TrueTomHarley

It’s true. With Zoom, I thought I could get away without wearing a tie. When the speaker noticed it, he told the cable company to cancel my ISP, and now I have to communicate through smoke signals.  I had imagined that the beard I have grown would have covered up the lack of tie, but no such l**k.
On the other hand, it might have been the Farmer Mort pants my wife has taken to wearing.

Moristotle, an atheist character with whom I interacted for the longest time on my blog, would all but plead with me to read his books. But I would respond that I had looked over many atheistic arguments individually and had not been impressed. Why think that would change were I to read them in orchestral form?
I’m not even opposed to reading them, per se. It is just that there are so many other things that have more desire to read, and other things I want to do, that practically speaking, I will probably never get around to it.
It is pretty much that way with a book from Rolf or someone else who finds fault. I can see why some with certain backgrounds might want to read it. But for me, there are just too many other things that I want to look at first. I know the subject as well as he. It’s sufficient for me to see blurbs of his book, commentary of it, and on that basis decide if I want to devour it whole. So far, no such desire has emerged. 
 

It’s true. With Zoom, I thought I could get away without wearing a tie. When the speaker noticed it, he told the cable company to cancel my ISP, and now I have to communicate through smoke signals.  I had imagined that the beard I have grown would have covered up the lack of tie, but no such l**k.
On the other hand, it might have been the Farmer Mort pants my wife has taken to wearing.

People just love to make rules about everything....it gives them a measure of control in their own lives and sometimes in other's lives.  I think some people measure their obedience or righteousness  to Jehovah on how acceptable they are to the group or how firmly they take it upon themselves to censure those who do not follow guidance. 
I am a bit like Tom in the sense that I have looked at all aspects of following GB guidance and thought about the scriptures as well as  obedience to Jehovah. I obey the GB because I have chosen to do so.... not because I need acceptance from anyone or my self-righteousness depends on how I can chastise others for overstepping a perceived ' rule'. 
When my freedom to express myself can hurt another spiritually - that is when my self-control kicks in. It comes from concern and love. We are free but our freedom must take account of others, especially the sensitive and weak. We cannot follow our 'righteous' desires wherever it may take us. It is  never our place to be the conscience of another and make decisions for them by saying - don't do this or that.  We can tell them in loving way if we see that their spirituality is suffering due to certain decisions they have taken and it is openly showing in their behavior. Concern would then oblige us to speak the truth. 

If it was JWI, you’d still be reading it. 
Because that “merely” is a pretty big merely. 
What if my roof caves in tomorrow and I decide it’s God’s fault? What if I park on the Kingdom Hall lawn, the elders tell me not to, and I say, “Oh yeah?! Well I show you right here on my blog!!!!” If I do it at Bethel, the GB will “merely” decline to put their stamp of approval on my rant—they will put me on potato-peeling detail in the kitchen instead, and call up someone from the bullpen who has his head screwed on straight. But if I am a loose cannon with my own blog—there is nothing anyone can do when I go haywire. That’s why I don’t ever expect to be acknowledged for my self-appointed role as an apologist, much less commended for it. Even the real apologists of the early centuries have not fared will at the hands of the writing committee, that tends to focus on things they got wrong.
No, the “merely” is a big deal. It makes for constancy and consistency. Call it a “think tank” at Bethel if you will. It is a concentration of gray hairs and experience, of meeting trials, of knowing they are to be judged for their actions (or inaction), of following up on having brought understanding of the sacred writings to begin with. 
I can just shoot my mouth off here, say whatever pops into my head, insult 4Jah whenever he deserves it (which is almost always), praise the Benoit Blanc movie even though there is crude language—and perhaps I have never faced a care in the world. But they can’t. 
What are my morals? I could (to paraphrase Bob Dylan) “be respectably married—or running a whorehouse in Buenos Aries.” Nobody knows. But the Bethel writers are vetted, not just for being good writers, but for being good Christians. They take it for granted that if your conduct is sullied, somehow that will come out in your guidance, even if it doesn’t seem to at first glance.
I had a friend that, eccentric though he was, had a gift of making complex things simple—even oversimplifying to drive the point home.  I can still hear him recounting to someone just how it works in Jehovah’s organization: “At Bethel, the Governing Body study their Bibles. An idea will occur to one of them. They will discuss it among themselves and when they all come to agreement, it will appear in print.”
“Now, the thing is,” he continued, “you also study your Bible. The same idea might have occurred to you, maybe even before it occurred to them. ‘And if this were Christendom, you’d run out and start your own religion over it.’  But because you know it is not a free-for-all, and you know that Jehovah is a God of order, you wait for material to come through the appointed channel.”
So if they have called themselves “Jehovah’s  mouthpiece” in the past, I can live with that. They have the greatest think tank collection of gray hairs that per the scriptures denotes wisdom, of experience in Christian works, in safeguarding and extending the king’s belongings, in knowing the will be held accountable before God. They have the  greatest sense of direction and following up on momentum. No, I will not do a Miriam and say—“does not Jehovah speak through all of us?” I am happy to have a thought that makes sense—I don’t go thinking I am God’s gift to the brotherhood for it.
The trouble is that there are so many literalists who see the expression “crocodile tears” and take it as proof that the one shedding them is a crocodile. There are so many literalists who do not strive to think of how phrases like “Jehovah’s mouthpiece” might apply, but they strive to think of how they don’t. It is the same with “being led by spirit.” It is almost too explosive a phrase to use because of the literalists—if you go to the bathroom—well—how can you be guided by spirit? since holy spirit would never do THAT!
It’s the same with elders and servants being “appointed by holy spirit.” How do you know they are? To my mind it is because the qualifications are in the Book inspired by holy spirit and the judgment as to how they measure up is made by a (small) “think tank” of holy spirit, and seconded by a traveling minister patterned after scripture—another repository of holy spirit. It works for me. But there will be some who think that if an appointee ever goes bad afterwards it must be that they were not appointed by holy spirit. I think not. Any of these terms must necessarily be “watered down” some when put in the context of humans, “in whose heart the inclination to do bad” is ingrained from youth up.
I think of certain brother appointed upon the recommendation of the BOE. The circuit overseer, an older and very experienced man, okayed the recommendation, with the observation: “He’s not the most humble brother in the world.” He didn’t have to be. All he had to do was to meet each of the qualifications to an acceptable degree. Alas, the CO should have listened to his gut, for the man in time went apostate. He was the one who was a history buff and used to impress the householder by answering, “Because I’m an historian,” when asked how he knew this or that about the past. Once I said to him, “Will you knock it off?! You are a history buff. An historian is when other people acknowledge you, not just you yourself!”
I could be wrong, but I bet the GB has learned to be very leery of such phrases and terms as “mouthpiece” and “inspired” and “spirit-directed”—not just for all the literalists, but for all the critics (who are often the same).  Some things if they say just once, it is magnified 100 times. Other things they say 100 times, only to find it ignored. “Don’t save seats for everyone you know,” they would say about the Regionals, “think of the elderly.” Finally, they gave up, and said to let the elderly in early, and everyone else only after the oldsters were seated. Innumerable directives went unheeded. Yet if they speak just once about “forums,” theIr words are enshrined for all time. I alluded to this in Tom Irregardless and Me. The organization would say that the Governing Body does not endorse such and such, and the friends would accordingly have a helpful sense of priority and focus. And then Oscar or someone would be found doing it, and Tom Pearlandswine would descend to tell him that the Governing Body DOES NOT ENDORSE!!! such and such. You never know what quote will be magnified and what will be forgotten, but I bet they are advancing on the learning curve.

To the extent that this is true, it undermines everything else you have said. You should take a month—it will take that long—to delete all of your tweets.
They have “rules,” do they, that children must sit with their parents, and in the ministry they must be with a parent? Then what is all your eternal beefing about, since you here state there is nothing to it?
Are you sure you are sane? A sub theme of virtually every post of yours is that JWs do anything the GB tells them to and do not do whatever they are not told. Well, here they tell them to do what in your eyes is the safest, most wholesome, practice in the world! What is it with your nasty tweets?

They do not—not according to what you say again and again and again and again—that they are complete puppets of the GB, do not do anything without being told, and would never go beyond what the GB has ordered them to do.

To the extent that this is true, it undermines everything else you have said. You should take a month—it will take that long—to delete all of your tweets.
They have “rules,” do they, that children must sit with their parents, and in the ministry they must be with a parent? Then what is all your eternal beefing about, since you here state there is nothing to it?
Are you sure you are sane? A sub theme of virtually every post of yours is that JWs do anything the GB tells them to and do not do whatever they are not told. Well, here they tell them to do what in your eyes is the safest, most wholesome, practice in the world! What is it with your nasty tweets?

