Oakspear

It was little bit more than simply planting the idea that a suggestion was equivalent to a command. Think of the "frog in the frying pan" illustration. Control progressed gradually.

I agree with you on this point

When I left in 2001 there were ten states without Limb Coordinators, most, if not all, of those ten had but one fellowship per state. No reason to believe it's not more now. Even in my own adopted state of Nebraska, in the early 80's there were large branches in Omaha and Lincoln, as well as twigs in Grand Island, Kearney, Beatrice, Columbus, Fremont, Bellevue, Blair, North Platte and WOW families in Sidney, Scotts Bluff, and McCook. In 1990 there were small branches in Lincoln and Omaha In 1995 there were branches of 2 twigs each in Lincoln and in Omaha. In 1997 the Omaha people were encouraged to move elsewhere since there would be no twig there, the Lincoln twigs merged into one. All Way Corps were reassigned and Lincoln was classified as an "outlying fellowship" in the Kansas City branch of the Limb of Missouri. Don't know if there is any WAy presence in Nebraska now.

The fact that once the texts were written they were accurately copied and faithfully transmitted over centuries of time really has nothing to do with the underlying "accuracy" of the texts or with whether they are myth or history.

Nice

Is Paul perhaps defining "scripture" as that which is given by inspiration of God, thus saying that which is given by inspiration of God is given by inspiration of God? What is that called, a tautology? Kind of like, "I have said what I have said". As much as I dislike circular reasoning I think you have to put up with some in a religious discussion. You can not prove that scripture is given by God, but you can operate under the premise that it is and go from there. But couldn't one set up conditions that eliminate inspiration and see if "the scriptures" meet this test.

There's nothing offensive in that belief...it only becomes offensive when it is used as a jumping off point for calling those who believe differently idiots! Nope. While I disagree with your conclusion, it's certainly a valid one.

"Before the cock crows twice, thou shalt deny me thrice" was changed, with patented VP comma removal to "Before the cock crows, twice thou shalt deny me thrice" - that's how I remember it... That changed the meaning from Peter denying Jesus three times before the second cock crow to the denials before the cock crow being counted as "twice thrice", or 2x3 (which I doubt is even grammatically correct in Greek!)

By the time the 90's rolled around, the answer to the question "where did you let the adversary in?" was just a setup for leadership to brand you as spiritually weak, a contaminant in the household, a doorstop letting evil in. There were many times that I would think about that question, honestly trying to dtermine where I had screwed up only to have my response accusedly thrown back in my face.

I think Lynn gets the tomatoes thrown at him because he and his followers post his letters here on a recurring basis, thus bringing his "ministry" to the attention of all of us. I don't recall any of the other splinters run by the old TWI big boys being pimped here.

I think it all boils down to "Who says that God can't speak directly to a human mind?"

Yeah, it was funny how one of the keys to the bible interpreting itself was the context when we hardly ever read the context. The principle (if you accept biblical inerrancy) that no section of scripture may contradict another section makes sense...to an extent, but only if the whole context of each verse is taken into account. Oftentimes the verses cited in these "ping-pong" teachings weren't talking about the same thing, but were used to bolster dubious premises.

sorry...wrong thread

Robert: I've participated in enough discussions, doctrinal and otherwise, with WordWolf, to feel comfortable answering a question not directed to me: the point about plagiarism, invented stories and the like is not beside the point. We were in a group that valued one man's opinion about the bible as supreme. Poking holes in that man's methodology and casting doubt upon his veracity and honesty gets us back to the point where we can actually have a discussion about what the text of the bible actually says, rather than what we thought Wierwille said about it. From your posts, you appear to have a "real" education in biblical research (did you mention University of Chicago at some point?); I for one welcome your insight and look forward to your contribution in doctrinal discussions. Many of us seem to be more interested in bashing Wierwille and consigning everything he wrote or taught to the "false" pile. I think that you would find that many who engage in what looks to you like diatribe actually agree with Wierwille on some points, but get worked up when PFAL is referenced rather than a section of the bible. Oak

Group hug :knuddel: :knuddel:

It's all good bro' - and Spectrum too...Sometimes it's easy to forget that there are non-Christians in this "Christian Nation"...I don't offend easily, but I like to remind folks that there's "unbelievers" in the room! Reminds me of when I was in college and had quite a few Jewish friends, whose parents just assumed that I was Jewish too. I was kind of shocked at the remarks about the goyim, but enjoyed being "undercover".

Reminds me of the South Park episode where it turned out it was the Mormons who were right and everyone else was barred from heaven...A good thing to remember is that not everyone here shares the same mythology/theology...snarky comments about "unbelievers" are likely to be insulting. (Same thing goes for snarky comments about Christians btw)

Hey G...you know where I stand (more or less) -

Don't include me in your end-of-the-world snuff fantasy

I don't believe that things are so clear cut. Think about how often we mistake another's meaning, at home, at work, in politics. Even here at GSC, and we're mostly from the same country, same culture, same cult background, a lot of us are in the same age group, yet we still manage to misunderstand each other while using a common native language! What about when translating texts from a dead language that wasn't even the native language of the people who are being written about? In addition, some languages, like Greek, are more compatible with "exactness" in my opinion, while others, like the Semitic languages, are filled with metaphors and other figurative usage. Language at best is a fuzzy, inexact way of conveying thoughts. That all being said, what's important, IMHO, is the big picture presented in the bible, not the trivia and minutia that we concerned ourselves with in TWI. Yes, sometimes it makes a difference if the word was translated wrongly or codex ABC has such and such a word in a different tense, or mood, or voice...but more often than not it just doesn't make that much of a difference.

Ah...another "orientalism" that Wierwille pulled out of his @$$

Atheists in general aren't "starkly opposed to God", but don't believe that he exists. Big difference.

When I was asked to leave TWI in 2001 because I "didn't believe that the Trustees were leading 'the ministry' in the right direction" my oldest son had already left TWI on his own. The second oldest, 22 at the time, continued for a while, but at some point his involvement just petered out. The other four at the time aged 18, 15, 13 and 10, went because their mom told them to. When my ex-wife stopped attending, they did as well. To them, it was just something that their parents made them do and viewed it as many of us viewed our parents' churches when we joined up with TWI. In addition, to them TWI represented one of the reasons for their parents divorce. I've also recently found out that there was a lot of juvenile cruelty, name calling and the like going on behind our backs directed at my kids by other TWI kids. None of them look back at their TWI days with any fondness.

The website uses the Way logo, so I would assume that it's TWI's affiliate in Indai.

There was also an expectation that you believed the line, whether it applied or not. I knew some people who changed tracks in life by replacing drugs, sex, crime, whatever with TWI; for whom getting involved in TWI got them away from a path of bad choices and eventual disaster or even death. But these folks, at least in my experience, were a small minority. Eventually I started hearing the badness of ones pre-PFAL life inflated, occasional pot smoking equated with being a drug addict or some adolescent trouble-making on par with a life of crime for instance.