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Sorry about the long post. I didn't even get to some of the things I wanted to say. But what I had hoped to do is show that we can't avoid interpreting, and it's always our "foundational" views that color just how we interpret them. I didn't want to make too much of the distinction between relatives in the flesh and relatives in the faith, because we are all brothers, and that expression should truly mean what it sounds like: that all of us are relatives, now. I think that our "foundational" views that color our interpretation are from the Mosaic Law, and based specifically on how nearly we can get to the harshness of that Law. We interpret by first considering the "sacrifice" side of the legal equation, and not the "mercy" side. I'm sure you already know it but our foundation for interpretation is easily seen by one of the first discussions of disfellowshipped relatives in the Watchtower. It first reminds us that we are not allowed to kill our disfellowshipped children because the law of the land forbids it: *** w52 11/15 p. 703 Questions From Readers *** In the case of where a father or mother or son or daughter is disfellowshiped, how should such person be treated by members of the family in their family relationship?—P. C., Ontario, Canada. We are not living today among theocratic nations where such members of our fleshly family relationship could be exterminated for apostasy from God and his theocratic organization, as was possible and was ordered in the nation of Israel in the wilderness of Sinai and in the land of Palestine. “Thou shalt surely kill him; thy hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him to death with stones, because he hath sought to draw thee away from Jehovah thy God, . . . ”—Deut. 13:6-11, AS. Being limited by the laws of the worldly nation in which we live and also by the laws of God through Jesus Christ, we can take action against apostates only to a certain extent, that is, consistent with both sets of laws. The law of the land and God’s law through Christ forbid us to kill apostates, even though they be members of our own flesh-and-blood family relationship. However, God’s law requires us to recognize their being disfellowshiped from his congregation, and this despite the fact that the law of the land in which we live requires us under some natural obligation to live with and have dealings with such apostates under the same roof. The rest of the article showed some additional cases where the law of the land and/or God's law requires certain types of contact with relatives. For example: not being able to throw minors out of the house, not being able to divorce due to disfellowshipping/apostasy, marriage partners living and eating under the same roof, etc. *** w52 11/15 p. 703 Questions From Readers *** God’s law does not allow a marriage partner to dismiss his mate because his mate becomes disfellowshiped or apostatizes. Neither will the law of the land in most cases allow a divorce to be granted on such grounds. The faithful believer and the apostate or disfellowshiped mate must legally continue to live together and render proper marriage dues one to the other. A father may not legally dismiss his minor child from his household because of apostasy or disfellowshiping, and a minor child or children may not abandon their father or their mother just because he becomes unfaithful to God and his theocratic organization. The parent must by laws of God and of man fulfill his parental obligations to the child or children as long as they are dependent minors, and the child or children must render filial submission to the parent as long as legally underage or as long as being without parental consent to depart from the home. Of course, if the children are of age, then there can be a departing and breaking of family ties in a physical way, because the spiritual ties have already snapped. Because of cases mentioned such as these certain verses are said not to apply, which appears to be the correct interpretation: *** w52 11/15 p. 704 Questions From Readers *** Because of being in close, indissoluble natural family ties and being of the same household under the one roof you may have to eat material food and live physically with that one at home, in which case 1 Corinthians 5:9-11 and 2 John 10 could not apply; but do not defeat the purpose of the congregation’s disfellowship order by eating spiritual or religious food with such one or receiving such one favorably in a religious way and bidding him farewell with a wish for his prosperity in his apostate course. When the Watchtower said: "we can take action against apostates only to a certain extent, that is, consistent with both sets of laws" it gives away the foundation. We are looking for the extent of "sacrifice" that is possible, not the necessary minimum. We are not looking for loopholes to show how much mercy is possible. I suspect that Percy Chapman (the branch servant in Ontario) wrote this question so that Fred Franz could submit the answer with an already written article. I have no evidence in this case, but I saw evidence in the 1970's that something like this was done for other other QFR's. So it's a bit difficult for me not to read between the lines and see the attitude of Fred Franz coming through. I could just see him giving a talk on he subject and adding "perhaps if we lived in Saudi Arabia" to that first paragraph.

Some current musings about it, that might all change tomorrow. Interesting and prescient now that Trump is being pushed around by the CIA. The Snowden paragraph (16th) was not as bad as I'd feared, if anything I would say it doesn't go far enough. HUGE chunks of Silicon Valley are currently government contractors or crucially depended on being government contractors at their inception, and the CIA has been intertwined with the Internet from its foundation. Silicon Valley is not only "complicit" with the surveillance state, it literally IS part of the surveillance state (for example see this https://surveillancevalley.com/blog/why-is-thcia-protecting-google). My beef with Snowden is that his libertarian ideology prevented him from fully grasping the magnitude of his own revelations, (even now https://surveillancevalley.com/blog/everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-tor-project) which is that the private "free-market" spying is a bigger and more pervasive problem in most people's daily lives than government spying on terrorists and criminals. The libertarian notion of "internet freedom" is a tool used by the USA State Department for regime change around the world. (Again, Tor is a perfect example https://surveillancevalley.com/blog/tor-project-the-super-secure-anonymity-network-built-on-deception-false-promises-and-heaps-of-libertarian-bullshit) Ultimately the term "deep state" is not well defined enough even here. This article, to me does a good job of describing the circumstances of why the term is popular, but the nailing down a precise and useful meaning is tricky. Was Alexander Hamilton an agent of the "deep state" when he established military sovereignty violently against the native nations and Whiskey Rebellion in the 1790s? Or did he and George Washington form the USA's "deep state" through western land speculation/conquest? When did USA's "deep state" take form? Under what possible circumstances could any society advanced enough to have an intelligence apparatus NOT have a "deep state"? The spies of any nation are usually fanatical supporters of that nation, but that alone doesn't prove that they can actually control what that nation does. Yes, evidence has piled up since the 1970's that the USA's spies are a "class unto themselves" in the sense that spying is an industry autonomous from the government (https://www.thenation.com/article/five-corporations-now-dominate-our-privatized-intelligence-industry/) but ... so what? You could say that about all defense contracting in general (see: the F-35). Is the network of capitalist interests behind the building and maintenance of firepower really so important in the decision-making process of the deployment of that firepower? Or are they merely loyal servants of politicians who are just greedy careless murder-happy imperialists? This is the crucial question posed by the term "deep state" and the article doesn't directly answer it. If anything, I'm leaning towards the latter hypothesis, and if that's true, then there is no deep state, just a plain old classical Marxist ruling class.To argue by analogy, Hollywood is an industry autonomous from the government too (even though, just like Silicon Valley, it grew out of the machinery of war - early WWI-era propaganda techniques laid the material basis for the modern advertising, movie and recording industries), controlled by interlocking rings of capital who profit from it. These capitalists make similar products, and the industry has become dominated by monopoly and oligopoly over time. Do we need the concept of "deep script" to explain why the new Star Wars movie is basically Al Qaeda propaganda? I don't think so, at least not necessarily. Seems to me that media act as state propaganda because that's what's materially profitable (Like Chomsky and Herman said https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_model), as plain and simple as that. When private actors work in concert to serve state ends, it can be explained by shared material class interests... the question is what exactly are those interests?Since inception the USA's spy-state it has served the interests of capital around the world by systematically attacking and destroying secular multi-ethnic nationalism and communism everywhere. The CIA's very first job was overthrowing the 1948 Italian election results. The entire purpose of NATO was to prevent the spread of communism west, and the CIA immediately picked up on anti-communist counter-insurgency techniques from the Nazis, and recruited collaborators into the highest positions of government (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip). NATO has never had a problem with working with terrorists whether the Islamic Jihadist or the European Fascist. We (US) invaded Iraq and destroyed Libya for the same reasons we (US) helped destroy Yugoslavia and pressured the Soviet Union to fall apart - our ruling class WANTS large secular non-racist governments to fall into chaos so they can buy off the remains after the collapse for cheap. No need for a "deep state" explanation; it's simple class interest. Same goes for our cooperation with Arabian oligarchies, Central and Latin American juntas, Turkey, Israel, criminal militias in the Congo, etc. Class interests, and a material need for cheap resources.

