If the teachings of Christ became "corrupt" over the years, why did it take over a thousand years for it to be corrected? And how could the one man (the founder or "restorer" of your religion) find out the correct teachings? Wouldn't it have been easier to correct the corruptions as they started instead of 1,000 years later? How is it that that one man could find the correct teachings but many others could not?
Christ depended on Peter--did he make a bad decision? If he knew his teachings would become corrupt and not corrected until over 1,000 years later, why would he depend on Peter? It wouldn't have mattered now would it?
Also, to take note, the "teachings" that became "corrupt" would have been SPOKEN teachings. The WRITINGS of Jesus' teachings aren't corrupt, unless you think the Bible is corrupt. Anyone could read his teachings and know if what they were taught were corrupt or not.
Wouldn't this also have made the fact that Jesus left us the Holy Spirit (Helper, Teacher, Spirit of Truth) obsolete?
GRNL - Today would be over 2,000 years, but at the time of "restoration ism" it hadn't reached 2,000 years.
So the Holy Spirit didn't "teach", "instruct", "help", or "guide" anyone of the correct teachings until 1,000+ years later? Did Jesus not leave the Holy Spirit to us until then? Did the Holy Spirit not do the job? Or are the "restoration" corrections wrong?
Jesus' teachings are not corrupted, WT organization's teachings are false teachings..not all of them..but what is bad makes them bad, not even Christians anymore
Next, corruption was entering at the time of the last of the apostles and foretold by Jesus. (2Peter 2:1-3; 2Tim. 4:3; Matt. 24:23-25)
They did it in the late 1800s by simply (we can call it simple because we did not have to do it) going back to the Bible only. By tossing off all pagan things with all the false theories religions of the time used, they were able to strictly apply only true Bible principles. They used the Bible to interpret itself, not man's ideas.
The time was right for Jehovah to need a human organization to fulfill the work at Matt. 24:14 at the beginning of the "last days of this wicked system". So His spirit aided those men at that time to a proper understanding of the Bible.
This did not come without problems. Like the disciples of Jesus first believing he was there to be king of Israel and deliver them from Rome until finally understanding his rule would be over the entire earth as a heavenly kingdom. They still had some beliefs left-overs from false religions they came out of. That caused some false steps. The point is that they learned from mistakes and corrected them to go on.
Now we are doing pretty well. Our mistakes are less. We still correct ourselves from time to time as our understanding grows. Overall, we know we have the correct understanding of Jehovah's purposes and direction. We know how important it is to be doing Jehovah's work today for the lives of all humans are in the balance as well as our best lives under God's Kingdom on earth.
The claim that God's truth was corrupted over the years and that God raised up a special prophet / witness through whom he chose to restore truth is the hallmark of Islam, Mormonism, JWs and many other recent end-time groups. Without that claim, you see, their religion could not claim to be unique and so able to demand unquestioning obedience. And without some different teachings to orthodox groups, they could not point to that as 'evidence' that God was now working through them. That is why they all have their own 'take' on end-time prophecies and are preoccupied with that subject, and have denied some of Christianity's main doctrines.
There is some truth at back of this, though. Corruption of biblical truth has always been in evidence, to a greater or lesser degree. The pure teaching of the 1st century Christians was under attack even then and after the apostles died, false shepherds entered the flock more and more. Yet Jesus had promised that the gates of hell would not overcome his Church and God's truth has never been lost. It is not the possession of any one denomination; it does not 'belong' to any group; nobody has taken a franchise out on it. God sovereignty enlightens the humble through the operation of his Holy Spirit. He uses the Church to proclaim the gospel in many ways and the fact that the gospel message today is exactly the same as it was in the 1st century is proof of that. This is why any group with a different gospel shows itself up to be false; such as you find with the Islamic, the Mormon and the JW gospel messages. As Paul warned, "Even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be accursed." (Gal. 1:6-9)
What about the trinity? As A?Catholic Dictionary notes: ?The third Person was asserted at a Council of Alexandria in 362?.?.?. and finally by the Council of Constantinople of 381.? That's over 300 years after Jesus died.
