Posts by Irenaeus

14

Moral absolutes

by Aztec in

i keep saying i am going to start a thread on this topic so here goes.... what, if anything, is always morally wrong?

murder, rape, incest?

how much do you think your belief, or lack thereof, in a higher power influences your opinion?.

A set of moral absolutes is only rationally possible if one believes that there is an ultimate good such as God who determines what morals should be. If one does not believe in God or at least some transcendent entity such as the Tao, then, in a purely materialistc world morality is meaningless except as a functional means of getting on within a society. However, if one can cheat, steal, rape or whatever and get away with it, there is nothing wrong with it; whatever happens just is! So, then, if there is no summum bonum, Nietzsche was quite right: We are beyond Good and Evil! This means that killing 6,000,000 Jews in concentration camps was not immoral; it was just Hitler expressing his feelings. It means that cannibalism, human sacrifice, the burning of small children to Moloch, and the sexual violation of small children is okay if it suits your fancy. It also means that all the bitching about the Watchtower Society and the "sins" of the Witnesses is nothing more than psychological venting. So if you don't have some moral and ethical basis for making statements about what is right or wrong, good or evil, don't make a fool of yourself by making judgments.

On the subject of war in Iraq, it is, I believe, a violation of traditional Christian values despite George Bush and his "born again Christianity." It cannot be defended from the standpoint of Christian pacifism, nor can it fit with the "just war" theory. That, I suspect, was why the pope was so against it.

16

What Is God's Real Name?

by Latin assassin from Manhattan in

if your name is mike, would you translate it to swahili, korean or russian?

american presidents never translate their names and they're the most powerful men on the planet.

is it possible that god's name is in fact, a hebrew name and that jws don't want to use this name because it will not bring in converts?

Irenaeus

First, the statement that we do not translate the names of leaders is wrong. Over the centuries the names of kings and others have been put in the forms used for those names in whatever particular language was being used. For example, a king named Carlos I in Spanish has often been called Charles I in English and Karl I in German. What is done with the names of American presidents is therefore neither here nor there. Anyway, how can the questioner be so sure that the English forms of their names are retained in all other languages?

Second, there are good reasons for changing name forms in various languages. Often, people using other languages cannot pronounce names as they are in the original languages in which they have been given. Frequently, there are sounds that are common in one language that do not exist in other languages. Many languages do not have the two TH sounds that exist in English, for example, and English speakers often have a heck of a time pronouncing a French U, a German umlauted U or a Spanish RR.

Third, I do think Greg Stafford has made a good case to show that in fact the form Yahweh was not the original pronunciation of the divine name, and since we cannot tell exactly how it was pronounced, various forms are okay. Because the name does have significance, probably meaning that God is active in relation to humans, for scholars, whether Christians or Jews, the name is important. Thus, while Watchtower arguments often lack rationallity, in this case I think they are right.

It is quite true that the name Jesus is not an accurate transliteration. Neither is the name James, which is Jacob in Hebrew and Greek but appears in modern languages in many forms. The case of the name Jesus is interesting. It simply couldn't have been transliterated from Aramaic or Hebrew into Greek. Why? Because Greek did not and does not have a letter H except as what is called a rough brething sign that is placed over a vowel or R at the beginning of a word. So when the Greeks had a name in a foreign language that they wanted to put in Greek, they substituted the letter S for the H in the original unless the H was the first letter in the name.

22

all sex and nothing to show for it!!!!!!!!!!

by petespal2002 in

reading the thred on vasectomy got me musing; if we were put on earth to populate it, and given sex organs purely for this purpose, what about all the jw's who 'sacrifice' having a family so they can 'do more' in the service.

would it not be improper to use your sex organs purely for pleasure, or do they give up having sex as well?

Irenaeus

I really feel sad to see the way a very serious issue has been treated on this thread. There can be no doubt that sex between a male and a female can and frequently does bring about procreation. But no sensible person besides the pope seems to think that that is the only reason for sex, and I doubt if even he does. Another reason for sex is to fulfill a healthy need and to develop a close relationship with a partner in life. Were this not the case, I would imagine that intercourse between a couple would end when the woman reached a point where she could no longer have children. While the Watchtower's view of sex is a curious one based largely on its concept of the nearness of the end and a desire to make more converts, the idea that a couple may decide not to have children for certain specific reasons is not illegitimate. Sometimes not having children may be for health reasons or for genetic reasons. Sometimes it may be for economic reasons. Also, it may be legitimate because a couple want to serve others in a positive and loving way. While Rutherford and his heirs had a rather sick view of sex and marriage, that is not to say that everything about JW thinking is wrong.

To me, as a person who has been married for many years to the same partner, has children, grandchildren and a coming great grandchild, sex is a wonderful and beautiful thing. Therefore, I cannot treat it lightly, nor can I treat an evaluation of it lightly or childishly. Human sexuality has profund moral, psychological and sociological ramifications, and I think it very sad indeed that, as Malcolm Muggeridge has said, "In our era the orgasm has replaced the cross as the prime article of worship."

14

Jehovah's Witnesses Defended

by greven in

jw
friends

hi guys!.

has anyone read "jehovah's witnesses defended: an answer to scholars and critics" by greg stafford?

i haven't but i ask this because it got a 4.5 rating on amazon.com!!!.

Irenaeus

I understand Furuli's latest work is out now. I will find the address and post it. The guy's first book took a stance on linguistics that is way out of date. To put it in a nutshell, he argues that the word gives us basic meaning when most liguists would argue that the context in which a word is placed is what gives the nuanced meaning of a word. I guess coming from so far north does something to some people's brains. I am sure Carl Olof Jonsson will chew him up and spit him out. After all, Carl's work is not based on linguistic examinations - which in this case don't mean a heck of a lot - but on some 14 lines of inquiry.

There are several academics in univerities in Europe and the U.S.A. who are JWs. How they can remain such is beyond me. The majority who study the movement and its nonsense leave, but some continue to stick. One can do this in Catholicism because there are various levels of religiosity in that faith, but there is one level of intellectuality in Watchtower religion--a very low one based on the low level of intellectuality at Brooklyn.

14

Jehovah's Witnesses Defended

by greven in

jw
friends

hi guys!.

has anyone read "jehovah's witnesses defended: an answer to scholars and critics" by greg stafford?

i haven't but i ask this because it got a 4.5 rating on amazon.com!!!.

Irenaeus

Interesting, isn't it that so many who started to defend the organization began to do more research and left. Jerry Bergman points that out. I think that Penton's first book was pro-Witness, and he says reaserching things and getting letters from unhappy Witnesses forced him to rethink. Then there was the guy from Florida many years ago that got mobbed at Cleveland. He too started defending the organization and got canned. Knorr in particular didn't like anyone writing anything, and he and the boys went after Schnell for having an independent book store.

Ray Franz has good words to say about Knorr, but I always disliked theman. I think he had ice water for blood and he was more than a bit of a wimp when it came to Rutherford.