JW Insider

The real issue to me is about the limit of obedience.
 
Paul was pretty straightforward. In essence he said Christian obedience to those taking the lead ended where those taking the lead departed from what had been taught and accepted. Paul admitted that obedience had a rightful limit, and he laid down a litmus test for it. 
 
Of course, back then there were supernatural evidences available to corroborate whose teaching had merit, and departure from those teachings was the litmus test. 
 
Today, to our knowledge, there are no supernatural evidences corroborating whose teaching to accept. What we have is something that was only building amongst early Christians. We have the Bible. So today the litmus test should be 1) what the Bible expressly states, and 2) what can be deduced from what the Bible says with a conclusion that is subject to known conventions of logical construction (i.e., a demonstrably sound conclusion)
To be blunt, 1) if a teaching is found to be not expressly stated in biblical text, or 2) if a teaching is not a demonstrably sound conclusion (or, worse, a refuted conclusion), then no Christian should be bound to obey that teaching. Such teachings should be left to accept or ignore based on personal conscience.

I assume that in Judaism a special system of slaughtering animals was developed to be consistent with the idea/prohibition of eating blood. If this is true, then JWs today should only buy meat from those butchers who have such a procedure (the Jewish procedure should be the one God approved for the Israelites in ancient times, i guess).
If the purpose, of the ban on not eating blood, is not to make the meat completely free of even a single drop of blood, then any insistence on a "total ban on the use of blood" is open to criticism. This is exactly what is happening today with JW. They eat the blood in the meat, because there is always blood in the meat, regardless of the fact that most of it came out during the slaughter. However, no one at WTJWorg insists that the meat be completely bloodless. From this, we could conclude that the only important thing is to slaughter the animal, during which the blood comes out of the body unhindered. Obviously, the "prohibition of eating blood" in that case was reduced to the process/method of taking the life of an animal, and not so much to the insistence on unconditional "abstinence from blood".
I remembered the everyday situation in which our gums bleed. How many times have we swallowed our own blood. And by that, everyone like that has broken the "commandment". All such JWs should be called before the JC and asked if they are repentant or unrepentant sinners and then exclude them. :))
I don't like blood as a medical issue only because of health dilemmas, because blood controls and storage are not done properly, and everyone donates blood who shouldn't.

I assume that in Judaism a special system of slaughtering animals was developed to be consistent with the idea/prohibition of eating blood. If this is true, then JWs today should only buy meat from those butchers who have such a procedure (the Jewish procedure should be the one God approved for the Israelites in ancient times, i guess).
If the purpose, of the ban on not eating blood, is not to make the meat completely free of even a single drop of blood, then any insistence on a "total ban on the use of blood" is open to criticism. This is exactly what is happening today with JW. They eat the blood in the meat, because there is always blood in the meat, regardless of the fact that most of it came out during the slaughter. However, no one at WTJWorg insists that the meat be completely bloodless. From this, we could conclude that the only important thing is to slaughter the animal, during which the blood comes out of the body unhindered. Obviously, the "prohibition of eating blood" in that case was reduced to the process/method of taking the life of an animal, and not so much to the insistence on unconditional "abstinence from blood".
I remembered the everyday situation in which our gums bleed. How many times have we swallowed our own blood. And by that, everyone like that has broken the "commandment". All such JWs should be called before the JC and asked if they are repentant or unrepentant sinners and then exclude them. :))
I don't like blood as a medical issue only because of health dilemmas, because blood controls and storage are not done properly, and everyone donates blood who shouldn't.

Cryosupernatant plasma (also known as cryo-poor plasma, cryoprecipitate depleted [or reduced] plasma) is a product rendered from blood that is left to individual JWs to accept or decline purely as a personal choice.

For whatever reason(s), cryosupernatant plasma has never been mentioned in our publications addressing use of products rendered from blood. This despite cryoprecipitate plasma finding ready reference in the general search bar at jw.org.

Medical use of cryosupernatant plasma is said to have markedly improved medical outcomes for JWs who accept it, and particularly for those suffering from acquired thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura (TTP). In this case the use of cryosupernatant is as a plasma exchange. The procedure uses an IV tube placed in a vein to remove blood from a TTP patient. The blood will traverse a cell separator to remove plasma from the blood. The non-plasma part of the blood is saved, and the donated cryosupernatant plasma is added to it (replacing the patient’s own blood plasma). The blood is then put back into the patient’s system through an IV line. This process can take a couple hours, and the plasma replacement therapy will continue daily for days or weeks until symptoms improve.

Because plasma makes up the majority of our circulating blood, as you can imagine, this procedure requires a lot of donated blood plasma.

Recently I have found this blood product cited for therapeutic use at jw.org, but not in the general search engine. To find this reference you have to navigate to the link for Medical Information for Clinicians page and use the search engine there. I’m unsure how long this reference has been there, but it is now.

So, though we don’t find this product on any of our diagrams, it is there, and it can save lives.

in the original context, the difference was that Angus Stewart asked "do you see yourself as modern-day disciples?" A lot of people use the term "Jesus' disciples" as synonymous with his original direct "twelve disciples." Of course, Bro Jackson could answer that the GB definitely see themselves as modern-day disciples. [Those taught by Jesus.] The GB also definitely see themselves as modern-day "sent-forth ones" which is the meaning of the word "apostles." And they do speak of themselves in several ways as a modern-day parallel to the apostles, or even as a kind of parallel to the small number of men who ended up writing all the books of the Christian Greek Scriptures. But Bro Jackson knew the danger of trying to explain these "parallels" to a non-JW so he steered clear of it by even pointing out that they, the GB, do not consider themselves to be the sole channel (mouthpiece) of truth today. Mr. Stewart had clearly been prepped with the knowledge that the Watchtower has many times pointed to the Watchtower publications and/or the Watchtower Society as the sole channel for dispensing truth today. This idea has been repeated very directly during the time of Russell, Rutherford and Knorr/Franz, but much more subtly in recent publications. 

