TrueTomHarley

in

I try not to be condescending. I don't think I am. Everything is subjective, though. Apparently, you think it.

I may have expressed something inelegantly but, in general, if it goes back from before I was born, I lose interest. If it also it requires eyestrain - I am not an eagle-eyed kid anymore - it disappears almost entirely. You have to be an historian for something that long ago, and that's not my thing - not for the sake of some piddly item that may have been no more than a bad hair day. If the man says he can't translate, what do I care? The fact is, it is translated by someone, they all remain anonymous there, who knows what was farmed out and to who? Of maybe God wrote it himself. (sigh...I'm being facetious here) The fact is, the translation exists and it get high marks. Not by Trinitarians, for it messes with some verses that cannot be rendered literally because it louses up their teaching. And there are some academics who look askance at the Name in the New Testament - inclusion of which is explained in an appendix. But other than that, it's well thought of. If you have to go back 70 years to dig up dirt, there can't be much dirt to dig up. Statements play differently at different time periods - just watch a movie from that time, or reflect that John differs so much from the other three gospels because times had changed and the foremost needs of the congregation had changed with them. So I don't necessarily want to unravel mindsets back then that accommodated statements that today's mindsets do not, especially if I think an opponent simply wants, and cannot get his head around anything but, a sound byte. Anyone can go back and have at it debating events back and forth and I'm not suggesting they can't or that it is a waste of time if they do. I'm just saying it it should hardly be considered mandatory after many decades, and a perfectly valid possible response is: 'who cares?' Even were a report from that long ago completely true, in our times complete scoundrels overhaul their image in far fewer years. So it doesn't interest me much to go there. Others will differ. More power to them if they do. But it's not mandatory. Similarly, I have little taste for things having to do with chronology, because even if opponents were to be absolutely correct, it amounts to little more than misreading a bus schedule. In athletics, runners jump the gun all the time, and they simply restart the race; nobody makes a big deal over it. It's the runner sitting on his rear end at the starting blocks that you wonder about. Grumblers here ought to specify whether they still even believe we are in the last days. Some do. But some have gone atheist, and dismiss ISIS as just one of those things - why, there have always been bad people. i like the truth also because it makes you nicer over time, when applied. I follow many sources on Twitter, which is the best way to get news, because you can choose your feeds. I choose all kinds of villains, along with the agreeable, so as to keep tabs on them. Few persons are as openly condescending and contemptuous than certain prominent atheists. Sometimes I worry that their cherished evolution is true and that they are the end result. If so, it's good-bye to the human race, for they do not suffer fools gladly. And a fool is anyone who disagrees with them.

I'm afraid you'll have to explain this one for me. I don't know what you mean.

Or you could just say 'it was 70 years ago. Who cares? Even if it was 100% faithfully reported, they've had plenty of time to shape up.' Everyone knows the world 70 years ago bears little resemblance to today. If someone insists on acting as a 10-year old, there's no need to go there with him.

When you get old and fat and it stretches into something unsightly.

I think I saw him with his cousin, Larry Largatherin

I figured she could help me break into the business, so I dropped by. She eyed me briefly, and then pulled the trap door. And she calls herself a sister!

What does this one mean at Ezekiel 39:15? "When those who pass through the land see a human bone, they will set up a marker beside it. Then those assigned to do the burying will bury it in the valley of Hamon-Gog...And they will cleanse the land." Bethel has never commented on this verse, so I am not allowed to speak of it until they tell me what to think. (I just threw that in for @Albert Michelson and crew) But if I could comment on it, I might offer that it tells how every last vestige of human thinking is cleared out after Armageddon, some of which are so skillfully interwoven by governments, business, contemporary thinkers and the like, that their effects are unnoticed, yet they affect us nonetheless. After Armageddon - gone! For example, even without ill intent, we are hearing endlessly of the displaced in Houston where (at last count) 37 have died, and are completely ignorant - or it is mentioned only in passing - that over 1000 have died in India - same cause. Repeat this to Americans again and again, as with any other news story, and it plants the subtle notion - not easily dislodged - that American lives are the ones that matter. It is probably the same in all nations. Now it is an ongoing struggle. Paul says we are 'overturning reasonings against every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God.' Every dividing thought, every undermining thought, every debased thought - thoughts that cannot be completely screened out even if we live and breathe jw.org - in the new system - gone in the new system! Unless there will just be a lot of bones to pick up, and the mens' wives drive them, as mine does me to my howls of protest, to keep everything neat and tidy.

'There's a new king in town'

A celebrity JW - we have precious few of them - would necessarily keep a low profile out of modesty, in addition to any business reasons. Imagine how she might be idolized by immature Witnesses otherwise. Still, if she wants my seal of approval, I'd better see a literature cart on her next photo shoot.

I've been trying to answer you for the longest time but I keep making types - um, typos. Â Â Between the Supremes and Led Zeppelin, you are starting to reveal the arena in which you are a prophetess.

