Thinking

Barely a word about it here in the States unless you go to a place like GETTR, in which case there is plenty.
I didn’t want to start a new social media account, but certain views are reliably suppressed or ‘fact-checked’ away on the main platforms that I felt driven to it. I follow only two people in my GETTR account, Malone and Dowd, and I have the same profile there as I do here and everywhere else. I’ve only commented once, nothing substantial, and don’t plan (as of yet) to make a habit of it. Last I checked I already had 20 followers.

Paul Samuel Leo Johnson Born Paul Samuel Leo Levitsky
October 4, 1873 Titusville, Pennsylvania, US Died October 22, 1950(aged 77) Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, US Occupation Minister Years active 1898–1950 Known for Founder of the Laymen's Home Missionary Movement Notable work Epiphany Studies in the Scriptures Part of a series on Bible Students Communities Free Bible Students Laymen's Home Missionary Movement Publishing houses Dawn Bible Students Association Pastoral Bible Institute Publications The Dawn The New Creation Frank and Ernest (broadcast) Studies in the Scriptures The Photo-Drama of Creation Biographies Charles Taze Russell Jonas Wendell William Henry Conley Nelson H. Barbour Paul S. L. Johnson A. H. Macmillan J. F. Rutherford Conrad C. Binkele Beliefs Jehovah Nontrinitarianism Atonement Dispensationalism Sheol and Hades Resurrection Annihilationism Separations Jehovah's Witnesses  Christianity portal v t e Paul Samuel Leo (formerly Levitsky) Johnson (October 4, 1873 – October 22, 1950) was an American scholar and pastor, the founder of the Laymen's Home Missionary Movement. He authored 17 volumes of religious writings entitled Epiphany Studies in the Scriptures, and published two magazines from about 1918 until his death in 1950. The movement he created continues his work and publishes his writings, operating from Chester Springs, Pennsylvania.
He was born in Titusville, Pennsylvania on October 4, 1873, to Jewishparents who had recently immigrated from Poland. His father was a prominent Hebrew scholar,[citation needed] and eventually became president of the Titusville synagogue. His mother died when he was 12, and his father remarried, both of which caused him distress; he ran away from home several times.
He eventually converted to Christianity and joined the Methodist Church.[clarification needed]
In 1890, he entered the Capital University of Columbus, Ohio, and graduated in 1895 with high honors. Records in that University's Library show him enrolled as Paul Levitsky;[citation needed] he then went to the Theological Seminary of the Evangelical Lutheran Joint Synod of Ohioand graduated in 1898. He pastored a Lutheran church for a short time in Mars, Pennsylvania, and was then transferred back to Columbus, Ohio, at St. Matthew's Lutheran Church, which was later razed to make way for highway infrastructure. He soon built a new church building and was noted (by the Capitol University Synod)[citation needed] to have baptized more people and collected less money than any other pastor in the synod.
In May 1903 he left the Lutheran Church as a consequence of changes in his beliefs, and began fellowship with the Columbus Ecclesia of the Watch Tower Society. The Lutheran Church later claimed they had disfellowshipped him for heresy, but he had already left them of his own free will.[citation needed] A year later, Pastor Charles Taze Russellappointed him as a Pilgrim of the Bible Student movement. He eventually served as Russell's personal secretary. In time, he became Russell's most trusted friend and advisor.[citation needed]
Johnson suffered a nervous breakdown in 1910 a result of withstanding dissidents from within who were challenging the teachings of Pastor C.T. Russell on questions around his understanding of the new covenant and the ransom for all.
Johnson left the Watch Tower Society when Joseph F. Rutherford took over its direction after Russell's death. He founded the Laymen's Home Missionary Movement in 1920, and served on its board of directors from 1920 until his death on October 22, 1950.
 
Rutherford changed Russell’s understanding of the ark from that representing Jesus…to representing the organisation….and just from this fast cursory search it doesnt seem he was much of a friend to Rutherford as he was to Russell.

“No, no, Rude Person is actually a very nice guy!”
Sorry, it is just such low-hanging fruit. Why should this character be so named? It’s almost like Nabal—the ‘senseless one.’
All of this is a bit at odds with the “shrewd and scheming legal mind” he is said to have had in the book’s promo.