It’s not a “semi-accusation” at all. I’m clearing you of any ill-intent. The very fact that you get all exorcized over this makes me reexamine that ‘clearing’—maybe it was unwise for me to have done this.
These are earthy things that are part of the universal human experience, and I occasionally make reference to them when if fits the context. If there is one thing that I cannot stand, it is the fellow who basks in his “righteousness,” going apoplectic at hearing a “naughty” word, and imagining he is thereby proving his holiness to God. It is stomach-turning—that sort of self-righteousness.
The only point I made in the prior post was that groups that insist upon separating children from parents and then fail to protect them ought to be held to more stringent standards than those that do not. There is nothing wrong with that point. It makes perfect sense. 
Of course it has happened, and still does—though in view of persons like yourself who want to stunt children by suggesting any contact an adult other than their own parent is perverted, they do it less and with much more caution. Always in the situations you describe, it happens with full approval of the parent & often at their request. I’ll give you an example:
My wife and I were in the ministry, along with a sister with her two children—ages probably 2 and 4. We’re all going at a snail’s pace, working In and out of the car, for the sake of the children. The sister, too, needs adult encouragement—she doesn’t get out all that much—and that’s why the “righteous” solution you might hit on: ‘work with your wife, and let her work with her two kids,’ does not work. 
When I am alone in the car with the two-year old, I get impatient to do another door or two. “C’mon, Seth,” I swoop the kid up, “Let’s take a door.” I ring the bell and a woman answers. I tell her I am working with my friend Seth, whom I am carrying, and “he wants to show a video to you.” I thumb through a few Caleb and Sophia videos on my IPad, ask Seth which one did he have in mind, and act as though it is he making the decision. .Meanwhile, the woman seems bemused by this—she’s playing along—it doesn’t happen all the time. We play the video, she views it attentively, Seth even more so, and when it is all done, I thank her, acknowledging “You’re a sport,” and we take our leave. I had the feeling that she was playing along simply for the child’s sake, and I stopped in sometime later to discover that I was right. I still reaffirmed that she was a good sport.
Now, I know child’s the mother well. I know the chemistry here. This was not a stranger’s child. I know you are probably dying to make a molestation scene out of this, but anyone not completely warped in own their values will instantly see if for what it is—a win-win-win for the child, the householder, and me—and even another win if you include God, for it is advancing the ministry.
You probably did the child a favor by not exposing it to your screwy personality. That point notwithstanding, why in the world would you not agree to this?—unless there is some twisted background that you are not conveying. I would do it in a heartbeat if a child asked it of me and if I knew the parents would have no objection.
Do you think you are proving yourself virtuous by your all but criminalizing contact between adults and their non-offspring? Do you think the interests of the world’s children are advanced by the Boy Scouts of America being driven into bankruptcy as retribution for the injuries inflicted upon a handful of children? The Boy Scouts take you out camping. They teach you how to tie knots. They teach responsibility. “Eagle scout project” are seen everywhere in my area—deeds of civic enhancement, education, historical illumination, ecological projects—deeds that are not likely to be done otherwise. They provide opportunities for children growing up that parents will most likely not be able to provide. And now your type deprive them of that by bankrupting the organization—all the time basking in your holiness about how you are ‘protecting children.’
You suggest all contact with a non-related child is wrong, even twisted, and then you think you are doing the village of children a favor? Back in JoePa days—American example, you may not know of it, when a man outstanding for molding generations of youth was suddenly destroyed because in a certain instance, he did not go “beyond the law” to penalize something he didn’t know was happening—a former coach of youth sports, Bob Cook, wrote: “The most upsetting thing about many child-protection rules is they assume any adult is capable of doing something bad. If you think of yourself as a good person, and the people around you as good people, you can’t help but be taken aback. You can’t help but think a wall has been put between yourself, the children you coach, and the families you deal with. It’s a wall that seems patently ridiculous when, in the case of the Catholics involved in my Virtus meeting, were tight-knit, south side Chicago parishes where families had known each other for generations.”
I cleared you previously on this, but now I walk it back some. With you, it may well be an example of the verse: “All things are clean to clean people; but to those who are defiled and faithless, nothing is clean, for both their minds and their consciences are defiled.” Nothing is clean to you, and with you vengeful crusade, you would penalize generations of children from the adult interaction that helps them grow into balanced adults themselves.
I surprise myself for getting into this thread so. I hadn’t intended to. I literally wrote the book on this topic of JW accusation—several chapters are on the topic, and I think there is not another like collection anywhere. Since it is free, I can link to it as simply another information source.
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/917311
It covers events up to the initial verdict against JWs in Montana, and has not been updated to include that verdict being thrown out. Maybe there will be a “Round 2” or maybe I will tack additional chapters on Round 1: At any rate, I’ve done my share on this and did not intend to involve myself much beyond—because the topic will never be dropped, and there are other things to explore. But your demented notion of ‘nothing being clean’ draws me in despite myself.
You donkey—it’s in the other thread, in a comment you attached a heehaw emoji to without reading. It’s found in your obtuseness as to how JW’s will not construe the many attacks on them as but examples of what Jesus said—how ‘if you were part of the world, the world would be fond of its own. Now because you are no part of the world, on that account the world hates you.’

I think two reasons...one for protection of the sheep...and one for their own protection.
True apostates are devious and incredibly selfish...con men and women who speak artfully contrived things and aid in scattering the sheep who are already beaten down and wounded,....Apostates were stumbled..and need to have ones think like them to justify their stumbling.
Keep in mind many who are branded Apostates are not True apostates...I’m talking about True Apostates here,
Secondly  
They truly have been used by Jehovah in advancing Gods work and knowledge of his Great Plan....BUT....pride and humility And abuse of such a position may also prove to be their stumbling stone...
 

Obtain your copy now at the link below while the supply lasts:
‘Tom Irregardless and Me’—Starting with Prince, a fierce and frolicking defense of Jehovah’s Witnesses. A riotous romp through their way of life. “We have become a theatrical spectacle to the world, and to angels and to men,” the Bible verse says. That being the case, let’s show some theater! Let’s skewer the liars who slander the Christ! Let’s pull down the house on the axis lords! Let the seed-pickers unite!
All persons with names like ‘Irregardless’ are real though generally composite. You can meet them in my circuit or even yours. Events related are faithfully depicted except for a few that I’ve made up. Persons with names recognizable from history or current events – you’re nuts! – it’s not those people at all!
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/686882
”Puts Rolf’s book to shame!”.....Oscar Oxgoad
”A highly entertaining author—especially if you’re not fussy”.....Tom Brexit
”Acceptable after a fashion. But his grasp of science and is weak, and his critical thinking abominable.”....Bernard Strawman
”A pack of lies! I hate it!”.....Vic Vomodog
”His chapter on blood transfusion taught me some valuable lessons.”....Dr Max ‘Ace’ Inhibitor

If it was JWI, you’d still be reading it. 
Because that “merely” is a pretty big merely. 
What if my roof caves in tomorrow and I decide it’s God’s fault? What if I park on the Kingdom Hall lawn, the elders tell me not to, and I say, “Oh yeah?! Well I show you right here on my blog!!!!” If I do it at Bethel, the GB will “merely” decline to put their stamp of approval on my rant—they will put me on potato-peeling detail in the kitchen instead, and call up someone from the bullpen who has his head screwed on straight. But if I am a loose cannon with my own blog—there is nothing anyone can do when I go haywire. That’s why I don’t ever expect to be acknowledged for my self-appointed role as an apologist, much less commended for it. Even the real apologists of the early centuries have not fared will at the hands of the writing committee, that tends to focus on things they got wrong.
No, the “merely” is a big deal. It makes for constancy and consistency. Call it a “think tank” at Bethel if you will. It is a concentration of gray hairs and experience, of meeting trials, of knowing they are to be judged for their actions (or inaction), of following up on having brought understanding of the sacred writings to begin with. 
I can just shoot my mouth off here, say whatever pops into my head, insult 4Jah whenever he deserves it (which is almost always), praise the Benoit Blanc movie even though there is crude language—and perhaps I have never faced a care in the world. But they can’t. 
What are my morals? I could (to paraphrase Bob Dylan) “be respectably married—or running a whorehouse in Buenos Aries.” Nobody knows. But the Bethel writers are vetted, not just for being good writers, but for being good Christians. They take it for granted that if your conduct is sullied, somehow that will come out in your guidance, even if it doesn’t seem to at first glance.
I had a friend that, eccentric though he was, had a gift of making complex things simple—even oversimplifying to drive the point home.  I can still hear him recounting to someone just how it works in Jehovah’s organization: “At Bethel, the Governing Body study their Bibles. An idea will occur to one of them. They will discuss it among themselves and when they all come to agreement, it will appear in print.”
“Now, the thing is,” he continued, “you also study your Bible. The same idea might have occurred to you, maybe even before it occurred to them. ‘And if this were Christendom, you’d run out and start your own religion over it.’  But because you know it is not a free-for-all, and you know that Jehovah is a God of order, you wait for material to come through the appointed channel.”
So if they have called themselves “Jehovah’s  mouthpiece” in the past, I can live with that. They have the greatest think tank collection of gray hairs that per the scriptures denotes wisdom, of experience in Christian works, in safeguarding and extending the king’s belongings, in knowing the will be held accountable before God. They have the  greatest sense of direction and following up on momentum. No, I will not do a Miriam and say—“does not Jehovah speak through all of us?” I am happy to have a thought that makes sense—I don’t go thinking I am God’s gift to the brotherhood for it.
The trouble is that there are so many literalists who see the expression “crocodile tears” and take it as proof that the one shedding them is a crocodile. There are so many literalists who do not strive to think of how phrases like “Jehovah’s mouthpiece” might apply, but they strive to think of how they don’t. It is the same with “being led by spirit.” It is almost too explosive a phrase to use because of the literalists—if you go to the bathroom—well—how can you be guided by spirit? since holy spirit would never do THAT!
It’s the same with elders and servants being “appointed by holy spirit.” How do you know they are? To my mind it is because the qualifications are in the Book inspired by holy spirit and the judgment as to how they measure up is made by a (small) “think tank” of holy spirit, and seconded by a traveling minister patterned after scripture—another repository of holy spirit. It works for me. But there will be some who think that if an appointee ever goes bad afterwards it must be that they were not appointed by holy spirit. I think not. Any of these terms must necessarily be “watered down” some when put in the context of humans, “in whose heart the inclination to do bad” is ingrained from youth up.
I think of certain brother appointed upon the recommendation of the BOE. The circuit overseer, an older and very experienced man, okayed the recommendation, with the observation: “He’s not the most humble brother in the world.” He didn’t have to be. All he had to do was to meet each of the qualifications to an acceptable degree. Alas, the CO should have listened to his gut, for the man in time went apostate. He was the one who was a history buff and used to impress the householder by answering, “Because I’m an historian,” when asked how he knew this or that about the past. Once I said to him, “Will you knock it off?! You are a history buff. An historian is when other people acknowledge you, not just you yourself!”
I could be wrong, but I bet the GB has learned to be very leery of such phrases and terms as “mouthpiece” and “inspired” and “spirit-directed”—not just for all the literalists, but for all the critics (who are often the same).  Some things if they say just once, it is magnified 100 times. Other things they say 100 times, only to find it ignored. “Don’t save seats for everyone you know,” they would say about the Regionals, “think of the elderly.” Finally, they gave up, and said to let the elderly in early, and everyone else only after the oldsters were seated. Innumerable directives went unheeded. Yet if they speak just once about “forums,” theIr words are enshrined for all time. I alluded to this in Tom Irregardless and Me. The organization would say that the Governing Body does not endorse such and such, and the friends would accordingly have a helpful sense of priority and focus. And then Oscar or someone would be found doing it, and Tom Pearlandswine would descend to tell him that the Governing Body DOES NOT ENDORSE!!! such and such. You never know what quote will be magnified and what will be forgotten, but I bet they are advancing on the learning curve.

