Mike

skyrider, If BG Leonard's class was Dr's SOLE rule of faith and practice, then how do you explain your declaration two lines later that he "heavily plagiarized from JE Stiles" ? It's things like this that show me you have no idea what a "sole rule of faith and practice" is. What you describe is a multiple source, not a single source. You plainly here do not get the idea of "only" or "sole." Even if you did not include this contradictory second line on Stiles, how do you explain the fact that Dr differed from BG Leonard and refused to go along with the terminology of "gifts of the spirit" but with "manifestations of the spirit? Here you plainly here do not get the idea of "rule." Dr plainly did not "line up" with many things Leonard taught, but this gifts issue is a big obvious difference, one that Leonard maintained all the way up to his visit to ROA '86. Like others, you use the phrase "only rule for faith and practice" like a buzz word that sounds good, but you obviously fail to understand what it means. Try reading my class and book quotes of Dr in Post #388 where he explains what he (and I) mean by "only rule for faith and practice." If after re-reading Dr's teaching there in that Post #388 you still don’t see where you completely missed the ideas of “sole” and “rule” as I just explained, then PM me and I’ll send you more of the class transcript and book on that subject than I posted. I felt I had to stay within the “fair use” guidelines and abbreviate in my posting of what we were taught on “only rule.” Mark Clarke, you too can PM me for more data on this. Your use of the phrase “the Bible” tells me you don’t know what Dr meant by “only rule” or “sole rule.” Within the phrase “the Bible” as it is most commonly used (not always, though) are hidden tens of critical Greek texts and hundreds (maybe thousands) of translations and versions, all differing in many significant places. The reason I parenthetically added "as it is most commonly used (not always, though)" is because once in a while, for certain pinpoint passages, Dr used that phrase to mean the collective aggregate of translations, and some other times he used it to mean PFAL writings. I'm getting ahead of myself, Mark, in answering your post that I had promised yesterday. I should go back to read it, but it seemed to overlap with this post to skyrider.

Thanks for the invitation, but I must decline for reasons more than just the constraints of time. I’ve decline from getting involved in Raf’s old thread where similar lines of thinking took place. I tried then to explain why, and am still trying to get those kinds of words out here. Let me try to get more detailed. I made my big decision a little over ten years ago, and the kind of discusion you seem to want to have I engaged in for many of the years prior to 1998. I went back and forth on the validity of many points in PFAL during those earlier years, but it was all finally settled for me by ’98. Now I want to put the bulk of my time absorbing the material, workig WITHIN it, which means using a completely different set of tools than working OUTSIDE it like you want to do. One of the tools I use is I assume it’s valid (my only rule for faith and practice) and proceed from there. You generally assume it’s invalid (or at least one point is) and work on it with set(s) of material you do think is valid, what I would call your somewhat unsettled, unspecified rule(s) for faith and practice. Even if you were to adopt a neutral stance toward PFAL’s validity (unlikely considering your posting against it), and even it you were to adopt and disclose one sole rule for faith and practice, I’d have to decline the opportunity to spend beaucoup hours debating PFAL. Our rules would still clash and we’d never convince each other of anything. Does this make any sense? I am willing to spend time in areas that we have commonality: our past ministry experience and teaching. I find that many are unclear on the details of the teaching, so I think discussing that is useful. These details as to what drove Dr to want to quit the ministry in 1942, but to get back on it after the snow seem to be far from known to most grads. Dr’s wanting to find a sole rule for faith and practice seems to be at the heart of the matter. He wanted a rule that was settled. Most grads, including you IMO, are not so unhappy to be in a state where you are trying to develop a rule. In one particular area you may try this idea one year (or decade) and that another. Dr wanted something he would never have to back up on in the days before the snow. That’s what a rule means, it’s rigid, like a ruler or yardstick. It’s length doesn’t change and it doesn’t flop around. I think most grads are content with rules that do change. I happened to hunger for something I don’t have to change and I finally found it. Can you name anything written in English that you think IS God-breathed?