I would participate gladly in an open-forum Biblical discussion about what we can learn from Paul's letter to the Galatians. If it can inform our modern day view of the GB that's fine, but I think the view of an ex-JW vs the view of a JW is going to be rather predictable on that count. Nevertheless, I'd say 'go for it.'

Boy that brings back some memories! I had more than a few exchanges with Rusky on the subject of blood, fractions, and associated biblical texts, etc. There is so much left unsaid about this issue. Even academic writers usually miss some of the big things. One day. One day. 

I think the organization (which I grew up calling the society) operates under an unstated premise that it's okay to hold divergent views so long as you don't attempt to create schism.
Over the years of its existence the society has suffered some pretty horrendous schisms, which understandably birthed fear of schism. For example, in the late 1920s the number of persons associating with the society dropped by about 80 percent. That will leave a wound to be felt for quite awhile. Resulting fear has, in my view, led to a position that confuses uniformity with unity. The society wants every person who submits to it to be uniform in belief, including when a teaching or teachings change. Uniformity of people is not unity of people, and eventually it grinds people down. Unity of people is people who maintain a common cause despite having differences, and it raises people up. Uniformity of people is people who maintain a common cause because they have no differences. But humans always have differences. We are all unique. The uniformity created by the society is an outcome of tools of conformity. But it still remains the case that humans are unique and will always have differences. The society knows this. In the end, unity can only thrive when its comprised of people who hold common cause despite their differences.
One thing I wish our contemporary governing body would do is to express a litmus test of themselves for sake of those who they ask obedience from. The early Christian leaders offered a means by which those they asked obedience from to legitimately say, in effect, "No, I'm not obeying that", and it was okay to do so. In the opening of the letter to Galatia such a litmus test was put in writing for all to see. That was a pretty bold thing to put out there for early Christians. It let them know their obedience did not require them to accept and promote something just because they were told to do so. What was said to Galatia served the purpose of falsifiability. It was a litmus test, and it was spelled out and in writing. Among early Christians, there was unity not because everyone agreed on everything. There was unity because despite differences they might have and share they were still united in a common cause to follow Christ and share the good news of his kingdom rule sure to come.
Getting back to the point, today's governing body knows perfectly well they are fallible, but they still want JWs to unite around common cause despite that fallibility. What they do not want is anyone to openly express disagreement so that it causes a schism. That's a fine line to walk, but there it is.

I wouldn't look back at the 1st century so much in the context of one's beliefs (mine or yours) about events in the distant past.
Our reality today is to decide/discern whether we should accept or reject or more thoroughly consider, unencumbered with the influence of WTJWorg, GB's statements about their claims to be the only ones who correctly interpret the Bible the way they do, from their inception to the present day.
With the abundance of archival material available to us, authored/written by the people at WTJWorg, it is possible to see a chronology of doctrine. The text from the publications gives us a certain insight into the personality and condition of those behind the text. Also, by relating it to events inside and outside WTJWorg, we can see more clearly why some things (doctrines, instructions, interpretations) were written in one way (as irrefutable and the pinnacle of true knowledge) and later changed, more or less modified, adapted or completely rejected. And with some doctrines, it happened that they were thrown out for a while and then reintroduced as correct after a certain period of time (the so-called flip-flop).
It is unnecessary to question whether an individual believe or does not believe in God and his ability. That doesn't solve anything. The question must be asked whether we should believe in People who claim that God is speaking contradictory things through them, and that both are true.

Let's see. ichi ni San-J go roku shichi hachi kuu juu . . . 
I stopped counting when it was up into the thirty-somethings. But more than half are still active, just rarely resurrected.

It's amazing, isn't it? It's also amazing how quickly each of the new avatars puts on the old personality, and then puts on old "socks," too.

It's true that many ex-JWs, apostates and interested persons mistakenly believe that Russell predicted 1914 as the end of the world, when 1914 was NOT supposed to be the end of the world. It was only the final date for the "rapture" of the remnant of Christ's Bride, and the year when Gentile kingdoms would cease ruling, and all religious and political institutions would plunge into their final chaos, which could last until the end of 1915, perhaps even a few months beyond.  At the same time, 1914 would also see a non-Gentile government in Jerusalem become established, which would begin to administer the earthly part of a one-world government for everyone on earth except Christians, who would all go to heaven (including the great crowd, also considered to be anointed.)
Many ex-JWs, apostates, and interested persons also mistakenly believe that F.Franz and/or the Watchtower Society predicted that 1975 would be the end of the "world." But in this case absolutely nothing was predicted that would definitely happen in that particular year. It was always about how close 1975 must be to the time when Armageddon was expected because of the unscriptural significance given to the end of 6,000 years of man's existence. F.Franz must have sincerely thought that there was some scriptural significance to "the end of 6,000 years. And of course, this fit perfectly with the idea already being promoted that the end must come before the lifespan ended of those who were teenagers in 1914. In other words they would already be about 75 years old in 1975. And you are right that this was seen to fit a host of other "signs of the times."