Obtain your copy now at the link below while the supply lasts:
‘Tom Irregardless and Me’—Starting with Prince, a fierce and frolicking defense of Jehovah’s Witnesses. A riotous romp through their way of life. “We have become a theatrical spectacle to the world, and to angels and to men,” the Bible verse says. That being the case, let’s show some theater! Let’s skewer the liars who slander the Christ! Let’s pull down the house on the axis lords! Let the seed-pickers unite!
All persons with names like ‘Irregardless’ are real though generally composite. You can meet them in my circuit or even yours. Events related are faithfully depicted except for a few that I’ve made up. Persons with names recognizable from history or current events – you’re nuts! – it’s not those people at all!
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/686882
”Puts Rolf’s book to shame!”.....Oscar Oxgoad
”A highly entertaining author—especially if you’re not fussy”.....Tom Brexit
”Acceptable after a fashion. But his grasp of science and is weak, and his critical thinking abominable.”....Bernard Strawman
”A pack of lies! I hate it!”.....Vic Vomodog
”His chapter on blood transfusion taught me some valuable lessons.”....Dr Max ‘Ace’ Inhibitor

If it was JWI, you’d still be reading it. 
Because that “merely” is a pretty big merely. 
What if my roof caves in tomorrow and I decide it’s God’s fault? What if I park on the Kingdom Hall lawn, the elders tell me not to, and I say, “Oh yeah?! Well I show you right here on my blog!!!!” If I do it at Bethel, the GB will “merely” decline to put their stamp of approval on my rant—they will put me on potato-peeling detail in the kitchen instead, and call up someone from the bullpen who has his head screwed on straight. But if I am a loose cannon with my own blog—there is nothing anyone can do when I go haywire. That’s why I don’t ever expect to be acknowledged for my self-appointed role as an apologist, much less commended for it. Even the real apologists of the early centuries have not fared will at the hands of the writing committee, that tends to focus on things they got wrong.
No, the “merely” is a big deal. It makes for constancy and consistency. Call it a “think tank” at Bethel if you will. It is a concentration of gray hairs and experience, of meeting trials, of knowing they are to be judged for their actions (or inaction), of following up on having brought understanding of the sacred writings to begin with. 
I can just shoot my mouth off here, say whatever pops into my head, insult 4Jah whenever he deserves it (which is almost always), praise the Benoit Blanc movie even though there is crude language—and perhaps I have never faced a care in the world. But they can’t. 
What are my morals? I could (to paraphrase Bob Dylan) “be respectably married—or running a whorehouse in Buenos Aries.” Nobody knows. But the Bethel writers are vetted, not just for being good writers, but for being good Christians. They take it for granted that if your conduct is sullied, somehow that will come out in your guidance, even if it doesn’t seem to at first glance.
I had a friend that, eccentric though he was, had a gift of making complex things simple—even oversimplifying to drive the point home.  I can still hear him recounting to someone just how it works in Jehovah’s organization: “At Bethel, the Governing Body study their Bibles. An idea will occur to one of them. They will discuss it among themselves and when they all come to agreement, it will appear in print.”
“Now, the thing is,” he continued, “you also study your Bible. The same idea might have occurred to you, maybe even before it occurred to them. ‘And if this were Christendom, you’d run out and start your own religion over it.’  But because you know it is not a free-for-all, and you know that Jehovah is a God of order, you wait for material to come through the appointed channel.”
So if they have called themselves “Jehovah’s  mouthpiece” in the past, I can live with that. They have the greatest think tank collection of gray hairs that per the scriptures denotes wisdom, of experience in Christian works, in safeguarding and extending the king’s belongings, in knowing the will be held accountable before God. They have the  greatest sense of direction and following up on momentum. No, I will not do a Miriam and say—“does not Jehovah speak through all of us?” I am happy to have a thought that makes sense—I don’t go thinking I am God’s gift to the brotherhood for it.
The trouble is that there are so many literalists who see the expression “crocodile tears” and take it as proof that the one shedding them is a crocodile. There are so many literalists who do not strive to think of how phrases like “Jehovah’s mouthpiece” might apply, but they strive to think of how they don’t. It is the same with “being led by spirit.” It is almost too explosive a phrase to use because of the literalists—if you go to the bathroom—well—how can you be guided by spirit? since holy spirit would never do THAT!
It’s the same with elders and servants being “appointed by holy spirit.” How do you know they are? To my mind it is because the qualifications are in the Book inspired by holy spirit and the judgment as to how they measure up is made by a (small) “think tank” of holy spirit, and seconded by a traveling minister patterned after scripture—another repository of holy spirit. It works for me. But there will be some who think that if an appointee ever goes bad afterwards it must be that they were not appointed by holy spirit. I think not. Any of these terms must necessarily be “watered down” some when put in the context of humans, “in whose heart the inclination to do bad” is ingrained from youth up.
I think of certain brother appointed upon the recommendation of the BOE. The circuit overseer, an older and very experienced man, okayed the recommendation, with the observation: “He’s not the most humble brother in the world.” He didn’t have to be. All he had to do was to meet each of the qualifications to an acceptable degree. Alas, the CO should have listened to his gut, for the man in time went apostate. He was the one who was a history buff and used to impress the householder by answering, “Because I’m an historian,” when asked how he knew this or that about the past. Once I said to him, “Will you knock it off?! You are a history buff. An historian is when other people acknowledge you, not just you yourself!”
I could be wrong, but I bet the GB has learned to be very leery of such phrases and terms as “mouthpiece” and “inspired” and “spirit-directed”—not just for all the literalists, but for all the critics (who are often the same).  Some things if they say just once, it is magnified 100 times. Other things they say 100 times, only to find it ignored. “Don’t save seats for everyone you know,” they would say about the Regionals, “think of the elderly.” Finally, they gave up, and said to let the elderly in early, and everyone else only after the oldsters were seated. Innumerable directives went unheeded. Yet if they speak just once about “forums,” theIr words are enshrined for all time. I alluded to this in Tom Irregardless and Me. The organization would say that the Governing Body does not endorse such and such, and the friends would accordingly have a helpful sense of priority and focus. And then Oscar or someone would be found doing it, and Tom Pearlandswine would descend to tell him that the Governing Body DOES NOT ENDORSE!!! such and such. You never know what quote will be magnified and what will be forgotten, but I bet they are advancing on the learning curve.