How's this: prior to the 1967-71 period, hardly any of the PFAL material was in final, worth mastering form. That's not to say that the KJV corrections found within post '67 books couldn't be found in pre '67 booklets. It's the finer details I'm thinking of that were not in the old materials. I think there's far more in the final forms of written PFAL than the KJV corrections. I didn't always think this, but nowadays I see that there are many proPFAL grads who see ONLY this benefit. For KJV correction fans, my statement can't make much sense. It's when the fine points are brought to the table that I think it does make sense.

Yes, that's the post I want to get into when I have more time. It's now in my word processor and I'll be back.

Mark, I still want to answer a long post you did the other day, but havn't gotten to it yet. It might be the moved post, and if so, I'll have to chase it down there. But here you ask a question many ask, and I've tried to answer it before, but I will again. You wrote: If PFAL is the new God-breathed Word, Mike, how do you explain the glaring errors in it? Now, really, what do you expect my answer is? Do you want me to say: "Sure there are errors, but I close my eyes to them."??? If I were to try to explain why there are errors in God-breathed PFAL I'd be an idiot or sorts. Of course, my real answer (you expect this, right?) is that I disagree with the notion that there are errors! Why do you think there are errors in there? It's because you apply a set of inquiry principles that I do not think valid. You, and many others here, seem to think that's a done deal, that PFAL errors are a proved thing. I don't. I see a lot of prejudice that goes into the "research" to find PFAL errors. I see a lot of assumptions that I don't make. But most of all, I see a profound lack of understand and awareness of what is actually in those writings. Most people shoot from the hip and don't even have the books from which to work their theories of PFAL errors, and even fewer have the magazine articles. Does this answer your question? As for an extended debate on something like "kingdom" I'm very disinclined to do so. Have you searched ALL of PFAL (book and magazine) to gather together ALL that is written on that subject, or are you satisfied with taking pot shots at one passage of text, or worse yet, at one fading memory of what is written? I just don't have the time to "work the Word" in detail with antagonists who don't want to get to know the whole thing first. I prefer to work it in detail with meek and humble students of PFAL who recognize that there are a vast number of unturned stones to discover. I do still want to get back to that other post of yours, but time is short right now. I got things to do this evening.

This is a good question. I don't have a good answer all prepared and at my fingertips right now. I'll try to answer some of it, and as more comes to me I'll add it in. The year 1967 was obviously a pivotal one with the filming of the class. In 1977 plans were made to re-film it and replace it, but they were canceled at the very last minute by a revelation Dr announced at lunch that the film class was a one time deal. He said we'd go ahead with video taping PFAL '77 but it would only be a grad supplement class, and then even that never happened. The year 1971 was another pivotal year with the publication of a slew of books that ended up being in their final edition: PFAL, BTMS, TNDC, WWAY. It seemed to signify that certain publications that had been in the preliminary stages for decades were finally done. Around that same year we saw the publication of the 1st edition of ADAN, plus RHST 6th edition. The ministry had “arrived,” in a sense, at the threshold of book production. In the May/June1979 issue of the Way Magazine the Our Times article by Dr titled “How the Word Works” talked about mastering the Word. In that same issue was the main article titled “Masters of the Word.” In that Our Times article we read: "At these occasions, the years of Biblical research I have spent come back to my mind, and joy wells up inside me as I think of what is available to you today through The Way Ministry in book and magazine form, setting forth the accuracy of God’s Word. This research took me years to work out, and now you can see the depth of it in just a few short hours of reading. Any person who works this material will have a fantastic opportunity to see how the Word works." This seemed to be an indication that the “book and magazine form” of setting forth the accuracy of God’s Word had come into being, and fairly recently relative to that 1979 publication date. By then JCNG and GMWD had come out and JCOP was in the works. Around this time scripture indexes for the books (most of which were now published in their near final form) were produced in booklet form and made available. There were also made scripture indexes for the Way Magazine articles, two of them, one for 1976-80 and 1981-86. We have not seen a magazine index for earlier dates. The hunch is that books from 1971 and up, and magazine articles from 1976 and up are the primary “setting forth” of what God taught/guided Dr for teaching to us. We have earlier books and earlier magazines, but for our study, whe had to draw lines SOMEWHERE and so far these seem to be the best. It’s pretty obvious, when looking at books and magazines from earlier dates, that they are somewhat in a preliminary form. In 1963 there was a black and white film class made like this, and it was rather primitive compared to the ’67 version. I’ve seen this film class and it is obviously a preliminary version. The charts are hand drawn and Dr’s camera style is not good. Early magazine articles also show less polish. There’s a book Dr wrote in 1952 that I once heard him say that if he has his way, we’ll never see it. His 1956 “Delema of Foreigh Missions in India” while fascinating in certain respects, is doctrinally lacking and he seemed to try and keep this from us also. That’s the best I have right now.