No one can tell for sure why we emphasized October so much. It was the habit of several chronologists after William Miller and therefore followers of Barbour and Russell also emphasized October. It has nothing to do with when the Temple fell even though the book "What does the Bible Really Teach" mistakenly indicates that the temple fell in October. Other publications such as Insight and various Watchtower articles say that it was NOT October. (More importantly, the Bible says it was not in October.) I think the "Bible Teach" book changed it to October just to simplify the reasons for explaining October 1914. It was probably for similar reasons that the date for Russell's announcement has changed from October 1st to October 4th to October 2nd. Don't know if you are aware, but the Watchtower has also taught that the actual date for the end of the Gentiles Times was October 4th:
*** w79 9/15 p. 24 par. 11 The “Cup” That All Nations Must Drink at God’s Hand ***
11 Now that the Gentile Times ended in 1914, we know that the day for Jehovah to hold an accounting with the Gentile nations for “their error” must be very near. Never has the world been the same since 1914. Secular historians cannot explain the reason for this. But the reason simply is that about October 4/5, 1914, or 2,520 years from the desolating of Judah and Jerusalem after the Babylonian conquest, the Gentile Times of uninterrupted world domination ended.
*** w75 11/1 p. 661 par. 15 The Time for Choosing God as Sovereign ***
This fact of universal interest has been true since the year 1914 C.E. In that year “the times of the Gentiles,” or, “the appointed times of the nations,” ended about October 4/5 , when counted from the desolation of Jerusalem and the land of Judah by the Babylonians in the year 607 B.C.E.
*** w73 3/15 p. 168 What Kind of Ruler Does Mankind Need? ***
When did Jehovah do so? In the year 1914 C.E. when the “appointed times of the [Gentile] nations” ended, about October 4/5.
*** w72 6/1 pp. 351-352 Questions From Readers ***
At the end of the Gentile Times, about Tishri 15 ( October 4/5 ), 1914 C.E., Revelation 11:15 was fulfilled: “The kingdom of the world did become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ.”
*** w72 12/15 p. 748 par. 5 The Time to Decide in the Name of Which God to Walk ***
By the end of the Gentile Times about October 4, 1914, eight nations and empires of Christendom, along with Japan, were fighting one another.
*** w71 12/1 pp. 717-718 par. 1 What Its “Right Condition” Means for Us Today ***
The Gentile Times had begun about the middle of the lunar month Tishri in 607 B.C.E., and so their 2,520 years of duration would end in 1914 about Tishri 15, which corresponds with October 4/5 . By then the British Empire and other empires of Christendom were embroiled in the war. The other member of the Anglo-American Dual World Power entered the war in the spring of 1917.
*** w70 1/15 p. 50 par. 5 Peace with God amid the “Great Tribulation” ***
Both the Bible’s time schedule and the physical facts of history prove that the Gentile Times, “the appointed times of the nations,” ended in 1914 C.E. about October 4/5 that year.

That expression "the physical facts . . .  prove" was an expression that Rutherford often used when there was no real evidence for something. In this case, it's probably F W Franz using it, but with the idea that WWI provided those "physical facts of history."  There are many more quotes like this, but notice that the next one actually admits that it is two months off, and offers no explanation for it.
*** w65 9/15 p. 569 A Pivotal Date in History ***
With this pivotal date established, it is easy to go back seventy years from the seventh month of the year 537 to the seventh month of 607 B.C.E. as the time of the desolation of Jerusalem and Judah. In 607 B.C.E., the month of Tishri began on September 22/23, the day for the observance of the festival of the new moon. It was in that month of 607 B.C.E. that the “seven times,” or, “the times of the Gentiles,” “the appointed times of the nations,” began. (Dan. 4:16, 23, 25, 32; Luke 21:24, AV; NW) This was two months after Jerusalem had been destroyed and its temple plundered, wrecked and burned down, after which its two principal priests were killed.—2 Ki. 25:5-21.
Evidently to make up for the lack of evidence for October 4th, one of the next paragraphs points out that "At Ezra 3:6 it is stated: 'From the first day of the seventh month on they started to offer up burnt sacrifices to Jehovah, when the foundation of Jehovah’s temple itself had not yet been laid.' This would be, according to the Gregorian Calendar, on September 28/29, of 537 B.C.E. So on the first day of the month they celebrated the new moon of the seventh month of that year."
Then, a footnote states the following (linked to September 28/29):
*** w65 9/15 p. 570 A Pivotal Date in History ***
Or, according to the Julian Calendar, October 4/5, 537 B.C.E. See Babylonian Chronology 626 B.C.–A.D. 75 (edition of 1956), by Parker and Dubberstein, page 29.
Just because Tishri 1 fell on October 4/5 in 537 doesn't mean it fell on October 4/5 in any other "signficant" year. The above admits that it wasn't that date in 607, and in 1914 Tishri 1 lands on September 8th. Of course, this particular new moon celebration was just one of three different memorials to the time of the Temple destruction, but was not the date for the destruction itself according to the Bible and the Insight book.
The October tradition is actually based on a lot of assumptions, including the idea that Adam was created around October 1, 4026. The old October 1, 4028 B.C.E. date was more definite, but when it changed to 4026, the Insight book changes it only to "likely".
*** it-1 p. 45 Adam ***
That was in the year 4026 B.C.E. It was likely in the fall of the year, for mankind’s most ancient calendars began counting time in the autumn around October 1, or at the first new moon of the lunar civil year.
For some reason we began believing that Jehovah, in effect, created the civil, secular calendar when he created Adam. (When Jehovah implemented the sacred calendar the first month was changed from Tishri to Nisan in the spring.) The older reasoning was closer to the idea that "we just knew" because we understood Bible chronology. The newer reasoning, starting around 1950,  included the idea that Adam must have been created in the fall, and this would explain why many secular calendars (including the Hebrew) started in the fall.
*** w70 5/1 p. 273 par. 5 An Ingathering Affecting All Mankind ***
However, Bible chronology which indicates that Adam was created in the fall of the year 4026 B.C.E. would bring us down to the year 1975 C.E. as the date marking 6,000 years of human history with yet 1,000 years to come for Christ’s Kingdom rule. So whatever the date for the end of this system, it is clear that the time left is reduced, with only approximately six years left until the end of 6,000 years of human history. (1 Cor. 7:29) This corroborates the understanding of Jesus’ words that the generation alive in 1914 with the outbreak of World War I would not pass away until the end comes.
*** w68 5/1 p. 272 Making Wise Use of the Remaining Time ***
4026 [B.C.E]           Creation of Adam (in early autumn)  Gen. 2:7
*** w51 4/1 p. 221 An Interesting Chronological Chart ***
  4025 B.C.    Adam’s creation (in the fall)         Gen. 2:7
 
