Tzaia

It also never went beyond the science or the imagery of the people who wrote it.

STF is dispensational, so there would be a lot of calling out that aspect in notes and what not.

[edit] As I've stated before, JWS was clear in that he needed a version/translation that agreed more with his theology.

I am going to derail this topic for a moment. I don't attack people. I attack ideas. If someone thought I was going after an individual when it came to me calling people lunatics, I'm sorry, you're mistaken. I don't do passive/aggressive. So unless I address you directly, it's safer to assume that I'm not talking about you.

I sincerely do not believe that 99.9999% of people who believe the bible take the OT at face value, even when they think they do. One who would take it at face value would resemble a salafi purity police on a mission more than even an ultra-orthodox jew. As comical as I find the ultra orthodox in their need to avoid me to maintain purity, I don't consider them lunatics. However, lunacy is readily apparent when one is a true believer muslim. Engage even the so-called "moderate" in a discussion of the practical application of their religion and just behold the lunacy. Same with the TV preacher. Dial into the Daystar channel and the likes of Pat Robertson and even Joel Osteen and tell me there's no lunacy going on there. I would beg to differ.

I spent years as a proudly fundamentalist christian, but I have never been particularly religious. I am really uncomfortable with the religion aspect of it. In 2005 I returned to school full time a few months after CES and I parted ways. That's when I started really looking into critical thinking. While I use critical thinking and problem solving continually in my profession (I am a computer person), I kept that separate from being a christian. In 2008, that changed. I read a number of Brian McLaren's books, one being "A New Kind of Christianity". I don't remember the specifics, but I do remember walking away no longer a fundamentalist and no longer willing to overlook the havoc that religion causes. Since then I've found myself becoming increasingly cynical and simply not caring about what it means to be a good christian. I have found that I am a kinder person as a result of not needing to run everything through the christian filter to gauge the rightness of something. To top it off, instead of feeling bad, all I've felt is relief.

I've always known why I'm not a Mormon (although no one does families better); why I'm not a Scientologist; why I'm not a Jehovah's Witness; why I'm not a Muslim; why I'm not a trinitarian, but I never really considered why I was ever a christian. Some people seemed at peace being a christian, but that was never me. I fought too much with the text. It just never sat well with me. For years I blamed me. Then it dawned on me that the reason why I struggled so much with it is because it never put me in a win/win situation. It's fine if all you do is hang out with the "like minded", but there is always that tension when you are not. Are they saved? Am I acting christian enough?

Now I really do not care and it is such a relief.

Actually, what little I've read fits current STF theology well. I do not know if or how he managed to work the benefits Momentus or personal prophecy into it, or any of the other off the wall things they've managed to latch on to over the years. I just know that for me the need to have special knowledge diminished, and not caring has been a relief.

I do not miss the drama.

Tzaia, when you initialize JWS, I am assumming that is John Schoenheit, correct? I suppose that I could go back through the forum topics to understand all that you mean but is there anything, specifically, that you find wrong with JWS's REV?

My objection to JWS's REV is that it is his; written to support his doctrine; essentially a vanity book. That is just my opinion.

It's difficult to wade through things here on GSC since I realize there is alot of personal bias from past experiences. You did help with some stipulation. So, is "working the word" now a bad thing since the taint of TWI.

Nope. I just think it's a waste of time, or a distraction, or a stumbling block. Take your pick.

What' the process for singling out specific portions of a previous post and to respond to them: is it a simple cut and paste?

There's a little balloon icon in the format bar above - next to the envelope to the right - click it where you want to quote text, then copy/paste the text between the ["quote"] ["/quote"](leave out the " marks)

It doesn't hurt to have moved beyond the best thing since sliced bread or canned beer, tho.

Actually, MRAP, you aren't a lunatic because you don't take the OT at face value. This is why I say this: You are still very busy trying to view it through some sort of lens that helps it make sense.

Well pretty much anyone who takes it (OT) at face value is a full blown lunatic. Same with Islam. Same with the TV preachers of Christianity.

Tzaia, sure, religion is a problem quite often but as far as the Bible (all the texts) itself, never considered it to be a problem, only problem is working with what we have - getting past theological and philisophical transcription of it through the last two millenium.

I used to feel the same way. Now I don't. Now I see *it* as the problem.

If seedy folks want to utilize the Bible for nefarious means then they have sealed their future. The efforts, as I see them, is in fact decoding the book, I don't take that as a dis on folks who are trying to give a best version of what it originally said. Yes, live right. No, it's wrong to use the written word to manipulate people,especially when you do so for personal gain and even more so when not caring what those actions do to screw up the lives of other people. As you know Tzaia, $ & Sex but you don't take it by misleading folks.

I used to think that people disappoint people and that god doesn't do that because he's not people. I don't think that anymore. I'm pretty equal opportunity.

It's unboubtedly easier to live the life of the world than live the life laid out in the Bible.

I would say that's it's impossible to live out the life laid out in the bible. And now I'm leaning towards not particularly desirable.

