jehovahs witness

FIRST OF ALL THE WITNESSES ARE NOT A CULT. THAT OPINION WAS FORMED BY SOMEONE THAT OBVIOUSLY FEELS THREATNED BY THE TRUTH.IT AMAZES ME THAT WHENEVER A WITNESS DOES SOMETHING WRONG IT MAKES THE FRONT PAGE OF THE NEWS! IF A BABTIST OR PROTESTANT DOES SOMETHING WRONG IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THEIR RELIGION. AND THIS BIG COVER UP GARBAGE IS A JOKE. ADMITTEDLY THEY ARE NOT PERFECT NOR CLAIM TO BE. MATT 24:9 SAYS THAT WE WOULD BE OBJECTS OF HATRED ON ACCOUNT OF HIS NAME. WHAT OTHER RELIGION IS HATED ON ACCOUNT OF HIS NAME? ONLY 1 THAT I CAN THINK OF THE WITNESSES PROUDLY GLORIFY JEHOVAHS NAME. ALSO WE ARE NOT PROGRAMMED. WE HAVE FREE WILL,GOD DOES NOT WANT ROBOTS, THAT IS WHY HE GAVE ADAM AND EVE FREE WILL. AND WE DO BELIEVE IN JESUS. HE IS GODS SON AND HE DID GIVE HIS LIFE FOR OUR SINS. I ALSO GET A KICK OUT OF THOSE WHO TELL US WHAT WE BELIEVE, ESPECIALLY IF IT ISN'T TRUE. PEOPLE JUST MAKE UP WHAT THEY WANT ABOUT THE WITNESSES AND THE NAIVE ONES BELIEVE IT. IF IT IS TRUE THEN LOOK INTO WHY WE BELIEVE WHAT WE DO. DONT JUST ASSUME TO KNOW EVERYTHING THAT THEY TEACH OR BELLIEVE BASED ON SOMEONE ELSE'S OPINION. TALK ABOUT HAVING A MIND OF YOUR OWN!!

IT AMAZES ME THAT WHENEVER A WITNESS DOES SOMETHING WRONG IT MAKES THE FRONT PAGE OF THE NEWS! IF A BABTIST OR PROTESTANT DOES SOMETHING WRONG IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THEIR RELIGION.

First, Baptists are Protestants, silly. Protestants are any Christian who is not a member of an Orthodox Church or the Catholic Church. Second, I cannot recall reading a single news article that blamed the Jehovah's Witness religion for the actions of a criminal who was a Jehovah's Witness. And if you think the media is friendly to Protestants (at least, to the ones who take Christian teachings seriously) you have lost your mind.

MATT 24:9 SAYS THAT WE WOULD BE OBJECTS OF HATRED ON ACCOUNT OF HIS NAME. WHAT OTHER RELIGION IS HATED ON ACCOUNT OF HIS NAME? ONLY 1 THAT I CAN THINK OF THE WITNESSES PROUDLY GLORIFY JEHOVAHS NAME.

After reading this I have my doubts that you're a real Witness. Jesus is the one speaking in Matthew 24, and Jehovah's Witnesses don't believe that Jesus is God, much less that Jesus is named Jehovah.

Oh...and for a religion that is hated because it carries forth the name of Jesus, try Christianity.

ALSO WE ARE NOT PROGRAMMED. WE HAVE FREE WILL,GOD DOES NOT WANT ROBOTS, THAT IS WHY HE GAVE ADAM AND EVE FREE WILL.

True, but you have surrendered your free will to an organization that does not allow you to think freely.

AND WE DO BELIEVE IN JESUS. HE IS GODS SON AND HE DID GIVE HIS LIFE FOR OUR SINS.

But He also said He was God...not only in the stuff I already mentioned to you ("I am the First and the Last," etc.) but in His earthly ministry. Yet your religion says that He is not God.

I ALSO GET A KICK OUT OF THOSE WHO TELL US WHAT WE BELIEVE, ESPECIALLY IF IT ISN'T TRUE. PEOPLE JUST MAKE UP WHAT THEY WANT ABOUT THE WITNESSES AND THE NAIVE ONES BELIEVE IT.

