Plagiarism on the road to success

[Taxidev]

1 hour ago, T-Bone said:

perhaps if you could be more specific on what it was that craig shared about this research from someone

When he mentioned that it was a corrected teaching, all he said was some people may remember that point, and would recognize that this was a correction, but he wasn't going to re-teach the error.  And this was in 1995 when I was listening to this, so I don't even remember what he was teaching.  I'm guessing the tape was from 1992 or 1993; my friend had lent me a box of tapes.

I did get the impression that TWI had already established what they considered to be truth, and someone disagreed with it, and sent in their research.  This was on a STS, so it was in plain view of everyone.  I had no reason to think he was BSing us - he said he agreed with the man's research and so corrected his own teaching.

Sorry, that's all I've got.

[Rocky]

1 hour ago, Taxidev said:

When he mentioned that it was a corrected teaching, all he said was some people may remember that point, and would recognize that this was a correction, but he wasn't going to re-teach the error.  And this was in 1995 when I was listening to this, so I don't even remember what he was teaching.  I'm guessing the tape was from 1992 or 1993; my friend had lent me a box of tapes.

I did get the impression that TWI had already established what they considered to be truth, and someone disagreed with it, and sent in their research.  This was on a STS, so it was in plain view of everyone.  I had no reason to think he was BSing us - he said he agreed with the man's research and so corrected his own teaching.

Sorry, that's all I've got.

I heard the same $hit from Wierwille in the mid-1970s. T-bone is right, it was just marketing bull$hit.

[T-Bone]

On 3/27/2018 at 11:16 AM, T-Bone said:

Hey Mike,

i was wondering if you had a chance yet to read Penworks’ Undertow book

 

On 3/27/2018 at 11:39 AM, Mike said:

I have it and am slowly reading it. 

My first objection, though, is how she objected to the idea that "the Bible interprets itself."   I find that objection very dim witted, even when pumped up with detail like with the posters that attacked it 15 years ago here.  It slowed down my reading, but I still intend to finish it. That interpretation issue lowered my expectations and the book's priority in my schedule.

In a nutshell:  Imagine how quirky it is for God to issue His Word to communicate to us, but then He FAILS to put cues, keys, and signposts in there to guide sincere seekers.  That sounds like a bad way to get a message out.  It's like Him saying "I want you to know something but I will not help you understand it."

The phrase "The Bible interprets itself" is an extreme abbreviation of a complex idea.  She did not do that justice IMO.  The criticism this idea got here 15 years ago I thought was similarly lacking. My impression was that she was leading uninformed readers into thinking God is supposed to be mysterious, an old Catholic idea.  Maybe her book will get better later. 

If you can recommend a spot to skip ahead to I would appreciate seeing what you feel is an section important to me.

 

T-Bone said on March 27, 2018:

“Hey Mike,

i was wondering if you had a chance yet to read Penworks’ Undertow book”

= = = = = = = =

Mike replied on March 27, 2018

“I have it and am slowly reading it.

 

My first objection, though, is how she objected to the idea that "the Bible interprets itself."   I find that objection very dim witted, even when pumped up with detail like with the posters that attacked it 15 years ago here.  It slowed down my reading, but I still intend to finish it. That interpretation issue lowered my expectations and the book's priority in my schedule.

 

In a nutshell:  Imagine how quirky it is for God to issue His Word to communicate to us, but then He FAILS to put cues, keys, and signposts in there to guide sincere seekers.  That sounds like a bad way to get a message out.  It's like Him saying "I want you to know something but I will not help you understand it."

 

The phrase "The Bible interprets itself" is an extreme abbreviation of a complex idea.  She did not do that justice IMO.  The criticism this idea got here 15 years ago I thought was similarly lacking. My impression was that she was leading uninformed readers into thinking God is supposed to be mysterious, an old Catholic idea.  Maybe her book will get better later.

 

If you can recommend a spot to skip ahead to I would appreciate seeing what you feel is an section important to me.”

= = = = = = =

Mike, that is a really lame response…a miserably weak attempt to shoot down Penwork’s great exposé on the innerworkings of TWI   Undertow: My Escape from the Fundamentalism and Cult Control of The Way International    . You should be ashamed of yourself for saying  “My first objection, though, is how she objected to the idea that "the Bible interprets itself."   I find that objection very dim witted.”  