I believe the problem is completely resolved by the Bible itself. You gave several examples of the ways in which situations either become an kind of announcement that we are fanatics, or that we have no natural affection, or that situations are created where we would need pharisaic rules to deal with all the many different possibilities. And I agree that many do come back after disfellowshipping, but that's just as much due to a method that any psychiatrist knows is the same as emotional blackmail. The combination of emotional blackmail, guilt, and personal ego, end up playing as much of a role as spiritual concern. There is also the factor of how humans love to judge and love the feeling of superiority and self-rightousness that they get through judging. The opportunity to shun a disfellowshipped person is something that some might even gloat about to themselves. (Luke 18:11) . . .The Pharisee stood and began to pray these things to himself, ‘O God, I thank you that I am not like everyone else—extortioners, unrighteous, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. Yet, the Israelites were given a law that supposedly provides the foundation for the Christian practice of expelling someone from the congregation. I don't think we are starting in the right place if we think like this. We need to start with the words of Jesus himself. Remember that it was Jesus who said that expelling one's wife for any reason was a concession that Moses gave due to their hard hearts. (Matthew 19:7, 8) . . .They said to him: “Why, then, did Moses direct giving a certificate of dismissal and divorcing her?” 8 He said to them: “Out of regard for your hard-heartedness, Moses made the concession to you of divorcing your wives, but that has not been the case from the beginning. But Jesus did not preach that we should have hard hearts. The Jewish law said that there was to be no punishment for a man who beat his slave to death as long as the slave suffered for more than one day before dying. (Exodus 21:20, 21) The Jewish law allowed for the beating of children with a literal rod. The Jewish law allowed for chopping off hands and gouging out eyes and knocking out teeth. But now we have a different kind of law that is written on our hearts. The entire law itself can be summed up in just a few words: (Matthew 22:37-40) . . .“‘You must love Jehovah your God with your whole heart and with your whole soul and with your whole mind.’ 38 This is the greatest and first commandment. 39 The second, like it, is this: ‘You must love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 On these two commandments the whole Law hangs, and the Prophets.” (Also, Luke 10:28) . . . keep doing this and you will get life.” (John 15:17)  “These things I command you, that you love one another. (Romans 13:8-10) . . .Do not owe anything to anyone except to love one another; for whoever loves his fellow man has fulfilled the law. 9 . . . whatever other commandment there is, is summed up in this saying: “You must love your neighbor as yourself.” 10 Love does not work evil to one’s neighbor; therefore, love is the law’s fulfillment. (Galatians 5:14) . . .For the entire Law has been fulfilled in one commandment, namely: “You must love your neighbor as yourself.” (1 Timothy 1:5) . . .Really, the objective of this instruction is love out of a clean heart and out of a good conscience and out of faith without hypocrisy. (James 2:7, 8) . . .Do they not blaspheme the fine name by which you were called? 8 If, now, you carry out the royal law according to the scripture, “You must love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing quite well. (Matthew 7:12) 12 “All things, therefore, that you want men to do to you, you also must do to them. This, in fact, is what the Law and the Prophets mean. So I think we need to keep that primary point from all those verses in mind, when we try to understand what was going on in the earliest Christian congregations. So I'll give it a try: Matthew 18:7 as you quoted above says that the "expelled" person becomes just like a man of the nations and a tax collector. In other words, they are no longer thought of as "family" (brothers) or as "someone related to us in the faith." But they are now just like everyone else in the world that we generally might avoid except when necessary to speak with hospitably, or do business with. But does this refer to a temporary or a final situation? Of course, Jesus set the perfect example by associating with tax collectors, and spoke with persons who rejected him. Ideally, a person of the nations would be someone that we would continue to see as our neighbor. Within months after this comment by Jesus in Matthew 18, people of the nations would now be desired to join with them again as those related to them in the faith. Also note that Jesus used the same pairing of "tax collectors" and "people of the nations" in the following way: (Matthew 5:43-48) 43 “You heard that it was said: ‘You must love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 However, I say to you: Continue to love your enemies and to pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may prove yourselves sons of your Father who is in the heavens, since he makes his sun rise on both the wicked and the good and makes it rain on both the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 For if you love those loving you, what reward do you have? Are not also the tax collectors doing the same thing? 47 And if you greet your brothers only, what extraordinary thing are you doing? Are not also the people of the nations doing the same thing? 48 You must accordingly be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. When we consider the logistics of disfellowshipping in the first century congregations, we should remember that some met in homes where the social consideration of hospitality was the key, where one could invite many people in, but if you were not invited you would not dare to "invade" the house. The size of the houses of most Christians would probably result in a much closer, more intimate atmosphere, and were probably usually timed to include the meal, with an exception made for the Memorial celebration. Therefore, if a person was invited in, it would be quite impossible not to associate in a close and friendly manner, which might provide the reason that some would not be invited into the house, "not even eating with such a one." Note this situation at Matthew's house (which may have been bigger than average, of course): (Matthew 9:10-13) . . .Later as he was dining in the house, look! many tax collectors and sinners came and began dining with Jesus and his disciples. 11 But on seeing this, the Pharisees said to his disciples: “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” 12 Hearing them, he said: “Healthy people do not need a physician, but those who are ill do. 13 Go, then, and learn what this means: ‘I want mercy, and not sacrifice.’ . . . As congregations began to use larger facilities, people could just come through the door and take a seat: (1 Corinthians 14:23) . . .So if the whole congregation comes together to one place and they all speak in tongues, but ordinary people or unbelievers come in, will they not say that you have lost your minds? (James 2:2, 3) . . .For if a man with gold rings on his fingers and in splendid clothing comes into your meeting, but a poor man in filthy clothing also enters, 3 do you look with favor on the one wearing the splendid clothing and say, “You take this seat here in a fine place,” and do you say to the poor one, “You keep standing” or, “Take that seat there under my footstool”? With those last two points in mind, now think about a key point that is rarely, if ever, explained according to the context. It's the point about the "rebuke given by the majority:" (2 Corinthians 2:5-11) 5 Now if anyone has caused sadness, he has saddened, not me, but all of you to an extent—not to be too harsh in what I say. 6 This rebuke given by the majority is sufficient for such a man; 7 now you should instead kindly forgive and comfort him, so that he may not be overwhelmed by excessive sadness. 8 I therefore exhort you to confirm your love for him. 9 For this is also why I wrote to you: to determine whether you would give proof of your obedience in all things. 10 If you forgive anyone for anything, I do also. In fact, whatever I have forgiven (if I have forgiven anything) has been for your sake in Christ’s sight, 11 so that we may not be overreached by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his designs. The interesting point here in 2 Cor 2:5-11 is that the context is about how Paul says that "we [Paul and fellow apostles, we could assume] are not masters [governors] over your faith." (1:23-2:4) Paul says that he expects that most would agree with him in the matter of forgiveness, and that this is why he mentioned the word "obedience" (see verse 9). I think this should remind us that there would be certain situations where Paul might expect everyone to agree but that this might also mean that everyone was NOT always expected to agree. In fact Paul had already dealt with this same idea of how not everyone would be in agreement with direction that came from letters from Paul: (2 Thessalonians 3:14, 15) 14 But if anyone is not obedient to our word through this letter, keep this one marked and stop associating with him, so that he may become ashamed. 15 And yet do not consider him an enemy, but continue admonishing him as a brother. In 2 Thessalonians, the issue was withdrawing from those who were walking disorderly (3:6) and not in agreement with the instructions given by Paul in this same letter which we now know is inspired Scripture (and by extension, any apostles with the same authority to instruct). There is never any talk about the specific amount of time that goes by between giving a rebuke for an offense by withdrawing our hospitality and when the person is received back. A rebuke has nothing to do with trying to judge whether the person is repentant, or how much time had gone by. A rebuke can be a one-time thing. Perhaps it was never up to the elders to judge repentance. Perhaps it was not up to the elders at all, but was a matter of every individual's conscience, after hearing the instruction and guidance that Paul gave. (And no doubt the elders would provide good guidance based on showing the same spirit Paul was showing and which he made clear in his letters.) But these things give us the idea that it was still up to each individual as to whether they might agree with the need to withdraw their hospitality. That's the most likely reason, I'd think, that Paul would speak of the "rebuke of the majority." It could also mean that by the time that a majority of people in the congregation had heard about it and had an opportunity to indicate to the wrongdoer that they were now aware of his or her wrongdoing. If either case, this could just as well be something that was over and done with in a matter of a week or so, or however long it took for a majority of the members to learn of the problem. Also on this matter of timing, some were evidently too willing to continue their withdrawal of hospitality without considering the sadness of the person affected. So Paul had to remind them. And Paul wasn't all that concerned with the fact that not every conscience would be in agreement, even when Paul knew he was right, and that he was giving the correct counsel for the situation. Paul was writing a letter that was inspired scripture (2 Thess) and he said to continue admonishing someone as a brother if they decided not to follow those instructions. How often do we hear anything like that from any of the governing authorities of religions today? And they aren't even apostles, and are not even inspired. It wasn't specifically about whether they were "repentant" but whether they were still practicing the wrongdoing: (1 Corinthians 5:9, 10) 9 In my letter I wrote you to stop keeping company with sexually immoral people, 10 not meaning entirely with the sexually immoral people of this world or the greedy people or extortioners or idolaters. Otherwise, you would actually have to get out of the world. And the other idea from the verse is that the persons they withdraw from are not entirely out of their lives, otherwise they would have to get out of the world, but that they would not mix with them in a friendly hospitable manner as if they were sharing with them in an approving way regarding their conduct. The point from 2 John about not even saying a greeting is similar, but appears to be taking it even a bit farther because of a specific, dangerous teaching that there never was a real Jesus on the earth. What reason would Christians have to be friendly and hospitable with this person. It was the most insidious teaching that the entire religion was based on a lie. That all of this was being made up by liars and impostors. We might expect that after the apostles died out, but as long as the apostles were alive, they knew that this was the most dangerous of all teachings when all the eye-witnesses of Jesus were dead. The testimony of eye-witnesses and the writings of the literate associates of those eye-witnesses is the very basis for what would be accepted as Christian Scripture. That verse, according to 2 John applies only to that particular form of apostasy or falsehood where Jesus himself is being denied: (1 John 2:22) . . .Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. (2 John 7-10) 7 For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those not acknowledging Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh. This is the deceiver and the antichrist. 8 Look out for yourselves, so that you do not lose the things we have worked to produce, but that you may obtain a full reward. 9 Everyone who pushes ahead and does not remain in the teaching of the Christ does not have God. The one who does remain in this teaching is the one who has both the Father and the Son. 10 If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him into your homes or say a greeting to him.