 
It might seem off the subject, but the October date of Adam's creation was once accepted as a very important factor in determining the possible date for Armageddon, and as we see in the quotes above, this was tied back to 1914. And as the quote below shows, for some reason we "needed to determine" time from the "autumn of 4026" -- elsewhere stated to be about October 1st.
*** w68 5/1 p. 271 pars. 4-5 Making Wise Use of the Remaining Time ***
Since it was also Jehovah’s purpose for man to multiply and fill the earth, it is logical that he would create Eve soon after Adam, perhaps just a few weeks or months later in the same year, 4026 B.C.E. After her creation, God’s rest day, the seventh period, immediately followed.
5 Therefore, God’s seventh day and the time man has been on earth apparently run parallel. To calculate where man is in the stream of time relative to God’s seventh day of 7,000 years, we need to determine how long a time has elapsed from the year of Adam and Eve’s creation in 4026 B.C.E. From the autumn of that year to the autumn of 1 B.C.E., there would be 4,025 years. From the autumn of 1 B.C.E. to the autumn of 1 C.E. is one year (there was no zero year). From the autumn of 1 C.E. to the autumn of 1967 is a total of 1,966 years. Adding 4,025 and 1 and 1,966, we get 5,992 years from the autumn of 4026 B.C.E. to the autumn of 1967. Thus, eight years remain to account for a full 6,000 years of the seventh day. Eight years from the autumn of 1967 would bring us to the autumn of 1975, fully 6,000 years into God’s seventh day, his rest day.
*** w67 7/15 pp. 446-447 The Removal of Mankind’s Chief Disturber ***
Adam was created in 4026 B.C.E., which means that six thousand years of human history end about the fall of 1975 C.E. We are in the great 7,000-year rest day of God, starting at the time he rested after the creation of Adam and Eve. There are, therefore, a thousand years left to run.
In those years we sometimes gave another piece of evidence as a reason for sticking with the October tradition. The following article which is specfically on the topic of the time of Adam's creation gives no other reason for October other than this one, and this one just appears almost out of the blue with no other context about October. (In 1955 we were still pointing to the 1976 date, not 1975, which happened when we changed the date of creation back again from 4025 to 4026.)
*** w55 2/1 p. 94 Questions From Readers ***
What are the reasons for changing the creation date of Adam first from 4028 B.C. to 4026 B.C. and now recently in the book “New Heavens and a New Earth” to 4025 B.C.? . . . Incidentally, Jesus, who became the second or “last Adam,” was born in the fall of the year around the first of October. . . . The very fact that, as part of Jehovah’s secret, no one today is able to find out how much time Adam and later Eve lived during the closing days of the sixth creative period, so no one can now determine when six thousand years of Jehovah’s present rest day come to an end. Obviously, whatever amount of Adam’s 930 years was lived before the beginning of that seventh-day rest of Jehovah, that unknown amount would have to be added to the 1976 date.
Apparently, the entire October tradition was just something we inherited from Nelson Barbour, and we kept it even though we found very little basis or evidence for it.
 
 
 
 

@Srecko Sostar As I see it, a large part(not all) of those who claim to be Christians, including JWs, and the lady of the video you shared (JW Research Rose) all work under the same principle. The principle is that the Christian religion is to be learned by interpreting the sources independently of the claims of any particular church/congregation, so that one must pick or find a church/congregation on the basis of that interpretation. The differences arise from differences about what the relevant sources are, and about how they are to be interpreted. But the principle is the same. 
The point is, that a large part of those who consider themselves Christian whether they are part of a church or not, have a perpetual openness to discovering new biblical and theological arguments to take us back to what the first century congregation itself actually thought. So to claim that something can be settled by biblical and theological arguments seems to be incompatible with that interpretative framework itself. 
So it's not change for the sake of changing. 
I understand your concern, as we all should, since it's clear we will stand before the Judgment seat and give an account for those whom we have aided in truth or misled. But this concern applies to everyone (not just JWs), especially those who are interested in knowing, loving, and serving God, according to the First Commandment (making every effort to seek out and embrace the religion God has revealed). 
Here's the issue I think we all have to face: 
If we as individuals and the Congregation are fallible, and thus could always be wrong, then the assent we give to doctrinal statements is always tentative and subject to substantive revision. If we and the Congregation could get it really, really wrong when we define a doctrine, then it would follow that we know next to nothing with any certainty. Statements of doctrine from a fallible authority of this kind cannot be clearly distinguished from human opinions, at least in theology, as distinct from, say mathematics or natural science. If this is so, then we don't know when what we're assenting to is a true expression of divine revelation, as opposed to a merely human way of interpreting the sources.  Everything remains up in the air, up for grabs, an open question yet to be settled and possibly false. 
I think is important to distinguish between the type of teachings and pronouncements that are being discussed : Do the teachings have to do with faith, with morals? Are they prudential judgments, policies, disciplines, practices, admonitions, worship? Prophecies, symbolic language, parables, prophetic passages? 
The issue you are trying to point out. if I'm right,  is if JWs have a system where some teachings don't change by contradiction, but develop/change in continuity, as opposed to other provisional teachings that can come and go, and even contradict previous decisions, because they are temporally conditioned, and the leadership is fallible with respect to them. There are two points to keep in mind though. First, a doctrine that develops is not corruption, though both involve change. Not all change is corruption.
On the other end of that same conversation: 
Fallibilism is not fallibility. Just because not everyone reasons well (although some people are better at avoiding error than others),our fallibility doesn’t prevent us from having more certainty about x than y. We can perceive the truth of some things to a greater degree than we do other things. So we have to distinguish between being susceptible to error, and the possible falsehood of any beliefs we hold or state. The fact that we are susceptible to error doesn’t mean that we cannot know with certainty that any of our beliefs are true. Nor does it mean that every proposition we believe or state might be false. Being fallible does not mean being skeptical about knowledge or truth. The text(Scripture) does possess meaning and can be accessed by ordinary people by their own reading of Scripture without the instruction of others . But accessing that meaning requires bringing the proper interpretative framework to the text. So what we need is to have intellectual humility and recognize that no one is well enough to avoid error absolutely. We have to recognize where and when and how we are fallible (noticing that we have gotten things wrong in the past, in these sorts of circumstances, in these sorts of ways, etc.)
But this issue is hardly new. You have Christians already in the 5th Century like Vincent of Lerins wrestling with John 17:3 and the idea of growth and development of understanding like Russell's "A new view of truth never can contradict a former truth. "New light" never extinguishes older "light" but adds to it."
The propositional content of our faith is crucial, but it is crucial with respect to its end, which is to safely direct persons to the living reality of God Himself, not merely to insist upon propositions about God.

