TrueTomHarley

1 hour ago, JW Insider said:

There are similarities to now, but there is much less "guilting" into increased activity, and it's positive aspects are emphasized more these days. Pioneering is also much easier now than it was, with more leniency on making your hours, and easier ways to count your hours

Yes. it was easy to get the frustrated feeling back then that whatever you were doing, it was not enough. And there was always some individual loose cannon somewhere to push that meme even harder. Such motivation has faded, and pioneering increasingly is presented for a more noble reason.

Pioneering is also being redefined, IMO, as a means of keeping ones occupied in kingdom activities of various types, giving ones more avenues to bring their gift to the altar.

As to the hour requirement, it is a concession to the times - an acknowledgment that life is simply so much more aggravating on all counts, and not just that of making a living. An insurance matter, for example, can take hours, even days to unravel, whereas at one time, you simply reached into your pocket and paid it. One now needs help to 'negotiate the health care system,' an indication plain as day that it is no good.

Sometimes in jest, with the new permutations of auxiliary pioneering at special times, I play hardball with the brothers. 'I'll do it,' I tell them, 'when the requirement drops to 15.' If one counts 'online witnessing,' I have special pioneered for many years. But I don't count it.

Having said that, a brother once expressed his annoyance at those who harp that Jehovah's Witnesses stress hours over people. 'The hours are people,'  he said.

6 hours ago, JW Insider said:

Not all of these recommendations were in the publications; some came from the talks during the circuit overseer's visit, and district overseers were encouraged to arrange special talks on the subject of 1975.  The May 1974 Kingdom Ministry was one of the publications that spoke to this issue directly. I'm quoting almost the entire article to give a better sense:

Having said that, and not disagreeing that there was great emphasis then on increased activity, most of the statements you have underlined have been continually said right down to today. If anything, the perception that one should pioneer whenever possible - that it is an activity 'right as rain' - as opposed to a special escalation of preaching, is more pervasive now than it was then.

I recall pushback from the Watchtower to those who wanted to have the faith, but live a 'normal life.' 'How can one lead a normal life in an abnormal world?' was the GB's answer. I think they have won that battle.

What is also true today, and it is a good thing,  is that there is far more emphasis on how one may acquire education 'a la carte,' so as to support oneself 'decently.' These days, after high school, we are encouraged to 'cherry pick' what we will need, rather than let an unbelieving world shovel indoctrination at us to undermine superior moral qualities.

Jehovah's Witnesses do not ignore education. We redefine it.

6 hours ago, ComfortMyPeople said:

Likewise, JWInsider, me and other have scriptural evidence that disagreement is not equal to disrespect.

No. However, in each of the four cases you mention, the person said what he said to the one he said it to - analagous simply to writing Bethel a letter.  He didn't discuss it at length on numerous threads on a public forum.

6 hours ago, ComfortMyPeople said:

Do vaccines hurt? Absolutely. The necessary hurt to get immunity.

I will acknowledge that the counsel about avoiding 'poison' can be overdone. Sometimes poison is best countered by a tiny bit of exposure up front, so should it hit full body slam later on, a person is not knocked out of the ring for being totally unprepared.

8 hours ago, James Thomas Rook Jr. said:

But, I was assured yesterday at the 2017 Convention in Greenville, SC., that Jehovah God and the Governing Body LOVES our "young ones".

(...except in Australia, the UK, and California,

Is is really possible to sit for three days through a convention when you loathe every word said, or at least the persons who say it? I don't think I would be able to do it.

2 hours ago, JW Insider said:

This brother (Rusk) also gave the main part of my wedding talk (with the vows), and one of the brothers from the Aid Book research team also gave 30 minutes of my wedding talk.

How long was your wedding talk?

7 hours ago, Anna said:

if in the future the GB scrapped 1914, would you lose faith? [yes, I know the question wasn't directed to me]

It's a bridge we cross when we come to it, for perhaps we will not.

In the meantime, Armageddon is just around the one heckuva corner. It's either that, or down the drain for us all, because the world isn't looking too good these days.

I'll hang with what we have because its the only game in town, at present, imperfect though it is.

12 minutes ago, JW Insider said:

This meant that each hall still had a piano and a couple of sisters who could play the songs, because there was no record set for the green-and-yellow

At my baptism, the brothers sang "You Ain't Nothin But a Hound Dog." What a nasty bunch they were there. 

But, seriously - at a congregation out in the hills, a duo playing piano and viola accompanied all songs. Such beautiful music you have never heard.

Did I ever tell you how spaceships fly in and out of those tunnels? Conspiracy theories, much?

How does the GB travel, @JW Insider? Do they go first class or passenger. Ever via private jet? It would hardly do for one of them to be dragged off the plane like that Vietnamese doctor was, especially if it meant skipping the Lagos convention they were due to address.

I think on this forum, but it could be elsewhere, is a brother who used to call on George Wallace, the Alabama governor, with the magazines. He described him as very cordial, and when the brother brought to his attention that violence had been threatened by the Klan at an assembly, Mr. Wallace told the police chief present to see to it.

It doesn't come up in a search here. Maybe I got my wires crossed. Does anyone know about this?