I'd be happy to contribute to a new topic about Jesus' Kingdom power or the old one, your choice. I think that I have commented in several threads that just went on so long they are difficult to navigate. So, if you have a new or specific point, or question, I think most people would prefer a new thread. And thanks for the invite to comment on your disfellowshipping thread. It was quite interesting. I'll be there tomorrow. It depends on the book. Also, my date of 900 C.E. for the MT only refers to the time when the earliest extant mss are available. It was obvious that they were copied carefully from earlier sources and even the vowel pointing was not 100% new to the Masoretes. It had been developing for quite a while -- although the point in the OP about using specific consonants to stand in for certain vowels sounds is related to this same research about the MT.

I have no interest in Valentine's Day, but I understand the appeal, especially for young ones, to have an excuse to express an amorous feeling verbally in a kind of teasing way that won't get them into trouble (because the holiday is designed to create an approved way to do this without the typical issues that young ones would deal with trying to navigate social norms). But the very fact that such a day was named after a "saint" that I knew nothing about was enough for me to avoid it and disapprove of it for my children. I can't say I ever cared to learn about the true history of the holiday, but it wouldn't surprise me that many things that might have some small value to some people are based on practices that we would and should find disgusting today. I often hear that we make it difficult to our children to get along in school by taking away so many things that others find "innocent." To me, however, taking a stand against something is a good and healthy thing, as long as we can explain our reasons correctly. (1 Peter 3:15) That said, I am very glad that someone (Ann, in this case) actually answered the question with relevant research. The question implies that Jehovah's Witnesses believe that Valentine's Day is related to Nimrod, and this should be quite embarrassing to many Jehovah's Witnesses, if they don't know anything about the basis for the claim. The Bible doesn't say anything about Nimrod being related to any one of the gods mentioned in the OP. None of that is Biblical and therefore 2 Tim 3:16 doesn't apply directly. What if the topic had been: Was Santa Claus and the Babylonian God of Pedophiles the same god worshiped? The Bible does not say anything about a Babylonian God of Pedophiles, of course, but neither does it say anything about Nimrod being worshiped. But if we became known as a group of supposed "Bible students" or "Bible researchers" and we went around talking about the "God of Pedophiles" then we should rightly be ridiculed for sloppy research. It turns out there also is no research that ties Nimrod to any of these claims we have made for him, either. Now if the discussion had turned toward false or improper practices and the ease with which religion absorbs these things for syncretic or ecumenical purposes, or the relationship of worldly attitudes in religion as a form of Satan's influence, then this could still be a useful and reasonable discussion of how such things from old still related to our times and our conscience. The fact that the Watch Tower publications stopped making such claims years ago, is a hint that we should probably be more careful ourselves. Just a quick follow-up quote from the Watchtower: *** w84 9/1 p. 20 Would You Spread a Rumor? *** DURING the Middle Ages an incredible rumor spread among the so-called Christians of Europe. It was whispered that each year at Passover, the Jews murdered a Christian and used his blood in their rituals. Sometimes they were said to capture Christian children and torture them horribly before killing them and using their blood. Right up until this century, during the Nazi period in Germany, this rumor was used as an excuse to persecute the Jews. The story was investigated and disproved several times, yet it persisted for almost a thousand years. If someone had told it to you, would you have shared in spreading it? Hopefully, all of us would have had enough common sense or compassion not to do so. Yet rumors are persistent and complex things. Once started, they are difficult to stop. Even today, absurd rumors spring up and spread like wildfire. For example, Procter & Gamble, a large firm supplying household products in the United States, was recently victimized by a rumor that it promoted Satanism and that its trademark was really a demon symbol. Another widespread rumor had it that a well-known chain of fast-food stores was putting worms in its hamburgers! Some years ago it was widely believed that a member of the singing group the Beatles had died in an auto accident and had been replaced by a double. Even the Watchtower Society’s publications have been the subject of rumors—for example, that one of the artists had secretly been introducing pictures of demons into the illustrations, was subsequently found out and disfellowshiped! Did you share in spreading any such stories? If so, you were—perhaps unwittingly—spreading an untruth, since they were all false.