The churches still believe in things that are wrong. What do the churches know of the trinity? The New Catholic Encyclopedia, 1967, Vol. 14, p. 299 says: "The formulation ?One God in three Persons? was not solidly established, certainly not fully assimilated into Christian life and its profession of faith, prior to the end of the 4Th century.... Among the Apostolic Fathers, there had been nothing even remotely approaching such a mentality or perspective."
No Apostle would have dreamed of thinking that there are three divine Persons" (Emil Brunner, Christian Doctrine of God, Dogmatics, Vol. 1, p. 226).
"Theologians agree that the New Testament also does not contain an explicit doctrine of the Trinity" (Encyclopedia of Religion, Vol. 15, p. 54).
"The New Testament writers...give us no formal or formulated doctrine of the Trinity, no explicit teaching that in one God there are three equal divine persons.... Nowhere do we find any Trinitarian doctrine of three distinct subjects of divine life and activity in the same Godhead" (Fortman, The Triune God, pp. xv, xvi, 16).
"Neither the word Trinity nor the explicit doctrine appears in the New Testament" (The New Encyclopedia Britannica, 1985, Vol. 11, p. 928).
"As far as the New Testament is concerned one does not find in it an actual doctrine of the Trinity" (Bernard Lohse, A Short History of Christian Doctrine, Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1966, p. 38).
"The New Testament does not contain the developed doctrine of the Trinity" (The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, ed. Colin Brown, Zondervan, 1976, Vol. 2, p. 84).
"The Bible lacks the express declaration that the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are of equal essence" (Karl Barth, cited in the New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, above).
"Jesus Christ never mentioned such a phenomenon, and nowhere in the New Testament does the word Trinity appear. The idea was only adopted by the Church three hundred years after the death of our Lord" (Arthur Weigall, The Paganism in our Christianity, G.P. Putnam and Sons, 1928, p. 198).
"Primitive Christianity did not have an explicit doctrine of the Trinity such as was subsequently elaborated in the creeds" (New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, Vol. 2, p. 84).
"The early Christians, however, did not at first think of applying the TRINITY idea to their own faith. They paid their devotions to God the Father and to Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and they recognized the...Holy Spirit; but there was no thought of these three being an actual Trinity, coequal and united in One" (Arthur Weigall, The Paganism in Our Christianity, p. 197).
"At first the Christian faith was not Trinitarian?It was not so in the apostolic and sub-apostolic ages, as reflected in the New Testament and other early Christian writings" (Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, ed. James Hastings, 1922, Vol. 12, p. 461).
And to think that you and most others STILL believe that God is tribune!!
Jesus started a new religion. It was to be quite different from Judaism. His followers, especially the apostles, had the responsibility to spread the teachings Jesus had left.
Jesus warned that false teachers and teachings would come in. (Matthew 13, starting at v.24)
But with the death of the apostles (Peter included) everyone calling themselves a follower of Christ had not heard anything from Jesus himself. They had all just been told by someone else. That is how, as you said, there could be errors in the spoken word. (1 Tim 4:1, 2 Thess. 2:3)
If anyone did not look to the Scriptures and just believed the spoken words, they could easily be misled. That is why the apostles urged everyone to test everything against the Scriptures.
Vot is sure you have heard about the "Dark Ages". What was happening in those days? The Church had accepted false teachings, like baptizing babies, hellfire, the Trinity, the divinity of Mary, Indulgences etc, and many people not having the Bible to read for themselves believed that these were true.
Those who read the Bible and spoke out against these things risked being killed. The Bible was only to be read by the clergy. People who tried to translate the Bible into common languages were burnt at the stake with their Bibles around their necks.
Anyone who tried to break away from the Church was called a heretic and sentenced to death. You see what happened to Galilei Galileo? He knew the earth revolved around the sun. The clergy denied it. He was died for that.
