the so-called "programming" as you eventually get into more in-depth discussions with JWs. Look for that moment when they stop being interested in discussing facts and fall back to "knowing it's the truth".
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  27

  How can I ever leave this cult?

  by Julia Orwell in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i've been out nearly two years but it's not out of me.

  i am on school holidays now til february so i thought without work to worry about i can come off my medication.

  i phased it slowly, starting in early november to avoid the physical side effects of coming down.

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  Apognophos

  It sounds to me like your problems do not directly have to do with the religion. I say this simply because most ex-JWs do not have this much trouble moving on. If you were never a Witness, you would not be fixated on your Witness past but on a past marriage, etc. That being said, I'm not sure it's healthy for you to keep living in the same place. Perhaps you need to move to where you don't know any JWs? I think you need to break out of the box of your old memories and start forming new ones, which may require drastic life changes.
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  24

  CREATIVE "DAYS" - What do JWs believe?

  by Bloody Hotdogs! in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  a few weeks ago, i asked you to critique my website article on dinosaurs (http://www.jwbeliefs.com/what-do-jehovahs-witnesses-believe-about-dinosaurs/).

  it was pointed out that much of what i wrote depends on the creative "days" being relatively short - something i believe jws teach.. after being prompted to review my conclusions/research, i was more convinced than ever that jws promote relatively short creative days.

  the nail in the coffin was the teaching that day seven is indicative of the length of the other six days (i.e.

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  Apognophos

  I basically agree with your findings, Hotdogs, except:

  FACT: JWs have always taught that "day" seven can be used to infer the length of the other days. This has been explicitly stated as recent as 1998 (see Creator Book, quoted above). Nothing has been published that contradicts or revises this teaching.

  Although the Creator book is obviously more recent than Insight, leaving_quietly's Insight quote shows that the Society has considered the possibility that the other days were not 7,000 years. Notice the phrase at the end "at least thousands of years in length", which is allowing for a range of possible lengths for those days.

  That being said, I think that it's probably an unpleasant thought for the higher-ups to contemplate the other six days being different lengths because it intrudes on the circular reasoning behind day 7 being 7,000 years. If the other days were longer then it brings into question why this one has to be 7,000 years and not longer. So most WT quotes do seem to be hinting that they want all days to be even in length, but they're still avoiding any definite statements about that.

  For that reason I still urge caution in making an assertion about something which does not have direct quotes from the Society to back it up. I know it's tempting to say that they believe this since it places them into a clear conflict with science, but even in the Creator book they are only saying "the other days must be thousands of years long", without using any wording like "of equal length to day 7". We may think we know what they are getting at, but it's not spelled out, so it's easily deniable on their part.

  FACT: If the "end" comes as soon as JWs say it will, "day" seven will end up being about 7000 years long.

  FACT: All six creative days are described as encompasing "thousands" of years each. The only reason for this slightly vague choice of words is that JWs cannot pinpoint the date of the beginning of “day” seven (something they once tried to do: 1975 fiasco) and therefore cannot know exactly how long it will end up being.

  No, day 7 is still exactly 7,000 years, in their opinion. It's just a question of when the day starts. Clearly Franz' date of 4026 B.C. was wrong; even if it were the date of Adam's creation, it seems that Eve's creation was more than 39 years later or else the 6,000 years would have been up by now and Armageddon would have come. This simply means that Eve's creation, the final act of day 6, happened after the fall of 3987 B.C. (if my math is right). It doesn't change the length of day 7 in the minds of the WT leadership.
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  30

  Governing Bodies Secret Elder's training video on suicide leaked

  by Watchtower-Free in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  watchtower minions have pulled down jwsurveys links .

  here's another one .. the gb should be held liable for this crap.

  http://www.mediafire.com/watch/cvas6fcrc9zca94/shepherding_instructional_suicidal_widow.avi.

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  Apognophos

  Am I the only one who always reads this thread title as "A training video for elders on how to commit suicide"? I can't be the only one.
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  42

  Creationism emails from a JW

  by TheStumbler in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  earlier this year, i received an email from a jw family member with a link to this video:.

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1ruhkgqjug.

  i wrote a long reply debunking the video (mostly copying talkorigins info).

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  Apognophos

  You might want to stick to just the first two paragraphs in your post 189 (up until "Further to this"); it's a good conclusion to the Quran analogy that makes things a little more explicit for the JW (better to spell things out for him than leave him to connect any of the dots). As you said, the part about the inaccuracies in the "science" of Genesis is tricky because it could be going "too far" for the JW. I don't think that anybody can absorb a ton of contrary information at once, JW or not.
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  24

  As a JW Did You Often Feel "Guilty" About Something?

  by minimus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  if muslim is supposed to be the religion of peace, jehovah's witnesses has to be the religion of guilt..

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  Apognophos

  Thankfully, not often. Though I do remember giving myself relief (if you know what I mean) once while I was aux pioneering and serving as an elder and I did feel a little guilt.

  Once?! Is that a joke?
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  42

  Creationism emails from a JW

  by TheStumbler in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  earlier this year, i received an email from a jw family member with a link to this video:.

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1ruhkgqjug.

  i wrote a long reply debunking the video (mostly copying talkorigins info).

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  Apognophos

  Well, I do think this part might be over the head of the average Witness. It's hard to really give the subject a good treatment while also being brief, and the evidence for the "creation from chaos" reading is clear only after looking at related myths and discussions of Hebrew words like bereshit and tohu wabohu. So yeah, maybe just keep it pithy and give him something to think about with the Quran comparison.