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Yeah......the longer you stick around the more manipulative and vicious the confrontation(s) for those exiting. Most notably, corps and upper-tier leadership are savaged with verbal attacks and when they leave are slandered before the whole corps body. Twi quickly goes into DAMAGE CONTROL MODE and only one version, their side of things, is heard in their echo chamber of bobble-heads. Wierwille would NOT allow any of his top men leave without confrontation. He verbally assaulted them on corps night calling them "cop-outs, flipped-outs, or possessed." It was this tactic that caught my attention back in 1978 during my in-residence year at Emporia. Guilt, shaming, confrontations and the salt covenant......ALL are used to manipulate followers from exiting. Open questions and dialogue are not allowed in twi. Hence, breathing life into Waydale and GSC.

Wry to the point of being bread. Life has gotten more interesting challenging, if that's possible. Et toi?

Also, let me quibble with the wording of "If we take it as a given that the Bible is inaccurate." That is not my position and it is not relevant. It would be more correct to say "If we do not take it as a given that the Bible is accurate." That gives the book room to be accurate in some places, inaccurate in others, each piece standing on its own. ALL of it can be accurate and it wouldn't change the outcome. "We view the book as an account of what someone believed at the time each book was written. The question then becomes what does it reflect about what was believed at the time, who believed it, and when was it believed?" Where I come from, we call that "common ground." Whether you believe it or not is not the point. An unbeliever cannot argue that the people of the time could not know that information because it's RIGHT THERE. Even the Shelliak would have to agree. :)

The only problem with "what did God reveal and when did He reveal it" is, hypothetically, if Hebrews says the people of the OT knew something, then that settles the question from the believer's perspective but not the historical. So we'll see if that becomes an issue.

Agreed. Unbelief is irrelevant to the conversation. Intellectual honesty is the approach we're seeking, believer or skeptic.

And by the way, I've already refuted my own preconceived notions by looking at the material honestly and following up on vague suggestions to uncover verses that addressed my questions with less ambiguity. Still willing to see more.

Sorry I misunderstood your post, WW. If you can think of a better way to phrase my questions, have at it. I need to pass the point of finding this thread irritating.

I can and I will, but honestly, it has passed the point of being annoying that I constantly have to clarify something that was not unclear in the first place, and that the subject has now become about my being "dead set" on looking at something from a logical perspective. So here's a different way to ask the same damn question (sorry, but we passed being annoying the third or fourth time I was accused of being stubborn about how I'm handling this topic). Looking at the Bible chronologically in the order that the stories take place, what is the first inkling that we have that "salvation" or "eternal life" is even a thing? And, following up on that logically, at what point is it clear, Biblically AND chronologically, that there is a "gospel" of salvation that is clearly articulated? Best answers we have come up with until this point is that there's a reference in Job to the expectation of a life after this one, and there are Psalms that seem to indicate (to my satisfaction at least) that "trusting in the Lord" is what "entitles" (I'm struggling to come up with a better word) a person to eternal life. I know you can look at certain verses in the New Testament that seem to indicate the people in Genesis knew certain things, but there is nothing in Genesis to reflect that, and the people who lived at the time of Genesis did not have access to the New Testament. Yeah, you can say "God said it, that settles it," but from a historical perspective, that doesn't fly. Answer the question the way a Jew would: They don't accept the New Testament as authoritative the same way Christians don't accept the book of Mormon's claims about Jesus as authoritative or the Koran's claims about Abraham as authoritative. Where is the gospel of salvation in the OT? If we're going to ask how it's changed, we have to approach it honestly, and that means approaching it chronologically. I'm willing to assume Adam knew the substance of Genesis 3:15 even though he wasn't there to hear that promise (or, at least, there's no indication he was). To deny he knew it would be nitpicking. But Genesis 3:15 says nothing about restoring man to immortality. That promise comes later (at the latest by Job). I'm willing to accept that the people of Genesis had the same expectation as Job even though there's no connection between the stories, again because it fits chronologically and I'm looking at this chronologically. And I say this knowing that Genesis-Deuteronomy were written centuries after the events described and not knowing at all when Job was written. To avoid that argument, I'm taking the timing of the stories AS THEY OCCUR at face value. What I'm not willing to do is accept that the people of Genesis knew what was written in Hebrews some thousand or two years later. That's ret-conning. It may satisfy the question from a theological standpoint, but it doesn't hold water chronologically. This should not be difficult. And it's not about ME or my being "dead set" against anything. It's about approaching the material on its own merits and not allowing ANY preconceived notions to take precedence. Is there a gospel of salvation in Genesis? Where? Exodus? Where? Leviticus? Where? Joshua, Judges, Ruth? Where do we first see the people of God actually believing in something that we can call "salvation" according to how we define it today?

my aunt took me to the 1964 World's Fair....only two things come out of distant memories: my aunt bought me a beret (i loved hats) - which i also lost later that day; and i saw a Sea Hunt themed detective show - in one of the halls they had a giant water tank with a huge viewing window - Loyd Bridges' voice over the speakers and a "detective" with a trench coat over his slim line air tank is in his underwater office with a desk, filing cabinet, etc. going through the motions of working on a case in sync with the voice-over - really dorky but i thought it was the craziest coolest thing back then since i watched the TV show.... Anyway - i know exactly what you mean about JAL's stiff manner; i've seen him teach several times and went to some corps promos he did; at the time i thought it was entertaining - but now consider his gig as nothing but all hype.....reminds me of a person i knew in high school who would launch into doing some stand up comic's routine - he'd have the lines, inflections, and gestures down pat - kinda funny and yet kinda not since it was an imitation...this guy wasn't naturally funny either - so it came across as just an act....when i think of JAL now i imagine he may think of himself as a consummate salesman for god. (intentional lower case on God spelling)

I think you were describing Animatronics. And I probably couldn't come up with a better description of JAL. I've thought for a long time that he has seemed inauthentic.