Jehovah uses whomever he chooses. Now what Jehovah makes of said individual in the long-term is up to him. I could care less about the sticks Jehovah uses as tools. (Mt. 23:17)

It’s extremely political over here at the moment….incredible…

We have a election tomorrow that’s probably why it’s been up and running mad the last few weeks…that and the monkey pox ….has all started and the COVID restrictions appear to be happening again soon…or threatened….

It’s extremely political over here at the moment….incredible…

Maybe I’ll get back to you after I finish Children, picked up a few weeks ago at a ….. um……eclectic book store out in the boondocks where you suspect the owner doesn’t really care if he ever sells a book or not—he just likes to hoard them. Cats roam freely and I’d be a little leery of books on the bottom row. Many aisles are completely impassable. You can only explore the far end by going down an adjacent aisle and doubling back.

That was a great answer…you have a lot of knowledge and experience…and express it so well…
Sometimes it’s like you are two different people…this one…I really like..I actually LEARN from such comments.

I'm convinced. Any of my own comments on the book will be in the Closed section. But not until I've read the whole book, which is taking even more time because I am trying to look up so many of the references. There are usually several on each of the 650 pages.

Well pudgy why dont you try the closed group….yeah some might find you a bit prickly or you might find others prickly…..sort of like it Is in  real life…one is allowed to disagree over there Too….or DONT reply to him…..you can pull the plug on him.
 

You really dont need to go thru all that nor write such to defend yourself…or should I say there should not be a need to.
Unfortunately anybody can come on here and slander and slander and slander…..again…and again…I dont know who runs this site…but I would imagine there has to be some legal responsibility for permitting said slander .
If the person who runs this site is a witness then they really need to get their act together……if the person who runs this site does not like witness’s..then it makes sense.

Anybody can accuse anybody of anything.
There is an aphorism that “A Grand Jury will refer a ham sandwich.” Here, locally, they referred 537 people in one day, and the defendant is not allowed to be there!
…. There are many people that have spent 20 or more years in prison, for first degree murder,  convicted in a court of law, and were awaiting their executions.
THEN … something happens and they are totally exonerated!
Sometimes before they are executed … sometimes after.
Anybody can accuse anybody of anything …. and at trial (more often than not) the truth will come out  during a trial, and they will be convicted or exonerated and set free.
As one judge said to a defendant …. “Just because the jury found you not guilty, if I was you I would not go around telling everybody I was innocent.”
Sometimes the innocent are severely punished, even onto death … and sometimes the guilty are set free
My lawyer advised me not to discuss my case with anyone, so I will not, but here is what I can say:
1.) I was arrested and spent three days in jail, and I instructed my wife NOT to bail me out, as I considered it just “one of those things” You folks saw my booking mug shot. I used to be a Private Investigator, and such things are an occupational hazard.
2.) Our 18 year old blind diabetic chihuahua Chippy got lost in the woods behind our house, so my wife bailed me out ($15,000 to the Bail Bondsman) and we went looking for her. We found her screaming for help in a creek, rescued her and took her to the vet ($2,100), which saved her life.
I am retired, so this is all a new experience for me ….  like riding a motorcycle at 65 mph in the rain. Very painful ($15,000), but “just one of those things.”
This coming Monday I am going to the courthouse as a citizen observer just to  see what goes on during felony trials. Free parking.
However, Wally has accused me, made up out of thin, malignant air that:
1.) I am a convict.
Not true, except for traffic citations approximately one every 22 years, my involvement with “the law” has been zero, except for various weapon permitting and fingerprinting and photos for professional licenses.
Lie and slander No. 1
2.)  I am an ex-convict. ( see No. 1 )
Lie and Slander No. 2
3.) I am on probation ( see No. 1 )
Lie and slander No. 3
4.) I am on parole  ( see No. 1 )
Lie and slander No. 4
 
 
……. (More later on this post)

I do look at IP addresses, as everyone who has been given moderator functions can do that. But they are often meaningless depending on your ISP, or whether you use a VPN or service that replaces the IP address. Also, I have never given information out about someone's location based on IP address anyway. Especially if I only know it from an IP location or private conversations. "Outta Here" was very clear about the country he lived in, even identifying a local UK Assembly Hall as one he used to attend. "Thinking" has also mentioned her country/continent more than once. So has TTH, Arauna (if you can keep up with her moves over the last half-decade), and several others.
There was no big production to impress. I was just making use of information people have provided in order to explain my own observations and opinions.