If it was JWI, you’d still be reading it. 
Because that “merely” is a pretty big merely. 
What if my roof caves in tomorrow and I decide it’s God’s fault? What if I park on the Kingdom Hall lawn, the elders tell me not to, and I say, “Oh yeah?! Well I show you right here on my blog!!!!” If I do it at Bethel, the GB will “merely” decline to put their stamp of approval on my rant—they will put me on potato-peeling detail in the kitchen instead, and call up someone from the bullpen who has his head screwed on straight. But if I am a loose cannon with my own blog—there is nothing anyone can do when I go haywire. That’s why I don’t ever expect to be acknowledged for my self-appointed role as an apologist, much less commended for it. Even the real apologists of the early centuries have not fared will at the hands of the writing committee, that tends to focus on things they got wrong.
No, the “merely” is a big deal. It makes for constancy and consistency. Call it a “think tank” at Bethel if you will. It is a concentration of gray hairs and experience, of meeting trials, of knowing they are to be judged for their actions (or inaction), of following up on having brought understanding of the sacred writings to begin with. 
I can just shoot my mouth off here, say whatever pops into my head, insult 4Jah whenever he deserves it (which is almost always), praise the Benoit Blanc movie even though there is crude language—and perhaps I have never faced a care in the world. But they can’t. 
What are my morals? I could (to paraphrase Bob Dylan) “be respectably married—or running a whorehouse in Buenos Aries.” Nobody knows. But the Bethel writers are vetted, not just for being good writers, but for being good Christians. They take it for granted that if your conduct is sullied, somehow that will come out in your guidance, even if it doesn’t seem to at first glance.
I had a friend that, eccentric though he was, had a gift of making complex things simple—even oversimplifying to drive the point home.  I can still hear him recounting to someone just how it works in Jehovah’s organization: “At Bethel, the Governing Body study their Bibles. An idea will occur to one of them. They will discuss it among themselves and when they all come to agreement, it will appear in print.”
“Now, the thing is,” he continued, “you also study your Bible. The same idea might have occurred to you, maybe even before it occurred to them. ‘And if this were Christendom, you’d run out and start your own religion over it.’  But because you know it is not a free-for-all, and you know that Jehovah is a God of order, you wait for material to come through the appointed channel.”
So if they have called themselves “Jehovah’s  mouthpiece” in the past, I can live with that. They have the greatest think tank collection of gray hairs that per the scriptures denotes wisdom, of experience in Christian works, in safeguarding and extending the king’s belongings, in knowing the will be held accountable before God. They have the  greatest sense of direction and following up on momentum. No, I will not do a Miriam and say—“does not Jehovah speak through all of us?” I am happy to have a thought that makes sense—I don’t go thinking I am God’s gift to the brotherhood for it.
The trouble is that there are so many literalists who see the expression “crocodile tears” and take it as proof that the one shedding them is a crocodile. There are so many literalists who do not strive to think of how phrases like “Jehovah’s mouthpiece” might apply, but they strive to think of how they don’t. It is the same with “being led by spirit.” It is almost too explosive a phrase to use because of the literalists—if you go to the bathroom—well—how can you be guided by spirit? since holy spirit would never do THAT!
It’s the same with elders and servants being “appointed by holy spirit.” How do you know they are? To my mind it is because the qualifications are in the Book inspired by holy spirit and the judgment as to how they measure up is made by a (small) “think tank” of holy spirit, and seconded by a traveling minister patterned after scripture—another repository of holy spirit. It works for me. But there will be some who think that if an appointee ever goes bad afterwards it must be that they were not appointed by holy spirit. I think not. Any of these terms must necessarily be “watered down” some when put in the context of humans, “in whose heart the inclination to do bad” is ingrained from youth up.
I think of certain brother appointed upon the recommendation of the BOE. The circuit overseer, an older and very experienced man, okayed the recommendation, with the observation: “He’s not the most humble brother in the world.” He didn’t have to be. All he had to do was to meet each of the qualifications to an acceptable degree. Alas, the CO should have listened to his gut, for the man in time went apostate. He was the one who was a history buff and used to impress the householder by answering, “Because I’m an historian,” when asked how he knew this or that about the past. Once I said to him, “Will you knock it off?! You are a history buff. An historian is when other people acknowledge you, not just you yourself!”
I could be wrong, but I bet the GB has learned to be very leery of such phrases and terms as “mouthpiece” and “inspired” and “spirit-directed”—not just for all the literalists, but for all the critics (who are often the same).  Some things if they say just once, it is magnified 100 times. Other things they say 100 times, only to find it ignored. “Don’t save seats for everyone you know,” they would say about the Regionals, “think of the elderly.” Finally, they gave up, and said to let the elderly in early, and everyone else only after the oldsters were seated. Innumerable directives went unheeded. Yet if they speak just once about “forums,” theIr words are enshrined for all time. I alluded to this in Tom Irregardless and Me. The organization would say that the Governing Body does not endorse such and such, and the friends would accordingly have a helpful sense of priority and focus. And then Oscar or someone would be found doing it, and Tom Pearlandswine would descend to tell him that the Governing Body DOES NOT ENDORSE!!! such and such. You never know what quote will be magnified and what will be forgotten, but I bet they are advancing on the learning curve.

If it was JWI, you’d still be reading it. 
Because that “merely” is a pretty big merely. 
What if my roof caves in tomorrow and I decide it’s God’s fault? What if I park on the Kingdom Hall lawn, the elders tell me not to, and I say, “Oh yeah?! Well I show you right here on my blog!!!!” If I do it at Bethel, the GB will “merely” decline to put their stamp of approval on my rant—they will put me on potato-peeling detail in the kitchen instead, and call up someone from the bullpen who has his head screwed on straight. But if I am a loose cannon with my own blog—there is nothing anyone can do when I go haywire. That’s why I don’t ever expect to be acknowledged for my self-appointed role as an apologist, much less commended for it. Even the real apologists of the early centuries have not fared will at the hands of the writing committee, that tends to focus on things they got wrong.
No, the “merely” is a big deal. It makes for constancy and consistency. Call it a “think tank” at Bethel if you will. It is a concentration of gray hairs and experience, of meeting trials, of knowing they are to be judged for their actions (or inaction), of following up on having brought understanding of the sacred writings to begin with. 
I can just shoot my mouth off here, say whatever pops into my head, insult 4Jah whenever he deserves it (which is almost always), praise the Benoit Blanc movie even though there is crude language—and perhaps I have never faced a care in the world. But they can’t. 
What are my morals? I could (to paraphrase Bob Dylan) “be respectably married—or running a whorehouse in Buenos Aries.” Nobody knows. But the Bethel writers are vetted, not just for being good writers, but for being good Christians. They take it for granted that if your conduct is sullied, somehow that will come out in your guidance, even if it doesn’t seem to at first glance.
I had a friend that, eccentric though he was, had a gift of making complex things simple—even oversimplifying to drive the point home.  I can still hear him recounting to someone just how it works in Jehovah’s organization: “At Bethel, the Governing Body study their Bibles. An idea will occur to one of them. They will discuss it among themselves and when they all come to agreement, it will appear in print.”
“Now, the thing is,” he continued, “you also study your Bible. The same idea might have occurred to you, maybe even before it occurred to them. ‘And if this were Christendom, you’d run out and start your own religion over it.’  But because you know it is not a free-for-all, and you know that Jehovah is a God of order, you wait for material to come through the appointed channel.”
So if they have called themselves “Jehovah’s  mouthpiece” in the past, I can live with that. They have the greatest think tank collection of gray hairs that per the scriptures denotes wisdom, of experience in Christian works, in safeguarding and extending the king’s belongings, in knowing the will be held accountable before God. They have the  greatest sense of direction and following up on momentum. No, I will not do a Miriam and say—“does not Jehovah speak through all of us?” I am happy to have a thought that makes sense—I don’t go thinking I am God’s gift to the brotherhood for it.
The trouble is that there are so many literalists who see the expression “crocodile tears” and take it as proof that the one shedding them is a crocodile. There are so many literalists who do not strive to think of how phrases like “Jehovah’s mouthpiece” might apply, but they strive to think of how they don’t. It is the same with “being led by spirit.” It is almost too explosive a phrase to use because of the literalists—if you go to the bathroom—well—how can you be guided by spirit? since holy spirit would never do THAT!
It’s the same with elders and servants being “appointed by holy spirit.” How do you know they are? To my mind it is because the qualifications are in the Book inspired by holy spirit and the judgment as to how they measure up is made by a (small) “think tank” of holy spirit, and seconded by a traveling minister patterned after scripture—another repository of holy spirit. It works for me. But there will be some who think that if an appointee ever goes bad afterwards it must be that they were not appointed by holy spirit. I think not. Any of these terms must necessarily be “watered down” some when put in the context of humans, “in whose heart the inclination to do bad” is ingrained from youth up.
I think of certain brother appointed upon the recommendation of the BOE. The circuit overseer, an older and very experienced man, okayed the recommendation, with the observation: “He’s not the most humble brother in the world.” He didn’t have to be. All he had to do was to meet each of the qualifications to an acceptable degree. Alas, the CO should have listened to his gut, for the man in time went apostate. He was the one who was a history buff and used to impress the householder by answering, “Because I’m an historian,” when asked how he knew this or that about the past. Once I said to him, “Will you knock it off?! You are a history buff. An historian is when other people acknowledge you, not just you yourself!”
I could be wrong, but I bet the GB has learned to be very leery of such phrases and terms as “mouthpiece” and “inspired” and “spirit-directed”—not just for all the literalists, but for all the critics (who are often the same).  Some things if they say just once, it is magnified 100 times. Other things they say 100 times, only to find it ignored. “Don’t save seats for everyone you know,” they would say about the Regionals, “think of the elderly.” Finally, they gave up, and said to let the elderly in early, and everyone else only after the oldsters were seated. Innumerable directives went unheeded. Yet if they speak just once about “forums,” theIr words are enshrined for all time. I alluded to this in Tom Irregardless and Me. The organization would say that the Governing Body does not endorse such and such, and the friends would accordingly have a helpful sense of priority and focus. And then Oscar or someone would be found doing it, and Tom Pearlandswine would descend to tell him that the Governing Body DOES NOT ENDORSE!!! such and such. You never know what quote will be magnified and what will be forgotten, but I bet they are advancing on the learning curve.