Oops! Sorry, I confused you with Twinky. I'll add a fourth purpose: we document how many, many times Wierwille complainers forgot or never got item after item that he taught, thus invalidating most of their objections that the teaching was not valuable to them.

I call it time management, and I hardly have a choice. You didn't answer my question.

For what reason do you want me to respond to that? I'm behind in responding to many posts. Some get lost in the shuffle, even though I do try to keep track of the ones I think would be most instructive for me to work on. I also have to try and ignore some because if I get too involved a not so useful situation usually develops where the story becomes too much about me. It's also the case that if I respond to too many of the emotionally charged posts that tempers start to flare and etiquette plummets. You may have not witnessed how easily this has happened in the past, but it did. So what do you think will be the benefit to others (that's why we DO all this... right?) if I were to respond to that passage, bumping it ahead of the others in line on my growing list?

waysuider, You wrote: "Of the tens of thousands of people who are grads of PFAL, how can you be so certain no one else seems to have looked under this "stone"?" I've been searching for ten years for them. In the non-Corps 99% of some 300 grads I've talked to never even knew of Dr's last teaching. In the Corps population it was like 40% had not heard of his last teaching and the call to master the writings. If you know of any, please tell me who. I found about 10% of the clergy I talked to knew not of the teaching. There were even two clergy in the Research Department who had not heard of the teaching until I told them a few years ago. Even when I informed them of this lost teaching, most went on to blow it off and refused to obey it. Some study (or studied) PFAL a little (and a lot earlier when they were less mature) but no one has had any systematic way of mastering it. No one, just NO ONE, had looked closely at the differences between supposedly identical chapters and magazine articles. No one, just NO ONE, had ever done any kind of a word study within the PFAL writings. I'd love to be wrong on this, but essentially no grads outside a small fellowship here and a few GreaseSpotters scattered around the country that I'm in touch with take mastering the collaterals seriously. If you know any, please connect us.

WordWolf, I think my use of science was limited to the idea of ONE rule and an UNCHANGING rule. If I was wrong in this limited area, please point out my specific error. Otherwise I'll blow off your unjustified criticism of me and continue using the analogy undaunted. Let's try this, not using science at all: If you are a member of a church that has some written standard for rules of conduct, and you decide to adopt another standard for your conduct, then you have either quit your church in heart, or you have introduced confusion to your church.

The following is NOT my logic: #1 The snowstorm was and the revalation to Wierwille was real... #2 Therefore the PFAL class was the fullfillment of that promise... #3 Therefore the PFAL class is the Word of God... *** Here IS my logic: #1 From ten years of focused study of written PFAL and from 27 preceding years of casual study of written PFAL, I have come to feel VERY comfortable with the God I have met in those pages and have totally committed my life to Him. #2 From many references within those pages where Dr claims to have gotten the PFAL material under God’s supervision, either from direct or indirect revelation as I defined it earlier on this thread, and from #1 above, I conclude that God did talk to him audibly as Dr claimed. #3 From #1 and #2 above, I conclude that the snowstorm is factual, that it did happen as reported. I feel no need and I will not try to derive #1 with logic. It came from simple obedience to an instruction that was Dr's very last teaching and that was largely ignored and/or disobeyed by ALL top leadership and as far as I can see all lower leadership too. I felt like doing what I saw no one else (hardly) did. It was an unturned stone no one seemed to look under.