Of all the religions on Earth, it is my long and carefully considered opinion, based on what I consider to be irrefutable facts, that as a group, Jehovah’s Witnesses have the best chance of all of them to be found acceptable to God and Christ. 
All the blessings of my life, which is almost over, is because I obeyed what I was taught by Jehovah’s Witnesses. 
The reverse is also true. 
The CORE 15% of what is taught is of life saving value, and to the best of my knowledge cannot be found elsewhere. 
That, to me, means the CORE 15% is in fact the “True Religion”.
I do not expect perfection from employers, spouses (and I have had three …), friends, the Police and/or Court Systems, Armed Forces military leaders, soldiers, sailors or airmen, or the McDonalds drive-thru which almost ALWAYS seems to screw up my order. 
The tolerance I have for applied stupidity I suspect Jehovah God also has for us … after all …. he is the Sovereign God of this Universe, and extending mercy does not diminish his majesty, authority or security in any way.
If we “stick our neck out”, someone can “cut off our head”.  Not so with Jehovah God.
I also suspect that, with MANY Biblical examples to review for reference, he has a high tolerance for us being theologically bat-crap crazy. Thousands of years of colossal screw ups and institutionalized injustices were tolerated before He replaced the old system.
I often think, Jehovah with a casual thought could destroy all his enemies, everywhere, in an instant … so why did He have brave men of valor fight and die on ancient battlefields, and put them through all of that?
Why does Jehovah God now allow the Governing Body to chase away almost as many disciples of his Son, as 8 million recruiters can enlist? 
I almost know, but I can’t prove it, as it would be “preaching error”, if I can’t prove it.
I suspect we are all being sifted, and hardened in “trials by fire” …. after all, the ONLY way you can get experience in how to endure getting beaten … is to get beaten.  
Military Special Forces know this … that is why training includes real torture, beatings, and conditioning on how to endure without being broken. Think of the 144,000. They will be given immortality … life forever with great power and authority, independent of God, but exactly parallel in purpose and agreement!
How does Jehovah know they can be trusted to be good at it? Immortality, by definition, means it can never be revoked.
EXPERIENCE.
Just as a Navy Seal, when dropped from a helicopter 12 miles off shore and has to swim to shore, then run 15 miles to base and without eating or rest, read an entire book, and take a test on it, there are casualties. People die, or fail, or wounded, or thrown out because they just can’t cut it.
Some of us are just plain not good enough, focused enough, motivated enough, tough enough, or strong enough.
You get the test FIRST ….….. and the lesson AFTERWARDS.
 
 
 

Based on the above, we can accept other possibilities of conclusion. The idea "that we have the capacity to become enemies of God" was realized by the very act of God's creation of angels and the first humans.
The possibility and capacity to be an enemy does not arise from the fact that someone is born/created perfect or imperfect, but from the fact that all of them have the freedom to decide that all of them  have free will, which they received from God. So, God is the cause of this possibility for someone to become his enemy. And what are we going to do now?
Free will exists only when we can realize it in reality. Before that it is just a fantasy of the mind. When can a baby realize, exercise its free will? 

Belief in the theological doctrine that we all inherited the sin of Adam and Eve and are therefore born sinful and therefore destined to make major and minor mistakes throughout life (that we are prone to sin) is a type of assertion and dogma. Claiming that babies are enemies of God is beyond that first concept.
Does the claim/fact that you were born/created imperfect and prone to sin inevitably mean that you are an enemy of God from the first day of your life?
Does the claim/fact that you were born/created perfect mean that you are not an enemy of God?
Adam and Eve were created/born perfect, says the WTJWorg interpretation. Nowhere in the Bible does God call the two of them His enemies, before or after sin.
On the other hand, the rebel perfect angel was called Satan or enemy/adversary only after the rebellion.
When can an imperfect baby be held responsible for rebellion?
Enmity between them and God was not automatically established from the act that happened to Adam and Eve. Because they did not rebel against God in the way that the Angel did. They "just" disobeyed him about eating the fruit from the tree. That is why God had no reason to call them enemies. If God did not call these two adults and mature people enemies, why would, according to the interpretation of GB member S.L. , babies should be considered enemies of God?
The Bible, in its later NT writings, connects the concept of enmity with God to certain activities that cause the persons who do so to be associated with enemies. Babies are never called enemies, as far as i know.
Furthermore, the question of hatred also opens up here. Does the Enemy deserve our hatred? Yes or no? Does God show hatred towards Adam and Eve? Towards Satan? To people who aren't his fans/worshipers?
But JWs are ready to hate "their enemies"? Yes or no?