I’ve heard of that school. “You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.” He should have been more cautious.
Ben Franklin once remarked of the parents of their graduates:
“I reflected in my Mind on the extream Folly of those Parents, who, blind to their Childrens Dulness, and insensible of the Solidity of their Skulls, because they think their Purses can afford it, will needs send them to the Temple of Learning, where, for want of a suitable Genius, they learn little more than how to carry themselves handsomely, and enter a Room genteely, (which might as well be acquir'd at a Dancing-School,) and from whence they return, after Abundance of Trouble and Charge, as great Blockheads as ever, only more proud and self-conceited.”

I wrote about Wayne Whitepebble’s son in Tom Irregardless and Me, how he 
“went to the university. He didn’t really want to go, and probably would not have were it not for his dad. Wayne had come up the hard way financially. Why should his son do the same? The lad was bright and landed a scholarship. He took the path of least resistance.
“You’ve got to get me out of here!” the young man cried during the first week of school. “There’s naked women running around here!” Well, they weren’t exactly naked - or maybe some of them were. They certainly were naked compared to anything Willie was used to. “Deal with it,” Wayne Whitepebble replied. “You’re staying.” He wasn’t worried for his son spiritually. Hadn’t Willie had a fine moral upbringing? Hadn’t the family visited the local Kingdom Hall to introduce him around? Hadn’t Wayne asked the local elders to keep an eye on his son? During the first few weeks of class, an elder did try to visit Willie, but never found him in.
“In time, Willie met someone he liked a lot. He went further with her than he had ever imagined he would. Thoroughly upended, he grappled with his thoughts and feelings, and then went further still. During those weeks, he attended two meetings at the new Kingdom Hall. How strange that he had once felt so attached there. Nobody there had a clue as to the challenges and pressures of his current life, much less the broadened horizons he was beginning to envision.
“College life with Madison was an entirely new experience. Living in the dorms, darting to the stately buildings for classes, crossing paths with fellow students, speaking with professors - what a new world this was. There was much more to life than he had ever dreamed. There were, however, bumps along the way. Madison had been initially intrigued at his spiritual take on matters, but he soon came to realize that he had been raised 180 degrees out of sync with this new world, and he began to resent it. He’d been ill-prepared for life! Classmates moved about seamlessly where he was most awkward. To think his religion had had him believing in Adam and Eve! He’d spoken of those two once, and had never done it again.
“His fellow students marched to protest injustice. What a difference he and Madison could make! There were real injustices. Yes, he’d learned about injustices back at the Kingdom Hall, too, but somehow it wasn’t the same. And to think that Tom Irregardless, when confronted with some news report he didn’t understand, which was almost anything, would dismiss it all with ‘it just goes to show we need the Kingdom!’ How long had he been saying that?  There were injustices in the world that an enlightened person could do something about now, not just in some fairy tale ‘new system.’
In time, the atheists came along. ‘How could there be a God with all the obscene things going on today? What God could allow it?’ If there was a God, he would have fixed things long ago! Actually, wasn’t religion at the root of injustice? Even his former one - even that one was guilty for plodding along with blinders, ignoring real problems, pushing everything onto the ‘new system.’ When Wayne Whitepebble saw his boy a half year later, he barely knew him. How could those elders in the local congregation have been so negligent?”
I freely admit that I am being imaginative. Ironically, the thing that seems the most far-fetched of all, the father saying “deal with it”—that actually happened (so I am told)—those were his actual words to his son over his complaint of “naked women”—everything else I made up.
You would think that Rolf would find room for that somewhere in his book. Attending college as an adult is not the same as attending as a teenager.

Mr Rook would not be so thin-skinned to see it that way. He would have had a good belly-laugh over it. You would have us believe that you were his friend? You did everything you could to separate him from his God. Remember, he was on my side of the Great Issue, not yours.
He came to have the same problem that Rolf is going to have—having “false friends” sucking him dry for info, kissing his feet with praise, ecstatic at the ‘dirt’ they think he is spilling, then turning around and saying he is delusional for not abandoning every last vestige of Witness belief—just like you do with JWI. At the same time, his genuine friends distance themselves. At least Rolf will find some companionship within the airy world of ‘scholarship’—no such luck for JTR.
It was worse for JTR. Rolf makes perfectly clear that he regards his faith as true. I gather that he is not too different from JWI, who has issues with some organizational matters, but has no problem acknowledging that there must be leadership and cooperating with it on that basis.  In contrast, JTR came across as a ‘spiritual terrorist,’ and it is only upon close examination—which the average Witness will be not inclined to do in view of his outrageous remarks—that one can see his love for Jehovah was genuine. Even his own kids deserted him—something he freely admitted—this despite the fact that he was not under congregation censure..
You simply cannot go about harshly criticizing ones held in high esteem—ones loved for their hard work and example—and expect to keep your friends. The loudest applause at any convention is at the question, “Would you like to send your greetings to the brothers in Bethel?” It’s like if some would come around and pretend to be my friends, saying the nicest things about me, yet they absolutely cannot stand my wife, and never fail to hurl abuses at her. Is that going to work with me? Will I be taken in? I don’t think so. And yes, the earthly organization is likened to a beloved human—a mother, as that AlanF, with the IQ of a Descartes and an EQ of the Sesame Street Cookie Monster, changed to ‘mommy,’ hoping to infuriate people.
I like to think with JTR it was a case of Psalm 141:5 and that he has time to undo the damage. Of course, you always have time to undo it with Jehovah if your turnaround is genuine, but I hope it is with family and friends as well.
“Should the righteous one strike me, it would be an act of loyal love; Should he reprove me, it would be like oil on my head, Which my head would never refuse. My prayer will continue even during their calamities.” 
I like to think it was that way here with a few who slammed him pretty hard but also made clear that the rebuke was not personal—and that he as a person had some very appealing qualities. I tried to do that, and I had some acknowledgement from him in ‘thanks’ emojis, not just upvotes. Others did this, as well—his spiritual brothers with his best interests at heart. I could well be a little too Pollyanna in reviewing how it has turned out—but his last few comments very neatly tie into a Pollyanna view—so that’s the one I’ll take. 
He wasn’t really wrong in the factual nature of anything he said—he was ‘wrong’ in how he had processed it. You can’t go about life being hypercritical. You have to be ready to move on. You can’t go digging through the diamonds to find the dirt. You have to be ready to forgive. It is an important theme of Jesus that he came to feel he ought more fully get his heart around.
You kept telling him how he could bask in a fine relationship with God while sticking it to the visible organization. He had too much common sense and honesty to fall for it. He knew that path leads inevitably to become fully part of the word—in time, doing all that the world does and thinking it can be offset with a smiley God emoji. 
Mark Smith’s book Secular Faith points out that the typical church member has more in common with atheists than with members of his own denomination of 100 years ago. That is what happens in the absence of an earthly counterpart to the heavenly organization. JTR knew that. That was among the things he meant when he lamented that he should have been closer to Jehovah.
Go ahead, you idiot—slap another braying emoji on this one. 