You can see how easy it was for true teachings to be covered up with false teachings?
Jesus foretold that true worship would be later restored. C. T. Russell did not do anything single-Handel. He was just one among many people who decided to dig into the Bible and look for truth amidst the confusion. C.T. Russell was the first president of the Watchtower Society, but never did he claim to have discovered anything all by his own.
Even since his day (he died in 1916), Jehovah's Witnesses have continued to reject umbilical teachings that have crept into Christendom over the centuries (Trinity, Christmas, Easter, infant baptism, clergy-laity distinction etc)
Bottom line, reading the Bible for yourself is the best protection against false teachings. (1 John 4:1)
There is and will always be people who claim to have
re-discovered the Biblical Truth that they claim was lost by The Church, and lets face it, they are talking about the Catholic Church. The inconsistency of their reasoning leads me to believe that the bias against the CATHOLIC Church is evident because many of them will say that the Catholic Church became corrupt immediately after the last apostle died while at the same time claim that the Catholic Church actually started during Constatines rule. This would make Christs words about the gates of hell not prevailing against the Church invalid as well as his claim that the Holy Spirit will guide the Church to "all" truth. These groups like the Jehovahs Witnesses will claim that there have always been faithful Christians adhering to "The Truth" while being persecuted by the Church. Yet they are never able to document or identify any group thoughtUTistory that holds the same beliefs as them. You would think that if you are going to separate yourself from the Church Christ founded, you would have hard proof for this. Not just say to the Lord, "Well I thought you meant something else." Take this scripture to heart: John 4:16-26 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate 8 to be with you ALWAYS, 17 the Spirit of truth, 9 which the world cannot accept, because it neither sees nor knows it. But you know it, because it remains with you, and will be in you. 18 I WILL NOT LEAVE YOU ORPHANS; I will come to you. 19 In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me, because I live and you will live. 20 ON THAT DAY you will realize that I am in my Father and you are in me and I in you. 21 Whoever has my commandments and observes them is the one who loves me. And whoever loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and reveal myself to him." 22 Judas, not the Iscariot, 11 said to him, "Master, (then) what happened that you will reveal yourself to us and not to the world?" 23 Jesus answered and said to him, "Whoever loves me will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our dwelling with him. 24 Whoever does not love me does not keep my words; yet the word you hear is not mine but that of the Father who sent me. 25 I have told you this while I am with you. 26 The Advocate, the holy Spirit that the Father will send in my name--he WILL teach you everything and remind you of all that (I) TOLD you.
This scripture says plainly that Christs Truths were TOLD to the Apostles, not written down. The Holy Spirit Will lead you to All truth. The point is that Christ never instructed the Apostles to write all his teaching. The letters in the New Testament were written to specific churches to answer specific questions or to clear certain matters. They absolutely contain Christs Truths but not all truth. There is nothing in scripture to claim that all Christs commandments and truths were written. To the contrary Matt. 28:20 - "observe ALL I have commanded," but, as we see in John 20:30 "Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of (his) disciples that are not written in this book", and in John 21:25 "There are also many other things that Jesus did, but if these were to be described individually, I do not think the whole world would contain the books that would be written."
Again, not ALL Jesus taught is in Scripture. So there must be things outside of Scripture that we must observe. This disproves "Bible alone" theology. He left a Church which scripture calls the foundation of Truth; 1 Tim 3:15 "But if I should be delayed, you should know how to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth." You'll notice if you look up these verses and others in the NWT, you wont see words like grace, gospel, church, the lords supper, etc. This is some what petty, but it's interesting that these words are replaced with other words like, undeserved kindness, good news, congregation and the lords evening meal in the Jehovah Witness language. These describe the same thing but it goes to show the distain that Jehovah Witnesses have for anything Orthadox. In other words, the desire to be different period is the overall objective and that is what has lead to teaching that never really fits what scripture teaches. You have to play with verses and take the minority opinion on how words should be translated. Even then, you end up with contradictions that are unavoidable.