I discovered something today that surprised me greatly, even though it should not have surprised me at all. This post could have gone in the Jewish section or a Controversial Post section, but I chose to put it here because, for me, it concerns my beliefs as one of Jehovah's Witnesses, and our recent reading of Isaiah. I base this discussion on a principle found in Paul's letter to the Thessalonians, although Paul at the time was specifically concerned with a different subject: (2 Thessalonians 2:1, 2) . . .we ask you not to be quickly shaken from your reason nor to be alarmed either by an inspired statement or by a spoken message or by a letter appearing to be from us. . . When I left Bethel, I had an opportunity to go to college. My work at Bethel had included picking up some valuable skills for study and research at libraries at Bethel and around NYC. Also, I was starting to pick up some Hebrew and wanted to learn more. I took a part-time job as an assistant editor and illustrator for a University publisher. This was the perfect job that became a kind of continuation of Bethel, and also allowed me to pioneer and to be on campus so that there would not be any push-back if I decided to attend college full-time. I took Computer Science as a major, but also took 8 semesters of Hebrew for 4 years. One of my reasons was because I had a strong interest in the Dead Sea Scrolls. I thoroughly enjoyed learning Hebrew, because much of the text used as a basis for learning was the Hebrew Bible itself. But after graduation in 1985 I got more heavily involved in congregation responsibilities, my first son was about to be born (1986) and the only jobs I could get in computer science were full time jobs. (Bureau of Labor Statistics, then A D Little, Cambridge [NYC account for NYC property owners]). However, during the time I was studying the "Dead Sea Scrolls" I became suspicious that so many of them matched the LXX (Septuagint), but that some (Isaiah scrolls in particular) were touted to be so much closer to the MT (Masoretic Text). I was suspicious of quite a few more things, too. This made me wonder if some of these scrolls had not been all buried prior to 70 C.E. What if some of them were written or "edited" from, say 400 or 500 C.E, a time closer to when the MT became finalized [900 C.E.].? But no one else seemed to talk about these issues and anomalies. Every time I saw one mentioned, no one ever dealt with more than one single issue, with a potential explanation for it, and this gives the impression that the overall set of anomalies is not so serious. However, this morning I got up at 3am and decided to start taking these questions seriously, after dropping them for 30 years. I'm talking about dozens of research resources. I'm not done yet, of course, but I did find one simple overview that only touches on some of the issues lightly. This will give about the quickest idea of what most of those issues and anomalies are. It's here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/1991/03/31/dead-sea-scroll-mystery/121c7d28-aff8-47a4-893a-b94820204136/?utm_term=.3b7aaa886bcc The issues mentioned here are quoted from the article linked above, written by Neil Altman. a series of marginal scroll markings that have now been identified as being Chinese symbols, probably from a period corresponding to the West's Middle Ages. About 800 A.D., writes Charles Pfeifer in his book, "The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Bible," "the Nestorian Patriarch Timotheus I wrote a letter to Sergius, the Metropolitan of Elam, in which he described the discovery of a large number of Hebrew manuscripts in a cave near Jericho," a discovery also cited by John Allegro in his account of the scrolls. The eventual disposition of these manuscripts is not known. Many scrolls were discovered not by archeologists, but by Bedouins, and passed through the hands of numerous people -- shady antiquities dealers and local priests as well the Bedouins -- before scholars were able to purchase them. This is the case with both the Order of the Community and the Isaiah scrolls. The discovery of codices in one of the caves; codices are manuscripts with pages written on both sides, and came into use in the 2nd Century A.D. The presence in the caves of lamps from the 3rd Century A.D.; while this does not directly affect the scrolls, it opens the caves to later entry. The use in the scrolls of consonants to replace vowels to assist pronunciation, as Solomon Zeitlin pointed out years ago, along with the use of final forms of Hebrew letters, suggests a late date. The discovery at Qumran of Arabic and Byzantine coins, which raises questions about the use of the site after its apparent abandonment in 68 A.D. A reference in one of the scrolls to the koshering of fish; though Jews supposedly wrote this document, Jews have never ritually prepared fish. The apparent use on the so-called "Copper Scroll" of both upper- and lower-case Greek letters suggests a late date for this curious finding, as does what I believe to be the presence of anachronistic script. The possible presence of Arabic and Roman numerals raises further doubts about the history of this very unusual metal document.

It's been my experience that Witnesses have a fairly easy time finding lodging with fellow JWs during events such as this. I took an interest in this story and called my parents, because we know a lot of Witnesses in Quincy, CA. I was conceived somewhere downstream from that same dam about 59 years ago. It actually overflowed once about 60 years ago and this was before they had built the concrete drainage. (They did that during Reagan's governorship, I think.) Several brothers had possessions swept away, and one brother we knew found a dead bear in his garage. This was supposedly, my mother says, why they moved back down to the LA area before I was born. At any rate, the only brothers we know there now drove to stay with friends in nearby congregations. I didn't ask if KH's were opened up, but the idea I got is that they all knew friends they could stay with.

Interesting. His political work for the campaign of William Jennings Bryan is another part of his past around this same time is of interest too, especially when we consider Rutherford's later politics approved for publication in the Golden Age, Watchtowers, various booklets and convention talks. (William Jennings Bryan himself is also of renewed interest to those who see current parallels with Donald Trump.)

I'm sure that a lot of newspapers will do this. "If it bleeds, it leads," etc. And that's why news reports may not be as much of a problem for the Watchtower's Legal Department as are the number of cases studied by physicians who now have hundreds of well-studied cases for comparison, especially regarding certain types of pregnancy issues with and without availability and/or acceptance of blood transfusion therapies. We have to be careful not to minimize the true sacrifice that many JWs have made over the years, sacrificing either themselves or their children, to their unwavering faith. The brother who gave my wedding talk was a good friend for many years of both my wife and myself. He was the primary Watchtower Editor in the Writing Dept. For many years, he was also the primary brother at Bethel who took questions on the blood issue. When I was in his office, I often had to sit quietly when an unexpected call was transferred from parents, doctors, patients, Service Department, PR Dept, or "HLC" reps. Some of these were heart-wrenching and I was squeamish just listening. But it was clear that many brothers and sisters, or persons in their care, have made the ultimate physical sacrifice knowing full well that they would have lived with a blood transfusion and died without one.

Of course, back then the pre-Watchtower site looked more like this:

Good point. Also, if that last aerial picture of the lake were shifted just slightly to the right, you would see IBM Sterling Forest, a place I went to every year from 2002 to 2012. (We had several contracts with them for backup, disaster recovery and key server mirrors for our data center.) It was only an hour away from our own company headquarters in NYC, and only 1.5 hours from my house before rush hour.

It's not supposed to be at the whim of the elder body, but there is no definitive way to be sure of repentance, so there will be different interpretations. There is another built-in issue: after a person has been disfellowshipped, there is an assumption that a certain amount of time must go by before repentance is real. The amount of time can also be a bit subjective based on many factors. But elders are selected for their ability to understand matters and their ministry as "shepherds" should allow them to know the local situation better than others, and therefore guidance to the congregation in these decisions should be trusted to the elders. Are you saying that you believe there are no circumstances whereby a person should be disfellowshipped (expelled) from a congregation?

I can understand this completely. I believe that giving such counsel has been much easier for the past couple of decades. However, during those years when our counsel was supposed to be more dogmatic and pharisaic, I also had to give similar counsel to a sister with an unbelieving husband, and a couple where one of them was partially disabled. However, I still think that it is proper to counsel a couple based on the principle in Romans 1, because it speaks of the "natural use of the body." It's true that we might have charged it with meaning that wasn't intended, but that also means that we might not have. Therefore, if conscience should play a role, then these verses ought to be included in potentially relevant counsel when helping one whose conscience is unclear. This also means that I would make an adjustment to your first and third bullet point. Just because both agree, does not necessarily mean that their conscience should be clear. I'm uncomfortable with using 1 Cor 7 in exactly the way you used it here as if should apply to an entire range of activities that might even push the envelope of what one spouse finds comfortable. It's possible that the verse is being "charged" with meaning that wasn't intended. Even if the principle is correct most of the time, I believe that any reasonable Christian couple should keep in mind that the real principle should not be that they simply agree, because agreement can be manipulated by emotion. Therefore, what someone might consent to at one time, might be something they would not have consented to at another time. Just the acknowledgment that this possibility might exist might make a couple think twice before engaging in experimentation that might prove dangerous either literally, or spiritually. I don't believe we should ever use the Bible as a kind of legalistic book of rules, but every part of it can and should be used for guidance, discipline, encouragement, and training/adjusting our conscience. I like your exposition of the verse in Proverbs 5:19. So true.