Whether his is narcissistic or not is for others to say, but there is clearly something squirrelly about him. Why he would throw away the brotherhood to absolutely no purpose is beyond me. To throw it away because he thinks the religion JWs practice is all wet is one thing. But he presses the point that his religion is the true one. So why publish an indictment of the GB as you reaffirm everything else. He knows it will cost him (something I myself did’t know, nor some others here). He has counted the costs and is willing for the brotherhood to be severed from him, for something he knows will do no good! He submits his work to Bethel, but when they “refuse” to engage him, he publishes it to make Reddit’s day. The Witness organization will say, “One more bit of opposition? Throw it on the stack,” and he knows they will say that. 
4Jah, odd even in a menagerie of oddballs, says: “I bet your sweating that Rolf wrote his book. I bet you’re sweating that my friends are scheming up other mischief.” Of course I am. But I also keep it in perspective. Could he really have been a Witness at one time, for he seems to have forgotten everything. Wasn’t that his ancestor that was saying to ancient worshippers of Jehovah: I bet you’re sweating that your buddies are “tortured because they would not accept release by some ransom, in order that they might attain a better resurrection.“  I bet you’re sweating that other have “their trial by mockings and scourgings.” I bet you’re sweating that for others it will be “by chains and prisons.” I bet you’re sweating that some will be “stoned, they were tried, they were sawn in two, they were slaughtered by the sword, they went about in sheepskins, in goatskins, while they were in need, in tribulation, mistreated.” I bet you’re sweating that my world has consigned them to “wander about in deserts and mountains and caves and dens of the earth.” Wasn’t that his cousin, 4Jahovich, who taunted Dennis Christensen, “I bet you’re sweating that we’re going to throw you in the hoosegow” or two the Russian branch: “I’ll bet you’re sweating that we’re going to declare you illegal extremists.” He has forgotten everything he ever knew about Christianity. It’s as though he thinks Jesus and the twelve are in the “Roman Empire Hall of Fame.”
The trick to doing what I am doing online is to know that I will lose. The villains will have their day in the sun before the Great Day arrives. So am I sweating? I wouldn’t put it that way. Does it cause me concern? Yes. To say I am sweating would be putting it too strongly. I think of the line besieged mothers sometimes use on their offspring: “I brought you into this world, and I can take you out.” So it is with Jehovah’s visible arrangement. They brought me into this spiritual world. Of course, they cannot take my faith from me. I have assimilated that and it remains unless I damage it myself. But if it seems that their direction should “take me out,“ I think of that second part of the saying. I know how Christians fared in the first century. They didn’t win the respect and honor of their fellow humans. They were reviled by the general populace, parallel to how JWs are reviled by the general populace today. I will say it is not because of overall GB doings; it is par for the course.
As for Rolf trading away the brotherhood—If I suffer misfortune and vanish from the internet, (as recently happened to a long-time player here) none of my online acquaintances will ever know why. Was I hit by a bus? Did I suddenly go gravely ill? Did I have a bad conscience over confronting the villains? Did I empty my pockets and still not have enough for my ISP bill? Nobody will ever know. But because I stick with the brotherhood, people will know my distress within a few hours, a day or so at most, and they will be people disposed to do everything they can to remedy my problem. All that Rolf throws away to no purpose other than making a statement. Narcissistic? Maybe not, but the symptoms resemble it closely enough that JWI can be forgiven for not knowing the difference.
I run the risk of seeming anti-scholar here, and I am not. I like books. I have read more than most. When the BBC ran a list of the 100 greatest books of all time, I found that I had read over 50 of them—“read” them via Books-on-Tape while working as a janitor. But too many things are phrased as though matters of scholarship, matters of the head, as though “Wisdom puffs up, but not in my case.” Forgive me, but I would not choose ‘Thinking’ as a moniker, even though I do a lot of it—and “Scholar JW” as a handle leaves me cold. There probably was nobody less scholarly than the twelve who accompanied Jesus, perhaps excepting only Judas, who was not from the hills, but from “metropolitan” Jerusalem. There were plenty of scholars at the time, but Jesus bypassed them all—he was looking for those who would do God’s will, as opposed to just studying it—to shake it down in its components with a heady goal of instructing others. “What is desired in a steward is to be found faithful,” Jesus states, not “analytical.” Of course, the head trains the heart—we all know that. But much more does the heart train the head, so that to overemphasize the head seems to be missing the point. There are brothers who wish to be known for their critical thinking, and even by their eagerness to be “led by the science.” It makes no sense to me. The first thing that contemporary scientists will do is to tell you where you can go with your quaint little notion of Adam and Eve. Science is THE tool of those humanists that would defy God. It is enough to keep up with it—we don’t have to venerate is as they do—as the be-all and end-all. Scholarship is a great thing—pour me a double-shot of it—but it ranks somewhat low in Christian qualities necessary for approval before God. To hear some carry on here (not you), it is the ONLY thing that matters.
 

I just got tired of saying “the divine/human interface” and was searching for a substitute. What I hit upon was sloppy. You are right. I should have stayed with what I had, but I didn’t want to wear the phrase out—a phrase that I never intended to mean anything more than providing leadership.
Sure. That’s what I think, too.
I don’t like to split hairs on these matters. I am pragmatic. Moses said that Jesus will “raise up a prophet like me.” He obviously didn’t if we insist on a parallel in each and every respect. Jesus was perfect, Moses was not. Jesus was put to death. Moses was not. So with the GB being like Moses, it is the same—in some respects they are, and in some respects there are not.
Of course. It is organizational leadership I speak of. Even in Moses time, are we to imagine that Israelites could have no relationship with God when Moses was not around? Could they not pray? Did Joseph act as he did because he learned from prior writings, but his counterpart living under Moses would have had to clear it with the prophet first? Of course not. 
It is perfectly fair game for the GB to refer to the murmuring Israelites under Moses so as to encourage obedience today among God’s people. No, they are not like Moses in every respect, but they are enough like him for the comparison to work. God does lead his people, and there has always been something visible for them to hang their hats on—though at no time does this “something visible” preclude one’s own relationship with God or one’s own study of the scriptures.
Of course they are just men. Paul and Barnabas were just men, too, though the crowds concluded differently and it was hard to restrain them. Even when the man behind the curtain says “Here I am,” the crowd wants to put him behind the curtain again and believes he is other than what he has just said he is. That’s all the GB is doing today, saying “Yes, I am a man. Yes, I am behind the curtain manipulating the machinery of organizational lead which is awesome, but I am still a man,” and some of the crowd will still say, “I think he is more than just a man, I think God gives him special spirit, I think....”—that’s just the way people are.
We can overthink this and in doing so become obtuse. In some way Jehovah leads his people today. Since the restoration of pure worship 150 years ago, leadership has been in connection with those supplying the printed spiritual food. There is no reason to think that should change, any more than you change horses midstream in the Jordan. This, too, is not rocket science. It is simply common sense. The men who brought the truth to us in the first place are the ones to defer to. If there is the occasional incidence of roller derby there at Bethel it does not mean that the answer comes from Amazon or Barnes & Noble, or however Rolf gets the word out these days. When people say of the GB, “They’re no Moses,” is is mostly because they want to rebel.
 I write supportively, as a apologist. Rolf writes as an investigative reporter—blowing the cover off what he thinks is THE top story. At most I will say, “There is a downside to this or that practice.” It’s not my place to “propose reforms” as Rolf does via Amazon. As you know, you are my heroine, for doing the most commonsense thing in the world: familiarizing yourself with apostate reasonings so that should your loved one come across them one day and be stumbled, you are able to do more than say: “DON’T READ THAT STUFF!!!” an answer that you know as well as I will almost always work to your loved one’s disadvantage—once the toothpaste is out of the tube it does not go back in again, and your loved one’s newly discovered information source will certainly say: “You see? What did I tell you? They want to keep blinders on you!”
We have elevated the ‘apostate’ practically to the status of bogeyman. “Run!!!!” we say, at the first possibility that he may rear his head, and all but throw a brick through the TV should he appear there—and it runs so contrary to the spirt of boldness that Christians are supposed to cultivate, and a willingness to always be ready with a defense of the faith, that people are nearly stumbled over THAT. 
It is a little like when Satan challenges Jehovah in the garden of Eden, and people say, “Why didn’t God just beat the snot out of him?” Because it is a moral issue that has been raised, not one of who has greater power. So when we verbally beat the snot out of ‘apostates’ and insist ones not go there on any account since they do nothing but lie—well, are not there some parallels? 
Now, the counsel not to hang out with ‘apostates’ is good, as is the counsel not to ‘engage’ with them. There is no mystery as to why people go ‘apostate’—like Demas they loved the present system, they “went out because they were not of our sort,“ they refused counsel to focus on the rafter in their own eye rather than the straw in another, they beat up on their fellow slaves when it seemed the master was delaying—there is no mystery at all to these things, and my spirituality has only grown in seeing, not just why people accept the truth, but also why, after accepting it, they reject it. Just why does “the sow that was bathed return to the mire?” The answer is no less edifying to me now than it would have been in the first century when it was written. 
There is no mystery in why people go apostate. There IS mystery in how virulent they become, and how persistent. It takes your breath away. With some, it is as though they have found a new purpose in life! even though, in every case, they have nothing better to offer! They can only bellyache about what they don’t like. It is especially so of ones who go apostate to become atheist, which seems to be true of most of those on Reddit, or at least the most visible ones. They have reassessed life and now feel that the remaining few decades until death, with nothing beyond, is a great bargain! It’s like the fellow who saws off the branch he is sitting on and grins as he goes crashing down to earth. It is like the fellow who loses his millions in the stock market, says “they were only paper gains, anyway,” and celebrates the few thousands he still has left. 
So obviously you don’t want to hang out here—what a corrosive atmosphere to let these malcontents hammer you day and night, and if you answer them, they just rephrase their beef and run it through again. Engage with these characters? It’s a little like masturbation (something I have never done, of course, but I am told about it). Sure, there is a rush that comes with answering a fathead, but the long-term effect is subtly undermining and corrosive to personality development. 
So it is a matter of degree. Of course you limit exposure and if some will eliminate it entirely, more power to them. But our track record of being unmarred by apostasy is so poor that at times, I wish we would re-examine that counsel to avoid at all costs even a whiff of it. When Amber Scorah sails through her life, ends up a missionary in China, and her faith and entire life is upended by one chance encounter there, something seems out of whack. Why did she cave so easily? Why wasn’t she better prepared for the contrasting view? When the Russian brother asks about his old friend and learns that one has left the faith because he read literature critical of the organization—literature that we are strongly advised not to read, it exaggerates the power of this crap. It is nothing more than the “sons of disobedience” at work, but it creates an almost superstitious horror among brothers that one chance encounter with an ‘apostate’ can upend a lifetime of dedication to God. I think it even works against zeal in the ministry—we work tirelessly over months or even years to make a disciple, with the underlying “knowledge” that it can all come to an abrupt end if that person so much as talks to an ‘apostate’—how can it not sap our willingness to go through the process in the first place?
Our cure is worse than the disease, and often leads to worse cases of the disease. If Amber is “not of our sort,”  let her learn that before she marries and goes off to China. Then hopefully she will take up a life in indifference to her former faith, and it will just be indifference—not hostility. 
I will at most detail a downside. I will not do a Rolf and call for an overhaul. What a tremendously immodest course that is! The GB is taking the lead, and they can amass scriptures to support what they advise regarding interaction with those who willfully leave the truth behind. Who am I to say those scriptures are invalid? Who am I to say I know better? For every iron I have in the fire, they have 100. I can only reflect on what appears before my own two eyes. They can reflect upon what appears before thousands of eyes. Highlight a downside and move on. Bring your gift to the altar. Maybe someone will say, “You know, that talkative yo-yo has a point.” But if they don,t, they don’t. They don’t have to tell me why they don’t. The expression “There are too many chiefs and not enough Indians” is one of the most under-appreciated bits of wisdom in the world.
I think a significant tell came early on—when Rolf commented how he had submitted his work to Bethel, but they “refused” to take him up on it. How does he know they “refused?” And even if they did, what makes him think that they cannot? They offered no comment on Shultz and de Vienne’s book, either, and the latter issued no beefs about being “refused”—they speculated (I think correctly, in the main) that they were “incurious as to their own history.” They didn’t comment on my books, either, even after I asked them too. Did I carry on about how they “refused” to address my work? I would never dream of such a thing. I’m perfectly willing to accept JWI’s verdict, when he said (more or less): “It’s because they think you are a loose cannon and they don’t want to provide the spark that sets you off.”
 