For some, I think it must be like the reason they tie C.T.Russell somehow to Freemasonry. There is absolutely no reason to think that CTR was a Freemason just because he was familiar with some of their terminology and dabbled in silly pyramidology. But to a lot of people, Freemasonry means "demon" and "demon-control" and therefore it means something much worse than it would have meant, if Russell had been an actual Freemason. 
The same goes for those anti-JWs with a 'no-better-than-average' sense of pareidolia (people who see people and faces in everyday objects). When they look at pictures in the Watchtower of clouds or trees or bushes or patterns on cloth or in woodwork or this or that or the other, they see deformed faces and think of demons. I think these same people are a bit paranoid, too, so that when a real cloud in the sky looks like a puppy they wait for the cloud to grow and change and shift and distort and only notice it when it looks like a werewolf to them. 
I have a sense that they want to dismiss the success of JWs and assign it to demonic forces and this somehow rationalizes it for them. (Seeing Jehovah's obvious blessing in something and then trying to say it was from Satan and his demons is, in my mind, the primary definition of 'sinning against the holy spirit.')
I say this because the answer is yes, they often do posit a reason. I just got sucked down a reddit-hole last night looking for the answer to the same question. And it's sometimes related to the idea that if the UN really is a [demon-inspired] beast of Revelation, then the Witnesses are sucking up to the beast for whatever favors the beast would grant them. 
For the most part, however, it's just mentioned as a show of hypocrisy and sloppiness (as opposed to faithfulness and "discreetness"). I saw a comparison of the directive by the WTS that Malawians not buy a 25 cent national ID card over which Witnesses were killed, and the nonchalant sign-up to a 1991 NGO application that said the NGO participant would 'support the mission' of the UN. 
Some posited that it was for free international flights to troublespots (I highly doubt it), higher visibility when getting involved in humanitarian aid, a way of highlighting support for UNICEF (for children) at the same time that trouble began brewing over child protection in congregations. 
Ciro Aulicino is the guy who signed up for it along with GB member Lloyd Barry. Several on the forum know these brothers and know that Ciro, at least, was prone to lapses in judgment, but always with a good heart and for a good reason. When he first moved from the Service Dept to the Writing Dept he immediately began setting up a regular schedule where he was at one of the major libraries for nearly a whole day at least once a week. He had no qualms about taking material for his public talks directly from 18th and 19th century authors and commentaries. His Awake! and Watchtower material would often start out with statistics from outside sources. He must have thought that the UN had the best statistics about various nations and international data. 
Personally, I absolutely believe the WTS's explanation that it was all about access to the library. Any non-profit organization could already have standard access to the UN library, but the library was also a pre-Internet source of information about past, present and future UN backed seminars and reports, and therefore the advantages of becoming an NGO would have been seen as tempting. Those seminars are related to world health, world crime, natural disasters, religious persecution, holocaust memorials, etc., and are attended by writers, researchers, journalists and other religious and political organizations, too. In fact, the WTS still attends seminars that are backed by UN NGO's because it can help highlight the WTS's own involvement with some of these same issues. 

I don't think I ever saw a Gilead tour letter for a U.N. tour. But the ones I have seen are very similar, and there is nothing in the writing or format of this one that looks odd. It's very much like the other letters that came out of the Gilead office in the 70s and 80s. When I pull out some of my old boxes of papers, I can post an almost identical memo/notice that was given to all Gilead students.

For some, I think it must be like the reason they tie C.T.Russell somehow to Freemasonry. There is absolutely no reason to think that CTR was a Freemason just because he was familiar with some of their terminology and dabbled in silly pyramidology. But to a lot of people, Freemasonry means "demon" and "demon-control" and therefore it means something much worse than it would have meant, if Russell had been an actual Freemason. 
The same goes for those anti-JWs with a 'no-better-than-average' sense of pareidolia (people who see people and faces in everyday objects). When they look at pictures in the Watchtower of clouds or trees or bushes or patterns on cloth or in woodwork or this or that or the other, they see deformed faces and think of demons. I think these same people are a bit paranoid, too, so that when a real cloud in the sky looks like a puppy they wait for the cloud to grow and change and shift and distort and only notice it when it looks like a werewolf to them. 
I have a sense that they want to dismiss the success of JWs and assign it to demonic forces and this somehow rationalizes it for them. (Seeing Jehovah's obvious blessing in something and then trying to say it was from Satan and his demons is, in my mind, the primary definition of 'sinning against the holy spirit.')
I say this because the answer is yes, they often do posit a reason. I just got sucked down a reddit-hole last night looking for the answer to the same question. And it's sometimes related to the idea that if the UN really is a [demon-inspired] beast of Revelation, then the Witnesses are sucking up to the beast for whatever favors the beast would grant them. 
For the most part, however, it's just mentioned as a show of hypocrisy and sloppiness (as opposed to faithfulness and "discreetness"). I saw a comparison of the directive by the WTS that Malawians not buy a 25 cent national ID card over which Witnesses were killed, and the nonchalant sign-up to a 1991 NGO application that said the NGO participant would 'support the mission' of the UN. 
Some posited that it was for free international flights to troublespots (I highly doubt it), higher visibility when getting involved in humanitarian aid, a way of highlighting support for UNICEF (for children) at the same time that trouble began brewing over child protection in congregations. 
Ciro Aulicino is the guy who signed up for it along with GB member Lloyd Barry. Several on the forum know these brothers and know that Ciro, at least, was prone to lapses in judgment, but always with a good heart and for a good reason. When he first moved from the Service Dept to the Writing Dept he immediately began setting up a regular schedule where he was at one of the major libraries for nearly a whole day at least once a week. He had no qualms about taking material for his public talks directly from 18th and 19th century authors and commentaries. His Awake! and Watchtower material would often start out with statistics from outside sources. He must have thought that the UN had the best statistics about various nations and international data. 
Personally, I absolutely believe the WTS's explanation that it was all about access to the library. Any non-profit organization could already have standard access to the UN library, but the library was also a pre-Internet source of information about past, present and future UN backed seminars and reports, and therefore the advantages of becoming an NGO would have been seen as tempting. Those seminars are related to world health, world crime, natural disasters, religious persecution, holocaust memorials, etc., and are attended by writers, researchers, journalists and other religious and political organizations, too. In fact, the WTS still attends seminars that are backed by UN NGO's because it can help highlight the WTS's own involvement with some of these same issues. 