The issue quoted from includes the following under the Christmas holiday heading, on page 195: In its issue of December 26, 1927, the New York World carried a full-page article on Christmas which showed beyond a doubt that the day was observed by various heathen nations for many centuries before the birth of Christ. On the same date, the Chicago Tribune, the Cincinnati Enquirer and the St. Paul Daily News carried shorter articles proving the heathen origin of the day. So did some of the larger magazines of the country. Should anyone desire to investigate the subject further, after reading this article, I would recommend a perusal of the following four books: Kitto's Illustrated Commentary; Wilkinson's Egyptians; History of Medieval Drama, by Robinson; and The Two Babylons, by Alexander Hyslop, an English clergyman. The last named book is specially interesting in its revelations, not only on the subject of Christmas, but also on other holidays and feast days now so popular. However, the actual article on Valentine's Day has no reference to any origins that go back to Nimrod (although this is used for Easter and Christmas, etc). The portion of the above post from @Bible Speaks that looks like it comes from the Golden Age (starting with "The romantic nature of Valentine's Day...") is not from the Golden Age. It's from Catholic.org as is the next section starting out "The first representation..." The quote is interrupted with a reference to Nimrod which is an allusion to the chart that apparently derived originally from "The Two Babylons." Here's the complete quote from the Golden Age regarding St. Valentine's Day, on page 208. ST. VALENTINE'S DAY has nothing very saintly to commend it as to its origin. The whole month of February was given over by the Romans to a period of almost unbridled licentiousness. One of the common practices was for a group of young men and young women to meet together. The names of the young women were placed in a box and the young men drew them as chance directed and they became partners for a day subsequently known as St. Valentine's Day. The young woman's gift for the day was a man. The gift the young woman drew might be more or less bad, mostly bad; and therefore the gifts passed out on St. Valentine's Day are often bad ones. It will be noticed that St. Valentine is supposed to be the god of love, or at least that cupids represent him. The dragging of the word "saint" into this thing is only a scheme of the Devil to make real saintliness seem like what it is not, licentiousness.

I think the best thing to do is to go into same the costume shop to buy a less conspicuous fake beard, and then if he tries it again next week you can trade "barbs" with him. Last pun, I promise. Or perhaps he remembered that 'love covers a multitude of chins.' Oh wait, just one more, OK? Maybe he's making progress, and he no longer believes in "once shaved, always shaved." Seriously, though.... You should take the time, of course, to understand his reasons. Perhaps something he saw or read triggered it. As I recall there were a lot of pictures of people discussing travel plans in that particular Watchtower Study, and travel experiences might be all he ever talks about all year. There is also a little picture of a man carrying a large stack of presents on page 22, and a reminder to have a sense of humor on page 23. Or perhaps he was trying to hide his Santa-sized stomach from his line of sight to avoid "setting the mind on the flesh" (see paragraph 10, for example, in the "middle" of Sunday's study, p.16). Or perhaps he misunderstood the opening of paragraph 13 when it said it was possible for a Christian to change, and he decided to change right there at his seat. I have to say that it is difficult to believe that a doppelganger for Friedrich Engels could actually engage himself as the catalyst for such a capitalistic enterprise.

That's not the yeartext for 1914. Because of the calendars, mostly, I recall most of the ones since 1964 or so. I was baptized in 1967, too, @Gloria Medina Our yeartext banner at the front of the Hall that year was beige-on-beige silk. (Here I am, send me.) Very hard to read except in a certain light. I think someone changed the 1914 one so they could claim it matched the 2014 one, which wasn't true, of course. Probably part of an "innocent" attempt to drum up more speculation for 2014 as the 100th anniversary of 1914, and the year when our "last memorial?" was on Nisan 14 on 04/14/14, etc.

I don't recall one, but I could have missed it. Based on several other experiences I know about, I rather doubt this was ever acknowledged as an error. After all, it's based somewhat on scriptural phrases that were used a lot throughout the mid-1940's, and which saw a resurgence in the mid 1950's, when 'Armageddon talk' spiked for a few years, and then again pre-1975. The idea was based on ideas such as: 'woe to the woman suckling a child in those days' 'let those with wives be as though they had none' etc. Assembly experiences included more praise for single pioneers as 'those who had made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom.' Even discussions of Lot's wife were sometimes tied to marriage and childbearing as if it were one of the things this system offers us, but which was considered to NOT be a part of the theme of building up the nucleus of the "New World Society." I believe this is something that tended to resolve itself with new ones coming in, and it has not been a serious problem, even in rhetoric, after 1953. I don't think anyone expected an apology or acknowledgment of error.