I hear that he foreclosed on his mother in the dead of winter and the poor woman would have froze to death for sure, but the wolves ate her first.
I am. That’s how I know.

You certainly do not want to do that. It’s a horrible habit it be afflicted with.
If I take a swipe at you as regards the moniker, I can hardly not expect a jab back. I don’t know why I did it, really. Cocky, I guess—it’s as good a verdict as any. The pieces fit together together for a diatribe I was cooking up. I forgot that the pieces have feelings. My bad. I apologize. I have no beef you whatsoever, never have, and your remarks are among my favorites. They do represent—well, “thinking.“ I might even encourage more of them, except that then you might have the experience, as I do from time to time, that in the abundance of words there does not fail to be transgression. 
“Aw, shut up, with your Kentucky-fried Foghorn Leghorn drawl!” the villain says to Benoit Blanc. it’s about time someone said it to me. (If you see the movie ‘Knives Out’—it is free on Amazon Prime—you must be prepared for a bit of language. It is by no means filthy, by today’s standards—I don’t recall a single f-bomb—but no way is it pristine like in the Kingdom Hall. It is an Hercule Poirot parody, with Daniel Craig playing the Christie-like eccentric, brilliant, and world-renowned sleuth, Benoit Blanc. There is nothing funnier, to my mind, then when he opens his mouth to speak an overbearing combination of French/Southern Redneck accent. He routinely says things that, at first glance are profound, but at second are just plain stupid.)
 

I just got tired of saying “the divine/human interface” and was searching for a substitute. What I hit upon was sloppy. You are right. I should have stayed with what I had, but I didn’t want to wear the phrase out—a phrase that I never intended to mean anything more than providing leadership.
Sure. That’s what I think, too.
I don’t like to split hairs on these matters. I am pragmatic. Moses said that Jesus will “raise up a prophet like me.” He obviously didn’t if we insist on a parallel in each and every respect. Jesus was perfect, Moses was not. Jesus was put to death. Moses was not. So with the GB being like Moses, it is the same—in some respects they are, and in some respects there are not.
Of course. It is organizational leadership I speak of. Even in Moses time, are we to imagine that Israelites could have no relationship with God when Moses was not around? Could they not pray? Did Joseph act as he did because he learned from prior writings, but his counterpart living under Moses would have had to clear it with the prophet first? Of course not. 
It is perfectly fair game for the GB to refer to the murmuring Israelites under Moses so as to encourage obedience today among God’s people. No, they are not like Moses in every respect, but they are enough like him for the comparison to work. God does lead his people, and there has always been something visible for them to hang their hats on—though at no time does this “something visible” preclude one’s own relationship with God or one’s own study of the scriptures.
Of course they are just men. Paul and Barnabas were just men, too, though the crowds concluded differently and it was hard to restrain them. Even when the man behind the curtain says “Here I am,” the crowd wants to put him behind the curtain again and believes he is other than what he has just said he is. That’s all the GB is doing today, saying “Yes, I am a man. Yes, I am behind the curtain manipulating the machinery of organizational lead which is awesome, but I am still a man,” and some of the crowd will still say, “I think he is more than just a man, I think God gives him special spirit, I think....”—that’s just the way people are.
We can overthink this and in doing so become obtuse. In some way Jehovah leads his people today. Since the restoration of pure worship 150 years ago, leadership has been in connection with those supplying the printed spiritual food. There is no reason to think that should change, any more than you change horses midstream in the Jordan. This, too, is not rocket science. It is simply common sense. The men who brought the truth to us in the first place are the ones to defer to. If there is the occasional incidence of roller derby there at Bethel it does not mean that the answer comes from Amazon or Barnes & Noble, or however Rolf gets the word out these days. When people say of the GB, “They’re no Moses,” is is mostly because they want to rebel.
 I write supportively, as a apologist. Rolf writes as an investigative reporter—blowing the cover off what he thinks is THE top story. At most I will say, “There is a downside to this or that practice.” It’s not my place to “propose reforms” as Rolf does via Amazon. As you know, you are my heroine, for doing the most commonsense thing in the world: familiarizing yourself with apostate reasonings so that should your loved one come across them one day and be stumbled, you are able to do more than say: “DON’T READ THAT STUFF!!!” an answer that you know as well as I will almost always work to your loved one’s disadvantage—once the toothpaste is out of the tube it does not go back in again, and your loved one’s newly discovered information source will certainly say: “You see? What did I tell you? They want to keep blinders on you!”
We have elevated the ‘apostate’ practically to the status of bogeyman. “Run!!!!” we say, at the first possibility that he may rear his head, and all but throw a brick through the TV should he appear there—and it runs so contrary to the spirt of boldness that Christians are supposed to cultivate, and a willingness to always be ready with a defense of the faith, that people are nearly stumbled over THAT. 
It is a little like when Satan challenges Jehovah in the garden of Eden, and people say, “Why didn’t God just beat the snot out of him?” Because it is a moral issue that has been raised, not one of who has greater power. So when we verbally beat the snot out of ‘apostates’ and insist ones not go there on any account since they do nothing but lie—well, are not there some parallels? 
Now, the counsel not to hang out with ‘apostates’ is good, as is the counsel not to ‘engage’ with them. There is no mystery as to why people go ‘apostate’—like Demas they loved the present system, they “went out because they were not of our sort,“ they refused counsel to focus on the rafter in their own eye rather than the straw in another, they beat up on their fellow slaves when it seemed the master was delaying—there is no mystery at all to these things, and my spirituality has only grown in seeing, not just why people accept the truth, but also why, after accepting it, they reject it. Just why does “the sow that was bathed return to the mire?” The answer is no less edifying to me now than it would have been in the first century when it was written. 
There is no mystery in why people go apostate. There IS mystery in how virulent they become, and how persistent. It takes your breath away. With some, it is as though they have found a new purpose in life! even though, in every case, they have nothing better to offer! They can only bellyache about what they don’t like. It is especially so of ones who go apostate to become atheist, which seems to be true of most of those on Reddit, or at least the most visible ones. They have reassessed life and now feel that the remaining few decades until death, with nothing beyond, is a great bargain! It’s like the fellow who saws off the branch he is sitting on and grins as he goes crashing down to earth. It is like the fellow who loses his millions in the stock market, says “they were only paper gains, anyway,” and celebrates the few thousands he still has left. 
So obviously you don’t want to hang out here—what a corrosive atmosphere to let these malcontents hammer you day and night, and if you answer them, they just rephrase their beef and run it through again. Engage with these characters? It’s a little like masturbation (something I have never done, of course, but I am told about it). Sure, there is a rush that comes with answering a fathead, but the long-term effect is subtly undermining and corrosive to personality development. 
So it is a matter of degree. Of course you limit exposure and if some will eliminate it entirely, more power to them. But our track record of being unmarred by apostasy is so poor that at times, I wish we would re-examine that counsel to avoid at all costs even a whiff of it. When Amber Scorah sails through her life, ends up a missionary in China, and her faith and entire life is upended by one chance encounter there, something seems out of whack. Why did she cave so easily? Why wasn’t she better prepared for the contrasting view? When the Russian brother asks about his old friend and learns that one has left the faith because he read literature critical of the organization—literature that we are strongly advised not to read, it exaggerates the power of this crap. It is nothing more than the “sons of disobedience” at work, but it creates an almost superstitious horror among brothers that one chance encounter with an ‘apostate’ can upend a lifetime of dedication to God. I think it even works against zeal in the ministry—we work tirelessly over months or even years to make a disciple, with the underlying “knowledge” that it can all come to an abrupt end if that person so much as talks to an ‘apostate’—how can it not sap our willingness to go through the process in the first place?
Our cure is worse than the disease, and often leads to worse cases of the disease. If Amber is “not of our sort,”  let her learn that before she marries and goes off to China. Then hopefully she will take up a life in indifference to her former faith, and it will just be indifference—not hostility. 
I will at most detail a downside. I will not do a Rolf and call for an overhaul. What a tremendously immodest course that is! The GB is taking the lead, and they can amass scriptures to support what they advise regarding interaction with those who willfully leave the truth behind. Who am I to say those scriptures are invalid? Who am I to say I know better? For every iron I have in the fire, they have 100. I can only reflect on what appears before my own two eyes. They can reflect upon what appears before thousands of eyes. Highlight a downside and move on. Bring your gift to the altar. Maybe someone will say, “You know, that talkative yo-yo has a point.” But if they don,t, they don’t. They don’t have to tell me why they don’t. The expression “There are too many chiefs and not enough Indians” is one of the most under-appreciated bits of wisdom in the world.
I think a significant tell came early on—when Rolf commented how he had submitted his work to Bethel, but they “refused” to take him up on it. How does he know they “refused?” And even if they did, what makes him think that they cannot? They offered no comment on Shultz and de Vienne’s book, either, and the latter issued no beefs about being “refused”—they speculated (I think correctly, in the main) that they were “incurious as to their own history.” They didn’t comment on my books, either, even after I asked them too. Did I carry on about how they “refused” to address my work? I would never dream of such a thing. I’m perfectly willing to accept JWI’s verdict, when he said (more or less): “It’s because they think you are a loose cannon and they don’t want to provide the spark that sets you off.”
 