16 minutes ago, Gnosis Pithos said:

If you refer to how the "librarian" deletes or block to DEFEND their regular commentators, then the IP we bounce off of would be the same

The old biddy.

On 6/25/2017 at 3:48 PM, JW Insider said:

(For many years, Daniel 4 on its own, had nothing to do with the "foundation" for 1914, although it was considered to be a weaker, but still valid, bit of corollary evidence by Russell.)

so if 607 BCE is such a clunker, how did it get to be a foundation in the first place? What is this about 'counting backwards?' The above quote seems to indicate otherwise. 

My vague impression has been that Russell or someone latched onto it strictly through Bible chronology and wasn't overly concerned that it wasn't prevailing opinion - surely something would eventually cause that opinion to come around, as often happens.  With 607 BCE as a starting point, it is just a Dan 4 calculation away from 1914. It is not that way?

As for the Gnosis mystery above, I assure that there are two scoundrels here as well that are chomping at the bit to chime in, but I am keeping a tight leash on them.

On 6/25/2017 at 3:48 PM, JW Insider said:

But as you said: "That's all you need." Unfortunately, this is true for many persons. I think that most of us believe that if someone makes a claim that fits a preconceived notion, it must be true.

Actually, I think that many things are essentially unknowable. They have too many permutations. Our nature is that of emotion. And vested interests spin too many notions, sometimes deliberately, to muddy the waters. We make fools of ourselves with our current insistence on 'critical analysis' when we imagine that will solve the problem. Jesus never spoke that way. If anything, he deliberately tweaked those of that mindset, with 'heart' illustrations that he rarely explained.

Illustrative is a quote from Max Planck. Who is more science-minded than he?

"A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it."

And that assumes that new 'truths' accepted after a generation truly are truths. it is not inevitable that they are. Instead, they are often the mountains, the hills, the islands, that crumble just when you need them the most.

That being the case, 'that's all you need' usually suffices. There is nothing wrong with it. Experts are like hired guns. They are like psychiatrists at a murder trial - one insisting the accused knew exactly what he was doing, the other insisting he was crazy as a loon.

Yes, it is a bit cynical. But that doesn't mean it's not true. Perhaps that's why people accept 'the Truth' in the first place. They see all the diverse puzzle pieces come together to reveal the mountain vista on the box cover. They taste and see that Jehovah is good. The latter has nothing to do with 'critical thinking,' the former only marginally so. The critical thinker would analyze the pieces in great detail, find some flaws in them, and therefore never attempt to assemble them.

If it goes, it goes. As you say, it is not the essence. But I like it when things work. WWI and the Spanish influenza works. Hitler, Roosevelt, the Fed, and the returning Jews do not.

Maybe Trump didn't. Maybe Chan isn't. Maybe Inglesias didn't. But they all should have.

2 hours ago, JW Insider said:

. If you are looking hard enough for something, you can always find it and make it significant through some bit of world history or organizational history. (rise of Hitler, Roosevelt, Federal Reserve Act, Jewish immigration to Palestine begins, etc.)

While one could say that those things are 'sexy,' they are not nearly so sexy as the entire world being at war for the first time, with the 2nd time largely being a consequence of the first.  If that is not 'peace being taken away from the earth' (Revelation 6), I'm not sure what is. If that is not Satan cast down (Revelation 12) and being peeved about it, I'm not sure what would be. Throw in the greatest pestilence ever, and some 'acceptable' food shortages, and the coincidence, if it were to be one, is ...I am tempted to say...unprecedented. 

In contrast, Hitler and Roosevelt 'rose' for some time, just try selling the Federal Reserve as the issue to get everyone hyped over, and the Jews are a 'been there, done that' thing with our emphasis on spiritual Israel. They are all very problematic. With regard to a World War, you would have to be looking hard NOT to see it.

2 hours ago, JW Insider said:

Therefore, I doubt very much that a 20 year change is in the works.

I wasn't suggesting that.

52 minutes ago, JW Insider said:

 

So probably the only thing that we might consider to be different is the idea that the Gentile kings had their day and the times of these nations and their kings ended 103 years ago. 

If you move the day back 20 years, does that fit with any verses? Should it be expected to?

19 hours ago, JW Insider said:

All evidence shows the 1914 date

If this is a reference to 607 (it is not JWI's fault if I do not do my homework), I think of the expression 'it is the victors that write history.' It is a political statement regarding world powers, but it applies to everything. Certainly, science is fraught with accounts of one view coming into vogue, and then crushing the opposition for as long as possible.

My understanding is that some scholarly type has written a defense of 607. That's all you need. Not one Witness teaching is the majority view today; should we insist this one must be? For all the hype about 'critical thinking' today, the pattern remains what it has always been; in fact, it intensifies: choose your belief (largely based on 'heart') then go find some 'experts' to back you up.

Will 1914 fall? If it does, it does. But I am far from burying it just yet. Nor do I feel I should encourage the GB to have the wisdom and courage to do whatever is right. If I drop dead tomorrow, they will do just fine.