Well, then tell me what is wrong with this statement from Wikipedia, which matches my understanding of your doctrinal positions:

Jehovah's Witnesses are best known for their door-to-door preaching, distribution of literature such as The Watchtower and Awake!, and for their refusal of military service and blood transfusions even in life-threatening situations. They consider use of the name Jehovah—one of the common English-language pronunciations of the Tetragrammaton—vital to proper worship; they reject Trinitarianism, immortality of the soul, and hellfire, which they consider to be unscriptural doctrines. They do not observe celebrations such as Christmas, Easter or birthdays because of their perceived pagan origins. Members commonly refer to their body of beliefs as "the Truth", and adherents consider themselves to be "in the Truth". Jehovah's Witnesses regard secular society as a place of moral contamination under the control of Satan, and limit their social interaction with non-Witnesses. Baptized members who violate the organization's fundamental moral principles or who dispute doctrinal matters are subject to disciplinary action, the most severe being a form of shunning they call disfellowshipping.
The religion's position regarding conscientious objection to military service and refusal to salute national flags has brought it into conflict with governments, particularly those that conscript citizens for military service.

IF IT IS TRUE THEN LOOK INTO WHY WE BELIEVE WHAT WE DO.

You believe it because you are told to believe it. You are told the only source of truth is the Watchtower, and then everything they say is the truth. Have you ever picked up a book claiming to debunk your religion and read it with an open mind?

TALK ABOUT HAVING A MIND OF YOUR OWN!!

Oh, the irony!

Why haven't you answered any post to you? Did the most recent issue of The Watchtower forbid you to push the reply button? I call shenanigans.

No, there’s a very sad reason so many started in New York. Following the Great Awakening, upstate New York was poor and poorly educated. Itinerant preachers found the local population easy to fleece with promises of revival. The locals eventually grew very cynical, making them very hard to be reached by mainline Protestant preachers afterward. But as G.K. Chesterton noted, those who believe in nothing will eventually come to believe in anything. Embittered against “traditional Protestantism,” they fell easy prey to Restorationism, which preached that there were essential flaws in mainstream Christianity. Most of these related their “restoration” of “true Christianity” to an imminent return of Christ.

Restorationist con men exploited the figurative nature of Revelations. In Greek, 1000 means 999+1, but it also means a “zillion.” To those ignorant of this, the claim that there would “only” be 144,000 saved people validates the notion that there is some massive defect in mainstream Christianity, thus validating restorationist cults. Plus, it’s real easy to get people to give away their life savings if they believe they’re going to get swept up to Heaven before they get to spend it.

The largest of the surviving restorationists are the Mormons, 7th Day Adventists, and Jehovah’s Witnesses. The Mormons are the most successful, because they never predicted exact dates of a rapture.

Please note that I am drawing a distinction between restorationism and reformation, even though the Reformation necessarily had some restorationist elements. Baptists aren’t truly restorationists because they believe that some elements of essential Christianity survived as a remnant throughout the Catholic era. Mainline Reformed Protestants, including not just Calvinists who use the name Reformed, but also Anglicans, Lutherans, etc., aren’t restorationists because they did not assert that ancient Catholics’ faith was so severely deformed as to prevent salvation, although one could infer that from some particular writings. To them, the Catholic Church deformed Christianity (hence, they refer to its reformation), as opposed to supplanting it (which, hence, requires restoration).

Restorationism is a feature, however, in some New England congregationalist churches, too... not strictly a quasi-Christian New York thing.

That’s right... Hebrew doesn’t have written vowels. A few diacritics can suggest what vowels can exist between consonants. But I was trying to explain how there simply aren’t any vowel combinations which can make sense of YHWH. The problem is that all four letters are “semi-vowels,” which are consonants which behave as vowels in certain ways. I’m oversimplifying it, partially because I never studied it too deeply and partly because I don’t remember it so clearly, but it’s something close to this: You can precede a semivowel, with another semivowel (Netanyahu, for instance), or follow it with a semivowel, but you can’t do both. (There’s all sorts of exceptions and complications, though, which are beyond my expertise.)

Consider this: You can put an ‘r’ after another consonant (”pray”) or before one, (”bard”), but you don’t put one between two consonants (”brd”). You don’t think of it as pronounceable. Try it. Did you just say “brd” or “bird”? Before you say “bird,” what sound did you make to indicate an “i”? NONE! We insert an “i” even though we don’t say an “i” because “brd” is supposed to be unpronounceable!

LIkewise, the Masoretes were able to insert vowel diacrits into YHWH, but those diacrits are not otherwise ever used between those letter combinations. Hence, even though the diacrits would otherwise suggest “Yahu,” (indeed, this is used for “God” in names such as Netanyahu) it’s translated as “Jeho.” The problem is that HW suggests “ehowa,” contradicting “Yahu.” Likewise, the WH suggests “weh,” but the HW suggests “ehowa.”

Thus, people can argue between Yahweh and Jehovah, but they are both absolutely impossible.

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