They're not a standard then, if there's more than one. By definition, setting a standard means agreeing on one, at least in a certain context. Some might step out of that context and adopt another standard for their own separate context. But within any context setting a standard means selecting ONE and only one to go by. For instance, for the metric system there can be only one standard for the length of the meter. Someone can say "Let's not use the metric system" and go back to the English system using inches, feet and yards, but WITHIN that English system there MUST be only one length that's the agreed upon distance for inches, feet, and yards. If there's more than one then it's not a system, it's confusion. *** Like I said on another thread, this is new learning for most, but in science this is Physics 101 material. Ditto for Chemistry 101. This is where those kinds of classes start: with their agreed on standards, their ONLY rule for practice. It's usually Chapter One.

I contend that we were taught to have one, and I contend that many don't understand this part of the teaching very well. I think if someone has more than one rule they need TO KNOW that they have more than one, and not delude themselves (or others) into thinking they have one when they have many shifting changing rules.

That's very possible, but it seems that FOR ME it would have taken more from God's budget. It's always this way with "WHAT IF" scenarios. It's very subjective. I can't claim to know anything here for sure. I just know Bullinger was a difficult in many places read FOR ME, even often where I knew exactly where he was going with his prose. I had an even MORE difficult time with his "Witness of the Stars" and his "Number in Scripture." They had my head spinning. Maybe it's just me, but I loved A. Conen Doyle's "Sherlock Holmes" stories, written about the same time and same country. I read all of them twice in Jr High, but Bullinger was much more difficult FOR ME.

WordWolf, What does all that have to do with the topic?

My basis for this is the observation of the complete inability of anyone to come up with an unchanging SINGLE rule for their faith and practice, and/or the anger some get when challenged to do so. *** It's so obvious that few are reading my posts in their entirety, but just looking for springboards to knock them down. For example: If you had just read on through you'd have seen that I handled this. It was a slip of the tongue and Dr immediately corrected himself, clarifying that he did NOT mean the KJV but something you can't buy in a bookstore anywhere on earth. Go back and read the whole thing. And then prove me wrong. Give me your printed, unchanging, SINGLE rule for their faith and practice, or tell me you don't have one. If you do have one then give me its Library of Congress number. If it doesn't have a Library of Congress number, then scan it and post it. If it's too long, then scan the first page and post it. Until you can do this I know this is new learning for you.

That's admirable. I try to do that too. ************ I think you're reading more into my comments there than I intended. Yes, a lot of people read it now, but if they're grads then they already know what Bullinger's getting to before he gets there. Grads have had a Bullinger primer in PFAL. I wonder how those never exposed to PFAL react to "How to Enjoy the Bible" ? My hunch is that if it weren't for PFAL then Bullinger's Companion Bible and all his works would have stayed in relative obscurity or even slipped off the map entirely. I think VPW popularized Bullinger. I could be wrong on this, but if statistics were to be taken of all Bullinger purchases, I wonder what percentage would be PFAL grads, or once degree of separation from a grad. I know this, there were no Bullinger people out in the streets in 1970 rescuing hippies the likes of me. Bullinger did not inspire any kind of mass movement that landed in the pages of Life and Time magazine. I doubt if there was ever a Bullinger meeting that had 10,000 plus people in attendance, year after year for over a decade.