I just got tired of saying “the divine/human interface” and was searching for a substitute. What I hit upon was sloppy. You are right. I should have stayed with what I had, but I didn’t want to wear the phrase out—a phrase that I never intended to mean anything more than providing leadership.
Sure. That’s what I think, too.
I don’t like to split hairs on these matters. I am pragmatic. Moses said that Jesus will “raise up a prophet like me.” He obviously didn’t if we insist on a parallel in each and every respect. Jesus was perfect, Moses was not. Jesus was put to death. Moses was not. So with the GB being like Moses, it is the same—in some respects they are, and in some respects there are not.
Of course. It is organizational leadership I speak of. Even in Moses time, are we to imagine that Israelites could have no relationship with God when Moses was not around? Could they not pray? Did Joseph act as he did because he learned from prior writings, but his counterpart living under Moses would have had to clear it with the prophet first? Of course not. 
It is perfectly fair game for the GB to refer to the murmuring Israelites under Moses so as to encourage obedience today among God’s people. No, they are not like Moses in every respect, but they are enough like him for the comparison to work. God does lead his people, and there has always been something visible for them to hang their hats on—though at no time does this “something visible” preclude one’s own relationship with God or one’s own study of the scriptures.
Of course they are just men. Paul and Barnabas were just men, too, though the crowds concluded differently and it was hard to restrain them. Even when the man behind the curtain says “Here I am,” the crowd wants to put him behind the curtain again and believes he is other than what he has just said he is. That’s all the GB is doing today, saying “Yes, I am a man. Yes, I am behind the curtain manipulating the machinery of organizational lead which is awesome, but I am still a man,” and some of the crowd will still say, “I think he is more than just a man, I think God gives him special spirit, I think....”—that’s just the way people are.
We can overthink this and in doing so become obtuse. In some way Jehovah leads his people today. Since the restoration of pure worship 150 years ago, leadership has been in connection with those supplying the printed spiritual food. There is no reason to think that should change, any more than you change horses midstream in the Jordan. This, too, is not rocket science. It is simply common sense. The men who brought the truth to us in the first place are the ones to defer to. If there is the occasional incidence of roller derby there at Bethel it does not mean that the answer comes from Amazon or Barnes & Noble, or however Rolf gets the word out these days. When people say of the GB, “They’re no Moses,” is is mostly because they want to rebel.
 I write supportively, as a apologist. Rolf writes as an investigative reporter—blowing the cover off what he thinks is THE top story. At most I will say, “There is a downside to this or that practice.” It’s not my place to “propose reforms” as Rolf does via Amazon. As you know, you are my heroine, for doing the most commonsense thing in the world: familiarizing yourself with apostate reasonings so that should your loved one come across them one day and be stumbled, you are able to do more than say: “DON’T READ THAT STUFF!!!” an answer that you know as well as I will almost always work to your loved one’s disadvantage—once the toothpaste is out of the tube it does not go back in again, and your loved one’s newly discovered information source will certainly say: “You see? What did I tell you? They want to keep blinders on you!”
We have elevated the ‘apostate’ practically to the status of bogeyman. “Run!!!!” we say, at the first possibility that he may rear his head, and all but throw a brick through the TV should he appear there—and it runs so contrary to the spirt of boldness that Christians are supposed to cultivate, and a willingness to always be ready with a defense of the faith, that people are nearly stumbled over THAT. 
It is a little like when Satan challenges Jehovah in the garden of Eden, and people say, “Why didn’t God just beat the snot out of him?” Because it is a moral issue that has been raised, not one of who has greater power. So when we verbally beat the snot out of ‘apostates’ and insist ones not go there on any account since they do nothing but lie—well, are not there some parallels? 
Now, the counsel not to hang out with ‘apostates’ is good, as is the counsel not to ‘engage’ with them. There is no mystery as to why people go ‘apostate’—like Demas they loved the present system, they “went out because they were not of our sort,“ they refused counsel to focus on the rafter in their own eye rather than the straw in another, they beat up on their fellow slaves when it seemed the master was delaying—there is no mystery at all to these things, and my spirituality has only grown in seeing, not just why people accept the truth, but also why, after accepting it, they reject it. Just why does “the sow that was bathed return to the mire?” The answer is no less edifying to me now than it would have been in the first century when it was written. 
There is no mystery in why people go apostate. There IS mystery in how virulent they become, and how persistent. It takes your breath away. With some, it is as though they have found a new purpose in life! even though, in every case, they have nothing better to offer! They can only bellyache about what they don’t like. It is especially so of ones who go apostate to become atheist, which seems to be true of most of those on Reddit, or at least the most visible ones. They have reassessed life and now feel that the remaining few decades until death, with nothing beyond, is a great bargain! It’s like the fellow who saws off the branch he is sitting on and grins as he goes crashing down to earth. It is like the fellow who loses his millions in the stock market, says “they were only paper gains, anyway,” and celebrates the few thousands he still has left. 
So obviously you don’t want to hang out here—what a corrosive atmosphere to let these malcontents hammer you day and night, and if you answer them, they just rephrase their beef and run it through again. Engage with these characters? It’s a little like masturbation (something I have never done, of course, but I am told about it). Sure, there is a rush that comes with answering a fathead, but the long-term effect is subtly undermining and corrosive to personality development. 
So it is a matter of degree. Of course you limit exposure and if some will eliminate it entirely, more power to them. But our track record of being unmarred by apostasy is so poor that at times, I wish we would re-examine that counsel to avoid at all costs even a whiff of it. When Amber Scorah sails through her life, ends up a missionary in China, and her faith and entire life is upended by one chance encounter there, something seems out of whack. Why did she cave so easily? Why wasn’t she better prepared for the contrasting view? When the Russian brother asks about his old friend and learns that one has left the faith because he read literature critical of the organization—literature that we are strongly advised not to read, it exaggerates the power of this crap. It is nothing more than the “sons of disobedience” at work, but it creates an almost superstitious horror among brothers that one chance encounter with an ‘apostate’ can upend a lifetime of dedication to God. I think it even works against zeal in the ministry—we work tirelessly over months or even years to make a disciple, with the underlying “knowledge” that it can all come to an abrupt end if that person so much as talks to an ‘apostate’—how can it not sap our willingness to go through the process in the first place?
Our cure is worse than the disease, and often leads to worse cases of the disease. If Amber is “not of our sort,”  let her learn that before she marries and goes off to China. Then hopefully she will take up a life in indifference to her former faith, and it will just be indifference—not hostility. 
I will at most detail a downside. I will not do a Rolf and call for an overhaul. What a tremendously immodest course that is! The GB is taking the lead, and they can amass scriptures to support what they advise regarding interaction with those who willfully leave the truth behind. Who am I to say those scriptures are invalid? Who am I to say I know better? For every iron I have in the fire, they have 100. I can only reflect on what appears before my own two eyes. They can reflect upon what appears before thousands of eyes. Highlight a downside and move on. Bring your gift to the altar. Maybe someone will say, “You know, that talkative yo-yo has a point.” But if they don,t, they don’t. They don’t have to tell me why they don’t. The expression “There are too many chiefs and not enough Indians” is one of the most under-appreciated bits of wisdom in the world.
I think a significant tell came early on—when Rolf commented how he had submitted his work to Bethel, but they “refused” to take him up on it. How does he know they “refused?” And even if they did, what makes him think that they cannot? They offered no comment on Shultz and de Vienne’s book, either, and the latter issued no beefs about being “refused”—they speculated (I think correctly, in the main) that they were “incurious as to their own history.” They didn’t comment on my books, either, even after I asked them too. Did I carry on about how they “refused” to address my work? I would never dream of such a thing. I’m perfectly willing to accept JWI’s verdict, when he said (more or less): “It’s because they think you are a loose cannon and they don’t want to provide the spark that sets you off.”