I’ll tell you what’s dim witted – when an incompetent plagiarist like wierwille screws up the work of someone else. He “borrowed” so much from Bullinger – but not like Bullinger was correct on everything (Bullinger’s dispensationalism and the supposedly 4 others crucified with Jesus are definitely mangled doctrines) – however I think Bullinger was correct on the keys to the interpretation of Scripture. In his book “How to Enjoy the Bible” covering   II Peter 1:20, 21   Bullinger says in regard to the phrase “of any private interpretation”, is that the little word “of” is genitive of origin – and is simply saying Scripture wasn’t CONCEIVED by anyone’s imagination or personal interpretation. Bullinger goes on from there to cover some basic hermeneutics – which is the study of the methodological principles of interpretation of the Bible. I believe Bullinger got that part right.

 

In PFAL however, wierwille muddied up II Peter 1:20, 21 and said The Bible should not be privately interpretated – in other words, it’s a no-no to have or offer a personal interpretation or opinion……there is to be no “I think it means this”.    wierwille goes on to say that if no private interpretation is allowed then there is either no possible interpretation or the Bible must interpret itself. If you’ve ever studied logical fallacies, then it shouldn’t surprise you that wierwille’s premise offers PFAL students a false dilemma - also referred to as false dichotomy – it is an informal fallacy based on a premise that erroneously limits what options are available – basically wierwille was saying either the Bible interprets itself   - or -   there is no interpretation possible.

Mike, do you realize how laughable and absurd wierwille’s “the Bible interprets itself” really is? Just pause for a moment and think about what an affront that is to logic, linguistics, historians, sociologists, anthropologists, and philosophers – not to mention Bible scholars, translators and textual researchers. We’re talking about a compilation of 66 different books written by 40 different authors over the course of an approximately 1500-year period, using basically 3 different languages, spanning a variety of cultural, political, and geographical settings.

What ramps up the ridiculousness of wierwille’s “teachings” and renders him totally incredulous is the fact that in live teachings or even speaking extemporaneously he often failed to adhere to the very interpretive keys that he promoted in PFAL -  I KNOW that for a fact – I have witnessed numerous times where he just seemed to pull an answer out of his a$$. And there often was the coup de grace to thwart anyone’s cognitive skills when wierwille would proclaim “Father showed me this.” That has nothing to do with keys to the interpretation of Scripture – that’s just wierwille’s signature intuition. Signature intuition refers to what wierwille felt was true regardless of what a passage might really mean; though incompetent with the biblical languages and having a penchant for plagiarism and logical fallacies he was always able to cobble together something he was proud of; signature intuition is wierwille's unique sixth sense of nonsense to divine Scripture so it always suited his lifestyle - and the devil be damned!  It seemed to me wierwille was usually flying by the seat of his pants – using his own initiative and “spiritual perceptions” . I think he lacked the discipline, wisdom, experience and honesty of a seasoned researcher and so relied more on intuition to pull off his man-of-god-teacher-act…usually if the teaching wasn’t being recorded or if it was a setting like the Advanced Class wierwille was prone to go off-script anyway…then the floodgates were opened – the last restraint was removed that was holding back an outpouring of powerful and “substantial” bull$hit.

 

Mike, I am surprised at how you so casually shoehorn some extra bull$hit into wierwille’s absurd claim when you said: “The phrase "The Bible interprets itself" is an extreme abbreviation of a complex idea.  She did not do that justice IMO.  The criticism this idea got here 15 years ago I thought was similarly lacking. My impression was that she was leading uninformed readers into thinking God is supposed to be mysterious, an old Catholic idea.”  What pray tell, is so complex about saying “the Bible interprets itself”? That’s like saying “this car practically sells itself”. I can just picture a 1964 Dodge on the street corner saying “Please buy me, I only had one owner a little old lady from Pasadena.”

And why is your go-to villain always the Catholics? What’s wrong with God being mysterious?

I think you’ve misidentified the real perpetrator - - it was  wierwille  - NOT Penworks – who was misleading uninformed Bible-readers how to think about God. In wierwille’s theology God would have to change all the laws of the universe not to accommodate your believing. Yup dat’s riiiight – I remember that mysterious-Star-Wars-The-Force gem from PFAL.

 

Mike, do you know what all your statements tell me – even this one “If you can recommend a spot to skip ahead to I would appreciate seeing what you feel is an section important to me.” They all actually reveal a lot about you. You prefer to ignore or avoid anything that disparages wierwille. You mindlessly defend him   and   PFAL  even  if wierwille / PFAL is wrong. You exhibit a conspiracy- theory-mindset based on your bias and ignorance. You seem to be impatient and lazy and seem to gravitate toward information that is chewed-up and partially processed and fed to you – like a momma bird of prey might feed their young. And lastly you seem to be comfortable with the idea of a god YOU can manage – perhaps the same idea of a god that wierwille believed in – a god that he could handle – a god that didn’t mind all the women he sexually molested – a god that didn’t mind his unabashed plagiarism – a god that was proud of his anti-Trinity campaigns.