Vot - "You can see how easy it was for true teachings to be covered up with false teachings?"
These accusations are nothing new. Yes, the abuses of some leaders within The Church have embarrassed us all to the point of humiliation, maybe that's an understatement. The Church has humbled itself and asked for forgiveness for the abuses of those commissioned the be shephards of the flock. Christ "our judge" will be just in whatever punishment/reward they will receive, but lets leave that up to him. If JW's were to apply this same standard in your own "congregations" I'm sure you would be horrified at the abuses that have taken place for which Christ will judge as well. Neither of us can control others to have them live as they teach. Lets just say that the behavior of some do not detract from the truths taught. You do prove my point however. There is a presupisition that your organization holds before all others and that is that the teaching taught MUST be different. The org. must come up with a differenent interpretation first then justify why they did. That leads to problems. As much as the org. promotes good behavior, the truths taught must be true, they are not. You must remember also that the Early Christians which your org. claims were apostates, were killed for their faith. I doubt that they would die for a lie for something they knew was a lie, would you?
Gramps - I have looked, as have many xjws who also leave the org. in droves once they find out. You guys don't seem to get that the behavior of some does not detract from the truths taught. You claim this for yourselves but deny that reasoning to others. Since all sin displeases God, whether in the Church or outside of it, it is sin. We are all sinner is need of forgiveness and a savior. Thank God for Christ who has the power to forgive sins and he gave this Authority to forgive sins to the Church. John 20:21 - before He grants them the authority to forgive sins, Jesus says to the apostles, "as the Father sent me, so I send you." As Christ was sent by the Father to forgive sins, so Christ sends the apostles and their successors to forgive sins. And also in John 20:23 - Jesus says, "If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven. If you retain the sins of any, they are retained." The text makes this very clear. This authority was transfered to others. Matt. 10:1,40 - Jesus declares to His apostles, "he who receives you, receives Me, and he who rejects you, rejects Me and the One who sent Me." Jesus freely gives His authority to the apostles in order for them to effectively convert the world. And again in Luke 5:24 - Luke also points out that Jesus' authority to forgive sins is as a man, not God. The Gospel writers record this to convince us that God has given this authority to men. This authority has been transferred from Christ to the apostles and their successors through the laying on of hands. Acts 6:6 - apostolic authority is transferred through the laying on of hands, we Catholics call this ordination. This authority has transferred beyond the original twelve apostles as the Church has grown.
it was man's interpretation that was wrong/ bad/ evil.
hence, the plethora of religious schisms starting with the worst, the roman amalgam of pagan ideas of the tribes around Roma and the few beliefs of the weakened small band of Christians left in the area.
Constantine demanded worship, was the pontiffs maxi mus, and was filled with evil and wrath.
want more info? you know where to find it.
but you are afraid to look.
Disciples John and Peter, as well as the apostle Paul, warned believers to shield themselves from false teachers. The words they wrote 2,000 years ago carry the same relevancy?and the same warning?today. From Paul we hear, ?But the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons? (1 Timothy 4:1). Cults and false religions draw in many new converts each year, some of them former church members. Peter warns, ?But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them? (2 Peter 2:1 ). Even within the church body are false teachers who seek to draw parishioners toward their own umbilical view of God and salvation.
The truth is, we will never eradicate all the false doctrines and demonic influences that pervade our world. Believers, then, must learn to live as salt and light in their culture. That means choosing a balanced spiritual life rather than extremes of fleshly pursuit or religious legalism.
To live in balance, we must be able to discern truth from error. Most deceptive philosophies are mixed with just enough truth to seem plausible. Consequently, what we hear needs to be sifted through a tough mental grid formed by way of prayer and meditation on the Word. If a believer is not scripturalLyrounded, he can easily be swayed by phony doctrines that appeal to the emotions and flesh.
Jehovah's Witnesses/Restorationists...some questions...?