… I only finished about half my previous post before it closed out the edit function, and refused to save ….. sigh …. I will continue it later, perhaps tomorrow.
 

Oh thank you as I hadn’t a clue…I do remember outta here..but I thought that was from another forum…I don’t go back as most of you on this forum,,,,so thanks for setting me straight…much appreciated 

He was a good guy. I’m sorry he’s gone.

Wrong- I will not hurt someone with real OCD.  I  call the apostates hate-OCD because all they can do is repeat the same stuff over and over about the GB

@Thinking, Eoin Joyce is the name of a person from UK (England) who contributed his comments here for several years. He indicated often that he was fed up with the lack of spiritual value in most of these discussions. (Which is all the more obvious lately.) He changed his account name from Eoin Joyce to "Gone Fishing" when he stopped commenting for a few months. Then he changed it to "Outta Here" when he got even more serious about leaving here for good. I believe that, by now, he has completely left the forum.
I can't hazard a guess as to why WalterPrescott assumed that someone from Australia was from the same neck of the woods as someone from England. But he has done this before, under several of his own previous account names, where he will make wild guesses about who is really the same as someone else. I think it is related to the fact that it's quite obvious to many of us when he tries to pass himself off as a different person, thinking perhaps that no one will notice that he is the same as AllenSmith/BillyTheKid/NoisySrecko/Dmitar and about 30 other different attempts to disguise himself under different account names.
For a while, he kept many of these identities simultaneously, and I could actually see the evidence for when he logged out from one name and logged back in with another. He tried to keep up the appearance of some intentional differences between some of those accounts, but he sometimes messed it up and used a characteristic of one account on another one.  For this new "WalterPrescott" account, he has borrowed a feature from @Cos, a Trinitarian, who often signed his posts with the fish symbol: "<><". Walter has already pointed this fish out as if it is evidence he isn't really "Allen Smith" but he probably doesn't realize that this kind of thing doesn't really work when there so many other giveaways, including a complete inability to "clothe himself with a new personality."

As you might have guessed, I rarely pay attention to whether something is in the Open or Closed club. The Closed Club is definitely much more pleasant, many less distractions, but I'm sure it gives others the feeling that we have something to hide. The real reason, of course, is to stay away from persons who look for any reason they can think of to start fights, create dissension, highlight GB errors, and turn the subject to false predictions and child abuse. Come to think of it, that's a good enough reason.
There is one other consideration. I prefer to share opinions where they can be challenged from anyone, not just the dozen or so people who regularly participate in the Closed Club. There is also a better chance that someone else, who we don't know yet, is also reading the book and will come along to join in the discussion. That has happened before with discussions of God's name in the LXX, etc.
What I could do, also, is exercise my moderator powers and merely move any posts to a different topic if they are mostly unrelated. I think I'll try that. That goes for memes and pictures that are unrelated too, Pudgy. 😉 Actually, I'm always happy when I see a bunch of unrelated pictures from Pudgy, because it reminds me of how much quicker it is can be to read through a book that has lots of pictures --and they're usually funny! But I feel badly for those who start a serious topic, like Arauna just did, and it so quickly gets taken over by parody covers of children's books.
So, if I end up making a topic of comments on this book, I think I'll try just making a separate topic for the distractions. That doesn't mean people can't attack the book, or attack me for bringing it up. Those posts can remain, of course. But the little squabbles people want to bring up on the side will go to a topic made for that purpose. Assuming I can keep up. 😧

I’m not a mate…I’m a Sheila …

I’m not a mate…I’m a Sheila …

It has begun, according to some market analysts. Could it have begun long, long ago without any of us noticing? What if it began and ended without us realizing it? It’s been generations since the last (openly) global conflict—how has the grammar of War changed since? While some American investors fear the reality of a World War, others believe the world’s #1 superpower is edging dangerously close to Civil War itself.

Who’s Elon Joyce?

You're digging yourself in a deeper hole.  More like an abyss! You know what Jehovah says about those who call others idiots!