 I have grown used to explaining that 'if the greatest war in history, the ONLY time until then that the entire world went to war at the same time (China & region excepted, as it was isolated at the time), AND if the greatest pestilence in history does not constitute fulfillment of Matt 24:7 and Luke 21:10, 11, what does? Vs 8 of Matt indicates it starts off with a bang, but continues for some time.

Will I have to change my tune on this?

On the vs 8 'you ain't seen nothin' yet' front, terrorist knife or vehicle attacks, unheard of not long ago, are now just 'one of those things.' The gay revolution took decades; whereas the transgendered revolution has taken mere months, and a 9 year old girl can be, on National Geographic, not just transgendered, but a transgendered activist. 'Fake news,' absolutely unheard of just 3 years ago, is now a staple of life, one more of many pitfalls to mess with us.

Perhaps 1914 will suffice to get us through to the end. Maybe that won't be so far off after all.

19 hours ago, PeterR said:

You may be right about that Anna. He may not know what anything is about, but I still don't see why he could not have just explained that he lost the plot, and we could move on.  He has plenty of time for personal jibes and speculation about me, but apparently no time to quickly review a discussion and admit he was wrong.

In effect, is he not saying: "Why does TrueTom not apologize to me? Why does he not scroll back through the pages to uncover the stupid, self-absorbed blunder I have made in assuming that since I have seen the video, everyone has seen it, even though most opportunities to see it lie still in the future - further complicated by my insistence that he brought it up in the first place? Why did he roll his eyes and dismiss ME as a loon instead of patiently trying to uncover where I had gone off the rails?" He is touchy about his feelings.

He is not unlike @James Thomas Rook Jr., who, when you call him on anything, screams that you know NOTHING about him, how he has seen the BLOOD,  the SWEAT, the TEARS, has stared into the VERY ABYSS, has DANCED WITH THE DEVIL IN THE PALE MOONLIGHT, and so forth. The reason I know nothing about such things is that he has never said them. All he does is spray tommygun accusations like a terrorist does bullets, never doubting that his EXTRAORDINARY EXPERIENCE and UNIQUE INSIGHT justifies his outrageous actions.

None are unjustified attacks on anyone's character or motive, least of all, his countless slams of the GB. No. They are all FULLY JUSTIFIED!!! Why? Because HE HAS MADE THEM!!!

Far from criticizing his style and format, I admire it greatly, and emulate it whenever I can.

Besides, I am answering your questions. I'm just not answering them in the way you prefer. I'm just not recognizing your right to submit others to interrogation. But, in every case (well...almost) I have responded to something you have said.

11 hours ago, PeterR said:

But if you're just willfully distracting from the purpose of the discussion

You need only change one word to make this statement accurate: 'But if you're just willfully distracting from MY purpose of the discussion'

For example, why did you not take issue with my characterizing many of my own people as "nuts?" What right had I to do that?

Generally speaking, if I have, at times, been ungracious to you, I think you have been no less to me. I simply haven't cried foul with every insult.

6 hours ago, James Thomas Rook Jr. said:

You are FAMOUS for ad hominum attacks, open, thinly disguised, and heavily disguised

Mr. Tact and Kindness is telling me about attacks?

3 hours ago, PeterR said:

Are you willing to address the actual issues raised?

... if you're just willfully distracting from the purpose of the discussion and the points raised then I'll stop wasting my time attempting to have any reasoned conversation with you.

Having failed to ceaselessly debate me at the Kingdom Hall, eventually being shown the door because they WILL NOT accept any answer other than the one they've already set their heart on, they instead go online with the same plea to debate.

What they were not able to get me to do at the Kingdom Hall - patiently hash over all their unsatisfiable issues with them, they imagine they will get me to do online.

It's not happening on my watch.

3 hours ago, PeterR said:

 

You're writing that many JWs might be "nuts", but at least they're "100% honest".

 

The gnat you should have strained, if you had to strain one , is "nuts," for that is hardly a medically precise term.

Obviously, "TrueTom" is not my real name. My early friends appended the 'Tom'  and I've had to live that down ever since.

2 hours ago, PeterR said:

Most JW's are not malicious liars. I can accept that. But "none are liars"? Really?

With some, if you are not strictly literal at all times, you are toast. It is why poets die young.

Tell them about 'crocodile tears' and they accuse you of changing the subject to crocodiles, whereas they are trying to speak about real issues involving real people.

("Dam* that TrueTom, mutters @The Librarian. Now I have to start another card category entry under 'reptiles.'")

*Misspelled deliberately so as not the offend the sensitive @James Thomas Rook Jr. with a bad word, which he would never use in his refined collection of graphics, lovingly collected as some people do rare stamps now bordering on 6000.

1 hour ago, PeterR said:

1 hour ago, PeterR said:

"Relatively minor" to those who live in a bubble of alternative facts.

 

Since the only alternative  facts I mentioned were the prospect of living forever on a paradise earth, is that, too, a misguided 'bubble' for you? If so, you would have saved everyone's time by cutting right to the chase.

2 minutes ago, PeterR said:

None? Ever? What basis is there to believe such a sweeping statement when the Bible says every man proves to be a liar.

Yes, that is the quote you pull from that long excerpt.