I was actually being facetious. We aren't, in many cases, and that's especially demonstrated online. Granted, it is not easy. Online conversations everywhere about anything are seldom more than screamfests. However, I suspect there are some Witnesses who go online because they can dispense with the manners that would get them kicked off the doorstep in a heartbeat. It is the human condition - certainly not primarily true of Witnesses. it is the same situation as persons 'nice as pie' publicly who let down all restraint at home. Witnesses should be better, for they represent Jehovah - that's all I am saying - and that is not always true. Again, I backtrack a bit. To some extent this forum is fake news, in that it bills itself as a Witness-friendly site, drawing people in from Twitter (which is how I got here). Whether that is right or wrong, who can say? This is the internet and people can do what they want. But many of our people come aboard under false expectations, rove around a little, discover some poisonous people (not you) who are as in-your-face obnoxious as can be - and they lose it! They reach for the spear like Phinehas, not realizing they leave a permanent online trial. (which is quickly buried, however) If they anyone spoke mean to you and your wife, I apologize. Not that it matters that I do, but I do anyway. On the other hand, when my daughter was asked whether one had to be a Witness to survive Armageddon, she said: "Well, I'm not Jesus. And I don't know."

I would say so, but I think that is a catch-all term and not a denomination per se. On another site, I did have one commented who said (from family experience) that nowhere is disparity of income so great then in churches where they preach prosperity income, where the foremost prosperous one is always the preacher. http://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2011/06/income-religion-and-jehovahs-witnesses.html (comments from 'Dave') Many in the greater community of churches don't like Osteen - it is not 'birds of a feather flock together' in this instance. They decry the lack of substance.

Just ban JTR and his graphics machine and you'll do fine.

Sometimes you have to do a brain dump so thoughts do not back up. There is much to spur them on lately. For example, astronomers have spotted an asteroid which will make the closest approach ever to earth. Is this reason to take cover, as timid ones have suggested? No! Rise to the occasion. This is your moment. Knock it out of the park! Batter UP!! They have also pointed out that daylight hours have been receding - so gradually that many do not notice. Their inattention will kill them, as some Bible verse says somewhere or ought to. This could be a worse crisis than global warming. Act now! Do not wait until it all disappears - when it will be too late. On the movie front, two men have proposed an update of Lord of the Flies, that film where boys stranded on a desert island go savage - with an all-female cast. "Women wouldn't act that way!" critics have cried. Question: How would they act? One moment while I take cover. Or maybe I'll just step into the path of that asteroid. http://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2017/08/lord-of-the-flies-with-females-how-would-they-act.html

How can you not like Coco? We all hope she keeps her head on straight, because that is not a given when operating in the stratosphere. But then, it is not a given anywhere. Exactly Exactly Exactly

It turns out that Mattress Mack is more generous than I realized. I had assumed he would have to somehow clean out his furniture store to make it a homeless shelter. Instead, he just opened the doors and let them flop down on any couch or bed they could find. How can anyone not love this guy? He's in the right place and the right time, and he does not squander that opportunity.

Maybe they will send it packing again someday. Come now - it is not a 'doctrine' every time they blow their nose, far less one you have to repeat. You get almost as much bang for the buck, with no downside, saying "this reminds us of that." Isn't that a good way to do it, so as not to get certain people going? It reminds me of when I once conducted the Watchtower Study and one of the titles for the review was 'How would you answer?' I used to point out that one could not go wrong here. Even if you said the most ridiculous thing in the world - well - that is how you would answer. It is good food because it makes you nicer over the years. See? Aren't they all nice here?

Besides, they changed that.

No. They're not. Why harp on them, then? Who cares?

Well - I agree with the kid that Houston may be poorly designed, but no one has had to cope with 50 inches before and so there's not much to measure with. Boy, that woman in the succeeding video is a ditz! - explaining at length cartoons that you can take in at a glance. Not to be unkind...but I am on a roll today.

Oh for crying out loud! How do I know? And I'm not going to retrace it all so as to recall.

Well, then, why aren't you, the very ESSENCE of TRUTH, disfellowshipped? Somehow, they put up with you. If you are to be believed, you go out in service. Why? - when you hate those who present the message so? Do you tell your students to cross their fingers at their baptism? You go to congregation meetings and each convention. It must be pure hell for you, gnashing your teeth at every word. I don't mean to be unkind here, but....what kind of a loser does that? At the conventions, part of the delight is seeing and visiting with old friends. Who can you speak with? Doubtless there are some of your ilk, but by far - it was no contest - the largest round of applause came after the line: "would you like to convey your greetings to Bethel?" Say - was that you I saw across the auditorium with smoke coming from your ears? I disagree vehemently with @Albert Michelson, but I would never call him a loser. He doesn't like Jehovah's Witnesses. So he doesn't go to all their meetings. He does other things in life that presumably have brought him satisfaction. He is fighting valiantly for his point of view on this blog - it has caught his attention. But I never heard of him before, and am unlikely to hear of him again. He has a life. He is going to get back to it when this battle is done, whether he wins or loses.

In that case, it was just too juvenile. There is such a thing as adulthood, you know.