This is an excellent point, and one we lose sight of now and then. I recall seeing a post over on jw-archive.org where someone insisted that it was a good thing that so many "little ones" stumbled over 1975. They were just being tested and found wanting. Therefore it was a good thing that there was so much talk about 1975 (or "the 1970's," or the final years of "this generation," or the preaching work that would be completed in the "20th century"). You brought up Brother Willi Diehl's experience from the 1991 Watchtower: *** w91 11/1 p. 29 ‘Jehovah Is My God, in Whom I Will Trust’ *** In May 1949, I informed headquarters in Bern that I planned to marry Marthe and that we desired to remain in full-time service. The reaction? No privileges other than regular pioneering. This we started in Biel, following our wedding in June 1949. I was not permitted to give talks, nor could we look for accommodations for delegates to a forthcoming assembly, even though we had been recommended by our circuit overseer for this privilege. Many no longer greeted us, treating us like disfellowshipped persons, even though we were pioneers. We knew, however, that getting married was not unscriptural, so we took refuge in prayer and put our trust in Jehovah. Actually, this treatment did not reflect the Society’s view. I don't know exactly what the Society's view was in 1949 in Switzerland, but one can still easily trace the where the idea came from. Full-time service (while married) was only available to pioneers (including missionaries) in 1949. If you got married you were showing that you were not serious about full-time service. This is why, in general, no one would get married at Bethel (and be allowed to stay) until Brother Knorr married Audrey Mock in 1953. (Audrey was actually engaged to Brother Richard Wheelock who would have been one of the first, if he had been allowed to stay at Bethel, but Brother Knorr made him break off the engagement, and then married her himself.) *** w04 7/1 p. 26 A Satisfying Life Despite Heartaches *** Since the 1920’s, Bethelites who desired to marry had been required to leave Bethel and serve Kingdom interests elsewhere. But in the early 1950’s, a few couples who had served at Bethel for some time were allowed to marry and stay. So when Nathan H. Knorr, who at the time was taking the lead in the worldwide Kingdom work, showed an interest in me, I thought, ‘Now, here is someone who will stay!’ In the 1960's and 1970's it was still quite common in my Missouri congregation for the old-timers to quote the infamous old line that Rutherford had used in a talk at the St. Louis assembly, directed primarily to 15,000 children sitting together out on the grounds instead of in the regular arena seats. Here it is: *** w41 9/15 p. 287 'Theocratic Assembly at St. Louis' *** The "sheep" will inherit on earth the blessings of the Kingdom. . . . They shall be children of the King, and he will be their King-Father. . . .Then the divine mandate shall be carried out, to fill the earth with a righteous, perfect offspring, and this by marriage and childbearing. . . . "Why, then, should a man who has the prospect before him of being of the great multitude now tie himself up to a stack of bones and a hank of hair?" (Applause) . . . "Soon you will see Barak and Deborah (I got a picture of her in this book), and when you see her you will love her very much. She is a real woman, and will be able to give you girls proper advice, you girls who are looking for a husband. When you see Daniel, David, Moses and all the prophets, listen to what they have to say, and they will properly advise you boys and girls. This was the attitude toward marriage among regular publishers. Imagine what it was like toward those chosen for full-time service! Over the previous 10 years, some awful things were being said about marriage and courtship and family relationships. "Having no natural affection" had become a kind of requirement if you wanted to show you were serious and spiritually mature. Dating and courtship was considered an "offense" to long-time Witnesses, although it began quickly changing among new ones being baptized. My own father wasn't even allowed to date until Knorr got married in 1953, and then he was immediately allowed to date for the first time, and my parents then married in January 31, 1954, exactly one year after Nathan and Audrey Knorr married on January 31, 1953. (And of course, if you did marry, you could not have children if you desired to ever go into the circuit work, as others in my family of that generation had done.) A lot of this type of slightly warped thinking remained at Bethel for at least another decade. Note: *** w61 12/15 p. 767 Questions From Readers *** How can girls guard against temptation in this sex-crazy world? When a girl reaches the age of puberty or physical maturity, her body has developed in the matter of sex more than in the mind. . . . However, the time will come when there will be great danger in such actions. Why? In answer to this question, we can learn about nature and sex from the bovine family of mammals, both wild and tame. Large herds of cattle, both male and female, wander over the plains feeding. Ordinarily the male or bull would not think of approaching the female or cow for sex purposes. If he did approach he would not receive a hearty welcome, but, rather, he might be gored by the cow’s horns. There is no petting or sex relations between bull and cow permitted, because the female is not in physical condition to breed. The bull seems to understand this and keeps in his own place. However, when the female of the species is in condition to breed, she makes the matter known. If there is no male in the herd, she will go elsewhere looking for one and she is unsettled until she finds one and then is bred by him. Now she is contented, and the end result is a calf. In this connection it is interesting to note that the male animal has no season at which he is not willing to engage in the breeding act. If we humans would take a lesson from these creatures, we would learn something of importance in matters of sex, as to its purpose and the results of its operation. As with a cow, when a young girl who has reached her puberty is in physical condition to conceive and become pregnant, her sex emotions are greatly aroused. . . . If the boy friend should become sexually aroused and lets her know it and then she yields her body to the advances of the amorous boy friend, she is likely to become pregnant as a result of just one sex experience of this kind. It's just an opinion, but I think that the type of "divisions" we should be more worried about than doctrines in the congregation are these types of differences that lead to judging others. The brother (Diehl) who married was judged as if he was worthy of being disfellowshipped. When the Bible speaks of divisions in the congregation it's often about how we tend to judge others. (James chapter 2) Also, I don't think that these things from the 1950's and 1960's are worth troubling ourselves over. At this point the experience might be almost humorous to us, although at the time it resulted in people sacrificing their opportunity to have children, or even a spouse. But no one held a gun to their head, and Christians have faith that Jehovah can make up for all physical losses. But it doesn't show love to trouble our brothers with unnecessary legalism like this. All we can do now, is to remember the experience so that we apply principles learned to any new decisions. There are definitely still people at Bethel, even now, who feel they are somehow more righteous and spiritually mature for having given up their opportunities for marriage and children. So we should always be on the watch for attitudes of self-righteousness and superiority. It's just one way in which we, as faithful servants, might start "beating" our fellow servants.

I agree with this, too. But this also could mean that all persons who burn fossil fuels, drive a car, use fuel-based electricity, fly in a plane, take a cruise, etc., are all ruining the earth. Of course the answer we expect to satisfy us is that we are more reasonable in the way we ruin the environment. That we are not like the big energy companies that take these fuels out of the ground for us. So this means, therefore, that as long as we only participate in ruining the earth, that we aren't going to be brought to ruin. I don't see many of us (or any of us) shouting this particular warning from the housetops to everyone who is ruining the earth. Most religions are silent about this particular warning, or even become complicit in the the politically expedient idea that politics trumps science on this subject. It's "politically correct" to be weak and hide from this problem. (Surprisingly, one of the biggest factors ruining the earth is the "Western" version of suburbs, in spite of the fact that this appears to make more of the earth look like thousands of little parks.)

Echoes of the crimes committed by Israel against Palestinians. And the way Sushi Muslims commit crimes against Sashimi Muslims, and vice versa. Hey JTR! How are you? BTW, this site is interesting http://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/05/21/death-statistic/ on that quote attributed to Stalin. The site shows where he might have gotten it from or where else it actually might have come from if it wasn't Stalin himself who said it.