I decided a long time ago not to let the TWI experience to quell my love of God or what he gave, via revelation, to the original writers of His word. I applaud true efforts to get it straight.

I used to applaud effort. Now I don't because I find very few are in the "true effort" category. Actually, statistically insignificant.

It's really easy to give into emotion, especially anger and then let it pollute the rest of you against what you hold most dear - not happening here.

Most of the time I don't really care enough to get emotional.

But to get back to the point - I like JAL. I knew (and cared deeply for) his parents, siblings, both wives, child. He's grown a lot in the past few years. I knew JWS and liked him at one time; spent a lot of time with hiim. He has his head so far up his butt and DG's butt.... Have no use for DG. He's manipulative and dishonest. JWS has no special insight into the bible.He believes he does, which makes him subject to bias and all kinds of things. He is being honest about this: that he has done the translation to fit with his theology. I had issues with that. I no longer care; it's simply another rabbit hole You do care. I still think it's nothing more than a rabbit hole.

Thanks again for posing the questions.

You are welcome.

Have you considered the bible, i.e. religion itself is the problem? All these efforts to decode the book; get it right; live it right; drive people to do some pretty fracked up stuff to other people - and themselves.

That's not the way it happened.

FYI - he did not leave willingly. He was fired. He was put on administrative leave at least twice for getting out of line. When someone writes a paper on the sin of fornication and adultery, which apparently was news to TWI, the leadership of the offshoot needs to uphold that standard. JAL had issues in that area. Then there was the whole personal prophecy thing where the leadership did a number on his wife. Totally trashed her in the name of god. They divorced. The soap opera became more intense. Huge family rift. He ended up getting back with her causing a rift at STF. So sometime in the summer of 2005, STF decided to cut all ties with JAL.

I always felt there was an inordinate intrusion into people's personal lives at all levels in TWI. That behavior continued in leadership within CES/STF(I).

He has been gone nearly 10 years. Started his own thing...again. He's dealing with health issues. Much, if not all of it is documented here in this sub forum.

Yes he was the ultimate Calvinist when it came to grace. He was all about license in the age of grace.

But Calvin was not a dispensationalist as that hadn't made it into the thought processes yet.

I have heard of Calvinist dispensationalists.

But anyway back to the dispensational thing...

One knows that the writers of Acts through the epistles didn't have the benefit of the gospels. The gospels didn't take into account anything written in the epistles. It appears that no one - including god - figured that anyone would put together all the writings, so the whole disjointed thing was cobbled together and it left a lot of people scratching their heads on how to deal with the disjointed thing.

Dispensations don't smooth over the rough spots.Not really.

One has to do something if you accept that it must be inerrant.

Yeah, I knew that. I knew about all the other things, too. But somehow I missed the pro basketball thing.

I was never a dispensationalist in the EW Bullinger tradition, but it was the only way I could live with the OT and with the gospels. Then I found out that the gospels were actually written after the epistles, which tends to take things out of the realm of "for your learning". That brought me out of dispensation-land, which led me to a comparative study of Jesus from the viewpoint of the gospels and Paul's take on Jesus. I came to the conclusion that Paul taught "another Jesus". Why not? It's not like he had the gospels to learn from. It's not like he had a personal relationship with Jesus. All he had was his own incredible (in order to be credible) experience.

Then it occurred to me that the gospels were nothing more than a created back story.

Joseph and Mary know from the time of conception that this baby was special. Yet NOTHING is written about him from their perspective. Ok, maybe the gospel of Thomas. Maybe. But nothing that made it into the big book. He's virtually absent from 12 to 30.

He comes on the scene and he's doing all these remarkable things, yet NO ONE thinks they need to record any of it. People of the book don't see that they are witnessing first hand the Messiah.

Surely even back then people got when history was being made.

I get that recording was more complicated back then, but there wasn't even much of an oral back story.

Why, why why.

Maybe because what was happening at the time wasn't anything like what was "recorded" after the fact.

I don't know, but given the number of messiah look-alikes...

Are you saying, waysider, that he might have exaggerated his pro basketball credentials?

1. The decision, when it was made, was determined to be controversial. Why it was deemed "the right thing to do" is worth examination - or not.

2. People get offended way to easily.

3. People like Pat Robertson thrive on #2.

4. People cave far to often to people who get offended easily.

Gawd, you really do know everything, MRAP.

It does? I guess I overlooked that. Maybe because I don't feel it when I read it.

Because some "faiths," more than others, are just a hot mess of bad ideas.

I did. I did some of the earliest posts. Then CES wanted the name and was going to do something completely different with it, but I insisted on the format of putting all the work out there and it would be edited by me. Then they screwed me over on my level of input.

The other thing I did was lead CES away from the Body Soul Spirit image-of-god TWI thing. No credit for that, tho.

I went through a few of those "Great Courses" a few years back on comparative religion and as is said in Ecclesiastes: There is nothing new under the sun.