For some, I think it must be like the reason they tie C.T.Russell somehow to Freemasonry. There is absolutely no reason to think that CTR was a Freemason just because he was familiar with some of their terminology and dabbled in silly pyramidology. But to a lot of people, Freemasonry means "demon" and "demon-control" and therefore it means something much worse than it would have meant, if Russell had been an actual Freemason. 
The same goes for those anti-JWs with a 'no-better-than-average' sense of pareidolia (people who see people and faces in everyday objects). When they look at pictures in the Watchtower of clouds or trees or bushes or patterns on cloth or in woodwork or this or that or the other, they see deformed faces and think of demons. I think these same people are a bit paranoid, too, so that when a real cloud in the sky looks like a puppy they wait for the cloud to grow and change and shift and distort and only notice it when it looks like a werewolf to them. 
I have a sense that they want to dismiss the success of JWs and assign it to demonic forces and this somehow rationalizes it for them. (Seeing Jehovah's obvious blessing in something and then trying to say it was from Satan and his demons is, in my mind, the primary definition of 'sinning against the holy spirit.')
I say this because the answer is yes, they often do posit a reason. I just got sucked down a reddit-hole last night looking for the answer to the same question. And it's sometimes related to the idea that if the UN really is a [demon-inspired] beast of Revelation, then the Witnesses are sucking up to the beast for whatever favors the beast would grant them. 
For the most part, however, it's just mentioned as a show of hypocrisy and sloppiness (as opposed to faithfulness and "discreetness"). I saw a comparison of the directive by the WTS that Malawians not buy a 25 cent national ID card over which Witnesses were killed, and the nonchalant sign-up to a 1991 NGO application that said the NGO participant would 'support the mission' of the UN. 
Some posited that it was for free international flights to troublespots (I highly doubt it), higher visibility when getting involved in humanitarian aid, a way of highlighting support for UNICEF (for children) at the same time that trouble began brewing over child protection in congregations. 
Ciro Aulicino is the guy who signed up for it along with GB member Lloyd Barry. Several on the forum know these brothers and know that Ciro, at least, was prone to lapses in judgment, but always with a good heart and for a good reason. When he first moved from the Service Dept to the Writing Dept he immediately began setting up a regular schedule where he was at one of the major libraries for nearly a whole day at least once a week. He had no qualms about taking material for his public talks directly from 18th and 19th century authors and commentaries. His Awake! and Watchtower material would often start out with statistics from outside sources. He must have thought that the UN had the best statistics about various nations and international data. 
Personally, I absolutely believe the WTS's explanation that it was all about access to the library. Any non-profit organization could already have standard access to the UN library, but the library was also a pre-Internet source of information about past, present and future UN backed seminars and reports, and therefore the advantages of becoming an NGO would have been seen as tempting. Those seminars are related to world health, world crime, natural disasters, religious persecution, holocaust memorials, etc., and are attended by writers, researchers, journalists and other religious and political organizations, too. In fact, the WTS still attends seminars that are backed by UN NGO's because it can help highlight the WTS's own involvement with some of these same issues. 

I don't think I ever saw a Gilead tour letter for a U.N. tour. But the ones I have seen are very similar, and there is nothing in the writing or format of this one that looks odd. It's very much like the other letters that came out of the Gilead office in the 70s and 80s. When I pull out some of my old boxes of papers, I can post an almost identical memo/notice that was given to all Gilead students.