It's true that my father laughed at the way Brother Toutjian's experience was "toned down" (in 1984 or so) but the discussion with the Gilead missionary (who was also an elder) was probably a lot more like the discussion you had with your mother. And although I wasn't there, I'm sure he didn't laugh when being disciplined by a District Overseer for adding a quick caveat about Matthew 24:36 to his talk. I think the talk was called "The Time Left is Reduced." It was one of those talks where we mentioned the exact number of months left before 1975. I asked him about it and it wasn't just that he just quoted the scripture of course. He also made a comment against the idea that Matthew 24:36 means we can know the year, even though we don't know the day or the hour. A lot of people were saying this same thing: "It might say we don't know the day or the hour, but that doesn't mean we don't know the YEAR!!" You said that a lot of people don't know that other Bible students arrived at chronology leading to 1914, but it's also interesting that the World Wide Church of God, which also had some roots in the 19th-century Adventist movements, was preaching 1975, too. I think that they first brought it up on the radio around 1955 and then Herbert W Armstrong published his book in 1956: "1975 in Prophecy." At the time, the 1955 Watchtower was still using 1976 as the end of 6,000 years since Adam's creation. But just like Charles Taze Russell had already taught, we realized that we didn't know the time between Adam's and Eve's creation. *** w55 2/1 p. 95 Questions From Readers *** According to Genesis 1:24-31 Adam was created during the last part of the sixth creative-day period of 7,000 years. Almost all independent chronologists assume incorrectly that, as soon as Adam was created, then began Jehovah’s seventh seven-thousand-year period of the creative week. Such then figure that from Adam’s creation, now thought to be the fall of 4025 B.C., why, six thousand years of God’s rest day would be ending in the fall of 1976. However, from our present chronology (which is admitted imperfect) at best the fall of the year 1976 would be the end of 6,000 years of human history for mankind, 6,000 years of man’s existence on the earth, not 6,000 years of Jehovah’s seventh seven-thousand-year period. Why not? Because Adam lived some time after his creation in the latter part of Jehovah’s sixth creative period, before the seventh period, Jehovah’s sabbath, began. Why, it must have taken Adam quite some time to name all the animals, as he was commissioned to do.

Ah! OK. I think you're right.

What does this mean? What info is blocked? On what site?

What you are quoting was written in the original Insight book in 1988. If you have the latest 2016 Watchtower Library on CD/DVD you can see what happened. Just search on: 1914 "The World" newspaper Look at the oldest references first, and pay attention especially to the years of these publications: You will see the quotation in the Watchtower in 1955, 1960, 1961, 1967 and 1984. I'll just quote that last one: *** w84 4/1 p. 5 1914 a Marked Year—Why? *** the ‘International Bible Students [Jehovah’s Witnesses],’ best known as ‘Millennial Dawners,’ have been proclaiming to the world that the Day of Wrath prophesied in the Bible would dawn in 1914. ‘Look out for 1914!’ It had also been used in the 1975 Yearbook the same way. And the very last use of it in this way was in the Revelation Climax book in 1988, (same year as the Insight book). That false portion of the quote has never been used in any of our books written after 1988. AFTER 1988 The most important point is to notice the Proclaimers book from 1993 is the last time this newspaper is referenced. But the Proclaimers book was researched by persons who had reviewed the actual teachings about the "Day of Wrath" and had tried to give a much more accurate picture of the beliefs about 1872/1873 being the Dawn of the Millennium. And they knew that the "Day of Wrath" ran parallel with the "Harvest" from 1874 to 1914. They didn't want statements in this book that opposers could pounce upon to prove that it was not accurate. (A few crept in anyway, some during the final editing process, but that's the nature of publishing.) So the Proclaimers book researchers, in 1993, knew that they could not use the entire quote, and reduced it to only the portion of that newspaper that we could claim was an accurate assessment of what the Bible Students and the Watch Tower had actually been saying: *** jv chap. 5 p. 60 Proclaiming the Lord’s Return (1870-1914) *** “Look Out for 1914!” When World War I broke out in 1914, “The World,” then a leading newspaper in New York City, stated in its magazine section: “The terrific war outbreak in Europe has fulfilled an extraordinary prophecy. . . . ‘Look out for 1914!’ has been the cry of the hundreds of travelling evangelists, who, representing this strange creed [associated with Russell], have gone up and down the country enunciating the doctrine that ‘the Kingdom of God is at hand.’”—“The World Magazine,” August 30, 1914. Note that they specifically left out the false portion of the quote this time, in 1993, and this 1914 newspaper has never been used again in a Watch Tower publication written after 1993. (And it has not been used incorrectly since 1988.) The subject matter is relevant to the book "God's Kingdom Rules" of course, but in the same place where we would usually expect this newspaper reference in prior publications we now only find the following: *** kr chap. 2 p. 15 par. 10 The Kingdom Is Born in Heaven *** The faithful anointed writers who contributed to that journal saw that Daniel’s prophecy regarding the “seven times” had a bearing on the timing of the fulfillment of God’s purposes regarding the Messianic Kingdom. As early as the 1870’s, they pointed to 1914 as the year when those seven times would end. (Dan. 4:25; Luke 21:24) Although our brothers of that era did not yet grasp the full significance of that marked year, they proclaimed what they knew far and wide, with long-lasting effects. *** kr chap. 2 p. 22 par. 29 The Kingdom Is Born in Heaven *** Long before 1914, the Bible Students said that a time of trouble would begin in that marked year. But even they could not have imagined how accurate that prediction would turn out to be. The idea that a "time of trouble" would begin in that marked year dates from the Watch Tower in 1904, so this is what is now meant by "long before 1914." As early as the 1870's the one thing still considered to be correct is that the "seven times" also called "the Gentile Times" would end in 1914. Of course, at the time this meant that all the Gentile Kingdoms would see their final end in 1914, so they didn't even get the idea about the "Gentile Times" right, either. Interestingly, the newspaper "The World" did get that particular belief correct (that the WT had predicted the end of all kingdoms in 1914) but this is a portion of the newspaper article that we have almost never quoted.

There has been an ongoing debate for many years both inside and outside the Bethel headquarters about how to present the information about 1914. In a few Watchtowers the predictions that were made prior to 1914 have been presented more accurately.