On a different thread nowIsee asked where does the phrase “only rule for faith and practice” come from. In written form, it was the title of Dr’s very last Magazine article in 1985, but it originated (as far as I know) in the film class Session 7. Here is (with my bold fonts) the 1967 version that we all heard in segment 31 Session 7 of THE CLASS : Now knowing logically that we have to have a center of reference, every person, and I put it in the singular because this is truth. We have to have at least one center for learning which is outside of the individual. But most of us have had multiple centers; we are confused in a multiple way. This knowing how the law of learning operates and how this thing works I came to the conclusion many years ago that for me this Word of God, this Bible--not the King James version, but THE Word of God which was given when holy men of God spake as they were moved by the holy spirit--that this Word of God is my only source for truth outside of the individual seeking. This is my primary and sole rule for faith and practice. This is why the law of learning operating the way it does and our knowledge of this I have to have some center of reference. For years I read around the Word of God; two, three theological works a week, every week. Because I just love to read and so I read and read and read. Well, these men were all centers of reference for learning and all I got was a hodge-podge of personal conviction but it was basically confusion. Because equally great men regarding the same verse of scripture would contradict each other. So, when I began to understand the operation of the senses in relationship to learning I finally came to the conclusion that instead of staying in confusion with all of men's opinions a lifetime I was willing to come to one point, one center of reference for truth which was outside of the individual seeking and that was THE Word of God. And I've staked my life on the accuracy and the integrity of God's Word. If this Word is wrong then I'm going to be wrong in what I teach. But I'm willing to take that "chance" as you would call it. As John Paul Jones or someone said "he's willing to go down with the ship." I'm willing to go down with the ship. If the Word of God is wrong I'm going to be wrong in everything that I've taught you in this foundational class on Power for Abundant Living. And everything we are dealing with now I could be wrong on but if the Word of God is right then the law of learning substantiates the truth that we're presenting and that is that this becomes our sole reference, our primary, our only rule of faith and practice outside of the individual seeking. We have to have something to turn to because you must learn, you must learn from something which is outside of you. Man needs a point of contact which is outside of him. In the PFAL book he words it differently on page 230: We gather information through our five senses from a source or sources outside ourselves. We come to conclusions from our accumulated knowledge, and thus we believe what we believe. Being aware of the process of learning, I came to the conclusion many years ago that for me the Word of God (not the King James Version, but the Word of God which was given when “... holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost”) would be my source for truth. This is my center of reference for learning. For years I read around the Word of God with the writers of outside works being centers of reference for me. Soon I suffered from a common disease called mental confusion because equally great men regarding the same verse of Scripture would contradict each other. When I began to consider the process of learning, I finally came to the conclusion that instead of spending my life in confusion with men’s opinions I would accept one center of reference for truth which was outside myself, and that was the Word of God. If the Word of God is wrong, I am going to be wrong; but if the Word of God is right, then I have everything to gain by taking it as my sole center of reference. I have a feeling this is brand new learning for most grads. Most tuned out this section of the class and book. Because I was into science, and standards are a big deal there, I was on keen alert in this section and never forgot it. In fact, I would teach at my twig that this section, segment 31 in Session 7, was the logical BEGINNING of the class. Do you see how there has to be only ONE center for learning, and it must be fixed and unchanging? Do you see how it was not the vague term “the Bible” that he used, but The Word, that’s the revelation God promised him for our benefit? In the class he slips, I think, and does say “the Bible” but then immediately corrects himself. In the book the term “the Bible” is missing altogether. *** This also solves another long standing mystery. In Session 1 we were taught that “the Bible” is the REVEALED Word of God, but that was prophesy. At that time there was no “the Bible” that was revealed in existance, only tattered remnants of an ancient one. As the PFAL reveltions got put into written form “the Bible” came into existance. That the PFAL writings are “the Bible” is the greatest secret in the world. Not many people, only a few hundred that I’ve contacted over the past ten years and readers of GreasSpot have ever heard it, and far fewer believe it. This truly IS the greatest secret in the world today that PFAL (book and magazine form) is THE Bible and is the Word of God in written form. Wasn’t this one of John Jeudes big initial objections with PFAL? I mean when Jeudes heard Dr say that the greatest secret in the world is that “the Bible” is the revealed Wored of God he dismissed the class right away. I think I read that somewhere.

Session 7 of PFAL. Please come see more detail to this in the "Snow thread" where the same topic is being covered.

Mark, until you settle on one version, and stick with every passage in that one version, your "only rule" is totally loosey goosey in my book. It's not a rule at all. There would be some unstated (and maybe unstable rule) you'd be following in making your decisions as to which version to use for which passage. The same would hold for better renderings/translations of words, and for augmentations like Orientalisms and such. There was only ONE bar in Paris that was the standard (until they upgraded it to something else involving light waves). If there were hundreds of bars it wouldn't be a standard unless they all were lined up together and had the same length./ The hundreds of versions of "the Bible" in no way all line up and say the same thing(s). In SOME things they so, but not nearly all.

In a parallel universe, where VPW decided not to teach, I'm a UFOologist trying to get my book on the History Channel.

Actually, I'm self unemployed and clean windows at several gas/convenience stores an love it, and I do stand-up comedy on Open Mics for free. I get a few laughs. I also am permitted to hang out occasionally with real scientists. It's all quite fun.