Ok – let’s move on from your half-a$$ed review of the book “Undertow”  - probably too cerebral for you anyway…how about another book that might be more to your liking – since it shows how wierwille lived “The Word” , taught “The Word” , ministered to and under-shepherded others:  the book is    Losing the Way: A Memoir of Spiritual Longing, Manipulation, Abuse, and Escape      . If you’d like me to recommend a spot that you can  skip ahead to, that I feel is a section that SHOULD be important to you -  then go directly to pages 117 to 120. It’s the part where Kristen – working in housekeeping relates an incident when she placed a welcome letter  on wierwille’s  pillow in the Coachman Suite at Rome City – the note said she would “do anything to make his time more blessed here”. 

The following night, after the evening teaching, wierwille called Kristen to his suite. He has a glass of Drambuie in one hand and a cigarette in the other  – he sits very relaxed – he had taken off his suit coat and tie, the top button of his white shirt was undone, and his shoes were kicked off. He asks her to sit on the bed and they exchange some polite small talk. He then asks her if she really meant what she said in the little welcome note. “Of course” she says.

Then wierwille says “Well, there is one thing you can do for me. I’d like you to take off your clothes. I’d like to show you how to really make love to a man. You know what I’m talking about. You’re of age. Don’t you want me to show you how to have intercourse? How to make love to a man of God!”

In the book Kristen says “This is tantamount to a father soliciting sex from his daughter. The betrayal is unthinkable.” Trying to delay or avert wierwille’s advances, Kristen tried asking him how such an act is consistent with The Word. wierwille explains that all things are pure to the pure…it’s a matter of keeping our minds renewed and centered on God…a man of God needs many women to satisfy his overwhelming needs.

There is nothing titillating when Kristen describes wierwille sexually molesting her. It’s like reading a police report of a daughter being raped by her own father…the first time I read this part my heart ached in sympathy for Kristen and there was utter revulsion over wierwille’s betrayal…after wierwille molested her, he says to her “It’s the lockbox, honey. You have to keep this in the lockbox of your soul. Many of God’s people wouldn’t understand what we’ve just done.”

After you read Kristen’s book “Losing The Way”, feel free to come back to Grease Spot and discuss anything that was too cerebral for you. Besides myself, I’m sure there’s other Grease Spotters here who have been through way corps training and can easily explain the tale of two wierwilles to you – there’s the one who taught the PFAL class   - and then there’s the one who lived the life of a predator’s dream…it’s good to be the king.

 

[Bolshevik]

The lack of a real self leads the narcissist to watch others more carefully, to take on the personality of others.  They have to borrow from others what they can't generate from within.  All this watching and studying others from a young age builds their skills of manipulation (to obtain supply)

They are copycats by nature.

[chockfull]

 

If there’s a problem I’ll solve it.  Check out the hook while my dj revolve it.

[T-Bone]

Tonto and I have been watching     The Dropout on Hulu - 8 episodes The miniseries documents the disgraced biotechnology company Theranos and its founder Elizabeth Holmes…the storyline follows the smoke-and-mirrors “success” story Holmes sold everybody. She would string along investors, lab techs, doctors, board of directors and even bamboozled Walgreens to buy into her one-of-a-kind idea for a mobile blood-test machine – often misleading them to ignore cold hard facts, delays in demos, faking it, and even using another company’s technology and putting her name on a number of the patents along with the head chemist – even though Holmes herself didn’t do any of the work nor really understood how any of it worked…hhmmmmmm all that fraud and plagiarism sounds kinda familiar  

[Rocky]

14 hours ago, T-Bone said:

Tonto and I have been watching     The Dropout on Hulu - 8 episodes The miniseries documents the disgraced biotechnology company Theranos and its founder Elizabeth Holmes…the storyline follows the smoke-and-mirrors “success” story Holmes sold everybody. She would string along investors, lab techs, doctors, board of directors and even bamboozled Walgreens to buy into her one-of-a-kind idea for a mobile blood-test machine – often misleading them to ignore cold hard facts, delays in demos, faking it, and even using another company’s technology and putting her name on a number of the patents along with the head chemist – even though Holmes herself didn’t do any of the work nor really understood how any of it worked…hhmmmmmm all that fraud and plagiarism sounds kinda familiar  

I watched the limited series. She definitely was playing a seriously HUGE con game on several levels.

[chockfull]

We just watched the Fyre music festival scam with Billy McFarland.  Billy is a narcissistic con.