For some, I think it must be like the reason they tie C.T.Russell somehow to Freemasonry. There is absolutely no reason to think that CTR was a Freemason just because he was familiar with some of their terminology and dabbled in silly pyramidology. But to a lot of people, Freemasonry means "demon" and "demon-control" and therefore it means something much worse than it would have meant, if Russell had been an actual Freemason. 
The same goes for those anti-JWs with a 'no-better-than-average' sense of pareidolia (people who see people and faces in everyday objects). When they look at pictures in the Watchtower of clouds or trees or bushes or patterns on cloth or in woodwork or this or that or the other, they see deformed faces and think of demons. I think these same people are a bit paranoid, too, so that when a real cloud in the sky looks like a puppy they wait for the cloud to grow and change and shift and distort and only notice it when it looks like a werewolf to them. 
I have a sense that they want to dismiss the success of JWs and assign it to demonic forces and this somehow rationalizes it for them. (Seeing Jehovah's obvious blessing in something and then trying to say it was from Satan and his demons is, in my mind, the primary definition of 'sinning against the holy spirit.')
I say this because the answer is yes, they often do posit a reason. I just got sucked down a reddit-hole last night looking for the answer to the same question. And it's sometimes related to the idea that if the UN really is a [demon-inspired] beast of Revelation, then the Witnesses are sucking up to the beast for whatever favors the beast would grant them. 
For the most part, however, it's just mentioned as a show of hypocrisy and sloppiness (as opposed to faithfulness and "discreetness"). I saw a comparison of the directive by the WTS that Malawians not buy a 25 cent national ID card over which Witnesses were killed, and the nonchalant sign-up to a 1991 NGO application that said the NGO participant would 'support the mission' of the UN. 
Some posited that it was for free international flights to troublespots (I highly doubt it), higher visibility when getting involved in humanitarian aid, a way of highlighting support for UNICEF (for children) at the same time that trouble began brewing over child protection in congregations. 
Ciro Aulicino is the guy who signed up for it along with GB member Lloyd Barry. Several on the forum know these brothers and know that Ciro, at least, was prone to lapses in judgment, but always with a good heart and for a good reason. When he first moved from the Service Dept to the Writing Dept he immediately began setting up a regular schedule where he was at one of the major libraries for nearly a whole day at least once a week. He had no qualms about taking material for his public talks directly from 18th and 19th century authors and commentaries. His Awake! and Watchtower material would often start out with statistics from outside sources. He must have thought that the UN had the best statistics about various nations and international data. 
Personally, I absolutely believe the WTS's explanation that it was all about access to the library. Any non-profit organization could already have standard access to the UN library, but the library was also a pre-Internet source of information about past, present and future UN backed seminars and reports, and therefore the advantages of becoming an NGO would have been seen as tempting. Those seminars are related to world health, world crime, natural disasters, religious persecution, holocaust memorials, etc., and are attended by writers, researchers, journalists and other religious and political organizations, too. In fact, the WTS still attends seminars that are backed by UN NGO's because it can help highlight the WTS's own involvement with some of these same issues. 

I don't think I ever saw a Gilead tour letter for a U.N. tour. But the ones I have seen are very similar, and there is nothing in the writing or format of this one that looks odd. It's very much like the other letters that came out of the Gilead office in the 70s and 80s. When I pull out some of my old boxes of papers, I can post an almost identical memo/notice that was given to all Gilead students.

For some, I think it must be like the reason they tie C.T.Russell somehow to Freemasonry. There is absolutely no reason to think that CTR was a Freemason just because he was familiar with some of their terminology and dabbled in silly pyramidology. But to a lot of people, Freemasonry means "demon" and "demon-control" and therefore it means something much worse than it would have meant, if Russell had been an actual Freemason. 
The same goes for those anti-JWs with a 'no-better-than-average' sense of pareidolia (people who see people and faces in everyday objects). When they look at pictures in the Watchtower of clouds or trees or bushes or patterns on cloth or in woodwork or this or that or the other, they see deformed faces and think of demons. I think these same people are a bit paranoid, too, so that when a real cloud in the sky looks like a puppy they wait for the cloud to grow and change and shift and distort and only notice it when it looks like a werewolf to them. 
I have a sense that they want to dismiss the success of JWs and assign it to demonic forces and this somehow rationalizes it for them. (Seeing Jehovah's obvious blessing in something and then trying to say it was from Satan and his demons is, in my mind, the primary definition of 'sinning against the holy spirit.')
I say this because the answer is yes, they often do posit a reason. I just got sucked down a reddit-hole last night looking for the answer to the same question. And it's sometimes related to the idea that if the UN really is a [demon-inspired] beast of Revelation, then the Witnesses are sucking up to the beast for whatever favors the beast would grant them. 
For the most part, however, it's just mentioned as a show of hypocrisy and sloppiness (as opposed to faithfulness and "discreetness"). I saw a comparison of the directive by the WTS that Malawians not buy a 25 cent national ID card over which Witnesses were killed, and the nonchalant sign-up to a 1991 NGO application that said the NGO participant would 'support the mission' of the UN. 
Some posited that it was for free international flights to troublespots (I highly doubt it), higher visibility when getting involved in humanitarian aid, a way of highlighting support for UNICEF (for children) at the same time that trouble began brewing over child protection in congregations. 
Ciro Aulicino is the guy who signed up for it along with GB member Lloyd Barry. Several on the forum know these brothers and know that Ciro, at least, was prone to lapses in judgment, but always with a good heart and for a good reason. When he first moved from the Service Dept to the Writing Dept he immediately began setting up a regular schedule where he was at one of the major libraries for nearly a whole day at least once a week. He had no qualms about taking material for his public talks directly from 18th and 19th century authors and commentaries. His Awake! and Watchtower material would often start out with statistics from outside sources. He must have thought that the UN had the best statistics about various nations and international data. 
Personally, I absolutely believe the WTS's explanation that it was all about access to the library. Any non-profit organization could already have standard access to the UN library, but the library was also a pre-Internet source of information about past, present and future UN backed seminars and reports, and therefore the advantages of becoming an NGO would have been seen as tempting. Those seminars are related to world health, world crime, natural disasters, religious persecution, holocaust memorials, etc., and are attended by writers, researchers, journalists and other religious and political organizations, too. In fact, the WTS still attends seminars that are backed by UN NGO's because it can help highlight the WTS's own involvement with some of these same issues.